Charles Darwin Archives

November 18, 2019 The National Trust Cover Photo, The Feminine History of Botany, William Shenstone, Leo Lesquereux, Asa Gray, Kim Wilde, Margaret Atwood, Emily Dickinson’s Gardening Life by Marta McDowell, Boot Tray reboot and Cranberry Frenzy in 1843

Today we celebrate the gardener who turned his farm into a picturesque wonder and the Swiss botanist who survived a fall from a mountaintop that foreshadowed a life of highs and lows. We’ll learn about the American botanist Darwin confided in two years before he shared his theory with the rest of the world and…

October 24, 2019 An 11-Story Monarch Mural, What Landscape Architects Wish You Knew, Antonie van Leeuwenhoek, Marianne North, Margaret Owen, Emily Dickinson, The Daylily by Peat and Petit, Plants to Cut Back, and A Fancy from Fontanelle

Today we celebrate the scientist who set the stage for Plant Anatomy and the amazing botanical illustrator Marianne North who traveled the world, capturing exotic flowers with her magnificent oil paintings. We also celebrate Margaret Owen, the English galanthophile and gardener we lost five years ago today. We’ll hear some thoughts from Emily Dickinson about…

Charles Darwin

Young Man with an Old Soul On this day in 1836, the HMS Beagle returned to England after a five-year voyage around the world. It was a revelatory trip for ship’s naturalist, Charles Darwin, who found the building blocks to his evolutionary theory in the many fossils and diverse species he discovered on his excursions.…

October 2, 2019 National Pumpkin Seed Day, Julius von Sachs, the HMS Beagle Returns Home, Patrick Geddes, Martha Brooks Hutcheson, Wallace Stevens, Heirloom Vegetable Gardening by William Woys Weaver, Rhubarb, and Old Garden Stories

Today is National Pumpkin Seed Day. Pumpkin seeds, also known as pepitas, are native to the Americas. Archaeologists discovered them in Mexico in caves that date back to 7,000 B.C. Today, China produces more pumpkins and pumpkin seeds than any other country. Pumpkin seeds are loaded with protein; a single cup provides 8-10 grams of…

Charles Darwin

Darwin’s Theory of Natural Selection 1835 Charles Darwin arrived at the Galapagos Islands on board a ship called the HMS Beagle. Once he’s on the islands, Darwin begins to check out all of the different and unique plants, and it gets him thinking. The experience basically shapes his theory of natural selection. …

September 16, 2019 National Indoor Plant Week, Lisa Eldred Steinkopf, Charles V of France, Robert Fortune, Charles Darwin, Robert Finch, The Chinese Kitchen Garden by Wendy Kiang-Spray, the Final Push to Plant Perennials, Kate Furbish, and 19th Century Female Scientists

#NationalIndoorPlantWeek is this week! Be sure to follow my friend, Lisa Steinkopf – the @HouseplantGuru – on twitter for a chance to win copies of her books and some houseplants. And remember, it’s all week long – so Happy Indoor Plant Week. Go get yourself something new for the Indoor season, which is just around…

September 5, 2019 Growing Cucumbers, Michel Sarrazin, Joseph Pitton de Tournefort, Asa Gray, Charles Darwin, Katherine Warington, Andrew Marvell, Tussie-Mussies by Geraldine Laufer, the Case for Coleus, and the Suffolk Tombstone of gardener Edward Ward

If you have struggled to grow tomatoes successfully, maybe it’s time to give cucumbers a try. They are much easier to grow than tomatoes. Just add some organic matter to the soil and mulch around the base of the plant. Cucumbers benefit from support, so install a trellis for the vines to climb. That’s it.…

Charles Darwin

Walks in the Cambridgeshire Countryside Today, in 1835, Charles Darwin wrote a letter to his friend J.S. Henslow. He wrote: “In a few days time, the Beagle will sail for the Galapagos Islands. I look forward with joy and interest to this, both as being somewhat nearer to England and for the sake of having…

July 12, 2019 Giant Water Lily, Captain Cook, Charles Darwin, Henry David Thoreau, Gardens Are for People by Thomas Church, Propagating Pelargoniums, and Yerba Buena

In China, July is the month of the lotus. Recently I shared a video in the Facebook Group for the Show from the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh,, which shows Senior Horticulturist, Pat Clifford, teaching their intern Hazel, how to remove the older leaves of the Giant Water Lily so the pond does not get overcrowded.…

May 7, 2019 Deep Dives in the Garden, Gerard van Swieten, Rochester Parks Commission, RHS Radish Trial, Henry Teuscher, Bartram’s Garden, Rabindranath Tagore, Penelope Lively, Life in the Garden, Garden Trials, and Charles Darwin

Gardeners love to fall in love with plants. We can fall so hard that we tune out other possibilities for our gardens. Then, in a fascinating twist, our deep dives can suddenly stop, and often, they are followed by a pivot. I started out like a shrub gardener. Then, I made a pivot to annuals…

The Many Moods of Darwin Revealed Through His Letters

“At present, I care for nothing in this wide world except the biology of seedling plants.” May 7, 1855 On this day, Darwin wrote to William Darwin Fox: I am rather low today about all my experiments — everything has been going wrong — the fan-tails have picked the feathers out of the Pouters in…