Why I Oughta...

This post is going up in early July, but I seem to have forgotten to post about this planting earlier this growing season.  I actually planted these in late May, so this is six weeks late.  Better late than never (for the Garden Diary), right? I planted up the front border of the Pizza Oven bed that was marked as one of my "Garden Edits" from a few seasons back and was the basis of my #3 Priority Project post earlier this year .  At that time, I called for twelve (12) Hakonechloa Macra grasses to fill the front border and filling in spaces in front of and behind the tree swing tree.   Over Memorial Day weekend, I bought ten one-gallon containers of the straight variety Macra grasses from Roy Diblik's Northwind Perennial Farm.  And, I lined them up along the front edge from the one legacy grass stretching (almost) all the way to the front corner of the pizza oven. See below for a couple photos of the grasses spaced out in their nursery pots: Here, below, is ...

#21 on my 2026 to-do list was to 'add another ornamental maple' to the garden.  So far, this season, I've planted a pair of them:  a North Wind Korean Maple (to replace the Arctic Jade) and an Alpenglow Korean Maple under the large tree swing.  Both from Iseli Nursery. Over the years, I've moved towards those Korean Maples. Acer pseudosieboldaianum. They have performed well (aside from the Arctic Jade).  They're more cold-hardy than Acer palmatums or Acer shirasawanum or Acer japonicum. But, the pull of the traditional Japanese Maples is still strong.  When I came across an Orange Dream Japanese Maple that was priced...ummm....right, I brought it home.   Also note... I still think about the full-moon maples like this one , too.  Below are a few photos showing the foliage, the tree form and where I planted it (in the back edge of the "Kitchen Curved" bed). The leaves in Summer are green with red(ish) stems: The tree has a low-graft and is about ...

The past few seasons, I've been making cut flower arrangements in jars and vases for the countertop in our kitchen and to give them out to family and friends.  But, over the past few years, I've been reading a little bit about the concept of Ikebana - which is Japanese flower arranging.  This page on KonMari has an overview of Ikebana that includes this top-line description : Ikebana is the centuries-old Japanese art of arranging flowers. The practice, which roughly translates to “making flowers come alive,” uses carefully selected blossoms, greenery and other flora to convey a specific feeling or emotion to an observer – just as a painting or sculpture might. KonMari is Marie Kondo .  The decluttering person.   Architectural Digest has this "Ikebana 101" post that lays out some of the history and practice.  In it, they highlight one particular school's approach to Ikebana that uses three types of stems:  subject, object and secondary.  In low bo...

I planted three All Gold Hakonehloa Macra Grasses from the Morton Arboretum Plant Sale last month where I filled in a couple of spots in the long border of existing All Gold grasses in the backyard .  I was at Home Depot and saw on their racks something familiar recently:  they were selling All Gold Japanese Forest Grasses.  $13 for a one-gallon container.  That's $7 cheaper per plant than at the Morton Sale .  But...see below.  It is about half-way filled with grass.  (It appears that these were divided this year/late last year) and didn't fill-out the container just yet.  And, they couldn't even be bothered to fill out the rest of the nursery pot with potting mix.   Never-the-less...I bought one.  Just one.  (I know....I broke one of my own rules .) I decided to plant it at the closest edge of the row (closest to our house) and planted it far enough away from the edge to allow for some groundcover to sneak in there, too....

Over the years, I've added two sets of Sun King Aralias to our backyard.  First, were six as part of a garden edit in the 'nook' garden in 2024 .  Last year, I planted three more on the opposite side of the garden .  In service of reptition and planting what works in the garden, I bought three more at this year's Morton Arboretum Plant sale.  See below for the tag/sign at the sale: When I brought them home, they were already good-sized plants.  See below for a look at the box of plants the day of the sale in my garage.  Compare the Sun Kings to the All Gold grasses right next to them: This Spring, the existing Sun Kings suffered some late-frost damage, so I held back on introducing these to the garden for weeks.  But, the time finally arrived. They were getting big and drying out. One of the things that I've been talking about over the years is what I've described as a 'hosta replacement' project on the northside.  I took this opportunity to remov...

I planted a small, ball-and-burlap Oregon Green Austrian Pine tree in our front yard in the Fall of 2024 .  This came one year after my big "Fall Planting" sprint in Fall of 2023 when I had so much success with evergreens/conifers.    I wrote a 'Getting to Know' post about this tree and talked about how it will reach a 10' height in ten years and has an open-branching look.  But, it also has some of the best 'candles' of all the conifers.   Last May, I posted some photos showing off the candles emerging for the first Spring in our garden .  In that post, I talked about how some folks choose to prune those candles to keep the tree more compact.   Here below are a few photos showing the current state of this tree and the current set of candles.   Spring Candles on Oregon Green Austrian Pine Candle'ing - the pruning of these candles - typically focuses on removing or shortening the 'dominant candle'.  Others, like the folks at th...

