Blueberries very easy edible plants. Blueberries are great for your brain. Did I mention easy? Once your plants are established, the trick to growing blueberries is proper pruning. We want to encourage new growth and to do that, we have to remove some of the old growth. This is a great thing to do together on a garden coach appointment. Do mulch around your plant periodically with coffee grounds to increase acidity in the soil (any time of year works for this – you could do it up to ten times per year! ) Don’t use peat moss even if other experts say to do it.
Archive for garden tips – Page 6
Bulbs can be the ultimate low maintenance plant, just pick the right ones and get them out of the garage. (Yes thousands of bulbs selected with great anticipation live and die in the garage.) Please don’t feel bad and give up on bulbs. Everyone has done this. Garden Coach makes the time and sets up the structure to get the right bulbs planted in the right place in your garden. We are placing orders now. Read on for a few quick picks of my favorite bulbs.
Here is my list of easy to find bulbs with graceful demise.
Alliums, lots can and is written about the good ones, (yes there are bad ones, avoid anything that says naturalizes). My top 3: Spring Allium Karativiense ‘Ivory Queen’, Early Summer Allium Cernuum; and Summer. Allium ‘Globemaster’. Mix ’em up with daisy headed flowers for great contrast.- Species Tulips – my favorite is the Greigii Tulips because their foliage is attractive with purple splotches. They are shorter at about 10 inches tall and so less likely to fall over with heavy rains. My personal Greigii favs are Oratoria or hot colored Toronto. Other more delicate looking types such as T. Clusiana Cynthia spice up the garden (reds) and open and close, showing off bright yellow and intricate interiors.
- Camassia – awesome blue flower, a native plant that can handle clay or heavy
soils and then goes dormant and needs no additional water in the summer. This is my idea of low maintenance. There are many varieties but check out Camassia quamash ‘Orion’ for a seriously blue hit of heaven. Plant them behind a group of Black Eyed Susan (Rudebeckia) or Asters or Sedum ‘Xenox’, cousin to S. ‘Autumn Joy’. - Dwarf Daffodils – go for the shorties and plant these with other “require good
drainage” kinds of plants like the heathers, or dwarf conifers, or even good old common Candy Tuft. This is a great way to get an easy burst of color – no muss, no fuss and no rubber bands on the dying foliage please. All these plants have the same needs, low water, good drainage and SUN. 
Fritilarria – very unusual looking, graceful, everything to gain and nothing to lose but only if you plant them right away. If you leave these in the garage even one day, it’s all over. Plant immediately upon receipt in filtered light. Underneath the edges of a large shrub or small tree would be good.- Lastly, a warning………Scilla is a BAD bluebell bulb that spreads. There are some trustworthy types of Scilla but too few for the risk………. No Scilla! Getting rid of it is a nightmare, (although I accomplished complete annihilation of it once). The NW has Scilla Hispanica in nearly all areas. It is kinda sweet (cute bluebell flower) but it is a Trojan horse. The seed can easily blow out of your yard to your neighbors yard. It takes both cutting off the flowers before they seed and digging the bulbs up over and over for years to get rid of it.
Read more about it? Click here for The Oregonian blog by Kym Pokorny on Bluebells
How to Prune Your Lavender Plants – Best Practice
How to Make Your Lavender Last for Ten Years-Prune Twice A Year
In late winter, (January and February) pruning lavender is an optimistic and happy task. If you are in on the secret this is when lavender gets the biggest cut. (See video below for the how to.) For decades people were taught to prune only in late winter. This outdated practice does not give you a long lasting plant.
In the fall no one wants to prune their blooming (still colorful if faded) lavender plants. (NOOOOO! I don’t want to prune them, they are soooo pretty right now!) I agree gentle gardener, but please let me persuade you to try this new technique and prune them the second time.
Trimming lavender back by half (late summer/early fall) and trim again in late winter/early spring. This gets you ten years instead of three in your garden! Learning how to do this in a garden coaching appointment is a confidence builder. Once you learn how, you can have fabulous low care lavender the rest of your gardening life.
Another bonus to pruning twice; lavender can look tidy for winter if we prune them correctly in the fall. How to properly prune lavender. The video was created by our own Stonegate Lavender grower from West Linn (who sadly closed up shop in 2015). I agree with her technique and her video is still live, teaching people the right technique.
Don’t worry, you don’t have to use a lavender saw, you can use your trusty Felco pruners or other clippers – the lavender saw Sarah is using is pretty cool and is old school as in 1500’s.
Lavender is an excellent plant for feeding our native bees and endangered bumble bees. Not any old plant will do for natural bees. Contact me for a landscape design that includes easy care colorful plants that are good for our pollinators.
