Minnesota garden answers, one yard at a time.
WCCO's Smart Gardens turns Saturday-morning yard questions into calm, local horticulture advice. University of Minnesota voices and a master gardener field texts and calls about turf, seedlings, rabbits, houseplants, pruning, pollinators, and the strange timing of Minnesota weather.
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WCCO's Smart Gardens is a lawn and garden call-in show shaped by Minnesota weather, University of Minnesota plant knowledge, and the urgency of whatever is happening in listeners' yards that week. It is practical first. The episodes move from cold snaps to warm spells, from snow cover to wet soil, from dormant grass to seed-starting season. That gives the show a useful rhythm. It does not treat gardening as a perfect weekend project; it treats it as a negotiation with thawing ground, rabbits, hail, early bees, late leaves, and plants that rarely follow a tidy calendar. The callers and texters supply the texture. Someone wants to know whether old potting soil can fill lawn depressions. Someone else has tulips coming up while rabbits are thriving. A houseplant owner is dealing with insects, a lawn owner is wondering about seed and fertilizer, and another listener has a Norfolk Island pine that has reached the ceiling. The answers are measured and locally grounded. Again and again, guests steer people away from rushing outside too early, especially when soil is wet or grass is waking from dormancy. Patience becomes one of the show's recurring virtues. So does observation. Mary Meyer brings pollinator awareness, early bulbs, willows, bare-root experiments, and Arboretum color into the conversation. Teresa Rooney brings master gardener steadiness to houseplants, winter moisture, rabbits, and basic plant care. Julie Wisenhorn and Laura Irish Hanson help connect home gardeners with seed-starting guidance, pruning timing, and extension resources. John Trappi gives the lawn side real weight, especially around turf, grass seed, fertilizing, and what not to do too soon. The result is less like a lecture and more like a neighborly plant clinic with a phone line. It is warm, specific, and gently funny. It is also refreshingly willing to say, wait and see.
Made for: For Minnesota gardeners, lawn keepers, houseplant owners, and seasonal tinkerers who want timely answers tied to real weather and real yards. It especially suits listeners who like call-in radio with expert backup.
What sets it apart: Its strength is the mix of local timing and practical restraint: the show often explains when not to rake, prune, seed, fertilize, or fuss. The rotating University of Minnesota and master gardener voices keep the advice grounded without making it feel academic.
WCCO's Smart Gardens
Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A February garden call-in balances bare-root planting plans, careful Norfolk pine pruning, and a water-themed Arboretum flower show.
WCCO's Smart Gardens makes a February lawn-and-garden call-in feel like a quiet exercise in patience. Mary Meyer talks through the off-season rituals of paging through catalogs and ordering bare-root plants, including a persimmon and native plums she hopes to try in Minnesota.
A patient, practical guide to replacing a tree with purpose, variety, and a longer view of the yard.
Tree replacement becomes a slower question of purpose as master gardener Teresa Rooney pushes gardeners past the quickest familiar choice. She points them toward the Arboretum to study mature size, then asks them to weigh shade, birds, pollinators, wind protection, and what they…
A useful August garden Q&A on smoky air, rhubarb, potting mix, and a brief Arboretum event note.
Smart Gardens uses a smoky August morning as the frame for a grounded, useful round of yard questions. Laura Irish-Hanson of the U of M responds to a listener worried about smoke and plants, then moves through two common midseason concerns: whether rhubarb can be dug and divided…
Practical food gardening for real spaces.
Cut flowers, real fields, honest growing.
Laura Irish Hanson from the University of Minnesota answers listener questions on lawn and garden care in a Q&A format.
Master Gardener Teresa Rooney answers listener questions on WCCO's Smart Gardens show.
Julie Weisenhorn discusses gardening tips including when to till soil, coppicing vs.
Denny and Mary Meyer discuss spring gardening topics including crabgrass control, pollinator protection, and peony pruning.
Lawn and garden experts from the University of Minnesota answer listener questions about fertilizing, grass seed selection, and weed treatment strategies.
Master Gardener Teresa Rooney discusses the benefits of spring moisture, warns about rabbit damage, and takes listener questions on soil testing and insect control.
Lawn and garden experts discuss spring lawn care, fertilizer tips, and lilac maintenance.
On the first day of spring, with a forecast of 76 degrees followed by 45 the next day, Julie Weisenhorn of the University of Minnesota tells WCCO listeners that "patience" is the key garden skill.
Mary Meyer of the University of Minnesota answers listener questions on February 21, with topics ranging from bare-root persimmons to bee lawns and apple pruning.
On WCCO's Smart Gardens, host Denny Long and Master Gardener Teresa Rooney answer caller and text questions on the last Saturday of January, with the temperature at zero and a forecast high of 18.
Master Gardener Teresa Rooney answers listener questions about caring for evergreen trees, gift plants like Christmas cactus and poinsettia, and general lawn and garden topics.
Lawn and garden experts answer listener questions about selecting apple seeds, dormant seeding with snow, and treating creeping Charlie.
Denny and Mary Meyer discuss ongoing gardening tasks, including attracting birds with plants, dormant seeding, and saving squash, while taking listener calls.
A radio host and a University of Minnesota expert discuss whether wildfire smoke affects garden plants.