Thanks for the words of encouragement, Sharon! :) Okay, where does one get alfalfa tea? I've heard it mentioned several times but have no idea where to get it.

We had an early snow that melted but i did do the box with leaves things on all the roses except Hansa and Martin Frobisher, both of which have never had any serious kind of winterkill in the past.

I just noticed that my 'Blue Queen' Salvia is poking through and I have 2 or 3 mystery plants that I'll see if I can figure out from last years notes yet!

I noticing that my tulips are finally ready to bloom -- usually they bloomed on DH's birthday (May 2) but oh well, at least I get to enjoy them yet! Also I usually have Johnny Jump Ups blooming by mid-April but this year I haven't even seen them yet! I sure is different this year!

Ang

Marcia, alfalfa tea is something you brew yourself. Here's a recipe for it:

The Mix:
Choose a garbage bin or barrel with no leaks and a tight fitting lid. Position it in an out of the way place - you don't want to have to move it once it's full. For a full size garbage bin (20 gallons) add 16 cups of alfalfa pellets or alfalfa meal (4 cups to every 5 gallons or 22 litres of water)

Add 1 - 2 cups of Epsom salts (magnesium sulphate crystals) (or one quarter to half a cup to 5 gallons) Optionally, add two tablespoons of Iron Chelate
Fill with water, put on a tight lid to prevent mosquitos from breeding in your "swamp"
Let stand for one week until it bubbles with fermentation. Your nose will tell you that it's ready.

Using it:

Apply alfalfa tea once per month in the spring and summer, especially after the first flush of flowers, to encourage repeat blooming. You can reduce or eliminate the Epsom salts in later batches.

Stop applying it in the fall, when you want the plants to start hardening off for the winter, and don't want to encourage soft new growth.

Put on some old clothes - you're going to get splashed, and you don't want to be socializing with anyone while wearing the alfalfa tea!

Scoop off the liquid with a bucket and apply.

Pour a gallon of tea per rose around the base of the plant; more for large climbers, less for potted roses and minis.

Soak small potted roses in a bucket of tea for 15 minutes each.

When you have scooped off most of the liquid, you will be left with a thick goop of alfalfa in the garbage bin. There are two ways to treat this:

Method A: You can add another quarter-cup of epsom salts, fill the garbage can one third of the way up again, and stir the mix briskly so that the alfalfa is suspended in the water. This slurry can be applied to your roses immediately. Choose the roses in the back of your beds for this tea, where the greenish brown puddle of alfalfa slurry won't be too visible.

Method B: Add the full dose of Epsom salts, refill to the top with water and let sit for another week. Use the liquid, and then bury the alfalfa dregs into your compost pile (by this time they will be pretty smelly)

I got this off of "Dave's Garden" website. There are a few variations that some people have to the recipe(like any recipe), but it's more or less all the same. I've got a batch brewing now in a 5 gallon pail. But now that I don't need all 4 rain barrels, I may have to move one over to the garden shed and use it to brew up bigger batches.

Here is my recipe for alfalfa tea:I bought a 32 gallon garbage can and added
12 cups alfalfa pellets
Fill with water 3/4 full and let sit for 4-5 days or so.
When it's ready ( you can tell ) add
2 cups epsom salt
1/2 cup chelated iron
and then I added some miracle grow as well.(About half as much as usual)
Fill to the top after stirring and water.

I found this off a rose site. The results were amazing on some of my bushes last year.

Has anyone tried using it for other plants as well?

Shelley

Shelley, you don't want to use Miracle-Gro, many of the hardy Rugosa hybrids dislike chemicals.

Here is the recipe I've been using for years, all natural.

I have used it for my Hostas, going to try it with Irises this year too.

Sharon

Here is a link that might be useful: Alfalfa Tea

Thanks, guys. Now i have to locate a source for alfalfa. There's a feed store on the way to Dryden - might be there.

This evening when i was out looking around again, i noticed that Martin's branches had some kind of black fungus on them. I took all those branches off. Is this stuff contagious to my other roses? None of the others has it.

