Why I Oughta...

Last year, we had three established Disneyland Roses and three bareroot plantings.  All three of the bareroot floribunda roses didn't come back this Spring.  And, the three established ones - while blooming very well this year - are showing signs of struggle with their foliage.  Last week, I gave them their second feeding of the season and used a 'combo' fert + systemic treatment granular that is billed to handle both insect/pests and fungus/diseases. Last year, I saw the foliage of these roses start to decline and while I'm PRETTY sure I had some sawfly larvae (lace-like foliage), I don't know if that was ALL that I was dealing with out there.  Fungus?  Other disease?  Perhaps. Last December, I posted about my Sawfly Larvae experience and that's how I was thinking of approaching this season :  combo fert+insect systemic and periodic spraying with Neem Oil on the leaves.  As I mentioned, I've applied two treatments of fert+ this year.  And...  I also spraye

When I think back on my gardening journey, I really started as a vegetable gardener.  Tomatoes, peppers, squash, beans, herbs and more.  When we moved, I really leaned AWAY from vegetables and into perennials and foliage.  Why?  Shade vs. Sun.  Our old garden had ALL Sun.  Our new one has almost ALL Shade.   But, I began to solve that by building a patio vegetable garden set-up over the years.  First, with a raised planter box.  Then last year, with a Greenstalk tower. #19 on my 2024 to-do list is to 'do more with vegetables' .   How am I going about doing that?  By planting a couple of bush tomatoes and some other things. First the tomatoes.  I've mostly settled on ONLY planting bush tomato plants.   This year, I bought one at the Morton Sale - Tiny Tim Cherry.  I also picked up two others at the big box store: Little Napoli - which is a roma in bush form (kinda neat) and Little Bing - also a cherry.  Below is a look at the three in the raised box: I normally grow basil an

Day four of Zinnia-mania - but now we move from beyond IB2DWs to the new cut flower bed that I carved out on the side of our house.   For 2024 plantings with Zinnias, I first  posted the details of some common orange Zinnias that I planted as bedding plants .  A day earlier, I planted a larger, further-along  Uproar Rose Zinnia  from the nursery.   Then, yesterday I planted a Zowie Yellow Flame Zinnia in the conifer garden IB2DWs .  I pinched off all the blooms on these to try to get them to grow a bit more bushier.   But, I'm also going full-on Zinnia Chaos Gardener with the new bed on the southside of the house .  I bought a couple of packets of Cut-and-Come-Again Zinnias and decided to direct sow them in the bed.  Did I evenly space them?  No, just kind-of scattered them.  Here's the bed recently planted - you can see anything but loam/dirt/mulch/compost/biosolids of course: I also put some in the Greenstalk tower.   But, that's not all.  Last Fall, I collected some Zin

Day three of Zinnia-mania IB2DWs.  Yesterday, I posted the details of some common orange Zinnias that I planted as bedding plants .  A day earlier, I planted a larger, further-along Uproar Rose Zinnia from the nursery.   I have been trying to push myself past the discomfort around flowers and this new Zinnia from The Growing Place certainly is there: out of my comfort zone.   As I walked around the nursery, this Zinnia jumped off the bench.  Zowie Yellow Flame Zinnia.  See below for the sign.  It reads: "This stunning cultivar will stand out in any setting with its 3' - 4' bicolor blooms of golden yellow and magenta orange."   This was the MOST expensive Zinnia that I have bought, but it was a 6.5" nursery pot: And, that meant that I really bought TWO zinnias.  After having them sit on the driveway for a couple of days, I noticed the foliage was drooping.  That evening - after work - I dug them in to the conifer garden.  Below you can see the immediate look - wi

 For Mother's Day, the kids and I bought a couple of flats of ordinary orange zinnias from the big box store that we planted in some pots for the Moms (and God Mothers) in our/their lives.  I ended up having a few extra and put some in our back patio containers (more on those later), and decided to plant four as bedding plants near the driveway in the original IB2DWs bed.  I picked orange because I like orange and it is the Illini color (of course).   Yesterday, I posted about the one Uproar Rose Zinnia IB2DWs - and that one is much larger/bushier than these.    Below the first photo shows what these orange zinnias look like after a week or so in the ground: I have limited experience with flowers (as I've said in the past), but what I've read and watched online, you can pinch off blooms to (try to) get bushier plants.  So, naturally...I decided to sacrifice these early orange flowers.  I cut them all off - you can see the result below.  I left the flower heads there on the

#2 on my priority list for 2024 is to 'keep going with flowers' .  That means...pushing through my discomfort around blooming perennials and annuals and planting things that I haven't in the past.  This year, that means that I am expanding a little bit out from what I *do* know and what I *do* like.    Last year, I had a small patio container that mixed some salmon-colored zinnias and Euphorbia .  It was great and I was able to cut from the Zinnias all through the late Summer/early Fall.   This Spring, I cut out a new bed on the southside and planned to spread some Zinnia seeds around (more on this soon) to serve as a sort-of cut flower garden bed.   But, I also went further with flowers this year by planting some dahlia tubers.  So far, I've planted six Melina Fleur Dahlia tubers (that I started indoors) .  Three in the sideyard, three in the front porch bed (where the Disneyland Roses were last year).  And, I put in three Orange Nugget Dahlia tubers in that Zinnia b

Last Fall, I planted a three-pack of Penstemon Midnight Masquerade in the conifer garden IB2DWs and talked about how I needed to keep going (out of my comfort zone) with flowers.  There was a lot to like about these perennials - they're drought tolerant, can handle heat and humidity, full of dark foliage and bloom purple and white flowers.  When I bought them, they were past bloom-time, so that flower part was taken on faith. This Spring, I marked their reemergence for their first Spring in early April when new foliage clumps came back from dormancy .   I topped this part of the bed with some big box mulch (not leaf mulch...) and mostly moved on in the gardening season.  Until this week.  When these things started to bloom.   Have a look at my three one-year-old Midnight Masquerade Penstemons ( or Beardtongue ) with their showy light purple and white clusters of flowers: This spot is full sun and is part of what I've always called the 'hard to grow' section.  The thick