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What Do You do with Extra Plants
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Posted by
mary_max 5 (
My Page) on
Sun, Jul 14, 13 at 15:36
| So what do you do when you have to divide up plants and don't have room for the new plants/bulbs. Do you toss them? That's so hard for me to do. But when the beds are full you can't just plants on. So what I am asking is do gardeners come to a time that they just must throw on compost pile and move on. |
Follow-Up Postings:
RE: What Do You do with Extra Plants
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Yes. I did. I gave them away and gave them away and gave them away. I planted a ditch garden or two. I donated to church groups and horticultural societies. And then, that began to be more trouble than it was worth.
It's like culling carrots. Just because all the seeds germinated, it doesn't mean all those carrots can grow in that space. |
RE: What Do You do with Extra Plants
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- Posted by mori1 5/6 KS (My Page) on
Sun, Jul 14, 13 at 16:12
| I sale, trade or give them away. A few years ago I went to a plant trade events and there were so many plants left over, so I took them. I put a post on craigslist. A woman who lived 45 minutes away came and got them. She has several acres but things were tight so this was a great help to her. |
RE: What Do You do with Extra Plants
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| After I had filled all thinkable available space, I began to toss them. When my brother-in-law and his wife lived outside the town, I could just throw my extras over to them(unlimited space). Now they moved to the town, and their son does not want to garden at all. It looks like fewer and fewer people are interested in gardening (in the sense of growing plants). The young generation will soon have to check in dictionaries what the word "garden" means. |
RE: What Do You do with Extra Plants
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| I give them away and have so far not found anyone unwilling to take them off my hands--even offered some winter sown perennials to the owner of a small local market and both he and his wife were thrilled to get free plants. A woman who used to groom my cat even showed up a week or so ago. The cat's long since deceased but I sent her home with several pots of winter sown plants. Folks whose gardens are already chock-a-block with things aren't likely to be in the market but new homeowners and plenty of folks new to gardening or home ownership will always be happy to get their hands on healthy plants for free. Haven't had a need to divide anything other than astilbes in recent memory but I gave the divisions to a neighbor who was thrilled to get them. Also divided a hosta that grew too large but I stuck my daughter with most of the divisions and planted the rest around the base of a giant oak tree. After two years, the tree looks like it's wearing a green petticoat. |
RE: What Do You do with Extra Plants
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| I have new neighbours on either side and wouldn't you know, both families are anti-social - can't give them the extra plants. I used to have two sets of perfect neighbours; they got my extra garden bounty too. I am pretty ruthless about tossing out plant material these days. You have to be careful about people giving plants away, usually they are invasives. |
RE: What Do You do with Extra Plants
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| Some of these stories just make me sad - I recently went through a divorce and she got the house and gardens. But, before then, I loved giving away/getting plants with friends and neighbors. In December, I moved in to my own house on 9 1/2 acres that has a beautiful place for a shade garden as well as a place for full sun (which I've never had) - As excited as I am to begin my gardens again, starting over from scratch has been difficult on a tight budget. But, I think you are right, wiselaw, this younger generation doesn't know what they are missing. |
Extra Plants
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| markparsons435 - where are you in Z6b? I've lots of perennials that need dividing and would be happy to share plant divisions (so long as you're committed to doing the labor) if you're within driving distance. Roughly half of my perennials were winter sown/grown from seed and are incredibly robust. |
RE: What Do You do with Extra Plants
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| I've sold some (to pay for new plants I wanted) and traded others. I've also used them to start new gardens. Many of my "foundation" plants like hosta and daylilies came from people giving away splits. I could NEVER have afforded to create my gardens (even in their not so done stages) without the freebies. I've gotten as few as one or two plants and as many as a truckbed full (the two times this happened, it was at least an hour drive one way from my house and we had to dig them-but it was worth it to get plants to fill the barren beds). |
RE: What Do You do with Extra Plants
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| Trade or give away! If no takers, compost is the next best option, IMHO. |
RE: What Do You do with Extra Plants
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| It depends. If I come across an unwanted seedling when I'm weeding, I normally toss it. If I'm dividing plants or digging out a plant for one reason or another, I'll either post it on freecycle or bring it to my office. Lots of people where I work are happy to take my extras off my hands. Wieslaw, you'll be happy to know that my 20 year old son who's currently going to college in Baltimore called me this spring. "Mom," he said, "I want to add some plants to the back of my house." He's currently renting a place with a cement patio. So he came home and I showed him how to plant in pots and take care of the plants and then we headed to a local nursery. He's a graphic designer student so his plant combos were excellent right from the start and so far, he tells me everything is growing fine. So, at least one young person is a gardener! |
RE: What Do You do with Extra Plants
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| There's two plant swaps each year in my area. Some people bring plants and don't want any to take home. Some are new gardeners who need plants. We have a potluck lunch,too. I've tried craigslist but sometimes the takers don't bring digging tools when I've specifically said the plants need to be dug. |
RE: What Do You do with Extra Plants
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| get angry.. throw them in the lawn.. and mow them over at speed .... if.. per chance.. a visitor comes by.. i will fill a trunk.... but the timing on that usually doenst work out.. and a year later.. i end up throwing twice as many in the lawn ... ken |
RE: What Do You do with Extra Plants
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| This is the Garden-Lovers biggest problem. It takes several years to enrich the soil, fill out areas, cultivate your gardens and then, suddenly, a corner has been turned and everything has exploded! After 10 years in this house, this has happened to us. We are running out of planting room and running out of pots to transplant things into and not wanting to purchase more soil to put them in anyhow. Plus, many of our neighbors are not such great gardeners. Sadly, I've begun to go down that dark road of death that Ken mentioned. But instead of throwing them in the lawn, we throw them over the edge of the river onto a bank we want to berm up. |
RE: What Do You do with Extra Plants
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| yeah..; but you probably fertilize your lawn.. i dont.. so anything i can immediately compost back into it.. is a bonus... but i learned the hard way ... you better do it before they go to seed.. lol.. or you will have a very colorful lawn ... lol ken |
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