Both Henry and JP Connell have no signs of life whatsoever. I cut Henry back quite a bit and am hoping for growth from the bottom. The funny thing is that the two White Kosters, which are supposed to be zone 4, are perfectly fine, leafing out nicely.

On another note, i am not seeing much activity around three of my geraniums. Usually they almost come out of the snow with leaves, but not this year. There are a few reseeded ones around, though, so if the parent plants don't make it, there'll be replacements available nearby.

Marcia, you'll easily find the pellets at the feed store.
If the black fungus looks kind of sooty it most probably is stem gall. Burn it and dip your pruners in a bleach and water solution to prevent spread. I had it on some of my Adelaide Hoodless bushes.

Sharon, my Rugosa's are in a totally different bed and I do not use the miracle grow on them.
Just in case anyone tries it, you also are not supposed to give newly planted rose bushes the tea until their second year in the ground. This stuff promotes top growth. I have dug enough around on the net and others do not have great winter success rate when they have applied the first year.

Shelley

Looks like my U of S cherry tree that was chewed by the voles is toast. It's only leafing out below the chew line. And the branches that are leafing out don't seem to be too conducive to turning into an attractive leader. I may try it but I think I'd get a funny looking tree in the end. Although, the flip side might be that if I try to wire up a new leader and I'm successful, I'll be awfully proud of myself. Maybe I will then. Just talked myself into it. Isn't this forum great? lol

Shauna

I finally got out really looking around, and so far I'm only seeing 2 of the 6 Uncharted Waters (daylily) that I planted...I'm hoping they're only late coming up due to their shadier location, but the two that are up are in the same location and they're about 6"...fingers crossed.

My John...Davis or Cabot...can't remember off hand (you'd think it would be easy since he's my only rose...) has died back to only one twig off the main stem...and one posessed branch coming up from the base that has surpassed last years death (can't call it growth now, can I?) by almost three times...but last year it bloomed the same as all the now dead growth so I guess I'll see if I can train it and shape it into something pretty.

Mom bought me a Theresa Bugnet (sp?) for Mother's Day...here's hoping I do better with it. I'll have to look back through the posts to see what I need to do differently.

So far looks like everything else is happy and healthy, so not bad.

Verena

I lost one of my thymes that came through the winter fine. I lose more plants to the early spring freeze/thaw than to anything else, I think. My Morden Sunrise is also looking pathetic. I'm hoping for it will come from the bottom. And those red tulips I planted at the end of the lane seem to have totally disappeared - there is absolutely no sign of them. Shauna, if you have the room to let your cherry tree grow, I'd let it. I have a 5' tall Patterson apple tree that came from a side shoot, after the cows got out and cracked the main trunk. I just kept the most promising shoot, and pruned off the rest.
Connie

Thanks, Connie. Looking at it again today, I think you are right. There are about 5 fairly strong branches below the chew line and right at the chew line, there is a new sprout. I think I'll just leave it for this year and see what it does. Will someone please remind us to do protection measures in the fall? If we all have wonderful gardens this year, we're going to forget about what a lousy winter it was and leave ourselves open to this stupid rodent damage again next year. lol Of course, that'd be me that I'm speaking of, not the rest of you. Please remind me! : D

Shauna

Hope it comes back for you Shauna. I'm no expert on rodent control, but can't you put that plastic drain pipe stuff on the lower trunks and just leave it there all year round?

My heuchera looked funny the other day and upon closer inspection all the new growth has been eaten by the rabbit. It's just old leaves and little stems where the new leaves were. Hope it grows back and stops getting eaten. I think Brenda was saying deer like them too (?) not that I have deer but they must be tasty.

Mr. Lincoln is in fact alive and well, but Sunsprite and Mme. Plantier #2 have taken a turn for the worse and all the green stems went brown. They might still come back from the roots. All the other roses are doing well. I have one floribunda that's doing that stupid trick where all its canes are green but hasn't started leafing out yet. I do not know why roses do that.

Gillian,

Deer do enjoy the new growth on my heuchera and poppies. Both are supposed to be on the deer resistant lists but are not deer proof. They do say that young new growth from plants may be at greater risk of being eaten and that younger deer may eat anything in sight as they learn what they do and do not like.

