Garden Experiments
For the love of gardening and wildlife habitat
Have you ever wondered what happens to the frogs in your backyard in winter? From 64 degrees during the day to 20 degrees at night, the following day is a dramatic change. Frogs are cold-blooded animals and derive their body temperature from the air surrounding them. So, at 20 degrees, will they freeze and die? Don’t worry – frogs have a way …
Continue Reading about How Do Frogs Survive in Winter? By Freezing!
Birds need water to survive, so keeping a bird bath full of fresh water will attract many different species. Here are some tips on how to keep your bird bath filled with water all year round. Do Birds Need Water in Winter? Winter is here, and the birds in your backyard are thirsty. Sure, they can get liquid from snow, but to process it, they …
Continue Reading about Bird Baths in Winter: How to Unfreeze Your Bird Bath
It’s gray, foggy, and drizzling outside – a perfect Mississippi winter day. When winter arrives, I curl up on the couch, tuck in the extra blankets, close my eyes and fervently wish I was somewhere tropical. I wish, I wish, I wish! Yep, still here. The only thing that gets me through these yucky days when I can’t be outside are my indoor …
Continue Reading about How to Survive the Winter: For Gardeners
The last couple of weeks the weather has been down right cold! Well, for Mississippi standards it was cold. Highs in the 20's and lots of wind - that always makes me curl up in lots of blankets and not want to go outdoors. Brrrr! But the cold front passed us by and now the temperatures are back up to a pleasant 65 degrees. My kind of winter …
Continue Reading about The Beauty of Decay in the Winter Garden
Our December weather has been unusual this year. It took a long time before our first freeze and then we've had a couple of days here and there that were in the 70's. But, as always, after warm winter weather, a bad storm follows. Because of the bouts of warmer temperatures, I've had some fun visitors to my garden that we wouldn't normally see …
As a native plant, cross vine has a big advantage - it's easy to grow, hardy, tolerates the heat, has a low water requirement, and can grow in both full sun and part shade. It's in the same family as trumpet creeper (Bignoniaceae), and the flowers are very similar - trumpet-shaped, 2" long tubular, and bright orange-red/yellow. Cross vine is …
