A plant that flowers in winter has a head start in making it onto any plants lover’s list. This perennial is one that can grow in Kentucky gardens from the knobs and bluegrass to Ohio River, making it a plant for all regions, over a wide range of climates. Despite its common name, Lenten Rose is not a garden rose at all. Continue reading
Category Archives: Flowers
Top Three New Year’s Resolutions for Gardeners
Many people enjoy making New Year’s Resolutions, so I would like to encourage you to make some gardening resolutions. Even those of you who do not typically grow anything can reap benefits from planting something, nurturing it, and watching it grow. It doesn’t have to be a large vegetable garden. A small container garden or raised bed garden will be just fine. Continue reading
Drying Flowers
Drying flowers is a great way to preserve some of summer’s beauty over the long winter months. Whether you are making a keepsake of your memories, or using them for some crafts while cooped up inside, drying flowers can be easy if done right. Consider the following when deciding on a method. Continue reading
Fall Gardening Cleanup Controls Spring Diseases
You can reduce the risk of some common problems next year by getting rid of leftover plant debris in vegetable, flower and fruit gardening areas this fall.
Several disease-causing fungi and bacteria spend the winter on plant debris, and can cause diseases the following growing season. Proper garden sanitation can combat such diseases as early blight, mildews, gray mold fungus and various root rot and wilt problems. Continue reading
Plant Bulbs NOW For Spring Color
Spring flowering bulbs such as crocus, daffodils, and tulips require a cold period during the winter in order to flower. These bulbs are planted and develop their root system in the fall and bloom during the spring. The variety of bloom color, plant height, shape, and timing of flowering provides seasonal interest in the spring for many Kentucky gardens and landscapes. Continue reading
Good Perennials for Beginning Gardeners
When starting a new hobby, there are tools to acquire, techniques to learn and materials to purchase. This is so true for flower gardening. The tools can be as simple as a trowel and a watering hose and as complex as irrigation systems and robotic lawn mowers. But for the beginning gardener, the vast variety of flowers, trees and shrubs can be overwhelming. (It still is for me, and I’ve been gardening for almost 40 years!) Continue reading
Planting Native Flowers for Pollinators
Need a reason to plant more flowers? How does supporting local agriculture, ensuring the availability of healthy fruits and vegetables, and protecting thousands of plant and animal species sound? By planting flowers that sustain pollinators, you are accomplishing all of this, as well as making your yard more attractive. Pollinators, which include bees, butterflies, moths, wasps, hummingbirds, and bats, make reproduction
possible for more than three-fourths of the flowering plants on earth, including many of the fruits and vegetables we eat every day. Continue reading
Forcing Cut Branches For Winter Flowers
Cut branches forced into bloom can help add sunshine to those gloomy winter days and it is not hard to coax many into flower. Branches from cherry, plum, forsythia, quince and viburnums can be forced into blooming and used in arrangements. Continue reading
Preserving Flowers
The gardening season is all but over for most of the landscape plants and flowers. Many avid gardeners who hate to see the growing season go may look for ways to keep it going by taking some of their favorite flowers indoors to keep through the winter until those warm, gardening days come around again. However, many will seek to keep their flowers around during winter months by picking those last vibrant blooms and preserving them by drying. Continue reading
Houseplants Insect and Mite Control
Many houseplants enjoy time outdoors during the summer. However, it’s a tough world out there and more than a few plants develop insect or mite infestations while they are basking in the summer sun. A few weeks indoors can allow pests to increase while the plants adjust to indoor conditions and symptoms become more apparent. Continue reading
Kentucky Hort News 