How to plan a Perennial Cutting Garden

Bring your perennials indoors to make pretty arrangements that last through the winter.

Lush flowerbeds overflowing with colorful blooms make you want to snip a few stems and take them inside. But you may be reluctant to plunder your garden, afraid you'll leave bare spots. Hesitate no more. Here are two strategies for producing plenty of cuttable flowers without destroying the look and style of your garden.

Top 15 Perennials for Cutting Campanula (bellflower) Carnation Coreopsis purple Coneflower (Echinacea purpurea) Gaillardia (blanketflower) Hibiscus moscheutos (rose mallow) Anemone japonica (Japanese anemone) Iris Liatris (gay-feather) Monarda (bee balm) Peonies (Paeonia) Phlox Rosa (rose) Salvia black-eyed Susan (Rudbeckia hirta)

1. Plant a cutting garden. With a designated cutting bed, you can plant and cut without worry. Select an inconspicuous location -- along a garage or in a back corner of your yard -- and be sure your cutting bed benefits from lots of sun and rich, well-drained soil -- just like your other beds. A cutting bed offers plenty of planting freedom. Its sole purpose is to produce flowers for you to cut, so don't worry about how it will look. You can mix and match colors, textures, heights, and varieties. Plant all your favorites.

2. Keep it simple. Make the bed simple to weed, feed, and cut by planting the flowers in rows. You might even make your cutting garden part of an existing vegetable or herb garden. The crop-style planting will blend right in, and your "production" gardens will be in one location. If you don't have gardening space to spare, spread cutting flowers throughout your existing beds; don't cluster them.

3. Plan ahead. Planning will help you avoid creating gaps if your scissors do get too much exercise. Draw your existing beds on paper, noting varieties, bloom times, and heights. Then pencil in the flowers you want to cut. Use bloom cycles as your guide to create a mix.

4. Mix and match. Plant a balanced mix of perennials and annuals. Your favorite perennials will come back year after year, while annuals will let you experiment. Both types make excellent cut flowers. The more colors, heights, and textures you grow, the more fun you can have creating indoor arrangements.

5. Don't limit yourself. Use aromatic herbs, flowering hedges, and plants with interesting foliage to add pizzazz to your arrangements

'Deadheading' flowers helps prolong... part 2

written by Deborah Benge Frost

...Some plants have individual stalks with flowers opening at the bottom first and finishing at the top. They lend themselves to pruning individual flower stems. As the plant has just a few flowers at the tip, they should be deadheaded. Salvia darcyii, Salvia coccinea, lady in red, white nymph and coral nymph, Mexican bush sage, larkspur, indigo spires salvia, and yellow bells are good candidates for this deadheading.

Plants can be deadheaded with your fingernails, scissors, hand pruners, snippers, lawn shears, hedge shears or a weed eater. There are some cordless, mini-hedge trimmers that are great for deadheading autumn sage and other heavily blooming plants.

Keep your flowering color blooming with some additional nitrogen to promote healthy growth and continued blooming.

There are a variety of fertilizers you can use, but make sure you are adding some nitrogen which is represented by the first number on a bag or bottle of fertilizer. Ammonium sulfate (21-0-0), urea (41-0-0), a slow release 24-0-0, and blood meal are good sources of nitrogen. These are all quickly available except the slow-release 24-0-0, which will slowly release nitrogen over many weeks. If your nitrogen source is quickly available, apply it in small amounts every few weeks for maintenance.

If you are getting some pretty good lightening along with some rain, your garden is getting a free liquid application of nitrogen. Lightening fixes atmospheric nitrogen, so when it rains it is carried down to your plants and soil.

There are many other organic and inorganic fertilizers that will provide nitrogen to your plants. Cottonseed meal is organic fertilizer that is slow-release and adds some nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium. Fish emulsion, sewage sludge and many others exist.

If plants are growing in soils that are highly amended with compost and soil- enriching mulches, you may not need any or very much fertilizer. Compost and organic mulches decompose slowly and act as a slow release fertilizer. If you are consistent in adding mulch and compost to your soil, you may have eliminated the need for additional commercial fertilizers.

If you find your garden void of color this time of year there are several plants for some quick summer color.

Look for blue plumbago, yellow bells, Lantana, hardy hibiscus, Pentas, annual vinca, fire bush, dwarf zinnias and Salvia coccinea, of which there are several cultivars on the market. Even though it's hot as blue blazes, these plants can tolerate being planted in summer-like conditions. Remember, you'll need to baby new plants until they are well-rooted and flourishing. Once they are established they can get by with average treatment.

