How To Nature

Category: flowers

  • Why I’m Scaling Back On Vegetables To Grow A Cut Flower Garden

    Zinnia Purple Prince

    All last summer, I was raking in the compliments on how beautiful my vegetable garden was. Big zucchini leaves, tall cornstalks and a wall of tomato plants.

    And it did look good, but my vegetable production had problems. Not one full cob of corn. Three zucchini. One or two cucumbers. Powdery mildew. Japanese beetles. I clearly have some problems to work out with growing vegetables. While I already know some of the things I could do differently to improve production, I also feel I need to take a step back from veggies and regroup.

    So this summer, I’ll switch over half of my vegetable raised beds into a cut flower garden. I never hesitate to buy vegetables for my family to eat, but I (usually) restrain myself from the urge to buy a bouquet of grocery store flowers every week. Even though it’s a strong urge. This summer I’ll grow more of what gives me joy. Forget about rosé. Bouquet all day. Plus, pollinators!

    Introduction To Cut Flowers

    So I open the seed catalog to a whole new category of plants, most of which I’ve never grown before. Starting at square one again. My flower experience has been mostly with annual bedding plants — petunias, calibrachoas, verbena, geranium, coleus — ones that I bought as plants and didn’t start from seed myself.

    My guide in flower selection is Floret Farm’s Cut Flower Garden. The photography in the book is just extraordinary, but there’s also information on cut flowers by season. I want to grow everything, of course. Last year, I grew the zinnia ‘Purple Prince’ pictured here. It went pretty well, so I’m branching out to some new varieties this year.

    Here’s what I’ve ordered. I tried to keep it to a peach/salmon/white palette, but things got away from me a little bit.

    Spring:

    Sweet Pea ‘Bristol’ from Floret

    Snapdragon ‘Plum Blossom’ from Burpee

    Summer:

    Alyssum ‘Rosie O’Day’ from Botanical Interests

    Aster ‘Tower Chamois’ from Johnny’s Selected Seeds

    Cosmos ‘Lemonade’ from Burpee

    Cosmos ‘Dazzler’ from Cornucopia Seeds

    Dahlia from ‘Cornel Bronze’ from Floret

    Zinnia ‘Double Zahara Yellow’ from Burpee

    Zinnia ‘Benary’s Giant Salmon Rose’ from Floret

    Zinnia ‘Benary’s Giant White’ from Johnny’s Selected Seeds

    Fall:

    Ornamental Kale ‘Crane White’ from Johnny’s Selected Seeds

    Ornamental Kale ‘Crane Red’ from Johnny’s Selected Seeds

    Sunflower ‘Candy Mountain Hybrid’ from Burpee

    Sunflower ‘Skyscraper’ from Ferry-Morse

    Not A Goodbye To Vegetables

    I’ll dedicate an equal amount of my raised bed space to vegetables. Lettuce, then slicing tomatoes. One zucchini plant. A disease resistant one. Peppers. Pumpkins? Maybe carrots. No corn. No cucumbers. No broccoli. And potatoes in grow bags. Simplify. A lot less experimenting with veggies this year. More space for each plant and less competition for water, sun and nutrients.

    Do you have any advice for this new cut flower gardener? Please let me know in the comments below or on Twitter @howtonaturechat.

  • Pruning, Pinching And Thinning: My Garden’s New Best Friends

    Pruning, pinching and thinning.

    Some gardeners consider these three of their least favorite words. Why does the thought of cutting a plant scare us so much, especially when all the experts say that what we’re supposed to do? 

    For me, it used to feel wrong to cut what you’ve coaxed to grow. It felt cruel and wasteful. I had trouble getting past the feeling that these plants are my fragile babies and a sharp pair of pruners is something I need to protect them from.

    Totally wrong. 

    Often as a gardener, I’ve looked at a sad looking flower or a stalled out vegetable plant flummoxed about what I can do to improve it. The answer is often that I should have pruned, pinched or thinned. 

    We always want more plants and vegetables. With gardening, it’s often true that less will equal more in the end. We need to cut to grow. Here are some examples where I’ve learned this first hand.

    Overgrown basil. I’ve overseed basil and just couldn’t bring myself to thin out the seedlings. Here’s how it goes: I sow too many seeds and try to will them all into thriving, but the whole pot turns into a leggy mess. The seedlings fight each other for water and light and I end up with no pesto. 

