We garden in Riverside, a nearby suburb of Chicago (Zone 5a–6b). In April 2020 we constructed two new 11×16 garden beds in order to reduce our Kentucky bluegrass lawn and to add more plants for beneficial pollinators.
My husband, Mark, used a straight-edge spade to cut the new bed outlines. We also converted the gently curving outlines of the existing perimeter beds into straight edges as well. This required lifting and repositioning many existing perennial and spring bulb plants in the perimeter garden beds.
In the above photo, 1×1 chunks of turf grass are awaiting removal. One method of eliminating the turf chunks is to lay them upside down in a secluded corner of the yard and let them decompose over time. Our property is not big enough to have a secluded area, so we sliced off the soil with my garden hand saw and distributed it on top of the existing and new garden beds. Admittedly, an easier way of disposing of the turf would have been to hire a landscape crew to haul it away. But we did this during the first weeks of COVID lockdown, when getting a crew was extremely difficult. Besides, we had a lot more fun and satisfaction completing the project ourselves.
Look at the middle of the photo in the lower foreground. You can see a robin patiently waiting for a “snack” (a worm). A small flock of robins gathered each time we excavated more lawn. One robin even caught a worm that I tossed in his direction! Spending time in nature provides a lot of entertainment.
Before we finished excavating turf grass, 36Buxus sinica var. insularism, ‘Franklin’s Gem’ (boxwood, Zones 4–9) arrived via Federal Express. After unboxing them, we gave the cardboard boxes a second life: We manage a charity vegetable garden at our church, so we laid the boxes flat on top of the raised beds and covered them with composted cow manure and shredded leaves. If you research “lasagna gardening” you will see that cardboard is one of the favorite foods of worms. It helps improve the soil as it decomposes. You can still plant vegetable seeds after covering a bed with cardboard. Simply poke a hole in the moist cardboard and drop a seed into the hole.
The above photo from our second-floor window shows the new garden beds partway through the turf-cutting process. The line of boxwood plants is staged around the perimeter of the space. If you are wondering what is in the window box in the lower part of the photo, that is mesclun mix lettuce. Lettuce was one of the foods in short supply in the Chicago area during the first month or so of the lockdown, so we grew some ourselves.
In the above photo, twoHydrangea paniculata ‘Limelight’ (Zones 3–8) and the boxwood are already installed in the middle of the new beds, while 56Nepeta‘Cat’s Pajamas’ (Zones 4–8) in their white nursery pots are awaiting installation. The nepeta’s main bloom time in our garden is mid-May through June. It still continues to flower through September, especially if I cut away the spent flower stalks, but the color is more muted. We still enjoy the geometry that the mass planting of nepeta creates even if the color is not as spectacular. Many types of bees and butterflies enjoy it too.
The next phase of the project, in fall 2020, involved planting a mixture of hundreds ofCrocus chrysanthus (early snow crocus, Zones 3–8) and Crocus vernus (large cupped crocus, Zones 3–8), including the variety ‘Jeanne d’Arc’ and others. We now see and hear early spring bees buzzing around both types of crocus in these beds. We also planted dozens of alliums inside each boxwood parterre. We purchased about nine different allium varieties to obtain a wide range of heights, bloom times, shapes, and colors. There are subtle differences in the varieties. The above photo was taken in spring 2021. I timed the design so that the alliums and nepetas would bloom at the same time.
This photo shows the garden beds in spring 2021. By now there was no problem in obtaining lettuce at grocery stores, so I planted pansies (Viola × wittrockiana, cool-season annual) and ‘Tete-a-Tete’ daffodils (Narcissus ‘Tete-a-tete’, Zones 3–8) in the window box in the foreground of the photo, which attract early butterflies and bees. The daffodils have finished their bloom in this photo. Since we designed the beds to have space in between each plant, we top off each bed with hardwood mulch each spring to create a dressier appearance, suppress potential weeds, and reduce the amount of supplemental watering needed during what can be some hot drought conditions in July and August. We also had our underground sprinkler system reconfigured to accommodate the new beds and the reconfigured existing beds. If you have an existing underground sprinkler system and are considering changing or adding beds, it is best to plan for the added cost as part of your entire project.
Our new beds still bring us viewing pleasure during our long Chicago-area winters. We like the shapes the snow creates with the individual boxwood plants and the “frosting” that the snow adds on top of the Hydrangea paniculata ‘Limelight’ dried flower heads. We hope you enjoyed our three-season gardening process as much as we did. Happy gardening at your own home.
Have a garden you’d like to share?
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.
Plants, like kids, need a well-balanced diet to grow up healthy and strong. However, tomatoes are an extra special case.
To get the most out of your tomato plant, you’ll need to give it various fertilizers over its lifetime, with each life stage having its own requirements.
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Perhaps the most confusing of these is the seedling stage, which begins when the seedling has gained 2 to 3 sets of true leaves.
During this time, the plant will begin demanding more nutrients as it heads toward its juvenile phase. But there are a few different camps for feeding a tomato seedling.
Let’s take a few moments to look at different fertilizers as we seek to find them.
The Best Fertilizer For Tomato Seedlings
As a little spoiler alert, there are actually two options, and you’ll have to test both to find out which is best for your own tomato garden.
Also, note that the best practice is to get your soil tested annually and adjust the NPK accordingly. Thus, if you are testing your soil, the NPK given here is meant as a plumb line, not a solid rule.
Granular vs. Liquid-Soluble
Starting off, we must address one of the biggest debates in fertilizing: whether to use granular or liquid-soluble fertilizers.
A lot of sources out there absolutely swear by granular, time-release fertilizers.
Their biggest argument is that you only need to feed the plant a few times during the entire growing season; thus, this method saves time while giving your plant everything it needs.
Sounds great, right? Well, unfortunately, none of the above is actually true.
In reality, granular fertilizers give your plants all of the nutrients, but they need more than the amount they need.
For example, nitrogen will break down more easily than zinc. When you use a granular formula, the plant will get a burst of one nutrient while the ground struggles to break down another.
This can lead to the plant being both overfed and deficient simultaneously.
Thus, you might find yourself amending the soil with eggshell tea or other amendments, even though the fertilizer SHOULD have provided everything your plant needs.
Liquid soluble fertilizers are precisely the opposite. Because this fertilizer dissolves in water, you can feed your plant while you water it, thus eliminating a step.
In addition, the fertilizer is designed to break down evenly, meaning once you’ve mixed it into the water, EVERY nutrient is dissolved and ready for absorption.
These fertilizers soak directly into the soil and can be consumed by the plant within seconds or minutes of application.
But perhaps the biggest advantage is that you can tweak the dilution as needed to get the perfect amount your plant needs every time.
Of course, there are still a few drawbacks, such as the fact that dissolved fertilizer has an incredibly short shelf life and should be used within a day.
You will also need to apply it more often, although this involves dumping a scoop or two into your watering container of choice and stirring.
Overall, however, there’s every reason always to use a liquid-soluble fertilizer and avoid slow-release formulas.
Tomato Nutrition 101
This is another major point of contention, and we’ll be perfectly honest – there are not one but TWO right answers here.
Let’s begin by touching upon what NPK is and what nutrients your plants need.
The NPK ratio on the fertilizer package is about the three most important macronutrients: nitrogen (N), phosphorus (P), and potassium (K).
Each of these nutrients will affect certain parts of your plants more than others, although they are all necessary for overall health.
Nitrogen encourages more foliage and will make your plant fuller and greener.
Phosphorus is primarily responsible for encouraging the plant to produce blooms and fruit, although excessive amounts can cause potassium to be leached from the soil.
Potassium has a similar role in both plants and people, encouraging strong stems and boosting the plant’s immune system.
Additionally, tomatoes need several other nutrients to grow properly, which are often listed on the back of the fertilizer package:
Boron
Calcium
Copper
Iron
Magnesium
Molybdenum
Zinc
You can already see that a tomato seedling will need plenty of nitrogen and a decent amount of potassium but not as much phosphorus. And that’s where the two options come in.
The Great NPK Debate
As mentioned earlier, the best thing you could do is to test your soil annually to adjust your NPK as needed.
However, many people don’t do this, which is why there’s more than one solution to the question of the best fertilizer.
For those who wish to play it safe, a basic 10-10-10 NPK fertilizer is perfectly fine and will still provide a healthy plant.
Many opt for this particular ratio because it can be used on other plants while still having great results. However, the other option is a high nitrogen mix of 26-6-16 diluted to ¼ strength.
This option is much closer to what the plant actually needs, but it also means you’ll want to pay attention to your soil’s nutrient levels.
This makes it more effective than the balanced formula but with a slightly higher risk if the soil already has an abundance of nutrients.
Don’t Be Afraid To Experiment!
At the end of the day, liquid-soluble fertilizers with both 10-10-10 and 26-6-16 ratios are equally viable. It will generally come down to the quality of your soil and personal preference as to which of these two will work best for your tomatoes.
Don’t be afraid to grab a small package of each and test them on separate plants to see which one works better for your own tomatoes.
If possible, test the soil each spring so you can tweak the NPK of your fertilizer accordingly, but this isn’t essential.
Also, feel free to tweak the dilution a little to get the perfect results.
Finally, remember that you will need to change the fertilizer when your tomato plant reaches its next growth stage. While the 10-10-10 gives you a little leeway, the 26-6-16 will need to be exchanged for a fertilizer that gives a more precise ratio for what the juvenile plant will need as it approaches full maturity.
ON GROUNDHOG DAY I am always reminded of another holiday: the Fourth of July, and specifically my first Independence Day on this piece of land, decades ago. To mark Groundhog Day, I offer a vintage essay on trying to fool Mother Nature, and being proved the fool instead.
It was a different winter then, and in so many ways a whole different era, but I think there’s still something left in this old piece of writing, anyhow (though not a definitive answer on how to outdo a woodchuck, sorry; that’s over here instead.). Enjoy.
(from ‘Newsday’ newspaper garden column, 1989)
TODAY IS THE DAY when thoughts officially turn to the potential coming of spring, but on Groundhog Day, my troubled mind can’t let go of memories of Fourth of July. Just the mention of anything groundhog, in fact, and those guilt-laden synapses of mine take me right to that Independence Day not long ago and an ill-advised display of underground fireworks.
I tried to off a groundhog with a smoke bomb.
There, I feel better now that I’ve shared it.
At that time, like many city people, I fought the way thing are, or at least objected to it energetically. The first year in the country house, we fought everything, I recall, not just the groundhog (or woodchuck, as we knew him to be called). On the morning after a harsh snowstorm, for example, we tried to travel back to the city, and in this self-important misadventure, learned a whole new meaning for the term respect.
We fought the deer, who for generations had been coming to eat beneath the apple trees we now insisted were ours; the mice, who asked only a warm place–our bedroom wall–to raise their children. We fought the logic that says that moss, not flowers, grows on the north side of a house, and we even fought each other.
