13,520 Garden Web Discussions | Perennials

Soil type is a consideration. The soil here is pretty loose so a fork works great. Gooey clay might call for a different tool.

hoovb, You are absolutely right. I have gooey clay, enough to set up a pottery. The tool above is the most handy for me.

aHa! compost! i have compost. must go feed my babies this weekend.... =)

Rouge, I collected seeds from my son's T.delavayii album....would you like some?

Yes, I have a mate who gardens on Salt Spring Island who has been at pains to convince me that Canada is, in fact, quite temperate and English-like.....not that I believe this for one nano-second. When snow-mobiles are common transport modes in the fens, I may take her assertions a bit more seriously.
Lin, I love hanging out with other planty types. As a shy and curmudgeonly type, I generally avoid my fellow humans....unless they are gardeners in which case I can find something to say instead of incoherent mumbling, hiding, or rushing off at the first sound of visitors (although I am pretty certain these planty convos are not exactly scintillating). I came within a whisker of going to the Heritage Rose conference at Mottisfont this year....but the horsebox was burgled a couple of weeks before the booking deadlines and I just could not justify the ticket and travel costs, knowing all our garden tools (and our woodburning stove ffs) had been robbed....so I missed out to my utmost chagrin (shoulda just gone).
I went through a phase of knowing nothing, then knowing lots and finally, knowing enough to know that I really did know nothing....and yep, I am greedy and avid for more knowledge, ideas, information, suggestions and best of all, furious contentious debate......
Tex, I can especially recommend any of C.Lloyds books - he writes in a particularly dry, even faintly arch, but distinctively english manner (of a certain age and class) which I suspect will amuse you no end.
There is an unfortunate backlash regarding famous gardeners and especially famous gardens which I despair about - the tendency to remain stuck in a time-warp where a certain style evolves and is then preserved in aspic....forever. True, there is always a temptation to remain within your comfort zone and the public are often voraciously against any sort of change. If you have made a name for yourself as this or that (New Perennials are still riding high in garden trends), it can be really difficult to throw it in and try something different for a while....which is why us poor and undistinguished types have much more fun....but then again, being a dilettante rather than becoming truly expert has its limitations as well.
Forum mates, where do you place yourself in this scheme - are you trying to explore everything about a particular style....or are you too much of a flipperty-gibbet to do much more than dabble? Do you have a 'speciality'....or a style you are maintaining. Are you a purist or all over the place. At bottom, do you have a garden philosophy which informs your art or do you change with every passing craze? (it must be fairly obvious which camp I fall into).
And, do you have garden gurus or educators who's advice and theories you adhere to?
Speaking personally, I have not yet come across the garden writer or thinker who I can follow on my woodland adventure...and feel I am ploughing a lonely meandering furrow with minimal guidance....(no money, no staff, no time, no water and no idea).

I have just got back from a weekend of leaf-raking and bulb-planting. I used to save my leaves for making leaf-mould....and I can't quite bring myself to let this booty go unused....but a forest worth of poplar leaves is a crazy big mountain (grandaughter did a lot of diving and romping).....

Oooooh Camp! Take those last questions and start a new thread, please!

Yes, you are right, Rouge - winter aconites can be really tricky to establish in autumn, especially if you have heavy soil or the corms have dried out (same with erythroniums and galanthus too). If you manage to get freshly dug corms (tubers?) and have free draining soil, they will establish....but often, a better bet is to lift them while they are in growth ('in the green') and plant in spring. This is a common method in england and many nurseries will send out trays of plants 'in the green'

They are easy in my chalky (alkaline) sandy woods, especially if they get a bit of easterly morning sun...although they will grow in the most inimical conditions amongst tree roots, they hate compacted soil. You could throw a handful of grit in the planting holes......

I did way more than meet my goals. My only goal for this year was to buy a nice new rose and some honeysuckle, remove the scraggly thorn bush, and then put the new rose where the bush used to be.

I did that (which was much much harder than I expected!), but I also put down all new landscaping timbers around my existing beds, extended the living room window bed about 4' into the yard (new timbers there too), and bought a bunch of different plants (some perennials). I also moved the decorative grass to behind the fence (so now it's not hanging over the sidewalk so we have to walk through it), and moved a very sickly knockout rose from under the living room window to where the grass used to be, which is a much sunnier spot for it. That rose is now looking fantastic! I don't know why the previous tenant decided to put it in its previous shady spot, but oh well, because it's much happier now.

I've also finally won the war against the mint and wild violets.

I'd have better luck finding a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow that finding stauntonia on this continent. LOL

Arbo -- the seven years almost turned me off, but...looking at the photos, if/when it does bloom, it's stunning. I want that!

Of course in that many years, I very well could've moved to Hawaii...but I'll be happy knowing it's blooming for the next folks.

And who knows? Maybe the plants I got are six year olds in tiny little pots, haha.