    Just do what it says on the seed packet. If you’re using peat pots or cells, thin to one seedling per cell when they have two sets of true leaves. My packet of seeds says one seedling per 12 inches. That means one healthy seedling is good enough for most containers. One healthy basil plant is better than none. 

    When I somewhat miraculously grew a plant, I didn’t want to pinch it. So it grew taller and taller until it just flopped over. Pinch the top leaves off a basil plant after two sets of true leaves. And that takes me into the same issue with zinnias.

    Leggy zinnias. Zinnias will grow and bloom just fine, even if you don’t prune or pinch them. When you don’t prune, however, each plant grows into very tall stems with only a few flowers.

    Zinnias unpinched (left) and pinched (right)
    Zinnias unpinched (left) and pinched (right)

    This is because of the principle of apical dominance, which I learned about from Proven Winners during a Twitter chat. Wikipedia’s description is a little technical, but it means that in some plants, hormones direct it to grow up through a tall main stem. When you pinch at the top of that stem, you stop that drive to grow up and instead spur the plant to grow out, through other secondary buds and then branches. 

    When I learned this, it pretty much changed everything for me. Now I’ve pinched back all of my zinnias after their third set of true leaves and they’re already stout and bushy. Take a look at the side-by-side comparison with last year’s zinnias.

    Strawberries and tomatoes: Pinching to direct energy. I read a suggestion online that gardeners should pinch all blossoms off first year strawberry plants in order to direct energy into making the plant’s root system stronger. Makes total sense but I’m not sure that I have the willpower to skip out on fresh strawberries all season. I pinched off the first few flushes of flowers, but I’m now not-so-patiently awaiting a harvest. 

    The idea of directing energy by pruning is the same with tomatoes. Pruning suckers out of tomato plant armpits directs energy into the already established stems or developing fruits. This also prevents your plant from growing into a tangle of branches, which can restrict airflow around the plant and lead to disease. 

    Too tall jade plant. I’ve grown jade plants till they were spindly and tall, while really hoping to have cool-looking branching plants. This is one where I was definitely scared to prune. They seemed to grow so slowly. And what if I cut too much? 

    After I read enough articles online, my top-heavy plants tipped over for the last time. I built up the courage to pull out my pruners and cut. And, thanks again to apical dominance, two new little plant shoots came out of each cut. 

    Increase zucchini and pumpkin production. This is my latest learning: prune zucchini and pumpkin…at some point. My zucchini production last year was ok, but there’s room for improvement and I think pruning could help. 

    I looked around the internet a little about when and where to prune. I’m still a little unclear on the right technique, but I’ll keep researching. If you have any thoughts, please let me know. 

    So I’m ruthless in the garden now. I cut. I trust the wisdom of the generations of gardeners before me. When they tell me to cut, I cut. And it’s working so far. 

  • How To Garden If You’ve Never Grown Anything Before

    Freckles romaine lettuce Botanical Interests garden
    It’s gorgeous and it’s delicious. ‘Freckles’ romaine lettuce.

    I saw the following question on Quora: “I am an absolute beginner in gardening — where do I start?” Becoming a gardening expert might not be in the cards for everyone, but knowing your way around a garden can relieve stress and keep you connected to nature. But how?

    Just do it! Everyone knows the very basics of how to garden: plant a seed, bulb or a plant in some dirt and take care of it. It’s the details that can trip us up. With all the variables (sun, water, air movement) in any growing environment, I think the best thing is to pick a project, get started and do research a little bit at a time along the way. There will be Googling and that’s ok.

    One important note on all projects: Get good dirt. If the dirt where you live isn’t good for growing the flower or vegetable you choose, it’s gonna be a tough road. Start out with a potting mix in a flower pot or container, one that includes drainage holes. Later on, you can learn about how to make the dirt outside in your garden beds better for growing in.

    Here are some projects that I think are really good for beginners, along with some details on each.

    Direct sow, if you want to start seeds.

    To direct sow is to put seeds right in the soil you plan to grow them in, instead of starting them in small pots indoors and then moving them to bigger pots outside.

    Zinnia Purple Prince garden
    Zinnia ‘Purple Prince’ is very easy to grow.

    Some of the seeds that work best as direct sow are sunflowers, zinnia and lettuce. You don’t have to start them indoors and therefore you don’t have to worry about them getting enough light. Follow the instructions on the seed packet and put your container in the sunniest outside spot you have. Even if you don’t water them every day, check on them every day.

