Why I Oughta...

Back in the Summer of 2022, I picked up and planted three VERY SMALL Green Velvet Boxwoods around the base of a flowering pear tree IB2DWs.  These were right at the break in the bed where our gravel (Bluestone chips) runs from our driveway back to the yard.   When I say 'very small', I mean it:  they were in 1# nursery pots.  I've planted a number of 1# boxwoods over the years and I've been ok with the fact that they take time to mature.   That's the case with these three.  They're not fast-growers, but they sure have grown up.   This post tracks 28-months of growth.  That's 2.5 growing seasons (1/2 of 2022, all of 2023 and 2024).   They grown from about six-inches tall and four-inches around.  To, what you see here, below.  These are now more than a foot tall and close to a foot in diameter.  The first photo shows two of them.  Then second photo shows the third one.  Note all the suckers coming out of the flowering pear tree that need to get cut down.   Th

Over the years, I've created and expanded garden beds using various methods including digging out all the turf, flipping the turf and (more recently) doing some combination of digging/flipping the turf and layering on cardboard to supress the grass.  That cardboard smothering method seems to work pretty well and it is well...easy.  At least it is FAR easier than digging out the turf.  But, the cardboard method has a big drawback - the grass is *STILL THERE*.  So, that means it is tricky to plant in the bed immediately. If you plant in the cardboard zone, you have be careful to remove the turf around any 'holes' in the cardboard that you want to plant in - otherwise you'll end up with grass peeking through around the stems/trunks of whatever you plant.  Trust me...I know.   My problem is that I don't plan ahead enough and get the beds ready BEFORE I want to plant them.  So, why shouldn't I use some of this "Fall Planting" time to build out new/extend ex

The Fall ornamental grass dividing season continues with a few more Karl Foerster Feather Reed Grasses.  I started dividing these grasses the last few weeks by taking some of the larger ones in front and back and dividing them up and transplanting .  Of the five larger ones in our backyard, I had already divided one of them and transplanted near our hops vine .  So, it was natural to take another one of the larger ones from this same area - in front of our kitchen window - and divide it up again.  One of the things that I've been thinking about for a while is how we add some 'corner beds' to our patio and I've mused about using boxwoods.  But, in thinking about how I could use these feather reed grasses in a series of plantings to bring some cohesion to the garden, it seemed right to try a trio of grasses on one of the corners of the patio.   I dug out a small bed on the southwest corner of the patio, removed the Automower wire and then divided a Karl Foerster Grass in

A few days ago, I posted (once again) about the 'in between two driveways' part of our yard and talked about how the hot, Summer sun beats down part of the area so much so that I've had the grass go dormant every year.  In that post, I talked about taking on just a PART of the area - down by the sidewalk - which is the worst-hit portion of the turf each year.  My thinking was to convert this section to a bed and plant it with something a bit more drought-tolerant.    My longer-term thinking is to convert much of this section 'in between two driveways' to a long, linear bed with just a little bit of turf .  But, that's a big project requiring quite a bit of turf removal AND a lot of planting.   That means I'm going to start with a smaller section right now - and I started to carve out the bed last night.  Just to get the contours of the area that I want to transform, I removed the edge and will follow with removing the (now dormant) turf in the coming days.

I've posted dozens of times about peonies.  Nat's favorite flower.  By a bunch.  We had a series of lovely and productive (flowering) peonies in Elmhurst, but in the past four growing seasons here in Downers Grove, we have yet to have ONE peony flower.  I think it has to do with all the shade we have and where the peonies are planted.  To try to solve that, I transplanted some of the peonies closer to the house in an attempt to get them some Sun.   But, for Mother's Day, we also bought Nat a new peony.  It is this "Duchesse De Nemours White Peony" that you can see on the tag below: This particular cultivar is white (which, we normally don't have) and comes with some credentials.  From White Flower Farm comes this description : A century-and-a-half after its introduction, the fragrant double 'Duchesse de Nemours' remains a standard by which all other white Peonies are judged. Strong stems give the blossoms an aristocratic bearing; a touch of yellow at t

