13,520 Garden Web Discussions | Perennials
TexasRanger, that is just lovely! I have been planning to actively veer away from yellow flowers in my garden, but I am really digging the cool and delicate blue/yellow combo there. I would try it if it worked in my zone, but it doesn't appear that it would.
Arlene, it's a biennial that blooms itself out in a season. All it requires is good drainage, mine are in sandy soil on a slope but some come up in back in regular soil. Too much water kills them but if you have a dry spot, you can grow it. I originally purchased seed from Plants of the Southwest - its a common plant and seed is available elsewhere. Mine come up in winter when its mild and take off in spring but many more plants also come up in spring and they grow quickly and bloom, they get bigger as the season progresses and love hot & dry. Its one of my favorite plants for filling in spaces. The color is stunning.
Baileya multiradiata is the name.
i would prefer a picture.. and an actual ID of the pest .. before we rely on the diagnosis ...
killing scale with oil.. is extremely hit and miss ... and timing is imperative ...
ignore the ants.. if in fact the problem is scale.. than the ants are eating the honeydew they produce... get id of the scale.. [or aphids].. and the ants go mind their own business ...
if you can not post a pic.. then cut off a small branch.. and take it to a local high end nursery ... as compared to bigboxstore ...
ken
A photo might help, but there are a large number of light blue/purple clematis and big box stores aren't known for accurate tags. In general, the bloom time is what tells you how to prune it. When did it bloom? If it bloomed with Empress, which is a type 2 (or B) prune, then it should be pruned the same way. Type 2 plants bloom on old growth and some on new growth as well, so spring pruning should be dead wood only. Some plants bloom better a second time (usually about September) if pruned lightly right after the first bloom to encourage new growth and to remove the old flowers. I don't grow Empress, and I am too far north to get second bloom on my type 2 clematis, so I don't know if you will get a second bloom if you prune lightly. Check to see if there buds forming on either plant over the next month. Even if they don't bloom a second time this year, they may in the future as they mature and get settled in.
You said "on the front porch." Did you plant them in the ground or are they still in their pots? It is much easier to grow clematis well in the ground for beginners IMO. They are heavy feeders (same type of fertilizer as for roses in spring) and have large root balls. They like even moisture, so a mulch is helpful as well.
There is also a clematis forum here on GW, though as far as I am concerned posting here is fine also.
I read that some Clematis can be cut back to a few inches during the dormant seasons and other like the taller variety you just leave alone.
==>>> i dont know what you are reading.. but you need better sources...
there are 3 specific types of Cs.. and they have different rules as to when and how to cut on them ...
there are no general rules ....
the default is to leave them until spring.. and cut back.. just as you are seeing new growth ... a failsafe situation ...
ken
Wow look at all those berries! I love your description of the bird hubub, isn't that just the best? I had a chickadee doing a little dance all around the serviceberry, chattering all the while, and finally he dangled upside down, nabbed a berry, then flew away. I think he was saying thank you. Waxwings are a favorite too. No matter what I'm in the middle of, I stop and admire them. All part of the joys of creating a little wildlife haven in our gardens!
Looks great! I'm so happy to see when shrubs aren't all "meatballed up" by pruning. I cut just a few branches off my heptacodium last week and the difference was amazing, and even the weed sumacs around back look like a landscape once I trimmed up the bottom.
Summertime pruning is a good thing, it's just easy to forget since most people aren't itching to get going like they do in spring.
A visit from some waxwings would be awesome. They're such a fun bird, but all I have are starlings and robins gobbling up berries.
You could just cut the rosa glauca to the ground this winter, the leaves will be great when it sprouts back up!
I'm no botanist but in my experience annual plants generally sprout, grow, bloom then die once frost nips them when the weather turns cold. Perennials on the other hand send up new growth in spring, bloom during their annual growth cycle, then go dormant once frost nips them when the weather turns cold. They return from year to year and repeat the process.
Pennisetum is an ornamental grass commonly referred to as fountain grass. There are several cultivars. 'Hameln' is a perennial cultivar. ' Red Bunny Tails' is an annual cultivar that may perform as a perennial in Z7 - see the link below for more information. It would likely be an annual in my Z6 garden.
