13,520 Garden Web Discussions | Perennials
Oh, p.s. Does Blanket Flower from a nursery bloom the first year? This is very important as the C. Baby Sun didn't bloom in its first year last year and I have many eyes upon me as I try to establish this perennial flower bed for our condominium. (what was I thinking? lol)
dinah C. 'Baby Sun' should have bloomed first year so hopefully this year it will perform beautifully. They usually bloom first year from seed.
Gaillardia (Blanket Flower) should also. 'Goblin' is one I have grown for many years and it is a prolific bloomer. It is very compact, under 12". There is 'Golden Goblin' but I have not grown it. So many new intros have come onto the market and time will tell if they perform as well.
There is a miniature Daylily that I would recommend. 'Penny's Worth' blooms all summer long. It will take a break for a few days here and there but it continues to bloom even after snow has fallen. It is also under 12".
I think you should give your Coreopsis a chance to prove itself but it is nice to have alternatives.
Daylily 'Penny's Worth' is in the centre of the pic.
Where are you? (you can add that under your profile under About Me.) I think how long-lived they are depends on the both the plant and the growing conditions. For me, Agastache rupestris is short-lived because years when we have either really cold temperatures without snow-cover or really cold wet springs, I lose mine. Mine are happy enough to reseed a few plants some years and they typically will return for 3-5 years before adverse conditions require replacement.
Many of the western Agastaches that I have tried are annuals in my garden, and I will have to look into some of the hardier blue Agastaches to find one or more that are both happy in my wet early spring and don't reseed too much. Anyone in colder zones have suggestions?
I for one think everyone has had a great comment here, and I would combine the answers into one plan!
If this were my yard, I would enlarge that paved area by about three times - at least out to the ac unit and out to the line of the downspout. I think having that paved area (whether it's concrete, stones, pavers, whatever) would just help define the area, and as it stands now that walkway is too tiny and utilitarian. A bigger area will give some definition to the area as an entryway, a sitting area, etc, and look better in scale to the house. Might even be nice to have a pathway connect from that to whatever other path/walkway you have in the yard. I can't tell from the photo if there is already one there or that is just dirt.
I have three rain barrels, and love them. I should note that not a one is connected to a downspout, as DH won't hear of cutting into the downspouts, so I can only dream of the abundance of water I'd have if I did! However, even without that, mine do fill up slowly but nicely, and I do use them with watering cans, either dipped in, or under the spigot, as my barrels are on cinderblocks to give just enough height to get a watering can under. These rain barrels help me cut down on my well use, and IMO are a great idea in general in terms of water conservation.
I'm not quite sure WHERE you want to put a garden - along the wall where the ac unit is? To the left of the photo where that bag is? Extending it out from the bag to cover that green area? Is that where the moss is? IMO, you can have a garden almost anywhere, if you have the right plant for the spot. I've put in a bog-type garden in an area where it floods every spring, and which sometimes has standing water well into August. Again, it's the matter of the right plant. Determine just how wet this area is, and do your homework researching plants that like that moisture level and the sun levels you have. Amending the soil helps, but do it as nature would - don't try to change the soil there, but enhance it. It will take some trial and error but I'm sure it can be done. There are many plants you can use.
As for moss, I too don't understand why some people dislike it so much. I had a friend who I used to help in her garden, and we live in a very wooded area. She had a quite damp yard, and lots of shade and trees, and along the edge of the lawn she had these wide swaths of moss - a good 10 to 15 feet deep from edge of lawn to woods. She tried for years to get rid of it and get grass to grow. I always told her it looked wonderful, it was soft, green, and from a distance who could tell? She was constantly worried about the resale value of not having a lawn (and it's going on a least 25 years that she's been in the house and worrying about this!). The one downfall to moss, IMO, is that it does rake up very easily when you are raking up leaves, so that is a pain. But other than that, if its green and nothing else will grow there (in terms of lawn, not garden), then that is the plant to have there! I don't know. I guess I'm just a big believer in working with nature and not against her.
Good luck and keep us posted on your evolving garden!
Dee
Dee -
For putting in a new garden, I was thinking where the bag is out to where moss is. I already have garden going where the AC unit is -some ferns, Japanese forest grass and astilbes. Right around the down spout in front of the shed there are a lot of weeds/moss and grass does not do well there anyways. I have not thought about expanding the pathway. It is really tiny and narrow right now. I do have a patio to the right of below picture that has seating area, etc.
I marked my picture on what I was thinking of converting to a garden bed. This might need to happen over two years, so I will do the left half this year and right half next year. I am 100% up for planting what works there! If moss, I want to encourage moss, but there are lots of weeds there too. Maybe I will try some large flagstones/splash block/rain barrel to see how that changes the area and next year I can decide next steps.