Part of the newly carved out beds in our backyard - near our patio - are the only real shots we have for a lot of Sun in the back.  As part of the whole transplanting/order of operations stuff, I transplanted a bunch of our peonies up here and left some spots for annuals.  Well, I treat dahlias as annuals - and don't keep the tubers like a good gardener should - so when I found this bicolor dahlia at a good price, I grabbed it and popped it right into the ground.  It is called a "Labella Maggiore rose bicolor dahlia" and it seems to be off to a decent start in the ground: Below are the tags that show that it gets between 18 and 28" tall - so not huge for dahlias.   The colors on this particular variety remind me of the Disneyland Rose colors that we see later this Summer.  I've grown dahlias in the ground before over in this area and I think that will be a nice feature to replicate every year.   I'll keep these wet and then mulch them in shortly.

I have a section of our backyard that calls for a bunch of Ferns.  Ostrich Ferns, to be precise.  Last year, I transplanted a bunch of them (10) to this area just to the West of the Large Northern Red Oak tree that has our swing on it.  You can see some of those in the photo below - the Ostrich ferns are the lime green ones that are vase-like.   But, with the newly expanded beds, I also needed to fill in the section in front.  I did that by transplanting three MORE Ostrich ferns in front.  But, then I had a little gap between those in the border and the ones from last year.  So, I when I came across a pair of ferns that I've never seen before (at a good price), I grabbed them and decided to use them here.   First up, a pair of Shaggy Shield Ferns.  I didn't know anything about them, but they caught my eye.  From the Missouri Botanic Garden comes this listing  that mentions they are native to Japan: Dryopteris cycadina, commonly called wood fern or shaggy wood fern, is native to

The area that (earlier this Spring), I labeled " Priority Area #2 " has begun to be addressed this Spring ahead of the mulch being applied.  Last year, I planted three Guacamole Hostas in this area that calls for nine total Guacamole Hostas and after I increased the bed size, it was time to add even more to get this area filled out.  Of the three that I planted last year, one of them has been having some trouble (with the cold weather + drought), so I decided to plant seven new ones - to bring the total to ten.  Nine + one troubled one.  Here (below) is the layout of these new Guacamole hostas in their nursery containers.  Four one gallon pots and three quart pots with smaller ones. And, here below, is an annotated version of that same photo.   Red circle = 2020 planted hostas. Green circle = new 2021 Guacamole hostas.  The four larger ones came from Hinsdale Nursery.  The smaller ones from Johannsen Farms in Bolingbrook. Purple circle = one of the Praying Hands hosta. Blue

This month, we added a large tree that checks A LOT of boxes.  This is the third tree of this growing season - with the small Japanese Maple Tamukayama and the bareroot Shagbark Hickory coming before this one. I say "this month" because I'm posting this in mid/late May, but I put it in the ground right at the beginning of May.   But, back to those 'boxes' that this checks.  This is the Weeping Nootka Falsecypress. Weeping. Check. Conifer. Check. Tolerates part shade.  Check. Narrow.  (kinda) Check. Focal.  Check. Nook.  Check. Horticulture Magazine describes it like this : The weeping Nootka cypress (Cupressusnootkatensis ‘Pendula’) is an evergreen tree with lots of personality, thanks to its draping, drooping branches that would fit right into a Dr. Seuss book. This award-winning conifer makes a dramatic addition to the garden where it can add valuable winter interest. Here is the tree that we bought - in the photo below - planted in the new north bed curve.  I

Yesterday, I posted a photo of some transplanted Ostrich Ferns in the south bed .  Today, I'm sharing a photo of some of those same, harvested Ostrich Ferns in the north bed - just past the Oak Tree with the swing.   I transplanted the four ferns you see along the border in front.  One of them is large - and came from the north side of the garage.  The other three came from around the Dawn Redwood. Also, in the photo below, you can see three or four other ferns - a little further back in the bed.  Those are a few of the ten that I put in this area last year .  It seems like NOT all ten of them made it.  But, this little section should fill in with Ostrich Ferns in the coming growing seasons. 

