Side note here first -- dear 007, could you possibly end your posts with your "name" that I would recognize? I hate that H**zz switched some folk to numbers only!!!

This year, in spite of my growing physical limitations, I am determined (hah) to tackle the horrible jungle behind the house. Once upon a time, it was pretty decently kempt, but the past few years it has been inundated with Mother Nature designing with wild, unchecked abandon: goldenrod, unwanted fern, multiflora roses,and many various unidentified weeds. It has defeated me, but I hope to get busy and bring it back to some semblance of attractiveness. We shall see!

I also hope to plant more than two dozen potted Asiatic and Oriental lilies actually into the gardens -- altho that may be a futile effort, between the critters underground and the lack of appropriate space. Originally, I had thought to treat these bulbs as annuals, and dispose of them after they bloomed in their large pots on the deck. But my Yankee frugality finds that too wasteful.

Major work is planned -- some granite steps down a slope that has plans to kill me if I traipse there, re-do of retaining wall for driveway, repair of fieldstone wall in front flower bed (where AC delivery was dragged over it and knocked it apart, grrr), re-setting of bricks on patio that winter frost heaving has made unsafe. Unfortunately, the guy who is to do all this has not been able to start the projects yet, and I am wondering if anything will get done at all this year...

So much to do, so little energy. It's most depressing! Waiting for nicer weather without the heat and humidity that has been so horrible this summer - maybe that will get me moving!

O roxanna - my sympathies - there are few things worse than having to wait on someone else's intentions to do work we just cannot do ourselves. I am in a similar position, having to rely on the vague promises of offspring and partners, to refit a window in my horsebox/cabin, as well as a heap of niggling maintenance work which my fella cannot manage anymore.

Why are you putting the lilies in the ground? It has been my experience that lilies will live in pots for years with little needed apart from a seasonal slow-release fertiliser. Keeping them in pots works out brilliantly in my teeny garden because I can stuff them in amongst the permanent plants, while still in their (lightweight, plastic pots, then, when the display is over, stash them in a discreet corner out of sight. I do the same with pelargoniums, agapanthus and dahlias as I have found that a lot of plants with an efficient rooty storage system (tubers, corms, fleshy rhizomes) are much less demanding of the usual treatment of container plants (root-pruning, up-potting, top-dressing, division and replanting)...although horticultural practices do seem to differ in the UK, re. containerised plants, maintenance and potting mixes.

I am also dealing with numerous wilderness areas, but am hoping to meet mother nature halfway, encouraging anything even vaguely acceptable as ornamental and adding in more self-seeding hooligans (and a drastic lowering of my horticultural standards (although honestly, they are already grovelling at floor level). Still, every time we murder yet another sow-thistle, knotweed, marestail, creeping buttercup or geum urbanum... is a little victory. Onwards and upwards.

Cheers, campanula

Heh heh, back to campanula rather than rosaprimulaHU-618169007... although I think just shortening it to 007 is a good idea and would be somewhat fun ;)

Oh the summertime mess and humidity doldrums. There was a little energy last week and a pile of mulch (blocking the driveway) so many things were ripped out and a nice generic blanket of mulch was spread in many parts of the garden. It looks neater at least, but there are still enough projects to fuel the guilt.

Funny you mention summer seed sowing as a time of hope! Perhaps when they're exciting new seeds, freshly purchased and waiting for the soil there's all that hope and optimism but my seeds are the exchange seeds etc which have been sitting in their bubble mailer since last winter. Hmmm. We had some rain last month and I see thousands of new weeds sprouting in any open soil, and it made me think of the of all those unsown envelopes, but I think the emotion leans more towards guilt rather than hope. But if the weeds can do it so can my plants, so I shall absolutely get them planted this week and stick whatever sprouts into the ground somewhere before it gets too cold.... unless I don't... then they're stuck waiting until December.

Hmmm. I wonder if I even believe that story. It's so cool here inside the house, and I'm going to a rock garden society sale tomorrow and should really put together some things to take along for the sale, so maybe not today for the seeds.

Maybe I will just plant the hollyhock seeds which I found in my pocket yesterday during a garden visit. That's hope and vision for next year since I can at least imagine them free of rust and Japanese beetles, and creating magical towers of color throughout the garden in a few months. In the meantime the rest of the projects might have to wait for cooler weather.