I even had a monkshood eaten one spring by the little fawns. Monkshood is extremely poisonous and is definitely on the deer proof list. Wonder how long it was before the numbness in their mouth and throat went away? Funny thing... the monkshood was never touched again that year!

There is a list of deer resistant plants at...

http://www.thenurseryatmountsi.com/deerx.htm

Brenda

Gillian, it is strange why roses can be so tempermental at times. I'm still waiting to see if Scentimental will grow. There's still some green cane at the base, but no leaf buds to speak of. I seem to remember it playing this trick last spring too. All I can say, is that it'd better hurry up and do something, because the Greenspot has some Distant Drums roses in, and 'ol Scentimental could be replaced in a heartbeat!lol

I'm still waiting on a few heuchera, tiarellas, and lily 'Fancy Crown' to do something. I'm also pretty sure that my Japanese maple is toast.:(

My Therese Bugnet came out really nicely, very green and leafy. My Morden Snowbeauty I thought was doing nothing until I looked at the bottom and see some short green shoots (?) Is it going to recover? I also have a heritage rose that I completely ignore and it grows relentlessly (I love it). I have lots of sedum (easy to gorw and very happy), half my daylilies came up. I tried a endless summer bigleaf hydrangea but I'm sceptical. It looks dead, but the nursery ones are just coming out now and I figure they are ahead of mine so maybe....I'm going to start a new thread re: overwintering in pots...any advice, stories, etc will be helpful.
Thanks :)

I'm so excited - the mystery rose has been quasi identified by one of my friends [who is a master gardener] as a tea rose - it came back for me with zero special treatment - amazing - what good things can happen to dummies who don't know what they've got.

Fern

Too funny, Fern! I have one from the grocery store that's alive and ready to open its leaves. I was totally excited, too when I saw it this spring. I only planted it because it hurts to throw a plant in the garbage, I never thought in a million years it would survive. I think I threw a pile of leaves on it but I'm crediting all our early snow and heavy snowpack all winter.

So my Summerwine Ninebark is starting to leaf out which makes me happy :^) I just planted it late last summer. And the White Bleeding hearts are back for their third season, but no sign of the regular pink one that I planted last summer :^( Or the peony yet...:^o Is there yet hope for me? I see some in town up two feet!

Well, I am starting to get depressed. I am not seeing anything much in the backyard. Even the grass is mostly dead. I have tons of perennials that aren't showing up, even things like the bleeding hearts that have been there for the last 20 or so years. What I do have coming up are two peonies (should be four), my Marie Bugnet, two clematis (should be 7), one Goat's Beard (should be 5), a couple of Cimifugas, lots of Ostrish ferns and lots of shoots from the ornamental plum tree (anyone have any ideas of how to get rid of these suckers?). I don't see my irises which normally can't be killed, hostas, the bleeding hearts that bloom all summer (can't remember the name right now), perennial geraniums, coral bells or tons of other stuff. The front yard seems to be okay for the most part. The hostas in the front of the house are up 6 inches already, one clematis looks like it will bloom in a couple of weeks (Yes it is that advanced!), the white bleeding hearts are huge and so is the goat's beard we have there. The perennial geraniums are nowhere to be seen, same for the two roses I planted last year. My coral bells look very dead. Okay, I better stop listing as I am just getting really worked up over this.... I like shopping for plants but I sure don't like the thought of replacing everything and starting from scratch again. Am I expecting too much too early?

Danni

It's been a weird winter, Danni. I'm finally seeing a bit of new growth on one of my heucheras. Two have nothing and one has foliage 6 inches tall. All planted in the same place. The zone 4 roses are leafing out and healthy while the indestructible ones are struggling (nothing on Morden Sunrise, Henry Kelsey and JP Connell). Three geraniums - nothing. One is coming along great. There are two polemoniums side by side - one is lush and green while the other is half dead.

Crazy. My mom is here now and she says our leaves are out further than Thunder Bay, so maybe your perenniels need another couple of weeks. Good luck!

