13,520 Garden Web Discussions | Perennials

I think the transition of one interests is always he hardest right before one finds the groove.. Letting go of one activity for another is often not as smooth as one would like or think it should be. I think it is the letting go of the love and grieving the ski's being put away. I like the gathering of ski bums in the garden. almost like a joyful wake. I think the acknowledging rituals that we make in our daily lives really help and are a joy in themselves. Pretty soon you will be tubing those freezing river.

Wow, wantonamara, those are great insights, and spot on. Of course today we have a winter storm warning, Beartooth pass is closed, snow is falling up high. But I'll stay the course! Must finish the paths this week!

I agree so much about the work in progress theme. This has always been fine as I've enjoyed the process. But I think a shift toward an end goal of less maintenance will help guide future progress. I was so close to impulse buying a $100 dwarf 'beehive' spruce yesterday in light of the need to have more shrubs. That's a bit steep for an impulse buy but it's the right idea.

Thanks again for the helpful words and strategies!

Karin

Well, I'll be darned, can't find one . Likely tossed it out, after a cold glass of ice water had got it wet & dried out, wrinkled, as I do tend to save packets, I usually save the various kinds of packets, as I like the different graphics, & save them, over the years & may have thought I had a duplicate & simply tossed all of them out, in error.
But maybe you can see an image of the packet, (a stock photo) used by Burpee, of packet for sale, if I'm not mistaken...Now that, ought to be rather easy to do, on the internet..as opposed to sifting all over again, through boxes, of saved seed pkts. from over nearly 20 years. lol

Hmm, there is some diffierence, at least from Burpee's site. The centers on yours are bigger, and more yellow (although the color could be a photo thing.). See link below for Burpee's photo of them.

Dee
P.S. I like yours better!!

Here is a link that might be useful: crazy daisy on Burpee site

S. 'silver carpet' blooms rarely and so you don't have all those ugly flowers. Also Helen von stein has big leaves and rarely blooms (never for me). Other than stachys, you could use Japanese painted fern, one of the silver leaves Brunneras, Pulmonaria, Russian sage, Helichrysum petiolare (all though an annual) forgot to mention blue fescue...

This post was edited by shadeyplace on Sat, Jun 7, 14 at 8:16

I don' t know how much shade, Salvia argentea can tolerate..
I much prefer the 'Silver Lace' dusty miller, for exactly just what the name implies about its' foliage, but there are fairly newer other cultivars like 'Cirrhus' (sp?) with broader leaves.
Then there are Verbascum, like the bombycifera, that is also a biennial, with silver fuzzy rosette of leaves. Unless, possibly the flower stalk is removed before too long? Not quite sure yet, as it is my first year with it...
For major display, artichoke are rather splendid, for extreme architectural appearance & silver foliage. But, with another winter, like the past one, it would be annual anyways!

Thanks dBarron. I'll try to move it when it's dormant or just take some root cuttings and plant it in the sunniest area in my garden.

Campanula, I've tried seeds (especially if I have a lot of them or if I'm impatient!) as late as mid June. But it's a hit and miss. Last year I was sort of lucky, got a few flowers, as October was weirdly warm, but it's a risk.

Anyway good luck with your poppies :-)

I've made repeated attempts with the 'Super Poppy' series & managed to get one of them to bloom., out of many in the series, maybe it was 'Manhattan'? & no, it didn't last long at all, flower or plant!
Although, one year I had sown seeds & one managed to stay in flower (the single bloom) lasting, for well over ten days... yeah, believe it or not!
I suspect, it must have had 'Super Poppy' genetics, in its background lineage..
They are of hybrid origins & that process was likely started, with original work by Burbank, is my best guess. But, later on the ' Super' series was developed by De Welt(?) in California & the entire lot, purchased by a British lady, Sandy Worth, holding the National Collection, over there in England..
I tried 'Plum Pudding' from seeds, in winter (impatience) & it was so cloudy, only one held onto to life & after just one day of exposure outside, that was the end of it.
Yet, with a couple "Plum.Pudding" bare roots, one flowered & it was orange. Very disappointing, to say the least. I gather, someone was trying to make a profit, as they are typically propagated by roots, when a named variety & hadn't heard much about reverting, except by seeds...

