More pocket meadows

I'm been on the lookout for informal plantings of native grasses and forbs (herbaceous perennials) --- these are the pocket meadow plants and plantings that I'm wanting to promote in an upcoming talk. More expansive meadows (at least in the eastern U.S.) are hard to manage, as they want to become...

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Interesting daylilies

I'm not really a daylily person, much preferring plants that are covered over with pollinators and flower visitors of various sorts. But a daylily farm, in a valley outside of Weaverville, NC was quite the site this morning.  I was tagging along with a friend who's writing an article about the...

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"It Raineth Every Day," Wm. Shakespeare

Tropical Storm DebbyOur wet season has started early and furiously!May's 30-year average rainfall for Jacksonville is 3.48"--we received 10.58".June's 30-year average is 5.37" and it is the start of our five-month wet season (and hurricane season). So far we've had 21.25" with 12.5" in the last three...

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A firefly June

We've seen almost as many fireflies this year than we used to see in the summers we spent as (young) researchers near the Chesapeake Bay in Maryland, many years ago.They're flashing again tonight, at all canopy levels.  It's probably the tail end of the mating season; they're definitely not as as abundant as earlier in June.  Fireflies are a seasonal component of living in the eastern U.S....

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Garden tours

I've been going on garden tours the last few weekends. Totally fun and often inspirational.I love seeing how gardeners create their gardens.  Everyone is different -- what plants they like, how they maintain their gardens, what sorts of elements they include, etc., etc.This pot vignette was...

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Coral honeysuckle (Lonicera sempervirens)

Lonicera sempervirensNormally, Lonicera sempervirens (coral honeysuckle) flowers heavily in the spring, sporadically (one or two periodic flower clusters) through the summer, and then a bit more in the fall.This plant is looking fabulous in late June -- practically in spring form! I imagine the cool...

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We have Met the Solution and It is Us

"We have met the enemy and he is us." Pogo's wise words (via Walt Kelly) have been repeatedoften in environmental circles, but have "people" beenlistening?? I hope so.I agree with Pogo and one of the reasons that I continue to write about green gardening and environmental issues is to convince others...

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Tuscan kale

I've grow Tuscan kale before, but this plant doesn't quite fit.  It has the dark green crinkled leaves of dinosaur or Tuscan kale, but it keeps growing.  It's not Jersey kale (walking stick kale) -- I have seeds of that, but the leaves aren't right.It must just be a robust Tuscan kale plant...

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Summer Solstice 2012

Sunrise this morning as we greet the longest day of the year--6/20/12.Here's an informative solstice article over on the National Geographic website. Last year's onion harvest--Granex Sweet onions were yummy!Day length is an important consideration for gardeners, because plants are dependent on...

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Roan Mountain

I had the pleasure of being on an excellent birding excursion to Roan Mountain today.  The Roan Mountain massif straddles North Carolina and Tennessee in the Southern Appalachian Mountains of the SE US.  We saw interesting plants and plant communities (grassy balds and spruce-fir forests)...

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A more practiced fledgling robin

The fledging robin is looking much more practiced searching for earthworms and insects.  Our mulch must be rich territory -- we had at least 8 robins poking around this afternoon along with this fledgling and mom. I posted about them before (with equally ho-hum photos). They've been great...

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What if we grew food instead of turf?

I found this image on Facebook and shared it on both the Lawn Reform Coalition and Sustainable Gardening pages. While lots of people "liked" it, even more shared it on their own pages. I found even more shares on other pages--it's gone viral. So this simple idea seems to have captured people's...

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NWF Backyard Wildlife Habitat

Why not display your sign?I've had my sign for quite awhile, but it graces an edge of my (inside) study in the Piedmont. I saw this sign, prominently displayed on a mailbox) on a garden tour today (this garden wasn't on the tour).  But, it had me thinking about it.The National Wildlife Federation's...

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Pollinator WeeK: June 18 --24

A tiger swallowtail on goldenrod in a natural meadow.The US Senate unanimously approved the motion to designate the last week in June as pollinator week. Who says the Senate can't agree on anything? In the past five years the pollinator week celebration has become an international event. This year it's...

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A fledgling robin

A couple of robins near the feeders caught my attention late this afternoon.  They were hopping around in an unusual fashion.It turned out that they were mom and older fledgling.  She would do a bit of foraging and then return to her offspring, who was complete with the lovely spotted breast...

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Productive raised beds

mid-June, 2012, WNCMy raised beds in the mountains have been amazing.  Filled with commercial compost, topped up with bags of mushroom compost, and enriched with Espoma organic slow-release fertilizer, they've continued to produce. This spring, it was greens, snow peas, sugar snap peas, and lettuce....

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Business Advice that's Bad for the Birds

Washington Post business article is off base.In yesterday's Washington Post business section, "Value Added: Mosquito-control business scratches this entrepreneur’s itch" describes a $300,000 business which is a franchise of the mosquito squad and the owner is a full time firefighter. This article is...

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Moving Away from Transplanted Gardener

Back in 2004 when my husband and I moved to northeast Florida, the gardening here was weird for me. Even though I have a masters degreee in Botany and have gardened all my life, almost everything I knew about gardening did not apply. So I started a gardener's log of what I learned and shared it on a...

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