I just got back, late last night, from a visit to Canada’s largest horticultural trade show. This is the show where all the landscapers and garden centres go for supplies and information. I got to see all the new plants, decorations and garden “stuff” that will be in your local shops next spring. I’ll tell you now that there are a lot more organic options coming down the pipe. Companies are gearing up and selling organic pest and weed solutions to commercial landscapers, lawn care companies (the Canadian province of Quebec has totally banned the sale and use of lawn chemicals in 2006 – only organic products may be used) and garden centres. There were significantly more of these producers this year than last year and that bodes well for the environment and homeowners (not to mention our children and pets).

There are new perennials, annuals and shrubs abounding so your choices continue to expand. I’ll try to grow as many as I can and write about them for you in upcoming columns. It’s a tough job but I’ll do my best. :-)

The featured ebook this week is one of the latest books I’ve written. A rather long ebook on Fragrant Plants, it contains listings and how-to-grow instructions for fragrant shrubs, perennials, annuals, roses, bulbs and a few trees. I’m

Is Your Garden Fragrant Enough?

quite pleased with it except for one small difficulty. The text is fully written but I’m short a few pictures of some of the perennials and shrubs. I’ll have to take these next spring and summer and then modify the book to include them. So what I did was cut the price of the book in half. All that’s missing are a few graphics to complete the project and the book will double in price next June. If you want the information (it won’t change) but without a few pictures – you want to click on the link and check it out.

New Articles for You

A short article on growing herbs in containers

How about growing fall mums

Or one on growing parrot tulips

Or even the first article on a series about pruning hybrid tea roses

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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Pray Tell, as a Master Gardener, I ask you with all due respect why you are do I read, "(I have to dig a lot of gardens already so I'm trying to temper my enthusiasm with a dose of reality. (what a drag!)"? Surely, you've learned the advantages to the topsoil of no-till gardening. Place old hay on top of the turf/bed areas you intend to plant in the spring, and add newspaper if you wish (that's what I do with my shredded paper), and water in well the first dumping, and more if you hit a drought (as we're in here in the South Plains), then plant your seed/plants in the straw when spring comes. My last tomato crop, one plant, yeilded 293 tomatoes, without any insecticide, or bottom rot, and my last vine ripened in the back bedroom (without soil) in time for New Year's dinner.

A: I’ve written about no-till gardening multiple times, I’ve been a big fan of Ruth Stout and have a first edition of her ground-breaking (pun intended!) book.:-)

And for those of you who don’t know who Ruth Stout was – she was the first North American writer to recommend deep mulching as a gardening technique. More recent books on this subject are simply repackaging her methods.

However…

I have numerous pathways to build. Each of these involves taking the soil out to a depth of 8 inches. That’s a lot of digging. (Not to mention putting the gravel back into the pathways – that’s a lot of shoveling.)

I have somewhere around 400 perennials to move back into the garden. That’s a lot of digging to get them out of their winter beds and move them into a temporary bed here for this summer until the beds are fully designed and built. Given that good friends let me use their vegetable garden as an overwintering bed, I do have to move them this spring.

I believe wholeheartedly in double digging vegetable and annual herb beds. Even though I’m only feeding two people now, that’s a lot of digging this first year. Subsequent years will be reduced in these beds.

But I need to get to know my soils. Remember, I’m growing a wide range of plants with different needs. You can’t grow a pulmonaria in deep mulch and expect it to grow well – the mulch rots it off. You can’t grow self-sowing perennials/annuals in deep mulch and expect them to self-sow (the mulch smothers their seeds as well as the weed seed). I have too many plants to succeed at a single growing method. And I can see flat rocks where I’m going to put garden beds. These have to be moved and dug out. I suspect there’s more where they came from.

And yes, deep mulch and using newspaper will form parts of my plans (I kept all the sheets of packing paper) for the shade gardens and the hosta beds but still – the shovel and I are going to be going steady for quite some time this spring.

