George's Current Ramblings and Readlings

Good Plants I Can’t Grow

August 17th, 2021

   No matter how much you know about plants or how many right things you do, sometimes plants just die.

Some people can do lupines like this. Not me.

   Like it or not, it’s a fact of gardening.

   A lot of the time, easy expiration is a shortcoming of particular plants, such as how dwarf Alberta spruces are spider-mite magnets, or how hosta and daylilies are candy to deer, or how delphiniums, heather, and lady’s mantle fry in our increasingly hot summers.

   That’s why I didn’t feel too inferior when I killed the persnickety blue poppy, a gorgeous spring bloomer that’s very happy in Vancouver and Great Britain but adamant about not moving to Harrisburg.

   My wife once bought me a pack of blue-poppy seeds and challenged me to grow some. I got a few to sprout inside, but only one survived the transplant… and that one died over the first winter before ever thinking about throwing out a petal.

   Failure, yes. Understandable? Also yes.

   Far more troubling are the “enigmas.”

   These are the plants we should be able to grow without much trouble, and, in fact, are ones that most people grow with their trowels tied behind their back.

   For some reason, I have a few enigmas that just won’t grow well for me even though they seem to thrive in other people’s gardens.

   I suspect I’m not alone in that… although I’ll bet enigma plants are different ones from gardener to gardener.

   For me, I can’t keep a lupine alive to save my life.

   I thought these spiked hybrid beauties just didn’t like our heat, and so I filed them in the general don’t-do-well-here category… until I heard several other local gardeners tell me how much they love their lupines.

   Apparently, lupines don’t mind sweating it out in some gardens. Just not mine.

Where the Rain Doesn’t Reach

August 10th, 2021

   Those summer rains can be a little tricky when it comes to keeping plants happy.

Just because we get a heavy rain doesn’t mean it’s reached all of our plant roots.

   Just because we’ve had a downpour doesn’t mean water has made it to where it counts, which is down to just below and all around our plant roots.

   Young and newly planted plants are particularly susceptible to these fakeouts.

   One problem spot is where the rains don’t reach at all.

   Tops on that list is under roof overhangs. These can sometimes reach out two or more feet over walls, blocking rain from falling on anything you’ve planted that close to the structure.

   Keep an eye on plants in these spots because you might have to water them even in rainy weather.

   A second sneakily dry area is under trees… especially big shade trees.

   For one thing, raindrops can be blocked and/or absorbed by the thick leaf canopies, limiting how much water actually makes it to the ground.

   Then the rain that makes it through the canopy has to penetrate the mulch layer that most people have around their plants under trees.

   Depending on how thick that layer is (and it shouldn’t be any more than about three inches around shrubs and one to two inches around perennials and groundcovers), it can take an inch or more of rain just to reach the soil surface under the mulch.

   Rain that gets soaked up by mulch is a factor anywhere, by the way… not just under trees.

Failure to Thrive

August 3rd, 2021

   Plants sometimes just aren’t happy where you put them.

This azalea is being stunted by big tree roots nearby.

   Good plants just sit there and seemingly sulk, barely growing or worse – starting down that road to a slow death.

   Once you realize you’re dealing with a “failure-to-thrive” situation, the best thing you can do (usually) is dig up the plant and try again.

   Sometimes just improving the soil and replanting in the same place is enough to make a big difference.

   Other times, moving the plant to a more amenable location turns the table.

   From what I’ve seen over the years, two main factors are behind most cases of stunted growth – 1.) lousy soil and 2.) wrong location.

How Native Do You Have to Go to Make the Birds and Bees Happy?

July 27th, 2021

   The designers of Penn State Arboretum’s new Pollinator and Bird Garden leaned heavily on research to determine the features, layout, and plant selection of this three-acre garden, which opened last month just down Park Avenue from Beaver Stadium.

That’s non-native yarrow and betony growing in Penn State’s new Pollinator and Bird Garden.

   Spots of it are very colorful already.

   But what struck me during my opening-day visit was that almost all of the showiest plants were non-native perennials – yarrow, Russian sage, catmint, salvia, and one of my favorite summer perennials, betony ‘Hummelo’ with its long-lasting flower spikes of pinkish-purple.

   What gives? Aren’t we supposed to be planting native plants if we want to attract pollinators?

   Well, yes and no.

   Just about everybody agrees that on the whole, native plants are the best bet for attracting the most bees, pollinating insects, birds, and hummingbirds.

   It’s hard to go wrong pollinator-wise if you load up the yard on nothing but natives.

   But the message that not everybody is getting is that many non-native plants – especially perennials – are also useful to pollinators.

   Dr. Douglas Tallamy, author of the ground-breaking “Bringing Nature Home” book (Timber Press, $19.95, 2009) says that of the top 50 pollinator-attracting perennials, 34 of them are U.S. natives… which means that 16 are not.

   That’s important because of the not-always-mentioned fact that a lot of native perennials just aren’t that great-looking to people.

   Some have unimpressive blooms, some have floppy, “messy” growth habits, many look “beat-up” at times (usually from the feeding activities of the desired pollinators), and some seed around to the point of weediness.

   When people aren’t expecting that and/or aren’t OK with that, the result can be a bad experience and a return to the traditional lawn.

   “The truth is a lot of pollinator plants are not that exciting to people,” said Dr. Harland Patch, a Penn State entomologist who’s director of pollinator programming at Penn State Arboretum. “So what we’ve done is interplant good pollinator plants with the best of the non-natives… Purism is not the point of this.”

That “Wow” First View

July 20th, 2021

   Real-estate agents often harp about how important it is for a house to have “good curb appeal” because that’s the first thing potential buyers see… and what forms their critical first impression.

This is what you see first when entering Karl Mattson’s Gettysburg back yard.

   The same holds true for a landscape. What you see in that first view tells you you’re about to behold something special – or will need a machete to get to the back yard.

   I mention this because I just saw a textbook example of a yard with a superb first view – the two-acre property of Karl Mattson in Gettysburg.

   Mattson’s yard was on the 2021 Dillsburg Garden Tour and was the pre-tour “don’t-miss” favorite despite being a nearly 30-minute drive from the rest of the pack.

   That puts some pressure on a garden right off the bat because expectations are high. I’ve found that hyped gardens often disappoint, not necessarily because they’re not good but because you’re expecting “great” and then even “very good” seems somehow ordinary or expected.

   When I pulled into the shaded driveway of Mattson’s yard right next to a section of the Gettysburg Battlefield, the front yard featured several large, neat, swooping, and diverse beds.

   Obviously, a plant-appreciator lived there.

   But that’s not what was the first view in my mind. To me, the real “first view” was when I walked to the end of the driveway and took a look into the back yard.

   Instant “wow!”

   The view was like a cover shot from Better Homes and Gardens magazine – a pond with waterfall in the foreground, flanking large black urns surrounded by magenta verbena, a tapestry of lush, multi-textured plants, and the coup de grace, a thatched wooden gazebo nestled between a pair of tall shade trees.