From this title, “Traffic Stopping Kale,” you may be imagining a major traffic incident in Los Angeles or Santa Barbara where a truck loaded with kale turned over on the interstate. Then tons of drivers hit their brakes and start grazing right off of the roadway. No, that is not what I am implying at […]

Have you noticed that vegetable gardening is hip again? I love this trend that Americans of all ages are experimenting with growing their own food. Whether their vegetables and fruit are being grown to supplement food from the grocery store or if the intent is to eat mostly from the garden, vegetable gardening (and horticulture) […]

Along the coast of Maine as we are readying for Christmas, our outdoor cultivation has come to a screeching halt as the ground is covered by a foot and a half of snow. To add emphasis to this being the time of the shortest days of the year, a half inch of ice fell the […]

This weekend was something we have been waiting on for a while. After a pipe broke in our ceiling in January, we have been living in a nearby summer cottage while our downstairs was being renovated. For two months, we lived in someone else’s home. We are extremely thankful that we had somewhere else to […]

If you have ever been up close and personal with a katsura tree (Cercidiphyllum japonicum), you’ve probably noticed that smell. Is it cotton candy (or do you call it candy floss tree?), or maybe it is the scent of brown sugar? Burnt sugar? Caramel? I’m going to call it the sweet scent of fall. As […]

Long after other Digitalis have taken the summer off for vacation, the rusty foxglove or Digitalis ferruginea is flowering during the warm days of July and August here in New England. This tall, slender foxglove is from Mediterranean regions of southeastern Europe. Depending on its growing conditions, it can behave as a perennial or self-sowing biennial. If […]

This week I want to take a break from writing about all of the cool plants that I am surrounded by each week to reflect on what it means to be a gardener. When I use the term gardener, I am using it loosely to describe anyone who passionately associates themselves with a garden as […]

Our family just got back from a week and a half vacation down south. We drove from Maine to Raleigh and then on to Atlanta. Our kids were performing in the Junior Theater Festival in Atlanta with a troupe from Boothbay. If you ever get a chance to see a Junior Theater Festival, by all […]

Update From Rochelle (fall 2023) – It is rare that a plant catches the zeitgeist, and when you look back at a time, you can see that it was uniquely of an era.  The fluffy blooms of cafe au lait dahlia is a zeitgeist flower of the late 20teens and into the pandemic times.   […]