I recently planted our first Japanese Maple Tree (Tamukeyama) and a trio of Autumn Brillance Ferns in the newly expanded south bed.  The plan in this area called for Ostrich Ferns, so I was able to scavenge five of them from the north bed - around the Dawn Redwood - and transplanted them in a little drift or colony to the east of the Maple.   You can see this little fern section come to life below.  Autumn ferns in the middle.  Ostrich Ferns on the left.  These are survivor ferns as I've not bought Ostrich Ferns in Downers Grove.  These came with the lot and even after being cut back and buried under sod, they...ummm...survived.   They spread out, so I'm hoping that these five make it through this growing season and (if they do), that means we'll have more than five here next year.  

 In the order of operations for this Spring, I continue down my transplanting plan.  First were the Fanal Astilbes that I moved out to the edge of the bed.  Then, I divided and transplanted 15 hostas in a border .  Today, posting a photo showing three newly transplanted All Gold Japanese Forest Grasses.  I planted six of them back here in the Fall and they all came back this Spring.  With this new bed created (and extended), I took three that were in the back and moved them up to the front edge of the bed - that you can see in the photo below: If I come across more of these grasses this year, I'm thinking I can use a couple of them on either side of these three to create a nice grass border.  I planted them far enough back to account for a full-size adult grass to live within the bed.  Posting this in early May, but I did this work on April 24, 2021.

Yesterday, I posted a photo showing the new location of the dozen Fanal Astilbes that I transplanted out to the edge of their new bed and commented that that was the FIRST of a few posts showing the transplanting that I have been doing this Spring.   Today, the photo below shows the new location of 15 teardown hostas that I planted on the southside of the yard in the curved border of this new bed.  You can see the first three on the left taking the 'second row' spot and if you look closely, there are two more in the 'second row' under the Oak tree at the top of the photo: Here's an annotated version of that photo showing the 15 hostas: A few important notes: 1. These hostas are (I'm pretty sure) Lanifolia Hostas .  Based on this "What hosta do I have?" page , I found this Lancifolia page in the Hosta Library.  Things check out.  I inherited them when we moved in.  They're plain green with glossy leaves.  2.  They get to a nice size - if left alone

Yesterday, I shared the planting of eight bareroot Bressingham Blue Hostas in a new bed in the backyard.  I had previously planted two others by the screened porch .  That's 10 of 18.  Going down my list, the next spot for the balance of these looks like back by the Yew Hedge.  From my planning post: 1.  Priority Area #2 for 2021 .  Calls for 8.  Done.  Posted yesterday . 2.  Hicks Yew Hedge corner.  Calls for 6. 3.   Screened porch corner.  Calls for 2.    This one is done already . That area calls for six Hadspens, too.  Here is showing these six (in blue) in relation to the previous eight (in green) per the plan: And, here's where they're going in - spreading to the north of the northern-most Hicks Yew. These are deep shade but likely have the BEST soil on the property.  I used wood chips last season to mulch in the yews and create the fire pit area, but this year they'll get a proper hardwood fine mulching.  Same thing, though:  Think I can beat 50% success rate on

Six weeks ago, Nat came home from Costco with some bareroot plants including 18 Bressingham Blue Hostas that I intended to put into the yard as soon as I could this Spring.  Bareroot season comes at you fast and I wanted to get them in right away.  But, the order of operations got in the way.  And, I had to wait to plant these until after the final edges of the beds were set.   I've planted these very same Bressingham Blue Hostas in 2018 .  I actually don't know where those ten went nor how many of them have made it.  I'm assuming that some of them are along the north side of the house, but I'll take a closer look this Summer when they all come up. As for these 18, I planted two of them already outside the screened porch .  Leaving 16.  In the post where I talked about buying these, I mentioned a bunch of spots where these COULD go.  I ended up convincing myself that the three places to start with these were: 1.  Priority Area #2 for 2021.  Calls for 8. 2.  Hicks Yew