ⓒ iStockPhoto - ObjectifMC

Bramble fruits - blackberries, raspberries and their related varieties like boysenberries and dewberries - are also fairly easy to grow. In many areas, bramble plants have escaped cultivation and become weeds, easily found on roadsides or in woodlands. I have run that in reverse in my own fruit garden and domesticated some wild black raspberries that were growing as a weed in a wild spot on my property, after first carefully determining that they were, in fact, edible.

Many blackberries and raspberries pretty much grow themselves, needing a gardener’s intervention mainly to keep the patch clear of weeds and older, non-producing vines.  Bramble berries pack a nutritional punch and don’t travel well, so they’re often prohibitively expensive in supermarkets. The ease of growing and expense of buying makes blackberries and raspberries a prime candidate for home growing. (continue reading…)

If you live in North America, (excluding Hawaii) your area has hummingbirds. These tiny nectarivores can hover, beat their wings between 20-90 times per second, and are the only type of bird able to fly backwards!

Hummingbirds are territorial and have an average lifespan of four years, so once you attract the birds to your yard they are very likely to return. There are two ways to attract and feed hummingbirds: feeders and gardens. (continue reading…)

ⓒ iStockPhoto - Hatman12

Strawberries are a good place for a beginning fruit gardener to begin dabbling in permaculture fruit plantings. The plants are inexpensive, often available in packs of 25 for $10 or less, and produce runners prolifically to propagate more plants, giving a lot of plant for your buck. Strawberry plants are pretty, so you can plant them as an edging plant in a sunny ornamental bed before committing to tearing up part of the yard for a full fruit garden.

Strawberries can be june-bearing, day-neutral or everbearing. If you’re looking for a lot of berries at once, to freeze or make jam, go for the june-bearing. They get ripe over a short period of time and the fruit is generally considered tastier than the other types. For a home planting for snacking purposes or a few shortcakes for special summertime occasions, though, the day-neutral and everbearing varieties produce a more constant but smaller stream of berries over the entire summer.

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©iStockphoto.com - ivanmateev

While many people enjoy vegetable gardening, fruit gardening is somewhat less common. Gardeners who already grow a vegetable garden can dip their toes into the world of growing fruit with annual vines crops. Watermelon, cantaloupe and honeydew melon will all grow in a vegetable garden if given enough space. Melons are members of the cucurbit family, along with cucumbers, and the growing techniques are similar. Like cucumbers, melons have sprawling vines that require some extra garden space or a separate bed where they have room to spread out.

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ⓒ iStockPhoto - MattJeacock

You might have heard people saying that lawns are bad for the environment. The lush expanse of golf-course greenery comes at a staggering environmental cost. It is not the grass which is bad, but it is the resources used to maintain the bigger lawn makes them harmful for the environment.If you decide to turn too much area of your backyard into lawn, you are reducing the space for wildlife habitat as well as polluting the environment.

A bigger lawn needs a more powerful mower which can create pollution equivalent to 10 to 12 times what the family car produces in an hour. In addition,  an estimated 8 million gallons of fuel spills each year. Seventy millions tons of artificial fertilizers, herbicides, insecticides and pesticides are applied in the lawns per year that effects the environment in one or the other way. These chemicals keep the lawn green but create underground water pollution and surface water pollution when run off with water and find their way to streams and rivers. Thus, we really have to rethink the way we care for our lawn that works with nature instead of against it and also saves the money, time and resources. (continue reading…)

English Ivy

Recently, I explored plant selections for your yard that can be widely-adapted to soil and climate conditions. Here are five more selections. Check with a nurseryperson for other recommendations specifically adapted for your area.

English Ivy (Hedera Helix)

General: This evergreen vine has three lobed leaves which can be used as ground cover or as a climbing vine. It can be used to cover the walls but at times it gets into the bricks, so keep looking wherever you plant it. Keep pruning so as to make it look tidy. It can adapt to a wide range of soil conditions. (continue reading…)

ⓒ Janet Harriett

When I first decided to create a native plant garden, I knew nothing. I ogled all the plants in the catalogs, and found a book that showed pictures of different gardens and listed the plants needed. I picked a pretty-looking butterfly garden, and ordered the plants. After I planted everything, the predictable happened: I started noticing the plants all around me because, surprise surprise, they’re native. Suddenly I saw milkweed everywhere, in the field behind my house, on the side of the road, on the side of every road.

Creating a native plant garden is a lesson in humility, and it will also redefine your idea of what a garden is. For most of us, a garden is a specific, unnatural spot on our property in which we plant a range of flowers and grasses in order to create a specific effect or just make things look pretty. A native plant garden is, well, just a little bit wilder, and if it had a mind of its own probably wouldn’t call itself a garden at all. The words landscape, or naturescape, are probably more accurate. Ideally, a native landscape will blend in with the rest of your yard and make you feel like your whole yard is a garden. (continue reading…)