Home Items: Vertical gardening and green cleaners

Tiny backyard, apartment balcony or windowsill - you can still grow your own food. In "Vertical Vegetables & Fruit: Creative Gardening Techniques for Growing Up in Small Spaces," master gardener Rhonda Massingham Hart discusses popular food plants and offers tips and building instructions on the best frameworks and support systems for each one.

Hot trends for 2012

Plants that do more and cost less. Water-saving strategies. Black and amber foliage. Small-space landscaping. Metal décor. Growing up (vertical gardening). And a bigger focus on front yards over back yards.

Gardening takes root in a local schoolyard

The teachers at Radio Park Elementary School in State College have a great tool to help their childr

Gardening news and notes: Climbing up the wall; event of the decade

French garden designer Patrick Blanc gets credit for inventing vertical gardens; horticultural expo Floriade held only once every 10 years.

Innovative gardening ideas that work

In addition to annuals, many gardeners concentrate on containers of perennials and trees for more permanent plantings. A Burnaby gardener working with a very small, flat space has put dwarf trees in tall planters to add a vertical accent to the rear and centre of his three tiny garden beds.