13,520 Garden Web Discussions | Perennials

Hardy geraniums would be perfect for that spot! So would verbena!

Got some Delphinium, Astilbe and mulch... Gonna leave it for awhile and see how things do... Thanks for all the advice and suggestions!

Marquest - What's the perennial in the bottom right corner of your 4th pic? Looks like it's in a red pot and look like leaves similar to a geranium, but look at those colors! Is it a heuchera that I don't know about? Can't quite make it out!

funnthsun LOL no it is a geranium for the pots on my patio. It rolled over while I was taking the pic for v1rtu0s1ty so she could see the colors in the shade garden. It is not part of that garden. Sorry for the confusion.

The annabelle suggestion wasn't actually for full sun location (I realized that after the fact), but rather if you did have another area along that brick wall that offers shade, it would look spectacular - but again I'm a Wisconsinite and have no idea how this plant grows in your region.

Wow, I never thought about expanding this bed but I see your point. The house sits up on a hill so there isnt a whole lot of room to expand but I could certianly go a few feet. I assume you would then suggest I move most everything forward, to make room closer to the wall for taller, deciduous plantings. I am planning on moving the JM out further from the house in the fall and this will require expanding the bed anyway. Here is the walkway where I have 2 clematis on a trellis. They are just about to bloom.

I had a couple coneflowers with AY last year and were removed then. Now this year although none of the have bloomed yet because its early, some of my Ruby Stars are giant but seem to have twisted growth and no signs of buds. Please tell me I dont have to rip out another ten plants or so? Is this also aster yellows? Thanks.

Here is another pic showing strange foliage.

Thank you for the suggestions...and reading them, I am astonished at how many of these are lurking somewhere in my garden or allotment especially things like polemonium (I have a very lovely sterile long flowering one), various heucheras (like all of us), heaps of alchemilla and hellebores (obviously, once you get one!). Also, after a visit to a famous woodland garden last year, I came away with many little envelopes of seeds (thalictrums, many aconitum (including the subtle but delightful 'Ivorine'). Astilbes have never d9ne much in my sunny sandy soil but am thinking that I can go overboard on these and.....geum rivale, another genus lost to hopeless futility.
Oh, hepaticas..........if I ever found a buried hoard of treasure in the woods, I would be getting many of these most fabulous plants. A few years ago, I visited a hepatica nursery - you know, those terribly expensive jewels from Japan - and practically had to be dragged away drooling and craving.
Another fail has always been primula so I am hoping to be able to establish many of the candelabra types (P.bulleyana, beesianum etc.)

Amazing how a few good ideas gets the brain cells activating again. Course, we are back at the woods this evening after several rainy days - where the weeds will have doubled in size - so must keep these ideas in mind and not despair at the seemingly hopeless task.

Little steps, one at a time, going forward.

Thanks guys.
Not entirely sure about the mexican pot, Marquest, but I really like the other one.

I know campanula it is about personal taste. I try to put some hardscape with color where I do not get sun to draw the eye into the dark areas.

The Mexican pots are dear to my heart because they were art pieces my daughter gave me for Mother's day and Birthdays. She knows my love of pots. If I need something to pump up the garden my go to solution is a distinct or conversation flower pot.

Hey Y'all,

Thank you all so much, especially Gardenweed. Gigi, I don't mind at all.
There was a woman at the nursery who helped me locate all of the things on my list. She seemed very helpful and said she also gardened for butterflies. As I'm returning all of these dead plants (the returnable ones-i'm pretty sure buddlejia is a shrub abd certain dwarf bottlebrush is) this weekend I'll hit her up for more information. Clay, I'm finding as I talk with family and neighbors, is a big problem in Baton Rouge - especially in the old neighborhoods. The water table is very, err, close here and so all of the building was done on what high ground was available. As the high ground was most likely going to be either an old, natural preColumbian levee or simply ground one of the many rivers (including THE river) and bayous couldn't simply shoot straight through it tends to be----clay! I'm in an old neighborhood, on high bround that is cut in one direction by a substantial bayou that's quite close and drainage 'ditches' (probably called rivers in CT ;p) I'm stuck in the middle on clay. My sister bought a house in a new subdivision that in my living memory was palmetto bottomlands (land given to flooding, lots of palmettos, bald cypress and small trash trees) and naturally she has superb soil. The fact that she is probably only a few feet from sea level will hopefully never become an issue. I'm curious to know what the people who made that land habitable did, but that's besides the point. I'm stuck with the clay while she can just throw down seeds. lol Another person on this forum suggested that I build my garden up so that at least some part of the roots will be out of clay. I don't know where that person was from, though. I'll see what the woman at the nursery has to say. I did discover that my local paper does have a gardening section-fancy that!-and will be paying it more attention than I have been (which was none). As for fertilizing, from what I understand the plants I'm looking to lay in are hardy and don't require much in the way of fertilizing. I am a long way from attempting composting, etc. I am absolutely hooked on butterfly/hummingbird gardening, but it is one of a few hobbies. Target shooting, my biggest hobby outside reading, is expensive (ammunition, range fees and travel expenses if you want to compete). m Reading, too, is expensive especially if you are a history geek who can't let a book he's read leave his possession. I have literally run out of bookcase space. Maybe kitchen shelving? Surely all of those pots and pans aren't necessary? She can cook with one or two, right? lol
On mulch. PLEASE everyone out there don't use cypress mulch. If you've ever seen a beautiful cypress swamp you'll know why. Use pines. They grow everywhere and grow fast. It's a horror what they do to get cypress mulch.

