Call it a sign of the times—but gardening and farming projects have become an important part of school curriculums all across New York City. According to GreenThumb, a division of the City Parks Department that provides schools with technical support, the number of school-based gardens registered with the city jumped from 40 to 232 in […]
In this busy season of gifting it’s easy to lose sight of the things that really matter. Few of us really need more things. For the gardeners on your gift list this season, consider something different: Give them a gift membership to a public garden located nearby, or alternatively, make a donation to a garden […]
As I planted garlic cloves along my sunny driveway yesterday, I was filled with gratitude for the blessings of yet another season in the garden. Each year, it seems that the day I plant garlic is the most beautiful of the fall season, and this one was no exception. Despite weeks of summer drought, multiple […]
A good friend and pretty experienced gardener recently asked me if it was too late to plant lettuce. Her question reminded me that there is considerable ambiguity about planting greens in the late summer/early fall. There shouldn’t be; September and October present perfect, in many years, the most perfect conditions for the germination and growth […]
Emerging from a summer that offered plenty to complain about—unseasonably warm early temperatures followed by drought –then prolonged heat extreme even for the height of summer—it’s small comfort to learn that this season’s weather appears to be part of a larger trend. As the authors—all researchers in the earth and climate sciences– of a recent […]
When my husband and I moved to New York’s Hudson Valley, we weren’t really prepared for the deer. Our yard slopes steeply down to a creek on one end, and ends at a busy curve in the county road at the other. What deer in their right mind would want to deal with that? Well […]
Whether growing plants in greenhouses or out in the ground, it’s common to complain that we don’t have the space we need. The more I garden, the more I find that making the most of my gardening space is an enjoyable challenge. Some years produce greater success than others; here are some tips based upon […]
Thanks to the vision of a singular gardener, a remarkable garden flourishes in Cold Spring, New York. Stone Crop www.stonecrop.org is only one of the gardens Frank Cabot created; its twelve acres inspire visitors to dream their own complex and creative horticultural dreams. From the nineteen fifties until the early nineties, the property was the […]
I’d already planned to write about global warming when White Flower Farm’s e-mail scooped me! I suspect this subject has been sitting front and center in most northeastern gardeners’ minds since the weather of the past few weeks arrived. The upshot of WFF’s message is that based upon the latest Department of Agriculture study, we […]
They were everywhere around the holidays—at groceries and big box stores— but despite their ubiquitous availability, Amaryllis can still surprise us. First, consider their name—it turns out they might not really be Amaryllis at all. Although Carl Linnaeus created the epithet Amaryllis belladonna in 1753, it was originally applied to both South African and South […]
What can you enjoy in your winter greenhouse that requires little care the rest of the year? In a recent conversation with Scott Canning, Director of Horticulture at Wave Hill– the public garden in Riverdale, New York– I learned about some South African winter-blooming bulbs growing in Wave Hill’s conservatory this winter. Since South African […]
These gift ideas are for the gardeners on your list– some to inspire and others to help make the jobs at hand as light as they can be. Growing Tasty Tropical Plants In Any Home Anywhere by Byron Martin and Lauralynn Martin is guide written by the co-owners of Logee’s, the world-famous greenhouse operation in […]
