Gardening and landscape design blog

Classic Garden Plans

pbs91 — 2005-02-24T04:12:08Z

From the editorial review of "Classic Garden Plans" by David Stuart: "...For any gardener who is unsure of what to grow or how to put plants together in coherent planting schemes, this book provides answers. Many of the garden plans and plantings included are simplified versions of those created by great gardeners such as Vita Sackville-West, Margery Fish, and Piet Oudolf. The author's extensive knowledge of period plants, and how they were put together to look beautiful, has enabled him to re-create historical classics, like the Renaissance parterre or the Monet water garden, from contemporary planting lists and plans. Each garden is given a brief historical context, and its best qualities, seasons, and times of day are explained. Planting plans are given for each scheme, together with a shopping list that can be taken to a nursery."

I have seen several examples of that kind of work and from my perspective the greater the variety of flowers involved the better.

Creating a pond in the garden

pbs91 — 2005-02-15T10:19:32Z

Making a pond in the garden might seem a bit of challenge but once the work
is over it looks fit for "1,000 places to see before you die" or even for
the "Love overboard".

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Rambling about the weather

pbs91 — 2005-02-03T18:08:17Z

I'm getting a bit upset with this weather. It snowed and rained for almost a week now. Then we got a little bit of sunshine and it reminded me of those nice summer days when we were enjoying our gardens, plants and flowers. Little bit of this and little bit of that makes such a huge difference. A good reminder at a time when everything seems to be frozen and covered with snow.

pbs91 — 2005-02-01T10:53:24Z

Home grown citrus tips

pbs91 — 2005-01-29T16:02:23Z

Brooklyn Botanical Garden in its Plants & Gardens News Volume 19, Number 3 | Fall 2004/Winter 2005 published an article by Scott D. Appel about growing citrus indoors:

"...Citrus are easy to cultivate indoors. Plant seeds immediately upon removal from fruit—contrary to popular belief, the seeds don't like to dry out. Start with a small pot and transplant the young plants as needed. Seedlings will need plenty of water, but don't let them sit in a saucer of excess runoff: Citrus hate wet feet. Use a compost-rich, well-draining, slightly acidic soil (about 5.5 to 6.0 in pH). Employ an acidifying fertilizer made specifically for citrus, as these plants have particular requirements for micronutrients that most fertilizers don't contain. A very sunny, cool window is the ideal location for cultivating your citrus.

Citrus trees grown from seed rarely flower and produce fruit. However, their fragrant leaves can be dropped into hot bathwater to impart a wonderful perfume. They can be added to stuffings, stews, and roasts or placed within the cavities of fish and fowl to add a delightful citrus flavor. Citrus leaves can be used in Thai stir-fries (leaves of the Kaffir lime, Citrus hystrix, are especially good for this). They can also be placed in the bottom of canning jars to impart a redolent tang to jams, jellies, chutneys, relishes, and marmalades".

A good idea for preparing some home-made marmelade