American wisteria 'Amethyst Falls' and 'Tamukeyama' Japanese maple (1 of 1) Come, step into my garden and take a walk with me. Ah May, I'm so glad you're here. It seemed like the weather would never get warm, and the rain would never stop falling. The front of our house with fescue lawn. We had visitors this week, and everyone kept asking what kind of fescue we planted. Just a normal Pennington mix. It's all about water and fertilizer. Fescue likes both, and we've had so much rain. I'm not complaining mind you, not about the rain anyway. Oklahomans never complain about rain. In some years, it can be so dry here that's it's all I can do to get things to live and grow. The green chairs in the front fescue lawn. I don't remember the grass ever looking this good. I've barely watered it. Mother Nature has done...

If you came across Red Dirt Ramblings because of a Google search, you're probably thinking about growing your first garden, and you might be interested in container gardening. Why? Because container gardening is a great way to begin. Honestly, this grape tomato is planted in too small a container. Still, it did fine. So, let's begin at the beginning. Growing a garden, vegetable, ornamental or a mixture of the two, is easy in containers. You usually don't even need to weed! 'Carmen' peppers, they're so dark red they're almost black. Peppers are easy to grow in containers. For vegetables, Smart Pots are wonderful and can be packed away once the gardening season is over. I grow potatoes, squash, and tomatoes in Smart Pots. You can too. Just pick the right-sized pot for what you're trying to grow. Here's a hint: Tomatoes and squash like pots in the five-gallon size or...

I have fallen crazy in love with Crazytunia Moonstruck, a Proven Winners selection. I am really behind on my April garden chores, and after the last couple of days, rain and abundant sun is making the cultivated plants and weeds grow. I would love to tell you I'm all sage and wisdom about my garden chores, but I am not. Quite frankly, I am trying not to panic. Part of the back garden in the middle of April. This looks good, but I have so much more to do. So, to keep us both on track, here are garden chores I'm performing in my garden for the last two weeks of this month. Keep cutting back ornamental grasses. Try not to cut any green growth, but if you cut some, it's okay. Don't cut back Mexican feather grass or carex. They may not recover. You comb them instead. For me,...

My top post on this blog year-after-year is Ten easy flowers to grow in Oklahoma. I wrote that post forever ago in 2011, so it's time to update it with ten more easy flowers to grow. Aren't I the clever one? Cosmos bipinnatus, cosmos. The only thing stopping a good cosmos flower is the Oklahoma wind so if you're not ready to stake them occasionally, grow shorter statured ones like the dwarf 'Sonata ' mix. There are also the brighter orange and yellow C. sulphureus. 'Lady Bird Dwarf ' is advertised as a shorter mixture. Personally, I love these dark and brooding 'Rubenza' ones so I'm growing them again this year. Cosmos 'Rubenza' from Floret Seeds. Ipomoea purpurea, morning glory. From 'Grandpa Ott's' purple to 'Heavenly Blue' and many bi-colored varieties, morning glories are some of the easiest plants to grow from seed. Score or soak the seeds and then...