And for the record, while deep mulching systems work well in some cases, I’d never use hay for a mulch. It tends to have too many weed seeds. Been there – done that weeding.

And if there’s a lesson for all of us in this question - it is that one single system of garden never works for all gardeners, in all parts of the world, for all plants. We all struggle to figure out what works for us – and when we do – we celebrate it and share it with others.

I’m delighted when folks write with tips that have worked for them – and I try to pass them along to you. But please understand in this funny gardening world of ours that one size rarely fits all. That’s why I love gardening so much – there’s always something to learn.

So yes, do experiment with deep planting systems (and Thanks for writing about this one).

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I was reading your letter about gnats in indoor plants. I was told they only lay eggs in dirt and to put a 1/4 inch layer of sand on the soil in the pots for 10 days and they will all die. It works . then you scoop the sand off. they will not lay in it. Bobbi

A: I have never tried this but it sounds as if it dries out the soil too. Good tip – if other readers try this, let me know how it works. Thanks Bobbi.

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I love, love, love your newsletter and all the help you offer to fellow gardeners. Well here I am seeking some of your advise. We have just purchased a summer home in Western Kentucky which we will probably be visiting at least once a month. The house has no landscaping at all, and I would like to know what types of plants will thrive "au natural" since I cannot not be there on a regular basis to take care of watering needs. Any help will be appreciated. Thanking you in advance.

A: This is a typical problem with second homes – how do you landscape for extreme low maintenance. The rule of thumb here is to decide if you want to really garden in the second place, or whether one garden is enough. If it were mine, I’d set up spring flowering shrubs for the early season and then shrub roses for summer blooms. I’d go with evergreens and shrubs throughout the garden. I’d cut the flowers to the minimum – if any. There wouldn’t be a container or hanging basket in sight as the maintenance on these is too high and a few hot days without water and they look ugly.

I don’t want to garden in two places. And the summer retreat should be enjoyable and not work.

Having said all that – I’ll put together some thoughts on tough plants and low-maintenance plants and put them up on the websites. I’ll make a note here when that is done.

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A few of us have been discussing how the collar is put around the plant without breaking the stems of the tiny transplants. Do you actually put it around the stem or do you put it around the root ball? Or something else? Any suggestions for us stem breakers? Thanks.

A: This is a query on using a band of cardboard around transplants to stop cutworms from eating them. I’ve never had this problem because I grow big transplants with thick stems. I’d wrap thin cardboard (shirt or cereal boxboard) around the stems and top of the root ball but not around the entire root system. If the cardboard springs open, use a small bit of tape or a rubber bank to hold it shut. And the answer is “whatever works for you!” :-)

And cutworms were usually only a problem in gardens where sod has recently lived. Good cultivation and organic growing practices tend to drastically lower its incidence in well-cultivated soils.

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We are haveing a severe drought in Oklahoma-we are 14 inches behind and suffering with serious grass fires. My question is should I deep water my trees and perrenials and fall planted bulbs? If so how often and how much. The drought does not seem to be coming to an end soon according to predictions. Thank you for any help you can give

A: Deep watering is necessary if you want to keep trees and shrubs alive and thriving. You can sacrifice cheaper perennial flowers but those mature trees are expensive and tough to fix. The last major drought we had in Eastern Ontario, I watered the trees (remember that a mature Maple will use 300 gallons of water a day) and let the perennial borders wilt. I can quickly replace the perennials but I wanted the trees to survive.

Bulbs don’t require water at all. They’re fine as they are genetically suited for spring water and then summer droughts. Ignore them – besides they are cheap to replace.

I would leave the hose dribbling overnight once night a week at the base of each tree trunk. In the morning, the ground around the tree would be soaked.

