PROVO • Brigham Young University professor Mikel Stevens will never forget the day when he stumbled across something that was unlike anything he’d ever seen throughout his passion for plants. Stevens ...

Every spring, I get giddy at the first sight of color that isn’t the white or brown of mud season. I know that each year, the abundance and beauty of wildflowers in this region will continuously ...

Racing tall grasses to soak up sun before they are covered, the white goblet-style blooms of Penstemon are visible in open areas and along roadsides in late May and early June. Several members of the ...

When I moved to Grass Valley in 1992, I bought a house, which was surrounded by two acres of old overgrown manzanita. A fire trap to be sure. After hiring a brush-clearing firm, I was left with an ...

Penstemon, also known as beardtongue (because one of its five stamens is infertile and looks different than the others, resembling a hairy tongue surrounded by a lip-shaped flower), is a perennial ...

Penstemons are among the most delightfully friendly plants of the spring garden; their nodding, bugle-shaped blooms announce that the peak time for flowering in Southern California gardens has arrived ...

PORTLAND, Ore.— The Center for Biological Diversity and Native Plant Society of Oregon submitted a petition to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service today to protect the tall western penstemon (Penstemon ...

I was back at my friend Pat’s house this week after seeing her “mini arboretum” last week. This time Pat gave me a guided tour of her plantings. I noticed she had numerous varieties of penstemon. Last ...

PORTLAND, Ore.— The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced today that they would consider protecting the tall western penstemon under the Endangered Species Act. The agency now has 12 months to ...

IT’S TIME FOR another round of Seattle Grows, a botanical party game (that I made up) where I ask local garden professionals what plant we should all be growing. This time I turned to Marcia Bruno, ...