Sanhedrin Nursery – Garden Blog

• Dig gently to harvest potatoes, a few plants at a time, after foliage yellows and dries up.

• Colorful petunias will brighten up any flower bed. Their purples, pinks and reds make a real splash when planted in groups of the same color.

• Dig and divide crowded spring-flowering bulbs and tubers including daffodils, scillas, muscari, and bearded iris.

• Keep flowers and vegetables in peak condition by giving them a midsummer feeding with a fertilizer that is higher in phosphorus than in nitrogen.

• After the June crop of raspberries is finished, remove canes that produced fruit leaving new green canes, which can then be trained on trellises.

Solve landscaping problems with vines

All vines scramble or climb, but that’s where their similarity ends. You can grow vines for shade, for food, or for beauty of foliage, bloom or fruit. Vines range from tough, woody grapes, wisterias and trumpet vines to annuals like morning-glories and sweet peas. Add in clematis, ivies and Virginia creeper and you have lots to work with.

Are you bothered by an unsightly view? Vines can be used to cover up unsightly views or structures. Does your deck or patio broil in the noonday sun? A vine planted to grow over an overhead structure can provide welcome, cooling shade much quicker than a tree can.

Vines are used to soften and connect the hard edges between structures and plants in a garden. Wisteria or grapes can be used to cover a sturdy trellis linking the house with the garden. Or they can climb over an arch or pergola to form a green entrance or walkway. The drooping clusters of wisteria’s fragrant flowers are beautiful in the spring.

Plant vines to screen unsightly walls or views. A well placed vine can provide the same amount of privacy as a tall shrub, while taking up less horizontal space. For this purpose, be sure to choose evergreen vines, and train them to cover a trellis thickly. You can also extend the height of a typical 4-6′ privacy fence by adding trellising materials and an evergreen vine.

Virginia creeper, which attaches itself to walls with little suction cups, is excellent for covering plain walls or fences. In the fall, it turns a brilliant scarlet before dropping its leaves.

Star jasmine and Carolina jessamine are both evergreen vines. Star jasmine is prized for its wonderful fragrance. It climbs by twining, so will easily grow up a wire fence, but you may have to tie them to a trellis to start them growing up a wood fence.

Carolina jessamine is a twining vine that covers arbors, fences, lampposts and pillars. It’s bright yellow trumpet flowers make an eye-catching display in the spring.

The deciduous clematis have wonderful show of large, colorful flowers in spring or summer. They are ideal on a pergola or trellis in an area where you want to enjoy summer shade or privacy but admit winter sun.

A chain-link fence can be turned into a beautiful green wall with vines. Orange trumpet vine or Virginia creeper will give a lush green look all summer but be bare in winter. Ivy or evergreen clematis will hide the fence permanently. Honeysuckle is partly deciduous but covers well and spreads its lovely fragrance over a large area.

Annual vines are generally overlooked for their landscaping qualities. Planting annual vines on fences, gates and other structures quickly brings an established look to a young garden. Create summer shade on a porch with a string trellis covered with vines. Try morning-glories, scarlet runner beans, and moonflower for eye-catching summer color. Hops vines make a beautiful green covering but die to the ground each winter.

Look to versatile vines to help solve many of your landscaping problems.

• Marigolds are prolific bloomers that will add bright orange, yellow, mahogony and crimson to your sunny flower beds.

• Prune rhododendrons, camellias and azaleas to shape them now. If you wait much longer, you will be cutting off next year’s flowers.

• Remove suckers on rose bushes. These vigorous canes emerge from below the bud union and should be cut off as far down as possible.

• Feed annual blooming plants and hanging baskets every two weeks for prolific bloom. Keep dead flowers pinched off.

• Start seeds of broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower and other cool-season crops now. Transplant them to the garden next month and they will be producing for you this fall.

Gardening in the Shade

When the weather is too hot for working in the sun, gardening in the shade is much more pleasant. While some plants do not grow well in low light, many others thrive in these conditions. Just as moisture, temperature, and soil conditions may limit plant growth, the amount of shade present may determine which plants will grow successfully. The key is to discover which ones are adapted to the conditions in your yard or garden.

Landscapes change their degree of shade over time. As trees and shrubs mature, the landscape receives greater shade. What was once a sunny garden may evolve into a shady one.

Keep in mind that light patterns also change with the seasons. An area that is in full sun in summer when the sun is high in the sky may have medium shade in spring and fall, when the sun is at a lower angle. Also a shady summer area may receive more sun in the winter when the leaves fall. Study your garden through the seasons to accurately determine what type of shade is present.

Available sunlight may be increased by selective pruning. Removal of lower limbs on large trees can increase light levels significantly. Large shade trees are a valuable resource that in most cases should be preserved. However, removal of diseased, unattractive, or poorly placed trees improves the beauty of your property and increases the light available for plant growth.

Plants growing in the shade often must also compete with roots of shading trees for nutrients and moisture. Shallow rooted trees such as large maples, birch trees, redwoods, poplars, pines and willows are particularly troublesome. Roots competing for limited surface water may cause shade gardens to dry out more quickly than expected.

