What Are You Planting This Spring?: A Garden Thread

[L.C. Blackwell]

The garden thing popped up on another board, where it doesn't quite fit, so here we are instead. The question: what are you planting this spring, or what do you wish you could plant?

I'll go first. I'm planting...

Lupines (sky blue)
Double-click Cosmos
Daylilies (mixed hybrid seeds)
maybe some lettuce and vegetable stuff, we'll see

What I'd like to plant:

Sweetpeas
More lilacs
More everything, that space and time and mosquitoes don't allow

Feel free to derail this thread for a discussion of gardening in general--I'm just feeling in the mood for spring and dirt and growing plants.

 

[CoriSCapnSkip]

I'll be continuing my ongoing project of digging out flowerbeds and replacing the soil with a layer of horse manure and a layer of Miracle Gro garden soil before putting in plants and topsoil. Sometimes I have done this working around large established plants. In the past several years I have obtained or transplanted shrubs such as virginal mock orange, old-fashioned red-flowering Japanese quince, lilacs, and these yellow flowering things we don't know the name of. The abovementioned fertilizers and applications of a product called Zamzow's Thrive have done wonders. I also dug and separated a lot of bulbs and when I replaced them spread bone meal, so things look very nice this spring.

Last fall I finally got hold of some hollyhock seeds and put them and some other things in an area I marked off and will be watching to see what comes up there.

My next big projects include thinning English ivy and moving Japanese lanterns which are getting kind of smothered. I'll put them in the same mix of soil I've been using for other things and keep the ivy out of them. I also hope to transplant a bunch of irises my neighbor is throwing out otherwise but don't know how far I'll get.

After the last frost danger has passed I plant gladiolus bulbs.

Also, this year a lady is giving me starts of ever-bearing raspberries. I'll be ripping out the middle of my regular raspberries and replacing them, but leave the regular raspberries on either side till the ever-bearing are well-established.

 

[Dgullen]

For the first time in several years I have a garden again, and have some plans! The previous owner left me very nice flower beds full of bulbs, and hibiscus, alium, aqualegia, and more so I have been working on the veg and digging out the neglected beds full of nettles, grass and dandelions.

Planted: spuds, gooseberries, parsley, chives, sage and thyme, and a grapevine in the green house.
Sown: runner & broad beans, courgette, marrow, sweet pepper, tomato, marigold (good companion plants for veg), and intend to get melon for the greenhouse.

And arrived today - raspberry canes and a loganberry. I bought 3-6 canes of three different type of raspberry, each fruiting at different times.

Dave

 

[Maryn]

I only put in a garden two years ago and am learning that deer will eat anything and don't hesitate to devour deer-resistant plants. I understand the red-twig dogwood should recover ("Think of it as the deer trimming it back, so you get that new red growth every year," said CallaLily) but the pussy willow and forsythia are goners, and I don't think I'll replace them with new bushes even though I'd like the height.

I'm thinking of adding plants I see do well here in our hard-clay soil: black-eyed susans, purple coneflower (I have some and they're doing well), morning glories and moonflowers given something to climb, and maybe sunflowers or ornamental grasses to get a height balance.

Of course, by August about a third of whatever I put in will be dead. That's the way it goes with a black thumb. I can take it.

Maryn, tough guy

 

[writerterri]

This spring I'm planting my butt on my couch and watching movies. I'm so allergic to spring.

Atchoo!

 

[Tepelus]

This year I'm going mostly native. I got a bunch of seeds for Christmas of native perennials and annuals, some non-native, and have been sowing them in milk jugs and setting them outside during the winter. Some seeds need the cold to germinate, some do not. Those that don't I generally sow this time of the year through April. I have a few that actually need to be sown in the fall, they need a warm-cold-warm cycle to sprout (Paw Paw, Cimicifuga and[SIZE=+2][/SIZE] Aristolochia serpentaria are a few I have sown that need this). I've got several that have sprouted already, but many more won't until we get more stable warmer weather. The Paw Paw won't sprout until the end of summer, if it will at all (it's a tough one to grow). Then there are the daylily seeds. Daylilies are my favorites, and I've made crosses in the last few years with plants I'm growing and harvested the seed. The ones I crossed in '08 and grew in '09 should hopefully bloom this year, last year I had one seedling bloom for me. The crosses I made in '09 and planted last year have another year to go and need transplanting, they're over-crowded.

