Month: December 2009

The Garden Professors Take a Holiday Break

Linda, Jeff, Bert, and Holly are taking a break.  We shall return full-force January 4th. Note that there MAY be sporadic, interim postings if one of us gets significantly riled up. Subscribers to our RSS feed will be duly alerted.

My “greeting card” below was inspired by Jeff’s post on the insulating powers of snow.  We here in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virgina have about 14″ of insulation at the moment!

Finally, thank you to all our wonderful Garden Professors readers and commenters – you made our first six months so fun and rewarding!… Continue reading this article “The Garden Professors Take a Holiday Break”

O Tannenbaum!

Twas the blog before Christmas…  My last chance to post about Christmas trees for another year.  I’m always surprised when I troll around the web or do interviews how many myths about Christmas trees still abound.  So in the spirit of the season, a little Christmas tree myth-busting.


“Good grief.  I’ve killed it.”

Using a real tree hurts the environment
Here’s a real post from the e-how.com website:

“Its so not fair to cut down all those baby trees, use them for a few weeks and then toss them by the curb for garbage removal.… Continue reading this article “O Tannenbaum!”

Foliage fun flaunted!

Not much activity on the Friday quiz!  It was a tricky one.  Take a look at our photos in total:

As you can see, these aren’t plant “problems” in the strictest sense.  (The “landscape” in question is a retail nursery.)  They are cultivated anomalies – little mutations that have been discovered and propagated.  There are several points to this exercise:

1)  Be sure you know your plant material!  Many peope mistakenly assume that plants such as these are diseased, pest-ridden, or lacking some nutrient and need to be “fixed.” … Continue reading this article “Foliage fun flaunted!”

Sunday rant – the evils of chemicals

It’s days like this that I am so grateful to have this blog at my disposal!

It’s 7 am on Sunday and I’m just finishing the paper, drinking Earl Grey tea, and listening to NPR.  Liane Hansen just finished an interview with Martha Stewart, who among other things was discussing healthy eating for the new year.  She’s a proponent of organic food (as are many of us), and mentioned two reasons she doesn’t like conventionally grown produce. … Continue reading this article “Sunday rant – the evils of chemicals”

Friday Foliage Fun!

Take a look at these three closeups of foliage from three different plants in a landscape in Washington state:

 

You’ve been asked to diagnose what’s going on in this landscape that would cause these foliar abnormalities.  (I get photos emailed to me all the time asking these kinds of questions.)  Bugs?  Disease?  Nutrient deficiencies? Environmental conditions?  All of the above?

More photos and answers on Monday!

Is It Worth Anything?

Plant aficionados everywhere are constantly looking for something which they can patent and make a million bucks on — something like ‘Endless Summer’ hydrangea which captured the public’s attention — and their wallets.  Many of the new plants we see today came from something called “branch sports” which are basically segments of a tree — like a branch — which has somehow mutated so that it offers something a little different than what the original tree did. … Continue reading this article “Is It Worth Anything?”

Invasives! Natives! No, wait, biodynamics

Just had to get your attention there.  We’ve had a great discussion over native and nonnative plants over the last few weeks.  I’m going to completely switch gears and move on to another topic  – biodynamics.

If you’re not familiar with this term, let me refer you to my online column here.  Biodynamics is a set of agricultural practices based on a belief system, not science, but is an increasingly popular approach, especially in the wine industry. … Continue reading this article “Invasives! Natives! No, wait, biodynamics”

Is there any future for a scientifically-sound gardening magazine?

(You’ll see two posts from me today.  This first one is easier to do at 6 a.m.)

One of the efforts I’ve been involved with is serving as science editor (and writer) for MasterGardener Magazine.  We started this quarterly publication in 2007 (take a look at it online at it here) – not just for Master Gardeners, but for anyone interested in sustainable gardens and landscapes.  Sadly, the publication went to an annual issue last year because of the economic downturn and now may be eliminated altogether.… Continue reading this article “Is there any future for a scientifically-sound gardening magazine?”

Pop Quiz!

Bet you weren’t expecting this on TUESDAY, eh?
Heh, heh.

Situation:  these photos are from a grad student project.  We wanted to create, observe, and record nutrient deficiency symptoms, so we grew the plants hydroponically in a made-from-scratch nutrient solution, containing everything except one particular nutrient. There were 12 separate batches of solution, one missing each essential mineral nutrient (N,P, K, Ca, Mg, S, Fe, Mn, Cu, B, Mo, Zn – couldn’t exclude Cl as it’s too common in salts). … Continue reading this article “Pop Quiz!”

Are natives the answer?

Last week Jeff kicked off a lively discussion about invasive plants.  Let me state up front that no one on this blog is promoting invasive plants.  But the issues surrounding invasive plants are extremely complex and have profound implications for many groups with whom we work in landscape horticulture and urban and community forestry.  It is essential in these discussions that we separate fact from hyperbole.  In some quarters, lines have been blurred and people fail to make key distinctions and lump exotic, alien, or non-native species together with invasives. … Continue reading this article “Are natives the answer?”