Fine Gardening – Issue 201
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Fungi Are a Sign of Soil Health
A great indicator of soil and plant health is the appearance of fungi in a lawn. The fruiting bodies of an important underground community, they often appear in the fall…
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These New Burnets Deserve Your Attention
These burnets are new on the scene, but they're already showing promise. ‘Blackthorn’ burnet Robust ‘Blackthorn’ burnet (S. ‘Blackthorn’) was one of the largest of all the burnets after just…
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Plants for a Matrix-Style Garden
When you garden with a matrix-style design, different plants can play different roles in the landscape. Here are some ideas to get your designs going. Planting plan details Matrix…
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Plants for a Layered-Style Garden
As you design with a layered approach, it helps to have a sense of what your options are. Here are some examples of the types of plants that can create…
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Thomas Rainer and Piet Oudolf on Naturalistic Gardens
Once we understand some of the concepts of naturalistic design, questions of a more practical nature tend to pop up. We reached out to landscape architect Thomas Rainer and garden…
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Burnets Are Tough and Beautiful Plants
I have no recollection of burnets—native or cultivated—before my back-to-back encounters with great burnet (Sanguisorba officinalis) in the South Korean countryside and on the grassy steppes of Siberia. The sight…
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Get to Know Burnets
Burnets are easy to grow, have great textural foliage, stay mostly disease-free, and put on a supremely unique bloom show from summer into fall, when much of the garden looks…
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Birds in the Garden | Letter from the Editor
A few months ago a bird got stuck in my hair. This did not happen while I was out in the garden. But it almost certainly had something to do…
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Gardening Advice for Summer
Winning tip: Keep those doors open My work-shed doors are spring loaded to help keep them closed. The problem was keeping them open when I was moving a mower or…
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A Compact Toad Lily for Late-Summer Blooms
Toad lily (Tricyrtis spp. and cvs., Zones 5–8) is an Asian perennial often found growing in dappled, open glades, woodland trail edges, partially shaded slopes, or, in some cases, enjoying…
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Wrap Up Summer With the Bright Blooms of 'Zimbelstern' Sneezeweed
Sneezeweeds won’t make you sneeze, but they will make you smile. Their cheery blooms come along to make you happy right when summer is starting to wear you down. One…
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Tweezers for Delicate Work in the Garden
Planting and pruning small, fragile items can be difficult. I cannot count the times I’ve cleared all the foliage from a string of pearls (Senecio rowleyanus, Zones 9–12) just by…
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Remove Shallow Weeds Quickly With This Hand Hoe
I’ve worked with other professional gardeners for over twenty-five years, and a tool that continues to be a popular part of our weeding arsenal is the Nejiri Gama hand hoe.…
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Harvest Cut Flowers With These Floral Shears
Anyone with a cutting garden needs a good pair of pruners. These 7-inch floral shears are perfect for when you need something a little smaller and less bulky than Felco…
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How to Grow Figs, Even in Colder Climates
Figs intrigue many gardeners. The breadth of interest struck me when I donated a spindly little dormant fig plant for a raffle and the winner told me she had received…
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Dynamic Garden Design Despite Challenging Conditions
“When the going gets tough, the tough get gardening” could describe John Markowski and his garden in Kingwood, New Jersey, where he has powered through suboptimal conditions to establish a…
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Plants for Birds in the Northwest
As William Cullina mentions in his article on plants for birds, the sad reality is songbirds are disappearing: “Habitat loss, pesticides, and the accompanying decline of insect populations have contributed…
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Plants for Birds in the Mountain West
As William Cullina mentions in his article on plants for birds, the sad reality is songbirds are disappearing: “Habitat loss, pesticides, and the accompanying decline of insect populations have contributed…
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Plants for Birds in the Southwest
As William Cullina mentions in his article on plants for birds, the sad reality is songbirds are disappearing: “Habitat loss, pesticides, and the accompanying decline of insect populations have contributed…
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Plants for Birds in the Southern Plains
As William Cullina mentions in his article on plants for birds, the sad reality is songbirds are disappearing: “Habitat loss, pesticides, and the accompanying decline of insect populations have contributed…
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Plants for Birds in the Midwest
As William Cullina mentions in his article on plants for birds, the sad reality is songbirds are disappearing: "Habitat loss, pesticides, and the accompanying decline of insect populations have contributed…
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Plants for Birds in the Southeast
As William Cullina mentions in his article on plants for birds, the sad reality is songbirds are disappearing: "Habitat loss, pesticides, and the accompanying decline of insect populations have contributed…
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Plants for Birds in the Northeast
As William Cullina mentions in his article on plants for birds, the sad reality is songbirds are disappearing: "Habitat loss, pesticides, and the accompanying decline of insect populations have contributed…
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Plants for the Birds in Your Region
As William Cullina mentions in his article on plants for birds, the sad reality is that songbirds are disappearing: "Habitat loss, pesticides, and the accompanying decline of insect populations have…
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Petite Houseplants for Any Home
Admitting you are addicted to collecting houseplants is the first step. The second step? Finding more space for new plants! Plants that stay small are the perfect solution for indoor…
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Want to Grow Figs? Try One of These Varieties
There’s a fig for every taste. Some are more berrylike; some are more datelike. The color of the skin ranges from very dark purple or brown to very light green,…
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Overwintering In-Ground Figs in Colder Climates
The most important rule when growing figs in cold areas is to be creative. For example, I once met a Zone 5 grower who made a “figatorium,” a greenhouse with…
Featured Articles
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Tropical Inspiration for Shade Containers
It’s easy to ignore the shady corners of our gardens and focus on areas with the most light, especially when it comes to creating warm-season containers. Many of us get…
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How to Get Your Shade Containers To Look Great All Season Long
How is taking care of a container in the shade different from taking care of a container in full sun? Does the limited light provide additional challenges—or does it provide…
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Everything You Should Know About Powdery Mildew
Powdery mildews may be the plant diseases most recognizable to gardeners. They are known for the gray to white patches of dusty fungal growth that develop on leaves of numerous…
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How to Make a More Sustainable Lawn
Patience is the key ingredient when creating sustainable landscapes that include lawns. The “quick and easy” approach—tilling the soil, working in amendments, rolling the soil to create a level base,…
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Native Plants for the Birds
I feel very fortunate to live near a tributary of the Delaware River, a stop on the great Atlantic flyway used by songbirds and raptors as they migrate between Central…
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Kindred Spirit® is a Tough, Slender Oak Tree
In 1974, legendary nurseryman Earl Cully planted a thousand acorns from a cross of columnar English oak (Quercus robur ‘Fastigiata’, Zones 4–8) with our native swamp white oak (Q. bicolor,…
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A Naturalistic Garden Is Better for the Environment and Requires Less Work
Many gardens elicit a “Geez, how did they do this?” response. It is not because of massive hardscape or Versailles-level precision; rather, it is more of the sense that these…
Articles
Fine Gardening Magazine