I've have Lonicera periclymenum 'Serotina", and it is unbelievably fragrant from about 6 at night until 8 or 9 in the morning. I've also have L. sempervirens 'Cedar Lane', which is beautiful, and attracts hummingbirds, but doesn't have a fragrance. Both have been free of pests/disease.
Hi Steve,
I just ran across some wonderful links posted by Freda Cameron (now dyhgarden, formerly wonbyherwits). Freda writes on travel and garden topics & has posted her pictures of Monet’s gardens at Giverny, Jardin des Plantes, Jardin du Luxemboug, etc. On each page you will need to scroll down past the initial links & topics to the text. Links after the text are not underlined but you will see that they are links when you move your cursor over them. Prices & schedules may have changed of course. Have fun & give us reviews of what you see when you come back!
“Do You Know the Way to Monet’s Gardens at Giverny?”
http://definingyourhome.blogspot.com/2013/10/do-you-know-way-to-monets-gardens-at.html
Her pictures of Giverny plus other gardens in Paris from her different trips:
http://definingyourhome.blogspot.com/p/monets-gardens-and-paris-2009.html
I grew it in my old garden, Annette. Perfectly well-behaved shrubby plant that offered an interesting evergreen texture. Always generated questions and interest from garden visitors :-) Definitely more of an oddity than a garden staple.
Haven't seen it offered for sale in my area for years, tho. I think the more or less universal avoidance of English ivy in the Pacific Northwest has scared away any interest in virtually any selection of ivy, even one which never develops adult foliage or produces flowers.
I divided my old (~15 years) clumps of Siberian Iris and not only was it not easy, the divisions were just eh - not really very vigorous and spotty flowering. I hit an end-of-season clearance and replaced those divisions with new clumps in fall 2013, which grew beautifully last summer. So, frankly, for the amount of labor required and less than great results, I say just ditch them and buy new plants if they aren't looking good anymore.
Thanks, everyone. We're selling the house and moving in mid-May, so with everything else I have to do, I think that I will tell the new owners that they need to divide them in the fall. :) They're young and a lot more energetic that I am, and I do remember that this is a long process (I think that there are about 16 huge plants...)
True that leaving old foliage may offer some protection to a perennial, but we live north of Toronto (as per glmtoronto) and I invariably cut back (almost to ground level) our own, and any other mixed local perennial garden I do, by the previous late fall.
On the other hand, that's what perennials do; namely, die back leaving no living part above ground in winter. Perhaps if plants are close to the limit of their hardiness range, for the location, the protection might be desirable.
I usually cut back in the fall, and I imagine my climate isn't too different from yours. The exceptions would be the western Agastaches like A. rupestris, woody herbs such as sage and lavender, or anything that's particularly borderline as to hardiness. I make sure to cut back plants that might carry over disease such as peonies and phlox near the beginning of my tidying process since I never know when we might have an unexpectedly early snowfall. If I am not able to finish before snow buries the gardens, I try to do it early enough in the spring that the soil in the gardens is still frozen. I try not to step on the beds, but if they are still frozen and I accidentally step on a bed, it won't compact the soil the way stepping on sodden ground will.
SB - could they have been trying to grow/flower while still under a crust of snow that was blocking light? "It'll be interesting to see if the leaves green up now that they are exposed to full light. I thought the ones in my picture above were also looking a bit anemic and I assumed that was due to them only recently escaping snow cover.
Don't worry about the snowdrops, they'll green up fine over the next few days. Often when spring comes suddenly they come up yellow first and then the chlorophyll takes a little longer to develop. The inside of the blooms might stay yellow , its a nice effect I think.
Excellent CMK!
(I have ordered very little. This past weekend I bought on-line 3 "Minnie Pearl" phlox paniculata and 1 Uvularia grandiflora).
(It is because of the far reaching influence ie enabling of GW that I have many epimediums and Helleborus).
LOL, don't get me started on Hellebores they can be down right addictive. I don't have many named varieties other than 'Onyx Odyssey', 'Ashwood Double White', 'Ashwood Double Pink' and H. foetidus 'Wester Flisk'. A few years back I grew seed from Ashwood in the U.K. and got a nice mix of colors....
Nothing spectacular but one from the 'Royal Heritage' strain, flower left bottom corner is from a flopped over H. argutifolius.
'Wester Flisk' in bloom
DS2 was up from Victoria the other day, showed me some pictures of the double Hellebore they grew, almost had me drooling :). The seed again from Ashwood in the U.K. needless to say mom sent him home with baggies with instructions to bag some of those flowers as soon as he stepped out of his truck. Yep they are addicting.
Annette