Here is a link that might be useful: Pennisetum messiacum
My brother planted peonies here 40+ years ago & I've added quite a few myself over the years. I've never done anything to them since moving here in 2005. The foliage gets discolored late in the growing season sometimes but I've never treated it and the plants just keep coming back every year with zero help from me. Since they also bloom heavily, I figure they're healthy and don't need my help.
I put peony rings around my baptisia to prevent flopping. They're perennials that are just really worth having in my garden beds--I have four. Like peonies, they need zero attention from me other than the peony rings for support and I leave those year-round. I do nothing either to or for my baptisias. They have incredible taproots so never need watering. The foliage remains lovely right through the growing season and once the weather cools they naturally go dormant. Basically all I do is enjoy them.
According to Perennials for Every Purpose by Larry Hodgson, baptisias grow 3-4 ft. tall and 3-4 ft. wide. I've had mine for a number of years and that's been my experience with each of the four I have planted. I don't know where you're located but don't guess yours will exceed those measurements.
Peonies can suffer from something called botrytis blight. I Googled it and found a picture on the Missouri Botanical Garden website (see link). Judging by the photo, your plants don't have it.
Sorry: I don't grow kiwi vine so can't help with that.
An established perennial garden generally shouldn't require a great deal of maintenance unless it includes roses. Mine doesn't for that very reason--I purposely have no roses in my garden.
Here is a link that might be useful: Botrytis blight
The peonies undoubtedly have botrytis, a fungal disease common to peonies, though they don't get it every year. Just leave them alone until frost kills them. Then cut them back, but never put peony foliage in the compost; put it in plastic bags and send it out with the trash. Clean your pruners with a weak bleach solution and just go on with the garden clean up.
Glad it's acceptable for you Dee. I guess I've felt that way too. One of mine is looking really good this year and seems a little bit bigger, but I moved the second one in the spring because it was slower growing than the other one and I thought it might be location. So now they're both about 6 ft away from each other and will get the same conditions. The one I moved has settled in but hasn't grown much at all, so maybe next year it might start catching up? The one that is doing well, is almost to the size that I'd be happy with. It's adding what I wanted to the bed and couldn't be easier. I don't have a problem with the color either.
On the other hand, I've pretty much decided I may rip out my Weigela Wine and Roses. I've been paying attention this year and although it looked pretty good in the spring and flowered well, since then the foliage has faded and looks washed out. I have a gold leaved Kolkwitzia in the border and I wanted the dark contrast in the bed with it. I also have a dark leaved Hibiscus Kopper King on the other side of it and I tried something different with that this year. It has been a little gangly for me in past seasons, so this year I took someone's advice to cut it back when it was about a foot tall and it has become bushier and not gangly at all. Tons of buds on it, clean foliage for a change and I noticed it has a little gold tone to part of the leaves that is working really well with the gold Kolkwitzia, so I am thinking I'm going to put another KKing in place of the Wine and Roses I'm taking out.
.....one month later, now it's a wait and see if it's winter hardy here. I have lost a few Echinaceas when we've had a really wet winter. I never been a fan of orange flowers but so far I'm loving this one. Picture taken in the rain.
Annette
It might be the warmer clime in VA but my Walkers Low flopped open in the middle (after blooming profusely and buzzing with tons of bees). It was lookin' kinda ratty so I cut it back (before July 4th). The result was like lepages - looks way better neat n fluffy even if rebloom is on the light side!
Keep in mind that mine is 1st yr plant, in inadvertently over-fertilized soil, and growing thru a 12" grid set about 6" high.
After posting I decided to let it bloom. It is still setting flower on the tips of the branches, still a good blue color - but the bees don't pay as much attention. It flopped, blocking some other plants - it's in a 4' wide border - but never got ratty looking. I want some blue in that area of the border, so I'm happy w/the decision.
But - it sprouted some good secondary growth, from the center, that looks like the description of trimmed-back growth, greener and fluffy, with light color just starting now. Note - we've had a cool wet Spring and Summer (for Denver) this year, may have affected it.
Both sprawl and upright are flowering, sorta the best of both worlds. Next yr plan on larger grid, set higher to try to hold the flop, and will only trim for appearance or to unblock other plants; no idea what growth will be like but hoping for a "shock of wheat" look.
May not be a good fit in the border - already planning to move 2 Achillea out to front yard because they take up so much room - but I'll give it another year. Thx for sharing all the info.
