I work as a florist, and we use a lot of my plants in wedding arrangements and hand flowers. We use a lot of Dusty Miller in boutonnières and bouquets. Rosemary looks pretty too (but the smell can be a bit much). I would go ahead and get a few types of Ivy started now, so that they have time to fill out in the next year. There are some really pretty Rudbeckias that are easy to grow in containers. They also last really well as cut flowers. Others that might work well for you would be Yarrow and salvia. I would plant some ornamental kale and cabbages this fall, those look surprisingly cool in bouquets. The plants that I think would be the best to plant now would be the greenery you would like to use. If the greenery you want can be overwintered indoors or is an evergreen in your area, go ahead and plant some so that you get the most out of the plant by next year. Congratulations and good luck!

Lambertson does not have any frilly edges...yet. There will be 1 in his '09 intros. He was talking about the excessive ruffling & angel wing cultivars from other hybridizers that he had issues with. His should just pop open because he doesn't have the ruffle factor. The part I'm concerned about with his intros is the heat playing a factor on color saturation. You always have to worry where you put a particular dl regardless of whether it is northern or southern grown. Is there tree or shrub root competition for water or nutrients? Is it on a slope, is it sitting low where frost hits the hardest...blah, blah, blah. I have the experience of my oh so famous way of planting things in 3's for a design element & I can personally attest to the fact that they don't all grow the same even though they may be a few feet apart from each other, all bought at the same time from the same grower & getting the same amount of water & fertilizer. Genetics of plants come into factor as well. When I was selling nursery stock for a living I found out that brand new cultivars of anything was pumped full of fertilizers to get them to grow as fast as they possibly could to get them out on the market. Those initial ones were not winter hardy! After a few years passed by & everything calmed down they got back to the natural growing behaviors that they were genetically incorporated to handle & then became winter hardy again. Do I dare even bring this up? Deathly afraid of getting hammered on here, but where did you buy them? Off the LA where they have been used for hybridizing? How small were they when you got them? This is the world of gardening where nothing ever grows the same even 2 feet away from each other. You can't bank on anything. I am one to definitely play the cards. I grow 2 dozen japanese maples in my yard that have defeated the odds & live on to be growing vigorous where no one thought they would. Same thing with exotic conifers... You never know until you try it. By the way, even though they are considered to be 'southern' some of those hybridizers do try to breed for the north. Petit & Peat have partnered up & Peat has a nursery in Canada that he tests their cultivars in. Stamile talks about his new cultivars that actually should be taller & more robust in the north. He also mentions several of his cultivars that are emo's that pop open in 40 degree weather. Not all of them will fly just anywhere, but you can't eliminate them just because they are 'southern'. I guess I may change my tune in several years if they fail me. I highly doubt it though, because I did my homework. I fail to see a lot of the northern hybridizers having huge branching & bud counts at this point where I see the southern bred ones much higher. I realize I will lose some of that due to my weather but it should make them VERY comparable to what is going with the northern ones. Why not take a few southerns until those northern ones get better? Sorry to say, in my mind's beauty eye, they still are prettier & enjoy them until the northern ones catch up. Should I deny myself of that? There are only 2 northern hybridizers that I can compare to what is going on down there & that is Brooker & Hanson & I will get them into my garden as I can find them available...not so easy because they seem to be consistantly sold out on the cultivars I want.

What a great read! Thanks so much for sharing. I have a friend who lives in a small town north of here. He doesn't follow Chris' strict protocol, but he does occasionally help himself to plants from abandoned property. I'm off to read the blog and do some shopping. ;)

Count me in! I go to the Perinnials Plus club meetings most of the time- It's a loosely organized club- no officers, no dues (we just pass the garden hat at the meetings to pay for postage) a lot of us are online, so we get emails- I am not sure who the kind persons are who organize it :)) Mostly, we go on garden tours (which is wonderful!) I have also been to the BonAir Library to meetings with extension agents, etc. very informative. We don't meet in Dec, Jan, Feb (I believe it is) *hope someone will post the schedule here and fill in all the details I left out* Those meetings are the 1st Weds of each month. I remember that April will be at Thieneman's Nursery, which is a wonderful, friendly place!!! so, let's have a get together - sounds like so much fun! happy spring! Linda by the airport :))