Last fall we had our old garage torn down and built a new one. I had to move and pot up all of my plants that were around the old one and this year, after I have prepped the soil around it, most will go around the new garage and the seeds I'm starting will eventually go around it too, once they get big enough to transplant. I have a lot of work ahead of me, and with all this rain I haven't been able to get a start on the new beds around the garage, the yard is too muddy. Hopefully in April I can start.

 

[backslashbaby]

Ooooh! I love hearing everyone's plans!

I'm adding more roses, because that will be engraved on my tombstone, no doubt. The Rose Lady

This year starts my mini-orchard, too! The price of fruit has gone out of sight as much as I eat it. I'm starting with what I eat the most of: cherries, pears, blueberries, raspberries, blackberries and nuts (almonds and hazelnuts). I already have strawberries and grapes.

Most of those will be a few years before fruiting, but it's exciting just the same.

I have my veggie staples down, so this year I'm adding a few white veggies to my herb garden (in a sundial pattern, all formal-like ). White tiny squash (winter and summer), tomatoes, and I might add these white cukes I found! I don't eat many cukes, but I may not be able to resist growing them, lol.

Also, lots of conifers. I love me some conifers. And camellias, and a variegated osmanthus that I'm quite excited about.

There's actually more. But I plant small plants and get excited watching them grow up, so it's not as much as it might sound, lol.

 

[LaurieD]

We rearranged the 5 roses around in the bed this winter and added a creamy white to the pinks and yellows. All of them have new growth, even the new one.

Last summer, we found a bunch of white lilac-looking bushes growing along the back fence line and under the trees. This winter we dug up 6 of them and put two in the back of the rose bed and the other 4 where my hybrid Lilies had been before the voles/moles ate the bulbs. All 6 have new leaves, so we managed to move them without killing them, whatever they are.

My front daylily bed is overflowing with "wild" daylilies - the tall orange ones. At last count, a dozen have escaped the bed and need to be moved before we start the mowing season. I think I'm going to put them along the fence near the driveway.

 

[jennontheisland]

No outdoor space.

But, I rooted some lemongrass from the grocery and it's still living. And a chunk of ginger has sent up a shoot so I feel obligated to put it in dirt.

I'm going to visit a friend in a few weeks and he's got a garden space started, so I'll be working there. Mostly veggies and herbs though.

 

[heyjude]

Kudos to all you green-thumbed people. I just can't do it. It all dies for me.

Hubby, however, has a truly green thumb. The other day he planted a lemon tree, an orange tree, blueberry bushes, and cilantro. Oh, and flowers. As long as I leave them be, they should be fine. Can't wait to pick my own lemons.

 

[Grrarrgh]

If I could just get grass to grow in my backyard, I'd be thrilled. Much less anything else.

 

[heyjude]

Oh thank God. I thought I killed this thread like I kill plants.

 

[Ol' Fashioned Girl]

Actually, we've got a section called 'Hands On' for all the gardeners, quilters, knitters, glass blowers, etc....

But I'm too lazy right now to move this thread there. Maybe later...

 

[writerterri]

Oh thank God. I thought I killed this thread like I kill plants.

Any plant I bring in here dies within days. No direct sunlight. And my black thumb.

 

[Maryn]

Anybody else noticed that the price of fresh pineapple just halved itself? It must be their season. Anyway, I'm going to try once again to root its top after we eat the fruit. I've done it before and kept it alive for a while, but some kind of nasty bugs got it. Maybe they're gone, since I've given them nothing to eat. (Or maybe they're lying in wait!)

Maryn, also black-thumbed

 

[L.C. Blackwell]

Woo-hoo, found a new section! And I have three baby lupines showing their noses already. Alas that the weather is not getting any warmer (yet.)

@ Maryn-- Deer will not eat daffodils. They pick out the tulips instead.

 

[sunandshadow]

Last fall I planted more crocuses (didn't have any yellow ones), more hyacinths (didn't have any peach ones) daffodils (didn't have any at all), and some small nodding alliums (didn't have any alliums). I also scattered columbine seeds around. This spring I added dutch irises, and when it gets a little warmer I'll be scattering hollyhock seeds, poppy seeds, pansy seeds, zinnia seeds, maybe some coneflowers. It's a loosely-structured experiment to see what flowers will naturally survive and reseed themselves in the local climate (zone 6 pennsylvania). I also bought a blue girl rose and some daylilies to plant when it gets a little warmer.