Neither skiers nor children eager to fashion Frosty on the front lawn, we moaned about snow simply because it was inconvenient, because it slowed us down. Now, several winters wiser, we pray for the stuff. It is nectar, sustenance. We have seen the devastation a winter windstorm can deal unto the naked garden, where no white blanket lies in place to soften the blow. When it melts around this time of year, we pray for more with all our might.
Beneath it, all manner of plant and animal life–even the groundhog–might sleep in safety until spring. Without it, they are like shivering homeless on the city streets.
This February morning, Punxsutawney Phil will raise his sleepy head toward the exit of his manmade bedroom burrow in Punxsutawney, Pa., aided by a human handler whose job it is to make him forecast the season ahead. The Blob, which is what a groundhog looks like, mostly, will either see or not see his shadow, depending on the strength of the late-winter sun. If he does, it’s back to bed for six more weeks; sorry, no early spring. The whole thing stems from an ancient Scotch couplet: “If the sun is bright and clear, there’ll be two winters in the year.”
I, for one, hope winter stays around awhile longer. I hope the rest of the winter, which hasn’t seemed like a winter to me at all yet, will bring lots of water to the earth in whatever form, however inconvenient, however messy. I hope it snows and sleets and rains and hails all over the country, every day if necessary, because recent droughts are too clear in my memory for me to hope otherwise.
I remember years when a third of the United States, or more, was parched deep into the subsoil, aching for those healing waters. Any gardener who has lost even one lettuce seedling to an unexpected April heat wave, or one potted plant when it baked on the radiator, should realize what that means: Without a proper sequence of the passing seasons, without the “inconvenient” weather like rain and sleet and even snow, there would be no farming and nor gardening, no flowers and no food.
I know, it’s been bright and pretty a lot of recent mornings, and you haven’t had to fight the chapping winds to get to work or school. Besides, you think, the trouble’s worse in some other region, not mine, and so it’s all right to feel safe and happy that’s it’s spring two months too soon.
It’s not right, and it’s not safe.
My groundhog did not die, by the way, that unpleasantly memorable Fourth of July, he didn’t even bat a droopy lid at the pair of fools who sealed off the doors of his burrow with big stones after dropping a smoke bomb down one end. He just sat up high on his haunches, as his breed is inclined to do, watching from the distant third opening to his subterranean home. If we had more experience, or if we had only asked one of the many local farmers, we’d have known the burrow probably had more than two openings. We would have known that the groundhog had more sense than two flatlanders, as we of the city streets are sometimes not so fondly called in our unfamiliar rural home.
The rest of the summer–or was I being paranoid?–he seemed to devote to watching me garden, a kind of hairy conscience lingering over my shoulder. All would be well in the garden when, suddenly, a rustling in the brush on the nearby hillside would herald his arrival.
“He’s planning his retaliation,” I would say to myself, wondering what tasty morsel he planned to make his crudite for the day. Day after sunny day, he watched me, until I finally lost it, and began to shout at him with the conviction in my voice that he should listen, that he should understand, that he should even respond.
I was fighting again, a sorry sight, and though he never ate a thing from that year’s summertime garden, the woodchuck had already won.
_____
The image of me and my pet woodchuck (kidding!) comes from an old “Popular Science” magazine, after I finally just gave up, and invited him in. (Garden doodle of Margaret’s Supermarket by Andre Jordan,)
Learn what plants were used in the long border in the article How to Make Changes to a Mature Garden:
“It was a difficult decision, but last spring I took down some of the largest trees with the hope of getting my full-sun border back and bringing plantings back into scale. Although each tree left a big hole, I knew that the existing sun-loving perennials and shrubs would fill in over time. In the meantime, I planned to fill the gaps with annuals that grow tall and wide, such as flowering tobacco (Nicotiana sylvestris, annual) and ‘Amistad’ sage (Salvia ‘Amistad’, Zones 9–11). I also intend to add a few more shrubs for structure and easy maintenance.”
Finding interesting plants for shade can be a struggle, but when you add in the desire for that plant to be a woody shrub, the list narrows even more. But these structural wonders are essential in giving our shady beds and borders depth and real presence.
Whether you’re looking colorful foliage, fabulous flowers, or out-of-this-world texture, there is sure to be at least one shade-loving shrub that will fit the bill. To help us hunt down these elusive garden treasures, we asked regional experts to pick out their four favorite shrubs for shade. Check out some sensational selections for your region, below, and discover even more shade-loving shrubs in this episode of the Let’s Argue About Plants podcast.
Finding interesting plants for shade can be a struggle, but when you add in the desire for that plant to be a woody shrub, the list narrows even more. But these structural wonders are essential in giving our shady beds and borders depth and real presence.
Whether you’re looking colorful foliage, fabulous flowers, or out-of-this-world texture, there is sure to be at least one shade-loving shrub that will fit the bill. To help us hunt down these elusive garden treasures, we asked regional experts to pick out their four favorite shrubs for shade. Check out some sensational selections for California, below, and discover even more shade-loving shrubs in this episode of the Let’s Argue About Plants podcast.
While this evergreen workhorse looks good year-round, spring is the season when ‘Mountain Fire’ andromeda really shines. Beginning in midspring, small white flowers borne in pendulous clusters are complemented by newly emerging red leaves. As the season progresses, the leaves change to green with some white variegation. Somewhat irregular in habit, ‘Mountain Fire’ can be pruned into a more formal shape with some effort but looks best in a casual setting where its quirky, sculptural shape is allowed to shine. Culturally, andromeda has similar requirements to azaleas (Rhododendron spp. and cvs., Zones 3–9), and the two make good companion plants in filtered shade. Be sure to provide the right soil—acidic and well draining yet moisture retentive.
Conditions:Partial to full shade; well-drained soil
Native range:China, Taiwan, Japan
If variegated gold dust plant were up for an award, it would definitely win in the category of “low-maintenance superstar.” This medium-size, shade-loving shrub sports glossy green leaves lightly speckled with gold. It maintains a bushy, somewhat tropical appearance year-round. Requiring virtually no pruning or shaping and with low to average water needs, it’s a great option for harder-to-reach spots at the back of the border where maintenance chores are more challenging. Sometimes grown as a houseplant elsewhere, in mild climates like ours it’s the perfect choice for a container on a shady front porch.
3. Fragrant Sweet Box
Photo: millettephotomedia.com
Name: Sarcococca ruscifolia
Zones: 7–9
Size: 3 to 5 feet tall and wide
Conditions:Partial to full shade; well-drained soil
Native range:Western China, Tibet
Fragrant sweet box makes an outstanding easy-care shrub for shady spaces. Featuring dark, glossy-green leaves on stiff, slightly arching stems, this evergreen shrub adds year-round structure to any planting. In late winter, intensely fragrant white flowers bloom when most of the garden is still sleeping. If possible, plant this shrub close to a window or door so the scent can be enjoyed despite the cooler weather. After the flowers are spent, small red berries add subtle interest. Fragrant sweet box has low to moderate water needs. It can have a gangly growth habit when first planted, as new branches tend to shoot out every which way; this slower-growing shrub requires some patience and selective pruning to maximize its good looks.
Conditions:Full sun to partial shade; well-drained soil
Native range:Western United States, Baja California
Adaptable to a range of conditions, ‘Mound San Bruno’ coffeeberry can handle a fair amount of shade and is often planted under native oak trees (Quercus spp. and cvs., Zones 4–10). Its shape and color will vary depending on how much sun it receives. It can be low and sprawling with larger green leaves when planted in shade, and it can have a larger, bushier form and smaller, gray-green leaves when planted in sun. New spring growth sports red stems and small white flowers that are attractive to pollinators but not particularly showy. Berries in shades of green, pink, and red gradually fade to black in autumn. Coffeeberry is an excellent choice for those in search of a low-fuss addition to a native pollinator garden.
Susan Morrison is a landscape designer and writer in Concord, California.
Finding interesting plants for shade can be a struggle, but when you add in the desire for that plant to be a woody shrub, the list narrows even more. But these structural wonders are essential in giving our shady beds and borders depth and real presence.
Whether you’re looking colorful foliage, fabulous flowers, or out-of-this-world texture, there is sure to be at least one shade-loving shrub that will fit the bill. To help us hunt down these elusive garden treasures, we asked regional experts to pick out their four favorite shrubs for shade. Check out some sensational selections for the Northeast, below, and discover even more shade-loving shrubs in this episode of the Let’s Argue About Plants podcast.
Conditions: Full sun to partial shade; rich, moist, loamy soil
Native range: Hybrid
This is a complex hybrid between two North American native species (C. florida and C. occidentalis), along with a species from western China (C. chinensis). A quick grower, ‘Venus’ will eventually form a large multistemmed shrub, so give it plenty of room, especially if it is grown as an understory plant under the high canopy of deciduous trees. It often stretches wider than it does tall, which sometimes surprises gardeners. One of the best reasons to plant ‘Venus’ is for its fruity-scented flowers, which smell like strawberry bubble gum to me. Expect most of the bright white blooms to appear in late May through mid-June. However, my plants tend to produce sporadic blossoms here and there throughout summer. The 10-inch leaves turn golden yellow in fall, adding to this shrub’s appeal. As a bonus, it is also tolerant of clay.
Conditions: Full sun to partial shade; average soil
Native range: Japan
I’ve had drivers stop and strangers walk through my yard just to ask me, “What’s that shrub blooming at the corner of your driveway?” ‘Golden Guinea’ kerria is just one of those plants that will earn lots of comments when it is in full flower. There is a double version of this fantastic shrub called ‘Flora Pleno’ (K. japonica ‘Flora Pleno’), which is perhaps just a bit too much of a good thing. ‘Golden Guinea’, on the other hand, hits the perfect tone: tasteful, and with single, bright yellow flowers that resemble single roses. To keep this quick-growing shrub looking tidy and elegant, each year remove one-third to one-half of the branches completely to the ground after blooming. Deer-resistant, it looks best when planted in informal settings such as the borders of a woodland or when added to a mixed bed with other shrubs.
Conditions: Partial shade; well-drained, average soil
Native range: Northeastern North America
As more of us are adding native shrubs and exploring more natural planting schemes, hobblebush is being revisited by gardeners, especially here in the Northeast. It is a viburnum, but it could be mistaken for a lacecap hydrangea when it is in bloom during May. Its simple appearance adds the perfect note to a woodland garden if you’re looking for a touch of authenticity. Hobblebush is often that missing note among maple trees (Acer spp. and cvs., Zones 3–9), ferns, and native shadblow (Amelanchier canadensis, Zones 4–8). The arching stems that touch the ground often develop roots that can trip or “hobble” a hiker—hence the common name. You’re just unlikely to find a hobblebush at your average garden center. Look for it at specialty nurseries, mailorder sources, or at wildflower centers.
