Brian Minter: How to care for your fragrant evergreen baskets

There's more to a winter garden than bare branches and dry leaves — in fact, Mother Nature provides a lot of fragrant evergreens that you can clip and put to use in some creative ways.

If you're a gardening buff, chances are at some point you've hung some evergreens in the household over the cold season to keep the colours alive — and our master gardener approves.

"This whole trend of bringing natural greens inside your home started so early, and I'm absolutely delighted see it happening," Brian Minter told host Gloria Macarenko on CBC's B.C. Almanac.

"But I think the bigger issue here is a little bit of wisdom in terms of when we're bringing fresh greens inside our homes."

Minter says if you're planning to put together a fragrant evergreen basket for the winter, it might be better to hang it outside on your porch.

"If it's outdoors, they will last until May or June," he said.

Just make sure the root ball is very wet — and that the basket has some shelter.

Hanging indoors

If you choose to hang your evergreen basket inside to brighten up your home, be wary of drying it out — Minter says there are several ways to prevent that.

"There's a product called Wilt Pruf which the nursery industry uses. It's a nice film that acts like an anti-desiccant."

Minter says you can even use it on your Christmas tree to keep it from drying out.

And of course, lots of water will also do the trick for baskets — and trees.

"Keep them hydrated. That's the beauty. It also brings out their fragrancy."

Minter brought his own fragrant winter evergreen basket into the CBC Vancouver studio.

Minter says some great items to feature in your winter baskets are white pine, cedar, frosted cones, winterberries and some plants that produce sweet-smelling perfumes.

With files from CBC's BC Almanac

To listen to the full interview, click on the audio labelled: Brian Minter: How to care for your fragrant evergreen baskets