Landscape Design Articles
Deep Shade Plants Tried and True
Deep Shade Plants Tried and True How to Select Plants for Shade Let's look at a handful of plants. Most of these plants can take a little sun but my point is, they can thrive in deep shade which is a difficult area for many homeowners to select plants for....
Hydrangea Love
Hydrangea Love Protecting your plants from intense summer heat in Portland Oregon Here are several lessons in this story for you, O gentle reader...........how to successfully transplant a shrub or tree in July heat, how to prevent leaf and flower scorch damage...
Do it yourself garden design
Do it yourself garden design I really enjoyed working on this Landscape Design in a Day project. Galen did all the measuring and all the work himself (except the concrete patio). This is a great example of what you can do with a plain backyard, some do it yourself...
Heather – The Perfect Low Maintenance Ground Color
Heather is a Must in Your Low Maintenance Landscape Design Look at your landscape right now…Could it use a little ground color? A plant with full season color which prefers full day sun, stays low – think 4 inches tall (never higher) and best of all........has the...
Itoh Peony Low Maintenance Beauty
Itoh Peony - Low Maintenance Beauty and Thrills for All What’s all the fuss about the new Itoh (say it Eeetoe) peony? These new plants eliminate the only weak point of the old fashioned peony, the weak stems which can really spoil the flowers in our often wild and...
Garden Tips: Top 5 Spring Garden Prep Tips
Garden Tips: Top 5 Early Spring Garden Prep Tips Here are my Top 5 garden tips for things to do January to early March: Cut back deciduous (gets dead looking in winter) grasses to 2" tall stubble. Fountain grass, switch grass and japanese silver grass are just 3 that...
Easy Edible Plants: Blueberries
Blueberries very easy edible plants. Blueberries are great for your brain. Did I mention easy? Once your plants are established, the trick to growing blueberries is proper pruning. We want to encourage new growth and to do that, we have to remove some of the old...
Winter Garden Plants that Sizzle with Color
Don't miss seeing the bare stems of witch hazel come alive with bright yellow or red orange flowers. I stopped en route to The Oregon Garden last Saturday to take photos of a field of flowering witch-hazel. I could feel the dozens of hummingbirds working these...
The Best of 2011 showcases Landscape Design In A Day
Check out the Oregonians Best of 2011 which showcases me and Landscape Design in a Day. The article talks about how today's landscape and garden designers do it all.......a carefully conceived plan just has to encompass layout of hardscape and plant materials...
Garden Design Gives Rental Property Added Splash
"Hi Carol, We just rented our former home to our first tenants. They loved the house, all the remodeling we did paid off. We worked so hard to have everything just perfect. But the yard would have been a sad thing without your design and help. Watching the...
Garden Tip: Using Stone in the Garden
I love to work with stone. Placing boulders in a hillside rockery, selecting patio flagstone for a patio, or creating a pathway that weaves through the lawn........stone anchors the design and brings nature to our doorstep. Flagstone versus stepping stone=No contest...
Garden Tip: How to Plant a Big Tree
We probably won't plant a tree this big at your house, but sometimes a really big tree is the answer. If it is, we can do it! The most important thing is to select the right tree. The next is to have it planted by someone else!
Garden Tip: Slug Love
Slug Love Here come Paul and Mary kissing in a tree, K I S S I N G...............Well, slug love is like most other kinds of love and produces little slugs sooner rather than later. Right now they are curling up under your fallen leaves making prospective little...
Garden Tips Planting in Late Fall or Early Winter
Buyer Beware! Watch out for fall discount plants at nurseries or garden stores. When you select plants on the leftover table at nurseries you are running some risks. The top of the pot will be chock full of weed seeds and the roots may well harbor larvae of...
6 Tips to Prep Your Garden for Winter
Winterize your irrigation system. This may mean flushing out an older system, or just draining your drip system. Bait for slugs all through fall and early winter. Don't bait for slugs if you live in the woods, you will kill all the big native slugs who don't even eat...
Holiday Open House at the Portland Audubon
Check out the Portland Audubon gift shop's open house event. It is an EVENT!! They have a big open house on Dec 3 and 4th with all kinds of cool things happening. The gift store manager, Nancy Mattson, scouts the country finding unusual items. As a former event...
Bulbs: Low Maintenance Beauty
Bulbs can be the ultimate low maintenance plant, just pick the right ones and get them out of the garage. (Yes thousands of bulbs selected with great anticipation live and die in the garage.) Please don't feel bad and give up on bulbs. Everyone has done this. Garden...
How to Prune Your Lavender Plants – Best Practice
How to Prune Your Lavender Plants - Best Practice How to Make Your Lavender Last for Ten Years-Prune Twice A Year In late winter, (January and February) pruning lavender is an optimistic and happy task. If you are in on the secret this is when lavender gets the...
Don’t Give Up and Call it Fall
Are you ready for the best time of year? Don't give up yet and call it fall. I am still invested in the soft warmth of the morning sun. I drink my coffee out on the balcony and watch the river birds soar and swirl overhead. This was our Barley Dog's last summer and...
Grafted Tomato Test Results
Ok, so I tested the new grafted tomatoes. I forgot about having too many variables, so I also tested a new potting soil which totally goofed my test. I can tell you though, that the tomatoes in the fancy slow release fertilizer planter did the best. One was a grafted...