Becoming too late here to sow anything to establish enough to winter over, though can do so in flats to hold in the garage protected from the brutal brunt of winter, thing is to actually get those packs sown! BUT, yes, my main fun has currently been dividing and moving all sorts of plants around, and around, something I never much have done at this time ... though, has great advantage of coordinating colors and textures, because when working with dormant plants, my imagined combinations often are outright failures! So much easier and less waste of time and energy to put a grouping of plants together when in full leaf, I can stand back and say it looks great or keep scratching that head of mine! Also, finally am getting better knack of setting in groups or swaths, instead of my normal single specimens, I know!!

Took plenty of cuttings of heliopsis 'Venus' and the new one 'Sparkling Contrast' and now wish to attempt propagation of softwood cuttings of a very nice shrubby potentilla that came to my garden as a gift. Also, making mental note of other things to move around come spring, I want each and every bed to again catch the eye like it had a handful of years ago.

My plotting, planning, and dreaming occurs over the dormant winter season when the catalogs arrive. The b*tching and criticizing occur during the growing season...

I rarely grow perennials from seeds, mostly annuals, and all that doesn't start until at least March under the lights, depending on exactly what it is. (most occurs April-May). So the planning and ordering happens usually soon after Christmas to make sure I have what I need to get going.

I'm constantly taking stock of what needs fixing or changing during the season -- I make mental notes or actual notes on the calendar (need to do this, move that here, etc), or I'll just move/re-arrange things right then rather than waiting until the "right time" if it's really bugging me.

While my big perennial border looks really good for the most part, there's always something that could be better. I think I'm the only one who notices, though. Why is that? Is that a personality or an artistic thing or something? IDK. I always see what needs improving. Just the other day had a guy come over for an estimate on a repair to the HVAC system, and he actually said my great room was "gorgeous" -- I thanked him but thought to myself WTF is this guy blind, it's a mess, just you all wait until I actually get to fixing it up. LOL! Same thing with the garden...it's never done, it can always be better.

What I really want to do is re-build my front porch and have the front landscaping/hardscaping done. That is a not a DIY job, so it's a matter of coughing up the cash. DH is actually not pushing back on this because the porch is crumbling and actually needs to be done. The front of my house looks much better than when I bought the house, I added some trees and shrubs and perennials, but the beds and walkway are poorly-shaped and just don't compliment the house well. The back of my house looks so much better than the front. The other thing I really want to do is rip out my butt-ugly deck and put in a proper patio, one that's accessible (it's important to take that into design consideration as we age). But here again -- gotta cough up the cash, and there's other things in the house that take priority. Maybe someday...

I am planning to re-locate my vegetable garden to over by the barn and water pumps and switch to raised beds. We're in the process of making improvements to our barn, so once that's done I can start the actual planning process, right now it's just general ideas, nothing like perimeter dimensions, underfoot or fencing materials or all that. In preparation for what I know will get done in the next year or three, I'm experimenting in the current vegetable garden in terms of how much do I actually need/want to grow (i.e. cutting back...), plant spacing, and planting in defined 4' x 8' areas to gauge how many raised beds I will need.

What I am NOT doing is keeping up with the weeding in the vegetable garden -- it should more accurately be called a weed garden. What a stinkin' mess. I keep the areas where I'm growing the vegetables cleared of weeds, but the rest of it I just don't care anymore, I'll get to it when I feel like it. Or not. (this is around a 2000 sq ft area -- it's overwhelming...which is one of the main reasons I'm downsizing it).

know there are still months of flowering still left

If that means 2 then you are correct ;).

my main fun has currently been dividing and moving all sorts of plants around,

My fave things to do in a garden.

Lat62, those pulsatilla sure can be beauties! Long years ago, Thompson and Morgan offered a glorious mixture of gems in double and semi double dark red, purples, pinks and bicolors, too bad now seldom can find such caliber of seed! A friend did pass along seed descendants of that original T&M mixture, though much of its former glory lost, colorful none the less. Those blue poppies I should give a try, have seen in some folks gardens and the local botanical gardens.

Mxk3 ... " I'm constantly taking stock of what needs fixing or changing during the season -- I make mental notes or actual notes on the calendar (need to do this, move that here, etc), or I'll just move/re-arrange things right then rather than waiting until the "right time" if it's really bugging me. " .... myself, am doing a good deal of that moving around right now, the ground is so bone dry that most plants if not too large and overgrown, they don't seem to mind the careful digging and being teased apart, reset and watered in with just a small sprinkling of feeding, heck most have hardly even missed a beat, those few that sulk, I cover over and shade for awhile.