Native range: Eastern and southern United States, the Atlantic coast of Canada
Whenever I find time to hike a mountain in Vermont or New Hampshire in early summer, I am seduced by this deciduous Rhododendron, yet rarely have I thought about adding a few to my garden. But why not? Why wouldn’t I want that spicysweet scent that wafts from the white to palest pink blooms across the summer hiking trails? Now I am totally addicted to the idea of incorporating this useful, salt-tolerant, native species into my beds. There are some notable cultivars too, including ‘Delaware Blue’ (with bluish green leaves and stunning dark pink flowers) and ‘Betty Cummins’ (with candy pink, tubular flowers held in trusses). But in my opinion, the species remains hard to beat.
Finding interesting plants for shade can be a struggle, but when you add in the desire for that plant to be a woody shrub, the list narrows even more. But these structural wonders are essential in giving our shady beds and borders depth and real presence.
Whether you’re looking colorful foliage, fabulous flowers, or out-of-this-world texture, there is sure to be at least one shade-loving shrub that will fit the bill. To help us hunt down these elusive garden treasures, we asked regional experts to pick out their four favorite shrubs for shade. Check out some sensational selections for the Northwest, below, and discover even more shade-loving shrubs in this episode of the Let’s Argue About Plants podcast.
Conditions: Partial to full shade; average to moist, well-drained soil
Native range: Japan
This unusual variegated conifer is a favorite for its bright, glowing white juvenile foliage, which it is slowly and constantly putting out. However, it absolutely does not love direct sun, which burns those delicate white tips. That makes it a great choice for conifer lovers with sun-compromised planting locations. ‘Knaptonensis’ is ideal for containers due to its slow growth and its plump, pyramidal shape. Regular moisture is a must, but otherwise this standout selection requires no human intervention to look its best.
2. ‘Filamentosa’ Heavenly Bamboo
Photo: courtesy of Juniper Level Botanic Garden at Plant Delights Nursery
Conditions:Full sun to partial shade; average soil
Native range: Japan, China, India
Although it is not actually a bamboo, this small shrub is quite heavenly. Not to be dismissed as yet another Nandina, ‘Filamentosa’ is strikingly different due to its very finely dissected foliage, which provides incredible year-round texture. If that isn’t enough, it provides evergreen foliage color as well; new growth is tinted red, which fades somewhat before taking on coppery orange tints in fall. Pinkish-white summer flowers are held above the foliage on glowing red stems. It grows slowly and is exceedingly low-maintenance. Its low, mounding habit makes it useful in containers or as an understory ground cover.
Conditions:Full sun to full shade; adaptable to a wide range of soil types, including clay and sand
Native range:Europe, Asia, Africa
While boxwood may seem ubiquitous, this underused evergreen cultivar is a workhorse that is especially valuable for dry shade. It makes a wonderful topiary if that appeals to you, but when left unpruned its naturally relaxed habit will provide year-round structure. Its finely textured dark green foliage sports creamy-white margins. The variegation is more muted in deeper shade, but in bright shade this shrub literally shines. Tough and undemanding, ‘Elegantissima’ deserves a place in every shade garden.
Conditions:Full sun to full shade; average to moist, well-drained soil
Native range:Southwestern Asia, southeastern Europe
Bold, glossy leaves and a low, neatly spreading habit make this laurel worth having, even in a small space. Dense and tidy, it rarely flowers or sets seed. It doesn’t run rampant like its larger cousins, but instead creates a tall, dense ground cover that will tolerate almost any growing conditions. It is fabulous skirting beneath hydrangeas (Hydrangea spp. and cvs., Zones 3–9) and other deciduous shrubs, creating handsome winter structure at ground level. It is also the perfect partner for every one of the other shrubs on this page. With no pruning necessary, ‘Mt. Vernon’ is as low-maintenance as it gets, yet it delivers big rewards.
*Invasive Alert:
Heavenly bamboo (Nandina domestica)
Japanese barberry (Berberis thunbergia)
This plant is considered invasive in AL, FL, GA, MD, MO, and SC.
Finding interesting plants for shade can be a struggle, but when you add in the desire for that plant to be a woody shrub, the list narrows even more. But these structural wonders are essential in giving our shady beds and borders depth and real presence.
Whether you’re looking colorful foliage, fabulous flowers, or out-of-this-world texture, there is sure to be at least one shade-loving shrub that will fit the bill. To help us hunt down these elusive garden treasures, we asked regional experts to pick out their four favorite shrubs for shade. Check out some sensational selections for the Southern Plains below, and discover even more shade-loving shrubs in this episode of the Let’s Argue About Plants podcast.
Conditions: Partial to full shade; mesic, well-drained soil
Native range: Southeastern United States, eastern Canada
These denizens of woodlands, canyons, and stream sides sport handsome palmate, glossy foliage. Depending on the source, some refer to this widely branching plant as a multitrunked small tree or as a large shrub. Red buckeye thrives in soil ranging from deep sand, to loam, and even to clay. In our region you’ll see a midsummer leaf drop, with the shrub closing up shop for the rest of the year until new spring shoots appear. This normal “summer deciduous” behavior is no reason to fret, but you should position this plant in your landscape accordingly. Deep scarlet to pale pink cylindrical-shaped blossoms sometimes show peach to yellow in western parts of the species’ range. The flowering time coincides with the spring migration of hummingbirds. Also, be aware that the young leaf shoots and seeds are poisonous.
Conditions:Partial to full shade; dry to moist soil
Native range:Eastern North America
Foraging for wild foods undoubtedly connects one with the riches of the natural world. Spicebush leads the pack of delectable edibles with leaves, twigs, and berries that are excellent when used to season teas and sweet or savory dishes. But the best aroma and spicy flavor derive from female plants’ glossy red ripe fruit, which grow in clusters following the tiny yellow flowers of spring. Various wildlife dine eagerly on the nectar and berries, and the kelly green leaves support several species of swallowtail butterfly and silk moth caterpillars before shifting to yellow in fall. Spicebush thrives in forest settings but forms denser foliage and a more compact shape with more sun.
Size: 2 to 5 feet tall and 5 to 8 feet wide (or more)
Conditions:Partial to full shade; dry to mesic, well-drained soil
Native range: Eastern half of the United States, Mexico
In mid to late spring, small bees and butterflies visit the white or powder pink–hued flowers dotting the gracefully arching branches of coralberry. Once pollinated, the blossoms give way to spangles of ¼-inch magenta-colored berries (technically called “drupes”) in tight clusters. The deciduous nature of this shrub allows for a full view of the fruit in winter. The berries persist along the branches for months; wildlife typically ignore them because of their mild toxicity. However, many animals appreciate the cover and nesting sites the wiry mass provides. If left unchecked, stems touching the ground will root, forming extensive colonies. Cut the plants back to nubs every few years to keep them tight and fresh, and reduce powdery mildew by keeping foliage dry and well-ventilated.
Conditions: Partial to full shade; dry to mesic, well-drained soil
Native range:Southwestern United States
You might just walk past this shrub without notice unless you happen across the hundreds of pollinator partiers imbibing from its dainty yellow blossoms. A diverse cast of characters from hairstreaks to bees to small beetles roils among the flowers in February—a time when little else is producing critical nectar. Birds nourish themselves on elbow bush’s summer fruits, which resemble elongated blueberries and are borne only on female plants. Nesting birds and bunnies seek shelter under the dense, right-angled branches that inspire the common name. Though not outrageously showy, this unsung hero is a real workhorse, growing easily and reliably in most conditions with good drainage. The light green foliage nicely foils other garden plants.
Andrea DeLong-Amaya is the director of horticulture at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center in Austin, Texas.
Finding interesting plants for shade can be a struggle, but when you add in the desire for that plant to be a woody shrub, the list narrows even more. But these structural wonders are essential in giving our shady beds and borders depth and real presence.
Whether you’re looking colorful foliage, fabulous flowers, or out-of-this-world texture, there is sure to be at least one shade-loving shrub that will fit the bill. To help us hunt down these elusive garden treasures, we asked regional experts to pick out their four favorite shrubs for shade. Check out some sensational selections for the Mountain West below, and discover even more shade-loving shrubs in this episode of the Let’s Argue About Plants podcast.
Conditions:Full sun to partial shade; well-drained soil
Native range: Hybrid
Eternal Fragrance™ daphne is a great plant to place near a front door so you can enjoy the wonderful aroma of its flowers. White blossoms that are sometimes blushed pink bloom in late spring and may continue to flower until fall. The shiny dark green leaves are very handsome and are borne on cinnamon-colored branches. Eternal Fragrance™ is semi-evergreen, depending on the severity of winter weather each year. In our smoking-hot summers, it will do much better with a modest amount of supplemental water. And while it can tolerate full sun in other regions, it requires afternoon shade in the Mountain West. Best of all, deer don’t usually browse this shrub.
Conditions:Full sun to partial shade; well-drained soil
Native range: Hybrid of North American-native species
The tiny pink flower blossoms of Proud Berry® coralberry that appear in summer are almost unnoticeable, but they are visited by hummingbirds, butterflies, and bees. The more impressive display comes later with a profusion of smooth pale pink berries that form in abundance on delicate but wiry branches. They look captivating in the garden and in floral arrangements. These berries, while mildly toxic to people and pets, are sometimes eaten by wildlife. Proud Berry® grows slowly but will develop into thickets. Once established, it’s naturally drought tolerant but appreciates additional water when summer gets blisteringly hot. While it can take full sun, it prefers dappled, dry shade.
Conditions:Full sun to partial shade; well-drained soil
Native range: Hybrid
‘Kaleidoscope’ abelia makes for a beautiful display in mass plantings. This plant has unusual foliage. The fresh spring growth flushes a rich red, sporting dark burgundy streaks. It then morphs to shades of gold, green, and orange. But the show doesn’t stop there. Charming and fragrant small flowers bloom pink-tinged in summer and fade to white. If winter isn’t terribly cold, this shrub may hold onto its leaves; otherwise, it will lose them. ‘Kaleidoscope’ needs almost no maintenance, but it may need supplemental water for the first couple of years.
4. Oceanspray
Photo: millettephotomedia.com
Name: Holodiscus discolor
Zones:5–10
Size:12 to 15 feet tall and 3 to 8 feet wide
Conditions:Full sun to full shade; moist to well-drained soil
Native range:Western North America
I grew up in northern Idaho, and this native shrub was everywhere. Its fragrant, fluffy, cream-colored flower clusters, which can be up to 10 inches long, call out to you in early summer. As they mature, they take on a tan and then a caramel color. These flowers are beloved by native bees and butterflies. Also called creambush and ironwood, oceanspray is deciduous and very adaptable to different light and soil conditions. It’s a great performer as an understory plant, but sunny mornings are also welcome. This shrub is drought tolerant once established. Until then, it may need some additional irrigation.
Mary Ann Newcomer is a lifelong gardener and the author of Rocky Mountain Gardener’s Handbook and The Timber Press Guide to Vegetable Gardening in the Mountain States.
Turmeric and ginger both require a long frost-free growing season. To get a head start, pre-sprout ginger and turmeric indoors. Pre-sprouting offers a simple andefficientsolution for getting these delicious spices quicker than ever. Read on for my best tips and tricks for pre-sprouting ginger and turmeric successfully.
Disclaimer: This post may contain affiliate links. See my disclosure policy for more information.
