It’s summertime and that means vacations. You’re a good plant parent and you want to make sure your plants are well taken care of but you don’t need to stay home all summer. I talked to the people who have years and years of knowledge gleaned from experience: the Swansons’ team! They offered their best tips for keeping your outdoor and indoor plants happy and healthy while you’re away.
While hoses, sprinklers, and watering bags are all excellent ways to water, many gardeners are turning to drip irrigation systems for their manifold benefits: once set up properly, a drip irrigation system is efficient, precise, and a relatively low-effort method for keeping our plants well-watered throughout the year. This post is an introduction to the key components and setup of a drip irrigation system.
One of the more common questions that newer gardeners might ask is, “when is the best time of year to prune __________?” This pruning calendar can help guide you to the best times to prune your garden plants. You’ll also find links to other posts with more in-depth information on how to prune, pruning specific plants and categories of plants, and pruning in individual seasons.
You and your rose soul-mates have found each other. Now what? How do you keep them happy and thriving in our maritime Pacific Northwest climate? Roses are not completely carefree, but with a few basic care guidelines, you can grow them successfully and enjoy their beauty for years to come.
Pollinators come in all shapes and sizes: bees, moths, butterflies, beetles, flies, and even bats, just to name a few. Knowing which plants serve our pollinators the best helps create a healthy and vibrant ecosystem where flora and fauna thrive. It also creates a diverse and beautiful garden for us to enjoy. Here are a few of our favorite flowers to attract bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds to your garden year after year.
It's been a hard week here at Swansons. We are so sad to say that we lost one of our chicks at the beginning of the week. Flower had always been our most delicate chick, but we had strong hopes that she would grow stronger each day and pull through. Unfortunately, she was just too weak and, despite all our care, she didn't make it. We are glad to see that the other chicks are doing well and growing each day.
Last post, I explained the basics of heading back. Now let's look at a quick spring thinning of that beefy magnolia I mentioned before, and other ornamental trees and shrubs (examples: Japanese maple, snowbell, rhododendron, camellia, etc.). If there is a “secret” to thinning trees and shrubs to look their best, it would be this...
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