Looking Back over the Summer

By Ms Sherry

Cestrum

Turk’s cap hibiscus

With the first of September just around the corner, it seems a good time to assess how our gardens fared this summer. What annuals or vegetables performed well – what would we plant or not plant again? Did some of the plants wilt under the summer heat, or fail to flourish with the amount of water we were able to provide? Did the wildlife demolish the plantings? Did some plants just need more care than we felt we could give – for insect or disease problems? Did some reproduce so wildly that they just outgrew their welcome?  A garden journal is a real help for those of us with selective or poor memories. Unless we keep some sort of record, next summer may find us making the same mistakes we did this year; a journal can also help us repeat our successes. I make notes in my yearly calendar to use as a guide when the huge array of plant material becomes available next spring. My memory often goes blank when faced with rows and rows of gorgeous greenery and blooms.

I will surely buy the wonderful begonias, Super Olympia Rose with bright pink flowers and light green leaves, again next year; they did beautifully in the sun; profusion zinnias will be at the top of my list for 2009 as they just don’t know when to quit. Over the years I was the kid in the candy store trying every new annual (and often perennial, too) that came on the market. No more; over the years by trial and error I learned to plant the old faithful for summer color – begonias, impatiens, pentas, and zinnias. Another fine performer this year was Mexican heather, an annual with either tiny lavender or white flowers.

By this time of the season our container plants are getting very tired. They are leggy, unless we kept them pinched; they have become pot bound and are requiring copious amounts of water on a daily basis. One cure-all is to pull them all out and replant and enjoy this second crop of flowers until the first frost, which in East Central Alabama may not happen until mid-November. In our area it is way too early to fill our gardens with pansies and others who prefer cool days and cooler nights.

The deer sneaked in and stripped my potato vines of all their leaves. I have lost them to the deer two years running, so next year regardless of how tempting those beautiful chartreuse leaves are, I won’t choose them unless I can keep them out of harm’s way. There are so many plants that deer do not browse that it will simply be a matter of choosing one of them. My beautiful leucothoe (a subject of an earlier blog) died and it looks like my shady lady anise (the second one) is not long for this world. The hydrangeas, although they had survived an early spring cold snap, did not perform well at all. As a matter of fact only the rebloomers like ‘Vince Dooley’ and ‘Endless Summer’ actually bloomed this year. That seems to be the same story I heard from my gardener friends. Hydrangeas no longer make my yearly shopping list even though I love them dearly. (By the way it is almost past time to prune hydrangeas that bloom on old wood: mophead and oakleaf hydrangeas should be pruned soon after blooming; they begin to set their new flower buds from August through October.) If you pruned after that time in years past, it may be one reason why your hydrangeas did not bloom. The hosta did not have a banner year; leaves which should have been more than a foot in size only reached a couple of inches. Most of the ones in pots fared better than those in the ground. From what I read, this problem stemmed from the drought and heat of summer 2007.  Failures in the hosta department will not deter me from buying them again next year, but more will be planted in containers than in the ground as the container-grown ones did better.

Late summer has many stars in the garden. Two full sun beauties are cestrum and Turk’s cap hibiscus. The cestrums have been blooming for a while but are clearly stand outs now. Their tubular flowers are beloved by hummingbirds and butterflies alike. They can get large and may need pruning after flowering. Cestrums are considered to be tropicals, but my cestrum hybrid, pictured above, grows very nicely in my zone 7B-8A garden. Another wonderful bloomer right now is the Turk’s cap hibiscus with brilliant red flowers that the butterflies just love. Within days the garden will be full of bright yellow butterflies flitting through the hibiscus, a scene that defies description. The little creatures dart so quickly that it is hard to capture them in a photograph. Speaking of creatures, the garden is buzzing with hummingbirds; if you have a feeder, keep it clean and full of fresh solution so these small miracle can tank up good before flying south for the winter.

Although many of our plants may be weary after putting on their glorious summer show, many are still at their peak. Take stock now and go from there. There are always beds to be filled, containers to be planted, and blossoms to admire. Gardening can be full of frustration – plants that don’t bloom or don’t survive or don’t thrive; but on the whole gardening can also be the most rewarding activity that there is, as we experience the pleasures of watching living things grow.  Just as a gardener rejoices over the past season’s successes and moans the failures, a gardener can always look to the next season for more challenges and more delights. 

Winged Creatures

By Ms Sherry

A Giant Swallowtail visits the zinnias.

A Monarch butterfly grabs a snack.

An Eastern Tiger Swallowtail in the zinnias.

A Swallowtail enjoys the pentas.

