Michigan Gardener - Your guide Great Lakes gardening: Garden Event Calendar / Expert Advice / Plant Profiles / Tree Care

PLEASE NOTE: In the autumn of 1995, we hatched the idea for a free, local gardening publication. The following spring, we published the first issue of Michigan Gardener magazine. Advertisers, readers, and distribution sites embraced our vision. Thus began an exciting journey of helping our local gardening community grow and prosper.
After 27 years, nearly 200 issues published, and millions of copies printed, we have decided it is time to end the publication of our Print Magazine and E-Newsletter.

We will continue to update our Website with articles and enter current gardening events in our website Event Calendar. All the best wishes for 2024 and beyond.

Boxwood blight is detected in Michigan

January 12, 2019 • Leave a Comment

Boxwood blight, a serious fungal disease that attacks boxwoods, has been detected for the first time in Michigan. The disease was found in Oakland County in three separate locations: a landscape firm, a homeowner’s yard, and holiday wreaths for sale at a retail store. The Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development (MDARD) was also notified by the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection that infected boxwood may have been sold at other retail locations in Michigan.

“Boxwood blight is a devastating disease that has caused significant losses to homeowners and the nursery industry in states that already have the disease,” said Gina Alessandri, director of MDARD’s Pesticide and Plant Pest Management Division.

Boxwood blight produces dark brown leaf spots and causes rapid defoliation that sometimes kills young boxwoods. Boxwood blight first appeared in the 1990s in the United Kingdom and is now widely distributed in Europe. In the United States, the disease was first found in 2011 in Connecticut, North Carolina and Virginia, and has since spread to more than 24 states. Boxwood blight affects all species of boxwood. However, some species and cultivars are more susceptible than others. American boxwood and English boxwood are highly susceptible. This disease also affects the related shrub sweetbox, as well as pachysandra, a well-known groundcover. Boxwood and pachysandra are commonly used in commercial and residential plantings throughout Michigan.

Wreaths displayed outdoors are a potential concern if they are exposed to the elements. The biggest risk comes when people dispose of the infected wreaths after the holidays. MDARD recommends that anyone who has a wreath containing boxwood plant parts should consider it infected and dispose of it by burning or, even better, double-bagging and including it with their trash for deposit in a landfill.

Alessandri advised that anyone who suspects that they have plants infected with boxwood blight should contact their local MSU Extension office.

Famed rose breeder David Austin dies at age 92

January 3, 2019 • Leave a Comment

David Austin, the rosarian and founder of David Austin Roses Ltd., died in December, 2018 at age 92. Over the past 20 years, U.S. and Canadian gardeners came to know Austin as the creator of beautiful, fragrant English roses.

He bred more than 200 English roses during his extraordinary career. From a farming background, Austin developed a keen interest in old roses in his early twenties. He felt that although the old roses were charming and often had magnificent fragrances, they were lacking in the color diversity and repeat blooming common to the more modern hybrid teas. This belief was the basis for the collection of English roses that gardeners enjoy today. He set about creating an entirely new rose, which combined the beauty and fragrance of old roses with the benefits of modern roses. His first English rose was ‘Constance Spry,’ launched in 1961. Notable varieties include ‘Gertrude Jekyll’—twice voted England’s favorite rose—and more recently, ‘Olivia Rose Austin.’

David Austin Jr., son and Managing Director of the company for the last 25 years said, “My father was a remarkable man. His love for the art of rose breeding was truly inspiring; he loved nothing more than seeing the pleasure that his roses gave to others.
His presence will be sorely missed within the global family company that he created. But the passion he instilled will continue and we will hold true to my father’s vision when he founded the company almost 50 years ago.”

Ask MG: How do I grow Cleome from seeds?

December 22, 2018 • Leave a Comment

I saved the seed from my cleome plants last year. When I put the seed out this year, it grew a lot of giant weeds. What happened?

Cleome vary in height from 2 to 5 feet; some are bushy, others are stalky. The cleome you see most is spider flower (Cleome spinosa or hassleriana), or hybrids or cultivars that have the Cleome spinosa in their parentage. This plant can look beautiful in the back of the border, especially in a cottage style garden. In a more formal garden it can look out of place or weedy. Some people find the scent offensive, which is skunk-like. It produces many seeds and can spread like wildfire. To prevent this, remove flowers as soon as they have formed seed pods. The plant will make new flowers and usually keeps blooming all summer.

If your cleome from last year was not a true species but a hybrid—which are labeled with a “cross” symbol (X) in the name—the seeds will either be sterile or the plants that grow from them won’t “come true.” Instead the plants will resemble one or more of its ancestors. The only way to make sure your cleome will be the color and size that you want is to buy seed from a specific species, hybrid, or cultivar.

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I saved the seed from my cleome plants last year. When I put the seed out this year, it grew a lot of giant weeds. What happened?