Archive for garden tips – Page 5

Satisfy Summer Color Cravings with Easy Care Crocosmia

Posted by Carol 
· June 20, 2014 
Croscosmia Explosion flowers

A parking strip garden in SE Portland, OR across from Laurelhurst Park. The gardener used to work for a huge wholesale company that sold unusual bulbs.

Crocosmia flowers mean summer has arrived!

Having grown up in Oregon I can’t really trust summer is here until I see those intense red, orange or yellow trumpets!

In Portland,  they typically start to flower in late June into early July. The variety Crocosmia ‘Lucifer’ is the local favorite because of the intense crimson hummingbird attracting flower. Plus it’s one tough plant that comes back even in adverse situations.

The Good News
Crocosmia are perfect for color cravers. The long, strappy stems are great in a vase and beloved by hummingbirds. They are tough and clients think they are extremely low maintenance.

So What’s Not to Love?
Crocosmia as a group can be aggressive spreaders – especially for small urban gardens. Lucifer reaches 36″-42” tall and has a tendency to flop halfway through summer. The corms need to be divided frequently to keep these issues in line. To me, that is not low maintenance.  I have better, findable replacements to add to your summer garden before you give Lucifer the “Get thee behind me”! hiss.

Croscosmia Explosion flowers

This crocosmia mimics the color of a juicy tangerine.

Other Crocosmia Options
Better varieties are 10 to 15 inches shorter than Lucifer, don’t crowd out their own flowers and don’t flop to the ground.  Lucifer lovers will complain that none of the other red varieties spread as fast as Lucifer . . . but there is such a thing as too much of a good thing.

Joy Creek NurseryJoy Creek Nursery in Scappoose, Oregon  grows many of the good varieties of crocosmia.  I talked with Maurice Horn, Co-owner and plantsman extraordinaire and all three Crocosmia listed below are currently available:

‘Hellfire’ available now (6/15/14) at Joy Creek Nursery is 24″-30” and is an intense orange red.

‘Walburton Red‘ is closer to the rich red of ‘Lucifer’ but will increase very slowly compared to ‘Lucifer’. This is where I compare cheap chocolate to real chocolate, by the way.

‘Golden Fleece’ is 24″-30″, an amazing color of deep clean yellow. It starts flowering late in the summer and will carry through to fall.

Croscosmia Explosion flowers

I love to see a mix of different varieties of crocosmia flowers together.

Other good varieties that are hard to find but worthy of your garden
These corms (bulbs) don’t overcrowd and therefore continue to flower freely:

  • Bright Eyes
  • Burnt Umber
  • Little Devil
  • Little Red Head
  • Miss Scarlet
  • Walburton Yellow

Please don’t feel you have to rip out your Lucifer even though I have compared it to bad chocolate! Feel free to try a few of these other varieties and then if you are tired of giving up space to “Mr. Spread and Flop”, you won’t have any problem giving him away to a friend or containing him. Perhaps ‘Lucifer’ is a really great first crocosmia, sort of like a first love James Dean bad boy that you can’t part with.

 

Categories : Dramatic Flowers, Garden Tips, Low Maintenance Landscape Examples, New Improved Plants, Parking Strips, Plants I Recommend
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Five Important Garden Tips

Posted by Carol 
· March 21, 2014 
Landscape Designer Irvington Portland Landscape Designer Carol Lindsay in M Wynton design

Carol Lindsay at Garden Designers Tour 2013 M. Wynton Design

Five Important Garden Tips You Need

Weeds and Garden Mulch

Use mulch or even bark dust initially. The first two years in your new landscape are critical for controlling weeds. While installing your new plants, the soil has probably been disturbed and this wakes up dormant seeds causing perhaps hundreds to germinate a a time. If you are diy, cover your soil with 2″ of garden mulch. Mulch is best for your soil and plants but if you have to have low maintenance no matter what, top dress your soil yearly with a dark hemlock bark for the first two years. After you are through the worst of it start applying a garden mulch at least once a year. This mulch will feed your soil and you won’t need fertilizer. 90 percent of plants live happily and healthily with applications of garden mulch and do need commercial fertilizers. There are many exceptions to these rules: SW desert style or xeric plantings like manzanita should not be fertilized or even top dressed with garden mulch ever. Gardenias are fertilizer pigs. Edibles like tomatoes….need fertilizers to produce food.

