Category: Home & Garden

Is your garden drooping faster than ice cream on a hot road? When summer hits hard, many plants give up, but some vegetables stay strong and even grow better.

You don’t need to avoid summer gardening. These hardy vegetables can turn your hot, dry yard into a productive space.

Meet the Heat Lovers: 11 Vegetables That Keep Going

I was surprised to learn that some vegetables don’t just tolerate heat; they thrive on it. They grow best when it’s hot.

They’re like the camels of the garden, able to keep producing when others stop.

1. Okra

Okra loves hot and dry weather. The hotter it gets, the more pods you’ll see. Once planted, it needs little care and will keep producing through summer.

2. Sweet Potatoes

While the topsoil heats up, sweet potatoes keep quietly growing below. They can go for long stretches without water once they’re settled. Many gardeners say they taste better when grown in hot weather.

3. Eggplant

Eggplants handle the kind of heat that stops other vegetables. They keep growing when temperatures climb and are often the last summer plant still going strong.

4. Peppers

Both sweet and hot peppers love full sun. Warm weather helps them grow and can deepen and strengthen their flavor.

5. Cherry Tomatoes

Big tomatoes often struggle in high heat, but cherry tomatoes keep producing small, sweet fruit all summer. They’re reliable and steady, even in long, hot spells.

6. Yardlong Beans

These beans grow well in heat and keep producing long pods that sometimes reach impressive lengths. They’re great for trellises or fences and will grow quickly and steadily in hot weather.

7. Malabar Spinach

Not a true spinach, but it fills in when real spinach can’t take the heat. Its thick, leafy vines stay strong through summer and provide steady greens for salads, cooking, or smoothies.

8. Cowpeas (Black-Eyed Peas / Southern Peas)

Cowpeas grow through dry, hot weather and still look fresh when other plants wilt.
They also add nitrogen to the soil, helping improve future plant growth.

9. Armenian Cucumbers

Regular cucumbers quit in high heat, but Armenian cucumbers keep producing crisp fruit. They come from hot regions, so they handle summer sun with ease.

10. Amaranth (Callaloo)

Amaranth gives you leafy greens even in midsummer. Its colorful leaves add beauty to the garden, and it often drops seeds that return next year.

11. Zucchini (Summer Squash)

Zucchini is famous for producing nonstop in warm weather. Give it steady water and room to grow, and you’ll have more than enough to share.

Even heat-loving vegetables will do better with a little support:

• Water in the morning so plants can absorb moisture before the heat rises
• Add mulch (2–3 inches) to help the soil stay cool and hold water
• Give some afternoon shade if the sun is intense
• Plant in mid to late spring so they’re established before the hottest days

Growing in summer isn’t about fighting the heat. It’s about working with plants that like it.

While other gardens might fade by July, yours can stay full and productive.
These vegetables don’t just survive the heat. They grow well because of it.

Start by choosing a few that your family likes. Plant them with good spacing and soil, and soon you’ll be harvesting fresh produce during the hottest months, when grocery prices are often highest.

Summer gardens can be amazing. With these heat-tough vegetables, you’ll still be picking food while others are wondering where their harvest went.

Think it’s too early to plant? Nope. While your neighbors are still holding off for “safe” dates, smart gardeners are already picking their first harvests.

Here’s the real secret: some veggies don’t just tolerate cold soil. They grow even better in it. A few even turn sweeter after a light frost, making that chilly weather a natural flavor boost.

Cold-Weather MVPs That Want To Grow Early

Want your empty spring garden to start producing fast? These hardy vegetables are ready to go while there’s still a chill in the air.

Fun fact: about 85% of these early crops actually prefer cool soil to grow strong roots. Pretty surprising, right?

1. Spinach: The Frost-Defying Powerhouse

Spinach doesn’t just like the cold… it powers through it. It can handle temperatures down to 20°F (-6°C) and still keep growing.

Plant early and let it do its thing. Bonus: spinach started in cold soil is way less likely to bolt later. Huge win.

3. Carrots: Cool Soil Brings Sweet Flavor

Carrots planted in chilly soil build up more natural sugars. Cold nights + cool days = better taste.

Plant 2–3 weeks before your last frost date for the best results.

4. Radishes: Super Fast Growers

Want fast harvests? Radishes can go from seed to plate in just 3–4 weeks when it’s cool.

Most people wait too long to plant them. By then, they’ve already missed the best growing window.

5. Peas: Early and Easy

Peas like a long, cool season. Plant them as soon as you can work the soil, even if there’s still a chance of snow.

They also fix nitrogen, giving your soil a boost while they climb

6. Lettuce: Tender but Tough

Lettuce grows great in early spring. It’s not as coldproof as spinach or kale, but still hardy enough.

Use a simple row cover on cold nights, and it’ll do just fine.

7. Beets: Sweet Roots, Tasty Greens

Beets grow best when they can take their time in cool soil. That’s when they develop their deepest color and sweetest taste.

You even get two harvests: greens above and roots below.

8. Broccoli: It Doesn’t Mind Fros

Broccoli can take temperatures down to 26°F (-3°C). Plant early and you’ll be cutting fresh heads while others are still starting seeds.

9. Onions: Ready Early

Onions aren’t the toughest, but they love those longer spring days to start forming bulbs.

Plant early to help them set strong roots before summer.

Why These Cold-Lovers Outperform Summer Crops

These veggies don’t just survive cold planting. They thrive. Like athletes training in tough weather, they’re built for it.

Their cells hold more natural sugars, which act like antifreeze.

Plant early and you also get:

• Fewer pests
• More garden use. Harvest early, then plant warm-weather crops
• Free spring rain instead of constant watering
• Earlier harvests than people who wait

Your Early Spring Planting Action Plan

Want to stop staring at empty beds? Start here:

• Start now. Don’t wait for perfect weather
• Plant in stages every 1–2 weeks
• Keep row covers nearby
• Water in the morning to avoid cold, wet leaves at night

Your garden can be productive much longer than you think. As someone once told me: “Empty beds are just unused potential.”

These early-spring crops turn cold soil into weeks of fresh food while everyone else is still waiting to plant.

Grab your gloves. Your cold-weather veggies are ready to take off, and your summer-garden friends will be jealous.

Remember when you thought gardening was all about planting pretty things and watching them grow? *raises hand guilty*

I used to drop serious cash on filling flower beds until I discovered the garden world’s best-kept secret: perennials that practically multiply themselves!

Did you know the average gardener can save over $200 annually by dividing perennials rather than buying new plants?

The game-changer for your garden isn’t what you think. It’s not fancy fertilizers or exotic varieties, but these multiplication masters hiding in plain sight.

Nature’s Copy Machine: Why Division Creates Garden Magic

Forget what you’ve heard about difficult plant propagation! Dividing perennials is like getting free plants that are exact genetic copies of your favorites.

