Category Gardening & Landscaping

I installed my first drip irrigation system backwards. I bought a kit at a hardware store, connected it to a…

Companion planting is one of those gardening topics where folklore and science are tangled together so thoroughly that most gardeners…

Most lawns are a fight against the place you live. You plant grass that wants cool, wet weather, then spend…

The first year I started seeds indoors, I grew them on a sunny windowsill and every one of them was…

The first summer I tried to cut back on watering, I killed a third of my yard. Not on purpose.…

Most pruning I see in residential yards is wrong. Not badly intentioned, just wrong. Wrong time of year, wrong cuts,…

Compost happens. That is the first thing to understand. Pile up organic matter, wait long enough, and it turns into…

Soil pH is the number that quietly controls how well your plants feed. You can have perfect soil structure, ideal…

I built my first raised bed from a kit I found online. It was 4×4 feet, 8 inches tall, made…

Most gardeners think of winter as the off-season, the time when the garden is put to bed and the seed…

The phrase “low maintenance” gets abused in landscaping. Every nursery tag says it. Every contractor promises it. Every homeowner wants…

The old approach to fall garden cleanup was simple: cut everything to the ground, bag it up, and leave the…

My first vegetable garden was a complete failure. I tilled up a 10 by 10 foot patch of clay soil…

I lost an entire planting of kale to cabbage worms one summer before I got serious about pest control. I…

If you can take a handful of soil, squeeze it, and it holds the shape of your fist like pottery,…