Thank you for all of the suggestions. So far for fall delivery I have ordered the following - Magnolia 'Butterflies' Magnolia 'Genie' Magnolia 'Vulcan' Chrysanthemifolia Star Magnolia Chionanthus virginicus Cercis canadensis 'The Rising Sun' Cercis canadensis 'Appalachian Red' Cercis canadensis 'Burgundy Hearts' Cornus kousa 'Blue Shadow' Cornus kousa 'Akatsuki' Syringa reticulate Fagus sylvatica âÂÂRoseo Marginataâ (tricolor beech) Kwanzan flowering cherry Weeping Double Red Flowering Peach Acer palmatum 'Coral Pink' Acer palmatum 'Oregon Sunset' Ginkgo biloba 'Mariken' (a male) Definitely excited! Still keeping an eye out for things that peek my interest. If any of the good mail order nurseries do end of season sales or anything, I would love to know about them! I am also still debating the purple cherry I asked about as I ordered the rosebud Burgundy Hearts which is the color and size I was looking for. Thank you for the suggestions! Also, everything above is mail order and smaller than what I see at nurseries (on purpose for saving reasons). Being in zone 6b and with the property having a windbreak all around, should I be doing anything special for these trees for the winter? I will be planting in October. I have planted shrubs and perennials at that time and been fine through the winter but don't have any experience with trees. Thank you again for all of the help!

HI Erin! Welcome to the wonderful fun of gardening and also, bless you in your new home! Where are you located? Are you thinking of only planting hostas or are you thinking of having a few other plants in there with them? Some contrast and especially color when the hostas are not blooming makes everything look really nice. Hostas are quite happy to have friends among them. My lot is .1 acre and that includes the house. So I do not not get hundreds of hostas or anything else (except slugs). It is pretty shady from my neighbors' trees though the bed in front of the house is in full sun. That is where daylilies and irises go. But I do have at least 25 cultivars of hostas and am planning some more. The advantage to a small garden is you have to plan what you put in it -- or else be prepared to pull out things to give away so you can make room for new acquisitions. And divisions from your older plants! The fun is, you don't get everything at once that you will ever have. Wait a while and put things in a few at a time (annuals will do to fill in places) and then you can have the pleasure of learning about new species and cultivars and acquiring them as the years go by. You will get different plants, hostas or otherwise, from various sources and they will always remind you of the person who gave it to you, swapped with you, or the trip you took when you bought one or another plant(s). I like to have some color spotted here & there so I use impatiens (I can hear the perennial people groaning) and I also have some Heron's Pirouette perennial begonias---these get about 2.5-3" tall when they bloom and have long lasting scapes ( flower stalks), arching gracefully --- here, from Aug till frost. In May, there is old fashioned bleeding heart -- both white and pink/white. These die back in the heat of summer so the hostas, which are getting big, fill in the bare spots the bleeding hearts left. I have a few liriope here & there because they are OK with dry shade & tree roots, and they are not boring if you only use a couple. You can get them with several shades of variegated foliage, and white or medium or dark blue flowers. And they bloom in very late summer/fall when not much else does, in the shady garden. I live in NJ overlooking the Delaware R just north of Trenton. I use astilbe, too--from white to pink to deep red frothy flowers in late spring and early summer. They are also beautiful with the hostas. Right now there are crocuses that have just opened yesterday (when it was sunny) and there will be squills and grape hyacinths, and daffodils are in the sunnier spots. I don't bother with tulips---though I love them, they are an expensive way to feed deer. I have lily of valley under the Norway spruce tree (which has had its lower branches removed to give sun to the bed under it) this is a rather dry shade bed---however the trunk of the spruce is ringed with Gold Standard hostas that are quite happy. The bed gets compost thrown over it every spring and it has sweet woodruff in there along with the hostas, and little spring bulbs such as crocuses & squills, and bigger ones ie English bluebells. Lily of the valley would like to take over the world, but there is easy way to stop it---dig some out. After it blooms, so you can have the wonderful flowers! I try to always have something blooming somewhere in the yard. It does not have to be a lot, just a bit--some white or pink flowered thing next to a dark leaved hosta brightens the corner. I have scilla Hispanica which is "wood hyacinths" -- you can get them in pink, white or blue, and they are very shade tolerant. They will bloom in May (here) and do very well next to hostas too. When the hosta leaves get bigger, the scilla is dying back for the summer. In our yard we have red shale which breaks down to clay in some parts, and what the locals call "the brown sand" in the other areas. In one little lot! Some kind of interesting geology was going on here a long time ago! We now have dark black soil over both, after years of digging in manure, leaves, & compost. You can ameliorate clay quite a lot with gypsum. We dig our yard's leaves right into our beds, around the plants, in fall. When we make a new bed, which we did a lot of after we got the new septic system, we take three years to do this digging, instead of planting things right away. The soil in those beds is wonderful. We also have a compost bin in the back corner---this is not rocket science and do not let compost hobbyists scare you! All you have to do is make a circle a yard or more across with sturdy wire, and throw in the leaves, weeds, and the non-meat kitchen scraps. Also grass clippings if you do not put weed killer and poisons on the lawn. Kitchen stuff meaning plant material such as peels, rinds, stems, leftover salad or other veggies that waited too long in the fridge to be eaten, and cut up toilet paper rollers. Turn it twice a year and when you turn it, take the well-composted stuff out & use it in your garden. When the ground is warm in summer, we just take the kitchen compost bowl out & dig the stuff right into the garden next to the plants. It breaks down very quickly in summer and the nutrition goes right into the plants. You said you have children---by all means, set aside a place for their own garden! Especially if you can make it in a sunny area. Let them plant veggies (then they will eat them) and make it easy ones such as lettuce and beans. You can grow beans as a little tent to save space. Or you can make a taller "tepee" with poles and leave an opening for the kids to crawl in under the beans. You can take a potato from the farmer's market (the organic stand; it won't have been sprayed with anti-sprouting stuff) and cut it up so the pieces have eyes. Just stick them in the ground a few feet apart. Then the kids can have their own potato plants. Well, you have heard enough from me! Once again, welcome to years & years of great fun!