Bob
Rouge, I'm glad you brought it up again, it's been about a month since I bought mine and I can't say enough nice things about this new plant. Mine is in full bloom now, the flowers last and last and last, almost like they're suspended in time. While other things have suffered a bit from this long hot spell we've had not this plant. I still have to see how it deals with winter, I've lost a few Echinaceas due to too wet a winter but I have high hopes for this Echibeckia. I have the orange flowering one but will keep my eyes open for the other ones. It's raining right now but will try and get a picture of mine later. It's heeled in, a temporary spot for the time being.
I'm still working on that small overgrown bed, so far two wheelbarrows full of roots dug. I'm afraid this bed isn't going to be ready for awhile, want to make sure i've got all the L. of the V. roots out before I do any planting.
Annette
To be honest, I am sceptical too, First off, it looks like a shoo-in for rudbeckia hirta....so I guess the perennial promise is the USP here ....but mostly, I have triailed a few intergeneric hybrids and all of them, in varying extents, seems to have some terrible weakness. For a self-confessed seed saver, the inevitable sterility is hardly ever an asset, especially in late flowerers such as the rudbeckias or anything which has a flowering cycle dependent on daylight length (shortening days after the solstice). Secondly, many hybrids seem to inherit a worrying disposition to come down with diseases. Hybrid vigour: we all recognise this phenomenon but when cutting across genera, I have not truly noticed any plus in this area.
Finally, I spent 4 years at hort.college walking past a tragic laburnocytisus Adamsii hybrid - for 4 weeks every May, I used to actually cut across fields at the rear of the college to avoid the grisly sight of this horror. They had a hawthorn and something one (graft chimaera) and several stone fruit hybrids as well (which I don't grow) but nothing as upsetting as the Adamsii.
Still, I am failing to get terribly excited about many of these highly bred nursery confections - possibly being a little bit poor but mostly because I have nearly always gone down the seed and cutting route and have pretty much missed out on the massive breeding programmes of the last 30 years or so (and as I often make some spare money by selling plants, the Breeder's rights and patents are essentially an obstacle. So, I shall not be spending money on this until it has had a thorough testing and even then, it would need to have sterling properties before parting with (gasp) cash money..
I am surprised that they cannot take the Texan sun Cheryl.
Mine sit out in the full Mediterranean sun all the time.
I have found this one to be very forgiving of poor treatment. I wouldn't expect them to take a harsh winter, but they grow well in England as they do here.
It has been in the same pot for 9 years. It travelled across Europe with me, when I moved from England 7 years ago.
I split it a few years ago and put each pot of it at each end of the pond.
My neighbour who watered my pots for me, when I had to visit England for 2 weeks, overlooked them, so when I returned they looked dead. They came back from the dead though and have looked good ever since.
Daisy
My Latitude is 5 degrees further south than Creete and even though our continental mass has us colder in the winter, the sun is a bugger in the summer.I found the Mediterranean sun bright but gentle. We are on par with Cairo. You average about 10-20 F 0 degrees less then us in summer (98- 103F this week). It makes a difference to the plants. Jadite in New Mexico has your latitude and similar highs but her humidity is way down and the evaporation rate is murderous in the sun.
My plant of Dittany maybe can be pushed out further into the sun , now that it is bigger. I take it carefully.
Fasciation, result of plant tissue growth along a line rather than to a point.
Occurs rarely, but more in some plant families. The daisy family, Asteraceae/Compositae, includes Echinacea, is one of them.
There are various potential causes, many environmental (or partly so).
Below: culver's root 'Fasciation' (July 19,14).
In the case of a few plants like this cultivar, fasciation occurs quite commonly; which does suggest a genetic tendency.
Ziyakr, just noted your information about the rose gloves.
Thanks.
Woody included pictures of some too quite recently.
Very interesting to see/read before and after garden pictures/info.
As said, I have had cleome, which was used as an annual filler, reseeding in mixed perennial beds. A problem (in that particular case) was the reseeded plants were too scattered.
On the other hand, I'd say cleome is a very attractive annual. The whole plant is elegant and I do think that it can compliment perennials.
I love cleome too. I agree they are vigorous reseeders though. They even poke through areas which I have heavily mulched--2-3 inches. Early in the season the seedling get attacked by flea beetles quite badly though.
I have started clipping off the lower seed pods every couple of weeks. I ask one of my kids to help and they hold a container while I snip them off.
You can let some seed pods ripen and collect the seed for next year.