You can also get some great summer color from seed. Some plants that are easy from seed during hot weather includes zinnia, cosmos, gomphrena or globe amaranth, red salvia, cypress vine, and ornamental sunflowers.

Caladium bulbs do very well when planted during hot weather. They won't even peek out of the ground until it's hot, so they are a good option right now.

'Deadheading' flowers helps prolong color in the flower garden!

written by Deborah Benge Frost

There's nothing as pleasing and cheering as landscape color. It's important to us and garden visitors so you'll want to keep it going as much of the year as you can.

Here are a few pointers for promoting and prolonging summer color.

Flowering annuals, perennials and roses that have been bursting with color sometimes hit a lull in the bloom count category.

After a plant flowers it produces seed if the flower is pollinated. Once the flower is pollinated, seed will begin to develop. This seed-making process requires lots of energy and it can cause plants to stop flowering. Seed development requires so much energy that it will even pull nitrogen from the lowest leaves to move it to where it is needed the most. So, unless you want seed you need to short circuit this process by deadheading, the removal of the fading flower.

Some plant, such as roses, can be deadheaded by removing individual flowers. To deadhead fading roses or clusters of roses, make the cut just above a five-leaflet leaf attachment. This will initiate new growth from the bud between the stem and leaf attachment. Yarrow, butterfly bush, and gaillardia are good examples of plants to be deadheaded this way. Cut the stem just above a good healthy leaf instead of leaving flowerless stalks standing.

Many other flowers send up flowers on tall, slender stems. But they bloom in such mass quantities that deadheading individual stems is a time-consuming job. Instead, trim all the stalks after most flowers have faded. In a couple of weeks the plants will be back in full bloom. This works well on coreopsis, plains black foot daisy, Dalhberg daisy, four nerve daisy and pin cushion flower.

Some plants bloom heavily and have many short flower stalks with several flowers on each stalk that bloom starting at the bottom and finish at the extending tip. Because there are so many these could be sheared when there are just a few flowers at the tips. This may take a few leaves off too, but it should promote branching and more flowering. Autumn sage or Salvia greggii, May night and blue hill salvia fit into this type of deadheading. End of part one!

Gardening and Flowers...

written by Willie Jones http://www.gardeningandflowers.com

If you want to improve your landscaping then start with the basics. Your soil. Is your soil sandy, a rich black or dense with clay? The type of soil you have will determine what kind of plants you will purchase. Of course you can buy rich soil to supplement a soil deficient in nutrients and oxygen. You can also purchase or make your own beneficial mulch. If you are unsure about your soil, ask a local nursery. They can guide you in making the right choice for your garden.

Once you you’ve determined what type of soil you are dealing with then you can get down to designing your landscape. Step back and have a look at your yard and home. You need to look at several factors: Do you have children who will be playing in the yard? If so then keep that in mind when you are designing. You’ll want to a lot a playing space for them that doesn’t interfere with your design structure. Look at the color and line structure of your home. You’ll want to accent it with greens and flowers. You can take a sterile looking house and transform it to a warm and inviting place. A house is an inanimate object and it’s the live plants, flowers and trees gently swaying in the wind that breath life into an otherwise still object.

As you are looking at your home and yard, entertain the idea of combining plants, shrubs and flowers of different sizes, shades, shapes and colors. For example, you may want to plant a dark green border shrub that can be easily squared off with trimming and then plant in front of that a lighter green or variegated green broad leaf plant or a bed of begonias or marigolds. If you can’t visualize what you want then I suggest getting some home and garden magazines or pictures of model homes to get an idea. Or you can even drive around the neibourhood to get your ideas. It pays to do your homework.

Another thing to consider when you are planning your garden is combining herbs with your flowers or shrubs. Not only do they have varied colors and shapes that can compliment your garden, you also have the benefit fresh herbs in your kitchen when you need it.

Part of the appeal for gardening is designing it and then making it happen. It is a rewarding and relaxing experience that continues throughout the years as you add to or change your garden as you please.

Enjoy!

About the Author:

Willie has been a designer for many years and flowers and greens are her passion. She also is a freelance writer and researcher and enjoys sharing her ideas with others. Gardening and Flowers.com

Add Massive Color To Your Flower Garden

Annuals are beautiful flowers that last just one season, but they provide tons of color at affordable prices.Some advice for planting annuals:

Annuals should be planted in blocks for the most effective look. Always consider the height, with the tallest at the back, mediums in the middle and the shortest at the front. In a round garden plot, put the tallest plants in the middle, and work the shorter ones to the edge. If you must put a taller one in front, ensure that it is a transparent and lacy plant.