How do ginger and turmeric grow?
Ginger and turmeric aren’t grown from seeds but from rhizomes. Rhizomes are underground stems that grow horizontally beneath the ground surface. They put out roots and shoots from their nodes, allowing them to spread and reproduce.
Reasons to pre-sprout ginger and turmeric
It speeds up the growing process and gives you a head start on the season
It eliminates rhizomes that don’t sprout – so you don’t waste space on them in the garden
Purchase organic turmeric and ginger for pre-sprouting.
Choose firm roots that look healthy.
Avoid any ginger or turmeric with bruises or soft spots.
Ideally, each piece has several nodes (the node is where the sprout forms).
Organic ginger and turmeric are often available at farmer’s markets or grocery stores.
Prepare the rhizomes for sprouting
Soak in water for 24 hours
Cut or break apart large rhizomes into pieces (ensure each piece has several nodes)
Let the cut ends heal and dry over (1-2 days)
Freshly cut ends of ginger need to heal over before plantingHealed over ends of ginger
Soak for 30 minutes in water with 1 cup of hydrogen peroxide per quart added to sterilize any mold and fungus spores.
Treating with a hydrogen peroxide solution before pre-sprouting helps eliminate mold and fungus spores
Two methods for pre-sprouting your ginger and turmeric
Method one for pre-sprouting ginger and turmeric:
Place sterilized ginger in a plastic bag with several damp pieces of paper towel, and seal the bag.
Keep the bag someplace warm.
Monitor for mold, and rinse off ginger each week until sprouts appear.
Method two for pre-sprouting ginger and turmeric:
Fill a tray with moist, sterile potting mix. Nestle the sterilized ginger or turmeric in the potting mix, so it is mostly covered.
Place humidity dome on top. Put on a heat mat under your seed starting lights.
Monitor moisture level and moisten potting soil as needed.
Sprouts (and roots!) should appear within 1-3 weeks for ginger. Turmeric usually takes longer to sprout and may take up to a month.
What to do AFTER you pre-sprout your ginger and turmeric:
Dispose of any rotted ginger or turmeric.
If it is warm enough to plant outside, plant the sprouted turmeric and ginger.
See these blog posts for planting and growing information.
(Click on the images to go to the corresponding blogposts)
But let’s be real, the most significant part of why we love these plants is those blossoms.
There are diseases and environmental problems that can cause your Lenten roses to fail to bloom, even if the rest of the plant looks perfectly happy.
Whether it’s a simple case of transplant shock or a serious problem with a pathogen, Lenten roses that refuse to bloom are suffering from some kind of problem.
Coming up, we’ll discuss nine of the most common issues and how to deal with them.
Depending on the species and your location, plants in the Helleborus genus may bloom any time from December to April.
If it’s currently July, gardeners shouldn’t be troubled by a bare plant.
But when February rolls around and nothing is happening, it may be time to start doing some troubleshooting.
Here are the top things to consider:
1. Age
Some hellebores won’t bloom in the first year or two after you buy and transplant them because they’re still too young to produce flowers.
You might not see blossoms until the next year, or even the year after that.
If you just purchased your Lenten rose and it looks healthy otherwise, let it do its thing and try to be patient.
However, if the plant was blooming when you bought it, it’s old enough to produce blossoms. Something else is probably going on.
2. Downy Mildew
Downy mildew on hellebores is caused by a water mold known as Peronospora pulveracea. It typically causes black or brown spots and fuzzy gray splotches to appear on the leaves.
Now and then, it might progress to the point where it causes the stems to collapse, the flowers to fall off the plant, or the buds to shrivel and die. It’s this last symptom that can cause your plant not to blossom.
The buds are the tiny growths at the end of the stems that will eventually open to reveal those lovely Lenten roses that we’re after. But if they shrivel up and fall off, there won’t be any flowers.
If the buds are already dying, your Lenten rose is past the point of the less invasive control method of pruning off infected areas, and it’s time to break out the big guns: fungicides.
3. Forced Blooming
When you buy a hellebore that is blooming outside of its normal flowering season – such as during the summertime – it’s probably because the plant was given hormones or chemicals to make it bloom at a time when it normally wouldn’t.
And then the plant doesn’t bloom when the regular flowering season arrives.
In that case, you don’t need to do anything. It will probably bloom on schedule the following year, once it’s had time to recover.
4. Lack of Food
All plants need sun, water, and nutrients. If you have the other two elements covered, the problem might be related to fertilizer.
Hellebores aren’t greedy. They’re usually happy with a side dressing of compost in the spring.
But if you aren’t seeing blossoms, try feeding your Lenten rose in March with a fertilizer made for flowering plants, and apply it again in September.
Follow the manufacturer’s directions for application.
Typically, hellebores only need food in the spring, but if the soil is deficient enough to prevent the plant from flowering, you should give it a second feeding in the late summer as well.
When asked for a recommendation, I always sing the praises of Down to Earth’s Rose & Flower fertilizer.
Even though hellebores thrive in partial or dappled shade, full, deep shade will likely result in plants that are devoid of blooms.
This might be the case even if yours has been blooming just fine for years.
You might have planted in the perfect spot initially, but conditions change over the years. Trees become larger and fill out, new fences are erected, the plant gets knocked off its axis by a meteor…
Okay, maybe not the last one, we hope.
The light also changes with the seasons, and gardeners often don’t realize how much the sun shifts in the winter.
While it might have been perfectly sunny in a given spot during the summer, the low winter sun might not reach your plants over a fence or evergreen hedge for many hours of the day, or possibly at all.
Keep an eye on your Lenten rose for a few days to see how much light it’s receiving. If it doesn’t have at least dappled sun exposure throughout the day or several hours of direct light, it’s probably too shady.
If you planted your hellebores too deep, this may also lead to a lack of flowers.
But don’t assume this isn’t the problem if your plant bloomed the same year you planted it, or even the year after you planted it.
It might have had enough energy stored up to produce blossoms despite its surroundings.
If the crown (the part where the roots and stem meet) is completely buried, your plant is positioned too deep. The crown should be just barely covered with soil.
Note that if you add compost or soil to your garden each year, you might also inadvertently bury the crown over time. Try to avoid this!
You have the option to dig the plant up and reseat it or you can brush away accumulated soil from above the crown.
7. Rootbound Plantings
Rootbound plants aren’t able to access the food and oxygen they need to thrive.
If you just purchased a plant and found when you took it out of its container that it was extremely rootbound, that might be the reason why it isn’t blooming.
Or if you’re growing in a container and haven’t upgraded the pot size in several years, the roots might be too crowded.
It might not start flowering again until more room becomes available.
If you’ve just transplanted a new start or division into the ground, it will acclimate to its new growing environment naturally.
But if you haven’t repotted your plant and it seems a bit confined, get on it! Move the plant to a pot one size larger and be sure to avoid burying the crown too deep.
When you transplant, make sure to carefully loosen up the root ball. A plant that is rootbound will have a hard time spreading its roots out unless you give it a little assistance.
8. Transplant Shock
Imagine someone grabbed you out of your bed while you were sleeping comfortably and tossed you into a foreign environment.
You’d probably need a second to get your bearings before you’d feel like your usual fabulous self again. Plants are like that, too.
Sometimes Lenten roses will hold back on the blossoms the year after being transplanted. This is especially true if the foliage or roots were trimmed back or broken during the process.
The solution, as is so often the case, is just to let time do its thing. As long as it’s happy where it’s planted, your hellebore will eventually reacclimate, produce buds, and bloom.
9. Watering Issues
Most plants will struggle if you water them too much or too little, and sometimes the blossoms are the first thing to go.
These plants need consistently moist soil that doesn’t ever dry out completely.
It shouldn’t be soggy at any time of year, but particularly during the spring, summer, or fall. And they need less supplemental water during the winter than they do at other times of year.
Of course, a brief period of wetness or dryness is no big deal, but chronic watering problems will stunt or prevent new growth and flowering.
If you had a ton of rain this year or perhaps you forgot to irrigate during the summer, your plant will likely need a year of appropriate, consistent watering to recover before it will start flowering again.
Plants that are growing in soil with poor drainage will likely never recover unless you amend the soil to improve the drainage conditions.
What the Hellebore Is Going On?!
Winter can be a challenging time for the flower lover. Nearly everything is dormant and the garden can be a pretty dreary place.
I think that’s why some of us are so crazy about hellebores – they’re like a ray of sunshine that appears to brighten lackluster landscapes.
If you found your plants weren’t forming flowers this year, I hope this guide helped you sort out the cause. Troubleshooting can be a multi-step process, but the results are so worth it.
Did you get to the bottom of the case of the missing blooms? Be sure to come back and let us know the reason for your problem and how you fixed it by leaving a message in the comments section below, and let us know if you have any questions we can help with as well.
Herbs are powerful plants. Just the thought of picking fresh rosemary (Salvia rosmarinus spp. and cvs., Zones 8–10) or basil (Ocimum basilicum spp. and cvs., annual) can awaken our sense of smell or conjure up memories. For thousands of years, humans have used herbs not only for cooking but also for medicinal, therapeutic, and spiritual purposes. Their aromatic qualities make them generally immune to insect and critter damage, and when they bloom, their flowers are alluring for pollinators. I like to think of herbs as the elders in the garden that bring great usefulness and beauty.
But purchasing plant starts in 4-inch pots for herb gardening is often a pricey endeavor—as is buying a fresh bundle of an herb from the grocery store when you only need a few sprigs. Growing herbs from seed can save time and money, allowing you to grow even more plants for less. Plus, whatever you don’t need can be dried for later use. The next time you plan to add some herbs to your garden menu, consider these great choices that can easily be grown from seed without requiring chilling, scarifying, or any other seed-starting treatment.
Start these indoors for faster maturity
While patience is an important quality to have when gardening, knowing how to fast-track to an earlier harvest is a valuable skill too. Because these herbs take longer to mature (and sometimes to germinate), it’s best to get a jump on the season by startingthem early indoors, especially in cooler climates.
Photo: Jennifer Benner
Give parsley seeds extra time for a full season of culinary use
Name: ‘Giant of Italy’ flat leaf parsley (Petroselinum crispum ‘Giant of Italy’)
Zones: 5–9
Size: 24 to 36 inches tall and 18 to 24 inches wide
Conditions: Full sun to partial shade; well-drained soil
Days to Germinate: 14 to 30
Days to Maturity: 75
Planting: Sow seeds indoors 6 weeks before your preferred spring transplanting date.
‘Giant of Italy’ parsley is a large, upright variety with many culinary uses. Its size makes it best suited for the garden, while more compact varieties such as ‘Titan’ work better in containers. Parsley can be slow to germinate, which is why I prefer to start it indoors. If you choose to sow it directly in the garden, do so as soon as possible in early spring. Parsley is a biennial and often reseeds itself in warmer climates. Its flowers and even its leaves attract and support beneficial insects.
