Independent gardening advice for real gardens, balconies and windowsills.
Practical advice on growing food and flowers, improving soil, and making the most of small spaces. Start anywhere — the garden will meet you.
The seeds of this climbing sapindaceous plant furnish the famous guarana of the Amazon and its principal tributaries. The ripe seeds, when thoroughly dried, are pounded into a fine powder, which made...
This belongs to the quinine family. The roots are bitter, and are employed as a purgative; the leaves are also used medicinally.
This euphorbiaceous plant has an acrid, milky, bitter juice; the root is emetic, and the dried branches are used medicinally.
The Barbadoes gooseberry, which belongs to the family _Cactaceae_. It grows about 15 feet in height, and produces yellow-colored, eatable, and pleasant-tasted fruit, which is used in the West Indies f...
The avocado or alligator pear, a common tree in the West Indies. The fruits are pear-shaped, covered with a brownish-green or purple skin. They are highly esteemed where grown, but strangers do not re...
This plant is called New Zealand flax, on account of the leaves containing a large quantity of strong, useful fiber, which is used by the natives of that country for making strings, ropes, and article...
The Japanese Medlar, or Chinese Lo-quat. It bears a small oval fruit of an orange color when ripe, having a pleasant subacid flavor. It stands ordinary winters in this climate, and forms a fine evergr...
A strong leguminous plant, the seeds of which are highly poisonous, and are employed by the natives of Old Calabar as an ordeal. Persons suspected of witchcraft or other crimes are compelled to eat th...
A Japanese species, which reaches the size of a small tree, and is held sacred by the Japanese, who form wreaths of it with which to decorate the tombs of their deceased friends, and they also burn th...
The indigo plant, a native of Asia, but cultivated and naturalized in many countries. The use of indigo as a dye is of great antiquity. Both Dioscorides and Pliny mention it, and it is supposed to hav...
A species of jalap is obtained from this convolvulaceous plant; this is a resinous matter contained in the juices.
A South American palm growing in the underwood of the forests on the Amazon and Rio Negro. The Indians use its slender stems for making their blow pipes or gravatanas, through which they blow small po...