Gardening With Tony

UNITED STATES—Gardens might be colorful throughout the year here. There is not much time between the latest of the autumn flowers and the earliest of the spring flowers. Winter flowers are glad to compensate for the lapse. Of course, there are plenty of flowers in spring and summer. Nonetheless, dried flowers are more popular now that there are fewer...

UNITED STATES—In milder climates of California, where many of us expect at least a few flowers to bloom right through winter, autumn foliar color and colorful winter berries are not appreciated quite as much as they are where autumn and winter arrive earlier, and are cool enough to prevent lingering bloom. Coincidentally, the same mild weather that allows winter...

UNITED STATES—Concrete is one of the most common of landscape materials. There are probably more landscapes that include concrete of one form or another than there are landscapes that include lawn, and most landscapes include lawn. There are more landscapes that lack shade trees than there are without concrete. We do not notice it much because, once it is...

UNITED STATES—Olive orchards formerly inhabited some of the regions that became urban in California. A few orchard trees remained within urban gardens of the homes that encroached on them. Unfortunately, for those who did not utilize the abundant olives, these trees were horridly messy. Many decades ago, pollarding eliminated the mess without eliminating the trees. Pollarding is extreme pruning that...

UNITED STATES—Too much of a good thing can be a problem. That is why bacon is not one of the four basic food groups. It is why sunny weather gets mixed with a bit of rain. It is why we can not give plants too much fertilizer. Since late last summer or autumn, there has not been much need...

UNITED STATES—Not many of our favorite plants grow like weeds. We must help most of them along, and give them what they want. A few might naturalize and perform well on their own, but if they do too well and become aggressive or invasive, they too become known as weeds. Although we might prefer some of our favorites to...

UNITED STATES—Anyone who has ever owned a cat knows that no one owns a cat. They do whatever they want to do, whenever and however they want to do it. They take orders from no one. If they decide to use a dry spot in the garden as their litterbox, or a tree trunk as their scratching post, it...

UNITED STATES—To those who do not enjoy gardening, the process of planting dormant bulbs must seem to be blatantly unproductive. Those of us who know what we are doing are so dutiful to select the bulbs we want, only to bury them in shallow graves in the garden, with nothing to show for all the effort. Knowing that the...

UNITED STATES—If there are any cool season vegetables left in the garden, they should probably be harvested pretty soon. If left too much longer, they will be ruined by warming weather. Cabbage will bolt (start to bloom) once it realizes that it is spring. Cauliflower and broccoli, which are juvenile flowers, will become bitter as the flowers mature and...

UNITED STATES—Narcissus, daffodil, freesia, snowdrop, snowflake, grape hyacinth, various iris and most other early spring blooming bulbs and bulb like plants should be perennials. We plant them with the hope that they will survive after bloom to bloom for another season, and perhaps for many seasons. Some should multiply to provide more bloom over the years. Bloom is just...