Get rid of blackberry and ivy

Treating blackberry and ivy with Roundup at the wrong time of year (spring and early summer) is pretty much useless.  In the Pacific NW late summer and early fall is the time when blackberry and ivy are most susceptible to glysophate (Roundup) herbicide. It’s a million times more effective in late summer and early fall.

In an ideal world we would not use herbicides at all;  if you are going to use them, use them sparingly correctly, and at a seasonal time when they will be effective.  For more information see my blog:  Treating blackberry and ivy .  I want acknowledge in light of recent research and court cases, we don’t know the full extent of harm Roundup and other herbicides cause.  It’s still the most practical way to reclaim our native plant areas from the stranglehold of Himalayan black berry and English ivy.  Digging out small areas of blackberries is also effective and better for the health of  mammals and other life forms.

Learn how to water-Watering every day is not your friend

Over watering or under watering new plant material is a typical cause of plant loss. Your common sense watering will kill your plants if you don’t have the specific information for the specific plant type.  You can’t water a new tree the same way you would water your petunias.  I insist my garden coach clients have a written watering plan for the first two years of their new landscape.  I tell them how long to water and to hand check the soil to see if their efforts are successful.  Last, but not least, if you’re watering every day you are in line for losing a lot of new plant material.

Sedum s Red Carpet in winter

Colorful tough ground cover for full sun

Plant labels lie.

Trust me it’s not a conspiracy, but they write the label so that it makes sense for the entire country.  In the Northwest we have the ideal growing conditions so plants will grow taller and wider than indicated.  In addition, just because a plants mature size is 15’ tall, does not mean it will stop growing once it gets there.

Learn light requirements for your plants

It’s not so easy. Labels don’t have enough room to explain the complexities of sunlight, let alone the four different kinds of shade.    Great Plant Picks is a great information resource in many ways, and has an excellent explanation about the different kinds of shade.   There is no perfect solution, even checking the Web will get you four different suggestions for light requirements on a single plant.  This is why experienced gardeners often move plants that don’t seem to thrive in the first location they select.  Others hire designers who know these things first hand.

Carol on a garden coach appointment in Irvington neighborhood Portland Oregon

“Thank you so much for all your information today and your helpful phone call Saturday.  I was pulling out plants in my mind as I was going to sleep last night.  I can’t wait to get started!”  D’Anne Oneill

No hedge pruning unless it’s a hedge

Pruning.  My best advice is don’t let your father-in-law prune your Japanese Maple!  Do not do hedge pruning on plants that are not hedges.  Too much learning already? most of my clients don’t want to become an expert gardener anymore than I want to become a computer technician!! Most just want a healthy and attractive landscape.  In which case, hire someone else to prune for you. While I certainly advocate for hiring a garden coach (since I am one) you can learn from a local nursery, community college or someone who has trees and shrubs that don’t have a bunch of stubs on them.  We want pruning that will enhance a plant’s natural and unique shape. Better yet, contact me to see if I have a real gardener I can refer you to.  Twice a year visits or less to handle pruning will save your trees and shrubs from your good intentions.

Categories : Fall Gardening, Garden Tips, Shade Garden Tips, Shade Plants
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Treatment for Blackberry and Ivy – How To Get Rid Of It

Posted by Carol 
· September 13, 2012 

Garden Tips for getting rid of Plant Invaders

The best time of year to treat blackberries and English ivy is coming right up…..so prepare now!

Blackberry Fruit

How can anything so sweet, be so evil?

Plan to treat invasive blackberry in September and early October. The reason for the specific timing is this: only in the fall will the plants pull an herbicide to the roots, thereby killing the entire plant. The rest of the year treatments are only partially effective. For greener garden practices that use less chemicals treat the plants only in the fall, and water your bad old blackberries well prior to treatment. In fact you could even fertilize them and pamper them for about two weeks…….and then treat them with an herbicide.

My long time client Pat Tangeman  is clearing a large area of her property. She bulldozed last winter and got rid of a decades old blackberry wilderness that had an extensive root system with many large stumps. However, even a bulldozer didn’t kill all the blackberries! Many came back this spring so she called me to problem solve and design a planting plan for the area.