From previous years I've got tulips, muscari, snakeheads, roses, bearded iris, and a peony that came with the property - the rest was all ivy, periwinkle, sedum, morning glories, and grass. Also some barberry bushes and a forest of rose of sharon weed-trees.

My garden this year will have bush beans, carrots, and okra, the three things I've had the most success at growing and eating so far, and the experimental vegetable of the year will be rutabagas. They're so cheap at the grocery store it's probably pointless to grow them, but I'm running out of vegetables I like to eat that I haven't already tried, and the peas and zuchini didn't grow well.

What I wish I had room for is more trees - I've got raspberries, grapes, blackberries (not very tasty but they make such huge amounts of fruit I don't have the heart to rip them out), blueberries (unless they died, again), and a small peach tree, but there's just no room for more fruit or nut trees. A greenhouse would be wonderful too, I'd love to be able to grow oranges and pineapples. I planted a strawberry last year but didn't get any berries, so I'll be curious to see if it does better this year.

 

[blacbird]

Where I live we still have a foot of snow on the ground, so I ain't planting anything outside. But I have started some things in indoor plant pots, under the optimism that the snow will eventually melt. These include hot peppers of three or four varieties (every other year I get a few to fruit), romaine lettuce, golden beets, yellow pear tomatoes and this years' experiment, ground cherries, a tomato relative). I figure for a buck-and-a-half of seeds, it's worth the entertainment top watch 'em die.

Also some annual flowers: gazanias and livingstone daisies, which do pretty well here.

Tomorrow I'm going for some more stuff in pots, zucchinis, nasturtiums, cabbages, kohlrabis, broccoli.

 

[Polenth]

In the winter, I planted some tulip bulbs (mixed types). They're starting to come through. I'll try to grow sunflowers again this year, but the slugs loved them a bit too much last year.

 

[Niti Newtfinger]

I'm going to plant a whole bunch of gorgeous red roses like the one in Beauty and the Beast. However, growing them is another issue entirely.

 

[icerose]

I'm going to plant a whole bunch of gorgeous red roses like the one in Beauty and the Beast. However, growing them is another issue entirely.

My grandparents had gigantic red roses in the front of their house all my growing up years. The roses were bigger than my grandpa's outstretched hand and just smelled amazing. We tried and tried to grow roses on the property I grew up on but every winter the hard freeze would come and the graft would die leaving only small wild roses. I love wild roses too, don't get me wrong, but we could never get those gorgeous roses my grandparents had. Turns out "location, location, location" applies as much to roses as it does real estate. If we ever hoped to grow nice roses we would have had to shelter them all winter long and give them a warm side such as the house to do well the rest of the year.

Live and learn right?

I hope your roses do well.

 

[icerose]

As for me no plans. My mother-in-law has been dealing with health issues since August so she's talking pretty heavily about changing her garden and flower beds to all grass. It might be the best decision for her so we'll see.

 

[Ari Meermans]

I'm sorry your MIL isn't well, icerose. I hope it isn't anything too serious; in any case, she probably should take it easy and not have a garden to stress over.

 

[Kate Thornton]

Tomatoes! They are going in (sets) this weekend. And shallots.

Out back, the first apricots are on the new stripling (3 tiny ones) the pluot is covered in fruit and the citrus are all bearing (Meyer lemons, blood oranges, Mexican Limes, tangerines have just finished, and kumquats & new limequats are bearing). The fig & pomegranate are leafing out and the new dwarf apple striplings are budding - no blossoms, so no apples this first year, but that's okay. The banana got frost bitten, but it's put out a new leaf.

The orchids are in bloom and all the lovely little muscari are up - some pointy and tiny shoots promise irises soon. The white camellia put out a few blossoms and the two Japanese maples - one green, one red - are starting to leaf out. Out front, the desert is abloom with poppies, sages, and a big pink grevilia.

I love Spring.


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[Kate Thornton]

Sunandshadow - you are in PA - you can grow citrus beautifully in containers if you have a garage or porch or something to protect them from frost. Try it!



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