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Contrary to popular food growing discourse, I’d like to see front lawns replaced with beautiful plants, or replaced with a combination of plants and hardscapes (which, by the way, includes […]

Photo credit: Monrovia Motley Mazus is what Stepables® calls Mazus radicans. Monrovia refers to it as Freckled Mazus. I was introduced to mazus at Little Prince of Oregon, a wholesale […]

Cathaya argyrophylla.  Photo courtesy of Buchholz & Buchholz Nursery I’m thinking a lot about conifers these days, in part because I’m contemplating registering for the American Conifer Society Western Region […]

Dahlia ‘Awe Shucks’ I ran out to Swan Island Dahlias just to get a quick photo to use for the Events page of Random Acts of Gardening. I ended up taking […]

Pistachio Hydrangia In the August issue of Random Acts of Gardening, I wrote about the New Varieties Showcase at the Farwest Show and several plants I was particularly interested in […]

Succulents are becoming some of my favorite plants. I have a lot of shade in my garden so it is challenging for me to use them in my garden beds, […]

According to a June 5, 2012, article in Scientific American titled “Do Plants Think?,” scientist Daniel Chamovitz, Ph.D., suggests plants “see,” “feel,” “smell” and even “remember” in order to survive. […]

Do you like to try the newest and/or more unusual plants in your garden? At this year’s Farwest Show, one of the nursery industry’s largest wholesale trade shows (sorry, it’s […]

“Earth laughs with flowers” is a favorite quote of mine from Ralph Waldo Emerson. If Mother Earth is laughing up/about/with flowers, that should be permission enough to have fun in […]

Usually we have plenty of water in the maritime Pacific Northwest—sometimes we feel like we have too much of it. But during the summer months we live in a Mediterranean […]