Sanhedrin Nursery – Garden Blog

• Fall is for planting! Trees, shrubs and perennials planted now will grow twice as much next year as those planted next spring.

• Holland flower bulbs are now available for fall planting. These lovely gems will bloom for you next spring.

• Tree collards are delicious winter vegetables. Set out plants now.

• Plant Bearded Iris right away so they will bloom for you next spring.

• Beautyberry has a profusion of violet fruit clusters that adorn it in autumn, making a unique display of colorful berries.

Wildflowers: Free Spirits of the Garden

Wildflowers form brilliant Persian carpets of color across many open areas of the United States each spring. Along roadways, through meadows and across hillsides they burst into bloom, coloring the landscape and offering a feast for the eye.

You can recreate these carpets of color in your own yard in large sweeping drifts or in a small flower bed. Wildflowers that are suited to California are low-maintenance landscaping. They are adapted to grow and bloom in the spring when the soil is still moist, and then die down as the warm summer weather dries out the landscape. They have low water and nutrient requirements and many of them, like godetia, baby blue eyes and tidytips, self-seed while others, like California poppies and lupines, have deep perennial roots that hold them over until the next season.

Open grassy areas are ideal places for a display of wildflowers. You can create a flowering meadow by combining wildflowers with grasses and seeding them over a large area. They can be sown among perennials as a stunning addition to the landscape. And wildflowers can be planted in their own flower bed. Seed at the rate of about 1 ounce per 300 square feet.

Fall is a great time to plant wildflowers, especially as the first rains fall. You can broadcast seed on a grassy hillside and throw a little straw or mulch over it and you will have some wildflowers next spring. But for the best germination, rake or rototill the top 1-2 inches of soil, removing as many weeds as possible. Broadcast the seed, then rake gently to mix the seed into the top 1/4-inch of soil. Keep it moist during germination, usually 2 to 4 weeks.

Wildflowers can be planted in either spring or fall. If you plant in the fall, both annual and perennial wildflowers will bloom next spring. If you wait until spring, the annuals will bloom the first year, and both the annuals and perennials will bloom in the second and succeeding years. If you let the plants set seed, they will sprout new plants the following year, and they’ll attract wild birds.

There are some specialty mixes available including butterfly and hummingbird mixtures. You can also plant a hillside of California poppies, that will make a stunning display each spring.

Beneficial Insect Mix will give you more than a beautiful color display. It contains flower varieties that will attract beneficial insects to your garden, which will help rid your garden of destructive insect pests. Plant a border around your garden, or mix with other flowers in the garden.

Nature’s Meadow™ combines grasses that are particularly good for erosion control with 24 different kinds of wildflower. What a beautiful hillside it will make!

So add a splash of springtime color to your landscape with wildflowers and enjoy their low-maintenance beauty.