MARGARET ROACH A WAY TO GARDEN
Episodes
Peter Zale on Native Orchids – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – May 13, 2024
10 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Today’s topic is orchids, but not the ones you might be growing as a flowering houseplant. Our subject is native terrestrial types that are more...
Philadelphia Gardens – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – May 6, 2024
03 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
The area around Philadelphia is well-known for its richness of public gardens, including many historic ones, but the region is also home to an impress...
Mary Phillips on Rethinking the Lawn – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – April 29, 2024
26 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
You’ve probably heard the expression No Mow May in recent years, a campaign borrowed from an effort in the UK meant to increase diversity by lea...
Stephen Procter on Ceramic Garden Art – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – April 22, 2024
19 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
It’s that time of year when we gardeners are shopping, shopping, shopping, often in hot pursuit of just the right plant that will make the design of...
Hilton Carter on Propagating Houseplants – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – April 15, 2024
12 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
I for one have a number of houseplants that would look a whole lot better right now if given a pinch or two or three, plus I could potentially enjoy t...
Japanese Maples at Mr Maple – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – April 8, 2024
05 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
I confess to something of a weakness for Japanese maples, and I suspect I’m not alone. Now, thanks to breeding work by experts like today’...
Madeline Hooper on Staying ‘GardenFit’ – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – April 1, 2024
29 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
You know how it goes, especially in those tempting first spring-like days: You’re barely out of bed before you’re out in the garden having...
David Mattern on Container Design – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – March 25, 2024
22 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Wait! Before you find yourself at the garden center grabbing up every irresistible thing that calls out to you, figuring you can somehow find a role...
Tim Johnson on Bio-Productive Gardens – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – March 18, 2024
15 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
In a recent phone call, today’s guest, Tim Johnson, used the phrase “bio-productive gardens,” and it stopped me. What does he mean by that, I th...
Darryl Cheng on Collectible Houseplants – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – March 11, 2024
08 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Some people collect art, others collect vintage cars, or maybe stamps or coins. Darryl Cheng collects houseplants, and in his latest book, “The New ...
Sam Hoadley on Amsonias – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – March 4, 2024
01 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Early on in making my garden decades ago, I bought a nursery pot of bluestar, or Amsonia, at a native plant sale, and planted it in a border here. It ...
K Greene on Herbs – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Feb 26, 2024
23 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
When shopping the seed catalogs, I realize I’m probably more likely to consider a tomato or pepper I haven’t grown before, or some unusual annual ...
Rebecca McMackin on the Native Movement – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Feb 19, 2024
16 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Maybe more than any other topic, the use of native plants has consistently figured among the top garden trends in recent years. Just how popular is th...
Be a Better Bird Watcher – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Feb 12, 2024
08 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Watching birds lifts my spirits, as it has for decades, and who couldn’t use their spirits lifted right about now? But there’s another muc...
Don Tipping on Diversity of Zinnias – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Feb 5, 2024
02 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
What’s not to love about zinnias? Organic seed farmer and breeder Don Tipping of Siskiyou Seeds and I both vote an emphatic “yes” in favor o...
Nancy Lawson Asks Is Your Yard Undergrown? – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Jan 29, 2024
26 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
As she often does, naturalist and nature writer Nancy Lawson—perhaps known better to some of you as the Humane Gardener after the title of her first...
David Culp on Snowdrops – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Jan 22, 2024
19 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
David Culp is a self-professed Galanthophile—a lover, and passionate longtime collector, of snowdrops in all their various incarnations.  He is...
Ken Druse on Seed Planning – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Jan 15, 2024
12 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
If you think nothing’s on the to-do list in winter, fellow gardeners—that we’re all meant to be dormant like the cannas in the cellar and the he...
Matt Mattus on Sweet Peas – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Jan 8, 2024
05 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Every year when I get to the sweet pea listings in the seed catalogs, I think this is the year, the year I’ll organize some supports in the gard...
Uli Lorimer on Ecological Resolutions – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Dec 25, 2024
22 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Like everyone around this time of year, I get into a “looking back while looking ahead” combined mindset. Today I want to do just that, but with a...
Jennifer Jewell on Beloved Seed Catalogs – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Dec 18, 2023
15 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Ho-ho-ho: It’s seed season, among other festive reasons to celebrate in December. Today I invited a similarly seed-obsessed friend, Jennifer Jew...
