Browsing category: My Country Gardens

What Do Bleeding Hearts Look Like When They First Come Up in the Spring?

Reader question… “Last summer I planted bleeding heart roots in one end of my patio garden. I need to clean away the dead leaves and debris but I’m nervous about accidentally pulling the plants up.”


Golden Glow (Rudbeckia laciniata hortensia)

Golden Glow in full bloom are a really impressive sight with their masses of bright yellow flowers. Normally the clumps will be five or six feet tall… this year with all the rain we’ve had, they are even taller than usual… probably very close to eight feet.


What Has Happened to My Rhododendron?

Reader question… “Help! I just noticed that the leaves on my rhododendron bush have changed to a purplish color and are curled into tight little cylinders. This rhododendron was here when we moved to this house and it has always bloomed profusely.”


The “Something” That Has Been Eating Our Cucumbers

Something has been eating our cucumbers. All summer we’ve been finding lots of cucumbers with what looks like small “bites” (but not quite the same) taken off the underside. We thought we might have a mouse or mole problem. We were wrong.


Pulmonaria (Pulmonaria saccharata)

Pulmonaria (Pulmonaria saccharata), also called lungwort, gets its name from pulmo, the Latin word for lung. The name comes from its green spotted leaves, which supposedly look like diseased lungs. There are more than a dozen species of this woodland perennial.


Common Primrose (Primula vulgaris)

Common primroses (Primula vulgaris)… also called English primroses… are very easy to grow. They like partial shade and moist, fertile soil with lots of organic material mixed in.


Money Plant (Lunaria annua)

Money Plant (Lunaria annua) is an easy-to-grow biennial that is called many names, including Dollar Plant, Silver Dollars, Honesty Plant, and Moonwort. This plant grows to just over two feet high and has large, dark green, heart-shaped leaves with pronounced serrated edges.


Bloodroot (Sanguinaria canadensis)

Bloodroot (Sanguinaria canadensis) is an herbaceous perennial and supposedly a common wildflower in New England…


Lamb’s Ear (Stachys lanata)

Lamb’s ear (Stachys lanata) has thick and fleshy ornamental foliage, and after it has been growing in the same spot for a couple of years, it has a tendency to die off in the center, leaving an empty area.


I Think I’ve Already Lost the Foxglove Battle

We have an astonishing number of “volunteer” foxgloves this year. Since these foxgloves are biennials, I guess I’ll have to admit that somebody… and that somebody would be me… must have missed more than a few foxglove seed pods over the years.