Photo: Nancy J. Ondra
Add a touch of tranquility to the garden and your favorite tea
Name: German chamomile (Matricaria recutita)
Zones: Annual
Size: 8 to 24 inches tall and 8 to 12 inches wide
Conditions: Full sun; average, fertile soil
Days to Germinate: 10 to 14
Days to Maturity: 75
Planting: Start seeds indoors 4 weeks before the last frost.
German chamomile is a fast-growing annual that often reseeds itself from year to year. Its tiny daisy-like flowers have been used in teas and tinctures since antiquity for a variety of therapeutic benefits, but most commonly to help support sleep. Once planted in the garden or in pots, chamomile is a profuse bloomer. Because just the flower heads are used for tea and not the stems, harvesting can be time-consuming, but having your own supply of dried chamomile from the garden is rewarding. Flowers may be steeped fresh, or dried and stored for later use. If you don’t have a dehydrator, you can spread the flowers on a screen or a baking sheet and place them in a warm, dry place indoors for a few days and then store them in an airtight jar. If you prefer, German chamomile seeds can also be sown directly in the garden in spring through early summer.
Photo: Courtesy of Johnny’s Selected Seeds
An ancient Mediterranean herb that offers one-of-a-kind flavor
Planting: Start seeds indoors 4 to 6 weeks before the last frost.
This herb can be found under a myriad of common names, including Syrian oregano, zaatar, Bible hyssop, and sometimes even sweet marjoram—though don’t confuse it with Origanum majorana, which is an entirely different plant. This Mediterranean herb has a flavor similar to that of oregano, but it is milder and has a bit more complexity. Due to its delicate and subtle flavor profile, it works well when added to dishes toward the end of cooking or as a garnish. In a variety of ancient cultures, plants within the Origanum genus had mythological, ritual, and medicinal significance. Syrian oregano can be direct-sown after danger of frost, but because it grows slowly it will be more successful if started early indoors.
Photo: Jennifer Benner
These edible petals provide a splash of color in containers and summer salads
Planting: Sow seeds indoors 4 to 6 weeks before the last frost date.
Calendula is commonly used in vegetable gardens, along with other flowering plants such as nasturtium (Tropaeolum majus spp. and cvs., annual), marigold (Tagetes spp. and cvs., -annual), and borage (Borago officinalis, annual) to draw in pollinators and add a splash of color. It also works well in containers. Calendula is -revered for its anti-inflammatory, astringent, antimicrobial, and antifungal healing properties; its petals are a common ingredient in natural skin-care products and can easily be used to make home-made salves. The edible petals can also be sprinkled on a summer salad or used as a beautiful garnish. Among my favorites is ‘Strawberry Blonde’ calendula, a creamy-pink selection that is less common than its orange and yellow relatives. The claw-shaped seeds can also be direct-sown a few weeks before the last frost date.
Photo: Jennifer Benner
This pollinator magnet has wonderfully aromatic leaves
Name: Lemon balm (Melissa officinalis)
Zones: 3–7
Size: 18 to 26 inches tall and 12 inches wide
Conditions: Full sun; moist, well-drained soil
Days to Germinate: 7 to 14
Days to Maturity: 70
Planting: Sow seeds indoors 6 to 8 weeks before the last frost date.
Most commonly used as a tea, this herb is known for its many benefits, including as a sedative, antiviral, and digestive. Its aromatic qualities are strongest when the leaves are fresh, but it is easy to dry for later use. Like most other herbs, lemon balm brings in pollinators when it blooms and readily spreads in the garden when it finds a spot where it is happy. The tiny seeds must be just barely covered with soil when sown indoors or out, as light is needed for germination. Starting seeds early indoors is advisable, however, to allow for more substantial growth in the first season.
Size: 20 to 24 inches tall and 10 to 14 inches wide
Conditions: Full sun; moist, rich, well-drained soil
Days to Germinate: 5 to 10
Days to Maturity: 68
Planting: Start seeds indoors 4 to 6 weeks before the last frost date. Follow with subsequent direct sowings after the danger of frost has passed.
Basil, and in particular the cultivar ‘Genovese’, is one of the most well-loved and widely used fresh herbs. When it is paired with fresh sliced tomato, blended into fresh pesto, or added to tomato sauce, its classic Mediterranean flavor makes it an iconic kitchen garden herb. Although it will hold in the garden longer than other herbs and can be pinched back to encourage new growth, it eventually burns out and can be susceptible to blight. Direct-sowing every 3 to 4 weeks throughout the warmest months will ensure a continual supply.
Size: 24 to 36 inches tall and 12 to 18 inches wide
Conditions: Full sun; fertile, well-drained soil
Days to Germinate: 7 to 21
Days to Maturity: 55
Planting: Start seeds indoors 4 to 6 weeks before the last frost date. Follow with subsequent direct sowings after the danger of frost has passed.
Dill is a critical herb in the kitchen garden of anyone who loves classic summer dishes such as grilled fish, potato or cucumber salad, and homemade pickles. When a recipe calls for fresh dill, it is very rewarding to have it on hand. I -especially like ‘Bouquet’, which is known for producing high yields of useful leaves and seeds. Easy to direct-sow, these feathery plants quickly stretch up and flower, making succession planting important if you wish to have a continuous supply. Sowing a cluster of seeds every 3 to 4 weeks should do the trick. If you have enough space to allow the older dill plants to bloom, their large, bright yellow flowers will support pollinators and beneficial insects. Dill often -reseeds itself in the garden from year to year, but its seeds can also be saved easily for planting.
Photo: Jennifer Benner
Creative dishes are just a snip away with this savory herb
Planting: Sow seeds indoors 4 weeks before your preferred spring transplanting date. Follow with subsequent direct sowings from spring to fall.
Fresh cilantro is used in Middle Eastern, Thai, Indian, East Asian, and Mexican dishes, and inventive recipes for cilantro pesto have become popular in recent years. Cilantro is also said to have many health-enhancing benefits. While it is easy to grow, it stretches -upward fairly quickly into delicate flowers that the bees love. The flowers turn to seed (coriander), which can be collected easily for future planting. This herb grows well and holds better in cooler weather. ‘Leisure’ is one of my favorite selections because it bolts slower than other varieties. Even so, direct-sowing seeds every 3 weeks will ensure a steady supply from spring to fall.
Erin Walrath-Mariano is a hands-on kitchen garden expert with more than 17 years of professional experience designing, building, and maintaining private kitchen gardens in Connecticut and New York.
We all know plants are smart living things. They communicate with insects and grow in the most unlikely places to survive. But can plants feel pain? The next time you grab the pruners, know exactly what’s going on behind the silent snip!
In this post, you will learn…
Can Plants Feel Pain?
It’s clear that plants are very much aware of their surroundings. They grow in places with desired light, following the sun. Plant roots grow and reach toward the water. Seeds utilize gravity and wind to spread.
However, while they may know how to survive, they’re not conscious and aware the same way we are.
Without a brain or nerves, they have no pain receptors. They don’t feel the same way we do, but they do have an inert instinct to survive.
In fact, they may produce certain chemicals to stop predators or heal themselves. A study recorded the sounds of caterpillars eating Arabidopsis plants. When the sound of the caterpillars eating was played to plants not currently under attack, they produced the same defense chemicals as those actually eaten.
Do Plants Feel Stress?
Plants can sense a lot about their environment. They’ll wilt when they’re not getting enough water. With too much sun, their leaves will crisp and burn. When moved out of their favourite spot in the house, they will drop leaves in protest!
Since they can’t run or hide, they do other things to reinforce and defend against the elements and predators.
I see plants under stress in the wake of all the forest fires. After a summer with heavy smoke and wildfires, the following spring and summer had some of the most pollen I’ve seen. When under stress, the plants produce excessive pollen the following season.
Stress can seriously affect how a plant grows!
Can Plants Feel Emotions?
It’s tough to use words like pain or stress when describing the reactions of plants because they don’t have emotions like us.
Stress and pain may exist for the plant in the same way that healthy and good conditions do, but it is not the same way we experience them.
Think of how a plant responds as reactions, not feelings.
Purple Coneflower
Do Plants Hurt When They Are Cut?
Plants are known to “scream” when cut. While they aren’t audible to the human ear, it’s less of a sign of pain than it is as a way of communication.
For instance, a study showed that when a hornworm eats sagebrush, the wounded plant sends distress signals to warn surrounding plants. The plants then make a chemical defense to get the worms to go away.
However, don’t let that thought keep you away from your clippers!
In most cases, trimming a plantcan help to stimulate growth and get rid of diseased and broken materials. The plants will self-heal. Adjacent cells to the cut will either multiply or grow to cover over the cut.
Do Plants Feel Touch?
Definitely! Plants need to be aware of their surroundings to survive. Sweet peas or beans will latch onto things to climb. Plants also use their roots to spread through the soil, going around rocks and other debris when it touches them.
Some plants also have instant reactions. A Venus fly trap, for example, is covered in micro hairs that set off a chemical reaction to close the plant when it’s touched.
Another famous example is the Mimosa pudica. Known as the sensitive plant, the Mimosa pudica will instantly fold its leaves when touched to prevent them from being damaged.
So, while plants may not feel pain in the traditional sense, they certainly are amazing living things that want to grow and thrive, just as they have for thousands of years.
I love to read, and I do it as often as the necessary business of life allows. Sometimes when real life is too overwhelming, and I can’t face a literary novel or a meaty biography, I turn to mysteries. As a mystery lover and a gardener, I find particular solace in the Brother Cadfael series, by the late English author Edith Pargeter, who wrote under the name Ellis Peters.
Peters’ sleuth, Brother Cadfael, is a twelfth century monk at an English monastery near Shrewsbury. Before entering the monastic life at the advanced age of forty, Cadfael had been a soldier and Crusader, professions that allowed him to travel extensively. When he finally settled down to life as brother and herbalist at the monastery of St. Peter and St. Paul, he brought with him a knowledge of healing arts and useful plants as well as a hoard of exotic seeds gathered on his travels.
Brother Cadfael has devotees all over the world, and most of them would probably acknowledge that the plots, especially after the first ten books or so, are somewhat formulaic. Without a doubt, the best thing about the books is the lovely, intensely atmospheric writing. Peters’ research was so thorough that she is able to put the reader squarely into the life of a twelfth century Benedictine monk. Perhaps equally important from a gardening standpoint, she puts the gardener/reader squarely into Brother Cadfael’s fruitful monastic garden. There is so much herbal lore and garden-related detail in the twenty-book Cadfael series, that a couple of English authors, Rob Talbot and Robin Whiteman, were able to assemble it into a book called Brother Cadfael’s Herb Garden (Little Brown & Co, London, 1996).
Brother Cadfael was the abbey’s herbalist, so his main responsibility was to grow and sometimes process all the various useful plants needed by the brothers. Then, as now, the term “herb” is used to describe a plant that can be used for medicine, fragrance, flavoring, or food. In the twenty-first century that encompasses a lot of plants. There were an impressive number in the twelfth century as well.