The result:
This fall she will treat her remaining blackberries and will allow the herbicide to trans-locate to the roots to truly kill the plant. Then she will have the remainder of large roots dug out. Once this is done she can plant the new garden we designed together. Victory over the blackberry!

Another client in the Dunthorpe area is having her English ivy treated by professionals the first of September. She is utilizing the same techniques by doing the pre-watering and pampering herself. Once the invasive plants are dead we will be ready to place her new garden plants from her garden planting plan.

Not sure still when would be a good time? Need a professional hands on approach to help get you started? There are still a few appointments for Garden Coaching open in September and October. Winter is also a great time for making plans so you can have what you want instead of taking your precious time to care for a layout and plants you don’t like.

Categories : Fall Gardening, Garden Pests, Garden Tips, Shade Garden Tips, Shade Plants
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Attack of the Root Weevils in Portland Shade Gardens

Posted by Carol 
· September 13, 2012 

Why you should care about root weevils, and what to do about them once you do.

Many Portland established shade gardens have  leaf damage from adult root weevils (see photo showing leaf notching). It is ugly, but it doesn’t kill your plant. A lot of leaf notching can spoil the looks of the plant just when you wanted to enjoy its beauty. The serious problem is caused by their larvae who eat the roots of your plants during the late fall and winter. It is very difficult to kill the larvae because they live underground nestled into the roots of your plants to be close to their chosen food source. Think of them as tiny, tiny zombies! Rooooooooooooooootttttssssssssssssss………..

So how do you know if you have a root weevil problem? Here is what I recommend:

Root weevil damage on hydrangea in Portland landscape design

It’s the damage done to the roots that we worry about. We must control the adult weevil before she lays her eggs.

Check your indicator shrubs for notching! These are Hydrangea, Red Twig Dogwood, Azalea, and Rhododendrons. Many perennials will also show the notched leaves such as Hostas and Coral Bells (Heuchera).  If you have only a few notches, you don’t have to do anything or you could treat once a year as a preventative measure.  If you have more than a few notches, we need to talk but you can also check out my other root weevil blog for all the gory details of killing root weevils.  It is tricky to do.

Don’t bring them into your garden………Here is a timely tip, be very picky about buying plants on discount, or at fundraisers!  Look for notching on the leaves, and don’t buy any plant that has notching, or is near plants with notching.  Root weevil can walk over to the plants near by and lay eggs so even if there is no notching on a plant there are probably eggs in the potting soil.  You don’t want to introduce them into your garden. (I’m not saying they came from your freshly purchased potting soil….root weevil just walk from one plant to another and lay their eggs.)

Now the important part. How do you get rid of them?  Hand picking is the easiest to actually do but they can be very hard to spot.  This dull colored beetle is only 1/4″ and hides effectively in the top of the soil or inside a leaf crevice. It can take checking your plants several evenings a week with a flashlight to find even one.

The chemical products out there are harmful to you and the bees which we need in order to have food. Using chemicals to get rid of root weevils is definitively not the way to go.

I purchase living nematodes that are specifically listed for root weevil. Properly applied, they will swim through your soil, enter the body of the root weevil larvae, and lay their eggs. The nematode hatchlings will eat the larvae. Initially you will do this in both September /early October and the following May which are the ideal nematode vs. larvae times!

The 3 most important things:

The soil must be warmed up and moist

You must apply the nematodes at dusk, never in direct sunlight.

Get the timing right-treat in May or early June.  Treat again in September.  If we are having a cool May you may want to wait until June.  In September you want to be sure your soil is well watered prior to the treatment of nematodes, and then water well for two weeks following the treatment. This will eliminate some of the root weevil problem for the next year.  You will have to repeat the biannual treatments for a few years to get the weevils properly controlled, and then continue with a once a year preventative treatment cycle (in September).

You’ll get better results if you use Pondzyme in the water before you add the nematodes.

The good news is that it is really easy to do…ok it’s tedious but your shade garden can look so bad if root weevils become numerous.
1) Take a 5 gallon bucket and fill it up with water.
2) Treat the water with a product called pondzyme (people use it to protect their fish from the additives in our water). I use 1 and ¼ teaspoons of Pondzyme to 5 gallons of water.
3) Add the nematodes to the water.
4) Using a plastic pitcher, not metal, I then water the nematodes into the soil where I see leaf notching.
It is very little effort for a dramatic and healthy result.   Good gardening!