Your garden is literally trying to tell you something important: “I want to grow MORE of me!“

When you divide these plants, you’re not just saving money (though that’s a spectacular bonus). You’re actually:

• Rejuvenating aging plants that might be struggling in the middle
• Creating denser, more vibrant flower displays
• Maintaining better plant health and longevity
• Filling bare spots without opening your wallet

The Easy-Dividers: 11 Perennials That Split Like Butter

1. Hostas: The Division Superstar

Hostas are the kindergarten scissors of the plant world. They divide with practically zero effort. Their clumping roots separate as easily as pulling apart a dinner roll.

The difference between amateur and pro plant parents is simply knowing when to divide (early spring or fall) for maximum success.

2. Phlox: The Shallow-Rooted Wonder

I was shocked to discover that phlox roots barely dive below the surface! This makes them absurdly easy to divide.

You can often just use your hands to separate sections. Your reward? A dramatic explosion of colorful blooms that will transform your borders.

3. Peonies: The Long-Term Investment

While peonies may take a year to recover from division, their tuberous roots separate cleanly, and, here’s the kicker, a single divided peony can thrive for another 100+ years! Talk about return on investment.

4. Coneflowers: The Fibrous Multiplier

Coneflowers (Echinacea) practically beg to be divided with their fibrous, forgiving root systems.

Most people make this mistake with their coneflowers: waiting too long to divide them. Split them every 3-4 years for maximum flowering potential.

5. Yarrows: Ground Cover Gold

The secret most plant experts won’t tell you is that yarrows not only divide effortlessly but actually performs better after division.

These low-growing beauties are like the sourdough starter of the garden world. Give some to friends and you’ll still have plenty left!

6. Asters: The Fall-Blooming Dividables

When most gardens start fading, asters bring the party with their vibrant blooms. Their clumping roots make division as simple as slicing a birthday cake, giving you multiple plants that will flourish just when your garden needs color most.

7. Geraniums: Pollinator Paradise

Hardy geraniums (not to be confused with annual pelargoniums) divide with spectacular ease. Their shallow root systems can be teased apart like untangling headphones; bit fiddly but totally doable.

Bonus: bees and butterflies absolutely adore them!

8. Coral Bells (Heuchera): The Foliage Stunner

These shade-tolerant beauties divide like a dream thanks to their surface-hugging crown. With over 50 varieties featuring foliage ranging from purple to lime green, dividing coral bells is like getting a free color palette for your garden’s shadier spots.

9. Blanket Flowers: The Color Explosion

Blanket flowers (Gaillardia) create what I call “color heaven” with their fiery blooms. Their shallow root systems make them easy to divide, like separating pancakes from a stack. One plant can become three in minutes flat!

10. Catmint: The Cat’s Meow

Division doesn’t get easier than with catmint’s cooperative roots. The game-changer with catmint is that division actually revitalizes older plants, transforming leggy, sparse growth into compact, vigorous blooming machines. (And yes, cats do generally love it!)

11. Stonecrop (Sedum): The Drought-Tough Divider

These succulents offer a rainbow of options: pink, purple, crimson, and blue flower clusters.

Their fleshy roots separate with minimal resistance, like pulling apart segments of an orange. Even better? They’re virtually indestructible in the process!

When to Divide: Timing Is Everything

Most of these perennials prefer division in early spring or fall when temperatures are cooler.

This gives them time to establish before the stress of summer heat or winter chill. Think of it like moving into a new house. You’d rather not do it during extreme weather!

Is the simple division technique for most of these plants? Dig up the entire clump, use a clean, sharp knife or spade to cut through the root ball, and replant the sections promptly. Water thoroughly and watch your garden multiply!

Pro tip: Want to ensure success? Divide when plants are just showing new growth but before they’ve invested energy in flowering. Your plants will bounce back like they’ve been to plant therapy!

From One to Many: The Garden That Keeps on Giving

Remember that single hosta you bought three years ago? By now, it could have become five plants through division.

That $15 investment could be worth $75 in plants! Plus, there’s something deeply satisfying about watching your garden expand from its own resources, like compound interest, but with flowers instead of dollars.

So grab your garden spade and start looking at your perennials not just as individual plants, but as future colonies of beauty that will transform your garden from sparse to spectacular, all without opening your wallet again!

Those gardens that seem to bloom nonstop aren’t just lucky. They’re using one simple habit: deadheading.

It’s fast, it’s easy, and it can turn a plain garden into something special. But here’s the surprise: about 40% of common flowers don’t need deadheading at all.

Cutting the wrong ones can be a waste of time and might even slow growth. So let’s keep this simple and focus on where it actually helps.

What Is Deadheading? (Hint: No Grateful Dead Concerts Involved)

Deadheading just means removing old flowers before they turn into seeds.

This tells the plant to invest its energy in more blooms, not in seeds.

Deadheading can:

• Make more flowers
• Keep plants blooming for weeks longer
• Stop plants from spreading where you don’t want them
• Keep your garden tidy

Plus, it’s a calm, enjoyable garden task.

7 Flowers That Really Want Deadheading

These flowers respond fast and strongly when you remove old blooms:

1. Petunias: The Ultimate Deadheading Success Story

Most people let old petunia blooms hang around. Without deadheading, petunias go from full and lovely to thin and messy. Take off old blooms and you’ll get more flowers nonstop.

Think of petunias like long-distance runners. Your deadheading gives them what they need to keep going.

2. Zinnias: The Gift That Keeps on Giving

Some people don’t know zinnias can bloom from early summer until frost with regular deadheading.

Their strong stems make it simple: just snap off old blooms at the next stem. You’ll get a steady color until cold weather arrives.

3. Geraniums (Pelargoniums): The Neat Ones

Geraniums hold on to old brown blooms like little dry flags. Deadhead often, and they’ll keep making flowers instead of seeds. Both zonal and ivy types respond well.

4. Marigolds: Bloom Machines in Disguise

Deadheaded marigolds can make up to 3 times more flowers than untouched ones!

Removing old blooms also helps stop mildew, which can be a problem. They’re like cars; simple routine care keeps them running well.

5. Cosmos: The Delicate Divas

These fine, airy flowers look delicate but bloom strongly when deadheaded.

You can often pinch blooms off with your fingers. Give them this little bit of care and they’ll bloom through hot weather.

6. Coneflowers (Echinacea): Two-in-One Plants

Deadhead early for the most flowers. Then choose: keep cutting for more blooms, or leave seed heads for birds in fall and winter.

It’s like having a blooming plant and a bird feeder in one.

7. Blanket Flower (Gaillardia): The Comeback Kings

When blanket flowers start looking rough, they’re telling you, “Please deadhead!”

Take off old blooms, and they quickly come back with bright new ones. For the best show, deadhead often. They bounce back fast.

5 Self-Sufficient Flowers That Say “Don’t Touch My Blooms!”

Knowing when not to prune is just as useful. These flowers handle their own cleanup:

1. Impatiens: Self-Cleaning Pros

Impatiens drop old blooms by themselves. No deadheading needed. They keep flowering without help.

2. Begonias (Most Types): The Low-Maintenance Beauties

Most begonias, especially tuberous and wax types, clean themselves.

They drop old blooms and stay nice on their own. They’re like teens who do their chores without being asked.