New USDA Hardiness Zone Map – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Dec 11, 2023
08 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
You no doubt have seen news that the USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map was just updated, and that half the country once again got reclassified a half-zone...
Seed Shopping with Turtle Tree – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Dec 4, 2023
01 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Let the seed-shopping season begin! The 2024 offerings are being loaded into seed-catalog websites, and the earliest print catalogs are already arrivi...
‘Gardening Can Be Murder’ Book – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Nov 20, 2023
17 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
I don’t think I’ve read a mystery novel since the “Nancy Drew” books of my long-ago childhood, though I will confess to having watched...
Eric Lee-Mader on Milkweeds – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Nov 13, 2023
10 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Most of us may automatically think “monarch” after hearing the word “milkweed,” or vice versa. And that’s in fact a critical and intimat...
Ken Druse on Fall Cleanup – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Nov 6, 2023
03 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Yes, it’s time or almost time to do some raking, and to dig the dahlias to stash – time to perform the rounds of the so-called “fall cleanup” ...
Byron Martin on Citrus Houseplants – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Oct 30, 2023
27 Oct 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Are any of your houseplants edible? A new book by the owners of the beloved rare plant business called Logee’s Greenhouses suggests that we make roo...
Cornell’s Natural Lawn – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Oct 23, 2023
20 Oct 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Reducing the footprint of our lawns has been a key environmental message for gardeners in recent years, since lawns lack biodiversity, and involve hug...
Brandywine Valley du Pont Gardens – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Oct 16, 2023
13 Oct 2023
Contributed by Lukas
It’s hard to think of another place so rich with major gardens as the Brandywine Valley in Chester County, Pennsylvania, and an adjacent portion...
The Wild-ish Garden of Margaret Renkl – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Oct 9, 2023
06 Oct 2023
Contributed by Lukas
My how times have changed. That’s what I keep thinking looking around my own garden in recent years, and I’ve been struck by the same thought over...
The Real Organic Project – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Oct 2, 2023
29 Sep 2023
Contributed by Lukas
When you shop for food—whether produce or meat or eggs—and see a label that says “organic,” what do you think that means? At its most fundamen...
Ross Gay on the Garden’s Delights – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Sept 25, 2023
22 Sep 2023
Contributed by Lukas
The words joy and delight figure prominently in writer Ross Gay’s work – and so do moments he spends in his garden, and descriptions of his relati...
Marianne Willburn on Overwintering Tropicals – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Sept 18, 2023
15 Sep 2023
Contributed by Lukas
It’s not time quite yet for what I call the mad stash – storing those non-hardy plants for the winter that we wish to keep alive for another year ...
Brad Herrick on Jumping Worms – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Sept 11, 2023
08 Sep 2023
Contributed by Lukas
The question “What do I do about the Asian jumping worms that are destroying my soil?” has outpaced what was the most common thing I was asked yea...
Linda Lipsen on Pressed Plants – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Aug 28, 2023
24 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
I saw news of a new book called “Pressed Plants” recently, and it got me thinking about my grandmother, and one of the many crafts she enjoyed way...
Claudia West on Immersive Landscapes – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Aug 21, 2023
17 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Maybe seven or eight years ago, in a conversation with landscape designer Claudia West, she said a sentence that has really stuck with me, as she expl...
Michael Judd on Food Forests – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Aug. 14, 2023
09 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
The term food forest, from the permaculture world, sounds big—like if I suggested you start one, you’d probably say, “I don’t have room f...
K Greene on Shallots – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – August 7, 2023
04 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
I saw a video reel on social media the other day of a harvest of shallots, and it made me realize that I haven’t grown those delicious little Allium...
Craig LeHoullier on Ripe Tomatoes – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – July 31, 2023
26 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Around this time each summer I look forward to the onslaught of fresh tomatoes—while at the same time hoping against hope that what I call “tomato...
Ken Druse on Lost Plants – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – July 24, 2023
19 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
We gardeners all know the experience of loss: of plants that don’t make it, for one reason or another—from a tomato felled by disease in a too-hum...
Harnek Singh on Succulent Stars – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – July 19, 2023
12 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Succulents: You probably already grow some perennial ones in your garden, and perhaps others that aren’t hardy are among your favorite houseplants. ...
