I (badly) need some advice from flower gardeners.
I created my first perennial bed when my youngest child turned 4 (1982) and was passionate about my flower beds for decades after that. In the front yard I had a 50' border alongside the vegetable garden, a 30' bed parallel to it across from the stone path to the house, and a 50' bed perpendicular to these, running alongside the dirt road. All were fairly wide.
I never tried to plan the property or design a garden; I took a more casual approach, but the result made me happy--and caused people to slow down and stop to talk about the flowers.
After my daughter died and my husband's health failed, I stopped cold. It's amazing how quickly weeds moved. But a few years later I went back to my gardens, using a shovel to dig out the wild blackberries, thistles, and grass. The beds weren't exactly restored to their former glory, but I added shrub roses and lots of new iris.
Then about 5 years ago a groundcover weed called germander speedwell arrived on my property, and that was the beginning of the end. The stuff was impossible for me to control, and it smothered everything in its path. Coupled with this was a dramatic reduction in my energy and stamina, very probably caused by a combination of my age and the many (11 that I know of) tick bites I've received over the past 3 or 4 years.
I realized I couldn't keep up with all the gardens, so I reluctantly shut down the one bordering the vegetable garden, giving away many of the iris and other plants, and moving what I could to the one bordering the road, which seemed to be doing okay at the time. I created a patch of zinnias and sunflowers of all heights in front of the vegetable garden, and that was a fun showstopper.
But nothing's doing well now. Germander speedwell has total control, and it's been joined by some other difficult weeds, including grasses I can't even dig up. I gave up on the sunflowers. Most of the front yard has turned into an eyesore, except for some paniculata hydrangeas here and there and a couple of rugosa roses. I'm thinking the only thing I can do is salvage what I can and mow the rest down. It won't even look decent mowed (those mounds of grass like thin steel, for instance), but it'll be better than it looks now--and it shouldn't harbor ticks.
But then what do I do with what I save? There's a Festiva Maxima peony planted maybe 100 years ago, for one thing, and some of my favorite monardas and irises. It might be smart to give up flower gardening entirely, but I really don't want to do that. I miss it, and I miss the way it made my property look. But I want to be realistic. The weeds are not going to go away, and I'm not going to get younger and more energetic.
Would a raised bed or island be the answer? Do people have raised beds to prevent grass, etc., from encroaching on their plantings? Do you have any other ideas for me? I've thought about this situation so much that I'm not thinking productively about it anymore.
Sorry this is so long! Thank you.
Comments (25)
11 years ago
11 years agoRelated Discussions
Novice Gardener: Need advice about flowers and veggies!
Comments (1)If you live somewhere with freaky weather it is always best to sow a few seeds and then sow some two weeks to one month later to act as back up plants should the first batch not survive. Its all about timing. If they stay in their pots too long, some plants just never do as well in the garden as those that got outside and in the ground at the perfect time. You'll never be able to forecast that "perfect" time so just take the risks you're comfortable with. Hot weather lovers like morning glories and zinnias do not do any better starting them early. They just kinda sit still until things warm up so there isn't a huge advantage to starting them early. They will set seed which will over winter and sprout next year but the zinnia seedlings won't show up until summer is half over and the morning glories will show up where you don't want them and also a bit late. Two things will slow down seedlings - lack of sunlight (much stronger than indoor lighting) and lack of warmth. It is better the keep them starved for light while you wait for things to warm up outside. Cool temps bring with them all sorts of rot problems with seedlings. If you're starting large seeds of things like melons or cucumbers just stick two or three seeds in each space and then use scissors to chop off the heads of the weakest plants after they're a week or so old. No need to risk damaging roots by digging them up to thin them. The headless ones will sink back into the soil over time. The truth about roots - the roots you see when you dig up a plant are not the parts of the roots that do the actual work of drawing in water and nutrients from the soil. The real workers as far as roots go are microscopic. Only superman can see them with the naked eye (and he ain't much of a gardener!). You can gauge a plants health by looking at its roots but the damage that is done by handling baby plants is to the microscopic roots. Some plants just freak out when those roots are damaged....See MoreNew to gardening and need some advice..
