Category Archives: Planting Tips

Want More Butterflies? Plant Butterfly Weed!

imageButterfly weed, Asclepias tuberosa, is the pretty orange flower, shown in the picture on the right  in my very hot and sunny front border. It’s right at home with other butterfly attractors including salvias,  trailing white lantana, purple and red gomphrena, zinnias, mexican heather, other heat loving annuals and, shown in the picture with the butterfly weed, a yellow hypericum shrub. It also is happy with other perennials.  To be successful in atracting butterflies, you need to have sources of nectar, sources for them to lay their eggs on,  and plants for the caterpillars to feed on…monarch butterflies like to lay their eggs on this asclepias, so it’s a very good butterfly plant to have!

Butterfly weed in my friend Carole Barton's garden...

Butterfly weed in my friend Carole Barton’s garden…

It’s the flowering star right now in my garden and in my friend and wholesale grower  Carole Barton’s garden also. Her very impressive stand of it in the picture to the left must be heaven for butterflies!  Even for those folks opposed to orange flowers, I hope you will try to find a spot for this one anyway…in addition to attracting butterflies it also is a magnet for other beneficial insects including lady beetles and bees.

Since it has a long tap root, take care in transplanting this perennial butterfly weed. It can be difficult to find, but we have these plants available now, if there’s a sunny spot in your garden and you’d like to try it for yourself.  The long tap root also makes it tolerant of drought once established – a huge plus in my book!  It will benefit from deadheading (cutting off the old blooms) after it’s through flowering – if you don’t get this done it may reseed, which might not be a bad thing depending on where you want it! It also reappears quite late in the spring – I worry each and every year that I’ve lost it and then, happy surprise, it reappears…

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See How The Garden (Emmet O’Neal Community Garden) Grows…

Learning...

Learning…

Leah watering new vegetable plantings...

Leah watering new vegetable plantings…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Oak Street Garden Shop’s owner, Billy Angell, and the Mountain Brook Emmet O’Neal Library have begun this summer’s vegetable garden across the street from the shop…soon it will be filled with all sorts of veggies, and flowers too.

imageThe garden is a teaching garden, and this year our market manager, Dená Hand, is lending her teaching abilities and helping Billy. This is a fun learning experience for kids who sign up with the “Dig Into Reading” program. Feel free to come by even if you’re not signed up though!

Each Tuesday and Thursday morning through June, the kids learn what vegetables they’ll be planting, how to plant seeds and seedlings, and how to care for them. Soon there will be okra, peppers, tomatoes, squash, cucumbers and more in the small plot – all planted with help from little hands of new gardeners!

imageIt’s a display garden as well, and folks are encouraged to come by, see how things are growing and ask questions throughout the summer. Do you have an elderly neighbor or friend that would appreciate any of the vegetables that are grown? Feel free to harvest and share with the community!

We’ll add more pictures as the garden progresses – but come see in person what’s going on in garden if you’re in the area!

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Shade Containers…No Impatiens? No Problem!

Because of the threat of downy mildew on impatiens, this year has seen all of us having to rethink what to plant in our shady beds and planters. In an earlier post  I explained what downy mildew is and offered some alternatives. After planting these pots (located in a very shady spot in front of Chez Fonfon downtown), I thought they offered a good example of a planting that utilizes different foliage and blooming options.

imageOwners Frank and Pardis Stitt prefer white and green for the front of this  French cafe, located next to their acclaimed restaurant Highlands in downtown Birmingham. These are fairly large, tan colored  cast stone planters  with nice clean lines.  A mix of contrasting green and variegated foliage with a touch of white add light to this shady spot,  and the stone wall adds a pleasing backdrop to the planting.

The photos shown here were taken right after planting, so you can imagine how much they will grow up, out and over the planters. By the end of the season they should be quite lush…and the folks at Chez Fonfon do a great job maintaining them.

