Category Archives: Green plants and flowers

Radicchio Overview DESCRIPTION Radicchio is an excellent addition to salads, adding crunch and a distinctive nutty, pleasantly bitter flavor. Its burgundy color is also gorgeous in among green leaves. Plant radicchio in spring a month before the last frost date or in mid-summer for a fall harvest. Best quality occurs when plants mature during cool weather. After harvest, remove the leaf veins to reduce bitterness. GENUS NAME Cichorium intybus COMMON NAME Radicchio PLANT TYPE Vegetable LIGHT Part Sun, Sun HEIGHT 6 to 6 inches WIDTH 6 to 18 inches PROPAGATION Seed More varieties for radicchio Chicory Cichorium intybus, also known as chicory, is a common roadside wildflower with pretty blue blooms. It flowers its second year in the garden. Use tender chicory leaves in fresh salads as you would dandelion leaves. The long white taproot of the plant can be harvested, dried, and used as a substitute for coffee.

Grow a super grain right in your backyard with these easy tips for planting, growing, and harvesting quinoa. PHOTO:  ERNESTOG / GETTY IMAGES Quinoa has become an increasingly well known grain in our kitchens and restaurants over the last decade or so. It’s also a rising star in gardens. Easy to grow from seed planted directly in the soil, quinoa (pronounced KEEN-wah) plants produce big, fluffy seed heads that are packed with tiny red, white, brown, and black seeds. Those seeds are gluten-free, high in protein, and have an earthy, nutty, somewhat sweet flavor. The young, tender leaves are also edible and nutritious, with a texture and flavor like spinach.  Quinoa Overview GENUS NAME Chenopodium quinoa COMMON NAME Quinoa PLANT TYPE Annual LIGHT Sun HEIGHT 4 to 7 Feet WIDTH 1 to 2 Feet FLOWER COLOR Orange, Red, Yellow FOLIAGE COLOR Blue/Green SEASON FEATURES Colorful Fall Foliage PROPAGATION Seed Where to Plant Quinoa…

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Plant a quince tree for its beautiful spring blooms followed by tart fruits. PHOTO:  ROB CARDILLO Like its relatives, apples and pears, quince has been used for food and medicine for thousands of years. Native to Southwest Asia, common quince can be grown around the globe in temperate climates with warm summers and cool winters. It produces white or pink spring flowers, followed by generous amounts of fruit. However, unlike apples and pears, most quince cultivars produce hard, highly astringent fruit that require either advanced ripening or processing with heat to make them edible. Quince can sometimes be confused with flowering quince (Chaenomeles speciosa), a completely different species that is native to East Asia and offers a wider range of flower colors including white, pink, salmon, and orange. Flowering quince blooms prior to fully leafing out in spring while edible quince will leaf out prior to blooming. The two can further be distinguished by…

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Queen Palm Tree Overview DESCRIPTION Queen palm is one of the most popular palms for commercial and home landscapes. This fast-growing palm is used to line streets or sidewalks or is often planted in clusters for fast structure and interest. Long, bright-green fronds give queen palm an elegant appearance year-round. Count on a queen palm to produce ornamental, bright orange dates in clusters during the winter months. GENUS NAME Syagrus romanzoffiana COMMON NAME Queen Palm Tree PLANT TYPE Tree LIGHT Sun HEIGHT 20 to 20 feet WIDTH 15 to 25 feet FOLIAGE COLOR Blue/Green ZONES 10, 11, 9 PROPAGATION Seed How to Plant a Palm Tree Median plantings, curbside planting strips, and petite planting areas near a deck or patio are all good places to plant queen palm. Pair queen palm with small and medium flowering and shade trees for a lush landscape. Great planting partners for queen palm include…

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This perennial will become a regal presence in your garden when your spring-blooming plants fade. Queen of the Prairie Overview GENUS NAME Filipendula rubra COMMON NAME Queen of the Prairie PLANT TYPE Perennial LIGHT Part Sun, Sun HEIGHT 3 to 8 feet WIDTH 3 to 4 feet FLOWER COLOR Pink, White FOLIAGE COLOR Blue/Green SEASON FEATURES Fall Bloom, Summer Bloom SPECIAL FEATURES Attracts Birds, Cut Flowers, Fragrance, Low Maintenance ZONES 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 PROPAGATION Division, Seed PROBLEM SOLVERS Deer Resistant, Slope/Erosion Control Count on queen of the prairie, also called meadowsweet, to pick up the floral show in your garden when spring-blooming perennials peter out. In midsummer, cloudlike clusters of pink or white blooms rise above the ferny, toothed leaves of this North American native. Although the fluffy flower stalks look delicate, this tall, sturdy perennial will stand up to wind and a variety of tough soil conditions.…

