The past couple of years I have been amazed seeing the potential of Silver Falls dichondra in mixed containers. This plant often ignored because it's silver or gray and of course is a cousin to the weed we fight in our precious lawns.

Silver Falls may be the ultimate spiller plant for baskets and mixed containers. While a showy trailer, Silver ...Read more

It has been eight years, and it is still causing an uproar in the gardening world. If you are an avid gardener, then you probably caught my 'tongue and cheek' on one of the best zinnias to ever hit the market, Uproar Rose. This beauty gives you bouquets for the vase and living arrangements in the landscape.

Uproar Rose was selected in 2009 as ...Read more

Fourteen years ago, Prairie Sun one of the most beautiful gloriosa daisies was chosen as an All-America Selections Award Winner. This award followed on the heel of Indian Summer another outstanding selection, and this might night have garnered all the love and attention it deserved. Thanks to progressive greenhouse growers and a new generation ...Read more

Twenty years ago something odd happened in the plant world, and as I look back now, I realize it flew under the radar. In 1997 a new plant called New Wonder Scaevola won the Georgia Gold Medal, Mississippi Medallion, and Louisiana Select awards. That trifecta was indeed quite rare. This little plant from Australia captured the imagination of the...Read more

Once you start growing the pineapple lily, you'll wonder why you haven't been growing it for years. Sparkling Burgundy was the first one to intrigue me at the Coastal Georgia Botanical Gardens as it was thriving in what I might normally consider extreme conditions. It was and still is growing in full sun, practically no attention from ...Read more

This time of the year it seems coleus is worth its weight in gold in the landscape offering a persevering performance and flaming color all summer, making it among the best buys for your gardening dollar.

The past few years, I touted the big-leafed selections like Inferno, Campfire or Mariposa but to be honest, the narrow-leafed varieties can ...Read more

The first time I saw the African blood lily was at a flower show in Atlanta. I was stunned at its size and beauty, and I put it on my ever-growing bucket list of must have flowers. Now thanks to my innovative Horticulture Coordinator Jamie Burghardt, I along with the throngs of visitors to the Coastal Georgia Botanical Gardens get to relish in ...Read more

If you have fascinated about finding a gold doubloon I've got one for you, and it is a stunning gardenia variety. Like the word suggest doubloon or double this gardenia gives you dazzling color with gold and green foliage and large tantalizingly aromatic flowers.

As a child I was always fascinated with the story of Ulysses and particularly the ...Read more

This is my fourth year to be watching our American Hemerocallis Display Garden and each year the selection Wild Irish catches my eye like few other daylilies. Each year I post it on our Facebook and the hits views and likes come pouring in. It's no wonder that an internet search finds it readily available from numerous sources.

Wild Irish was ...Read more

I'll never forget that rare cold morning at the National Butterfly Center in Mission, Texas. There they were Monarchs and Queens, cousin butterflies roosting in the Retama trees waiting for the sun to warm them for flight. I had already fallen in love with the trees for their flashy display of thousands of yellow blooms but also the green bark ...Read more

If I told you that the name of the most beautiful bulb you could grow derives from Greek words meaning 'head of a horse,' try as you might you probably could not conjure up the vision of an amaryllis. The amaryllis so exquisite in spring gardens in the South is known botanically as Hippeastrum, meaning the head of a horse, or horseman.

I assure...Read more

A deutzia renaissance is how my friend Dr. Gerald Klingaman, retired horticulturist, with the University of Arkansas, wrote about this new love that is occurring for this fuzzy heirloom that has been around for ages. If you haven't discovered the old-fashioned fuzzy deutzia, then make it a high priority, your landscape deserves it.

At the ...Read more