The cast iron plant, aspidistra, stays in these planters year-round and is the backbone of this planting. Occasionally in the spring  it needs to be pulled out and thinned; at the same time any damaged leaves from winter are cut off. Once that is done, the planters are topped off with fresh potting soil, Osmocote is mixed in,  and they’re ready to plant.image

I started with the ‘Aaron’ caladiums first. (These will work in full sun as well!) The white center on the leaf really brightens this planting and is the direct opposite of the Algerian ivy leaf with its green center and white outline…foliage is so fun to work with! The tiny needlepoint like ivy is a big contrast – a much smaller and darker green leaf than the first two. Difficult to see, but, right up against the aspidistra, I added a blue-green grass-like juncus – it picks up the gray-green color in the Algerian ivy.

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Next, the blooms – white New Guinea impatiens (These and the Sunpatiens are NOT affected by the downy mildew disease.) and some Euphorbia ‘Silver Fog’ to brighten this spot even more. The euphorbia is difficult to see in these photos, but it is a very nice filler for sunny spots too – I’m hoping it will get just enough light to bloom well and add its airy texture to this composition.

 

Last, a bit of the tiny, low growing baby tears – a lighter green to brighten the very lowest level of the planting, next to the dark green ivy. Eventually this will get engulfed by the rest, but until then it will be another lighter green in the mix…

So…no impatiens? No problem!  Want to see another example? Take a look at this massive moss hanging basket – it’s planted all for shade too!

 

 

 

 

 

Perennial To-Dos For A Great Garden…

Perennial chrysanthemums benefit from being cut back once or twice or they tend to get lanky with fewer blooms.

Perennial chrysanthemums benefit from being cut back once or twice or they tend to get lanky with fewer blooms.

May and June are key months to keep an eye on your perennials as they’re coming up and (hopefully) growing like gangbusters.  A few tasks to do now involve some summer perennials and many of your late blooming fall plants. Of course, the  following tips are not something you have to do, but are only suggestions gleaned from my gardening experiences through the years. Remember, gardening is not one-size-fits-all!

Do you have summer phlox in your garden? Now is the perfect time to selectively thin your clumps, especially if they’re large. (If they are outgrowing their space or haven’t been blooming well, divide them this fall.)

To thin your summer phlox, simply reach into the clump and pull out the smallest stems. This effectively allows better air circulation – which in turn leads to a healthier clump less prone to mildew problems. At the same time, cut back by half some of the remaining stems. A longer bloom period will be the result…

Perennial sunflower - just about to be cut back in late May.

Perennial sunflower – just about to be cut back in late May.

Asters in front of Texas sage in late May after their first cut-back. Hedge shears do a great job quickly!

Asters in front of Texas sage in late May after their first cut-back. Hedge shears do a great job quickly!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For more blooms on your late blooming perennial sunflowers, salvias, asters, Joe pye weed and chrysanthemums,  now is the perfect time to get in the garden and cut them back – if you have large areas, use a hedge clipper and cut them back by half. (Hedge clippers – the old fashioned manual ones –  work best on asters and perennial mums.) When you cut a stem, it will respond by creating two stems, so you’ll have a fuller, shorter plant with more flowers later.

Perennial sunflower getting cut back. It will create two stems here - more blooms!

Perennial sunflower getting cut back. It will create two stems here – more blooms!

Now you don’t have to do this, (I’m not the garden police!) and, if you don’t, they’ll just be taller and bloom earlier in the fall, growing to their full height in your garden.
I do like cutting mine back now though. I also make a second cut-back on half the clumps about a month later. This effectively “staggers” the bloom time – those not cut back this second time will bloom first, and be a bit taller, and the plants that are cut back the second time will bloom a bit later.  More blooms, longer! It’s a win win!

Late blooming Salvia madrensis - forsythia sage...cut back at least 3 times during the growing season.

Late blooming Salvia madrensis – forsythia sage…cut back at least 3 times during the growing season. Shown here just beginning to bloom – this will turn into a mass of yellow salvia blooms…

Many southern gardeners say “Don’t cut late blooming perennials back after July 4th”.

Rule breaker that I am, I have cut perennial mums, asters and sunflowers back as late as mid-July and had no ill-effect. But I like extending my blooms well into fall – it’s one of my favorite times of the year!