3. Vinca (Periwinkle): The “Hands Off” Perennial

Vincas don’t need deadheading. Trying to do it might even slow their blooming.

A heads-up: in many places, vinca spreads easily and can become invasive. Plant carefully.

4. Lobelia: The “Less Is More” Flowerer

Lobelias clean itself well. If they get too long or thin, give them a light trim instead of picking off each bloom.

Think of it like a quick haircut rather than plucking a bunch of individual hairs.

5. Sweet Alyssum: Best With a Trim

Instead of picking blooms one by one, sweet alyssum responds great to a simple trim halfway down.

Simple Deadheading Tips

This light cut makes them bloom again in just a week or so.

• Mornings are best. Plants are happy and firm
• Sharp scissors or pruners make cleaner cuts
• Remove blooms once they fade, before they make seeds
• Throw old blooms in compost or trash, not under plants
• Cut just above a leaf or stem fork for better regrowth

Your first tries may feel awkward, like writing with your other hand. But stick with it!

Soon you’ll know exactly where to cut and how much to take. Your plants will show clear results, and your garden will look better than ever.

The Bottom Line: Deadhead Smarter, Not Harder

Deadheading is a simple way to get more blooms, longer color, and a neat garden. Focus on the plants that benefit from it, and let the self-cleaning ones handle themselves.

Just a few minutes here and there can turn short bloom time into months of flowers. Grab your pruners. Your plants are ready to show off.

Globally, cities are expanding. By 2050, more than two-thirds of the population is expected to live in urban areas. This growth increases the demand for green spaces, prompting people to find creative ways to incorporate nture into a limited footprint. At the same time, awareness of native plants’ importance is on the rise. Driven by this need and curious about the outcomes, I took on the challenge of discovering to what extent native plants can successfully be grown in containers. With a mix of enthusiasm, trial and error, and plenty of sweat, I discovered what works best—often through unexpected lessons along the way.

Gardening in a major city

As an urban botanist based in Chicago, my encounters with wild plants are often limited to the same aggressive species pushing through sidewalk cracks or the predictable selection of ornamental plants in city gardens. While I appreciate the resilience of dandelions, the summer displays of impatiens, and even the fiery red of burning bushes in the fall, I know native plants can offer so much more. Determined to bring biodiversity to my own urban space, I transformed my small 5×10 balcony into a haven for native Illinois prairie species—an experiment driven by curiosity, a love for plants, and the challenge of growing them in pots year after year. With little guidance available on overwintering natives in containers, I had to select pots that could withstand Chicago’s harsh freeze-thaw cycles, experiment with different soil compositions, and carefully choose species that could thrive in a limited space.

Overwintering Results

Over 15 years, I’ve learned which native plants survive best in pots, which struggle, and which ones flourish beyond expectations. Species with fibrous roots or rhizomes, like certain asters and sedges, tend to overwinter well, while tap-rooted plants often struggle. I’ve also found that “nurse” plants, like Carex species, help stabilize soil and protect more delicate neighbors. Some of my standout performers include nodding onion (Allium cernuum, Zones 4–8), partridge pea (Chamaecrista fasciculata, Zones 3–9), and aromatic aster (Symphyotrichum oblongifolium, Zones 3–8), while overachievers like wild columbine (Aquilegia canadensis, Zones 3–8) and stiff goldenrod (Oligoneuron rigidum, Zones 3–9) are great for beginners.

Overachievers:

I would recommend these plants for first-time growers. All were overall really robust and will thrive even with occasional neglect.

• Wild columbine (Aquilegia canadensis, Zones 3–8)
• Lanceleaf coreopsis (Coreopsis lanceolata, Zones 4–9)
• Stiff goldenrod (Oligoneuron rigidum, Zones 3–9)
• Giant Solomon’s seal (Polygonatum commutatum, Zones 3–7)
• Heath aster (Symphyotrichum ericoides, Zones 3–10)
• New England aster (Symphyotrichum novae-angliae, Zones 4–8)

Favorite top performers:

In total, there are 23 plants that made my top-performers list. Here, I will keep the selection brief and highlight some of my favorites. Let me know in the comments if you’d like a deeper dive on this topic and my full list of recommendations.

• Partridge pea (Chamaecrista fasciculata, Zones 3–9) reseeds and attracts wonderful pollinators.
• Nodding onion (Allium cernuum, Zones 4–8) is a reliable performer. The city of Chicago gets its name from the Algonquin Indian name for this plant, chigagou, so Chicagoans can have a little extra pride growing this native.
• Spotted beebalm (Monarda punctata, Zones 3–8) self-seeds easily and produces a wonderful display. It also attracts some amazing wasps.
• Sand phlox (Phlox bifida, Zones 4–8) and wild blue phlox (P. divaricata, Zones 3–8) are two of many phloxes that are amazing and worth the effort.
• Aromatic aster (Symphyotrichum oblongifolium, Zones 3–8) is not too aggressive and has amazing fall color.

Favorite good performers:

This list is longer—31 native plants altogether. These are all wonderful, but there were small issues that left them off the top-performers list. Either they did not do well every year or were a messier plant to deal with, but that does not mean they aren’t worth buying and potting up. Here were my favorites from that list:

• Anise hyssop (Agastache foeniculum, Zones 4–8) is almost a top performer but is messy and big. However, pollinators love it, and it also self-seeds nicely.
• Canada anemone (Anemone canadensis, Zones 3–8) is a bit aggressive but produces a nice display.
• Harebell (Campanula rotundifolia, Zones 3–6) is a little messy but so beautiful.
• Prairie clover (Dalea spp., Zones 3–8) can create such great displays but does not always overwinter well.
• Fringed loosestrife (Lysimachia ciliata, Zones 3–9) was a surprise. The color and floral display are wonderful, but it can also be aggressive.
• Starry campion (Silene stellata, Zones 5–8) has fantastic flowers, but it did struggle at times.
• Large-flowered bellwort (Uvularia grandiflora, Zones 4–9) is a personal favorite that lived many years but did not always flower.

Conclusion

Despite setbacks, this ongoing experiment has proven that native plants can thrive in containers, providing vital habitat for pollinators and adding beauty to even the smallest urban spaces. My hope is that by sharing my success, more city dwellers will be inspired to bring native plants into their own lives, creating richer, more sustainable urban landscapes.

Find more information on growing native plants in the Midwest:

Discuss this article or ask gardening questions with a regional gardening expert on the Gardening Answers forum.

And for more Midwest regional reports, click here.

Jeremie Fant is the Director of Conservation at the Chicago Botanic Garden in Glencoe, Illinois. He has been testing different native plants in containers for over 15 years.

