We can create our home version of “Holiday Beautiful” with the plants around us from the growing season. Sometimes ornamental grasses have a second life. It continues to move in the wind as a dried plant in winter. Lights add a festive look at night. Eastern red cedar boughs, some with green berries, stay fresh … Continue reading
Filed under Container Gardens …
Add a Little Spice
At Plant Exchange blog, the asters of fall are now memory, and houseplants are a source of winter green. The remainder of plant activity indoors, occurs under fluorescent light on a table. Herbs pots are here, as they grew outdoors from starter plants this summer. They include sage, front and center, and clockwise, thyme, rosemary, tarragon, … Continue reading
Garden Bloggers Bloom Day November 15th
Welcome to a crisp, sunny 46 degrees F. on the Northern Plains. We’re USDA Zone 4-5a in this region, and flowers outdoors are behind us. These leaves lie beneath a Japanese maple tree. These leaf colors are paint-able but show that the tree didn’t reach its full color before the beginning of fall cold snaps. Some … Continue reading
Regional Plant-Related Event
2021 Siouxland Garden Show The two-day Siouxland Garden Show draws more than 2,500 attendees from the tri-state area each year for lawn and garden education sessions and vendor shopping. Many youth, families, and older adults attend our annual event. Following the recommendations of our state universities, we are choosing to be proactive by not hosting … Continue reading
Miss Seeing Other Gardens this Season?
With limited opportunities to view others’ gardens last growing season, it’s a treat to look at a public display garden in our Northern Plains growing region. The results of the 2020 top-performing flowering annuals at the Morris, Minnesota West Central Research and Outreach Center display gardens have been announced. They grow 40% from seed and 60% … Continue reading
Another Look at Late Bloomers
By late September here on the Northern Plains, most plants have had the big flower or fall color reveal. If not, like many maples this year, red leaf color started and halted with hard frosts; crunchy brown leaves remain. Most locust trees had their golden color. Sunflowers had a fine season of showy blooms. Goldenrod … Continue reading
Garden Bloggers Bloom Day October 15th
Welcome to Garden Bloggers Bloom Day in South Dakota. Color is dominant now, but ranges from the subtle of native sumac… to the bold sun-filled cottonwood tree rising on the left of the photo. Native grasses such as little bluestem and others glow in mass at the entrance to Lewis & Clark Recreation Area by … Continue reading
Nasturtium Late Bloomers
We love showy flowers that grow from seed within the season. Nasturtiums are easy to grow and maintain under the wide range of conditions on the Northern Plains. At Plant Exchange, nasturtiums grow beautifully into fall, when long season plants look weary. It’s also the right timing for them. Tiny white butterfly caterpillars associated with … Continue reading
Transition to Fall
Today, let’s look at plants in transition on the Northern Plains, here at Plant Exchange blog. Trees are beginning to turn fall colors. Sunflowers are still in bloom at the edge of fields, in flowerbeds, and containers. Pollinators enjoy Agastache and other flowers in bloom. We begin to bring in plants that overwinter indoors about … Continue reading
Flowering Tobacco
One of this season’s best performing plants is Nicotiana or flowering tobacco. Once planted in spring, a little supplemental water is all that is required. Here it grows pest-free. It is an ornamental relative of N. tabacum that is grown for tobacco production. The lightly fragrant flowers bloom the second half of summer after seedlings are planted outdoors … Continue reading
