THIS IS AN IMPORTANT NOTE. If you don’t understand or use rss feeds, then you can ignore this note. But if you want to be updated every time I write an article without having to do a search for it, then you might want to check out this section.

I have just changed all the RSS feeds on my sites to new software. Unfortunately, this makes the old rss feeds out of date.

The good news is that the new rss feeds are all automatic. While I may have missed a few in the past (the old system was manual) this new system tracks the new pages as well as when I make changes to older pages (so if I add a variety or make a new link, you’ll be told on your rss reader.

Each of the following sites has an rss feed. The only feed that will remain partially manual is the feed at www.simplegiftsfarm.com That is the feed that I will continue to use to add interesting tidbits and manually add all of my individual pages (not the changes though) to the list.

If you are interested in a specific subject, say “perennials” then sign up for the perennials rss feed. If you’re interested in “water gardening” then sign up for the water garden feed. If you want it all – sign up for the simplegiftsfarm.com feed.

Signing up is pretty simple. Click the funny orange tags on the pages at the website of your choice. You can sign up for yahoo and msn feeds right there as well.

For now – the settings are set for “beginner” level, this means that everybody has to go to the instruction page to get the right url (its at the bottom of the instruction page). In another two weeks, I’ll change this to “normal” settings and the pages will be like every other one on the web and there will be no instruction page.

Aren’t computers wonderful? :-)

New RSS feeds are found on these websites

http://www.simplegiftsfarm.com - my oldest website – now focused on design and container growing

http://www.beginner-gardening.com dealing with a bit of everything – the main lawn pages, vines, woody plants to come.

http://www.water-gardening-information.com what else but water gardening

http://www.gardening-information-perennials.com perennial flower gardening

http://www.learn-rose-gardening.com about rose gardening

http://www.organic-gardening-tips.com the main organic gardening site.

http://www.vegetable-gardening-tips.com all about vegetables and herbs

http://www.flower-garden-bulbs.com the bulb growing site.

Want to ask a question? Click here to ask a gardening question.www.gardening-tips-perennials.com/askagardeningquestion.html

Your Questions Answered

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If I'm correct you said that if I spread manure the worms will take it down and digest it. If I do this and wait, can I get out of Double digging my garden and still get (more or less) the same effect. Thank you Yosef

A: In part theory yes, you can. If you add compost, compost tea and composted manure in large amounts (2-4 pounds / square foot) every year for several years, your soil would be well aerated and fertile. On the other hand, it would not be structurally different – still the same rocks and debris etc that double digging removes.

In warmer climates, the organic matter is consumed very much faster than in cooler climates. In sandier soils such as the Southern sands, organic matter seems to disappear almost overnight. The sandier your soil, the more organic matter you have to add to the surface on a regular basis to create and maintain a decent garden soil.

The anecdotal evidence (that means stories from growers not science) seems to indicate that the use of compost tea will loosen up clay soils quite quickly and help sandy soils aggregate (make better soil) so compost teas would be a faster way than sheet composting where you simply lay the organic material on the soil.

In practice, double digging makes great soil NOW. You’ll get instant crop increases from any plant you put in this kind of soil. If you don’t want great soil to a 18” depth and you’re happy taking several years to get decent soil then laying it down will do the trick.

I double dig my kitchen vegetable patch every year or every second year. The rest of the garden gets double dug once on establishment and then layers of compost and mulch to maintain it. I spot double dig when renovating or moving plants.

Read about it here at http://www.organic-gardening-tips.com/doubledigging.html

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After a severe drought this summer, our potentilla hedge has green on the tops, dry dead-looking twigs below and at plant base. Is this good? Do you trim off the deadwood, cut the plant down to releaf (and when) or replace?

A: Potentilla can be pruned with a lawn mower! Next spring, I’d wait to see what was dead and what was alive and then I’d give it a serious hair cut back to the live wood and trim up all the shrubs so they’re the same height and shape. Give them all some compost at that time and water regularly. They’ll very quickly shoot back up and into bloom.

