Reference & Research Links for Gardeners

Back to the Gardens Are My Passion Page

http://www.cityfarmer.org/ An enjoyable romp through the Canadian articles ranging from rooftop agriculture to emotional compost.

Cyndi's Catalog of Garden Catalogs Like stuff coming in your mailbox? Check out this website. Frankly, I could stop right here. But I won't....

Gardenweb.com Excellent web forums on anything and any plant you might find interesting. And if it's not there you can start your own thread and someone somewhere will answer your query.

WinterSown Educational Organization This is Trudi Davidoff's incredible website dedicated to the most simple yet little known method of starting seeds. This site is a "must read" if you love seed starting!

Garden Bazaar Actually a part of GardenWeb but here you get to meet the merchants of goodies for your garden.

The Plant Stand CompanyFinally a way to elevate your drain dish off the floor. Check out the pictures.

Premier Ponds Ranked #1 for Best Mailorder Source for Pond Supplies by GardenWeb Users' Choice Awards. Sounds pretty decent to me...

Bob Smoley's Gardenworld The only place I know with a huge collection of Sanseverias. Also cacti and succulents that are hard to find elsewhere.

Gardenias Learn all about the many varieties-far more than most nurseries sell, their cultural requirements. From the University of Florida, of course.

Neva's Garden Page An outstanding resource page on apple and pear varieties. A fine website.

Pruning Hydrangeas Made Easy Well done and if you have these lovely plants, essential reading.

Hibiscus: A list of lists A huge page of information on the lovely flower of the tropics that you can grow in your own home.

Phil's Texas Cold Hardy Citrus Page A fine page showing his grafting of fruit trees and discussing his techniques. Well done!

NAFEX, NORTH AMERICAN FRUIT EXPLORERS,INC., 1716 Apples Rd., Chapin, IL 62628, E-mail: nafex<vorbeck@csj.net> An outstanding resource for pomologists and amateur fruit growers. This organization exists to promote the knowledge and culture of a wide variety of fruits. In addition, the list of nurseries is unique in that these are the "source" nurseries that other better known companies buy stock from to resell. The problem with reselling stock is that commonly mixups and problems in handling can degrade the quality of the young fruit tree. The end result is time wasted for the buyer. The listed nurseries are first class.

PERENNIAL PLANT ASSOCIATION, 3383 Schirtzinger Road, Hilliard, Ohio 43026, 614-771-8431, Fax: 614-876-5238, ppa@perennialplant.org This is a trade organization known for its' outstanding seminars and information.

Hort.net This site lists thousands of plant photos, mailing lists, links, and horticultural related news.A well known and reliable website.

Roger's Homepage Some good pictures of plants he's bred but the real treasure here is the huge and well organized list of links on his site.

The Northumberland BerryWorks, 707 Front Street, Northumberland, PA 17875. Ed Mashburn, Phone: (570) 473-9910 Ed@currants.com. This is an interesting page that deals specifically with just currants and gooseberries. These are among the very few shrubs that will produce abundant fruit in shade. Besides that they are lovely ornamentals.

The Northwest Berry and Grape Information Network If there are any questions of any type having to do with this subject here is the resource. They even have e-mail forums for Q & A's.

The Backyard Fruit Growers website is based in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania and is an informal group of home growers who share information. Many excellent links here too.

BackyardGardener.com A very nice informative site for what else?

Two Rainy Side Gardeners This website is nicely set up with information for the Pacific Northwest gardener. Lots of good articles to peruse.

Paul Barden: Old Garden Roses and Beyond This is an absolutely first rate non-commercial website by a man with great passion and knowledge of his subject and talent as a webmaster. My hat is off to him!

SelecTree for California An unusual solution for selection of trees for your home set up by one of my Alma Maters, Cal Poly University. It lists thousands of trees and also has a search where you plug in what you are looking for and it offers suggestions. I still prefer the massed brainpower available on GardenWeb.com but this is still useful.

Consumer Horticulture North Carolina Cooperative Extension Service. A wonderful website with excellent photographs of the plants you are interested along with pertinent information. I found it very useful finding out about the Styrax japonica cultivars, for instance.

Noble Plants A huge source of information on a variety of plants including many cultivars I was never aware of. It's oriented towards botanists and professionals interested in plant taxonomy. In addition this site has many of the very latest and greatest cultivars such as the latest Buddleia including "Attraction", "Bicolor", and "Guinever" which were bred by Dr. Michael Dirr and his students.

