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Internet Resources for Gardeners

by Karen Fletcher

The Garden Spider's Web

Eventually every fanatical gardener has to face up to the age-old question: what do you do when it's too dark or too cold to garden? We tug off our Wellies and wash our hands, and we read books about gardening, pore over seed and plant catalogs, and swap stories about gardening. And, as we sit down at our computers, we wonder if we can find a high-quality out-of-garden experience out here on the wild, wild Web.

o Virtual Garden Tours

We can take a slow link to New Zealand and visit the Pukeiti Rhododendron Trust, or drop by to see what the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew have on offer. We can take tours of the Missouri Botanical Garden, the gardens of the University of Delaware or the greenhouses at the University of Georgia. We can visit National Wildflower Research Center in Austin, Texas where we wouldn't want to miss the wonderful photo of founder Lady Bird Johnson in a field of bluebonnets. Job's Tears, Beggar's Buttons, Large Cuckoo-Pint, and Doll's Eyes await us on the unofficial tour of the Medicinal Herb Garden at the University of Washington.

Some people have invited us over to visit their private gardens. We can't ask for cuttings but we can save their graphics to disk. An urban oasis awaits us as we visit the Chase-Cross garden in Nova Scotia. And on Pete's Pond Page, Pete tells all and shows all about his experiences building a pond and Japanese garden in his backyard.

o Horticulture Information

Once we've gotten over our child-like fascination with slow-loading images, we can find a wealth of good, solid horticulture information in good, old-fashioned text form if we know where to look.

Cooperative Extension Services around the country offer a wealth of information based on the research and teaching at our land grant universities. We can check the University of Florida's AgriGator listings to see what is available in our own state. We can find lots of good information in other states, as long as we keep in mind, of course, that not everything will apply to our USDA Zone. (Speaking of which, here's a handy collection of USDA Zone links).

The following searchable collections are especially handy when we're in a hurry to zero in on a particular piece of information.

Virginia Cooperative Extension Information Resources offers a searchable collection of detailed, easy-to-read factsheets, among them factsheets on general gardening topics, indoor gardening, and fruits and vegetables.

Horticulture Solutions from the Illinois Cooperative Extension Service offers a well-organized collection of answers to hundreds of frequently asked gardening questions. And some not-so-frequently asked questions, too, in case you were wondering about composting circus animal manure.

Although the SunSITE gopher is sometimes too busy to respond, the rec.gardens archives at SunSITE are well worth a visit. The archives yield a number of FAQS contributed by fellow gardeners; among them: And, not to be missed, the Turnip FAQ.

For the determined and dedicated information junkies, The Garden Gate offers The Teaching Garden a collection of glossaries, FAQs, special topic WWW pages, plant lists and online plant databases.

o A Guide to Botanical Correctness

As dedicated gardeners, we owe it to the world to hold to a high standard of botanical correctness and to eschew all things non-BC. We can sit in on Dr. Wolf's Botany 3700 class at California State University - Stanilaus and supplement our fifth-grade Latin and fifth-rate Greek by browsing a glossary of roots of botanical terms or brush up on our latin pronunciation.

If we aspire to know an angiosperm from a gymnosperm without a programme, and are willing to go for two falls out of three with terms like 'diadelphous', 'denticulate', and 'dioecious', we can tackle detailed descriptions of flowering plant families with illustrations.

We can delve into the huge library of plant images used in teaching Botany courses at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. And finally, for the full-immersion botany experience, we can visit the Internet Directory for Botany.

o Magazines, Books, Catalogs, Etc.

Although we've been so busy that the last two issues of Horticulture and a couple of new books languish unread on our shelves, and we really believe deep in our hearts that getting gardening magazines in the mail is one of the hallmarks of a civilized life, we nonetheless crave online stimulation.

We are really carrying enough magazines subscriptions already, so we promise just to take a quick peek at this list of gardening magazines and this guide to garden publication. And on the theory that one can never have enough catalogs, we can find just the thing in the indexed SOURCES for garden and greenhouse or plunge mouse-first into the hundreds of listings in Cyndi's Catalog of Catalogs.