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This squash family member is an autumn favorite, with varieties that run the gamut from tiny fruits to scale-breaking giants. Growing Pumpkins Pumpkins tend to be sprawling plants, but they can have a bit of charm with their large, dark-green, shield-shape leaves. Plan your pumpkin patch with care: Unless you select only the compact, bush-type varieties, you’ll find your pumpkin plants will quickly take up quite a bit of garden space. If you don’t have much in the way of horizontal space, you can let your pumpkins grow vertically on a sturdy trellis, arbor, or pergola. Because pumpkin plants are relatively deer-resistant, thanks to their bristly leaves and stems, they can be useful for planting around the perimeter of the vegetable garden as one way to help deter four-legged critters. Pumpkin Care Must-Knows If you want good harvests, be sure to plant pumpkins in full sun (at least 6 to…

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Enlist this easy-to-grow shrub as a privacy screen or living fence. You’ll love its ample foliage, pretty white flowers, and dark-hued berries. With its lustrous deep-green foliage, privet makes a dense privacy hedge or living fence. Some varieties also have golden foliage, while others may be variegated with gray-green mottling or even cream-silver edges. These plants, hardy in Zones 5-9, can be evergreen, semi-evergreen, or deciduous, depending on where you live and the variety you choose. These plants grow quickly and are not bothered by pollution in urban settings. They’re also fairly salt-tolerant. In late spring to early summer, fragrant privet flowers—which are tubular and white—accent the attractive foliage and lure pollinators like bees and butterflies. Privet berries and leaves are toxic to animals1 and humans.2 Privet Overview GENUS NAME Ligustrum COMMON NAME Privet PLANT TYPE Shrub LIGHT Part Sun, Sun HEIGHT 8 to 20 feet WIDTH 6 to 8 feet FLOWER COLOR…

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The types of blooms you can expect vary among species, and some are even fragrant. With more than 400 species, primrose comes in a rainbow of colors, shapes, and sizes. It’s one of the earliest perennials to flower, and in Zones 2-8, where they’re hardy (depending on the type), they may remain evergreen. Most primroses offer dainty blossoms held in loose clusters at the tips of long stalks. Other types hold their clusters of flowers so close together that they form tight balls of color, earning the common name “drumstick primrose.” Candelabra primroses produce layers of blossoms along a bloom stalk and look stunning en masse. Plant them near a path or low bench for the best chance to catch a whiff of their soft, subtle scent. Primrose Overview GENUS NAME Primula COMMON NAME Primrose PLANT TYPE Perennial LIGHT Part Sun, Shade, Sun HEIGHT 6 to 24 inches WIDTH 6 to 18…

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A beauty and a beast, the prickly pear is beloved for its blossoms and feared for its vicious spines. A beauty and a beast, the prickly pear is beloved for its blossoms and feared for its vicious spines. Some varieties produce yellow, red, and orange cup-shape flowers that last just one day, while others retain their large clump of blooms for several weeks, providing delicate beauty among the thorns. The fleshy green pads are covered in long spines (sometimes as long as 3 inches) as well as clusters of small, barbed hairs known as glochids, but don’t let the spines deter you from planting prickly pear. It is also a good plant for erosion control and is deer-resistant thanks to its natural defense system.   Prickly Pear Cactus Overview GENUS NAME Opuntia COMMON NAME Prickly Pear Cactus PLANT TYPE Perennial LIGHT Sun HEIGHT 1 to 15 feet WIDTH 1 to…

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This tough houseplant is almost impossible to kill. Colorful Combinations With its showy foliage in glossy shades of green, gold, and white, pothos complements any home setting. While it seldom blossoms when planted in a container, this vining houseplant is grown for its heart-shaped foliage. In most settings, each leaf can reach up to 4 inches long. When grown outdoors in a tropical environment, pothos transforms into a plant that hardly seems like the indoor version. Once mature, the leaves are often erratically lobed and can reach several feet long and wide. Pothos Care Must-Knows Start with a good, moisture-retentive potting mix. While a pothos can tolerate just about any amount of water, it doesn’t do as well when water conditions fluctuate. Ideally, a pothos likes evenly moist soil that dries out slightly between watering. Try to avoid overwatering or allowing the soil to remain soggy. Give your pothos a low…

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