Thanks, Michael and campanula. That's what I figured since it's not like my garden doesn't have plenty of ants of its own. It was just really odd to see that they had colonized there.

Only thing may be that the could be aphid or scale farmers. And thus vector those insects...but the ants of themselves aren't harmful to the plant.

Cats and birds have been around for a long time but cats have not been fed and cultured the way we do now. Larger predators have been removed until this rebirth of coyotes. Balance is a hard thing to maintain. Human intervention of the food chain is all over the place and sometimes further intervention is called for and sometimes less is called for.

I have been asked by "my" biologist who has designed my wildlife plan to BE the predator that brings the land back in balance. I don't like it, but it has been suggested to kill Racoons,, stray feral cats, deer, and FIRE ANTS. They are all out of balance. I know my neighbors' cats that live close to me., but there are 2 places that have 30+ cats. One old man who used to buy 40lbs of cat food a week died a year or so back and , oh lordy, were we trapping some sorry mean cats that inundated us and taking them down to the shelter. I have another guy who lives about 1/4 mile from me who has at least 30 cats hanging at his house. They make it over here and we try to scare them off. My cats are past their hay day of hunting. They don't bring down anything. Even the lizards pay the little mind. The cats do like the field mice and the rabbits. I see a family of really fleet whiptails that have moved in. The coon population has dwindled because of our activity and the foxes have replaced them. They are much more in balance. The coyotes are working on those cats. I hear them at night. My cats stay inside at night. I tried being a cowbird predator but that didn't work out too well. The rather large trap is at my neighbors house raising chickens. My neighbors got rid of their cows and we don't see the cow birds now. The deer are a hard nut to crack. Our land is weirdly shaped and the place they love to hang is by the road and hunting them is dangerous for passing traffic. We do have a mountain lion on occasion. Then , all the deer get scarce in a hurry and I start feeling like I am on the menu when I go run the trash out in the night time with my long mag light grasped tightly. I have heard it roar. We have boars. The lions killed 2 400lb boars a couple of years ago and my neighbor shot 4 of them last summer. They can root up ground in a hurry.I wish I could channel that energy in the spring, I wouldn't need a tractor to plow over a field.

We do have wildlife in disarray. The boars do damage, the deer are making once common trees endangered. I am doing my best caging tree seedlings and watering them in the summer when we have no rain. Lately there have been no seedlings making it through the summers because of the drought. I have been revegetating and diversifying flora and fighting invasives. It is a big pill.

Yes, deers used to be much less common, due to less habitat, more food pressure (like bison, elk, etc), and have predation from mtn lions and wolves.

And that causes them to be more like what we call them, hooved rats. I admit they're cute...and I love them, but I know exactly how much damage they do when overpopulated.

I agree with above poster about serious population reduction. I also have a neighbor with 30+ cats, the coyotes do help in keeping population down, but they're struggling with the birthrate and people wanting to kill coyotes.

In the past 30 years of my life, I have seen the local extermination of chipmunks and possibly flying squirrels (though I wouldn't bet on the latter), frogs and toads (for the most part, leopard frogs still semi-plentiful), and many snakes, due to human efforts and their pets run amuck.

As a consequence, I've seen bird populations dive, rats and mice have lemming years, and insect damage to local crops go WAY up.

You could say 30 years is too short a cycle to pay attention to, but it's the only cycle I can see in my life time.

White only if you are willing to do the maintenance. I remember when the farm fence were all white. Then rather suddenly, they all switched. Around here, you can occasionally run into a fancy horse farm with white fences, but you know those places have money.

Interesting how areas of the country do things differently !
Locally , the finer horse farms and cattle farms use black rails . White I now see in lots of neighborhoods that have no farm or rural feel whatsoever . Also if it is white it's almost always vinyl , which would be lovely but a huge expense . I don't see too many un stained or un painted rails , unless they are very old and falling apart. Our installer is using some kind of treated for rot and termite wood .
. I think I see more black than white . Mad gallica , I think it's the opposite here in tn ! Or at least my part .
I know the white will match the trim on house . I like white as long as it looks fresh and clean. White looks nice , sun or shine .
I feel like the black will disappear behind plants and not be as jarring to the eye when it first goes up.
I feel like both are great and no wrong choice ! Isn't that awful ?

