Fantastic Fall Gardening!
No, we are not Vermont, and there may be an exodus of foliage fanatics headed east, but right here in western Kansas we have some bragging rights also. Your garden doesn’t have to shut down just because fall is here. Armed with a list of fall performing flowers, shrubs and trees that are still earning their garden space into the waning months, a bit of planning on paper translates to a garden that still pops when you are planning for Turkey Day.
Planning for fall colors is more than just trees. The oaks, ornamental pears and Chinese pistache may be the backbone of late season color, but shrubs can add another level of interest to the mix. Add to that the grasses that are heading out and why go anywhere else to revel in fallish fantasies?
Burning Bush in Shirley's yard
Anything in the viburnum shrub family will color up reddish to bring the eyes down from the treetops to mid border level. The large dried orbs of the Annabelle hydrangea and berries hanging on to the cranberry cotoneaster are a stunning blend.
Don’t forget the flowers. Mums, tall sedums and asters stirred up with the fading flowers of Blue Victoria salvia and Russian sage stave off the impending wintery shut down for as long as possible. Leave the dried heads on the echinacea and goldenrod for the birds. A little planning means long- term gardening.
Subscribe to the comments for this postThe Poinsettias Are Coming!
Fall fell last weekend and freezing temperatures sent outdoor summering houseplants back inside to the tropical warmth of sunny windows for their winter snooze. My five-year-old poinsettia made its annual fall journey back to the south living room window a few weeks ago. It is about three feet tall, the old stems have turned woody like a shrub. I bumped it up to a fourteen-inch ceramic pot a few years ago and it still performs well without an annual repotting. While it’s tropical neighbors are beginning their winter sleep, the poinsettia has work to do, beginning with it’s seasonal parade of brillant scarlet leaves (yes, leaves, not flowers).
Courtesy of Public Domain Pictures
Poinsettias are day length sensitive. Their Holiday colors appear when a strict light/darkness schedule is observed. It means a thirteen or fourteen-hour night and the remaining hours in good sunlight. Even a street lamp shining through a window or a night light nearby will interrupt the budding efforts of the plant.
Overwatering is the surest way to kill a poinsettia. Add to that a too warm spot and the plant will fade before your eyes. Fertilize about twice a month, provide temperatures not above seventy degrees and a cooler ten degrees at night and watering when the top one inch of soil is dry to the touch will keep the plant happy.
When the springtime temperatures settle in the fifties, summer the plant outside in partial or dappled shade, trimming it way back to just a few buds per stem. It will grow new leaves and fill out to be a thick shrub.
If you have passed by the opportunity to grow and enjoy this beautiful Holiday plant because of its short life span, fear no more. This season, pick up a healthy plant and enjoy it for years by just observing a few necessary requirements for your very own annual Christmas parade.
Let’s Plant A Tree!
The fall months give us the best opportunities of the whole year to plant a tree, or better yet, several trees. Planting a tree in the fall allows the plant to settle in to the new address before top growth occurs during the warmer months.
Deciding what variety to plant is probably the hardest part of the whole endeavor. As a Master Gardener, I get that question a lot. However, choosing a tree is not the problem many people think it is if just a few questions are answered before you ever get to the nursery.
Why is the tree being planted? Is this a large shade tree over the kid’s sand box or a patio where shade on the western exposure will be enjoyed for years to come or is this a small tree in the entry garden? Does it drop fruit or seedpods that would mess up certain situations or not affect the planting site at all? Don’t even think about digging that first spade full of dirt without knowing where underground utilities or overhead power lines are? Will the tree outgrow its space or is it neighborhood friendly? Determine the soil type, sandy, loam, acid or alkaline? Here in western Kansas, additional irrigation is almost always needed. Maintenance is critical for several years to come.
To assist us with the actual tree variety selection is a publication provided by the Garden City Parks Department. The Parks and Tree Board have spent a lot of time compiling a list of recommended trees for this specific area. After
answering all the questions to assist in selection, the actual list that groups trees by size with fruiting, leaf color and flowering information will ease the decision process.
Now you are armed with the necessary information to make a nursery visit. Look for a tree with healthy leaves or buds, a straight well developed leader and healthy bark. A good branch spacing is between ten to eighteen inches and
Walnut trees in Shirley's yard
well spaced around the tree. You can actually “sneak a peek” at the roots if it is a small containerized tree by pulling the plant out of the container. White, healthy roots should be present, not a gray, moldy mass encircling the root ball.
