MOTHER NATURE'S GARDEN
Mother Nature’s Garden: A much needed hike and old friends
It’s Boxing Day, and life has mostly returned to normal here at Mother Nature’s Garden. The dogs are slumped on their beds, refusing to make ...
It’s Boxing Day, and life has mostly returned to normal here at Mother Nature’s Garden. The dogs are slumped on their beds, refusing to make ...
If you’re of a certain age and grew up in the South, then you’re probably familiar with this phrase. It can refer to many different ...
As Sir Francis Bacon wrote in his essay on gardens, “There ought to be gardens for all months in the year, in which, severally, things ...
Throughout New England and the mountains in Virginia, there are stone walls built by farmers primarily from the mid-1700s until the early 1800s. There used ...
Since the late 15th century, we humans have moved around 13,000 species of plants from their native habitats to other areas around the world. Sometimes ...
Traditional gardening has always been about wrestling nature into submission, an approach that’s labor intensive and somewhat like warfare. Gardeners have to be vigilant in ...
“You can see the goldenrod, that most tenacious and pernicious and beauteous of all New England flora, bowing away from the wind like a great ...
Wildflower meadows have been an important feature of the British landscape for hundreds of years. Nevertheless, they didn’t develop as natural features of the landscape, ...
A few weeks ago, I escaped to Maine to explore some gardens and late-blooming native plants there. Obviously, the growing season is shorter, and the ...
Even though the days are still warm, there’s a chill in the early morning and late afternoon air. Autumn is here, so it’s time to ...
Farmville is blessed with many talented gardeners. Explore the various neighborhoods, and you’ll find English kitchen gardens with tidy paths, carefully clipped borders, and thriving ...
Nestled at the end of a long winding driveway in Pamplin is a picturesque farm belonging to Al and Betsy Lookofsky. There’s an old smoke ...
Way back pre-pandemic, when travel was easy, I spent some time in Cornwall with friends. It was a great opportunity to explore local gardens and ...
Hi fellow gardeners, it’s me, Anca. My Mom is busy filling in some holes in the backyard, so I thought I would chat with you ...
The Perfect Plant for the Midsummer Garden The hot, humid, potentially dry days of summer are upon us, but even those gardeners who retreat indoors ...
We tend to think of orchids as fragile, delicate plants requiring pampering, but they are extremely resilient and capable of growing in a wide variety ...
It’s magnolia time! The sweetbay magnolias have finished blooming in the wet lowlands along the High Bridge Trail, but the iconic southern magnolias all over ...
You all know that I’m slightly obsessed with daylilies. They’re the perfect plant for hot summer days when I just can’t be bothered to work ...
Farmville is blessed with many talented gardeners. Explore the various neighborhoods, and you’ll find English kitchen gardens with tidy paths, carefully clipped borders, and thriving ...
For years I’ve found heartleaf (Hexastylis spp.) all over Cumberland, Appomattox, Powhatan, and Prince Edward Counties. There are eight species of this low growing, evergreen ...
One of my favorite spring ephemerals, the eastern shooting star (Primula meadia), has a variety of common names – pride of Ohio, prairie pointers and ...
I’m fascinated by plants that bloom at a specific time every day. That old garden favorite, the four o’clock, opens every afternoon around 4 p.m. ...
Spring is definitely here. The days are longer, the temperatures are warmer, and there are blooms appearing everywhere. Some like pussy toes are modest and ...
A poll done by YouGov revealed that blue is the favorite color in almost all countries. Ancient Egyptians, Chinese and Mesoamericans developed ways of producing ...
Many gardeners say that they can tell the temperature outside simply by looking out the window at the leaves on their rhododendron. If the leaves ...
No matter when you visit, bald cypress swamps are magical places. In late spring and summer, there’s green everywhere – moss, resurrection ferns, tree leaves ...
Have you ever tried to define a weed? I often hear that it’s just a plant that appears where it’s not wanted. By that definition, ...