    When should you plant them? For the sunflower and zinnia, wait until your last frost date has passed. What’s that? Basically, when the coast is clear for cold that could kill your tender plants. Here’s a handy map of last (and first) frost dates from Bonnie Plants. For the lettuce, plant those seeds three weeks before your last frost date.

    If you don’t want to start with seeds, you can also look for zinnia, sunflower and lettuce plants at your local garden center.

    Try some houseplants.

    I live in Ohio, which is pretty much known for being overcast, but I’ve had a lot of success with jade and ZZ plants (Zamioculcas zamiifolia). I don’t have either in direct sun, but they’re doing well and they look great. I’ve been watering the ZZ plant every week and the jade every other week.

    Other good houseplants to try are sanseveria, schefflera, pothos, philodendron and rubber tree.

    Countertop garden.

    The hip new garden product out there is the countertop garden. These modules offer varying degrees of automating care for your garden. Most help with keeping plants watered and many include lighting and hydroponic (no soil, just water) growing. Best case scenario: They take almost all the burden off the gardener to remember to care for the plants. Can you beat that?

    These gardens also have a secret mission: while it seems that you set them and forget them, they can also teach a beginner gardener the needs of a plant’s lifecycle. By watching a smart garden operate, you learn how often they need to be fed, how much light they need and how much time to produce a fruit or flower. Once you see this cycle, trying to grow a plant on your own with less technological help seems not so scary.

    A few examples, the Smart Garden from Click and Grow, the AeroGarden from MiracleGro, Modern Sprout and KRYDDA/VÄXER from IKEA.

    What was your first garden project? Was it a success? Do you recommend a project to beginner gardeners? Let me know in the comments on Twitter @howtonaturechat.

  • The Pollinator-Friendly Flowers I’m Planting

    white alyssum is great for attracting pollinatorsLast year, I had trouble with some vegetable crops (zucchini and corn) because they weren’t being pollinated. This year, I’m going to have lots of flowers to get those pollinators in my garden. This is great for me, because I’m more comfortable in the flower world.

    Even though I am a flower person, I’m not so familiar with a lot of the flowers that seem to be considered traditional pollinator attractors.

    But which flowers do the best job of bringing the bees, birds and butterflies to the garden? After doing the research, here are the seeds that I picked up with the intent of attracting these pollinators.

    My pollinator seed packs; borage; alyssum; milkweedBorage.

    What is that? It’s one of those flowers that I’d never heard of, but when I started investigating pollinators, this one was on every list. I got a packet from Botanical Interests.

    I’ll direct sow (love a direct sow seed) in my raised beds two weeks before our average last frost date. I got a tip from @libraryseedbank that borage and tomatoes get along well, so they’ll be together in my garden.

    Blue flowers – my favorite color. A few other bonuses: The seed packet also says that borage is deer resistant. And the flowers are edible, so my salads are going to be even more beautiful.

    Bee balm. Monarda Wild Bergamot.

    I don’t know why this plant has so many different names, but one of them has “bee” right in it. The packet recommends keeping them inside for six to eight weeks, so I’ll probably start them mid-March with my tomatoes and then move them outside mid-May.

    I bought a packet of Wild Bergamot from Johnny’s Selected Seeds. This perennial variety grows 36 to 48 inches tall, so I won’t put it in my raised beds but somewhere nearby.

    Alyssum

    Who knew these sweet little flowers were so good for pollination? Well, not me. Another deer resistant variety, the alyssum I picked up is Rosie O’Day, a purplish-pink variety from Botanical Interests. I’ll start this annual inside, four weeks before our last frost date. It’s only four inches tall, so it won’t block the sun for any of my vegetables. Great for the ends of raised beds.

    Zinnia

    Grew zinnia last year, they were killer and I have to grow more. I have some leftover seeds from last year that I’m going to try again: Candy Cane Red On White and Purple Prince, both from Burpee. I thought Candy Cane was going to be a sea of crazy red and white striped flowers, but only some in the mix have this coloring. Purple Prince ended up being my favorite.

    I didn’t do a good job with pinching them back as they grew, so they were tall and not very bushy. I’ll put these in big planter boxes near the raised beds, but start them inside four weeks before our last frost date.

    Butterfly Flower. Milkweed. Asclepsias Tuberosa.

    It’s the Perennial Plant Association’s Plant of the Year for 2017 and it could use the publicity. Another plant I don’t feel is very well-known. And the names milkweed and butterfly weed aren’t doing anything for it, but it’s beautiful! Monarch butterflies love milkweed, so we’ll see how it goes. Another perennial. I got a packet of Asclepsias tuberosa seeds from Botanical Interests.