Last year, I planted three new (to me) ferns from the Morton Arboretum Plant Sale: Godzilla Japanese Painted Ferns . Athyrium 'Godzilla'.  They were billed as being as large (when mature) as four-to-six-feet in span.  That's B-I-G.   Last year, mine certainly didn't get *that big*.  But, they seemed to do just fine.  Because, this Spring, all three of them have emerged from dormancy.  See below for a shot of this area.   Hard to identify the fern crowns, right?  Here, below is an annotated version showing the locations: These are 'stumpery adjacent' and if they actually grow to their full-size, will fill in this space.   Maybe more of these as part of the "hosta replacement plan" on the other side of the garden?

Over the past couple of seasons, I've learned to 'know' (and plant) a pair of Korean Maple trees in our garden.  A Northern Glow in the Island Bed up front and an Arctic Jade in the backyard .  We also have a couple of Emperor 1 trees in the backyard (but...I'm pretty sure I lost the largest one this Winter.  It was ravaged by the Cicadas of 2024 and didn't seem to recover in 2025).   My success with the two Korean Maples has lead me to think about adding another one - and I wrote a 'getting to know' post about The Northwind Korean Maple from Iseli Nursery that is part of their Jack Frost Collection of cold-hardy trees.   But, as I was poking around in my Google Photos recently, I came across a cluster of photos of a different ornamental tree that I took at The Growing Place last year - on the same visit where I bought the Arctic Jade.  Those photos were for this Fernleaf Fullmoon Maple.  Acer japonicum 'Acontifolium'. This is - as the name...

While the (dang) rabbits were able to get to *some* of my Japanese Forest Grasses (when they were green), on-balance most of them are showing off a little bit of their 'winter interest'.  Are these the largest masses of grasses?  No.  But, they're SOMETHING - in terms of sizes.  I transplanted these over in 2024, so they have had two growing seasons on this border .  Here's a post showing them re-emerging for year two in April 2025 .   Here's the grasses right now, under a light blanket of snow: Here's hoping that they'll FILL OUT and get 'fat and sassy' in 2026.  

One of the shade-tolerant foliage shrubs (is it a shrub?) that continues to be a standout in our backyard is Japanese Golden Spikenard - also called Sun King Aralia.  I have a drift of them in the far back 'nook' behind the small Weeping Nootka Cypress tree.  And this year, I planted three more on the other side of the garden - in hopes of bringing some of that sweet 'garden repetition' to the backyard .   I called them 'foliage' plants because that's what they're grown for:  bright green, almost-tropical-looking foliage that thrives in low-light conditions.  But, for the first time...I now have discovered that they also FLOWER.   See below for the little cluster of flowers that has appeared out the top of the canopy:  That's new (to me).  But, wait...there's more (than flowers).  Via the Missouri Botanical Garden listing : Sun King’ is a golden-leaved cultivar that features a large rounded clump of golden yellow compound leaves whi...

Back in June, I planted three (more) Sun King Aralias in the backyard.  Last year, I planted six of the same plant in the far backyard and they came back and are thriving.  So, at the Morton Arboretum Sale this year, I bought three more for the yard.   I tucked them into the other side of the backyard (southside) about half-way back near the Green Giant Thujas.  This is a spot where I previously had an Oakleaf Hydrangea (rabbits killed it) and these three bright-green perennials check a few boxes:  1.  Repetition.  With this second colony of Sun Kings, we now are starting to show a little bit of the notion of 'repetition'. 2.  Lean into what's working.  With the six (that I ignored last year) coming back, I knew these would work well in our conditions. 3. Japanese-inspired gardening. I mean...the plants are named Sun King Golden Japanese Aralias. 4.  Foliage gardening.  These don't flower.  Or, at least don't flower mean...

Last year, I put in six Sun King Golden Japanese Aralia plants in a 'garden edit' in what I call the 'nook' behind our Weeping Nootka Cypress tree in the backyard .  They're really bright pops of semi-tropical-looking plants that thrive in shade.  And...since we have plenty of shade, these feel like a made-for-us kind of variety.  I bought those original six at the Morton Arboretum plant sale and they did just OK for their first year.  They went dormant early, so I wasn't sure if they'd come back. I saw some new growth in early April, but still wasn't sure .  By early May, I saw all six were back , so that means...(at least to me) that these *work* in our backyard.   #15 on my 2025 to-do list is to 'lean into what is working' - so adding more of these checks that box. #20 on that same list is to focus on 'repetition' vs adding net-new.  So, check number two.  And, finally...#10 is to work on 'legibility'.  These bright chartreuse...

A couple weeks ago, I posted a "Getting to Know" post about the Arctic Jade Korean Maple tree .  I showed a couple of photos from the inventory at the Growing Place and talked about how this cultivar is part of the "Jack Frost" Collection from Iseli Nursery .  The Arctic Jade is a hybrid maple that is 'more hardy' than a traditional Japanese Maple, but has 'large green, deeply cut leaves reminiscent of A. japonicum ‘Aconitifolium’. There's a lot to love about this tree - and that's why I brought one home. They had two sizes and after hemming-and-hawing, I went with the larger container that had a larger, more-full tree.  Below is the Arctic Jade Korean Maple tree on our driveway:    Here's a closer look at the leaves: There are a couple of items on my 2025 to-do list that are relevant - #5 is to "Get back in the Japanese Maple game" and #13 is to "add some trees".  This Korean Maple checks both of those boxes.   I placed...