Adding organic matter to shade garden soils will help. Most woodland species are accustomed to growing in soils rich in leaf litter compost. Raking and removal of leaves each fall in the typical landscape disrupts this natural nutrient recycling process. If you are patient, earthworms will eventually incorporate organic matter into the soil.

Bright, bold colors are less common in shade tolerant plants than in sun-loving ones. Flowers are usually produced less abundantly in the shade as well. For these reasons, shade gardens are often more subtle and restful than sunny ones.

Plant textures become more important elements of the design. Large-leaved plants such as hostas have a coarse texture, while finely divided fern fronds create a fine texture. Strong contrasts in texture will help individual plants stand out.

Glossy leaves have more impact than dull or velvety ones. Variegated or yellow-green foliage is evident in the shade more than dark green or blue-green foliage. Light colors – white, cream, yellow and pastel pink – stand out in the shade, while deep reds, blues and purples may fade into the shade unless set off by a contrasting lighter color. To emphasize plantings in the shade, concentrate on plants with light-colored flowers or foliage.

Impatiens, begonias and coleus are by far the most successful flowering annuals for a wide range of shade conditions. Bedding or wax begonias come in pink, red or white with green or dark purple leaves. A spectacular sight is a bed or border of impatiens edged with wax begonias in a contrasting color. The color range for impatiens includes red, pink, white, orange, orchid and bi-colors. Plant a large-leafed Kong Coleus to the background and you’ll have a stunning display.

Add a fountain or birdbath and you will enjoy your shade garden all through the hot days of summer.

• Roses need water and fertilizer to keep blooming well throughout the summer. Watch for pests and treat immediately to prevent infestations.

• Budworms eat the petals of geraniums and petunias, leaving you with no flowers. Spray plants weekly with BT for complete control.

• Birdbaths will attract our feathered friends to your backyard so you can enjoy them close-up. Place them a few feet from a bushy shrub to give the birds protection.

• Garlic should be harvested when the leafy tops turn yellow and fall over; air-dry bulbs, remove tops and store bulbs in a cool place.

• Shade-loving begonias and impatiens will add color and beauty in both planters and hanging baskets.

Landscaping with Herbs

Although many people think that herbs belong on the windowsill or in the vegetable garden, herbs also make fine landscaping plants. Many attractive shrubs and ground covers are herbal plants that can add beauty to the landscape while providing foliage and flowers for herbal uses.

Herbs are generally easy to grow and require less watering and attention than most other plants. Their aromatic oils make them relatively immune to insect attack, and for this same reason, deer usually leave them alone. Their fragrance in the garden is another reason to make use of them.

Some low-growing herbs make good lawn substitutes in small areas and around stepping stones. Chamomile and woolly thyme are very good in sunny areas. They can be mowed occasionally if they get taller than you want. Corsican mint, which forms a moss-like mat, in sun or partial shade emits a very strong, pleasant odor of mint when lightly brushed. It is the mint used to flavor liqueurs.

Creeping thyme, lemon thyme and silver thyme are very drought tolerant and make a mounding mat for full sun. Prostrate rosemary grows about 18 inches tall and is excellent for planting on hillsides and for draping over walls. All types of rosemary can be used for culinary purposes and are very deer resistant.

Lavenders, upright rosemary and sage are all lovely shrubs for dry sunny areas. There are many types of lavenders to choose from that grow between 18 inches and 4 feet tall. Lavender can be used as a foundation plant or to create a hedge and will still provide you with delightfully flavored flowers and leaves.

Upright rosemary can grow to 4 to 6 feet tall and makes a nice clipped hedge. Culinary sage has gray-green leaves. There are also varieties with variegated yellow and green leaves, or silver and purple leaves. They make a small mound, about 2 feet tall.

Santolina, or lavender cotton, is a gray, mounding plant that is useful for borders. Catmint has soft, gray-green foliage and lavender-blue flowers that make a showy display.

Foliage is one of the most interesting aspects of herbs for landscaping. Several members of the artemesia family are particularly striking with their silver or gray leaves. Artemesia ‘Powis Castle’ has finely cut, silver-gray foliage that is fragrant and it makes a fine background plant at 3 feet tall. Germander makes a low mound with small rosy-purple flowers in dense heads.

One of the largest herb plants is the Mediterranean bay laurel, Laurus nobilis. It is an evergreen shrub growing 12 feet tall in a dense, tapering cone. This shrub has the bay leaves used in cooking, and it makes a good screening plant.

Two of the most interesting flowering herbs are bee balm (also called monarda and bergamot) and purple coneflower. Bee balm leaves make a fine tea, and purple coneflower, the familiar echinacea of many herbal remedies, is a long-blooming perennial that can be a great addition to any garden. It is great favorite of monarch butterflies and should be in every butterfly garden.

While most herbs prefer a sunny location, some will do well in part sun or shade. Sweet woodruff — used in potpourris and as a moth deterrent — is an excellent shady area ground cover that cares little about soil conditions.

Whether you want a formal herb garden or a hillside of fragrant herbs, you’ll find herbs to be useful and attractive plants for landscaping.