    Bonus Pollinator Tip

    I heard in the Encyclopedia Botanica podcast (I’m a big fan) that you should plant your pollinator attractors on the edges of your garden beds and not intermingled in with your veggies. I asked Petitti Garden Center’s Noelle Akin about this practice and she said it’s because the flowers that attract bees and butterflies can also attract the bad bugs you don’t want near your veggies. In an outdoor environment, the ecosystem will take care of itself, but best not to tempt the bad bugs too close to your plants.

  • Create A Gardening Bullet Journal

    gardening bullet journal garden goals bugOn a Twitter chat, I once heard a gardener say that she inherited a notebook full of gardening advice from her grandmother. It was full of advice on the local growing conditions, her grandmother’s tricks and tips that she’d learned over probably decades of gardening. Talk about an heirloom! That’s information that should probably be published. A gardener would sell their favorite trowel for information like that.

    Looking back on my first year of vegetable gardening, there are so many things I feel I’ve already forgotten. I kept some notes, but a more diligent tracking of my moves in the garden would have made for a much more robust starting point for next season.

    Here’s my effort to remedy that. Have you heard of bullet journaling? It’s a note taking system that really stuck with me over the last few years. Now I’m using some of its ideas to track what I’ve done in the garden and what I want to do next.

    Garden Bullet Journal Pages

    Here’s what I have for my gardening bullet journal pages:

    Garden goals: What I want to accomplish in 2017 and how to get there. Writing them down makes them a little more real and makes it less likely that I’ll fall behind on a goal or forget it completely.

    Seed varieties/crop details: A place to aggregate all the info you find on your plants. There are slightly different variables to take note of for flower varieties versus vegetable varieties.

    Monthly calendar. I prefer a monthly calendar for the garden over daily or weekly. Dates to keep track of include seed starting, transplanting, germination, harvest and frost dates.

    Crop harvest count: A list of the crops you grew and notes on when and how much you harvested.

    To do differently next year: Here’s where I’ll make notes through the season about what didn’t turn out exactly as planned.

    Advice to remember: Be sure to keep track of all those tiny pieces of wisdom that you pick up, whether they’re from other gardeners, books or the internet.

    You can see more of my gardening bullet journal, with printable templates you can use, by filling out the form below. The printables include templates for variety notes, garden goals, a fertilizer calendar and more.

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  • 5 Things I’ll Do Differently In My Vegetable Garden Next Year

    Irrigation hoseI’m in the process of finishing up my first summer of vegetable gardening and I’m looking back on quite a few successes. I started in April with seeds and I grew and harvested tomatoes, peppers and zucchini in July through September. I stopped an outbreak of blossom end rot.

    Other things I tried were pure learning experiences. I didn’t get any acorn squash or pumpkins because of a powdery mildew problem. My onions didn’t germinate. My peppers were largely crowded out by tomatoes. And my corn grew tiny little ears but not many kernels. I’m going to learn from these challenges.

    This summer has been about eating tomatoes, bell peppers and zucchini, but also about patience and observation. And about learning from things that go wrong. Mainly this:

    Now I’m onto planning for next year and thinking about what I need to research and learn. Here are the top five things that I’ll do differently in my vegetable garden 2.0 next year, most mission critical first.

    1. Drip irrigation. The overhead sprinkler I used this year got the job done, with some unwanted side effects — that powdery mildew problem. There was just too much moisture on the leaves. This method also wasted a lot of water. Next year, drip irrigation. I’m starting my research with this article on DIY irrigation systems from Home For The Harvest. We used soaker hoses once before and I think they became clogged, so I’ll be studying this a lot more.

    2. Attract pollinators to the garden. Now I get what everybody is talking about. The reason I didn’t have more zucchini this year is because they weren’t getting pollinated. And I probably also had a pollination problem with my corn. Bees, get thee to my vegetable garden.

    I have no in-ground garden beds near the raised bed vegetable garden, so this is going to take some planning. I might have some room in the raised beds for some low-growing flowers, but that space is limited. I’d rather have strong, tough perennials in the ground for pollinators to enjoy year after year.

    3. Better staking. Tomatoes and bell peppers could have used sturdier supports this year. And I bet cucumbers and zucchini would have had fewer disease problems if they were raised up away from the soil and supported better. In my square foot garden setup, I think everything would have been a little happier with good staking. Traditional tomato cages are probably out. They just didn’t give tall or sturdy enough support. I added plastic stakes to those plants by late summer.