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You had an article on water lilies and how to plant using burlap, layer of compost and then clay-dirt. I thought I had saved it but if I did I can't find it NOW to put in my book for next year..However, my question is - would the compost not seep into the Pond Water and promote Algae?? Thanks.

A: I don’t plant my lilies in burlap and if I did I wouldn’t add compost to the bottom of the pot because it would seep out through the burlap and turn the water a distinct brown (been there, turned that water brown)

I tend to plant my lilies in pots and I never really liked burlap in the pond (especially the dyed burlap you see in garden shops now). I like the stability of the hard or clay pot and the fact that it lasts for several years. If I use a big enough one, I don’t have to dig or do anything to the lily root for several years.

Having said that, if/when I do another pond, I’ll likely dig planting holes under the liner and then fill those indentations with a soil/rock combination so I can plant directly into the pond without having to use pots. This will simply mean I’ll have to renovate or pull up the lilies every few years when they outgrow these planting indentations. But this should be relatively easily done in the spring when the pond is being cleaned out.

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I have apreformed pond and it is only 14inches deep,,I have to bring my fish in for the winter(Z3) Is there any way to have an ajoining deeper pond,,or best to take out the old and install a liner type only..sincerely kathy

A: Installing an adjoining pond to a preformed pond is going to create massive headaches. I’ve heard of folks trying it and unless the pond was designed to be part of a system, you’re only creating problems for yourself. Marrying the levels and getting the water quantity right (the bottom pond has to be larger than the upper) can be a pain.

If it were mine, and I wanted to go bigger, I’d rip out the old one (carefully so I could use it somewhere else) and I’d install a proper pond that’s sized right.

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I have a saw mill down the road & can get free dust, chips or bark. I have sandy soil & want to amend it to help hold water better, what is best to work into my soil, the fine dust or medium with small chunks?

A: The fast answer is that no sized saw dust is right to work into your soil. None of it. You can use sawdust as a mulch if you don’t dig it in but in that case, use the larger chunks (like regular mulch).

The problem with sawdust is that it is cellulose based and as it decomposes, it takes up a lot of nitrogen. (the fungi that eat it will require nitrogen to live and will try to rob that nitrogen from the soil bacteria that are feeding your plants.)

This is nitrogen that would normally go to the plants. Mixing sawdust into the soil will rob your plants of available nitrogen and your garden will suffer until you 1) add enough nitrogen or 2) the sawdust is decomposed.

Short answer. Don’t do it!

The alternative is to compost it first in a large pile. Add the nitrogen to the pile and when it breaks down into compost, apply this compost to the garden.

Sawdust when used as a mulch can compact quite heavily and stop plants from emerging or can, in the case of some trees like western redwoods, leave a compound in the soil that will actually stunt the growth of plants.

Bark chunks are ok to use – just don’t dig them into the soil. Compost the sawdust.

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I got anxious to plant my water lillies before I got my Pond and I still don't have it, so I have my water plants in a large clay pot, how can I keep them for the winter- do I bring them inside, can i let them dry out and replant in the spring.... I don't know anything about water plants. Thanks

A: You really can’t let them dry out. That will kill them for sure. You’ll have to overwinter hardy lilies by keeping the cold and damp. Put them in a cool cellar in a big pot or set your pot in tub of water so they’ll stay damp. Cool and damp. If you overheat them, they’ll start growing – you want them to stay cool because you want them dormant so they’ll flower next year. A plant that is not allowed to go dormant is an unhappy plant. Unhappy plants simply wither away or don’t flower heavily.

And you don’t want to let them freeze. Freezing will kill hardy waterlilies as quickly as letting them dry out.

From My Garden To Yours

If it’s October, you have to know that it is now bulb planting month. Unfortunately, I find myself between gardens this fall and will not be planting bulbs but if I were I know what I’d be planting.

