When the city has only the colors of brick, slush, and concrete, green is precious. That’s why we plant evergreens. Just about every yard I see has some evergreen tree or shrub. There are tiny tidy boxwoods in pots. There are towering spruces. There are rows and rows of arborvitaes, the go-to plant for privacy […]
In American yards, the default way of covering the soil is grass. You’ll see yards with no trees, no shrubs, no flowers, but there’s nearly always at least a little patch of grass. Very often the grass makes no sense. On city streets with tiny front gardens, shaded by trees and buildings, I’ll often see […]
As I walk my neighborhood in summer, I wonder: Why don’t I see more lilies? They have so much to offer a garden—color, elegance, fragrance. And yet mine is the only yard on my block with visible lilies, and I’m too sun-deprived to have many. Maybe people think that because lilies are elegant, they must […]
I was rushing to plant shrubs on a recent hot day when the heavens opened. Thunder boomed, lightning flashed, rain ran down my neck and dripped off my nose. I kept at it for a while, because gardeners are waterproof and the shrubs desperately needed planting. I’d been putting it off through weeks of June […]
Summer is upon us. The freezing nights of spring are over, and days are warm in the sun. Now my plants and I are facing a different threat: the sun itself. As a shade gardener, I’m always focused on sunlight. Light is a plant’s basic requirement, and in my tree- and building-shaded space, sunshine is […]
Today, in the third week of April, it snowed in Chicago. Temperatures are still falling below freezing at night. Which is why I’m glad I didn’t buy petunias when I saw them for sale, in full bloom, three weeks ago–on April Fool’s Day, appropriately. Petunias, with their ruffly bell-shaped flowers, are popular for summer gardens […]
This is just about my favorite time of year in the garden, because it’s time for wildflowers. They’re blooming in the woods where I take long walks, but they’re also in bloom in my yard. I don’t live in the woods—far from it. Most of my garden grows in the shade between a four-story apartment […]
Many gardeners, stuck inside, are itchy to go shopping. Emails and catalogs arrive daily, the weather’s still too bad to do much outdoors, and nearly a year into the pandemic, you have online ordering developed to a fine art. You’re ordering plants anyway, so why not add a tool or two? It’s worthwhile, though, to […]
The other day I had the rare privilege of being the first human to hike down a woodland trail after a snowfall. It was just me and (to judge by the tracks) foxes, raccoons, deer, rabbits, squirrels, voles, wild turkeys and coyotes. Then I noticed something else against the pristine white: a scattering of seeds, […]
Gardening is a distillation of hope: that seeds will sprout, saplings will survive, rain will come, a plant will bloom as beautifully as the picture in the catalog. It seems right to spread hope through the gift of gardening this holiday season, and there are plenty of easy ways to do it. Get kids started: […]
Winter is settling in. The last roses, which lingered almost until Thanksgiving, have been blasted by a couple of cold nights. Trees are gray and bare, their colorful leaves fallen. The busyness of gardening, such a powerful balm and refuge in this difficult year, has come to an end. All is bare and still. But […]
My neighbor has set up a gigantic, animated witch balloon (Halloween decorating seems to have escalated this year). Meanwhile, I’ve set up a sprinkler. Deep in October, with the first hard freeze due any day, most people are done with gardening, apart from raking leaves. But I’m still busy with the hose. Why on earth? […]
