Starting a vegetable garden can be a rewarding prospect for any homeowner. In addition to having fresh veggies on the ready, digging in the dirt has big health benefits. Though yanking out weeds might ...

A variety of pink, white, and red azaleas in full bloom - Sanne Dost/Shutterstock Who doesn't love a healthy and thriving azalea in full bloom? When covered with a sea of colorful flowers, azaleas are ...

Right under our collective noses - and probably in your very own yard - is a great gardening tool that we have typically shunned. Pine straw. Raked up often to be disposed of, this all-natural, ...

Over the years, I’ve had many questions from readers about using pine straw as a mulch in the vegetable garden. Is it a good idea? Let’s cover some of the basics. Mulching is a long-established ...

If you need to top up the mulch in your garden, you might be faced with the choice between using pine bark or pine straw.

In the bamboo forests of southern China, mulching the ground with straw during winter is a common management practice. Farmers use materials such as rice straw and bamboo branches to insulate the soil ...

Summer has definitely arrived. With temperatures reaching the high 90s and 100s every day, water is quickly lost from soils and plants. Evapotranspiration is the agricultural term for the total amount ...

Wood mulch and wood chips will mat down to make a firm but spongy surface for your garden paths and around playsets. Pine straw is too slippery to walk on, so skip it when mulching these high-traffic ...

How do you boost soil water content and soil health without irrigating? Best cover it with a layer of straw, a new study concludes. Farmers in China's Loess Plateau have for decades used both plastic ...