Photos: Jeremie Fant

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Organo Republic 16 Perennial Wildflower Seeds Mix for Indoor & Outdoors

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Premium 16 Perennial Wildflower Seeds Mix – Special Garden Flower Seeds Blend designed for planting indoor & outdoors across North America. With over 16 varieties and 100,000 wildflower seeds, this mix is the best solution to attract pollinators – bees, butterflies & birds are essential for garden plants health. Our Special Perennial Wildflower Seeds Mix Includes White Yarrow, Columbine, New England Aster, Siberian Wallflower, Shasta Daisy, Lance-Leaf Coreopsis, Sweet William, Purple Coneflower, Blanketflower, Gayfeather, Blue Flax, Lupine, Dwarf Evening, Primrose, Mexican Hat, Prairie Coneflower, Black Eyed Susan. Easy & Fun Growing Experience with our online guides – Don’t plant disappointment – Add more colors to your wildflower garden! We send only super hearty heirloom flower seeds with the highest germination rate and fast sprout. Our detailed growing guide helps you grow seeds the garden of your dream like a PRO. Colorful Wildflower Garden from Seeds – Grow wildflowers everywhere – Indoor in window garden or Outdoors Flower garden Garden make a beautiful design for your garden borders, pathways, field or meadow and attract pollinators. Made in the USA by Small Family-Owned Business – Quality You Can Trust – Our wildflower bulk seeds variety pack are tested at the highest germination rates before being sealed to last for up to 3 years before you need to plant. Each packet of our flower seeds variety pack is resealable to make it easy to store and has its own label with a QR code for the growing instructions.

Planting in a Post-Wild World: Designing Plant Communities for Resilient Landscapes

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Featuring gorgeous photography and advice for landscapers, Planting in a Post-Wild World by Thomas Rainer and Claudia West is dedicated to the idea of a new nature—a hybrid of both the wild and the cultivated—that can nourish in our cities and suburbs.

BESIDES THEIR native-heavier plant palette and looser style, ecologically designed landscapes have another difference: The way we maintain them is not the same as with more traditional, ornamentally-focused gardens.

I’m asked again and again by gardeners who have planted a meadow-like area or some other habitat-inspired, naturalistic feature about how to handle its aftercare: about what to do when the picture changes a couple of years down the road and thereafter—when the balance of the plants in their design starts to shift, and there’s too much or too little of something for their liking, or when some unwanted weedy elements find their way in.

I sought some hands-on advice from Dan Wilder, who manages native plantings professionally on thousands of acres of conserved natural lands, and also on his own home-garden scale.

Dan Wilder is a longtime native plant expert, and the director of Applied Ecology for the nonprofit Norcross Wildlife Foundation in Massachusetts, an 8,000-acre sanctuary. He is also a board member of the Ecological Landscape Alliance, a leader in promoting sustainable approaches to the landscape to professionals and gardeners alike.  With Mark Richardson, Dan co-authored the book “Native Plants for New England Gardens.”

Note: I inserted some subheadings below so you can zero in on his tips about topics like how different soil prep methods affect the outcome of a meadow, or tackling woody invasives in a meadow, or how to simulate the effect of fire (the natural editor of native landscapes).

editing an ecological planting, with dan wilder

Margaret Roach: I’ve missed talking to you, Dan, and I think of you each time somebody calls me up, as I said in the introduction, and asks me one of those questions. Because with these more naturalistic plantings that a lot of us are excited about incorporating into our landscapes and shifting part of our lawn over to or whatever, even familiar horticultural terms like weeding aren’t exactly the same as they were with our hostas and daffodils [laughter]. Do you know what I mean?

Dan Wilder: Oh, sure, definitely. I mean, we could spend the next hour if we want to, just trying to figure out what a weed is. I mean this, it’s a very kind of personal choice, and so it makes it a really hard kind of decision when you give someone the heads up, “Hey, just go weed that area.” It really doesn’t mean anything. It’s complicated.

Margaret: And I think the other thing is that for a lot of us, we maybe say if it’s a “meadow” or meadow-style planting or some mixture of herbaceous plants, we see the picture on the package or where we purchased the seeds or something like that, and it’s one moment in time that’s being portrayed, right? It’s not the whole life of that planting. And in the mix, or the various ingredients we plant, there’s plants that are annuals and there’s plants that are biennials and there’s plants that are perennials [laughter], and there’s some that live a long time and there’s some that don’t live very long and it’s going to evolve, isn’t it?

Dan: Yes, absolutely. I mean, if you take a meadow as a really good example, a one-year meadow is completely different from a three-year meadow, a five-year meadow, a 10-year meadow. And even that, once you hit whatever stride you’re going to hit at 10 years, a dry year versus a wet year versus the trees on the edges kind of overgrowing it—so many factors can really make this area change on a regular basis. And sometimes for the better, and sometimes it’s a challenge, but it’s a very dynamic system.

One of the running jokes that we tend to say a lot of times is the Northeast meadow is just another name for “not yet forest,” and I think anyone who’s grown a meadow or a meadow planting realizes that if you just don’t do anything to a meadow, eventually it’s shrubs and trees and no longer a meadow. These are dynamic landscapes.

Margaret: Succession, as the hit television show or whatever: succession [laughter]. That’s what we’re watching unfold in front of us is the process of succession where different plants join the community and then begin to dominate the community.

Dan: Yeah. And with those plants and those different stages comes different wildlife. And different wildlife that take advantage of that one-year or the three-year or the 10-year meadow, or getting into those youngest forest stands that we’ll call early successional or thicket habitat, that kind of period where it’s really hard to define if it’s still a meadow or if it’s a forest, yet you get different wildlife at every different stage of this process.

Margaret: So you’ve worked in—as I said in the introduction—at Norcross, you’ve worked in thousands of acres of natural lands, and you’ve also worked on your own home-garden scale, and you worked elsewhere before that in the native plant world. What are the lessons that you take home as the home gardener, when you go to try to figure out how to “weed” or “edit” or I don’t even know what word to use [laughter]? When you manage your home plantings, what are some of the aha’s you’ve had ,or what are some of the things that we want to tell people about guidance and so forth that are front of mind for you?

Dan: Yeah, I tend to start pretty broad, and then narrow down as I go, as I think through these concepts. For me, the first question I ask folks, and this includes myself when I’m in an area, is what is my goal? What am I trying to accomplish?

And then even a little bit more narrow than that is what is my goal for this site? For this area I’m standing in? I mean because even at my home-gardener scale, I’ve got the veggie garden that’s right outside of my back door, and then I’ve got the kind of slightly more wild kind of what I think of as my woody garden where I’ve got things like blueberries and raspberries and those sort of still cultivated, but a little more kind of less managed areas. And then I’ve got my area I think of as my kind of back lot, which is not unmanaged, but is nothing like a vegetable garden.

So your goals are obviously very important, but your goals are going to shift drastically depending on where you’re standing. And I see that at Norcross, too. I have thousands of acres. You don’t manage thousands of acres in any sort of monolithic way.

Every area kind of gets a whole new set of goals. There are general ones—for me it’s wildlife, it’s habitat, it’s native species. Those are kind of the really broad goals that don’t normally change drastically, but the kind of specifics of the site can really vary greatly from area to area. And I think when people start looking at it that way, you realize that common milkweed [Asclepias syriaca] might be an ally for me in one of my more kind of naturalistic meadows, but maybe doesn’t belong in my vegetable garden. And looking at specific areas can make a big difference.

