Concern for pollinators is getting a lot of attention these days, thankfully, but are all the pollinator-supporting programs equally good? As in, supported by science and actually effective?  One glaring example of the lack of scientific support is the increasingly discredited “No-Mow” month campaign from the Xerces Society’s Bee City USA program. Turns out, No-Mow does more harm than good. (See Benjamin Vogt’s big-picture review; Doug Tallamy is also a critic.) No-Mow must have been dreamed up by a PR consultant, because even the single study touted to prove its worth (a small study in ..read more

Behind posts, articles, conferences and social media, there’s a backstory. Have you kept up with the digital correspondence between Ranters Scott Beuerlein and Marianne Willburn?  You can start here, or go back and find the entire correspondence at Dear Gardener. 30 November 2023 Lovettsville, VA Dear Scott, I’m not sure who owes who a letter, but it’s early morning, and I find myself at a loose end, still slightly under the spell of jet lag, hit with the left hook of Daylight Savings Time.  I’m mixing metaphors, but you understand. Can’t be bothered to read another article on the ..read more

It’s a constant disappointment to me that some people just don’t care about trees. There are people with homes and families and responsibilities, the trappings of adult life, for whom trees are nothing more than an embellishment or an adornment. An Alniaria, formerly a species of Sorbus, glows in the sun I Love Trees Have you ever stood at the bottom of a nice big tree and looked up? With winter arriving across much of the northern hemisphere it’s a good time to look up and marvel at the bare canopy of deciduous trees. See how the mighty trunk splits into large branches, then these in turn ..read more

There’s a process to coming home after a long journey. There’s a process to settling back into one’s routines and ruts and beloved pillows and remembering the systems that facilitate the regular tick of one’s daily life. Gardeners – by which I mean, individuals who find themselves staring at the state of the tetrapanax along the front path at one o’clock in the morning after a nine-hour flight instead of making a beeline for afore mentioned pillow – share a similar base process with the rest of the normal world, but instinctively add another layer of homecoming to the chaos.     ..read more

When you hear about pollinators, and I’m happy to see lots of attention now being paid to their predicament, I bet you don’t think of geckos, like this plant-based sculpture of one pollinating a Trochetia flower. Or even less likely to be on my pollinator radar is the lemur in this sculpture, in a sculpture with the traveler’s tree it pollinates in its native Madagascar. Right there, that’s two pollinators I won’t be trying to attract to my garden. These and eight other plant-based sculptures of pollinating animals and the plants they pollinate are a wonderful new addition to the holiday tra ..read more

I hate to have to tell you this, but pleasure is out of fashion. We’re not supposed, anymore, to enjoy our gardens. They are there for the sake of the planet.  (Which is very backward in showing its appreciation.) And for insects, grubs, creepy crawlies and slugs. And all their friends and relations.  Gardens are for promoting bio diversity and diversity of all the kinds you can throw a raspberry cane at. They are ecological, so weed if you dare. They are there for your mental health, so if you don’t have any of that (whatever it is) a garden may be wasted on you. Things do per ..read more

Thanksgiving has arrived!  The cool season annuals are finally going out. As I put them in their places, Charlie Brown tunes pop into my head. We’re all feeling festive. Bill’s inflatable turkey sits outside bouncing in the breeze, delighted to be the focal point of a front yard instead of the dining table. “Eat more cranberries!” I’ve much to be thankful for this year—great family, great friends, Great Dixter. In my dreams, I never left. Cultivating an attitude of gratitude is easy. The autumn weather has been gentle. The morning air is cool, but not too cold. ‘Carefree Sunshin ..read more

In late fall, dire decisions have to be made that mean certain death for some plants, possible extended life for others and assured survival for a treasured few. As I use a large proportion of semi-tropical, full tropical and ordinary annual plants in the outdoor garden every year, when the temps head downward, I have to decide what to try to save. Usually, the process is quite brutal because I’m already maintaining way more houseplants than I ever thought I’d have and refuse to even think about a basement greenhouse. So out the annuals go. Or so I thought. Over the past few years, my retire ..read more

I’ll always have a childlike wonder for snow days. I have friends who have mastered the art of overwintering plants in our quixotic Pacific Northwest climate. They carefully plot and have a plan for protecting their tender lovelies with temporary structures and great migrations indoors where sturdy shelving and proper lighting awaits. I am not like that. As the first of the winter holidays approaches, my container collection of somewhat tender plants sits in an open-air shelter in the back garden where they are protected from prodigious Pacific Northwest rains, yet subject to freezing tempe ..read more

There are a couple of magnificent, one hundred-and fifty-year-old gingkoes across the Ohio River in Louisville. Visitors to Cave Hill Cemetery and the Peterson-Dumesnil House make annual pilgrimages to see the colorful leaves. You can’t help being awestruck. My gingko in Utica, Indiana doesn’t draw big crowds, but it holds magic. Good to the last leaf. Peterson-Dumesnil gingko Its faded yellow ginkgo leaf fell in my lap just after I had planted 10 more daffodils, 50 crocus, 30 blue and pink Spanish bluebells and was arguing with myself about where to plant three hardy cyclamens. I was lean ..read more