Why I Oughta...

Back in late April, I bought a single 1# nursery container of a stonecrop/sedum at the Morton Arboretum Arbor Day Plant Sale that reminded me of eucalyptus.  I bought it on a whim and didn't have a plan for it.  When I cut and created the new Island bed in the front yard, I ended up tucking it into the backside of that bed - behind the Spring Grove Ginkgo.  I don't seem to have posted about it.  And, to be fair...I mostly forgot about it.   But, the rabbits didn't forget about it.  They've been gnawing at it all Summer.  But, it keeps growing back.   The name of the plant - October Daphne - would imply that it puts on a show in October.  But...perhaps due to the rabbit damage, that show has ALREADY begun - in early/mid-September.  See below for a photo showing the pink blooms on some of the tips: Here, below, is a look at the sign from the sale that describes the sedum (or stonecrop) - Sedum sieboldii 'October Daphne' - as a 'low spreading species'.   Gr

Last Fall, I planted a pair of variegated sedums -  Sedum kamtschaticum 'Variegatum' down by the sidewalk as a drought-tolerant groundcover .  They managed the conditions of the Winter and emerged this Spring.  I posted about them in March when very little else was growing in our garden .  They had been eaten a bit by the (dang!) rabbits, but otherwise were in good shape.  Today - in early June - they're putting on some yellow blooms.  One of them (the one on the right) is a bigger clump, but they're BOTH beginning to flower.  See below for a few photos.  Just above them are the recently-planted Dusty Miller annuals (that are being invaded by some turfgrass that didn't get properly smothered.   It looks like I didn't post about those (yet), so I need to get them into the [garden diary]. They're likely candidates to divide in a few years - once they've spread out a bit.  

What's better than *some* sedum groundcover?  MORE sedum ground cover is, well...the answer we have on hand.  As part of #FallPlanting, I added three quart-sized Stonecrop groundcover plants to the front yard.  I put two down by the sidewalk IB2DWs (extended) and one on the southside by the patch of Angelina Sedum close to the front porch. For keeping track of to-do's and what-have-you, I'm saying these 2 plants go toward 3 goals:   #2 (IB2DWs extended), #3 (plant and improve front porch bed) and #17 (keep going with Groundcover).  This is a variegated sedum - you can see the sign above.  And, it was jumping off the nursery bench to me at the end-of-season sale at The Growing Place.  Here's what Gardenia has to say (screenshot below): Below is a look at the one in the front porch bed: And here's one of two down by the sidewalk: I'm posting this in November 2023, but I did this dividing and transplanting in mid-October 2023.

#17 on my 2023 to-do list was to 'keep going with groundcover' and that's something that I've done in little pockets all season-long.  The idea of 'living mulch' along with the ability to buy LESS wood mulch is quite attractive to me.  Not to mention the increased competition with weeds, the 'reduction of footcandles' (as Roy Diblik puts it ) and the filling in spaces.  There's, frankly, a lot of reasons to like groundcover.   Last year, I added 20-or-so groundcover plants including some Ajuga and Carex. This year, I've looked at how well the Ajuga 'Chocolate Chip' has done and posted about my groundcover progress for 2023 .  Earlier this Summer -in early August - I ran a subtotal of my groundcover plantings for the 2023 season .  At that time, I totaled 30 new groundcover plants and plugs for 2023: 1  Epimedium warleyense  - Orange Queen Epimedium 3  Spine Tingler Epimedium 14  Ajuga Chocolate Chip 6  Ajuga Bronze Beauty 3  Carex Montana

On a recent visit to Northwind Perennial Farm in Wisconsin, I found myself face-to-face with a table of Sedum plants.  Stonecrop is what some may call them.  They're NOT new plants in general and not necessarily new to me, either.  I had some inherited Sedum in our house in Elmhurst that seemed to do just fine along the driveway.  Didn't think about them much then.  And haven't thought about them much now.   We also have some Angelina Sedum that I really like in a few spots.  But, these more upright sedum?   Don't have them in our garden, but that doesn't mean I can't 'get to know' them a little bit, right? Below are signs for three:  Neon, Karl and Stardust.  The sign for the Neon variety says a lot (to me):  We've been buying Sedum since the 1970's.   Lol.  The Stardust sign is even better:  This is an upright sedum with white flowers.  Go find a spot.  Another LOL. For me, the Neon and Stardust sedums are viable - as they're listed for