Home and Garden Resources

What's Inside

Growing Lawns in Shaded Areas - Growing a lawn in shade is often a problem. Under the most adverse circumstances it is an insoluble problem. You simply cannot grow turf without some direct sunlight or in places where other prohibiting factors exist. Strongly competing tree roots may occ... more

Loamy Soil - When a soil is referred to as loamy, it usually means that the soil contains a mixture of humus, sand and clay. A good loamy soil should contain, in addition to the clay particles, an ample supply of humus with sufficient sand to prevent it setting hard u... more

Seed Stratification - Certain seeds will not germinate until they have been subjected for some weeks or even months to low temperatures and humid conditions similar to those which occur in nature after they drop from the parent plant and are covered with fallen leaves and othe... more

Climbing Roses - Climbing roses are often slow starters and will not produce a profusion of flowers for at least two years after planting. They are, however, very long lived. They can be grown on arches, pergolas, fences and walls. There is a basic difference between ramb... more

Care of lawns in shaded areas - If the lawn-to-be will receive at least two hours of direct sunlight or its equivalent in dappled sunshine (very light shade with sun filtering in through for most of the day) ordinary grass mixtures intended for sunny places are satisfactory, but in plac... more

Pruning Roses - The most common error made in pruning roses is the location of the cut in relation to the dormant eyes or buds on the stems. Every rose stem, either on a bush in a dormant state or on one in full growth, has a number of growing points, or buds, often hard... more

Propagating Plants by Cuttings - For many plants this is the quickest, easiest and cheapest method of propagation; one that provides a sure way of perpetuating a kind or variety in the exact likeness of the parent plant. For this reason, cuttings are in common use, especially for the rai... more

Testing your soil - Soil-testing kits available and by and large they do a very good job of accurately testing your soil. However, if you are only interested in knowing if your soil is acid or otherwise, without worrying about degrees of acidity or alkalinity, here is a simp... more

Fixing shallow hard loamy clay soil - 1 Add soil to the surface to increase the depth. 2 Double-dig the whole area. To do this, open up a 60 cm wide trench at one end of the area and remove the top soil down to the clay base. Barrow this soil to the other end of the area where digging will... more