A noun. A verb. A blog.
This summer, I’ve been battling tree-of-heaven (Ailanthus altissima) like never before. We’ve written before about this struggle, but I’ve never seen it keep coming back so aggressively from the root – till now. Ailanthus is an alien species (read more about it in our previous post), that has become a regular citizen of Toronto’s unguarded laneways and unclaimed […]
I’ve given up watching the late-night news. No need to be reminded that the world is going through a bit of a bad patch. Not right before bedtime. And I can’t always be in the garden – the gardener’s happy place, no matter which way we fall on the political divide. Lately, I’ve found refuge in HortusTV, the online garden network, […]
When I first saw the Corona Flex-Dial adjustable pruners I wasn’t sure what to make of the dial on the side. But now having tried it out on some of my first pruning jobs of the year I can say that I love these pruners. I tackled a few shrubs, and old yew, a prickly […]
It doesn’t always happen, but when my review copy of Veggie Garden Remix arrived – the latest garden book by Niki Jabbour – I sat right down and read it. Cover to cover! Jabbour began with a garden best-seller in her Year-Round Vegetable Gardener, which is in something like its eighth or ninth printing now. Her newest is on its way […]
Yes, we publish our own gardener’s journal, but we think there’s room for all of us. Read on and find out how you can win a copy of the new one from B.C. garden writer Donna Balzer and her daughter Chelsie Anderson, The Three-Year Gardener’s Gratitude Journal. Balzer’s journal announces its attitude right from the cover, with fun […]
Odd events can lead us to new passions. A car detour in Pennsylvania to visit the memorial site for the Flight 93 plane in the countryside, was the start of author and gardener Kylee Baumle’s obsession with Monarch butterflies. She and her mother discovered a dead monarch butterfly lying on the ground. Not only did the butterfly […]
I didn’t realize as I hastily took this shot (on my way to our group photo for the Garden Bloggers Fling in Washington D.C.) that I was looking at a clever gardening technique. It simply seemed like a handsome steeple in the sweet spot of a colourful garden. It’s the outer edge of the cutting garden at Hillwood Estate Museum & Gardens, […]
At last! Sunday gave us a day that was springy enough to let us work outside. An afternoon of liberating my pent-up gardener accomplished a lot. But. No matter how eager I was, here are three things I didn’t do to clean up the garden. I didn’t get carried away April 2 in Toronto is a touch early for any drastic garden task […]
We fell in love with she sheds before we knew she sheds were she sheds! That’s the term for the distaff version of a man cave, but in outdoor shed. In 2012, for instance, we showed you Beacher Michelle Blais’ hand-built creation. In 2015, we peeked into an artsy bunkhouse in Port Hope. And, last August, I mused about […]
A while back, I lost it. I mean, really lost it. My garden tool bag, that is. Worse, it held all my best-of-the-best tools, collected over a gardening lifetime. You’d better believe that taught me a thing or few. Like: not to get distracted by a phone call when loading stuff into a car not to lean my tool […]
It may sound hyperbolic, but it’s true. This book has changed my interior landscape. For the better. Since getting my review copy of Tara Heibel and Tassy de Give’s book Rooted in Design last spring, houseplants have been popping up at home all over the place. And, if you read this blog, you know how bad […]
The pesky squirrel problem makes people want to stop planting bulbs. Those darned critters seem to have radar, and know exactly when and where you’ve planted your bulbs – then they dig them up and either eat them, or plant them in someone else’s garden. Grrrrr. But don’t despair. I used to be one of those people, […]