The Node
Woodlanders' resource center for plant education, how-tos, garden inspiration, and news.
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Southeast
37 articles
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The Quiet Harvest: Saving Seed as the Season Turns
How-To: Saving Native Seed. Late summer is the nursery's second harvest; here is how to gather, clean, and keep native seed so the plants you love sow true next spring.
The Blueberry That Grew Into a Tree
Plant Highlight · Sparkleberry · The Southeast. Vaccinium arboreum took the blueberry blueprint, added a trunk, cinnamon bark, and a taste for dry limestone, and became a small ornamental tree.
Where the Black Gum Wants to Stand
Landscape Design · Black Gum · The Southeast. The tupelo thrives in standing water and dry clay alike, which makes siting the tree a matter of listening to the ground...
The Apothecary That Stands
Essay on the living apothecary. How people found medicine in bark, root, and resin long before we could isolate a compound, and why the woods, not the herb bed, are...
Ferns of the Oak Woods
A field guide to the wood ferns (Dryopteris): the evergreen backbone of Southern shade, how to identify them, the tangled native hybrid family tree, and seven to grow.
Yellowroot (Xanthorhiza simplicissima): The Buttercup That Went to Wood
Plant Highlight · Xanthorhiza simplicissima · Southeastern Streambanks. The only woody member of the buttercup family: a quiet shade groundcover with a chrome-yellow root, a berberine dye, and a deep...
A Field Guide to the Sumacs (Rhus)
Field Guide · The Genus Rhus · Southeastern United States. A grower's guide to the sumacs Woodlanders keeps in cultivation, from staghorn and smooth sumac to the federally endangered Michaux's,...
The Trees That Carry the Largest Flowers in North America
Plant Highlight · Bigleaf & Ashe Magnolia · Aiken, SC. On the bigleaf magnolias, a pair of Southern natives that grow leaves the size of canoe paddles and blooms you...
Cuttings in the Heat: The Summer Craft of Making More From Less
From the Fields · Propagation · Aiken, SC. A dispatch from the summer potting bench on the craft of rooting semi-hardwood cuttings in July, with four plants we are propagating...
Gardening for the Dry Years: A Xeriscape Field Guide for the Changing South
Field Guide · Xeriscape & Drought · Aiken, SC. As Southern summers lengthen and rain grows less reliable, these are the drought-proof heroes now filling our propagation benches: the salvia...
A Field Guide to Cold-Hardy Citrus
Field Guide · Cold-Hardy Citrus · Zones 7–9 — A practical guide to choosing, siting, and keeping citrus alive north of the citrus belt: the hardiness ladder, the three families...
South Carolina Grower's Dispatch: Summer 2026
The Grower's Dispatch · South Carolina A Field Report for the Summer Ahead Anniversaries worth celebrating, a drought worth taking seriously, and a closer look at what to plant when...
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