P.S. Max remembers you! :)

Hi dannie - I'm in the same boat as you...my list of now shows is depressingly long, and I'm feeling discouraged! I'm in Thunder Bay, and the dry summer followed by not much snow sure took its toll in my garden. I've also lost things that have been around for years - fern leaf bleeding hearts, oregano, masterwort, poppies, geraniums, pulmonarias, coral bells, euphorbias, lupines, forget-me-nots, and 3/4's of the bulbs I planted last fall, to name just a few. I'm still waiting for the astilbes and my hops to make an appearance before I write them off too. The stars in my garden so far are monkshood, sedums, ferns, delphiniums, hostas (just poking thru now), siberian irises, goatsbeard and lady's mantle...maybe I'll just divide those to fill in the holes!
This is my first post on this forum and I'm sorry it's so negative, but I'm feeling like a big black thumb these days and I had to vent!
Sheryll

Sheryll, welcome to the FN!! I can see why you would be so discouraged when you had so many of your perennials not make it through the winter.

I know that when I saw a perennial silene not make it this year in my yard I was so disappointed because it had been there for 5 or 6 years already. I loved it. Then, I looked on the other, "bright" side...now...what I can plant there instead...2 irises and some miniature daylilies or maybe a miniature veronica and a miniature campanula. I needed spots for the new purchases I made this spring. Now, I have an area that instead of holding one spreading ground cover perennial, I think I will plant 2 or 3 new short upright perennials!

Brenda

I share your disappointment. . . Things are very odd in my yard also. Hosta is just coming up today. No growth on Morden Sunrise. Delphiniums--1 is about knee high, 3 are about ankle high, 2 are toe high, and there should be 4 more somewhere. I planted an epimedium last summer having high hopes--no sign of it yet. Now I see that many catalogs have it listed as zone 5. Guess I can't go across the bridge to Wisconsin to buy plants. Since my Duluth garden seems to just be popping, perhaps Thunder Bay won't be far behind. However, that is a good point, Brenda--now there's room for new stuff!

Andie

Brenda, I have made a few purchases at the greenhouses (one of them was perennial silene - it's a new one for me) and it IS a good feeling to plant some new things!
Andie - I have some epimedium that have made it thru 2 winters (with lots of mulch!) so far, and I haven't given up on them yet this year....

Sheryll

Yay!!! My peony (Fiesta Maxima)finally popped up. It was just waiting for this heat we're finally getting. I also had a perennial geranium called 'Vision Pink' that was rated zone 4 come back for me. How sweet it is!

I went and dug around a bit... I would say that 90% of my perennials are dead and rotten. What isn't rotten is very dry. I am so happy that a few people have given me some divisions as it is going to get expensive to replace everything. Oh well... I guess gardening goes on....

Danni

That's a shame, Dannie. I wonder how others in Thunder Bay are doing. Have you talked to Gale? It was too early to tell much in her yard when i was there.

With all of the snow cover last year I surprising lost quite a few things.
One each of Tiarella, Miniature Goatsbeard,Veronica, Amur Maple tree, Soapwart, Rockcress,and alot of Blue Flax.
I could of been our soggy soil from that fall that they had to go to sleep in.
I think this was my main issue with my Rose de Rescht too.
I had no trouble filling in the spots though. In fact I could have used a few more.(Not the roses though)
Shelley

I also lost a lot of blue flax, almost all of them, actually.

Well, I've officially given up on the clematis - no sign of life on five of them - and I thought Jackmanii was impossible to kill! Lost two out of three heuchera, a dwarf burning bush and a bleeding heart. Probably some others that I've forgotten I planted.

Both holly bushes made it, although with quite a bit of winter kill. Peonies are thriving - about 18" high already with visible buds. Roses - well, Morden Snowbeauty and Morden Blush and John Cabot are thriving; Adelaide Hoodless and Golden Unicorn are getting a very slow start but I'm hopeful. The wiegela is coming along quite nicely and that is the one shrub that is borderline for our zone - go figure. Columbine and achillea have never looked better and the Clematis 'Willy' actually has a few flowers on it.

Weird - doesn't seem to be any logic to what survived and what didn't.