    Traditional tomato cages are probably out. They just didn’t give tall or sturdy enough support. I added plastic stakes to those plants by late summer. These square cages look good, but require a little DIY and elbow grease.

    In my square foot garden setup, I think everything would have been a little happier with good staking. Traditional tomato cages are probably out. They just didn’t give tall or sturdy enough support. I added plastic stakes to those plants by late summer. These square cages look good but require a little DIY and elbow grease.

    4. Composting. I have all these banana peels and egg shells that I’m just throwing away. How about doing something productive with them? There are quite a few types out there. It seems that a few features I want are a tumbling-type composter with insulation (but not too much insulation) and no metal internal parts to rust. I want to get this in place this fall so I can take advantage of fallen leaves. Any recommendations, internet? Here’s a fun video I watched to get some tips.

    5. Learn about preservation and canning. I was pleasantly surprised by a big tomato harvest this summer. I wasn’t sure I’d harvest any. I grew a middle-of-the-road amount: we weren’t able to use them all in salads and BLTs, but we didn’t have enough to make a big batch of sauce for canning. And it’s a good thing, because I don’t know how to can yet.

    Let’s put it this way: I’d like to grow some fruit next year, but not until I learn how to make jam.

    Do you have advice for me on any of these topics?

    Let’s talk on Twitter @HowToNatureChat, in the comments below or by email at [email protected].

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  • When You Accidentally Grow The Hallucinogenic Plant Jimsonweed In Your Backyard

    Datura jimson weed nightshade
    If you think it looks scary, you’re right. It’s datura, also known as jimson weed and nightshade. And I found it growing in my garden.

    I can’t be the only one who has accidentally grown a hallucinogenic plant in their yard, right? Here’s how I found out what was going on in my garden container.

    That week, the #Gardenchat Twitter chat topic was plant identification. Participants were all talking about the plants and weeds in their yards that they needed help identifying.

    I didn’t think I had much to offer to the conversation, then I remembered that weird weed that I’d let grow in one of my vacant containers. I’d figured it was just a tree sapling because it was quite woody.

    But then it grew some long, pendulous trumpet-shaped lavender-colored flowers and freaky spiked green seed pods. That was pretty weird. Not like any tree I’d seen in the neighborhood.

    So I posted a pic on Twitter, sure that it would be some super-common weed that all real, experienced gardeners recognize on sight. I felt silly even bringing it up.

    A few gardeners did recognize it, but I was not expecting the ID. It was datura, also known as jimson weed, devil’s trumpets and nightshade. If ingested, flowers and seeds can range anywhere from mildly hallucinogenic to deadly.

    I can’t believe we never saw any squirrels tripping in the yard.

    Wikipedia and #GardenChat contributors (thanks @CountryglLiz and @Denise4003) both point to birds as a possible source of this weed, carrying seeds from who knows where in their bellies and then ever-so-kindly depositing them in my yard. Makes sense, since the container is close to our bird feeder.

    So how do I get rid of it? Burning it is probably not a good idea. GardeningKnowHow says to basically treat jimson weed like a biohazard. Glyphosate. Gloves. The whole nine. Fun.

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  • How To Save A Droopy Coleus

    People are trying to be good gardeners. Then they get a droopy coleus and just need a little nudge in the right direction. They think they should instinctively know how to take care of plants and that there must be something wrong with them. That they have a black thumb. I hate to see this.

    There’s a lot to learn. It takes time and trusted resources to guide you in the right direction.

    How can @mytribeofsix save this sad coleus? Let her know on Instagram.

    https://instagram.com/p/BDy4k20qQC1/

  • How Not To Grow Stephanotis

    I got a cutting of stephanotis and I tried to root it. It did not work. I blame it on Orphan Black assassin Helena. No one strikes fear in my heart more than Helena, and now she’s struck in my garden. *whimper*

    Maybe I’ll just buy a finished plant.

  • Ring Corsages And Succulent Cuffs: Wearable Garden Trends

    Who wants a boring old wrist corsage when you could have one of these cool ring corsages? Lux Wedding Florist has a post sharing more on the trend.

    Whoa. Love it. For my birthday, Valentine’s Day. Having it with me all day long. This one is from Fiona Perry Floral Design.

    And have you seen anything like these succulent cuffs from House of Sunshine now available at Plant Depot? More long-lasting than a corsage. Here’s House of Sunshine’s Etsy store.