Gardening Tips

The last ripe fig is gone, and your tree looks like it can rest until spring. Not quite.…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 6

Every spring, Bradford pears light up North Carolina roadsides with white blooms that smell like something went bad…

By Jasmine Hughes · Oct 6

Most Southern gardeners have watched a monarch drift across the yard and keep going. Flowers feed adult butterflies,…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 6

A droopy snapdragon in a pot makes most of us grab the watering can right away. But a…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 5

Some of the most common plants in North Carolina yards are now on official watch lists, and a…

By Jasmine Hughes · Oct 5

You plant a batch of fresh bulbs, and the next morning the soil is churned up and a…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 5

That shiny green ivy filling your shady bed may look tidy, but it can behave very differently once…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 5

You set out fall lettuce in a bed that worked hard all summer, and now the leaves look…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 5

Tulips do not feel at home in most Texas and Florida winters, because the ground never stays cold…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 5

A hummingbird feeder can look fine from the patio and still have sticky film tucked into its tiny…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 5

A hummingbird feeder that hangs untouched all week can leave any gardener scratching their head. In hot parts…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 5

A raised bed that looks dry again just days after watering can leave you wondering what went wrong.…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 5

Rats in the shed and chewed plants in the garden make many North Carolina homeowners reach for poison…

By Jasmine Hughes · Oct 5

You scrape the weeds out of your patio on Saturday, and by the next warm, rainy stretch they…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 5

A black-eyed Susan that looks ragged by fall can leave you wondering if it is finished. Before you…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 5

You spot a small brown cone dangling from your arborvitae and wonder if it is a seed pod,…

By Jasmine Hughes · Oct 5

Fall is the secret planting season most Southern gardeners miss. Seeds scattered in October or November settle into…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 5

Bare, weedy ground under a shade tree is a common headache in North Carolina yards. Many people reach…

By Jasmine Hughes · Oct 5

A sticky puddle under your hummingbird feeder is more than a messy nuisance. Spilled nectar invites ants, bees,…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 5

Warm autumn afternoons can turn a sunny wall into a crawling mass of small orange beetles. Many of…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 5

Bright red berries on bare branches can make a gray winter yard look alive. Winterberry holly is a…

By Jasmine Hughes · Oct 5

Garlic is one of the easiest crops to tuck into a Southern bed, but the calendar trips up…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 5

A feeder full of nectar and no hummingbirds in sight can leave you scratching your head. Where you…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 5

Walk out your back door on a sleety January morning and the yard can look empty. Juncos, sparrows,…

By Jasmine Hughes · Oct 5

Every fall, hummingbirds zip south through Texas and Florida looking for one thing: fuel. If your porch pots…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 5

Daylilies look messy once the flowers fade, and it is tempting to grab the shears and clear everything…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 4

You planted foxgloves, and now you have a bold clump of fuzzy green leaves but no tall flower…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 4

You bring your budding Christmas cactus to the front room for the holidays, and a few days later…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 4

Spring gardens often start with a mad scramble of buying seeds, prepping beds, and racing the heat. In…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 4

That green carpet of chickweed in late winter did not appear overnight. In many Southern lawns, the seeds…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 4

Few native trees offer something for caterpillars in summer and something for people to admire in autumn. Common…

By Jasmine Hughes · Oct 4

You pull a plump, shiny radish from the garden, slice it open, and find a spongy or hollow…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 4

Crape myrtles are everywhere in North Carolina yards, and many of them stand close to a driveway. When…

By Jasmine Hughes · Oct 4

A hummingbird feeder that suddenly goes quiet can leave you scratching your head. Before you start changing things…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 4

You hung the feeder, filled it with nectar, and waited. Meanwhile, the neighbors have hummingbirds buzzing around their…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 4

A feeder full of buzzing, stinging visitors can make a backyard feel off limits to the hummingbirds you…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 4

You flip on the porch light and see a gray, pointy-faced opossum shuffling past your collards. It is…

By Jasmine Hughes · Oct 4

Your raised bed looks a little lower than it did in spring, and the tomato and pepper plants…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 4

Plenty of North Carolina homeowners plant a row of Leyland cypress for fast privacy, only to watch the…

By Jasmine Hughes · Oct 4

A droopy pansy in a fall container can make you grab the watering can fast. But wilting is…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 4

You reach under a pot or into a pile of leaves, and a sharp sting stops you cold.…

By Jasmine Hughes · Oct 4

Every fall, Southern yards fill up with leaves that most of us bag and send to the curb.…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 4

You see a monarch drift over your fence, pause for a second, and then sail right into the…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 4

A fuzzy little caterpillar on a shrub can look cute, but some of them can leave a painful…

By Jasmine Hughes · Oct 4

Red and black bugs clustered on a warm wall can make anyone nervous about what comes next. Boxelder…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 4

If your feeders go quiet by September, the problem may not be the birds at all. Hummingbirds heading…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 3

A fig tree in a pot can give you sweet, sticky fruit right off your North Carolina patio.…

By Jasmine Hughes · Oct 3

A bag of bulbs tucked into the soil this fall can turn into a burst of color when…

By Ethan Brooks · Oct 3

Every fall, North Carolina porches fill with silver dusty miller that gets tossed when frost hits. There is…

By Jasmine Hughes · Oct 3