Growing Guides

Prizehead is an old-fashioned loose-leaf lettuce with big, frilly, red-tinged leaves that are among the sweetest and most tender you can grow. It grows fast, harvests cut-and-come-again, and brings both beautiful color and delicate flavor to the salad bowl. Here...

Lovage (Levisticum officinale) is a towering, hardy perennial herb that tastes like a bold, concentrated celery, which makes it a favorite for soups, stocks, and stews. It is easy to grow lovage from seed, and just one or two plants...

Hyssop (Hyssopus officinalis) is a hardy perennial herb prized for its spikes of vivid blue flowers, which hum with bees and butterflies all summer long. It is easy to grow hyssop from seed, and the reward is a fragrant, bushy...

Caraway (Carum carvi) is a hardy biennial herb grown for its warm, aromatic seeds, the same ones that flavor rye bread, sauerkraut, and roasted cabbage. It is easy to grow caraway from seed if you know its rhythm: the plant...

Wild bergamot, better known as bee balm (Monarda fistulosa), is a hardy native perennial that turns a sunny bed into a hummingbird and butterfly hotspot. Its shaggy, lavender-pink flowers sit atop aromatic, minty foliage and come back a little bigger...

Minnesota Midget is a compact, early cantaloupe made for small gardens and short seasons. Its short 3 to 4 foot vines bear tidy, softball-sized melons with sweet golden-orange flesh in just about 70 days, making it a favorite for containers...

Imperial 45 is a classic netted cantaloupe and a dependable garden favorite. Its round, heavily netted fruit ripens to deep orange, sweet, and aromatic flesh on productive vines, giving you full-flavored melons in about 85 days. Here is what makes...

Sugar Baby is the go-to icebox watermelon for small gardens and short seasons. Its compact, round fruit runs 8 to 12 pounds with a dark green rind and deep red, fine-textured flesh that is intensely sweet. Ripening early in about...

Jubilee is a classic Southern market melon known for its impressive size and reliable sweetness. Its large, oblong fruit carries a light green rind boldly striped in dark green and can weigh 25 to 40 pounds, with crisp, juicy red...