Welcome to Plant Exchange on the Northern Plains, USDA Zone 4b-5a. Temperatures are fluctuating, averaging highs in the 50’s and lows in the 30’s. The ice is off area lakes and days have been mild enough for some trees to flower. Snow fell wet and heavy overnight but is beginning to melt. Moisture is welcome. … Continue reading
Filed under houseplants …
Recharge Garden Interest
At Plant Exchange blog, we depend on a few indoor plants to recharge our interest for next season’s gardening. Amaryllis is an easy-care plant with its battery to supply kick-start energy for the plant to grow and bloom. Amaryllis bulb in its native Africa comes to life with spring rains, has 2-5 sparkling blooms for … Continue reading
Three Easy-Care Houseplants
Adequate quality light in winter is necessary for healthy houseplants. In this USDA 4-5a growing zone on the Northern Plains, lack of satisfactory light quality indoors can be a problem. Choosing plants with a tolerance to lower light increases the chance they can adapt to the indirect winter sunlight they receive. These houseplants can be … Continue reading
Versatile Boston Fern
Boston or Sword Fern is a familiar light shade porch plant in summer. It grows well in a container, and its 3-foot arching fronds move in the breeze. While some treat it as an annual to buy and discard each year, it adapts well to bring it indoors as an easy-care house plant. A friend … Continue reading
How Does a Winter-Flowering Plant Make Seed?
Camellias are introduced plants from Japan and nearby Asian countries that have adapted well in the Southeast United States for more than a hundred years. In the south, camellias bloom in the fall or winter or early spring, sometimes before bulb plants. In nature, not many plants bloom at this time. Camellias are shrubs with … Continue reading
Decorate for the Holidays with your Plants
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
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
Houseplants Add Pep
Too early to lounge outdoors here. It’s about eight weeks before the last frost when starter plants and houseplants needing rejuvenation are taken outdoors. What can we do with houseplants to add pep to our indoor surroundings now? Rearrange houseplants. Consider moving plants to different rooms where light is better as the angle of the … Continue reading
New Houseplant Now
If you’d like easy-care, low-input indoor plants to add greenery to your living space, consider succulents. These Echeveria succulents are fleshy plants that found naturally in dry conditions in well-drained soil. Succulents are available now in nurseries and big box stores. They grow slowly, retaining their design shape so that little trimming is needed. Plants were … Continue reading
For You, Reader
Holiday wishes of opportunity and good fortune for all. Thank you, readers, for showing up this year! Thanks to all the contributors that make reading the Plant Exchange blog worthwhile.
