Why I Oughta...

Nat had our two front porch containers (the long, galvanized one and the round white pottery one) done by a professional.  And they look MUCH better than they do when we do them ourselves.    Yesterday, I shared a couple of photos of our large nursery pot of Mums , but on the other side of the front door, the containers - along with a BIG white pumpkin - look like this - photo below. There are a couple of LARGE cabbages/kales in the containers and one of the things I picked up (another pro-tip) is that the professional 'tipped' the cabbages/kales forward in the planter.  They're NOT planted straight up/down in the container.  Rather, they're planted on an angle - so the head of the cabbage or kale - faces up-and-out.  Very, very, very clever.   Here, below, is a 'profile view' of the galvanized container plantings.  Note how the cabbage is tilted forward or pitched forward.

You just brought home that awesome pot of Mums from Costco (or the pumpkin patch that you went to this past weekend) and put them up by the front door along with some of your pumpkins and gourds.   You're worried about killing them by forgetting to water them - that's very valid.  But, there's another problem you're about to face:  flopping, open-crowned mums.    Some call this 'falling over' and unless you have a number of your mums tucked-in tightly together in a cluster, your mums are going to 'fall over' or flop.   How do you avoid it?  By using a piece of string or twin or wire to tie them up and keep them held together at the top.  I wrote about this pro-tip back in 2017 - when I encouraged everyone to take a piece of string around the foliage and stems of their mums and tie them together .  I've been doing it ever since. This year, we went with a monochromatic nursery container of maroon or dark red mums.  I used a piece of padded garden wire

Are you like Nat and I and get your mums from Costco?  You know the massive ones in the big plastic pot that is good enough to display on your front porch as-is?  Then, my friend, I have a tip for you:  Get ahead of things by tying up a piece of string or twine about 1/2 up the plant.  That way, they won't splay on you when the buds flower out and get top heavy.