Are you itching to get gardening but also a tad concerned about where you’re going to put any new plants? Part of the fun of having a garden–any garden–is adding to your collection. What do you do if your gardening space is already filled to the brim? If the only gardening direction you can go…
Where I live in Canada, spring can be about as long lived as an ice cream cone which is to say not long. Sometimes I feel like we barrel right through late winter into early summer with spring merely a squashed hope staining the sidewalk. It’s the fleetingness and fragility of ephemerals (plants that pop…
Spring is in the air and each day more birds are showing up, singing their hearts out and partying on. But there’s a problem. By all reports, everyone’s doing fine in the making babies, erm, eggs department but hatching and caring for the demanding little rascals has become more of a challenge due to an…
Any day now the miracle of cherry blossoms will begin. Not here in Fernie, of course. We’re still encased in snow and ice. But in Tokyo, beloved cherry blossoms are predicted to appear around March 26 and peak April 2. Meanwhile, in Vancouver, B.C., cherry trees have already started to bloom, evidently, depending on where…
Spring is almost here. I know it’s not far off because our grocery stores are displaying pots of those classic white trumpet-shaped lilies right up next to the check-out counters. I guess they’re hoping you’ll succumb to their beauty and intoxicating fragrance and grab one on your way to the cashier even though you only…
If you reside in the northern hemisphere, like me, you’re enduring what’s referred to as the dead of winter. Apt. Not much alive out there (garden-wise) except for the evergreens. Snow and ice have pretty much turned the world into a blank-ish slate. Naturally, I start to crave colour. Colour that occurs naturally, as in…
All signs were pointing to this year being less than exciting colour-wise. Paint company Benjamin Moore promised that 2025 is going to be all about Cinnamon Slate, described as a “delicate mix of heathered plum and velvety brown.” Sherwin Williams went the extra mile introducing a “color capsule” of the year which included a painfully…
Gardeners have double vision, I think. You’ve got one view towards what’s happening in the here and now. But you’ve also got a picture in your mind’s eye of what will be happening months from now and even into the next season. One way we play out this balancing act is when we plant now…
Primulas (aka primroses) are the poster flowers of spring with their carousels of blooms in every cheery shade imaginable swirling above rosettes of velvety green leaves. The cute, short varieties are such common spring-welcoming plants here in Canada that you’ll often find them at the grocery store (strategically positioned next to the cash registers to…
I learned a new word the other day: hortifuturism. I also learned about a new colour: Cyber Lime. The Garden Media Group, a U.S.-based garden industry PR firm was championing both as hot, hot, hot for 2024 in their annual trends report. “What better color to symbolize the traits of hortifuturism?” the giddy copy gushed…
If you happen to be driving along a backroad on the Bruce Peninsula in early spring, you’d be forgiven for thinking that the dandelions have come early. Those bright yellow flowers sprinkled along a roadside ditch or covering a knoll beside a pasture in early March sure look like them. This hillside is covered with…
I’ve moaned about the limitations of gardening in a true woodland setting (Rocks! Tree roots! More @$#*?! rocks!) but there are a great many wonderful benefits, one of which is the variety of native spring flowers that plant themselves and then pop up reliably every spring independent of my ministrations. Starting around the first week…
Ever wonder how plants know when to start growing again in the spring? We know that temperature and light have something to do with it. Well, scientists led by the University of Cambridge have discovered the real mechanics behind what stimulates plant growth: a ‘thermometer’ molecule. Science Daily reported October, 2016, that: ” Researchers have revealed…
The new year has arrived and we’re well past the winter solstice but in case you’re not convinced that the days are getting longer, this remarkable video takes only 90 seconds to transport you from the dregs of winter to a mezmerizing spring.
I’m feeling the need to get creative with some fresh container planting ideas. This may have something to do with the fact that the weather right now is…(fill in your choice of expletive here). We’re already well into April but winter is continuing to be annoying, flinging snow, rain and hail all over southwestern Ontario.…
Horticulturist, Arborist and Garden Columnist
Celebrating gardens, photography and a creative life
Garden of Flowers, Beads, and Yarns
ruminate vb. to chew (the cud)
Reflections On A Life in Exile
Saint Andrews Forest Farm Blog
a chat over the garden fence
There's always room for one more plant.
a little garden near Gawler
.....and nurturing my soul
Ministry of the fence 