It seems that the butterflies like my zinnias and pentas as much as I do. The two have not only beautified the garden but have also proved to be magnets for these winged beauties. Splashes of bright yellow constantly dart through the flowers. Perhaps, because we have had more rainfall this year; perhaps because of the color choices for my annuals (usually I choose a white color scheme; however, this year I went for bright) there appears to be many more butterflies in the landscape than in previous years. I made a point to plant lots of the same color flowers so the near sighted butterflies could not possibly miss my garden. Butterflies are drawn to bright flowers planted in masses. Choosing a tubular flower like the penta makes it easy for the butterflies to get their needed nectar; evidently zinnias are also a prime supplier of nectar also. The butterflies’ daily visits to the blossoms are a show that can’t be rivaled. Swallowtail butterflies hover over the profusion zinnias and the pentas flitting from one flower to another. A monarch butterfly has even been visiting. Both the zinnia and the penta are full sun plants, allowing the butterflies to absorb the sun’s warmth while they eat.

Pentas are sometimes referred to as Egyptian star clusters. They can have white, light purple, pink or red flowers. As I discovered last summer they do not like drought, wilting in the summer heat if they did not receive a daily watering in the big pots where they were planted. Pentas prefer good, well-drained soil, regular water, and regular doses of a water-soluble fertilizer such as Peters during the summer months. Don’t forget to deadhead the old flowers. Hummingbirds love the pentas as much as the butterflies do.

Profusion zinnias, although related to the common zinnias, are a hybrid zinnia and are not as susceptible to powdery mildew. They grow only about a foot tall and come in white, orange, or cherry red. Zinnias love the heat;  mine grown in pots are now requiring watering every day. My sister grows them every year but she uses them as bedding plants where she tells me they do not require as much water. When planted in the ground, too much water is their enemy, but in pots there does not ever seem to be enough water. (For those of you who have container plants, by this time of the growing season their roots have expanded as much as their size and they need lots of water.) 

When it comes to the combination of butterflies and flowers there are not enough words. And because a picture is worth a thousand words I have provided several. Enjoy them please;  I hope they inspire you to make your garden a haven for nature’s creatures. Whether butterfly or bird, they can bring so much joy.  For more information about attracting butterflies to your garden please refer to my earlier blog on that subject.

Gardening Tips

By Ms Sherry

Pots of Profusion Zinnias in white and cherry red brave the sizzling temperatures better than I have.

Since I frequently refer to master gardeners, please let me mention who these wonderful folks are. Master Gardeners are volunteers who have been trained to supplement the non-commercial horticulture programs of Cooperative Extension Systems Universities. I am part of a Master Gardener program administered by the Calhoun County Office of the Alabama Cooperative Extension System. (There are Extension System Offices all over the country!) To be certified as a Master Gardner (MG) one must successfully complete the Master Gardener training course and then complete a minimum of 40 hours of volunteer service. After being certified, to remain active Master Gardeners must give 20 hours volunteer service yearly working on a variety of projects around our community. One of our objectives as a Master Gardener is to make horticultural information more available to local individuals and groups. MG is a terrific program – an opportunity to meet others who share a passion for gardening, to learn,  and to share our knowledge with others. We like to say that we beautify our county one project at a time.

Here in East Central Alabama with temperatures ranging in the mid-nineties and the heat index over 100 degrees, it is as hard to think about going outside now as it is in mid January when the temperatures are in the teens. Regardless of the time of the year, we can always use tips on how to garden smarter. I frequently turn to my fellow Master Gardeners for inspiration. 

• I think the tip about planning ahead and putting down about 4 - 6 inches of mulch where I plan to garden next year is a BIG help if the soil is hard or clay-like. Also, a good layer of newspaper under the mulch is wonderful insofar as holding moisture and keeping weed seed from germinating.
• Before I share this next tip, let me provide a disclaimer - I have no idea how long it will work, but temporarily it works fine.

If you should have a small hole in your hose when watering, a toothpick works great for sealing the hole. It appears that the toothpick swells when it gets wet and adapts to fit the hole. I don’t know where I saw this tip originally, but I am sure I didn’t dream it up on my own. However, I had occasion to use it and by golly, it worked just fine. Hope this helps someone, somewhere at sometime or the other.