Online gardening catalogs promise a Brave New Bookshelf uncluttered by five-year-old catalogs too pretty to throw away. The online format give companies the perfect opportunity to share their horticultural expertise and offer more than just price lists and click here to order.

Those of us lucky enough to live in the middle of the country where prairies can grow can visit Heyne Custom Seed Services in Iowa and learn more about prairies and native plants. The Cook's Garden can draw on the considerable expertise of founder Shepherd Ogden. At InterUrban WaterFarms we can wade into the fascinating subject of hydroponics, find a FAQ or read further.

The people who've been selling us gardening books and magazines are beginning to figure out that there may be a whole new market medium out here. Visit Time Warner's Virtual Garden and try out their searchable plant database or browse Sunset magazine's gardening section.

Books That Work's Complete Guide to Garden Stuff leads us to explore its pages if only because we like the rough and ready title. We can travel to gardening's hi-tech edge with Growing EDGE

o Newsgroups and Mailing Lists

USENET newsgroups offer open and lively discussions on a myriad of topics. Of these, rec.gardens is a premier gathering place for gardeners from all over. The group is busy, chaotic, and friendly; a nice break after a long day at work. Or a nice break during a long day at work... The drawback to rec.gardens is that we have to sift through hundreds of topics to get to ones we're interested in. (Here in Zone 5 where men are men and gardeners are men and women, where we battle Arctic winters and tropical summers, we just don't have much time or sympathy for whiny babies in Zone 10 whose Ficus isn't doing well out on the ol' terrazzo in February.)

Thanks to balkanization of rec.gardens, orchid and rose fanciers split to form rec.gardens.orchids and rec.gardens.roses (with its well-maintained roses FAQ). And for gardeners who believe in sunk costs, there is rec.ponds.

For those most patient of gardeners, the bonsai enthusiasts, there's rec.arts.bonsai. For lots of opinions about folk remedies and some of the fascinating lore of herbs, alt.folklore.herbs offers interesting tidbits.

Although we are already constantly on the brink of exceeding our disk quotas, we nonetheless go looking for more e-mail and discover mailing lists. We need to proceed with caution, however. Some lists, gardens in particular, are notorious for delivering voluminous amounts of daily e-mail, and are only for the frequent e-mail user. Mailing lists give us an opportunity to join discussions on more specialized topics, from alpines, chile peppers, and indoor gardening, to organic gardening and plants for mediterranean climates.

o Pretty Pictures

Whether we're looking for esthetic enjoyment, scientific enlightenment or just looking for some neato pix to swipe, there's plenty of variety on the Web. (When you're out there swiping those neato pix be sure to stick to ones that are offered for public use and aren't copyrighted.) If we have the speed and the patience, Internet Directory for Botany takes us to images of plants and gardens all over the world.

o Gardening Software

Although we'd still like to think that good software is available for free or as shareware there is so much reasonably-priced software ($30-$50) available that there is something for everyone.

The proliferation of gardening software in the last year bring us a selection of products to choose from, from searchable databases like PlantCare2000 for houseplants, Garden Companion for garden plants, to CAD-based design programs like LandDesigner Multimedia for Windows and Mum's the Word Plus for the Mac. No one program does it all, though, and let's face it, until we have the searchable, fully illustrated equivalent of Hortus Third cum virtual reality garden design program - offering gorgeous photographic realism and ambient fragrance, of course - we won't really be happy, will we? Click here to doubledig. In our dreams...

o Keeping Up And Finding Answers

We're not exactly slugs when it comes to net surfing but we'd rather have someone else do most of the work for us, so we check in regularly at What's Coming Into Bloom? at The Garden Gate and check out the Yahoo Guide.

And finally, if we are ready to venture out on our own in search of answers The Gardener's Guide to Finding Answers on the Internet is a good overall guide.
The Garden Spider sits, motionless in her web, awaiting your e-mail comments, feedback, and suggestions for additions.

Karen Fletcher
The Garden Gate

Last updated August 31, 1997.

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