Comments (7)Ashley, The photos you like are from a yard in Long Island, New York, so the plants, while very lovely, don't have to deal with the same harsh summer conditions we have here. (Their "hot" is not even the same as our "hot" even though we all are in zone 7.) Just thought I'd throw that in because often we admire yards from other parts of the country, but sometimes we can't use some of those plants here in our climate or they bloom earlier in our climate and all are not in bloom together. Also, the landscapes in the photos you like were done by a person who is a garden designer and, yes, the design is amazing, as you'd expect from someone who designs gardens. : ) First of all, you need to figure out what kind of soil you have---clay, sand, sandy loam, silt, etc. because the kind of soil you have will help determine what you can grow. I would guess you have sandy loam or clayey loam but I'm just guessing. Secondly, even more importantly, you need to know if your soil is alkaline or acidic. Some parts of Oklahoma have extremely alkaline soil, some have acidic soil, and some have soil that is close to neutral. Different plants grow well in soils with different pH factors, so figure out your soil pH before you start to plant. From looking at the photo of your home, which I've linked below for other folks so it is easier to view, it looks like your beds are not very deep. How deep are they? Three feet? Four feet? More? As small as the beds are, you will have to select smaller plants or the beds will get too crowded very quickly and will look too "busy". Or, if you want to have a lot of plants, you could enlarge the beds before you try to plant too much. You also have to be careful and select smaller plants until your shrubs get some height to them or the taller flowers will shade out parts of the shrubs which can lead to uneven growth and a mis-shapen form. Take Malva "Zebrina", for example. Just a couple of months after planting, one plant can be 3 feet wide or wider and 3 to 4 feet tall and it would overwhelm the small shrubs. I use a lot of Malva "Zebrina" and hollyhocks, for example, but I have a two story house so I have deeper beds--some of mine are 12'-15' deep (deep meaning horizontally wide, not soil that deep), so I have the space in front of taller shrubs to plant taller flowers. You don't have that sort of space in your current beds, though, so you have to be careful in selecting taller flowers. Unless the beds are deeper than they appear to be in the photo, the following plants on your list would tend to get too large for the space you have: four o'clocks, tall phlox, tall cannas (you might be able to grow the dwarf cannas but you'll probably have to dig and divide them every year to get them from taking over the shrubs' space), hibiscus, Russian Sage (there is at least one named dwarf Russian sage that doesn't get as large as the others and it might be a possibility) and maybe Autumn Sage. You can't have hostas on the south side of your house because they need shade and would struggle in the hot July and August sun without a lot of shade. You don't want chameleon plant because it is very invasive. I don't know about silver lace vine on the south side of a house. It is not crazy about our summers and normally does best on the east or north side of a house where it has some protection from the summer sun and the southerly winds that are so dominant during the hot months. These plants are good candidates for your beds, but not too many of them unless you enlarge the beds: Globe Amaranth Gazania Daisies Cosmos (the dwarf ones only, like Cosmic Orange or Cosmic Red or Cosmic Yellow or the dwarf Lady Bug line because some of the taller ones would get 4' to 5' or taller and overwhelm the shrubs) Stonecrop Hardy Ice Plant (only if you have well-drained soil) Yarrow Lantana (not generally reliably hardy in zone 7, but sometimes comes back for 2, 3 or 4 years if the soil drains well and the winters are kind) Verbena (the perennial ones can spread out 4' wide but the annuals stay manageable) Daylily (if carefully selected and placed--some of them get huge too, so you'd want smaller ones) Zinnias (choose the smaller ones (height-wise) like the Dreamland or Magellan or Zahara series that get maybe 12" to 16" high. Some zinnias get 4' tall or taller and about as wide and they'd be too large for your current beds) If you are doing to put a bed on the west side of the house that would be 4' to 5' wide, you could fill it with flowers and many of the ones you listed--both tall and short ones--would be great for a location like that where you don't have to worry about the flowers burying the slower growing shrubs. So, if you are going to keep the beds their current size, I'd go with smaller, shorter plants like gazanias or blanket flowers for the first couple of years in order to give the shrubs time to gain a little height after width. After that, you can carefully add some of the taller plants you like, but slowly and in moderation so the bed won't be overfilled. Dawn Here is a link that might be useful:...See MoreI need advice badly....
Comments (6)Mimi- I'm not a landscaper either...sounds like the crape myrtle you're describing is like one of mine, and it's an Acoma. Only gets to about 10', wider than tall, beautiful arching shape. That shape sold me- I actually wanted a pink. I applaud you for wanting to have suggestions for the builder. His people will most likely suggest bradford pears, and other problematic [though popular]choices that you will eventually pay someone else to remove. Check out serviceberry "Autumn Brilliance", to use instead of Bradford pears. I'm sure others will have ideas for you as well. Your house looks great! TD...See MoreNeed advice badly! What should I do about my countertop?
Comments (88)So glad that the OP posted and that everyone else commented. Am just at the beginning of a huge remodel. My first. In the past I've only bought houses that were "ready to go" or "good enough" and did not even imagine that I would be able to go to the fabricators and "OK" the slab before cutting. This lurking on websites is part of my research, so thanks to all who gave me some good stuff to read and learn. I have put "see slab at fabricators" in my "countertop" file front-and-center to make sure I don't forget to do that, whether I purchase quartz or granite. This is extremely helpful information for newbies. FWIW--the blob was hideous, mostly because it was not conforming to the rest of the counter top pattern. Blobs in other patterns/styles look "fine" because the slab is full of them...and that is the POINT of that particular slab. not with this one though...it was not conforming in size or frequency....See More- 11 years ago
I looked up xeriscapes. . . the pictures do look nice, and we certainly have rocks here. But I'm remembering what happened to the rock garden I created once upon a time (that weed again, plus others). Of course, my plants weren't in pots.
Sylvia, I've moved that peony twice already. :-) The first time it was little more than a leaf that I recognized. In its second or third year after being transplanted it produced 72 blooms! The son of the woman who originally planted it, then in his 80s, came to see it. It was quite an emotional experience for him.
The extension office said the only way to kill the speedwell is by a strict schedule of spraying. I remember it was something other than Roundup, because they said Roundup won't work. We do our best to control it in the vegetable gardens by digging and/or using a long-handled claw tool. The roots are fine, numerous, and tenacious.
I should mention that I live in a 150+-year-old farmhouse.
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