Margaret

I also gave up! I dug a few hostas and other plants up to see if there was a smidgen of green and nada! So I went out and consoled myself with buying a whole lot of new plants *grin*. We got them all planted yesterday and the yard looks *soooo much* better. I did replace them mostly with the same types that we lost but I got new cultivars: hostas, astilbes, goat's beard, veronicas, irises, perennial geraniums and a few gorgeous columbines. Someone also gave me some divisions for which I was very grateful. I will need to get more hostas for the planters along the patio and I am thinking of putting in some ferns such as Japanese Painted ferns in there too. Has anyone tried Dead Nettle (Lamium)? There are some very pretty looking types out there and I wondered if it was something I was going to regret or enjoy...

I find that the lamium, maculatum, is a very nice self seeder. It is also easy to pull out if it self seeds somewhere you don't want it to be. I like it as a ground cover under roses and bushes. It comes with either a light pink or a dark pink flower. I have little plants here and there in my landscaping.

Beacon's silver lamium is shorter and will self seed but not as often. It is also pretty with its silvery leaves and pink flowers. White Nancy and some of the others are the same in that they do not self seed as readily, but they are really pretty.

I find that lamium can grow in sun or shade and is a much hardier plant than something like ajuga. I would highly recommend it.

Brenda

My balloon flower decided to present itself within the last couple of days. I plan to pull the plug on the "no shows" in the next day or two. These include trumpet vine, butterfly weed, mockorange, Morden Sunrise, Russian sage and some oriental lilies. Do you think I should wait longer on any of these? I have been nurturing what I thought was a butterfly weedÂturned out to be a volunteer common white alyssum. Variegated dogwood and dwarf burning bush alive, but anemic.

Hoghaven (are you a Harley owner?), my dogwood and one of my burning bushes are decidedly anemic this year too. The other burning bush (always larger and stronger than the other) is all leafed out and very nice looking. Go figure. There are some lilies in one garden that just popped out in the last day or so, so maybe give yours another week just to see.

Miss Sunrise's baby sucker seems to have come back now but there's no sign of life on the main plant or on Henry Kelsey. I have two clematises coming that will take Henry's place. Where he is, i just can't dig deep enough to plant six inches lower.

I would still wait on any plant(s) if they haven't made an appearance yet. The other day, I thought I lost one of my tall Sedums, therefore I took the spade and dug it up, lo and behold it was still alive with shoots just coming up.

Laurie, how's your Fancy Crown Lily doing?

Sharon

Sharon, there are 2 little leaves coming up from it, which should be baby bulblets. But still no mama coming up.:( I'm still waiting on a couple other lilies that I planted last fall too. There have been a few that have popped up just this past week, so I'll give them another couple of weeks before I try digging to see if there's anything left of a bulb or not.

I dug out clematis 'Duchess of Albany' yesterday and replaced it with alpina 'Ruby', which should be much hardier. Still no signs of clematis 'Negritjanka' and 'John Paul II', so I think they'll have to be replaced with others. I only lost one iris, 'Butterscotch Carpet', and the japanese maple, and a heucherella. So really, all in all, I had a pretty good winter success rate this year.:0)

Sharon, I thought I had lost Sedum 'Autumn Joy' too, but it showed up last week. I also have a lily that never showed up but sent up a few little leaves. I think it was 'Red Dutch', which also did nothing last year. Oh well. All the Orientals I planted this spring have sprouted, wow they are nice & big! :0)

northspruce,
In what sort of location are your orientals? I have not been successful for quite a few tries. Sun/partshade? drainage? acid/alkaline? protection/winter mulch? I would be so happy if I could grow a nice bed of lilies!

marciaz3,
well. . . I have an electric bike--hardly a Harley, though!
Hoghaven started as my web persona when I actually had a real live hog farm. "Hoghaven" expressed my personal philosophy of happy, healthy animals. DH and I sold the farm a few years ago and now live in the "San Francisco of the North" also known as the "Finnish Riviera". The electric bike really comes in handy when climbing the hills. (You should see the stares when the chubby, ol' lady passes the strong youngsters going up a hill!)

