Summary: Garden flowers can pull double duty by supplying garden color in the summer and indoor beauty during the winter serving as a reminder for what is to come when the weather warms up. Question: My mom always grew flowers for color in a backyard garden and dried them for use in the winter. My […]

I love blue in the garden, and my favorite of all is that of the perennial Anchusa azurea (A. italica) dropmore. Its small flowers in panicled racemes make a cloud of gentian blue that is very lovely. In the border it looks wonderful with anything, especially yellow flowers like daylilies, coreopsis, doronicum, and gaillardia. This […]

Let your asters play a dual role. The foliage of these plants was useful all summer in hiding spaces left by Oriental poppies and spring bulbs. The two dozen hardy aster plants in our garden play two important roles. Not only do they furnish fall color but they earn their keep all summer by hiding […]

April is the month to add color to your fall garden. Perennial asters set out now will provide month long beauty in late summer when a splash of color is most welcome in the perennial border. There are several hundred species of hardy asters, sometimes called starwort and michaelmas daisy. They range in height from […]

For many years it was taken for granted that the gladiolus was a non-fragrant flower. The first natural impulse when one sees a flower is to smell it. As a result of this impulse some people began to detect slight odors and fragrance in certain gladiolus. Research disclosed that many of the original species used […]

What better way to introduce September than with the beautiful photo of chrysanthemums in a fall garden. June may have its rare days but garden enjoyment is not, and should never be, a one-season affair, as photos prove. Fall is as good a gardening season as any, both to appreciate what past labors have accomplished […]

For the most bloom with the least care over the longest period of time, my favorite flowering landscape plant I choose the double flowering balsama greatly improved version of the old-fashioned single flower called Garden Balsam, Touch-Me-Not and Lady’s Slipper. Balsam (Impatiens balsamina) has beautiful camellia type double blooms shading from deep to pastel colors […]