SACRAMENTO — Eight-foot sunflower stalks tower over tracts overrun with weeds. A wooden post marks a habitat for ground-nesting native bees. Near one garden entrance, a tree’s branches droop to the ground, laden with ripe yellow peaches.

Here, in the River District, at the confluence of the Sacramento and American rivers, large green ...Read more

Last year was exciting for The Garden Guy as I became introduced to a plant called Estrellita Little Star. The name is neat to me as Estrellita actually means Little Star. While that might sound redundant it also sounds like a profound introduction: This beautiful flower is Estrellita…. Little Star. It is like Spanish and English celebrating ...Read more

Over the years The Garden Guy has written about the various Pantone Colors of the Year. I really love applying trendy colors to the garden. A new coleus making its debut has made me really start to think about this color that is so thrilling. It is a color that you simply can’t use wrong. It makes you happy when you see it in mixed containers...Read more

NEW YORK — High octane celebrities Martin Scorsese, Robert De Niro and Patti Smith waded into a fight to keep the Elizabeth Street Garden, a whimsical greenspace near Little Italy, from being turned into affordable housing on Thursday, penning letters to Mayor Eric Adams and the New York City Department of Housing Preservation and Development....Read more

There will be a lot of temptation for gardeners in 2025; so many new plants are showing up at the garden center. Being the astute gardener you are, you probably can guess I am yanking your chain a little as I introduce you to the Totally Tempted cuphea series.

If you are a hummingbird lover you already know some cupheas. The Totally Tempted ...Read more

Early in the summer, I was sent a press release that caused one of those "holy wow!" moments. The headline said it all: "Proven Winners ColorChoice Expands Catalog with the Addition of Hollywood Hibiscus." I had already become familiar with the Hollywood Hibiscus series and was thrilled that Proven Winners was adding this to their lineup.

Even ...Read more

There is no doubt that the new Supertunia Tiara petunias have triggered the excitement meter for the new plants of 2025. A few weeks ago, I wrote about Supertunia Tiara Pink that is truly a "holy wow" new introduction. But there is a partner named Supertunia Tiara Blue that will take your breath away.

Tiara Blue will reach about 12 inches tall ...Read more

The Garden Guy was a scaevola guru when scaevola wasn’t cool. Well, maybe that’s a slight exaggeration; let me explain. The year was 1997 and your humble columnist was the coordinator of the Mississippi Medallion Award program, whereby we selected outstanding plants for promotion, based on how they performed in trials. That year we chose ...Read more

The Garden Guy fell in love with the pineapple lily during the years as director of the Coastal Georgia Botanical Garden in Savannah. Every year they returned and did their beautiful display without any extra attention from any of the horticulturists. They also enlarged their clumps giving multiple blooms. All I could think was how in the world ...Read more

Water-hungry lawns are symbols of Los Angeles' past. In this series, we spotlight yards with alternative, low-water landscaping built for the future.

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LOS ANGELES -- The temperature was in the 90s in West Hills, but that didn't deter an astonishing number of monarch butterflies, hummingbirds and bees from feeding on the California-...Read more

One of the plants that literally took your breath away at the plant trials this year was the new Supertunia Tiara Pink. Shoot, I am not even a pink flower guy in the least but this one had me mesmerized. Subsequently the ones made available to me in testing have been the same, a "Holy wow!"

I’ve recently posted a photo on my Facebook page and...Read more

The Garden Guy used to drive Mississippi’s Highway 49 from Hattiesburg to Gulfport to fall in love with the native Stokes aster. They aren’t just native to Mississippi but found throughout the South. I have loved them at homes I have owned and in places like the Columbus Botanical Garden when I was director. I promise you will be stoked over...Read more

At the end of April, I had a gardening epiphany, a virtuoso experience if you will: I grew my first dahlia.

The hot and humid region of the Chattahoochee Valley of west Georgia is probably not the first area of the country that comes to mind at the mention of a dahlia paradise. But this day in April, as I looked at the Pinkerific, I felt as if...Read more

A year ago, a lot of us had the opportunity to try Supertunia Hoopla Vivid Orchid petunia. Even more importantly though, these new plants were part of the university trial programs. My first reaction was that these petunias were just a fancy novelty. These trial programs proved me wrong and this year the gardening public is showing their delight...Read more

After seeing the flowers at the Young’s Plant Farm annual garden tour in Auburn, Alabama, I felt a sense of desperation to get my hands on the Luscious Basket Tangeglow lantana. I don’t always think about lantana being a component plant in mixed-container designs, but they had several that were simply dazzling.

Luscious Basket Tangeglow is ...Read more

During The Garden Guy’s stint as executive director of the National Butterfly Center in Mission, Texas, I was completely taken by a native plant named the Manfreda maculosa. The common names associated with this plant are false aloe, spice lily and Texas tuberose and it was comfortably residing in the Agavaceae or Agave family. I’ll chase ...Read more