Look for strong contrasts in one area, or more subtle groupings in another.

Annuals require sunlight (though some do OK in shade) and rich moisture-retentive soil, with organic matter dug into it. They are half-hardy, and will need to be protected if there is a chance of frost. They can be covered with a fleece or individual plastic bottles.

Annuals need to be fed every two weeks, deadheaded regularly and watered frequently. They should last through the entire growing season, provided you continue to look after them.

Here are the annuals which are perfect to plant in pots, baskets or in garden beds:

Half-hardy summer annuals:
ageratum, impatiens (busy lizzie), cosmos, morning glory, lobelia, nicotiana.

Hardy annuals: marigolds, nasturtians, sweet peas, and sunflowers.

Annuals that thrive in the shade are impatiens, fuschia and lobelia.

10 Free Gardening Products

By Linda Gray

One of the pleasurable spin-offs in organic gardening is finding alternative ways of coming up with the same, if not better, end result... Household throw aways can be valuable to the alternate enthusiast. Here are ten recyclable ideas to make gardening a little less hard on the pocket!

1. Hedge clippings: Instead of burning or direct composting, beg, borrow or even buy, if the quantity justifies the price, an electric garden muncher.

Branches up to an inch in diameter are posted into a slot and the machine munches them up into small chips. Spread these chips thickly around shrubs or fruit trees to help keep moisture in, and control the temperature of the soil.

2. Food Waste: All food waste must be composted. Composting is becoming quite an art form, and special composting bins can be bought, or very simply made.

There are many different theories and each gardener will find his or her preferred way. Keeping the compost fairly warm is the overall key to a good result. Or, if you’re in no hurry, simply keep adding to a heap, and dig out the bottom when required. Sieve before using and the compost will be ready for planting small plants and even seeds.

3. Old carpets, large damaged cardboard boxes; and similar materials can be laid over the vegetable plot in autumn to help prevent those early spring weeds appearing. Spread over a whole patch and weigh down with stones or logs. Lift off on a sunny day in early spring a few days before digging.

4. Paint trays: Keep old roller painting trays and similar containers for seed trays. Punch a few holes in the bottom for drainage. Add a little fine gravel before filling with seed compost. Seed trays shouldn’t be deeper than 15cm.

5. Yoghurt pots: All plastic yoghurt or dessert pots can be washed and saved for re-potting seedlings. Make a hole in the bottom of each and add a little fine gravel before filling with compost or soil..

6. Glass jars: Glass jars with sealable lids are excellent for storing seeds, beans and peas for planting next year. (Safe from mice as well) After washing the jars, dry in the oven to remove all traces of moisture before storing your seeds. Collect dark glass jars, or wrap paper round clear jars to prevent seeds being damaged by light.

7. Ice Lolly sticks: Make perfect row markers in your seed trays or greenhouse beds. The wooden ones won’t last for ever but you can at least write on them with pen, pencil or crayons!

8. Wire coat hangers: Make mini-cloches with discarded or broken wire coat hangers. Pull into a square shape. Place the hook in the soil and push down gently until the natural bend in the wire rests on top of the soil. Place another a short distance away in your seed bed to create two ends of a cloche. Now throw over a sheet of plastic and hold down with logs or stones.

Note: this will work only when creating very small cloches.

9. Clear plastic: Keep any clear plastic containers that could be placed upside down over a plant. Cut a mineral water bottle in half to make two handy individual cloches. Large sheets of clear plastic from packaged household items are fine for throwing over mini coat hanger cloches.

10. Aluminium bottle tops: Keep aluminium tops from milk or juice bottles, and also coloured foil around beer or wine bottles. Thread together to maka bird scarer. Simply thread with thick cotton and hang on your fruit bushes before the birds find the new fruits.

Look out for other tools for the garden from kitchen throwaways such as: old kitchen spoons and forks for transplanting tiny plants in the greenhouse. Leaky buckets for harvesting small quantities of potatoes, carrots etc; light wooden boxes for harvesting salads through the summer, and transporting pots etc;

Keep an eye on that rubbish bag and turn today’s throwaways into tomorrow’s tools!

Linda Gray is a freelance writer and, with her partner, has spent ten years renovating an acre of neglected woodland. With a growing family to feed ‘off the land’, frugal gardening has become second nature! Drop in at www.flower-and-garden-tips.com for pots of gardening inspiration!