Why I Oughta...

Dahlia season has begun here.  With the initial planting of seventeen dahlias.  That was day one of planting the tubers that I started out in the garden.  I made this annotated map to show (mostly myself) where everything is planted because I'm growing many new (to me) varieties for the first time and have a much more diverse lineup than in previous seasons.  Note:  this post is going live in early June, but I planted these on May 20th.  Last year, I planted them in the first week of June , so this is almost three weeks earlier.  Here, below is that map.  So far, I've put six in the "Pizza Oven West" bed, seven along the side of the house in the "South Sun Wall" bed and four "Under the Elm".  You can see them numbered in red: Pizza Oven East 1.  Crichton Honey 2.  Cafe Au Lait 3.  Creme de Cognac 4.  Blue Wish 5.  Milena Fleur 6.  Jowie Winnie Here (below) is a photo below of these plantings.  Note that I pu...

Yesterday, I showed photos of the 76 Titan Blue Lavender Halo Vinca annuals that I added to our front porch bed where I hope they'll grow into a carpet of color.  In service of the notion of 'repetition', I opted to plant the same annuals down in the island bed to try to carry that same color further forward and bring those two plantings together visually.   I went with 36 vinca down there.  Below are a few photos showing how the 36 Titan Blue Lavender Vinca are planted in between the Red Wizard Sun Coleus and the existing Ajuga groundcover that abuts the sidewalk.  First up are side-views: And, here below is the curb-view: Last year, I didn't have luck with the flowering annuals in this bed, so I'm hoping that these Titan Vinca will fare better.  

Last year, I planted a new (to me) annual bedding plant in our front porch beds:  Madagascar Vinca.  64 plugs .  They worked really well and filled in the front of the border with a carpet of pink color by the end of July .  I mentioned in that post that ten-or-so died immediately, so the total was closer to 54 plants that filled-in the bed.  They were pink - which was a result of just *having* to choose something.   This year, I found flats of purple Vinca at Wannemakers.  Titan Lavender Blue Halo.  Here, below, is a photo of the plant tag and one of the flats: Here's what Ball Seed says about Titan Lavender Blue Halo Vinca : Big, bold and better branching vincas! Titan is up to 2 weeks faster to flower than open-pollinated vincas, with superior branching and big flowers in all the top-selling colours. The most uniform F1 vinca series on the market shows off flowers that are up to 50% larger than O.P. types in cooler temperatures. Faster to...

A few of the tubers that I ordered turned out to be not viable.  And, they were sold out of a like-for-like variety, so they offered up a replacement based on their current, in-stock inventory.  I went with something I've never grown, but is pretty well-known:  Cafe Au Lait dahlias.  See below for the tuber and the package that they arrived in recently: I haven't (in the past few seasons) grown any Dinnerplate Dahlias, so this will be a new (to me) experience in terms of size and staking.  Here's what Longfield Gardens says about C-A-L : Cafe au Lait is the variety that launched today's dahlia mania. These big, romantic blooms are must-have for anyone who loves flowers. Cafe au Lait's blossoms are wonderfully variable in hue depending on weather conditions and time of year. You can expect flowers ranging from creamy yellow and bone through blush pink and rose. They are a fabulous cut flower, and like peonies, it takes just a few stems to make an impressive arran...

Number 19 on my 2026 to-do list was to upgrade the stumpery.  That means improving the hard features (like fountain, stumps, bench, etc), but also the plantings.  I wrote in the list:  The thing that I need to add here are even more Autumn Ferns. See #15. I have some Autumn Ferns and LOVE them. More is better. #15 is "Stay focused by using the concept of Repetition vs. new."  Those two items - repetiton + Stumpery plantings collided when I found a bunch of quart-sized Autumn Ferns at the nursery.  They were nice-sized and healthy looking: I ended up buying seven of them for the Stumpery.  I spaced them out behind the front row of All Gold Hakonechloa grasses and inter-planted with some of the existing Crested Surf Japanese Painted Ferns.  This area was mostly blank. There are two small Autumn Ferns that came back around here , so these seven make it nine for this area.  See below for the seven new ferns planted in the bed.  The stumps for th...

More groundcover (or living mulch) is something I've been working-on for a couple of growing seasons.  This month, I put in six Ajuga 'Chocolate Chip' plugs in the [kitchen curved] bed in the backyard and six Ajuga 'Burgundy Glow' in the backyard near the colony of Hellebores on the northside .  This week, I put in six more Ajuga 'Chocolate Chip' plugs in the front of the Island Bed in our front yard down along the sidewalk.  This brings my 2026 groundcover planting total to 24. Here, below, is a look at the six new plugs that are to the left of the three existing ones that went in last year in August .   Here are the three existing groudcover plants last Fall .  One of the challenges down by the sidewalk is retaining the mulch, so I'm hoping these plugs will grow-in and provide a 'living mulch' mat that stretches the front of the bed along the sidewalk.  You can see the six new ones in this photo of the red coleus annuals: These weren't the...