The Uses and Benefits of Yarrow

M AY IS MADNESS. I have already said that in the monthly chores column. But it’s madness otherwise, too: garden tours to prep for; workshops I’m giving with friends; a garden contest I’m judging (as in, free prizes!); a sister in the news to brag about…and oh, I need your help with the Urgent Garden Question Forums here, too.

Your Urgent Garden Questions have been arriving in blog comments, on Facebook, and in emails, and we’ve rounded up the most representative ones to tackle today, in the monthly Q&A episode of the program. (All past editions of our Q&As together are at this link.)Ken, an award-winning garden photographer and author of more books than I can count, including “The New Shade Garden” and “Making More Plants,” produced his own “Real Dirt” podcast for 10 years, all available on KenDruse dot com (and on iTunes, too).Let’s dig right in:Read along as you listen to the April 24, 2107 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on iTunes or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts here).Oh, an

FULL SUN (or light shade in hotter zones), and well-drained soil that’s high in organic matter is the basic regimen (though the sweetbay magnolia, M. virginiana, can also take a wet spot). Give the others those requirements, plus a light layer of aged organic mulch, and they generally will thrive. Fertilizing isn’t needed, says Andrew. (At Scott they only mulch the circles of trees in lawn areas, using a combination of leaf compost and one-year-old composted wood chips.)Magnolias are not the easiest to plant under, however, because of their fleshy, moisture-hogging root systems.  “Some plants that can take dry shade will make a go of it,” he says, suggesting Epimedium, or Asarum, or Christmas fern. Among bulbs, try Scilla, or Chionodoxa, or even toadlilies (Tricyrtis), he recommends.Magnolia grandiflora, the so-called Southern magnol

At least dear H. niger dared flower when nobody else really did, or could.May 5—my first Open Day of the season—looms. Uh-oh; I was getting nowhere except panicky, save but for a few big beds of hellebores I’d cut back so far, against my better judgment and usual admonition never to work in frozen or mucky soil.The moles and voles, incidentally, seem undeterred by any such conditions, and when the snow disappeared there were signs of their handiwork—including an impressive series of mole hills, above, signs that those fossorial insectivores (underground-dwelling insect-eaters) were tunneling energetically deep below. I never trap moles, but am far less benevolent toward the unrelated plant-eating rodents whose name starts with a “V.” (More ontelling the two apart.)Then it started snowing again at mid-week, and dipped to around 20F, and the rhododendron leaves curled up like t

The book from Yale University Press is called “Ginkgo: The Tree That Time Forgot,” and its author—the tree’s biographer, really—is Peter Crane, former director of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, and current dean and professor in the School of Forestry and Environmental Studies at Yale.He joined me on my public-radio show and podcast to talk about Ginkgo biloba—about why it is “the platypus of the plant world,” how a love poem by Goethe helped popularize the tree, and how there are now more than 200 cultivars with diverse

Sam Hoadley is manager of Horticultural Research at Mt. Cuba, where he and the team trialed 70 differentCarex over a four-year period. Sam’s report on the findings will be published on the Mt. Cuba website January 13.Sam is also teaching a virtual class on February 1st on these important native plants. (That’s Carex haydenii, above.)Before joining Mt. Cuba, Sam was lead horticulturist for Longwood Gardens’ hillside garden, and he received his degree in Sustainable Landscape Horticulture from University of Vermont.Plus: Enter to win one of two tickets to the virtual event on Carex by commenting in the box at the bottom of the page.Read

With more than 20 years’ experience, Arctic Cabins have designed their BBQ cabins in the traditional Finnish style, from sustainably sourced, slow-grown Scandinavian Redwood Spruce. This is a tried and tested material which is both visually stunning and durable. 

Forgetting that she’s not a vegetable gardener, I was recently lamenting to my daughter Lucy that at least a couple of my zucchini plants end up flopping over each growing season.“Oh, are they just being dramatic?” she asked, humorousl

The biggest benefit of juicy, reddish-black boysenberries is that they make the most excellent pie filling you’ll ever taste. (Okay, rhubarb is one of my favorite fillings, too.)Each berry weighs around 7-8 grams, which is heavy for the fruit of a br

With more than 20 years’ experience, Arctic Cabins have designed their BBQ cabins in the traditional Finnish style, from sustainably sourced, slow-grown Scandinavian Redwood Spruce. This is a tried and tested material which is both visually stunning and durable. 

Always searching for a natural treatment to help alleviate pesky migraines? The answer may be found in feverfew, a plant with a famous history of soothing stubborn headaches.An ancient medicinal,