We love leatherflower (Clematis viorna), a native vining clematis, for its thick, bell-shaped purple flowers that come all summer long.

A May “to-do” list for gardeners in the Southeast United States

WINTER FLOWERS always come as a special delight—all the more so if they happen to be fragrant. Luckily, we in the South can grow a number of winter-blooming shrubs renowned for their fragrance.

Michael Dirr is one of those rare, driven individuals who make the rest of us look like we’re mired in Jell-O.

BY JENKS FARMER / Columbia, South Carolina, Zone 8
EVERYONE in my neighborhood (and yours, too, I’ll bet) has a lawn. Unfortunately, most of them are the same—unimaginative and crew-cut, not at all like the fun, …

BY JENKS FARMER / Columbia, South Carolina, Zone 8
Caladiums are old favorites in southern gardens. Like many plants, they also inspire some people to become insane collectors of every available cultivar—I know a gardener in …

BY C. COLSTON BURRELL/Free Union, Virginia, Zone 7
The allure of exotic plants is inescapable. In spite of a rich and beautiful native flora, we are invariably drawn to plants from distant shores. As a result, …

BY C. COLSTON BURRELL / Free Union, Virginia, Zone 7
I am a lustful gardener. I once referred to myself as a chlorophyll addict, and an earnest voice asked who had bestowed my certification. Though I …

These good-smelling plants are perfect for Southern gardens.

When it comes to containers, sometimes thinking outside the box means finding…a box.

When I first started gardening, I didn’t care a speck about foliage size. Itsy-bitsy leaves were fine with me as long as the flowers were pretty. (Prime example: asters.) But as 1 delved into garden books and magazines, I discovered that size matters, at least when you’re a leaf.