I’d be looking for fragrant tulips (http://www.flower-garden-bulbs.com/fragranttulips.html) to plant in the largest numbers I could afford. There are few things as nice as a superb flower show in the spring unless it is a superbly fragrant flower show. These bulbs (there’s too many to list here) will give you both fragrance and a great display of spring blooms. I’d tuck a few hyacinths here and there among them but because I think hyacinths are a very overpowering fragrance, I’d only plant a few in a small clump here and there. Do remember that the fragrance will be more powerful if you plant your bulbs in small clumps together and the visual impact will be equally powerful if you do the same. Spacing the bulbs out in long lines or planting a bulb here or there in the garden lessens the impact of the bulb colour and fragrance.

I think I’d want to select a specific colour range for my early tulips and another for the mid and late season tulips. I’d be tempted to go with something like yellow and red tulips for a bright spring show and then switch to a more subdued pink tulip for my late flowering flowers. I’d let the early ones announce spring in strident tones and then use the later plantings to blend in with the early flowering perennials such as lungwort with its blue and pink tones.

Then I’d switch my allegiance to discovering some great lilies. I’d pick them with fragrance in mind for sure. I can see a garden of giant Madonna lilies flowering with their sweet fragrance and pure white blossoms. There would be a huge clump (6-8 bulbs) of Regal Lilies from China with their white, sweetly fragrant blossoms for mid-summer fragrance on a still night. I note that once I’d bought these bulbs, I could collect the seed and start my own so I’d have quite a few more in several years. I’d also want to toss a few fragrant Oriental hybrids. The Oriental class of lilies is decidedly fragrant with ‘Stargazer’ being the best known of the older varieties. Note the Asiatic and L.A. class of lilies have more flowers on each stem but they are not fragrant. When purchasing your bulbs this fall, do check the boxes to ensure you’re getting fragrant Orientals.

And it will come as no surprise if I tell you that some of the newer Daffodils such as ‘Liberty Bells’ also come with a sweet fragrance in the evening. You’ll lose the fragrance of daffodils during the day as they are not particularly strong, but if you plant a good-sized clump next to a doorway or window, you’ll be surprised on a still night just what a fragrance they produce. Do plant them in larger numbers in a clump to concentrate the perfume production in one place in the garden. If you want a slightly older variety, then look for the class of daffodils called ‘Jonquils” as they are almost all fragrant. These smaller flowered plants are wonderful when planted in masses and you’ll easily find ‘Baby Moon’, ‘Bell Song’, Fruit Cup’ and ‘Pipit’ on local shelves. The Poeticus class of daffodils is also a fragrant group although botanically they seem mixed up on the shelves. Look for names that include “actaea” and “recurvus” and you’re probably in the right box. If you can find the double ‘Cheerfullness' I understand it to be a heavily fragrant variety as well.

Even though it is a bit of a pest, I would put in some lily of the valley pips. These spread like crazy and can become a weed but they are surely fragrant in the spring. That fragrance reminds me of the special talcum powder my Scottish grandmother used to have around the house in a small metal can. I’m not sure where that memory came from or whether you can still obtain that brand of powder but I’m sure the plants will be easily found and available locally this fall. A few bucks of pips will soon turn into a field of fragrance.

While only Tulipa tarda is fragrant, I would surely seek out as many of the smaller species tulips as I could find. I simply love these tiny plants and if you have a rock garden where the plants will dry out during the summer and bake in the heat, these smaller tulips will thrive there. They love spring moisture but baking summer heat. They’ll self-sow like mad so very quickly you’ll have colonies of them. T. tarda can become a weed (but such a delightful and easily controlled weed) in such a garden. There are few brighter spring bloomers than these early species tulips. Just don’t put them in the main border as they are quite small and you’ll quickly lose sight of them.

So those would be my choices this fall if I were planting bulbs. Next year for sure.