Independent gardening advice for real gardens, balconies and windowsills.
Practical advice on growing food and flowers, improving soil, and making the most of small spaces. Start anywhere — the garden will meet you.
(Drosera rotundifolia) Sundew family Flowers - Small, white, growing in a 1-sided, curved raceme of buds chiefly. Calyx usually 5-parted; usually 5 petals, and as many stamens as petals; usually 3 sty...
(Helianthemum Canadense) Rock-rose family Flowers - Solitary, or rarely 2; about 1 in. across, 5-parted, with showy yellow petals; the 5 unequal sepals hairy. Also abundant small flowers lacking petal...
(Cephalanthus occidentalis) Madder family Flowers - Fragrant, white, small, tubular, hairy within, 4-parted, the long, yellow-tipped style far protruding; the florets clustered on a fleshy receptacle,...
(Rhodora Canadensis; Rhododendron Rhodora of Gray) Heath family Flowers - Purplish pink, rose, or nearly white, 1 1/2 in. broad or less, in clusters on short, stiff, hairy pedicels, and usually appear...
(Aronia arbutifolia; Pyrus arbutifolia of Gray) Apple family Flowers - White or magenta tinged, 1/2 in. across or less, in terminal, compound cymes, finally overtopped by young sterile shoots. Calyx 5...
"I want the inner meaning and the understanding of the wildflowers in the meadow. Why are they? What end? What purpose? The plant knows, and sees, and feels; where is its mind when the petal falls? Ab...
(Crotalaria sagittalis) Pea family Flowers - Yellow, 1/2 in. long or less, usually only 2 or 3 on a long peduncle. Calyx 5-toothed, slightly 2-lipped; corolla papilionaceous. Stem: 3 to 10 in. high, w...
(Ulmaria rubra; Spirea lobata of Gray) Rose family Flowers - Deep pink, like the peach blossom, fragrant, about 1/3 in. across, clustered in large cymose panicles on a long footstalk. Calyx 5-lobed; 5...
(Pyxidanthera barbulata) Diapensia family Flowers - Abundant, white, or sometimes pink, about 1/4 in. across, 5-parted, solitary, seated at tips of branches. Stem: Prostrate, creeping, much branched,...
(Rubus odoratus) Rose family Flowers - Royal purple or bluish pink, showy, fragrant, 1 to 2 in. broad, loosely clustered at top of stem. Calyx sticky-hairy, deeply 5-parted, with long pointed tips; co...
(Atragene Americana) Crowfoot family Flowers - Showy, purplish blue, about 3 in. across; 4 sepals, broadly expanded, thin, translucent, strongly veined, very large, simulating petals; petals small, sp...
(Phytolacca decandra) Pokeweed family Flowers - White, with a green centre, pink-tinted outside, about 1/4 in. across, in bracted racemes 2 to 8 in. long. Calyx of 4 or 5 rounded persistent sepals, si...