Your All Things Plants weekly news

for December 20, 2014

This Week's Gardening Ideas:

By SongofJoy December 20, 2014

A How-To Guide for Propagating Bromeliads When it comes to separating a bromeliad offset, often called a pup, from the mother plant, many people develop a case of "separation anxiety." I know I did. While it isn't terribly difficult to do, there are some basic guidelines to follow in order to achieve success. (1,398 words - Read the full article)

By gone2seed December 19, 2014

Grafting Adenium 101 I will admit right here that my first attempt at grafting was a complete failure. Only one of twelve grafts survived and grew. It was almost enough to make me give up. What kept me trying was a couple of chance natural grafts that live on one of my plant benches. If these two could be secure grafts without any help from anyone, then surely I could get two pieces of adenium to grow together. My second attempt went somewhat better with nine of twelve succeeding. This will be my third try. (971 words - Read the full article)

By threegardeners December 18, 2014

Make Your Own Moss Pole A moss pole is the best way to grow plants like Philodendrons and Syngoniums. Moss poles are really pretty simple to make; let me show you. (444 words - Read the full article)

By AlohaHoya December 17, 2014

Where Do Cloves Come from? Where do those little dry, hard, brown sticks we poke into hams come from? Seed pods? Vines? Trees? (292 words - Read the full article)

By flaflwrgrl December 16, 2014

Keep Squirrels out of Feeders To keep squirrels out of your bird feeders you can hang the feeder using strong mono-filament line from a limb which is 6 feet off the ground. You must be sure to keep the feeder 6 feet from the trunk of the tree as well as 6 feet from any other branches. The squirrels can not hold onto the fishing line to get to the feeder & they (almost always) can't jump the distance to the feeder.

By dave December 15, 2014

Building a Hugelkultur Raised Bed Sheet mulching is a technique of laying organic material in layers on the ground to build up a raised bed of rich soil for your plants. Hugelkultur is an extension of this technique, where a gardener builds quite tall raised beds using logs and dead branches as the first layer in this bed. (1,315 words - Read the full article)

By Bubbles December 14, 2014

Growing Unusual Fruits and Vegetables from the Grocery Store Have you ever wandered through a grocery produce section and wondered how some of the more exotic fruits and vegetables are grown and how they should be prepared? I recently roamed the aisles of a local grocery that caters to our city's growing international transplants. I had never seen so many root vegetables that were unknown to me. My husband wasn't along and therefore could not be embarrassed by his wife, so I asked permission to photograph some of the produce with my phone. The produce manager smiled and said, "People do it all the time." (1,436 words - Read the full article)

The most popular images last week from our plant database:

By bootandall:

By kkaymci55:

By HamiltonSquare:

By jmorth:

By Gleni:

By Zaubergarten:

By zuzu:

By bootandall:

By Zaubergarten:

The most popular Multi-Plant Photos from last week:

Photo by dirtdorphins:

Photo by jmorth:

Photo by rositoes:

Photo by DavidofDeLand:

Photo by DavidofDeLand:

Photo by treehugger:

Photo by EdBurton:

Photo by pardalinum:

Photo by treehugger:

Noteworthy acorn tips given this week:

4 people gave for post #750426 in "Banner for December 17, 2014 by dirtdorphins" by dirtdorphins

4 people gave for the idea "Where Do Cloves Come from?" by AlohaHoya

4 people gave for post #749975 in "Banner for December 16, 2014 by rocklady" by rocklady

3 people gave for post #751133 in "Banner for December 19, 2014 by Newyorkrita" by Newyorkrita

3 people gave for post #750817 in "Banner for December 18, 2014 by Paul2032" by Paul2032

2 people gave for post #750092 in "The Circle of Life: everything else" by dirtdorphins

2 people gave for the Multi-Plant Photo #2365 by dirtdorphins

2 people gave for post #751187 in "Budget close-ups - Adding a flash to the mix" by evermorelawnless

2 people gave for post #751523 in "Banner for December 20, 2014 by TBGDN" by TBGDN

The most active threads this week:

Some new reviews from the ATP Green Pages:

We keep growing, because ATP is where all the excitement is these days! Check out these numbers from last week:

• 68 members joined.
• 3,106 posts written.
• 1,069 images posted to the plant database.
• 472 plants added to personal inventory lists.