Recent research has provided us specific planting instructions too detailed for this article, but you can obtain a copy of the latest planting guide from the parks department or your county agent. Planting depth, watering, staking, fertilizing and mulching are all addressed in this publication. Do you think you are too old to benefit from all the effort it takes to establish a tree? Nonsense! Plant for the next generation, after all, someone planted for you thirty or forty years ago.
Spring Flowering Bulbs Jump Start The Garden
When we started getting serious with landscaping plans here at the farm twenty years ago, I was sure bulbs would have an important role in the whole scheme of things. That was then and this is now, and spring flowering bulbs continue to
Tulips courtesy of Free Tulip Pictures
jump-start the gardening season here each year. I choose the loudest and brightest colors I can find. Yellows, oranges, hot pinks, reds and purples shock my winter weary senses into life and from then on its garden, garden, garden.
But don’t just get stuck on tulips. Daffodils, hyacinths, crocus and my favorite, alliums are a treasure also. In groups among emerging perennials or a row in front of evergreen hedges, spring flowering bulbs will bring the garden up to speed as the world wakes from the frozen wintery world.
Spring flowering bulbs are planted in the fall; a soil temperature of around fifty-five degrees is about right. Choose a location with at least six hours of direct sunlight, even after the trees have leafed out. They must have lots of sun after they bloom to produce next year’s flowers.
Don’t plant them in a low spot that holds water, bulbs need good drainage. If soil tests indicate, feed with the recommended fertilizer. After the flowers are gone, cut off the flowering stalk so seeds do not develop but leave the foliage to die back naturally. It is feeding the bulb for next spring’s bloom. Sorry, but there is no blue tulip, regardless of the advertising hype. Neither is there a black tulip, though a few varieties come close. The blues will be some shade of lilac, violet or purple and the blacks will be a dark eggplant. No, you cannot plant them just anytime of the year. They must be planted sometime in late September through December. If you find leftovers on sale next spring, chances are good the bulbs are dry and dead. Pass up on the bargain.
Tulips are not forever. Perennial tulips, those coming back year after year are sometimes promised, but not always delivered. The best perennial tulip is the Darwin Hybrid. Daffodils usually live longer than tulips and rodents will not eat the bulbs and rabbits consider the foliage off limits.
Your 2010 Garden Starts Right Now!
There are all kinds of gimmicks vying for the dollar in your pocket, and yes, also the dirt in your garden. Upside down tomato plants, strawberry towers and noodlehead sprinklers give the skeptics something to ponder. And now there is lasagna gardening, touted as a no-dig, no-till gardening method, sure to produce a veggie crop worthy of county fair ribbons.
Lasagna Gardening written by Patricia Lanza has been around long enough to earn a nod from many skeptics all over the country in every growing zone. No tilling or digging your way through the growing season she says, and she isn’t fibbing.
Just as a cook layers pasta and sauce and cheese to build a favorite casserole, gardeners layer an assortment of organic materials on rock hard sod and end up with a rich, fluffy soil that puts veggies on the table. There is no strict “recipe” as the ingredients can be flexible. You will probably need to buy some ingredients such as peat moss or potting soil, but most materials are nearby and free.
The first layer is composed of several layers of wet newspapers spread out on top of the grass or weeds. Begin to build the bed by layering grass clippings, shredded newspapers, fall leaves, kitchen veggie scraps, composted manure, pine needles and peat moss. You need to mix layers of “green” (kitchen veggie scraps) with “brown” (fall leaves and pine needles). It would be advantageous to have twice as much “brown” but don’t get too hung up on that. It will all cook down and the mix is not that important.
Fall is an excellent time to begin your lasagna garden because so many of these materials are available as the gardening world goes to sleep for the winter. Let the lasagna “cook” all winter. If we have a dry, cold winter you will have to add moisture every once in awhile. By spring, it will have settled to less than half the height you started with. Building a lasagna garden up to two feet high is not too much. When it is planting time, tuck in the plants or seeds just as if you had tilled or spaded the soil. Add another layer of mulch or straw to suppress the weeds and conserve moisture. The beauty of this gardening method is that there is really no wrong way to do it.