Southern Gardening

Thank goodness spring has arrived!

After what seems to be an eternity, I finally had a chance to do some much-needed work in my landscape and garden. The pleasant weather we’ve had only adds to my enthusiasm.

Many folks have been waiting for this moment - the day it's warm enough and past the main threat of frost to become tomato planting time.

What a crazy late winter and early spring we’ve had so far this year: warm, cold and repeat.

The seasons are playing tricks on us with cold temperatures following warm. While we go through this latest cold snap, which I have high hopes will be the last, I want to address a landscape issue that’s generating quite a few questions.

I join the gardening world in waiting for the Southern indica azaleas to officially kick off the spring season with their gaudy show of beautiful color. But there’s one landscape shrub that tends to get lost when the azaleas start showing off, and it is actually one of my spring-flowering favorites.

This week, I want to tell you about the Indian hawthorn.

This week, I want to spend our time considering the last of the 2019 Mississippi Medallion selections, Sweetie Pie blackberry.

This week, we continue our look at the 2019 Mississippi Medallion plants with a fantastic Mississippi tree, the tupelo. Tupelo is known botanically as Nyssa sylvatica and is commonly called black tupelo or black gum.

We survived the latest polar vortex, and I join other Mississippi gardeners in being thankful that we didn’t get the really extreme cold our friends up North experienced. But still, it was cold enough for me and my garden. 

One of the signs that spring will be sprung in the near future is when the daffodils start awakening and poking up in the landscape beds.

If there’s one vegetable that could be considered the ultimate home-grown vegetable in Mississippi, it has to be collards.

Collards were chosen as a 2019 Mississippi Medallion winner because they are considered absolutely necessary for true Southern cuisine. As a bonus, they’re really easy for home gardeners to grow.

Many home gardeners look forward to this time of year to browse catalogs in search of great new plants to enjoy in their 2019 landscapes.

This January’s temperatures have been drastically different from what we saw during last year’s first month.

As I'm writing this last Southern Gardening column of 2018, I'm trying to take one more look back before plunging headlong into the 2019 gardening season that's just around the corner. But I'm having trouble concentrating because the mail carrier is distracting me.

2018 was quite a year in our Mississippi gardens and landscapes: hot and dry, humid and rainy. Every year, there are winners and losers when we garden, and such is the nature of the gardening game. 

With the Christmas celebration approaching, I’ve been thinking about favorite traditions, past and present. It probably comes as no surprise that many of these traditions are food related.

The questions being emailed to me are literally filling up my inbox. I thought I’d share a couple of these questions, along with and my answers that should help home gardeners before we head into the 2019 spring and summer gardening seasons.

It’s that time of year again for shopping, eating, delivery trucks and poinsettias. Yep—it’s the Christmas season. (Photo by Gary Bachman)

Are you looking for cool-season color that’s a sure thing -- a take-it-to-the-bank garden plant? Then, do I have the plant for you. Though quite small in stature, this plant is huge in the color department. Now that I’ve got your attention, the plant I’m referring to is the beautiful viola.

This past week, we got a rude wakeup call from Mother Nature saying that winter has finally arrived.

I answered many phone calls and emails asking what could be done to protect landscape plants. I even shared some last-second cold weather protection tips on WLOX television. I want to point out that, except for the most tender, most plants came through the couple of days of cold weather just fine.

This past weekend, I started planting cool-season color in my 25-gallon citrus containers.

I like underplanting in these containers for a couple of reasons. First, I can maintain a color pop through the year. And second, these annuals act as a colorful ground cover carpet that helps keep weeds at bay. I really do hate weeding, and even plants grown in containers need help with weed control.