I miss my hosta collection. I could of course just buy new ones but with my deer population it would be like throwing money down the drain. I have to try out Plantskydd (a deer repellent which I bought last year but never got around to applying mainly due to my husband's sensitive nose) to see if that could make a difference.

Marianne

I was born and spent my early childhood in Sacramento, California, so I miss the tender shrubs, bulbs and perennials that thrive there. I use some of them as summer patio plants here, but it always seems a shame to let them perish in our fall and winter freezes (I don't have a greenhouse or enough room indoors to bring them all in).

Still, if I lived in a zone 8 or 9, I know I'd miss the plants I've come to love from colder climates: peonies and lilacs to name just two. I guess I can't say that I miss any one plant or even a few plants--I find ways to garden wherever I live, and accept that I want to grow everything hardy or not.

Lisa

Dogwoods and azaleas! Even if they were hardy enough, they don't like our soil here. I grew up in the south, and the springs were beautiful. Here, not so much. I've learned to appreciate the things that do well here, but I find gardening here more challenging.

Bonnie

Interesting, Lisa. I thought of lilacs and peonies too. I had a lilac bush outside my window as a child in Kansas, and I dearly loved it. Planted Miss Kim here year before last, and the blasted voles got it last spring. Nothing else. Just the lilac. So, I just won't have lilacs....sigh.....I had a row of ancient peonies around our very first home in Indiana 30 years ago. I loved them. I brought some south with me....you can just imagine. Poor things. I gave them a decent burial in the compost pile anyway. :)
I have decided that plants are like friendships. They are some of the best memories of anywhere we live and become an important part of who we are and maybe even a little bit of why we are who we are.

Lilies and the small fritilaria. We have the dreaded red lily beetles here, and I don't want to have to spread poisons to enjoy those flowers, so I just do without except for two long ago planted lilies that seem somewhat resistant. On those I squish the few beetles that appear.

I miss cleome. I had grown it for several yrs, but then I started adding some perennials to that garden and I just don't have the room for them anymore. I grew the really tall ones...at least 5ft tall and they were wide too. I only grew a few of them, but they really filled up the back roll. I just may put some in where I had some roses before. They are really great plants.

Kat

At our other home, we had a huge row of lilac bushes. I loved them. My husband, hates them.
I talked him into letting me have a small dwarf lilac, but I long for the bigger ones.
The slugs destroyed 2 of my gallardias, I have one left, but I'll be ready this year.

I miss a lot of my perennials, I had to move out of my old home quickly and only got to take a handful of plants. They are now growing in my garage. Out of over 100 plants I got: 3 daylilies, astilbe, liatris, 2 roses, 3 ornamental grasses, Mugo pine and a Potentilla shrub. I will really miss my coneflowers, Sedum, other grasses, Lamium, ajuga, hostas, lilies and daffodils. Luckily most of these can be replaced eventually.

Jen

I miss bachelor buttons and sweet peas - I never get the soil prepared in fall for early peas, and I never seem to have room for bachelor buttons - although I really love them.

Also, I ripped out some plume poppy that I'd planted in the wrong spot, and have been unable to find a better, safer location for it. I miss the color of the leaves, and the way raindrops stood on them - but I don't miss the fear of them taking over my yard. The same goes for the mat-forming veronica, the one with the dainty blue flowers. I actually had to move to get rid of that one, and when I drive by my old garden sometimes, when it's in bloom, I'm really tempted... but I resist.

The 150+ foot tall old-growth hemlocks that towered in the backyard in Maine. The sound in the wind...

*sigh*

We also had a large tree specimen of burning bush that came with the house, very interesting. I knew of them as trees before I did as shrubs.

I miss my pretty purple Lythrum plant. Nothing else is quite like it but since even the supposedly 'sterile' varieties are not reliably sterile, I can't in good conscious grow it. It's a 'noxious weed' here too but I've never actually seen it in the wild here. I remember seeing it everywhere when we were in Mass. but I guess they have to outlaw it here too. Too bad it's such a thug (never was in my garden but it must be elsewhere), because it was quite lovely.

I miss my beautiful Iris Pseudacoris. In my last garden I had a big clump of it, the beautiful yellow flowers were perfect blooming with my purple baptisia and purple and blue Siberian iris. What a spectacular view. But then I learned how invasive it is. I live near wetlands and ponds and even though I could control it with care in my garden I fear birds might spread the seed. In my new garden I am about to experiment with other plants to find a balance to the predominant blues of the end of spring.

Joyce -

I recently saw a yellow Siberian iris, but I can't remember where since I've looked at (& drooled over) so many online catalogs recently. Maybe you can find one of those to replace your Iris pseudacoris.

I found that yellow Siberian on the Songsparrow nursery site
IRIS SIBERICA 'WELFENSCHATZ'

I know it's not as intense a yellow as the I. pseudacoris, but it's a start. If there's one out there, there are probably more also.

Here is a link that might be useful: Songsparrow nursery I. siberica 'Welfenschatz'

I'd really like to miss Iris pseudacoris! I've been trying to eradicate it ever since I found out what it was. I'd picked it up at a local plant sale, and within a few years it showed its thuggish nature. It's especially annoying since it looks a lot like other irises until it blooms, so it's difficult to know which ones to dig up.

(OT: from the same plant sale I brought home the evil Anemone canadensis. Since it's native I guess we're not supposed to call it invasive, but it's certainly ineradicable. When will I learn?)

Thanks nhbabs. I may well get that for next spring's bloom.