I-Marketing-Biz » Kent Higgins

Basic Garden Features

Kent Higgins — Sun, 24 Oct 2010 21:34:56 +0000

The first killing frosts have put a stop to visible activity in the garden. But there are many clear, warm days that give the gardener an urge to dig. This is good because digging the soil is one of the chief things that needs to be done in November. Expose the soil to the freezing and thawing action of winter.

Basic Garden Features

Try Caladiums As House Plants This Winter

Kent Higgins — Sun, 17 Oct 2010 18:55:49 +0000

Perhaps the one time that indoor plants are most appreciated is in the long gray wintery months that precede spring. Foliage plants, African violets, gloxinias and begonias are about the extent of what the average indoor gardener has to work with.

Try Caladiums As House Plants This Winter

Gentians The Blues Of Autumn Under Solar Garden Lights

Kent Higgins — Tue, 12 Oct 2010 17:09:49 +0000

One of the choice wild flowers that we rarely see these days is the fringed gentian, Gentiana erinita. It is an elusive plant, and if you have the good fortune to find it covering a corner of a damp meadow one year, do not count on seeing it there the next. It is a biennial and, therefore, dependent on having its seeds reach the ground if it is to survive. It blooms in September, and the late Autumn winds shake free the little hairy scales which often travel far, but only those germinate which strike the moist earth at the end of their journey.

Gentians The Blues Of Autumn Under Solar Garden Lights

Fun With Gourds

Kent Higgins — Sat, 09 Oct 2010 12:57:19 +0000

It is HARVEST TIME! An autumn chill is in the air, and on the fence hang ornamental gourds waiting to be gathered. Their striped colors of bright green and yellow are most attractive. Their foliage has passed its prime and the yellow blossoms are almost gone.

Fun With Gourds

The Time Of House Plant

Kent Higgins — Fri, 08 Oct 2010 22:27:03 +0000

Just as Memorial Day is the signal for the relegation of house plants to the porch, the shrub border or some special corner in the garden, so is Labor Day the time for the preparation of the plants for their return to the house. Preparation means repotting with new soil in good clean pots, cleaning the saucers and trays and refilling them with a thin layer of fine gravel.

The Time Of House Plant

Fall Planting Still A Good Option

Kent Higgins — Wed, 22 Sep 2010 21:50:51 +0000

Although many of us paid dearly for fall planting this past year, fall is still one of the best times, if not the best, to plant in many areas. Unless there is a bad wind problem or a very early winter, fall planted plants have a chance to get started next spring and maybe even this fall. That puts them a couple of jumps ahead when the hot dry weather comes next summer. If in doubt, try it. In case you are afraid the ground will freeze up, put on two or three inches of mulch. It is amazing how much such a mulch slows up the penetration of frost into the ground.

Fall Planting Still A Good Option

October West Coast Gardening Gets Important

Kent Higgins — Wed, 22 Sep 2010 20:47:54 +0000

October, the most important autumn month for plantsmen, is a busy one for all West Coast gardeners. It is a housecleaning month for established gardens and a time when ideas for a bright new plot are translated into actions. A garden, thank goodness, is never done; there is always some improvement that can be made. It may be necessary to "put on the brakes": to thin out some of the bushes and to prune the remainder in order to allow them to attain their best forms. Do this by taking out some central growth deep down from the bottom. A diseased tree may have to be removed or a border remade. Do all revamping now.

October West Coast Gardening Gets Important

The Landscape And Secluded Sitting Areas

Kent Higgins — Sun, 19 Sep 2010 21:48:35 +0000

If you develop and landscape your property along naturalistic instead of formal lines, you will provide no patios or terraces. But because of the appeal of some spot where you can sit and enjoy the garden shielded from the eyes of the outside world, you will want to find or create some area for that purpose.

The Landscape And Secluded Sitting Areas

Planting New Cammellias In Southern Gardens

Kent Higgins — Sat, 11 Sep 2010 21:09:29 +0000

From late August until mid-September is the best time to plant new camellias to replace those damaged by frost last winter. One gardener here told me that only five of his 300 very fine plants were lost. Three of Alba Plena were killed down to the ground. He cut them back to the surface of the soil and a few shoots are now showing. None of the plants are allowed to have branches which bend down to the ground.

Planting New Cammellias In Southern Gardens

Fall Lawns Call For Seed Feed And Weed

Kent Higgins — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 12:52:38 +0000

Selecting Stock Plants - September is a good time to begin making cuttings for starting next year's plants. Lantana cuttings should be made from seasoned wood before any lush growth occurs after the fall rains. If the cutting wood is soft, the cuttings will rot or blast instead of developing roots. The colorful Jacob's coat (Alternanthera) can be kept as cuttings over winter as can other types of herbaceous plants such as hibiscus, geraniums, coleus, ice plant, sultana and wandering Jew. By September, these plants are conditioned properly for taking of cuttings.

Fall Lawns Call For Seed Feed And Weed