Thanks So Very Much Y'all!
Pano

"...Reading, too, is expensive especially if you are a history geek who can't let a book he's read leave his possession.."

OMG! A fellow history-loving, book-hoarding, piles-of-history-books-on-the-floor, kept-every-history-book-they've-ever-read reader! I actually work at a library, but I don't take out history books because I like to KEEP my history books, lol. So I see them, add them to my list, and then buy them when I can.

:)
Dee

I have a purple version. They really are pretty. Personally, I would leave them. :):)

Wow flora, I've never heard that common name - how weird. I've tried some Scabiosa and it's pretty but S. columbaria rarely made it through the winter, and S. ochroleuca was a bit more perennial but never thrived.

Thanks for the advice on spacing, rouge. Yeah, I did plant them a bit close but I wanted a mass of purple flowers this year to grow under the trellis (to the left, right and above these Veronicas which can't be seen in the picture) that I have Crimson Mandevillas growing on :) I'll transplant the Veronicas once they start to crowd each other and probably spread them around to other areas of my landscaping since I just LOVE them!

I too had Royal candles, and two other varieties in my WI rich black but clayish soil, and they all petered out on me after a few years. Going to try them again in my new sandy soil.

One of my nurseries has a spring special, buy I ceramic pot get the second equal value free. I have gotten several too expensive for me large pots this way.

What Is hard to find for me is unusual pots. Perhaps because we have to take pots inside for the winter not many people use ceramic or clay pots and most pots I see are the very plain ones, either all one color or a couple of blended colors. I'd be willing to pay more for an unusual pot.

Steins Garden Center has a nice variety of both ceramic and clay pots. I can find more expensive must-haves at local nurseries.

And how lucky for you to have purchased your home from a landscape architect!!!

I'm reviving this thread as I never found a purple cimicifuga that someone had grown themselves and stayed purple all season.

I still am searching for the answer because I can just SEE these planted with my purple heucheras.

But they are all expensive and after paying $24 each for plants in 1996--can't believe I did that--and then they went green, I'm not willing to gamble again. So, any suggestions if you grow purple cimicifugas?

I'm reviving this thread as I never found a purple cimicifuga that someone had grown themselves and stayed purple all season.

I still am searching for the answer because I can just SEE these planted with my purple heucheras.

But they are all expensive and after paying $24 each for plants in 1996--can't believe I did that--and then they went green, I'm not willing to gamble again. So, any suggestions if you grow purple cimicifugas?

If you can find it, Tordon will kill the buckthorn with one application.

Paul, I know this is almost exactly a year later but I am curious as to the health of your stand of "Indian Pink" last summer and now this new year.

Yours looks a whole lot better than mine at this point. I ended up moving mine from the front to the back after dismantling part of my front shade garden last year. It is a lot smaller now unfortunately.

On an interesting side note...it had heaved a bit and I buried it deeper a few weeks ago. I noticed the most unusual thing, this Thalictrum seems to have very tuber-like roots to it. There were tons of little tubers coming from the plant. I took two of them and am doing a bit of an experiment (dusted with rooting hormone and plopped under my grow light) to see if they root out. Who knows, maybe I will have a little constellation of Evening Stars around here if it works, LOL. ;-)
CMK

Although one can't see them in the picture very well, there really are some small pink flowers hear the top of the plant.

I've fallen in love with coleus. They are easy to grow from seed, and even easier to grow from cuttings. They come in an infinite combination of colors and textures and don't need dead heading.

I feel your pain at not having enough full sun to grow your traditional favorites. I also moved to a mostly-full-shade yard and I'm relearning how to garden. I support the idea of removing trees judiciously, or even just thinning some branches to allow a bit more light to get through. Hire an expert so you're sure the job is done right. Good luck.

Martha

Thank you so much for your encouragement! I've felt so discouraged about it. Today I'm charting sun patterns every hour to determine the sunniest location...I'm going to get that shade book, and I'm also going to try a few sun lovers in sunny spots. Yay for gardening! It's always an experiment, isn't it? :)

Most of the concrete shown in that photo was removed, BlueBirdPeony. We estimate it would have taken 6 concrete dumpsters to remove it all, plus extra weight fees, so we got very creative working it into the landscape design as retaining walls, patios and walks. The concrete removed from both the front and back yards, that we did not repurpose, filled 3/4 of the single dumpster that left this morning.

It was a crazy amount of work over two years, between house update projects. And, of course, there are some future projects to complete. But after installing the 250 sq' sod patch this past week and watching the dumpster disappearing down the road this morning, the feeling that the problem area had finally been dealt with was such a relief! I can take an update photo, once I have planted some landscape plants lounging on the walkway.

WOW Gyr_Falcon that is a lot of concrete.

My problem is the entire yard. I purchased a 3+ acre property that had not been cared for for several years. The couple raised their kids and when they finally were too old to take care of the property the kids put their parents in a home and the house sat with no care for years.

The wildlife moved in along with every sap tree in the state.

It is a work in progress. Acre at a time.

BlueBird I do not see anything wrong with your gardens. I think you just need some hardscape/focal point to pull it together. A bird bath, a statue. It is a room without decor. The plants and trees are good but a living room without a couch is a incomplete living room.

Lovely! I adore tree peonies - both flowers and foliage. Your wisteria is fabulous BTW! :0)

I saw a woody peony today at a nursery. It looks like yours. I took a picture of it. First time I saw a flower that is about 7 inches wide. It's beautiful!