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From My Garden To Yours

It has been an interesting holiday season with gardening taking a second spot to family and friends. I relaunched the gardening season this week with several major moves. The Christmas tree that occupied a place of honour in the living room has gone to a secluded spot behind the garage. It will sit there for the next few months and next spring when all the needles have gone brown and dropped, I’ll cut off the branches for garden stakes. These branches, with their multi-tipped ends, will be shoved into the soil next to floppy plants such as delphiniums and tall daisies. The plants will grow up next to them, the plant leaves will be supported by the woody stems, and eventually the plants will cover over the branches. Instead of stiff wooden stakes standing in their ugly support, the evergreen branches will disappear behind the plants and fill the same function. The main trunk will be cut up for kindling and the entire tree will be functionally recycled into my garden and living.

The plants were all fed this week in celebration of a new season and while the sun porch took on a subtle fishy smell that drove the dog nuts for a short time, it will start to wake up the plants and remind them of the longer days we’re starting to see. I’ll feed in another three weeks again and then in early March, I’ll go to twice a month feeding. By April, my plants will be fed once a week. I want to see some good growth on these overwintering plants so they get a jump on next summer. I did manage to save one small, pitiful geranium in the move and it has been given a sunny spot and a weekly feeding now. I want a bunch of cuttings off this plant in the spring so whether it likes it or not, it is getting pushed along. Mind you, as soon as March comes I’m going to cut it to the ground anyway so it’s not happy now and it won’t be any happier with me then.

I also watered my overwintering rose and other pots of dormant plants that are sitting in the unheated cold cellar. If you are overwintering plants, remember they do require some water over the winter and the soil cannot be allowed to go bone dry. Having said that, I usually find that while I’ll check it monthly, I usually only add water once in mid-winter and it doesn’t require more until late spring just before I start to put the plants outdoors. If your finger feels damp after touching the soil, do not water any overwintering plants or houseplants.

I also cleaned out an old aquarium this past week. The old gravel is now decorating the driveway and the tank is about to become my indoor greenhouse. The heating mat will be installed on the bottom (covered with dampish peat) to provide some bottom heat and I’ll lay a bit of plastic over the top to preserve moisture. I’ll have an indoor greenhouse for plant propagation as I’ll be doing a lot of it this coming year. If you start your own seeds or take cuttings, this is as simple as it gets for an indoor greenhouse. There is a long history of this kind of arrangement (called Wardian cases) in the literature of plant collecting in the days of sailing ships. This kind of arrangement was how plant collectors managed to transport plants over long sea voyages. With one or more aquariums, I’m afraid the sun porch will quickly resemble a greenhouse interior. I’m told there’s betting going on between family and friends about how long I’ll last without a proper greenhouse out in the garden.

I moved some of the indoor plants around this week and while the larger guys don’t need stands to reach the sunlight from the windows, they do require another small consideration. I grow all my plants in clay pots and have saucers under those pots. I’ve found over the years that if I support the saucers slightly off the floor or shelf, the saucers do not stain underneath themselves. So this week, I cut up some bamboo pole sections (about an inch long) and split the sections in half with a chisel to create u-shaped bits of wood. These were spaced at 6 chunks per saucer under the saucer and now air can get below the saucer to eliminate any seepage or floor marking. This is a small thing in indoor gardening and you can substitute anything you like for the same effect. I note this also works nicely in the summer on decks and patios to reduce the staining from potted plants.

I also decided that this is the last year the banana tree gets to stay indoors for the winter. This hardy banana (Musa basjoo) is slated to start living outdoors in late May and we’ll see exactly how hardy it really is. You know there comes a time when every young plant has to leave the nest and given this is quite an ugly plant for indoor growing (the leaves constantly turn yellow and die as the plant grows), the time is coming up this spring. I’ll keep you informed on how its doing. You can see a picture and description of the plant at http://www.beginner-gardening.com/banana.html if you’re interested in growing your own hardy banana. Local garden centers can order these for you with no problem.

As 2006 unfolds, I’ll be sharing all the lessons, successes and failures in my new garden. I’ll learn as much about gardening from the failures as I do from the success stories I get to write about. And believe me, I’ll have my share of “whoops!” as the summer progresses. Stay tuned!