Category: Plants

photos of plants

Posted on in Gardening, House Plants, Surviving Winter

Act Now for Mid-winter Flowers

Crocus_XG-CO_LAH_6312Imagine that it’s wintertime. Anything verdant and green has long turned to brown. Limbs lie leafless. A few berries may yet hang on the shrubs. We’re already eager for spring, but the growing season is still months away. Wouldn’t this be the perfect time to enjoy bright red tulips, or the sweet aroma of blooming narcissus? If you want to enjoy these and other mid-winter flowers, now is the time to start forcing bulbs.

Pretty much any spring bulb can be forced. All we have to do is fool them into thinking that spring has arrived—in the middle of January. To do that, we have to plan ahead—up to 15 weeks ahead.

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Posted on in Gardening, Plant Profiles

Blood-thirsty Plants

Audrey LSOHOne of my favorite plays is Little Shop of Horrors. It’s about a flower shop that inadvertently acquires a plant that murders people. It’s the perfect Halloween movie. Our kids were involved in their high school production; I can still see Audrey II licking her bloody lips!

Are there really plants like Audrey that need blood to survive? Well, perhaps not blood, exactly, but there are plenty of carnivorous plant species—and who knows what they do when we’re not looking?

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Posted on in Garden Quiz, Gardening

Quiz: Garden Jargon

Garden Bed?
A Garden Bed?

How well do you know your gardening terms? As with most groups of people with a specific hobby or occupation, those who garden have a specialized vocabulary—our garden jargon. We often use words that other people might not understand—or will they?

I have an interesting little quiz for you today. I’ve taken a series of gardening terms that have other meanings not related to gardening. For example, a bed can be a place we sleep—or a landscaped area, often filled with flowers.

I’ve picked ten such words plus an extra-tricky bonus word. They have a “normal” meaning, and also a specific, garden-related definition. I’ve given you the definitions that don’t pertain to plants. Can you come up with the garden-related word? Extra points if you know what it means in a garden context. The answers will appear Monday at the end of the article.

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Posted on in Gardening, Landscaping, Plant Profiles

Fabulous Fall Grasses

What do we plant for fall color? Most of us would quickly list off maples and crabapples, or perhaps a burning bush (aka winged euonymus). But what about grasses? Some ornamental grasses have impressive fall foliage, and it lasts all winter.

Ornamental grasses are everywhere. What was once a fairly obscure group of landscape plants have emerged into the spotlight, and their popularity shows no sign of fading. That’s not surprising, considering how much they have going for them—flowing leaves, towering seed heads, a fountain shape unlike that of shrubs or perennials that adds contrast and texture to the garden.

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Posted on in Plant Profiles, Xeriscape

Presenting Autumn, Starring Rabbitbrush!

Chrysothamnus nauseosus_Rabbitbrush_Cylindropuntia_Cholla_ChicoBasinRanch-CO_LAH_2989-001With intense sulfur-yellow flowers covering its gray-green foliage, blooming Rabbitbrush demands to be noticed. In fact, the prairies of eastern Colorado are almost blanketed with it—something we never notice until it blooms. Interspersed with prickly cholla cactus and some perennial range grasses, it forms the essence of western landscapes. But it’s not just for the wide open spaces. Rabbitbrush is an excellent performer in the garden as well.

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Posted on in Botany for Gardeners

A Plant by Any Other Name…

Blue Columbine - Aquilegia caeruleaHow do you pronounce Gomphocarpus physocarpus? What is it? And how can we ever remember how to spell it? What’s Aquilegia caerulea? You might know it as Colorado’s native Blue Columbine (right). Or how about Symphyotrichum novae-angliae? Isn’t it simpler just to say New England Aster? Scientific names are enough to drive gardeners crazy, so why in the world do we need to bother with them?

Scientific names, also called Latin names, can be annoying, but they serve a valuable purpose. We owe a huge thank you to Carl von Linné, the Swedish biologist who, back in the 1700s, invented what we now call binomial nomenclature. He also had the bright idea to use Latin, or at least to Latinize the words from another language, in order to avoid giving preference to any nationality. Scientists all around the world use the same Latin name to designate a particular species.

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Posted on in Veggies

Two Pestos You’ll Love

Basil @DBG LAH 175Summer is ending. For the past month, my potted basil plants have been doing their best to flower. I know that if I let them go to seed, they would die, so I’ve been pinching off the buds. However, now our nights are dipping into the 40s—too cold for these tropical annuals. Even if they don’t freeze, the chill turns the leaves black—not very appetizing. I’ve hauled the plants inside, but I can’t postpone the inevitable. It’s time to make pesto.

There’s no aroma quite like that of freshly made pesto, and that’s exactly what my kitchen smells like right now. I have two favorite pesto recipes, and I’d like to share them with you so your kitchen can smell this amazing too.

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Posted on in Gardening, Plant Profiles

September is for Rudbeckias

Rudbeckia - Black-eyed Susan_XG_20090826_LAH_9669Summer ends this weekend, but late-blooming flowers are far from finished. One can’t help but notice the conspicuous school-bus-yellow daisies, known as Black-eyed Susans, which thrive along our Colorado roadsides. (Most are Rudbeckia hirta, but other species also grow here.) Happily for us gardeners, there are cultivated forms of Rudbeckia that continue to brighten our home landscapes well into autumn.

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Posted on in Gardening, Landscaping, Soils, Surviving Winter, Veggies, Weeds

Putting Your Garden to Bed

I first posted this back in 2009, but (with one exception, below) my advice hasn’t changed. While I‘m off looking for migrating warblers today, you should be out in your garden. Here’s why:

  • carrot-sleeping-in-bedSpending time now on chores such as weeding and garden cleanup will reward you many times over when spring arrives.
  • Amending your soil this fall will give you a head start on next year’s garden.
  • Fall is also a great time to build a new patio or raised bed.
  • Protecting your less-hardy plants will increase the odds of them surviving a Colorado winter.
  • Winter’s cold weather is a great time to read articles, take classes, and prowl the Internet to become a more knowledgeable gardener.
  • And the most pressing issue? The weather gurus are predicting snow tonight and/or tomorrow!

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Posted on in Gardening, Humor, Plant Profiles

Plant Quiz Answers

DBG_LAH_1264If you haven’t tried to identify the plants in my quiz, back up to last Thursday and try your hand before reading any further.

So, how did you enjoy trying to ID various random plants from a photo or two? I think it’s fun, which is why I love my job. Sometimes I know the answer off the top of my head (number 1, for example) while others have me tearing my hair out while I track them down (such as number 8).

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