Perennial sunflower - 'Marc's Apollo' beginning to bloom in mid-September...

Perennial sunflower – ‘Marc’s Apollo’ beginning to bloom in mid-September…

 

 

 

Above all, enjoy your garden – after all, that’s what you planted it for, right? Hopefully by following these tips you’ll be able to enjoy it even longer!

***One of my absolute favorite reference books on perennial gardening is The Well-Tended Perennial Garden by my friend, Tracy DiSabato-Aust. If you enjoy perennials and gardening, this is a must have!!!

 

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Need Veggie Plants? We’ve Got Them Now!

If you want a good selection of tomatoes, now is the time to come in! One of our small, one man operation wholesale growers decided to get out of the business and go to work for a larger grower – and we told him we’d buy his inventory of tomatoes and peppers to help out. So….we have a LOT of tomatoes and peppers right now – please come and take a look! Most of those we have are heirlooms, and there are some hybrids as well.

 

A sampling of the tomatoes in stock now...

A sampling of the tomatoes in stock now…

First, here are some garden preparation and planting tips for growing the best tomatoes:

Tomatoes grow best in a spot with lots of sun – at least 8 hours. Try not to plant tomatoes in the same spot as the year before.

Prepare your beds well. Loosen the soil and add soil amendments – some good ones are mushroom compost, cow manure and soil conditioner.

Rotating them to different spots will help keep soilborne diseases like bacterial spot and blight to a minimum.

When you plant them, plant deeply, burying the stems – new roots will form on the stems under the soil and make a sturdier plant with more fruits.

After planting, water well and add mulch. Mulch will help conserve water in the soil and moderate soil temperatures too.

Be sure to water them deeply each week.  Watering every 5 days or so during the height of summer deeply is much better than watering a little bit every day. To prevent foliar disease, water the soil beneath the plant, not the leaves, and water early in the day.

Pinch out suckers – non fruiting branches that form between fruiting stems. It’s best to pinch them out when they’re young, so keep up with this!

Stake them. Put in stakes when you transplant them to avoid damaging roots later. We have 7′ bamboo stakes and garden twine.

Determinate tomatoes will produce one big yield and be finished. Celebrity is a determinate tomato. Most of those we carry, though are considered indeterminate, meaning the vine continues to grow and as it grows, will produce more flowers and more tomatoes as the season progresses.

On a quick perusal of our stock, here is the list as of this week:

SunGold: Very popular cherry tomato, SunGold was developed by a Japanese breeder in the 1990s. Good disease tolerance.

Yellow Pear: Another that folks ask for every year. Heirloom, with yellow, pearshaped, sweet fruit.

Red Cherry: An heirloom, cultivated since the early 1800s. High yielding.

Black Cherry: A hybrid, bred in Florida. Sweet, deep red tomatoes with a blackish hue.

Mortgage Lifter: Indeterminate heirloom that produces large, pink low acid fruits. Originated in the 1930s, and the developer  (with no breeding experience)  paid off his mortgage selling his seedlings.

Cherokee Purple: Heirloom with a unique dusty rose color. Extremely sweet with a rich, smoky taste.

Brandywine Red: An old Amish heirloom from 1885.

Beefsteak: Heirloom with 4″-5″ slightly ribbed bright red, sweet fruit.

Better Boy: Classic – prolific producer – hybrid.

Talladega: Hybrid – developed for the Southeast, it’s a midseason deep red beefsteak tomato.    

Park’s Whopper: Hybrid – Large, 4″ fruits.                                                                                     

Green Zebra: Hybrid developed in the 80’s. Popularized by Chef Alice Waters at Chez Panisse. It’s ripe when the light green stripes turn yellow.

Black Krim: An heirloom, it’s a medium size very dark maroon beefsteak tomato.

Atkinson: A good hybrid for the Southeast. Developed by Auburn University.

Celebrity: Another disease resistant hybrid, this one is determinate, but still will get quite large and produce a lot of fruit. A solid, all purpose tomato.