• Wash or shake most or all of the soil off that came with your plants in the container from the nursery, before you plant them in the ground. I used to just take the plant out of the container rough up the roots if necessary a bit and plop them in the ground with whatever soil mixture the nursery had planted them in the container with. Then a couple of years ago I read an article written by Tony Avent, the owner of Plant Delights. I thought what he said made sense and I had seen myself some of the consequences of just going from the container from the nursery to the hole I prepared for my plant. I had for one reason or another redug up some plants and noticed the root ball area was sometimes dry and well didn’t look like what I thought a healthy space for the roots should look like compared to the immediate area around the root ball, the soil in the garden…..Another words my experience confirmed what Tony Avent had written in his article…... Anyways I started doing it the other way, washing and shaking most if not all the packing soil off the plants before planting and I noticed that they seemed to perform better overall…when you live with the plants for awhile you get a feel for when things are just peachy and when some plants are in first gear and just getting started and some are already in fourth gear and down the road…You know what I mean…I had this one drift of echinaceas a couple of years ago and a couple of the coneflowers I had planted were really far behind and I decided to dig’em up and see what was going on, maybe some root rot problems or whatever…When I dug them up I didn’t see any root rot or anything like that but again the area the original root balls were immediately in didn’t look right to me…I washed the old packing soil off the root balls replanted them in the same holes without any new amendments and after sometime I noticed they looked better and were starting to catch up with their neighbors…after that and after reading Tony’s article I never planted new plants the old usual way again…Do some plants just naturally grow faster and better than others even when they are the same cultivars, planted at the same time, and next to each other?...Of course…But unless I’m mighty mistaken overall plants planted without any of their container soil seem to do better for me that those that are planted with it…Give the roots of your plants a chance to grow in the soil you plant them in to begin with…..“plant roots need to be in contact with the soil in which they will be growing…not the mix that was used at the nursery” .....You’ll see the difference, I sure did…....If you’d like to read the article Tony Avent wrote here is the URL:
http://www.plantdelights.com/Tony/planting.html

• My tips are the same old ones—- MULCH, MULCH & COMPOST, COMPOST.
These two things have made a world of difference in my garden.

• From Urban Agent, Hayes Jackson, who works very closely with our MG program
• ~recycle broken concrete or brick and tile sections. they make great and inexpensive stepping stones, low retaining walls, and a wonderful material for small patio areas…...or even garden art.
~plant lime-loving plants like holly fern, hens and chicks, and agapanthus in broken concrete blocks or incorporate broken pieces into planting hole to maintain a higher pH in acidic soils.
~I often adorn new or small plants (especially perennials and bulbs) with 2 bamboo poles (in an inverted V and tied with twine or copper wire) to mark the plants, and to discourage pets and people from stepping on them. the simple natural design is appealing, easy and inexpensive.
~I use hostas to compliment my summer annual containers. the bold texture compliments many annuals such as impatiens, begonias and flowering sage. once I replace my summer annuals with winter pansies, I have a larger hosta plant ready for fall repotting or planting….when hostas are harder to find in the nurseries. in the deep south, many hosta varieties tend to perform better in above ground pots where rhizomes can receive a better winter chill.

• Well, one I have not been able to use lately is to put buckets under the eaves of the house when it rains heavily and catch the run off. (I barely remember rain. I put my buckets out this past weekend but they are still empty. )
• Another is to put used coffee filters over the drainage holes when filling pots. I compost them (we buy the brown ones that are made from recycled material) anyway so there are usually a few on top of the heap that I can get to readily.
• I have started wearing a short little apron with pockets to hold my clippers and a few other small things. I always need clippers no matter what I started out to do and hate to go back for them.
• I think a good tip is to weed continually instead of waiting until the weeds get out of control. Every time I go to the mailbox I pull a few weeds out of the bed. Seems to work for me. Also, the earlier the better for me in the yard. Not only is it cooler, there are less distractions (my daughter sleeps late!).

• Take an old mail box or a bird feeder, turn it into yard art with paint and trim and use it to store extra yard tool– snips, gloves, hand spade, etc. That way when you need something your tools are close at hand and protected from the elements.
• A couple of products that have helped me with some pesky problems have been Deer Stopper (ordered on the internet) and Permatil (found in Birmingham garden centers). After reading reviews I bought the deer repellant both in a spray and in a granular form. This product basically made of rotten eggs scented with rosemary has kept the local deer population from munching on some of my favorite plants.  Permatil is marketed as a vole bloc; Permatil resembles small pebbles. Use it generously around the plants which the voles often target as their next snack. Form a moat around the roots of a plant with the rocks. The thinking is that the voles do not like to crawl through the rocks to get to the root. Clothing can now be purchased with bug repellant and also with sun screen in the fabric – built in protection from the sun and insects. Years ago I ordered a baseball cap with netting attached to cover your face; it keeps gnats out of your mouth, nose and my ears.
• If you run out of room in the ground for a plant, put it in a container. With proper nutrition,  moisture, and enough space to accommodate growing roots, just about any plant can become a container plant. Container plants make great screen if you have meters or air- conditioner units that you want to hide but can’t disguise with a permanent planting.

• Best gardening tip I have right now is go to the local farmer’s market. You meet fellow master gardeners, meet the local farmers and meet old friends. You laugh, talk, gather lots of vegetables without alot of sweat and back breaking work. It’s fun, but go early.

• When you need gardening information, check the internet. There is a wealth of information out there.