The Plants Database Another effort to list a huge number of plants and offer descriptive information about them.

NeoFlora They claim to be the world's largest plant database. I tested it with the entry Camellia reticulata. No doubt about it, more information about this hard to find species and its cultivars than any other site.

FindNurseries.com It is just what it sounds like: any nursery, any state!

GreatPlantPicks.com This is a website where the pros in the business list and discuss what they consider the most notable plants for gardens. It's oriented towards the Northwest region but it's useful to everyone.

Rod's Garden, Gardening Information & Advice Rod is an Oregon Certified Nursery Professional with almost 30 years experience. His website is loaded with helpful and informative topics to guide you in your quest for the perfect garden.

Mulberry Fruit Facts There is lots to know about these beautiful and useful fruiting trees. This is a good source. And here's an interesting article on the potential of Mulberries as a forage source for domestic animals: the URL is http://www.fao.org/ag/magazine/0009sp2.htm The following link will tell you how important Mulberry trees are & includes some useful links: http://journeytoforever.org/edu_silk_mulberry.html . The following article: Mulberry Breeding, Cultivation and Utilization in Japan is interesting in terms of their emphasis on the farming for silkworm and animal feed using the leaves. In addition the leaves contain compounds that control hypertension and hangover too!

The Seed Site Everything you wanted to know about seeds is here, even pictures of what the seedlings will look like.

The Rose Hybridizers Association A very small group of folks who love the adventure and creativity of crossing roses and seeing what progeny they create. There are only about a dozen rose hybridizers in the entire world that are responsible for nearly all the roses introduced!

The Plant Expert This guy has a terrific list of bulb suppliers and lots more.

Mark's Garden Plants A Plantaholics Paradise! Excellent pictures each with a caption that appears as you hold the pointer over the image.

Higo Camellia This a wonderful Italian website dedicated to the rare and remarkable Higo strain from ancient Japan. It's well worth a visit.

My Camellia Homepage By a German doctor hobbyist. Nicely done.

Tom Clothier's Garden Walk and Talk His garden in an informally informative text.

Perennial Gardening on the Praries Maureen and Glen garden in the cold Canadian prairie
have literally hundreds of photos on their website showing what they've been able to
overwinter there. It's an instructive website for those in similar climates.

GardenBuddies.com A nice homey site very much like GardenWeb.com which I belong to and use often.

Belgian Chrysanthemums: A Revolution in Fall Garden Mums

New Plant Page A resource about new and rare ornamental plants provided in the public interest by members of the New Ornamentals Society.

Cultivar.org Your online guide to the nomenclature, cultivar descriptions, classification, and identificaton of garden plants.

Freesia.nl Din Boekestjin grows Freesias professionally in the Netherlands and owns this website. These are among the most graceful and hauntingly fragrant of all flowers and are easy to grow. Strangely there is very little information on the Internet about these flowers. This is a nice site.

Wulfinghoff.nl P.O.Box 34, 2280 AA Rijswijk, The Netherlands Office Address: Sammersweg 1, Rijswijk, The Netherlands Tel:   (31)174 29 35 70 Fax: (31)174 29 39 30 E-mail: info@wulfinghoff.nl They have a couple dozen Freesia cultivars with brief descriptions and I'm waiting to find out if they'll ship retail quantities to America. Gorgeous flowers! Also Alstroemerias as well.

Secrets of Deadheading Roses An interesting article. Personally I do summer pruning and cut away the twiggy, often diseased, foliage then fertilize which results in fast new growth and vigorous rebloom with more substantial stems than the tenuous twigs that otherwise would be the source of many of the blooms. However I may see if I can set up a control and experimental patch of roses at some point in the future to test this. The problem with this article is that it's based on testimony, not a set up experiment with written records collected over several seasons and by several testers. Testimony by itself is nice but it's not scientifically valid.

Aspirin for plants-research finding of the century?? A good thread from GardenWeb.com. But it's not the finding of the century. But do consider these other products: Messenger, Spray-n-Grow and compost tea.

Rose Rosette Disease This is a website dealing with a specific rose disease and it's well done.

Bamboo Threatens to Bring Indian Famine When bamboo flowers it changes everything around it.

Aspirin For Your Plants? Try It!