Margaret: So common milkweed you just cited because it is an enthusiastic grower; it will take up a lot of space. It’s a tough one. I hear that a lot about certain goldenrods. People are like, “Oh, my whole meadow is becoming goldenrods.” People are panicking and they want to know what to do, and that and milkweed are two of the ones I hear a lot about among herbaceous things.

Dan: Certainly, and thinking about these kind of site-specific goals, I have certain meadows where if roughleaf goldenrod, which I think of as the most vigorous goldenrod out there, I have some meadows where if rough-leaf goldenrod [Solidago rugosa] started taking over the meadow, I would consider that such a success. It would be rough-leaf goldenrod in place of the mugwort [Artemisia vulgaris] that my meadow currently looks at.

I have other areas where if rough-leaf goldenrod started taking over, I’d be managing it out because I’d be worried it would be outcompeting the showy goldenrod [Solidago speciosa] and the bird’s foot violet [Viola pedata, below]. And this is the same plant in areas that are really not too far away, but it is very specific to what I’m trying to accomplish in that area.

And I think this is where editing really starts to make sense as kind of our choice of word, because it really does become a choice of the individual, and of the landscape. And you’ve really got to not always do what the landscape tells you, but you sure ought to listen to it before you make up your own mind.

Margaret: And again, boiling it down to the home-garden scale, if too much of that milkweed or too much of that aggressive goldenrod starts to poke its head up [laughter] and take up territory, what is the intervention method? That’s the other thing. As I said before, it’s like among my hostas, I know how to pull a weed. But weeding here, am I opening up soil and bringing up more weed seeds from the seed bank beneath—the sort of hidden supply? Am I going to make more trouble?

What do I do? Do I mow? I mean, I know you have a lot of expertise in burning, for instance, a more traditional method. How do you know what to do when you encounter one of these? Is that the next step, after you’ve decided what your goal for that area, is to know tactically?

Dan: Yes, I think it is, but I think even before you get into what to do for it, you got to look again at what you’re trying to accomplish in terms of that specific species. So let’s say you’ve got that rough-leaf goldenrod showing up. Are we trying to make the goldenrod go away entirely? Are we trying to remove it, or are we trying to simply knock it back so that we can keep the diversity of other species kind of up there? And a lot of time that comes down to the difference between say a weedy native species versus an invasive species appearing in the meadow. When mugwort shows up, I try and make it go away, end stop. When rough-leaf goldenrod comes up, more often than not, I want it there and I want it to stay. I just want to see less of it.

And that’s where I find that instead of kind of weeding it out in the traditional sense, as in grabbing it by the stem and pulling it out or uprooting it comes in, I am more often finding myself going into a kind of…I’m going for cutbacks. I’m getting in there and kind of cutting this thing back with the goal of not really disturbing the soil as much, but really knocking the plant back.

I’ve got a wet meadow that I work in where rough-leaf goldenrod is quite vigorous and we’ve got a population of fringed gentian [Gentianopsis crinita] that we are trying to kind of manage for. And we will go into that meadow usually twice a year with brushcutters, and we will just go after the big, fat, chunky kind of populations of rough-leaf goldenrod, and we’ll just hit them with the brushcutter and cut them down to size. We don’t actually try and remove them, but by doing that, all the plants around them all of a sudden have this new competitive edge in that they’re getting the sun, and the rough-leaf goldenrod isn’t, because it doesn’t have any leaves left.

And it starts to really kind tip the balance against the species that you’re trying to kind of edit down. And I find it takes a lot less effort from me to kind of get into that area with a brushcutter and just start hitting the big patches of rough-leaf goldenrod. I can do that whole meadow in a matter of an hour and that’s one person on a pretty large meadow, and it’s very doable.

If I was actually trying to remove that plant or weed it out by hand or even go after every rough-leaf goldenrod I saw versus just those big chunky patches, that’d be a matter of a week. So I try and really kind of go for the least amount of effort for the highest gain, and in this case I find cutting back is really effective. [Below, selective cutting at Norcross.]

Margaret: Preston Montague, a landscape designer in the Southeast-

Dan: He’s great.

Margaret: He’s great, and he loves his string trimmer for that. He’ll go in and edit out—not dig out, but do what you just said: zap them, the unwanted. He’ll do his editing with the string trimmer, and give the plants around it, as you just said, more of the light and the room to take advantage, and the undesirables are not photosynthesizing. And he finds that to be an effective tactic and like you said; very quick, relatively speaking, and less laborious.

Dan: Yeah, yeah, I agree with him wholeheartedly. I think I might shift the string trimmer to more of one of those kind of star-bladed sort of brushcutter heads. I like those a little bit more. It gives me the option of letting things go a little further without having to worry about the string not doing the job. That, and I tend to trying to reduce the plastic in the garden when I can and the metal heads are great to work with.

tackling woody invaders in a meadow

Margaret: Yeah. O.K., so that’s one example. What about when it’s a woody thing that comes into my meadow? I have a lot of blackberry or raspberry or something, Rubus.

Dan: Sure. Again, we’ve got to define our locations, but sometimes I’ll do the same thing I just described: Get in there with that metal-head brushcutter and just go through things individually. But when we start looking at larger meadows, and especially blackberry being a common example, a standard kind of mowing can really do a lot. And if you time it right and kind of do it correctly. It can really favor the plants you want to favor.

Let me give you some more specifics. Assuming you’ve got a larger meadow, I joked before that a meadow is just another name for not yet forest [laughter]. The more often you mow that meadow, the more it’s going to favor the herbaceous spectrum. And even taking that further, if you mow it more and more often as in on an annual basis or even more, you’re going to favor the shorter-lived herbaceous spectrum. And the less often you mow it, the more you’re going to favor the longer-lived plants, and this ends up being our woody species.

So if you mow a meadow every single year, you’re really not going to have any woody species to deal with. Every time they start growing in there, the mower’s going to knock them down and they’re really never going hit that competitive edge. I don’t particularly like mowing a meadow annually. I like to kind of spread my mowings out, but we can use the exact same concept.

Oftentimes what we do is we look at the kind of meadow and instead of saying we need to mow it every year, or every three years, we look at the meadow and say, do we need to mow this meadow? Are there pine trees that are starting to come up to size? Am I seeing that blackberry that’s starting to spread into areas where I’ve got a lot of cool herbaceous plants I’m trying to favor? When I start seeing that, I’ll break out the mower and I’ll go ahead and mow.

I often try and kind of mow the meadow in sections over a period of several years, so that especially if it’s a larger meadow, I can leave sections of it standing for two or three years and be mowing other sections, kind of working my way across the meadow. The general rule is for a large meadow: Mow a third of it every year, and that means it takes you three years to mow the full meadow, but it’s this kind of one-third process that always leaves two-thirds of the meadow standing. That’s got the great advantage of leaving a lot of wintering wildlife habitat up.

It also allows you to kind of see the meadow throughout different stages. You’ll have a one-year mowed, a two-year mowed, and a three-year mowed section, and you can kind of see what’s working for you.