Ethan Kauffman on Natives at Stoneleigh – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – July 10, 2023
06 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Can a historic formal space become the home to a forward-thinking landscape of native plants? The team at Stoneleigh, a five-year-old public garden on...
Erik Keller on the Garden as Therapy – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – July 3, 2023
27 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
No doubt all of you who are listening, all you gardeners, would agree that interacting with plants, and with nature, has a restorative benefit—that ...
Ken Druse on Summer Edits – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – June 26, 2023
23 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Summer has just officially arrived … and with it a whole new to-do list of tasks aimed at keeping the garden going in the best possible shape al...
Noah Charney on Reading Your Land – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – June 19, 2023
13 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
How well do you really know the piece of land on which you live and garden, or the bigger landscape context it sits within—that forms your neighborh...
Nancy Lawson on Weed-Fighting Natives – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – June 12, 2023
08 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
When I spoke to naturalist and nature writer Nancy Lawson recently about her adventures in wildscaping at her Maryland garden, there was one...
Ken Druse on Primula From Seed – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – May 29, 2023
26 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
I was remarking to my friend Ken Druse earlier this spring about a garden I’d just visited, and how the stands of primulas in it made me jealous, an...
Jenks Farmer on Pineapple Lilies – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – May 1, 2023
14 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
I am crazy about pineapple lilies – bulbs in the genus Eucomis – and though in my Zone 5 garden they aren’t hardy, I can’t imagine a growing s...
Frances Palmer on Dahlias – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – May 8, 2023
04 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Some of us plant a row or two of annuals for cutting, but Frances Palmer has taken the phrase “cutting garden” to the most delightful extreme. Fro...
Nancy Lawson on Wildscaping – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – April 24, 2023
19 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Our human-centric way of looking at things in the garden and tasting, hearing, seeing and touching things is just one person’s opinion, and hard...
Owen Wormser on Meadows – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – April 17, 2023
12 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
The time is approaching for my annual pass with the tractor through my little meadow on the hill above my house, the one time each year I really inter...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – April 10, 2023 – Purdue Plant Doctor
05 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
As a garden writer, I get a lot of questions every year basically asking this: What’s wrong with my (fill in the blank) plant? An accurate diagnosis...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – March 27, 2023 – Marianne Willburn on Tropical Edibles
22 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Marianne Willburn appreciates the bold and often vertical element that some favorite tropical plants add to her temperate garden. But maybe best of al...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – March 20 2023 – Ken Druse on Making More Plants
16 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
The days are longer and the light is strengthening—triggers that don’t just start to wake up our plants, indoors and out, but also get us gard...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – March 13 2023 – Jim Nardi on the World of Trees
08 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Today’s guest says you can tell a lot about a tree by the company it keeps – from unseen microbes to fungi, countless insects and other arthropods...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach March 6, 2023 – Karl Gercens on Houseplant Tuneups
04 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Could your houseplants use a tuneup after a hard winter indoors? I know mine will need it, from re-potting, to light pruning, to full scale rejuvenati...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – February 27, 2023 – Jared Barnes on Garden Trends
22 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Each year the powers that be in the horticulture industry declare what the trends are—what color is “in” and what design styles we’re all mean...
