Annual
A plant that germinates, blooms, fruits and dies in the course of one year.

Bedding Plant
Foliage or an ornamental plant suited for habit by growing in beds or masses.

Biennial
A plant that requires two seasons of growth to produce its flowers and fruit and then dies after the second year.

Botanical Name
The Latin or "scientific" name for a plant, usually composed of two words, the genus and the species.

Bulb
A term commonly used for a whole category of spring or summer-blooming perennial plants that may grow from underground stems, corms, rhizomes, tubers, and tuberous roots.

Compost
A mass of decomposed, rotted organic matter (such as yard and garden wastes.)

Deciduous
A plant that drops its leaves in winter and resprouts in spring.

Evergreen
A plant that holds some foliage throughout the year.

Ground Cover
Low-growing, usually spreading plants that, when planted close together, form a layer of uniform foliage.

Hardening off
The process of gradually acclimating greenouse- or indoor-grown plants to outdoor growing conditions.

Hardiness
The ability of a plant to withstand low temperatures without artifical protection. Hardiness zone maps divide the world into climatic zones, based on average winter minimum temperatures.

Hybrid
A cross between any two plants that are not genetically the same. Hybrids rarely breed true.

Native Plant
A plant that occurs naturally in a specific region or locality.

Open-pollinated
Plant varieties that have the ability to cross-pollinate among themselves by natural means and produce plants that resemble the parent variety.

Perennial
A plant that renews its top growth seasonally and lives year after year.