If you’ve got the time and the ability to, I will not mow the edges of my meadow nearly as often, and that’s where I will kind of specifically go in there with that kind of handheld brushcutter, because I often like to let the shrubs grow a little bit more thickly and larger kind of on the edges. I’m looking for the center of the meadow being more of your standard meadow kind of, dominated by herbaceous plants, and these edges having, for me, it’s often highbush blueberries, hazelnuts, serviceberries, spiraeas—and these are plants that I will favor on the edges.

You often hear this referred to as a soft edge, which can sometimes be the most beneficial part of the meadow from kind of a habitat point of view or an ecotone point of view. But that again comes down to your goals and your goals for the site and your time, because maintaining that soft edge does take more time and effort than just a general mow. And when we started looking at large areas, you kind of have to pick and choose your battles.

simulating the effect of fire

Margaret: Yeah, and as I said before, you, because you’re working in large areas, you’re able to use nature’s traditional method. You’re able to use fire in some cases, controlled burns, to manage some of these areas, and we can’t necessarily do that in our home landscapes, but fire, there’s lessons from it that you’ve taken, I assume that we’ve interpreted from it, yes?

Dan: Oh, certainly. I mean it’d be unrealistic to tell everyone to go out and burn their landscape, although I’ve been surprised at how applicable it is sometimes on a smaller scale for certain individuals. I learned to burn landscapes through a guy who pretty much took me to his place and burned his front yard and then his backyard. Not exactly a common situation, but he had the skill to do it.

But we’ve learned a lot; fire is a much more kind of delicate tool in terms of picking and choosing species on the landscape than I ever first thought it would be when I got into it. And it makes sense now that I look back at it. It’s not the fire that’s picking as much as it’s the plants and the animals that have adapted to live with it.

So when you put fire on the landscape, you have certain species that really thrive and other species that don’t. So for us, fire often is put into these landscapes where we have these kind of unique and often rare fire-adapted species. We usually hear to these referred to as barrens—pitch pine barrens is kind of the classic example, but you’ll find heath dominated landscapes with blueberries and such, or grasslands with little bluestem [Schizachyrium scoparium], big bluestem [Andropogon gerardi], other species like that. A lot of these are fire-adapted landscapes, and we can take these lessons and bring them into our own landscape. Fire is disturbance on the landscape, and I actually manage at least one area that is a fire-adapted landscape that we can’t burn. And we go in there with our brushcutters and we kind of pretend we’re fire for the day.

What we do with that is we’ll go in and we’re brushcutting, and we are cutting white pine and we’re cutting birch and we’re cutting species that we know don’t respond well to fire and we’re cutting them hard. And the blueberries and the pitch pine and the oaks that we see are generally left behind, and though we are not fire, we are kind of pretending we are. And what we’re trying to do is recreate what would’ve happened if it were fire running through the landscape, where the pitch pine and the oak and then a lot of these little bluestem is perfectly adapted and will either survive the fire or bounce back from it readily, where the white pine and the birch, they’re more adapted to just growing quickly and not necessarily responding well to a disturbance like fire. [Above, a meadow managed at Norcross by pretending to be fire with mowing. Below, a mesic site managed by editing with brushcutters.]

how site prep affects the outcome

Margaret: Interesting. When you’ve been doing various plantings in your home landscape, native plantings and so forth as well as the looser, wilder areas, is the way that you prepare like when we transition, say, an area of lawn to something more diverse, also going to help or hurt what’s going to happen later? I mean, is that also a part of it: how well we prepare?

Dan: Yes. Absolutely. And this is—I don’t want to be a broken record here—but coming back to what is your goal for the site? Let’s take that lawn as an example. If my goal is, let’s say we’re going to kill the lawn and plant a meadow of sorts. Am I planting a rich, diverse meadow? In which case I might want to smother my lawn. I want to keep that organic matter on site. I want to be able to kind of really encourage this rich, diverse meadow that I might see in say, one of my more mesic sites.

Or am I trying to create a sandplain grassland, something where it’s little bluestem-dominated, maybe some blueberries, probably a lighter plant spectrum, but perhaps associating with a kind of higher diversity of certain types of wildlife? If that were my goal, then I would probably get in there with a sod cutter and remove that lawn and remove the organic matter, and I want a thin soil. The advantage to that is that there’s a limited number of plants that will grow in there, and that also includes the invasive species that don’t do so well in those conditions.

So how you prepare your site and how much material you left on site, how much disturbance you do to the soil, those are all going to affect the future of that landscape. It’s where sometimes you just get out there and start getting to work on the landscape and seeing what the landscape responds to. And this is often necessary when you’re working in areas that have been manipulated for a long, long period of time and they’re not really giving you those clues as to what they kind of want to be anymore.

But if possible, what I like to do is get onto the landscape, take a look at what’s growing there already: What’s doing well, what’s doing poorly, what can I learn from the clues on the landscape? And then take those clues and try and figure out what would do well here that would also support my personal goals.

If I’m trying to grow food in a really thin soil, then I’ve either got a lot of compost to bring in, or maybe I want to grow blueberries that actually do well in thin soils, versus am I trying to put on a show and do something really floriferous and beautiful, in which case whether you’ve got a thin soil or a rich kind of mesic soil, you’ve got options. You can really kind of pick and choose.

One of the real big things that I kind of think a lot about these days is soil disturbance. If the soil has not been disturbed historically, then I’d like to keep it that way. I’m not going to till and dig as heavily in untouched soil as I would in say an old farm site, because that often tends to lead to more challenges that you have to work with.

Really this is the theme of the day: What are your goals and what are your goals for that site, and let that really help to guide you. That also means that some weeds are not weeds, depending on where you’re looking [laughter], which is really nice. It’s nice to call a common milkweed an ally and say, I don’t have to work against this plant.

Common violet is I think my best example of that. I spent years in the hort industry being told violet is a weed and weeding it out of gardens, and it is absolutely one of my favorite. I don’t think I could call it a weed anymore, but let’s jokingly call it my favorite weed. It’s a lovely little plant that really doesn’t deserve to be weeded out. I’ve never seen a take over anything. It’s just always an ally and I don’t really know why I spent a decade weeding it. [Below, common blue violet, V. sororia.]

Margaret: I just wanted to ask, besides the violet, are there any others? I mean the other day we were emailing and you showed me an incredible native lily that I’d never seen. Anything else that you want us to be on the alert for that you’re particularly in love with at the moment besides your violets and that lily; I can’t remember the species of lily, I’m sorry.

Dan: Yeah, that was wood lily [Lilium philadelphicum]. It’s a lily for the dry kind of barrens communities. You tend to think of lilies and wet sites. They mostly are, but that one was an upland lily.

Let me give you a few of my favorite plants that I was once taught were weeds that I think people should take a second look at, because I think that’s a really kind of applicable example. We talked about the common violet. That’s a great one. The American self-heal sometimes called heal-all, Prunella vulgaris, a lovely species. I believe we’ve talked about that one before.

I would also say that if you are the sort of person who says goldenrods are weeds, I would tell you to look deeper into the different species of goldenrods and realize that some of them certainly can be considered weeds and some of them are phenomenal garden plants, and they’re not all the same.