Cadfael’s herbs were well tended, and he took great satisfaction in the appearance of turned earth, the leafing out of the various plants, and even of the drying stalks left in the garden and the fields after a successful harvest. Though he was bound by the Benedictine Rule, which balances work with worship and prayer, and prescribes how each hour of the day is to be spent, Cadfael often found compelling reasons to spend extra time in the garden or in his herbarium workshop. Every gardener can understand his reasons.
Today Cadfael would be called a “four season gardener”. During the growing season he cultivated, planted and tended his beds. After the harvest, in the late fall and winter, he saw to the storing of the following year’s seeds, the drying of the various herbs and the concoction of the salves and potions which he and the abbey’s official apothecary used to treat illness. Then as now there was a constant supply of collicky babies, women with menstrual problems, middle aged people with aching joints and the mortally ill suffering from intractable pain. All who sought help at the monastery were dosed with Cadfael’s plant-based remedies. The collicky baby, for example, might receive a syrup that included fennel and mint. In the winter, monks with colds and sore throats were treated with a mixture made mostly of horehound, an herb that is distantly related to both thyme and Russian sage. About half of the plants in Cadfael’s garden were used in one form or another to treat digestive problems, though there were more than a few, such as field peas and members of the cabbage family, that may also have caused them.
Time after time in the books, Peters makes reference to her sleuth’s use of “poppy syrup” or “poppy juice” to treat agonizing pain. As a Crusader, Cadfael had gathered seeds of the opium poppy (Papaver somniferum) in the Middle East, along with the knowledge of how to make the seeds into a medicine that could be given reliably to those for whom no other remedy was available. After taking up the monastic life he grew his poppies and selected seeds from the best plants each year until he arrived at a strain with the qualities that he found most useful. As someone in possession of such a potent remedy for pain, “the chief enemy of man”, Cadfael was welcome in the abbey’s small hospital and in sick rooms throughout the surrounding community.
The most appealing thing about Cadfael’s little domain—the gardens and fields and his herbarium workshop—was that it was an oasis of calm, comfort and order in the chaotic and often dangerous medieval world. The monk’s workshop, for example, was warm in winter, because a constant fire was needed to cook the medicinal syrups and potions. In the garden the plants were grown in well-ordered rows, and the herb garden was divided into easily tended sections, probably like those on display at The Cloisters museum in New York. Poisonous plants were grown in a separate area, to protect the unwary.
Brother Cadfael’s healing touch always works on me, reminding me that the garden can be a source of health and inspiration as well as a metaphor for life. The twelfth century was not so different from our own; the weapons are more dangerous now, but human nature is resolutely unchanged. When I turn back to my own beds and borders, I think that while Brother Cadfael would have been distressed by the weeds, he would also have shared my delight in the roses, mint and lavender.
As pleasing to our eyes as it is to its winged visitors, this garden shimmers in scarlet, purple, orange, and yellow, the vibrant colors most attractive to hummingbirds and butterflies. The selected perennials also feature fragrance and special characteristics—clusters of small flowers and tubular forms—essential to drawing your small guests. The Butterfly Bush (Buddleia) and Caryopteris …. shrubs provide shelter for delicate butterfly wings on windy days. Don’t forget to provide a source of water; butterflies prefer sipping from a shallow container filled with gravel and water. And place a few attractive flat stones in your garden where butterflies can bask in the sun. For optimal results, hang a hummingbird feeder near your garden, since these tiny birds must feed almost nonstop. Plant this garden in full sun for best results; more than a few hours of shade will result in decreased flowering and less vigorous growth. The ornamental Grasses have been included to lend grace, texture, and year-long beauty to your garden.
Helpful hints
Using a Grass such as Calamagrostis’Karl Foerster’ instead of the Buddleia could make this garden a Zone 5 collection.
Place a water source nearby for birds to bathe in and also a shallow butterfly basin filled with sand and stones to attract monarchs.
Add shrubs such as Lilacs, VVeigela, and Flowering Crab Apples to attract and provide shelter for hummingbirds.
Grow Dill, Fennel, and Parsley nearby to promote and encourage successful swallowtail larvae.
a. Achillea ‘paprika’ b. Buddeia ‘nanho purple’ c. Caryoptersis ‘long wood blue’ d. Delphinium ‘casa blanca’ e. Deschampsia ‘bronze Veli’ f. Echinacea ‘magnus’ g. Liatris ‘kobold’ h. Monarda ‘garrdenveiw scarlet’ i. Origanum ‘herrenhausen’ j. Pennisetum ‘hameln’ k. Pennstmon ‘elfin pink’ l. Phlox ‘david’ m. Scabiosa ‘butterfly blue’
Our previous potato patches were less than satisfactory. Though we reaped more than we sowed, it wasn’t a lot more. The “soil” at our previous location was truly terrible, and many of our potatoes were attacked by boring insects, got weird rot and scab issues, or simply failed to produce much of anything. Sometimes we’d plant a piece of potato and only reap one tuber from the effort. This in spite of fertilizing, mounding the soil and planting nice, big, widely spaced rows. We even staggered plantings through the end of January into March, hoping to hit the perfect sweet spot of timing in at least one of our attempts.
The soil is much better here, so we’re hoping for some decent yields. Our best performer at the previous property was Yukon Gold, but we’re not sure if that was a fluke, so we’re testing the four most commonly sold varieties in our area yet again.
The ground has been fed with aged cow manure from our cows, as well as a sprinkling of wood ashes. I hope to mix up some Solomon’s Gold again – we just need to inventory what we have left and what we’re missing. It worked remarkably well on our previous test plot of vegetables, though it’s truly high effort to find all the ingredients and get them mixed.
We now have a secret weapon on the mixing, however. With our new property we ended up inheriting a small electric cement mixer. Instead of paying a child to pour buckets of amendments back and forth to mix them, we can now dump a large quantity of everything into the barrel of the mixer and let it spin for a few minutes, then dump everything out into a convenient sealed trashcan we can keep near the garden. The kids really didn’t like mixing all the dusty stuff, even with pay, so they won’t mind. In fact, they’ll probably love using the cement mixer once we show them how to use it.
We did find that our earliest potato planting last year did the best, so we went ahead and planted most of our potatoes over the last couple of days. We still have a box of live seed potatoes I saved from last year, so those will probably get stuck here and there through the Grocery Row Gardens as we find space.
Potatoes are one of of very favorite things to grow. They’re (usually) easy to grow, fun to dig, and of much better flavor than store-bought tubers.
Lawn dethatcher is a tool used to remove dead grass and debris from the surface of the lawn. It is an essential tool for keeping your lawn healthy, as it helps to aerate and loosen the soil, allowing water and nutrients to penetrate deeper into the soil. Lawn dethatchers come in a variety of shapes and sizes, making them suitable for different types of lawns. They are also relatively easy to use, making them a great choice for homeowners who want to maintain their own lawns.
The thatch is the light-brown layer that accumulates over time between the soil and the grasses in your lawn. The majority of it is composed of decomposing organic matter, such as compressed and dead grass, leaves, branches, runners, and roots.
It’s acceptable in moderation, but as it accumulates over a number of years without being addressed, it tends to block the air and essential nutrients that your turf needs to develop healthily.
Even worse, it harbors insects and other pests, which further stunts the growth of your lawn. To get rid of it, you have to use a lawn dethatcher.
Signs Your Lawn Needs Dethatching
Lawn dethatching shouldn’t be done as frequently as lawn mowing, but if your grass starts exhibiting the following signs, there may be too much thatch and it has to be removed.
If it stops expanding and begins to develop brown patches. Because it blocks water and essential nutrients from reaching the roots, thatch buildup hinders grass development. In turn, this will prevent the grass from developing and potentially result in their dying.
If fertilizer and watering do not have the desired effect. Unless the thatch is eliminated, a browning lawn caused by thatch build-up will not respond well to watering, fertilizer treatment, or even reseeding.
If your grass is soft. Make careful to cut deeply enough to view the soil while taking a sample of the turf with a trowel. The thatch layer may then be measured. You should probably get the lawn dethatcher out if it is thicker than 3/4 inch.
If you see any of the aforementioned symptoms, you must get rid of the thick thatch layer that is impeding the growth of your lawn.
Types Of Dethatching Rakes
Learning about the numerous varieties, such as manual, power, and tow behind rakes, is the first step in selecting the best dethatching rake for one’s lawn.
Manual
A manual rake, the most cheap form of dethatcher, resembles a regular rake used to collect leaves in the yard quite closely. Dethatching rakes are different from regular rakes in that they feature shorter tines that are intended to rip up dead grass from the ground.
This form of dethatcher needs the operator to apply all of the necessary pulling effort, unlike a power dethatcher or a tow-behind dethatcher. They are not only more affordable, but they also take up a lot less space than motorized or tow-behind dethatchers.
Power Rake
A power rake resembles a miniature lawnmower, except that it has a cylinder that is coated in dethatcher tines rather of a rotating blade for cutting grass. The cylinder is spun through the lawn by a motor, picking up dead grass as it goes.
Power dethatchers may be connected into a regular outlet and have an electric motor. They are appropriate for small yards because they have a restricted range due to the power cable they require.
Tow Behind
A tow-behind dethatcher is made out of a metal frame that extends underneath it and multiple rows of tines. The detatcher is towed by the frame, which includes two wheels and a hitch that hooks into the rear of a riding lawnmower or an ATV.
A tow-behind dethatcher can cover a large area with each pass because it is typically 4 feet wide. The operator of certain tow-behind dethatchers may change the tine height using handles. This style of dethatcher is appropriate for big yards owing to its wide breadth, but because of its bulky size, it might be more difficult to operate.
What To Consider When Choosing The Best Dethatching Rake
The head of a dethatching rake has metal tines that are used to pick off loose thatch, and the handle is attached to the head. Continue reading to discover more about a dethatching rake’s basic components.
Tines
The metal prongs that protrude from the dethatching rake are known as tines. A dethatching rake’s tines are narrower with a pointed tip than a leaf rake’s large tines, which allow it to pick out dead grass without seriously damaging the soil or healthy grass. Additionally bent for thatch-biting action are the tines of the rake.
Dethatching rakes are made of steel because this material is strong enough to draw up thick layers of dead grass without bending, whereas raking leaves only takes a little amount of power. In order to prepare the soil for reseeding once the thatch has been removed, certain dethatching rakes contain tines on the head’s opposing side.
Head
Dethatcher tines and a frame holding them make up the dethatching rake’s head. The breadth of a dethatcher rake head ranges from 13 to 15 inches. The more thatch the rake can remove in one pass, the broader the head should be.
Remember that a rake with a smaller head will take less power to drag through the thatch than a dethatcher with a larger head and more tines. For greater accuracy during dethatching, certain dethatching rakes come equipped with adjustable heads that the user may adjust in respect to the handle.
Handle
Rakes used for dethatching have thicker handles than leaf rakes. These handles, which are normally constructed of hardwood, are capable of withstanding the power required to drag the rake head through thick thatch without breaking.
