Articles by Benjamin Vogt / Monarch Gardens

There was a time in my gardening life when autumn was about despair and resignation. The glory of flowers and wildlife sprinkling color through my beds was shattered, then worn away, and all I was left with was decay that needed to be cleaned up. I di…

I don’t know about you, but I live for fall — with its cool mornings, crisp air and quiet evenings. Plus, at least one-third of my plants bloom after August, and the trees, shrubs, grasses and perennial flowers bring a rainbow of colors to the garden …

Late summer is the perfect time to take stock and watch your landscape, as some plants will already begin turning or thinning out. In addition, if you want to do some editing, early to mid fall is probably the very best time to be planting — it’s much…

Like some gardeners, I’m too hard on myself. And I’m especially hard on myself when I don’t see enough flowers in the early summer shoulder season. After the spring flush, it’s hard to accept that nature ebbs and flows — that it almost needs to — and …

The first flower to emerge in spring is often a surprise, catching me pleasantly off guard even though, in my bones, I know it’s time. In late March, as I was taking a quick stroll through the garden on an unseasonably warm day in Nebraska, I was look…

For some of us, spring can’t come soon enough. But no matter where we are, snowy or not, the spring itch is fully upon us — and I’m here to urge you to think twice about scratching. Why shouldn’t you clean up the garden just yet?

Even as you shiver in the cold north wind, it’s important to embrace the winter season. The more you do, the sweeter spring and summer will be. Here’s how to savor the last winter moments and learn more about your garden habitat.

Today is the day. It’s a Saturday in late autumn, when the temperature spikes into the 50s or 60s, the sun is out and I still have 200 plugs to get into the ground before the soil freezes. I do this to myself every year: After scrambling to get client…

Fall is a great time to plant, because many trees, shrubs, sedges and even perennial flowers are going dormant. This means less transplant shock and stress, partly because the plants are not focusing on maintaining leaves or flowers. Instead, these sl…

This article is from our Most Popular stories file.My belief in leaving the garden alone in fall was cemented on a December morning, when a robin landed on a garden chest where I keep my tools. It balanced on the edge where some…