whatttt?????? you said: They look a little ridiculous as the leaves are sooo crowded. that is kinda the whole point of a mature clump of hosta ... no need to EVER divide a clump .... unless you need the exercise ... but if you want to dig them up year after year ... feel free .. they are your hosta .... most hosta start looking ratty in august .... so that is a good time to dig and divide .. yes.. they will look like heck for the rest of the year ... but will be just peachy in spring ... dig up half the clump.. insert shovel.. jump on it until you get through it... then rip out half ... or quarter it ... or do surgery down to 1000 individual pieces ... as long as it has the leaves.. a piece of crown and a root .. it will probably grow .... or just throw them on the driveway and run them over a few time.. and plant the bits and pieces .. and you will have a 1000 new plants ... they are hosta.. you are going to have to try real hard to kill them ... good luck ken

Garter Snakes, Indigo Snakes, Owls and Hawks might starve to death without voles. I don't understand why we don't build habitats for the above snakes instead of saying "eek, a snake". If I had them in my yard I would have no voles. the KKK River is up for the first time in a year. The other morning two young men (sigh) were carefully walking along the emergent weeds on the river bank. One suddenly grabbed and came up with a Water Moccosin by the tail. It was about 3 1/2 feet long. He held it for almost 5 minutes while his 'bud' took pictures with his phone. When he finally released it, unhurt, he left out his breath which I think he held for the full 5 minutes. What a adren rush he had, and I don't blame him. I once removed a copperhead from my Mom and Dad's yard and released it into the woods. I'd pinned it down and grabbed it behind it's triangular head. I am not a 'eek' gal! Toads in the garden are good (they love slugs) as are Guinea Hens, chickens and ducks which most urban laws don't allow. Snakes are GREAT in the garden because they prey on Voles, Ground Squirrels, Gophers, and even tree Squirrels, Ground Hogs and Rabbits avoid Indigo Snakes. They can get over 6 feet long but only pose a threat to humans if you try to grab them. who'd want to: they smell like putrid rubber. I know. I'd once rescued on that was caught in a plastic mesh. It wasn't my most pleasant 'rescue'. The snake was almost 8 feet long and 4" diameter, but the opening in the net was only 2". it would have died had I not released it. All that being said, I still don't know what the value of voles are other than fodder for other creatures great or small. Ken, with a thousand hostas, a dollar a basket is waaaaay above my budget! 'Eco' friendly Theresa Maybe this should be the subject of another thread.