That is certainly true for the goldenrods as well as the asters. There’s some lovely ones, there’s some weedy ones. Pick and choose which ones belong on your landscape.

Same story for milkweed. I think most people are more familiar with common milkweed versus butterfly milkweed, but if you’re not familiar with the fact that there’s different milkweeds around, go get to know them. They are absolutely lovely.

Margaret: Yes, yes, yes.

Dan: And one final one, just to throw a woody into the mix: Our native steeplebush, Spiraea tomentosa, is a plant that can grow in gardens, it can grow in wild places. It can be a meadow plant as a woody species. It’s a great meadow plant. It could be a part of a wooded edge. As ageneral rule I was told is that the native spiraeas just don’t have much compared to the Asiatic species. I think I can flip that around these days. Nothing wrong with the Asiatic ones. They’re actually quite lovely, but the native ones are just as nice and they don’t get the same level of credit. So go check out steeplebush.

Margaret: Some good how-to and some plant recommendations from Dan Wilder. Thank you for making time today to talk about this, and I hope it won’t be as long between conversations as it has been this time. Thanks, Dan.

Dan: Thank you so much, Margaret. Reach out anytime. It’s always a pleasure.

(All photos courtesy of Dan Wilder; used with permission.)

prefer the podcast version of the show?

MY WEEKLY public-radio show, rated a “top-5 garden podcast” by “The Guardian” newspaper in the UK, began its 16th year in March 2025. It’s produced at Robin Hood Radio, the smallest NPR station in the nation. Listen locally in the Hudson Valley (NY)-Berkshires (MA)-Litchfield Hills (CT) Mondays at 8:30 AM Eastern, rerun at 8:30 Saturdays. Or play the Nov. 3, 2025 show using the player near the top of this transcript. You can subscribe to all future editions on iTunes/Apple Podcasts or Spotify (and browse my archive of podcasts here).

A greenhouse offers exactly what many rodents are looking for: stable temperatures, shelter, and a dependable supply of food in the form of seeds, roots, and tender new growth.

When conditions outdoors become less predictable, particularly in fall and winter, it’s common for mice and rats to move in.

They can uproot seedlings overnight, dig through carefully prepared trays, and make short work of stored bulbs or bags of soil amendments.

They also reproduce quickly, which means a small problem can become a significant one in little time.

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Most of the activity happens out of sight. Rodents are primarily nocturnal, so you rarely see them in the greenhouse during the day. Instead, you notice the evidence.

A tray of starts looks disturbed, a row of seedlings has vanished, or you find shredded leaves and paper tucked into a corner.

The sooner this evidence is recognized, the easier it is to intervene.

The goal is straightforward: reduce what attracts these pests, close off the ways they enter, and remove any that are already inside.

Signs of Rodent Activity

The animals most likely to take up residence inside a greenhouse are house mice and rats. Both will readily eat seeds, young stems, roots, and stored crops.

They’re agile, persistent, and opportunistic. Mice can pass through openings smaller than a quarter inch wide, and rats are strong enough to chew through wood, plastic, and thin metal if they have time.

Voles may also appear in greenhouses built directly on soil, particularly where there are existing tunnels in surrounding beds.

They enter at ground level and feed on root systems and bulbs rather than exposed plant tops.

Chipmunks, squirrels, and groundhogs can cause noticeable damage outdoors, but they are rarely long-term residents inside the structure.

They may come and go, nibbling and doing damage.

Signs of rodent presence include:

• Soil that looks scraped or pushed aside
• Seedlings disappearing in neat, tidy bites rather than collapse
• Small, dark droppings along shelves or corners
• Shredded material like paper, plastic, or dried leaves formed into a nest
• Piles of seeds or nuts collected in pots, trays, or tool bins

Mice are diligent hoarders. If you find a cache, the greenhouse is not simply a place they’ve visited, it’s where they’ve taken up residence.

Recognizing the activity is only the first step.

It’s the end of the gardening season, or at least it’s starting to slow down. It’s the perfect time to reflect on what has done well in your own home landscape but also to look around for some new plants that you want to grow in your garden next year. These could be larger investment plants, such as trees or shrubs, or annuals that will perform better than the varieties you selected this growing season.

The State Botanical Garden of Tennessee, along with being a fantastic public garden to visit and get inspiration, is designated as an All-America Selections (AAS) Test Garden. This means we are one of the locations across the United States that puts the newest plant varieties to the test and evaluates how these new arrivals will stack up for home gardeners.

Many annuals we test will see their peak during the height of summer, but plenty keep on performing into fall and offer gardeners an extended period of color. This year, there are a few standout annuals in the late-season garden that are really looking good and show no signs of slowing down. Watch the video above to learn more about four fabulous annuals to add to your garden for fall color!

Like This Video? Watch More on the Fine Gardening YouTube Channel

Top-performing annuals for fall color featured in the video:

• Heartland^® ‘White’ lantana
• Heartland^® ‘Sunrise’ lantana
• Burning Embers celosia
• Solarscape^® XL Pink Jewel impatiens

Find more on designing with annuals:

Discuss this video or ask gardening questions with a regional gardening expert on the Gardening Answers forum.

And for more Southeast regional reports, click here.

Andy Pulte is a faculty member in the plant sciences department at the University of Tennessee.

When I’m designing a planting plan, clients most often request 1) an analogous color scheme—neighbors on the color wheel—of blue, purple, pink, or 2) a simple green-and-white palette. I love the easy serenity of these options, but sometimes we want to inject more energy into the scheme, and no color brings the energy quite like orange.

At this point, some of you are totally with me (Reese’s! Life of a Showgirl vinyl! Veuve Clicquot!), and some of you are cringing (fake tans and Home Depot parking-lot jams). Orange elicits a definite reaction. One of the funniest things a client ever said to me was, “I like any color, but don’t come at me with some orange!”

Stay with me, though, because I’m not just talking about a secondary color of 50 percent yellow and 50 percent red. The orange flowers readily available at the nurseries cover a wide spectrum, from strong coral to the softest peach. I’m confident there’s an orange option for you.

How can you introduce orange flowers in your garden?

For a low-risk approach, experiment with a container arrangement or add just one type of perennial to a bed for a limited period of extra pop. (This is the “throw-pillow approach”—fun and easy to change if you regret your choice.)

If you’re solidly in the pro-orange camp, you might like a variety of accent plants to cover a longer season, or even a hotter analogous planting plan (yellow, orange, red) with tropical resort vibes.

Tip: I love to pull out my Gardener’s Color Wheel when planning (obsessing) over plant combinations.

Easy Annuals

I use a lot of impatiens and begonias for months of container color. I often combine multiple colors to soften the transition between flowers (photo above left), but a strong complementary palette has a hot vibe that is still harmonious with a garden containing a lot of blues and purples (photo above right).

Powerful Perennials

‘Totally Tangerine’ geum

I’m obsessed with ‘Totally Tangerine’ geum (Geum ‘Totally Tangerine’, Zones 5–7). Fuzzy foliage forms a solid base, with stalks of bright yellow-orange flowers held up in an airy display. This one starts early (April) and keeps going for months, but it’s also a small flower that blends well into a bed without being overpowering.