Resources:

March Biological is mail order.  I like them.
Living nematodes for root weevil larvae can often be purchased May through September at: Portland Nursery
http://www.portlandnursery.com/
Farmington Gardens
http://www.farmingtongardens.com/
Cornell Farms
http://www.cornellfarms.com/
and other higher end garden centers.
Tranquility Ponds has 3 locations and they sell an 8 oz bottle of Pondzyme for $26.00.  Remember you need the pondzyme to protect your nematode warriors from chemicals in our water so don’t skip this step.  It is very concentrated so it should last you a very long time.    http://portlandpondsupplies.com/

Categories : Garden Pests, Garden Tips, Shade Plants
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Hydrangea Love

Posted by Carol 
· May 1, 2012 

Designers mom with favorite hydrangea

My Mom with Oliver, the Hydrangea

Hydrangea Love

There are several lessons in this story for you, O gentle reader………..how to successfully transplant a shrub or tree in July heat……, how to prevent hot weather damage to your plants when we have intense hot weather right on top of weeks of cool rain, (more critical if you agreed to have your garden on a fundraiser tour).  This will also work to restore plants in a container that you forgot to water???? ……………..these helpful lessons all fit into this story.

The story:  My mom and dad planted and named the two hydrangea by the back patio, Mary and Oliver.  Mary was beautiful no matter what but Oliver had troubles.  Every year in early summer, Oliver’s flowers would get crisped.  If they had planted Oliver a few feet closer to the covered patio there would be no problem and no story.   They planted Mary in the afternoon shade of the patio but Oliver got the early afternoon sun in June and July. He was just not a super sun tolerant kind of guy.

He could handle the sun better once the leaves and petals had hardened off in July but in early June, while the leaves and petals were full of spring, freshly unfurled, a 100 degree day or two would toast all the new flowers on the plant.  So Oliver’s flowers would scorch and my parents would then over water Oliver trying to get some water back into his petals. They did not understand that once petals are scorched they stay that way. Oliver’s new flowers were fine but now the plant’s leaves looked terrible. Over watering caused the leaves to wilt and yellow. Oliver was a mess.  I offered to come over and protect Oliver from them. The human Mary and Oliver had long since gone on so these were not really plants to my parents, but symbols of their dear friends.

Protecting plants from heat stress in Portland Area Landscape Design

The Sheet Trick

So how did I do this?  The Sheet Trick!  My first solution was to water once a week and the second solution was to protect Oliver from intense sun.  My solution was time consuming mostly because I lived in NW Portland and my parents lived in Gladstone.  If I was expecting intense sun,  I would drive over, get out some binder clips, drape a white sheet over Oliver to cover all his leaves and flowers and then clip the sheet onto various large stems so it could not blow off.

Because the leaves were covered (this is science folks!) they held in the water rather than letting it go, this is called transpiration. Transpiration is part of the plants photosynthesis process with the sun.  See Wikipedia on photosynthesis.  Since the flower petals and leaves kept their water, they stayed cool enough and did not scorch. I would not leave the sheet on for more three days at a time so I didn’t have to go over there every single day, just when I knew it was going to be hot.

Hydrangea PistachioWhat’s important for you gentle reader is that this sheet trick is handy beyond belief for all kinds of things.  Number 1  best tip ever for transplanting a shrub in the summer…….keep it covered for 3 days and I mean immediately or even during the digging of the plant if you are feeling compulsive.  Use it to protect flowering plants if we have intense heat while the flower petals are still new and soft. Use this trick if you have had an irrigation boo boo and your plants in one area didn’t get any water and  have wilted.  Presto, sprinkle the leaves with water gently, water the plant and cover for a few days……..your plant will have a better chance of recovery.

Every generation loves hydrangeas, my parents loved theirs, I love them although confess I have none of my own down here on the floating river house, my step daughters would love to have them…..maybe I can fix that this year.  They also look mighty fine with ornamental grasses so not just for an old fashioned garden but could be used in more modern gardens if placed thoughtfully.

Categories : Dramatic Flowers, Garden Tips, Spring Gardening, Summer Garden Tips
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