Some rakes include fiberglass handles, which are substantially lighter and have strength characteristics comparable to those of hardwood. They are usually more pricey as well. Dethatching rake handles also include a rubber coating, enabling the user to maintain a secure grasp on the rake while operating it.
To help you find the best lawn dethatcher for the task, we’ve examined a number of them and have listed the top 8 (both walk-behind and tow-behind) below.
Our Top Picks
The manual dethatching rakes with excellent thatch removal designs and materials are listed below. This list also contains motorized and pull-behind dethatchers in addition to manual rakes. The finest dethatching rake for you can be one of these top options.
The company GreenWorks sells a variety of equipment and accessories for gardening at very reasonable prices. Check out the lawn dethatcher they have.
Our top recommendation for the best lawn dethatcher right now is the Greenworks 27022. Given that it is currently the most reasonably priced and trustworthy alternative on the market, it has earned the top rank on our list. This ergonomic device is powered by a strong built-in motor that draws 10 amps. The machine’s top has adjustable handles with cushioned grips that make it easy and comfortable for the user to use.
With a 14-inch operating width that speeds up construction and makes it easy to access tight spaces, the Greenworks 27022 is ideal for tiny backyards and lawns. Additionally, you may modify the depth in two stages in accordance with the typical length of your lawn. To prevent them from losing their edge over time, the thatch-removing tines are constructed of stainless steel. The Greenworks 27022 lawn dethatcher comes with a 4 year guarantee from GreenWorks.
Best Features
Most cost-effective lawn mower Greatest lawn dethatcher Operating width of 14 inches 18 tines on a corded electric lawn dethatcher with a four-year warranty
Pros
There is a lengthy warranty term. Really comfy and ergonomic design Tined stainless steel blades
Cons
Large backyards could require a wider working space.
We all recognize the name Sun Joe since it is a well-known brand when it comes to gardening tools. Thousands of people are already receiving excellent service from Sun Joe’s 2-in-1 lawn dethatcher.
We are placing the Sun Joe AJ801E grass dethatcher in position two. You may acquire a two-in-one tool that is both a lawn dethatcher and an electric scarifier for a reasonable price, which is quite useful for your maintenance requirements. Given that it has an 18-tine working surface that is 12.6 inches wide, it is perfect for cultivating small to medium-sized lawns. This machine has a minimum cutting height of 0.12 inches, which enables upkeep of even the finest lawns.
It contains a strong 13 amp motor that completes the task more quickly and makes grass maintenance simple. Cut the grass roots using the Sun Joe AJ801E’s scarifier feature to encourage thicker, healthier grass growth on your lawn. It has superior air boost technology that allows the stainless steel tine to pull up more grass with each pass. It is ETL-approved and comes with a 2-year Sun Joe guarantee.
Best Features
6 inch operating width, two-in-one grass edging device 18 tine corded electric lawn dethatcher 2 years of guarantee with a minimum grass cutting height of 12 inches
Pros
It comes with a warranty period Simple to use Fine maintenance is possible
Cons
The cutting width is too short
Goplus is a well-known producer of tools for maintaining gardens and lawns. The gardening equipment from this manufacturer is available in small sizes and is very effective and user-friendly.
This two-in-one tool enables you to scarify and dethatch your grass. It has a strong 12 amp motor, a 13 inch operating width, and can dethatch a lot of grass in a single walk. In addition, the lawn dethatcher includes three depth positions from which you may select based on how much grass you want to remove. For automated garbage collection, there is a 40-litre grass collection bag.
For great durability and temperature resistance, the grass dethatcher from Goplus has a robust metal frame with a wear-resistant cover. For greater security, it has a dual security switch. To start the machine, you must first push the safety button and then pull the lever.
When it comes to comfort, the ergonomic grip keeps you from growing weary even after lengthy periods of use. The front wheels’ big diameter also makes it simple to relocate the grass dethatcher.
Best Features
Two-in-one grass dethatcher A robust 12 amp motor Operating width of 13 inches 3-position depth adjustments 40-liter bag for collecting grass Construction of a solid metal frame and a cover with wear resistance Adaptive grip Dual security switch for safety
Pros
Durable and long lasting Prevents fatigue while operating Safe to use
Cons
Can not make tight turns
Due to the fact that it exclusively serves specialized farmers and other high-end applications, Agri Fab has experienced significant growth in popularity in recent years. The grass dethatcher and other gardening equipment are its most potent products.
If you have a big farm that needs frequent upkeep, the grass dethatcher from Agri Fab will be the perfect solution for you. The 48-inch operating breadth of the Agri Fab 45-0295 is excellent, and the tool has 24 rust-resistant tines. Every time you use it, you’ll get a new patch of lawn ground thanks to these tines’ ability to efficiently remove the roots of dead grass. These tines have all been heat treated to prevent them from losing their edge over time.
The grass dethatcher’s front wheels are 7 inches wide so they may be readily moved without encountering any resistance. The task is made more simpler by the cantilever handle at the top, which makes it simple to lower and elevate the tines as needed. The tines themselves are made of heavy gauge steel with a welded drawbar and are very durable. A universal hitch is also available, easily fitting all supported cars.
Best Features
48-inch operating width heavy-gauge steel tines for a heavy-duty lawn dethatcher Lawn dethatcher with 24 tines and 7-inch wheels tow behind
Pros
Best working width in this list Adaptable to all climates Convenient to raise or lower
Cons
There is no warranty period
If you haven’t yet discovered the perfect tow-behind dethatcher for your needs, check out Brinly’s lawn dethatcher. It will grab your attention because it is the final dethatcher of this kind in our choices.
Thatch removal is a laborious job, especially if you have a sizable backyard that is entirely covered with grass. For these kinds of lands, only lawn dethatchers like the Brinly DT-48BH are an option since it has a wide operating width of 48 inches and two rows of separate tines. These tines are perfect for gaining more ground quickly, especially if you attach them to a quick tractor.
The Brinly DT-48BH’s tines are made of sturdy spring steel while its body is composed of steel. This device’s 8-inch broad transport wheels provide excellent portability and less obstacles when in use. However, the wheels are positioned on the dethatcher’s back half and are parallel to the tray, giving the device a generally small dimension. These 3/16-inch-diameter spring steel tines are all entirely flexible for guaranteed performance.
Best Features
Most effective heavy-duty lawn dethatcher Compared to other comparable choices, inexpensive 48-inch working width universal hookup pin Tow behind lawn dethatcher with 60 tines of 8 inches
Pros
Very large wheels are installed Overall form factor and footprint is small Covers a lot of area in less time
Cons
There is no warranty period
Since 1895, one of the most well-known brands has been creating lawn mowers, tillers, gardening cultivators, and other garden equipment. This brand is called Earthwise. The company is dedicated to producing environmentally friendly outdoor goods.
The lawn dethatcher from Earthwise uses a strong 13 amp engine to dethatch your lawn. Additionally, it has a working breadth of a generous 16 inches, which will make quick work of any dethatching jobs. You receive a 10 gallon catcher bag that is attached to the dethatcher for gathering the waste.
The grass dethatcher has a working depth of -0.4 to 0.4 inches so you may dethatch completely by either scratching the surface or getting to the roots. The tangled layers of grass and detritus may be broken apart with the 45 spring pins. For better dethatching results, the spring pins are constructed of piano wires that have had their zinc coating applied. With this grass dethatcher, upkeep is essentially nonexistent.
This grass dethatcher is covered by a 2-year manufacturer’s guarantee from the original purchase date by Earthwise.
Best Features
Motor of 13 amps Operating width of 16 inches 10 litres of waste catcher bag, operating depth of 0.4 to 0.4 inches, and 45 piano wires with zinc plating used as spring pins Manufacturer’s guarantee of two years
Comparatively speaking to the other options on our list right now, VonHaus is a premium brand. It is renowned for creating incredibly useful and adaptable goods, like the lawn dethatcher shown below.
Another 2-in-1 lawn from the upscale VonHaus brand is presented here. A separate aerator feature is also included with the VonHaus dethatcher. You won’t have any trouble maneuvering it on even the worst lawns because it has a strong 12.5 amp motor. The motor may remove damaged soil elements, allowing for a healthy soil turnover and improved grass growth. It has a working width of 15 inches and a depth that can be adjusted from -0.47 inches to +0.24 inches.
This unit’s 45-liter total collecting capacity is excellent since it means you won’t need to empty it as frequently as you would with a smaller alternative. The soft-grip handles of the dethatcher are simple to fold after use, and you can also take the grass box out to store it in a small area. Given its high price range, the guarantee period is 3 years, which is fantastic.
Best Features
High-quality lawn dethatcher A two-in-one gardening tool Five adjustable height adjustments Fifteen-inch working width 3-year warranty on a corded electric lawn dethatcher Handle folding
Pros
The handles include a soft region for grasping for comfort. May be conveniently housed in small spaces High capacity collection box
Cons
Quite expensive for the available performance
Mantis is another another really pricey brand that has made it into today’s choices. The grass dethatcher seen here, along with every other MAntis product, is sold at a high price point.
A full gardening tool is not what the Mantis 5222 Power Tiller is. It serves as a high-end addition to your current Mantis 700 series lawn thatcher. It is simply linked to all Mantis 7000 series goods, which are well-liked in the marketplace. However, before buying the attachment, you should still enter your model number and verify compatibility. It is the only item on our list with 60 sturdy and flexible spring steel tines and is powered by an electric source.
The tough steel tines can readily remove the leftover thatch and weeds from your garden that may otherwise hinder the lawn grass’s ability to develop and maintain its health. Given the huge number of tines, it can cover a breadth of 15 inches in a single pass, and as a result, it performs better than any electrical device to date. Two additional fender extensions are included and slot into the sides of the fender to give additional protection.
Best Features
Excellent replacement for a damaged dethatcher with a working width of 15 inches 60 tine corded electric lawn dethatcher Compatible with goods from the mantis 7000 series Available are two fender extensions.
Pros
Tine number and strength are really high. Extremely high-quality lawn dethatcher attachment Fueled by a strong motor
Cons
No warranty period despite the price tag
How We Chose The Best Dethatching Rakes
A dethatcher rake that is well suited for the task at hand is the finest option for the user. In light of this, we selected a wide variety of dethatching rakes to accommodate yards with varying demands and sizes. We added manual dethatching rakes with tine configurations that enable them to bite into deep thatch without seriously harming good grass for small- to medium-sized yards. These hand rakes have steel heads and robust hardwood or fiberglass handles.
In addition to manual dethatching rakes, we have included corded electric ones that are appropriate for smaller yards and don’t have the same physical demands as a manual rake. We also selected the top tow-behind dethatcher for ride-on mowers for bigger yards.
FAQs
Read on for answers to some of the most frequently asked concerns concerning dethatching rakes if you’re unsure how to measure the amount of thatch in your lawn or if a normal rake would suffice.
Q. How Can I Tell If My Lawn Has Too Much Thatch?
By removing a 2-inch-deep section of your lawn, you can determine how much thatch is there. Measure the quantity of spongy material between the soil and the lush grass after taking the sample. Your grass has too much thatch if it is thicker than 0.75 inches.
