Home & Garden: Height of Porch Railings

Height of Porch Railings

From a practical standpoint, porch railings can help ensure a safe play area for families with young children. In most municipalities, any porch deck area that exceeds 30 inches above ground level is required to have railings. Porch railings should enhance house architecture in style and form, but p

Home & Garden: Smart Tips to Adjust the PH Level in a Hydroponic Garden

Smart Tips to Adjust the PH Level in a Hydroponic Garden

If you have hydroponic garden, it is very important for you to balance the levels of the pH since it can influence to the healthy growth of your pants. You should know that the plants in your hydroponic garden require staying in the proper pH level so that they can absorb the nutrients. Basically, e

Home & Garden: How to Install Poly Rope on an Electric Fence

How to Install Poly Rope on an Electric Fence

Livestock owners and gardeners alike often turn to electric fencing to provide a successful method of fencing animals in or out of a specific area. Electric poly rope is constructed of a sturdy, synthetic polyethylene or polypropylene material intertwined with multiple thin strands of stainless stee

Home & Garden: About Garden Edging

About Garden Edging

Tending a garden means constant digging, planting, and fertilizing. Wild flowers and weeds seem to crop up out of nowhere, and stray grass constantly spreads into the garden from the yard. Landscape edging provides an attractive border and helps keep everything in its place. A variety of edging opti

Home & Garden: Kentucky Bluegrass Seed History

Kentucky Bluegrass Seed History

Poa pratensis---Kentucky bluegrass---is the most common cool-season grass and its seeds are found in hundreds of varieties. It is used on lawns, athletic fields, golf courses and in parks, and it grows in meadows and open woods as well as along streams and roads.

Home & Garden: Is March the Best Month For Pruning Trees?

Is March the Best Month For Pruning Trees?

Pruning landscape trees and bushes in March while they're still dormant boosts their appearance, health and structure. Work done before leaves bud out promotes quicker healing, greatly reducing fatal diseases brought by late spring tree boring insects.

Home & Garden: How to Paint the Outside of an Above Ground Pool

How to Paint the Outside of an Above Ground Pool

You can significantly improve the appearance of an older above ground pool by repainting the support walls. But you can inject additional style to your yard by color-coordinating the pool to match any outdoor color schemes, or camouflaging it with natural color so it visually recedes into the backgr

Home & Garden: Alternatives to Nitrogen Fertilizers

Alternatives to Nitrogen Fertilizers

Legumes are an organic alternative to nitrogen fertilizers.Flohsamen, hell und dunkel image by bbroianigo from Fotolia.comMany farmers and homeowners use nitrogen fertilizers to produce green, lush grass or healthy crops. Producing nitrogen fertilizers requires a lot of energy, however,...

Home & Garden: How Long Does it Take to Grow Peppers Hydroponically?

How Long Does it Take to Grow Peppers Hydroponically?

Plants grown hydroponically tend to do very well, typically growing much more quickly than do the same plants when grown in a conventional garden. There are many different kinds of peppers, and any of them can be grown successfully in a hydroponic garden. Some of the larger plants may need extra sup

Home & Garden: Tools You Can Use to Aerate Your Lawn

Tools You Can Use to Aerate Your Lawn

The term aeration aptly implies the result of the procedure: exposing the lawn's soil to air. However, the aeration's purpose is not to allow air to reach the soil, but to allow water to reach the soil. When a lawn's soil become overly compacted or develops a thick, underlying layer of material, cal

Home & Garden: Can Ivy Be Started From a Stem?

Can Ivy Be Started From a Stem?

Ivy (Hedera spp.) is an evergreen vine from the ginseng plant family. Widely recognized ivy varieties include English ivy and Algerian ivy. Often grown as groundcovers, the fast-growing plants have thick, leathery, lobed foliage. Some varieties bloom with green flowers followed by black berries. It

Home & Garden: Designs for Wooden Planters

Designs for Wooden Planters

Planters create a garden out of a paved terrace, a vegetable patch on a front porch or a landscaped walk along an urban sidewalk. Wooden planters are warm and natural and weather attractively when they are left out all year. Go with custom-designed planters to maximize use of a specific space. Use r

Home & Garden: How to Protect Your Porch Posts From Rotting

How to Protect Your Porch Posts From Rotting

Rotting wooden porch posts can spell trouble. If rot damage is severe, the posts may not be structurally sound, which can compromise your and your family's safety. Depending on how bad the damage is, you'll need to either replace the posts or repair them. Both tasks will needlessly cost you money. T

Home & Garden: How to Widen a Driveway With Pavers

How to Widen a Driveway With Pavers

A standard two-car driveway is 20 feet wide. However, if you have a trailer or recreational vehicle, your driveway is probably a little too narrow to comfortably accommodate your vehicle and trailer. If there is a wide planting strip along the sides of the driveway, you can easily widen the driveway

Home & Garden: The Germination of Buffalo Grass Seed

The Germination of Buffalo Grass Seed

A native perennial, buffalo grass (Buchloe dactyloides) once grew wild across the Great Plains of North America from Montana to Mexico and was the predominate food source for the American bison. The warm season grass spreads rapidly from its root system and seed dispersal.

Home & Garden: Ideas for Outdoor Stone Fire Pits

Ideas for Outdoor Stone Fire Pits

Outdoor stone fire pits are a great addition to any home's yard, patio or garden and can create a whole new exterior space for entertaining and relaxing. If you are considering installing an outdoor stone fire pit, you can build simple fire pits with the materials available to you, build...

Home & Garden: Are Ground Moles Dangerous to Pets?

Are Ground Moles Dangerous to Pets?

The answers area yes and no! This is because moles are more dangerous to their habitat than they are directly to other animal and human beings. Moles are not known to known to be dangerous to pets or even human beings. Moles resemble rats and at some point will behave like they are rats that are fou

Home & Garden: The Signs of a Flooded Lawn Mower Engine

The Signs of a Flooded Lawn Mower Engine

Lawn mowers often experience problems when their engines are flooded.lawnmower image by sumos from Fotolia.comLawn mower engines flood when excess gas comes into or fills the engine. This excess gas can cause a variety of problems for the lawn mower. Lawn mower engines will typically...

Home & Garden: How to Replace Lava in Newcastle Gas Fire Pits

How to Replace Lava in Newcastle Gas Fire Pits

Fire pits enable a homeowner to enjoy the comfort and beauty of a fire outdoors in a safe, controlled situation. Newcastle makes a gas fire bowl that can be placed on an outdoor tabletop or walkway. It features a 12,000 BTU burner fed by a 1 lb. propane tank. The lava rocks, which sit inside the bow