Butterfly milkweed

The plant that made me an orange convert was butterfly milkweed (Asclepias tuberosa, Zones 3–9). This isn’t a new plant to anyone, but could we take a moment to appreciate the range of color on a single plant? It covers the spectrum from coral to yellow, allowing it to both stand out and serve as an echo of other flowers. The bloom time covers the summer months, increased by its tendency to self-sow.

Kismet^® ‘Intense Orange’ coneflower

Each year there are more orange Echinacea options at the nurseries. A popular option is Sombrero^® Adobe Orange (Echinacea ‘Balsomador’, Zones 4–9), which Mt. Cuba named as one of the top cultivars for pollinator visits and ease of growing in their 2019 report. I like Kismet^® ‘Intense Orange’ coneflower (E. ‘TNECHKIO’, Zones 4–9) for its compact habit (about 18 inches high). It works well in a container or toward the front of a bed.

Little Goblin^® Orange winterberry

One of my favorite shrubs is winterberry (Ilex verticillata, Zones 3–9). You’re familiar with the beautiful red berries, but a lesser-known variety to try is Little Goblin^® Orange (I. verticillata ‘NCIV2’). These shrubs have the same winter impact but with fat orange berries instead of red. Try them on their own or mixed in with a dwarf red berry like ‘Red Sprite’ (I. verticillata ‘Red Sprite’ syn. I. verticillata ‘Nana’) or Berry Poppins^® (I. verticillata ‘FarrowBPop’) to carry the orange energy right through the winter.

What do you think? Are you ready to experiment in your garden?

Other ways to introduce orange in the garden:

• Try an orange structure, such as an arbor or a trellis.
• Adirondack chairs are like Volkswagen Beetles—they work in any color. Try a pair of orange chairs for a bright accent.

Find more orange plant inspiration:

Discuss this article or ask gardening questions with a regional gardening expert on the Gardening Answers forum.

And for more Mid-Atlantic regional reports, click here.

Maureen Robinson is president of the Washington, D.C., Maryland, and Virginia chapter of the Association of Professional Landscape Designers (APLD).

Photos, except where noted: Maureen Robinson

Fine Gardening Recommended Products

ARS Telescoping Long Reach Pruner

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Berry & Bird Rabbiting Spade, Trenching Shovel

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Ideal Tool for All Gardeners Use: Our heavy duty trenching shovel is designed by a professional gardening tool designer. Lifetime Durability: This heavy duty drain spade is made of high-quality stainless steel, it is very strong and durable, even if it is used for high-strength work, it will not bend. Ergonomic Wood Handle: The handle of this planting spade is made of ash hardwood harvested from FSC-certified forests and has an ergonomically streamlined design, making it very suitable for everyone’s hands. Multi-Use: This digging shovel is generally used for digging trenches, digging holes, transplanting, edging, moving compost, cutting thick turf and furrowing. The sharp blade allows you to cut, scoop, dig, lift and dice in hard soil.

Planting in a Post-Wild World: Designing Plant Communities for Resilient Landscapes

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Featuring gorgeous photography and advice for landscapers, Planting in a Post-Wild World by Thomas Rainer and Claudia West is dedicated to the idea of a new nature—a hybrid of both the wild and the cultivated—that can nourish in our cities and suburbs.

Happy Friday GPODers!

And Happy Halloween! We’ve made it to the end of our three festive days of decor, and we’re ending it off with some spectacular displays from a frequent contributor. Howard Nemeroff, the owner of Plant Parenting in Chicago, has shared his incredible container designs several times on the blog before (Check out some of his previous submissions here: New Container Creations from Howard, Howard’s Spring Container Displays, Celebrating Summer and Welcoming Fall, New Creations From a Window Box Expert, and One Window Box, Four Seasons), but today he’s showcasing a different side to his designs—pumpkins! Along with the incredible fall container displays he creates for his clients, he also builds festive pumpkin arrangements. Here are some of his designs from this year, and be sure to check him out on Instagram to see more: @plant_parenting

There are so many elements to play with when designing with pumpkins, and Howard utilizes them all to perfection. Creating captivating color combinations is an obvious choice and some have ridges and bumps that provide excellent texture, but their exciting shapes and forms shouldn’t be ignored. This design plays with color while juxtaposing short and squat varieties with the three tall pumpkins drawing the eye up to the front door.

Shape, texture, and color are all on prominent display in this festive concoction! For a gardener who wants a little bit of everything, Howard piles a fantastic mix of pumpkins, gourds, foliage and berries. And just like his containers, he is able to perfectly mix and combine many elements to create a cohesive design.

However, even simpler designs can be captivating when constructed with Howard’s eye. From this angle, it looks like this massive pile of pumpkins is growing from a vine out of those lush, green containers at the top of the stairs.

With all of the variation out there, a simple stack of pumpkins is all you need for some fun fall decor. However, Howard always takes his designs to the next level. Some dark heuchera scattered throughout and a swirl of burgundy branches gives the display a moodier vibe while clusters of berries add more pops of orange.

Lastly, this classic combination of ornamental cabbage and white mums gets a hair-raising twist with two plastic skeletons tangled up in a trellis of vines. While goth gardening is a trend that has grown in popularity over recent years, you don’t need to plant up special plants to celebrate the spooky season in the garden!

Thank you so much for sharing your gorgeous creations with us again, Howard! It’s inspiring to see how you develop new designs every year and for every season.

As we creep further into fall and the growing season continues to wind down, what activities do you take up to keep the plant magic alive? Do you build beautiful wreaths for the holidays? Does your attention turn to houseplants? Are you already planning the seeds you’ll be starting in winter? Let us know in the comments below, or consider sharing your indoor garden and plant crafts with the blog! Follow the directions below to submit photos via email, or send me a DM on Instagram: @agirlherdogandtheroad.

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Have photos to share? We’d love to see your garden, a particular collection of plants you love, or a wonderful garden you had the chance to visit!

To submit, send 5–10 photos to [email protected] along with some information about the plants in the pictures and where you took the photos. We’d love to hear where you are located, how long you’ve been gardening, successes you are proud of, failures you learned from, hopes for the future, favorite plants, or funny stories from your garden.

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Fine Gardening Recommended Products

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Made from ceramic in a vibrant green color, this outdoor plant pot features a one-of-a-kind lava finish. This decorative planter for outdoor plants measures 14″ in diameter (outer top, 8.5″ at bottom) x 11″ H and weighs 23.6 lbs. Its inner measurements are 11.75″ in diameter x 10″ H. The planter has a soil capacity of 3.05 gallons (0.41 cu ft).

Veradek Corten Steel Series Cube Planter

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The Square Metal Planter is built from thick-gauge corten steel that naturally develops a rust patina for a modern rustic look. Measuring 22″ tall by 21″ wide, it includes drainage holes, optional plugs, and styrofoam insulation for year-round use. Delivered flat with hardware and instructions, it assembles easily and is designed to withstand temperatures from -20 to 120 degrees, making it a durable and stylish choice for any outdoor space.