Winter

Seed Starting

Seed Starting

Starting seeds indoors is a rewarding gardening experience and can help extend your growing season to include more plant varieties than your outdoor season may permit. Furthermore, a larger selection of seed varieties doesn’t limit your opportunities to growing only those transplants that are available at planting time. The key…

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Feeding Birds in Winter

Feeding Birds in Winter

Winter is a crucial time for birds. As temperatures drop, there are no insects to eat and the natural seeds are covered with snow, and as the season lengthens, the berries and crab apples are long gone. Birds need enough food to maintain their body temperatures and must search for…

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Decorating Your Home With Houseplants

Decorating Your Home With Houseplants

Bring the bright atmosphere of a tropical vacation into your home this winter with houseplants. An integral part of your home décor, houseplants not only artistically improve your home, they also cleanse and freshen your indoor air quality. Plants take in carbon dioxide and release clean, pure oxygen. Some plants…

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Ideas for Creating Winter Interest in the Garden

Ideas for Creating Winter Interest in the Garden

Quick … look out your window! How does your winter landscape look from inside your home? If it’s bleak and uninteresting, we have some suggestions for you. Treat it like your home!  Perk it up by using your indoor decorating skills outdoors.

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Easy-to-Grow Indoor Herbs for Winter

Easy-to-Grow Indoor Herbs for Winter

Even though it may be miserable weather outside, don’t be stuck having to buy overpriced fresh herbs at the store or using dried. Why not grow your own inside the house? Most common herbs will grow quite happily in a sunny window. Your kitchen may be the perfect spot. After all, it’s probably warm and sunny there.

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Rotating Your Vegetable Crops

Rotating Your Vegetable Crops

Whether you just plant a few tomatoes, herbs and some lettuce or an elaborate garden complete with exotic selections of lesser known veggies, you’ll want to rotate your crops each year. All types of vegetable crops – brassicas, onions, legumes and root crops – require a slightly different blend of…

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Attracting Birds to Your Garden

Attracting Birds to Your Garden

One of the benefits of a garden is the wildlife it attracts, and birds are some of the most popular garden wildlife. Most birds are voracious eaters that are glad to keep the insect population down, and may eat 500-1,000 insects in one afternoon. This makes them ideal for natural…

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Size Up Your Site: A First Step in Planning Your Landscape

Size Up Your Site: A First Step in Planning Your Landscape

Whether you plan your garden from start to finish or use a professional designer, a few simple steps can help you assess your property’s potential to develop the landscape of your dreams. By getting involved in the landscape design process, you can address practical problems, structure your outdoor living space…

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Variegated Solomon’s Seal

Variegated Solomon’s Seal

If you don’t already grow variegated Solomon’s Seal in your shade garden, this is the year to start. This charming, visually appealing perennial is similar to hostas, but has its own unique character that will add beauty, texture and interest to your landscape.

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Bloom Phalaenopsis, Bloom!

Bloom Phalaenopsis, Bloom!

Elegant Phalaenopsis, or moth orchid, is said to be the easiest orchid to coax into bloom. Although this is true, you must first be aware of the basic needs of this plant in order to be successful.

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Winter Composting the 3-Bucket Way

Winter Composting the 3-Bucket Way

It’s cold outside and the compost pile is frozen. Do you really feel like hauling kitchen scraps out into the winter wasteland only to have them picked through by scavengers when there isn’t enough bacteria available to break them down? Fortunately, there is an alternative. Keep your kitchen scraps cooking…

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