Ben Vogt on Natural Design – A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – February 20, 2023
20 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
. It’s probably the question I am asked most: Gardeners want to go wilder and use more native plants to create habitat. But how do they figure out w...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – February 6, 2023 – Bonnetta Adeeb on Ujamaa Seeds
03 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Like any gardener looking ahead to another growing season, I’m deep into the seed catalogs, dreaming of things to come. But many seeds also offer us...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – January 30, 2023 – Charles Dowding on No-Till Gardening
28 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Promises of less work with more garden productivity often raise my suspicions, perhaps sounding too good to be true—except when the subject is no-di...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – January 23, 2023 – Jay Tracy on Crazy Cucumbers
19 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
If you think you know what a cucumber is, think again. Spend even five minutes on the website of The Cucumber Shop, a passion project of today’s cuc...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – January 16, 2023 – Sam Hoadley on Sedges
12 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
With the surge in interest in lawn alternatives and other native choices for groundcover, the genus Carex is always mentioned high up on the...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – January 9, 2023 – Lane Selman on Seed Shopping
04 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Have you started browsing the incoming seed catalogs yet or clicking around their websites, looking to see if the 2023 lineups have been unveiled? Tod...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – January 2, 2023 – Marc Hamer on a Garden Life
29 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
It’s that time of year when we look both ways. Not left and right, like we’re crossing the road, but back and forward at the year just wou...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – December 19, 2022 – Kathy Tracey on Botanical Holiday Cheer
18 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
When shorter, colder days have us indoors more, a bit of botanical company can make it all a lot brighter. This edition of the podcast has suggestions...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – December 12, 2022 – Julie Zickefoose on Safer Bird Feeding
08 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
I put out my first bird feeder of the season on Thanksgiving and got the party started. But there’s more to feeding the birds than just filling ...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – December 5, 2022 – Noel Kingsbury on Creative Maintenance
02 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
If I say garden maintenance, you probably think of work—of getting out the pruners and hedge trimmers and such, and subduing any overenthusiastic pl...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – November 21, 2022 – Ken Druse on Fall and Winter Fragrance
16 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Winter cold has just finally descended here, and I am already missing the smells of the growing season—from the range of flowers to just brushing up...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – November 14, 2022 – Lee Reich on Historic Fruit
10 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
‘Tis the season when I’m making more applesauce to freeze and baking pears for dessert (or for breakfast), so what sweeter topic for todayR...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach -November 7, 2022 – Jared Rosenbaum on Food Habitats
03 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In his new book, Wild Plant Culture, restoration ecologist Jared Rosenbaum says something provocative about gardening with native plants. “It&...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – October 31, 2022 – Uli Lorimer on Eco Cleanup
26 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
We’ve all heard the environmentally conscious advice: The way we used to clean up our gardens – extra-tidy, but to within an inch of its life for ...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – October 24, 2022 – Joan Strassman on Slow Birding
19 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A new book I’m reading emphasizes the word watching in the expression bird watching. As in: Don’t be in such a hurry to merely note that you’ve ...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – October 17, 2022 – Ken Druse on Plant Surprises
15 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
One thing that Ken Druse and I are certain about when it comes to plants: that they will often surprise you, Some grow bigger or stay smaller than the...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – October 10, 2022 – Nick McCullough on Garden Design
10 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
If I say “English garden,” you probably conjure a mental picture of colorful mixed borders and garden rooms enclosed by hedging. But what’s ...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – October 3, 2022 – Charley Eiseman on Galls and Mines
03 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Since I took a walk with today’s guest about 10 years ago, I’ve adopted a whole different way of looking at what I might have once seen as imperfe...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – September 26, 2022 – Joe Lamp’l on Vegetable Success
26 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Becoming a successful vegetable gardener involves a lot of trial and error. As the seasons pass we hopefully get better at it—harvesting not just fo...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – September 19, 2022 – Mark Richardson on Historic Apples
19 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A collection of historic apples that was threatened by disease is having a second act at the New England Botanic Garden at Tower Hill in Boylston, Mas...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – September 12, 2022 – Cornell Climate Change Garden
12 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In emails received from many parts of the country, I’m hearing gardeners say the same thing: This year has been really hard. Count me in on those vo...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – Sept 5, 2022 – Ken Druse on Seed Saving
05 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Maybe like I do, you always mean to be better at seed saving, and it gets away from you. Well, right now is the perfect time with pen and paper or you...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – August 29, 2022 – Andy Brand on Beauty in Details
29 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Ecological horticulturist Andy Brand can’t help himself. He just has to look closely at everything outdoors: every plant, every insect, every pr...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – August 22, 2022 – Crevice Gardening
22 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
I’ve never had a rock garden, I confess. But a new book about a modern and extreme form of the art caught my attention recently.  It’s called...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – August 15, 2022 – Jenny Rose Carey on Flowers for Hot Dry Spots
15 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Hot and dry: That’s the lament of gardeners in most regions in high summer, and also of many plants in their flower gardens. The author of a new boo...
A Way to Garden with Margaret Roach – August 8, 2022 – Craig LeHoullier on Tomato Troubles
08 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
I call the phenomenon tomato troubles. You know, the yellow-spotted foliage that falls off, or the plant that produces all those misshapen fruits and ...