Q. What Is The Best Way To Dethatch A Lawn?
Using a dethatcher tool, such as a hand rake, motorized rake, or tow-behind dethatcher, is the finest way to dethatch a lawn. You may also try to hasten the breakdown of the thatch by fertilizing and frequently watering the grass.
Q. Is A Dethatching Rake Worth It?
The state of your grass will determine whether or not a dethatching rake is worthwhile. A dethatching rake could be a wise purchase if your lawn suffers from too much thatch on a regular basis.
Q. Can I Use A Regular Rake To Dethatch?
A conventional leaf rake should not be used to clear thatch from a lawn. When trying to use the rake to dethatch the lawn, it won’t work very well and might harm good grass. Having said that, lawns with mild thatch difficulties may be raked using a metal rake.
Q. Can I Use A Dethatching Rake In The Summer To Prepare My Lawn For Fall?
The ideal times to dethatch a lawn are in late spring and early fall, however this depends on whether the grass grows better in warm or chilly climates. Dethatching warm-season grasses in the early spring can harm new growth, thus it should be avoided.
Q. How Do I Get Rid Of Thatch Naturally?
By taking a few simple actions, you may naturally remove thatch without the use of a dethatching equipment. Make sure to maintain constant moisture in the soil beneath the thatch. As soon as the thatch issue is under control, collect all grass clippings in the lawnmower bag and apply nitrogen-rich fertilizer to hasten the breakdown of the dead grass.
After I order my wish list of seeds, the fun begins: coaxing them to grow. Every year, I set up a makeshift “seed lab” in a corner of my New York City apartment. I clip a grow light to a bookshelf, pack a large bin with rows of CowPots filled with seed starting mix, and […]
The fiddle-leaf fig (Ficus lyrata) is a wonderful plant well-known for its unique, fiddle-shaped foliage.
A popular plant for indoor enthusiasts, this particular Ficus often finds itself in communal portions of the house where its beauty can be shown off.
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But these plants may not be the best bet for homes with cats or dogs, as many houseplants can be toxic or even deadly to pets.
Do fiddle-leaf figs count among these plants, or is one of the plants safe for cats?
Are Fiddle Leaf Plants Toxic to Cats?
Sadly, fiddle-leaf figs aren’t safe for plants and contain calcium oxalate, a compound considered toxic to both humans and pets.
The good news is the plant won’t kill your cat, but the bad news is that nobbling on it can still lead to some major side effects.
Calcium Oxalate 101
We should be perfectly clear up front: scientists still don’t understand the purpose of calcium oxalate, so while the effects on humans and pets are well-known, there’s still a lot of mystery as to why it is created in the first place.
Created from oxalic acid, calcium oxalate is a form of calcium salt that can be found in over 1,000 genera of plants.
That’s right, genera of plants, meaning tens of thousands of individual species – including the majority of the Araceae family – contain these mysterious crystals!
While there are a few theories about the function of calcium oxalate, including a means of plant defense, the most popular theory is that the crystals are formed as a byproduct of detoxifying from excess calcium intake.
But whatever the reason for them, we do know that calcium oxalate comes in both soluble and insoluble forms.
One would think the soluble version would be safer, but it’s actually often the more dangerous of the two.
The Effects Of Calcium Oxalate Ingestion
Humans consume calcium oxalate daily in green foods such as broccoli, but the amount is still quite small.
However, a full-sized adult human can develop kidney stones from consuming too much calcium oxalate.
Now imagine being only a tiny fraction of that size, and you’ll find an acceptable amount for an adult human can be deadly for your cat.
Insoluble crystals are nasty businesses and produce visible immediate symptoms. This is because the crystals are grouped into raphides, broken apart when your cat begins chewing on the host plant.
These tiny shards are like microscopic needles, stabbing at the gums, tongue, and throat.
The results are edema, over-salivating, oral pain, pawing at the mouth, swelling, and vomiting as the cat tries desperately to quell the discomfort, much as you would after biting into a particularly hot pepper.
Even worse, if your poor cat gets some in its eyes, there could be swelling, photosensitivity, and pain due to the eye’s surface being scratched up by the crystals.
But wait, we said soluble calcium oxalate could be even worse, and the symptoms of ingestion do indeed make the insoluble crystals look like child’s play.
When digested, the oxalate is absorbed by the gastrointestinal tract. This is where scientists believe the crystals are related to detoxification because they can bond with the natural calcium in your cat’s body, resulting in a deficiency known as hypocalcemia.
Even worse, the symptoms can take up to 36 hours to manifest and require immediate medical intervention to avoid the risk of permanent damage to your cat’s body.
Visible symptoms can include diarrhea, malaise, tremors, weakness, and the entire list of symptoms caused by insoluble crystals.
Internally, meanwhile, the crystals can cause damage to the kidneys and also lead to the formation of oxalate bladder stones.
These stones can lead to painful urination accompanied by blood, more frequent peeing, or a sudden habit of peeing outside the litterbox. The cat may also seem to have difficulty urinating.
Purebred breeds such as Burmese, Siamese, Himalayan, and Persian cats, as well as older cats, have a higher risk of forming oxalate bladder stones.
Treating Accidental Ingestion
So let’s say your cat took a nibble of the fiddle-leaf fig.
The first thing you need to do is take a picture of the damage and call your vet.
Depending on how much was consumed, they may require you to come in or observe the cat. They may also require you to bring a sample of the plant in.
If you or your vet suspect oxalate bladder stones, you will need to provide a urine sample, and the vet may perform bloodwork to confirm the presence of oxalate stones.
If confirmed, the vet will surgically remove them. However, if the symptoms appear mild and little more than a nibble, your vet may prescribe an over-the-counter medication to ease the discomfort.
Likewise, you can give your cat a little lactose-free yogurt to soothe its throat. Just remember that cats are lactose intolerant, so giving them too much lactose can give them diarrhea.
Preventing Ingestion
In most cases, your cat probably won’t be interested in munching on the fiddle leaf, but super-chewers and overly curious cats can be more problematic.
In the worst cases, you’ll have to isolate the plant by putting it in a room the cat can’t access or a place it can’t climb to.
For some cats, you can group strong-scented plants around the fig, making them want to avoid the plants, although this won’t always help if the cat is determined.
One other measure that can help protect your cat from many of the side effects of calcium oxalate is giving them a proper diet.
Raw meat is by far the best for cats; they’ll be leaner and more active.
You’ll find they also stay hydrated without needing as much water because their bodies are adapted to processing the raw meat’s blood content.
But meat can be expensive, so the next best thing is canned food.
You should check the labels to ensure there aren’t a lot of additives, but canned food is otherwise a decent alternative to raw meat and sometimes far cheaper.
Both of these will actually help keep your cat properly hydrated and can reduce symptoms while making it harder for bladder stones to form.
As for dry doof… If you’ve ever watched videos of how they make Chicken McNuggets, the process for making dried cat food is nearly identical.
The resulting kibble has poor nutritional value and can actually dehydrate your cat, resulting in calcium oxalate ingestion having more pronounced symptoms.
In the above photo, 1×1 chunks of turf grass are awaiting removal. One method of eliminating the turf chunks is to lay them upside down in a secluded corner of the yard and let them decompose over time. Our property is not big enough to have a secluded area, so we sliced off the soil with my garden hand saw and distributed it on top of the existing and new garden beds. Admittedly, an easier way of disposing of the turf would have been to hire a landscape crew to haul it away. But we did this during the first weeks of COVID lockdown, when getting a crew was extremely difficult. Besides, we had a lot more fun and satisfaction completing the project ourselves.
Look at the middle of the photo in the lower foreground. You can see a robin patiently waiting for a “snack” (a worm). A small flock of robins gathered each time we excavated more lawn. One robin even caught a worm that I tossed in his direction! Spending time in nature provides a lot of entertainment.
Before we finished excavating turf grass, 36 Buxus sinica var. insularism, ‘Franklin’s Gem’ (boxwood, Zones 4–9) arrived via Federal Express. After unboxing them, we gave the cardboard boxes a second life: We manage a charity vegetable garden at our church, so we laid the boxes flat on top of the raised beds and covered them with composted cow manure and shredded leaves. If you research “lasagna gardening” you will see that cardboard is one of the favorite foods of worms. It helps improve the soil as it decomposes. You can still plant vegetable seeds after covering a bed with cardboard. Simply poke a hole in the moist cardboard and drop a seed into the hole.
The above photo from our second-floor window shows the new garden beds partway through the turf-cutting process. The line of boxwood plants is staged around the perimeter of the space. If you are wondering what is in the window box in the lower part of the photo, that is mesclun mix lettuce. Lettuce was one of the foods in short supply in the Chicago area during the first month or so of the lockdown, so we grew some ourselves.
In the above photo, two Hydrangea paniculata ‘Limelight’ (Zones 3–8) and the boxwood are already installed in the middle of the new beds, while 56 Nepeta ‘Cat’s Pajamas’ (Zones 4–8) in their white nursery pots are awaiting installation. The nepeta’s main bloom time in our garden is mid-May through June. It still continues to flower through September, especially if I cut away the spent flower stalks, but the color is more muted. We still enjoy the geometry that the mass planting of nepeta creates even if the color is not as spectacular. Many types of bees and butterflies enjoy it too.
The next phase of the project, in fall 2020, involved planting a mixture of hundreds of Crocus chrysanthus (early snow crocus, Zones 3–8) and Crocus vernus (large cupped crocus, Zones 3–8), including the variety ‘Jeanne d’Arc’ and others. We now see and hear early spring bees buzzing around both types of crocus in these beds. We also planted dozens of alliums inside each boxwood parterre. We purchased about nine different allium varieties to obtain a wide range of heights, bloom times, shapes, and colors. There are subtle differences in the varieties. The above photo was taken in spring 2021. I timed the design so that the alliums and nepetas would bloom at the same time.
This photo shows the garden beds in spring 2021. By now there was no problem in obtaining lettuce at grocery stores, so I planted pansies (Viola × wittrockiana, cool-season annual) and ‘Tete-a-Tete’ daffodils (Narcissus ‘Tete-a-tete’, Zones 3–8) in the window box in the foreground of the photo, which attract early butterflies and bees. The daffodils have finished their bloom in this photo. Since we designed the beds to have space in between each plant, we top off each bed with hardwood mulch each spring to create a dressier appearance, suppress potential weeds, and reduce the amount of supplemental watering needed during what can be some hot drought conditions in July and August. We also had our underground sprinkler system reconfigured to accommodate the new beds and the reconfigured existing beds. If you have an existing underground sprinkler system and are considering changing or adding beds, it is best to plan for the added cost as part of your entire project.
Our new beds still bring us viewing pleasure during our long Chicago-area winters. We like the shapes the snow creates with the individual boxwood plants and the “frosting” that the snow adds on top of the Hydrangea paniculata ‘Limelight’ dried flower heads. We hope you enjoyed our three-season gardening process as much as we did. Happy gardening at your own home.
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