Hoghaven, those lilies are in a bed with my roses, so they get the same blanket of leaves and burlap in the winter. But I should point out I just planted them this spring so they haven't made a winter yet. I have a couple of Orienpets that are a year old.

The drainage in my whole yard is excellent, it's sandy soil. Lilies appreciate good drainage.

Arrrrrrrrrrgh! Laurie, how long did you have 'Duchess of Albany'? I just planted her where Jackmanii used to be. There was no sign of it in the ground, just some dead roots. I'd hate to lose another one so soon. Jackmanii only lasted a couple of years. The two i have coming are C. alpina 'Pamela Jackman' and C. durandii. Hope they do okay too.

Hoghaven, I also suggest waiting a bit longer before giving up on some of your perennials. My Russian Sage and gaillardia just started sprouting in the last couple of days. Mind you, Russian Sage isn't exactly hardy for my zone and is always very late coming up. However it usually manages a few blooms.
Good luck anyway.

Marcia, I had Duchess of Albany for 3 years, but it was planted out in the open, no shelter at all. Is yours planted up against a building? If it is, it'll have a much better shot at living I would imagine. Mine did ok the first year, but went into decline the next 2 years. It's the same story for my John Paul II, and Ville de Lyon, and Jackmanii.....there's so many nice hardy types of clematis out there, I think I'll stick to them. I also just picked up Durandii, so we'll have to compare notes together.;^)

Gillian, I've also noticed that my Orientals are looking really robust this year. I wonder if it depends on how far down the frost gets to in the winter, as to how well they do the next year? I expected/hoped that the ones on the south side of the house would do well, but even those out in the island bed have multiplied as well.

Jackmanii was planted up against the house and that's where i put 'Duchess of Albany'. Fingers crossed! 'Cardinal Rouge' was in the open. He never really flourished, but he did last about five years, i think. I'll have to find something hardier to replace him with.

Clematis "BlueBird" (macropetala) is very hardy for me
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savona

Clematis "BlueBird" (macropetala) is hardy for me too. It reseeds quite a bit in my yard.

We have abot 40 varieties of clematis and Bluebird is the only one to produce viable seedlings(some are now full mature plants) . We have had a few Tangutica seedling here and there but they seem to disappear.

I can't say we lost any plants of note this year. No obvious omissions in he marginal species. We have thousands of plants so hard to know if some particular lily, irs, etc. didn't make it.

Just a note...some 'perennials' are short lived and there may not have been any negative variable. Above someone mentions 'flax'....the plants were probably fine but didn't reseed. Similar issues with short-live perennials like clematis, poppies, etc. can happen. Nothing wrong with the weather or zones, etc.

Well, will wonders never cease, but I actually have some Houttuynia cordata 'Chameleon' coming back from last year. I tried it about 3 years ago, and it all winter killed, but there's a tiny piece coming up from last year. Of course, last week I picked up another container of it when I found it for $2.99. Oh well, I just hope nobody from a warmer zone reads this and thinks I'm crazy for wanting it in my garden, because it can be terribly invasive in the south. I'm hoping I won't have that problem here.

Well my last clematis has decided to show itself. Aswell as the gas plant that was missing. This is wonderful..everything I planted last year is now accounted for.

Sure enough - I no sooner plant the two new clematis that I ordered and a couple days later I notice green shoots coming from two of the clematis that I was sure were casualties!

On the other hand, Golden Unicorn and Adelaide Hoodless are goners - and I did so love that Golden Unicorn!

Margaret

Margaret, that's exactly what happened to me too. I picked up a couple of new clematis as replacements, and yesterday Negritjanka decides to sprout! Now I have to find a new place for the replacement.
That's too bad about Golden Unicorn.....it's a real beauty. I'm surprised that Adaelaide Hoodless didn't survive. I thought that one could live through any kind of winter you threw at it!

Laurie, I thought A.H. was pretty hardy, too. It was quite close to the sidewalk so maybe it got too much salt...??

LOL - your comment about a new place for the replacement; I'm trying to figure out if I want to move one of them or have them all growing intertwined.

Margaret