We've had a bad winter in PA. Our recently planted mimosa have died on top. All plants are putting out shoots at the bottom. Will these three trees make a full comeback or should I replace them. Thanks ValKey

You could have come and dug up our mature mimosa instead. We now only have the stump left. That thing grew a foot a day or so, seriously. I have never heard of a nursery potting something up in dirt. Very wierd. Good luck with your little tree.

I've had mine growing in a shady rock garden for over 10 years at least. I also had a variegated one for over 5 years, but it finally bit the dust. The variegated one was really nice, but not nearly so vigorous as the standard variety. Like most plants, it will bloom better with more sun. Great, low-care perennial.

Okay, I'm envious, lol. Nice looking plant Doug...
CMK

Ditto what wantonamara said. Next, don't panic. Lavender needs full sun but requires dry to average soil (see link). Planted in healthy soil on a steep slope they should have sufficiently adequate drainage to thrive with minimal help.

Here is a link that might be useful: Missouri Botanical Garden - 'Hidcote' Lavender

and never expect all of many to survive ... expect some ratio of failure ...

could you favor us with a pic of the whole .. i have never seen nor heard of the netting ... sounds interesting ..

BTW .... dig up one of them.. AND FIND OUT HOW WET OR DRY THE SOIL IS .... and adjust watering accordingly ...

if you are just guessing with your watering.. obviously.. you are frustrated because you lack info ... but coming to us for info ... gets you no where.. but more guesses... so all you are left with.. is digging some holes and finding out .. and mind you .. dealing with a hill ...and how water moves across and thru it.. can be divergent in differing spots ... and that may be why.. those struggling.. are not all in one place.. leading you to dig more holes ...

you might want to dig out all those struggling.. and set up a nursery bed with some break in the blistering sun ...... and see if you cant rescue them.. by fall ... then.. you have a whole bunch of holes all set for observation ...

i SUSPECT ... you have been incredible successful ... perhaps even better than many of us might do ... but are a perfectionist at heart.. and its driving you a bit crazy ... that yoru success is not 100% ... heck.. most gardeners ... dealing with the vagaries of mother nature.. would probably be thrilled.. with a 90% success rate and would just replant the holes in fall [NOT NOW] ... and if that is the case.. the problem is in your head... LOL ...

BTW.. in fall ... you can harvest some of the plants on any edge.. and put them into the bare spots... to make the 'look' equal ... and then add replacements at the edge..

or even better.. DIVERSIFY your planting ...

good luck

pic of the whole.. please

ken

My mother is a huge proponent of natural medicine. She uses Turmeric in gel-capsules for her arthritis and swears by it...
CMK

Turmeric is a powerful anti inflammatory, and inflamation is the base cause of many illnesses--from heart disease to arthritis to colon cancer.

I checked and both winky red/white and canadensis have leafminer damage but the winky one is drying out and the other one seems fine. Makes me wish I had only purchased canadensis. Good to know.

The soil does drain well. I have many small barlows double plants. Do they have problems taking our heat too?

Thanks everyone!

This URL shows the range of A canadensis.

Here is a link that might be useful: A. canadensis range

It is sure interesting to read about what people lost. This past winter was certainly brutal. Really the only thing that didn't come back for me is my oldest and largest butterfly bush. For years this kept coming back with new growth every spring on the old woody stems and was a really vigorous grower. This year there was a bit of growth at the bottom but I could see it wasn't developing well and now noticed today that the whole main stem is rotting. Time to replace it, but I want to find the biggest one that I can since this one ran about 6-7 feet high when in full bloom.

Keith

The exact same thing happened to me, Keith. I had a piece of green growth, a small piece, on the bottom of a 6 year old Royal Red Butterfly Bush. When I didn't see it growing any higher, as the rest of my butterfly bushes did, I checked on it and the greenery was gone. Now, I need to find a replacement as well. An old friend bought the Royal Red for me at a local gardening flea market so I don't know if any of the local gradening centers will have one. I'll no doubt end up with another variety.

Linda