Pairing plants in the garden is one of the things I struggle with. I take heart in the fact that I think it takes a lot of gardeners a long time to get the knack of what looks best with what, and that the beauty of gardening is that you can (almost) always move plants around when things don’t work ...
The Impatient Gardener blog was started in 2009 and its library of posts includes practical how-tos, plant guides, favorite garden gear, successes and failures and much more. If you’re looking for something specific, the search function at the top of the page can help.
Growing containerized shrubs has been sort of a game-changer for me. There is something about them that is stately, and while I love containers full of annuals (like, a lot) shrubs add a little something different to the palette. The problem with growing shrubs in containers, however, is winter. You invest a bit of money […]
I’m not even going to look in the archives, but I’m willing to bet that every year around this time I’ve started a post by telling you I’ve done no Christmas shopping. I think we can all safely assume that short of taking advantage of a few cyber week sales for things we needed, there […]
FYI: I’ve posted an update to how this all worked out at the bottom! I am not a rose expert. In fact, longtime readers may recall that it wasn’t too long ago that I publicly swore that I would never grow roses again. The problem with making such declarations is that it’s difficult to hide […]
Dahlias have become quite the favorite flower. Dare I say they’ve even become a bit trendy? I hate the idea of a flower being a fad. I prefer to chalk up the interest in dahlias to a combination of access to lovely new varieties, more information available on how to grow them and social media […]
Well hello there! If you’ve made it here you’re officially on the new The Impatient Gardener site, the creation of which took a little longer than I expected and was probably poorly timed. But I think the effort was worth it and I hope you do too. My hope is that you’ll find the site […]
You might have noticed that I didn’t write much about the vegetable garden this year. That’s not because I didn’t grow vegetables, but it wasn’t my best year in the vegetable garden.It’s been my pattern to really let a garden slip after I’ve developed a plan in my head for how I’m going to change […]
Mr. Much More Patient and I spent a good part of the weekend dealing with the first round of fallen leaves at our house. Because we have a lot of trees, it works better to do it in two or three sessions rather than wait until everything is on the ground.And while some people bag […]
It has been a difficult few weeks to be a gardener in my area. The sun is setting early (and soon to be much earlier) so there’s no time for gardening after work and the weekends have been rainy. I appreciate this late season rain, as I believe that it is best for plants to […]
I tend to go on a bit here about taking stock of your garden so you can make changes next year, but that’s because I still think it’s one of the single best things you can do. Plus, I find it to be a very optimistic activity. In the middle of a season of decomposition, […]
This is a challenging time in the garden for me. We’ve not yet had a frost, so although things are looking a little ragged, there’s nothing that’s dead and looking terrible. Which means I’m faced with the conundrum of going against my gardener’s gut reaction to do everything I can to keep plants looking good […]
To my knowledge there is no garden task that strikes fear into the heart of gardeners so much as pruning. By my estimation, the two most likely explanations for this are: We’ve all been scolded and made to feel bad/silly/stupid for pruning incorrectly. We live in perpetual fear of killing plants by pruning incorrectly. There […]
It’s been awhile since I’ve done a Friday Finds, so I thought I’d pop in quickly to share some of my favorites for the week. First off, a bit of a programming note. I haven’t been posting a lot lately simply because it’s been one of those busy times in life. I was out of […]
For as much as I love plants, my relationship with houseplants is, as they say on Facebook, complicated. I love having them, because a house devoid of plant life would be depressing. But at the same time I don’t love the space they take up nor their neediness. And because of that it is only […]
Sometimes I am tempted to create more gardens (which I absolutely do not need) simply to create more garden paths. I don’t know why I have a love affair with paths, but I collect pictures of them and ideas for future paths with the same zeal that I collect garden ideas.My tastes in paths are […]