Grace

Ah, that is unfortunate. I did look for stauntonia hexaphylla and saw that ForestFarms.com did carry it (currently out of stock) but you might try it's near relative akebia quinata...but try to find the lovely pale flowered one. It should remain evergreen for you and may even fruit (edible).
Or seeds are more easily available (Chilterns amongst others will ship to the US) and I think Plantworld also carries it.

Nope - it isn't a perennial here. I sometimes manage to overwinter a plant but even in my greenhouse, they are iffy. On the other hand, one tiny plant, bought in spring, would provide cuttings for a dozen people to share...and have sizeable plants by late summer when they finally show some flowers (mine are just emerging).

Wish it was perennial here. I had a plant that someone from down south sent me and I really enjoyed it that year. I'd love to try it again but I forget to try to find some in the spring.

Linda

I only have the large Joe Pye, but control it by clipping it in half each year. Perhaps some trimming would help control the height in Little Joe also?

This is my third year with 'Baby Joe' and it has never failed to impress. The young new growth has such nice color and texture that everyone remarks of its beauty and the plant just continues on looking great all season. Oh, and yes, its height is about 3 ft in my deeply dug and amended garden soil. Next spring, 'Baby Joe' will be divided and spread around to numerous locations throughout my yard, did I mention that I LOVE this plant! Seeing aachenelf's beautiful photo of 'Little Joe' makes me realize I must also get this one!

'Baby Joe' autumn foliage shot

Great. I think this may be its sister flower, Bidens aristosa. The leaves have less tooth. I can't tell the difference of the flowerheads....

Yep, I would agree with one of the bidens (not the rampageous heterophylla though, thankfully)

....."end up dong a double-lutz as I walk to my car." Emerogork2, that made me laugh!

I'm going to enjoy autumn as long as possible. I'm still picking lots of tomatoes, the leaves are just started to change colors, and we still have crickets chirping at night. Fall is wonderful.

About winter: It's nice to have four seasons. Winter is a no guilt time of year. Not a weed in sight. Yeah, that's the ticket, winter is a great time of year...... NO! No, it's not! I can't talk myself into this any longer. I'm over it.

The only good thing about winter is that it's followed by SPRING!

I enjoy winter because by late Fall, I am weary of gardening and ready to put it to bed. Winter can be brutal, but I don't have to be out in it and by Spring, I rejoice in the little bleeding hearts poking through and I am anxious to get digging in the soil and planning new plants for the gardens. There is no stopping a gardener, it's in the soul, much like farmers. We rejoice when new plants have survived and anticipate new plants we will discover at the nurseries.

Eupatorium Chocolate is the 'seedingest' perennial i have. It grows any and every where. shade, dry, - no problem. Right up there w/ it is Persicaria Lance Corporal. Same attributes but shorter- corydalis lutea. Man, i could give you truckloads of all 3.

If you do ever come across Rhodotypos in the wild- it is the only shrub (except for wild honeysuckle bush and red wing euonymus) that will grow in my dry shade (where i have tried and lost more things than i care to remember.)
Rhodo....jet beard- is related to kerria i think. white kerria-like flowers; sooo pretty in spring; lots of black berries in fall. Ours came from some nearby woods.
mindy

I have Chocolate that gets only morning sun and it's about a foot and a half tall, has barely increased in size and still is only in bud. In sun, it gets at least three feet tall and clumps get noticably bigger each year. It has never seeded in the many years it's been in the ground, perhaps that's only because it does bloom so late then gets cut down before it has a chance. Although many years it never got cut down till Spring. The foliage on this plant stays reliably pristine throughout the season (mentioned before). I use it in bouquets as a filler with a little Miscanthus thrown in and it lasts well! That is, when I cut flowers...a rarity!

What about a daylily? They're tough as nails and some have especially tall bloom stems. I found one earlier this Summer in one of my borders that was obscured behind an evergreen in the shade and it was blooming its heart out--a deep purplish red with a yellow throat! I divided and moved it front and center in my newly deepened beds.

Hoping you find a solution!

This post was edited by catkin on Sat, Sep 27, 14 at 15:27

I am a bit obsessed with all things ALLIUM ;).

For something a bit different consider those alliums with *yellow* flowers such as OBLIQUUM and MOLY.

Don't neglect fall blooming allium Ozawa..

I planted this last year at this time after getting this suggestion on GW. But I put them on the front edge of a garden which is for all intents and purposes is wild. This border would get "whipper snipped" and most of the time "Ozawa" would get mown down. I dont see any sign of them...my fault.

Louisville, KY. I've had problems with mites this year in general, starting with the roses in May. I think they live in the grass, and the lawn crew blows clippings all over our gardens, which is why I already had the Forbid 4F. I bought the butterfly bush this late because I was busy with school and work, but got a few week's break in late July/early August, which is when I expanded my garden and bought new plants to fill it.

I amended the planting hole because it's solid red clay below 2 inches down. And it was doing okay until the mites. I have some salvia that was also attacked, which I treated the same way as the butterfly bush, but it only improved.

Two points:

Never fertilize a stressed plant.

Butterfly bushes rarely succeed with fall planting in zones 6 and lower.