"While my big perennial border looks really good for the most part, there's always something that could be better. I think I'm the only one who notices, though. Why is that? Is that a personality or an artistic thing or something? IDK. I always see what needs improving" ... When my eye sees everything playing very well in harmony, I'm thrilled satisfied and appreciate to leave be, though if something is sticking out like a sore thumb, I'll fixate a bit, in other folks gardens I seldom will much notice something out of place for noting the good and finding inspiration.

Frozebud, let me know if I can mail you some blue poppy seeds, I'll have lots!

And thanks for the encouragement about the pulsatilla - interesting about the colorful varieties!

I ordered from sellers on etsy, from wisconsin and minnesota , red and dark purple (black?)

I hope I can get them to germinate

Lat62, sure, we can exchange seed, love doing so with friends online and in person, just drop me a private message :) I had gone out to check on collecting some pulsatilla seed to pass along, but nothing but stalks remain, these are not of knock one's socks off flowers, though a few were pretty darn nice. I guess, I should broaden my online searches and might come up with a specialty breeder.

I'm still too much in the throes of the low level of despair and overwhelmedness of my August garden to think ahead to seeds lol. It was compounded this year due to not being able to get out in the garden nearly as much as I would have liked - in my fourth week of recovering from surgery, so physically can't do much, and when I do have time/can go out, it's always seems to be raining or 90 degrees. Had so looked forward to getting out there today to at least sit on the ground and do some weeding, and woke up to rain, which is supposed to continue to well after midnight.

So the garden is more of a mess than usual. I seem to have dueling outlooks though. As I walk through it and feel overwhelmed at what needs to be done, I can also overlook the weeds and see the garden as a whole, with all the color (mostly from annuals at this time but hey, still beautiful!), all the pollinators, all the tomatoes (even if they are STILL all green and lying on the ground from a recent storm). It's a bit easier to let things go this year since I have a valid excuse haha.

My seed sowing starts in January or February. I have been getting the emails about end-of-season sales, and I know I should take advantage, but my mindset is just not there yet. I stockpile my catalogs, and some time around Christmas take a Sunday afternoon, have a cup of tea, and sit at the dining room table and make my wish lists. Then I see I would need about $1200 for everything so I start whittling down! I get my list down to about $200 (spread amongst several companies so it seems like I'm not spending as much lol) and then start wintersowing in late January.

Till then it's weeding, thinking, cutting back plants, thinking, planting out, thinking, raking leaves, thinking, mulching, thinking - I do WAY more thinking about my garden than actually working in it lol.

Of course by December all my August thoughts of being ruthless, cutting back on plants or the size of the garden in general, making things physically easier, getting rid of foo-foo stuff, sowing fewer annuals and veggies - those thoughts are all gone, completely erased as I ooh and ahh over the catalogs, so come spring I find myself in the same boat - the SS I Sowed Way Too Many Plants Again

mxk I literally did laugh at loud at your comments about your great room. I can relate, to that and to your comments about being the only one who sees what's wrong. I think it's because people can't see the vision in our heads, and we are too focused on that vision, instead of what's in front of us. One day our mailman had to bring a package or something up our long driveway and he walked up it, around the house, and left it on the back patio. A few days later he saw my husband and was raving to him about how beautiful our yard was and how he never knew because he didn't see it from the street, and said it was such a beautiful garden. My reaction when my husband told me this was huh?? I was shocked, because all I could think of was what a mess it was, how the weeds were rampant, how the voles had damaged some plants, how I planted stuff in the wrong spot and needed to move it - and so on. And I think WE are the same when we see others' gardens - we see the beauty in it, not all the work that the gardener thinks needs to be done! But I guess that's a good thing!

:)

Dee

Have sowed (23.8.24) patrinia scabiosifolia, alchemilla robusta, agastache 'Navajo Sunset', various digitalis, arenaria montana, verbena bonariensis, gaura 'Cool Breeze', and most joyously, a packet of copper canyon daisy (tagetes lemonii) arrived from New Zealand.

However, I have reigned in my seed saving mania so the kitchen table is still usable as a table and not a filthy repository of plant material.

Lol, I was just re-reading through this thread and saw this again:

"... This is the time of year when I can ignore the currently alarming state of existing beds because I have been transported to an imaginary future where all and everything is possible..."

Unfortunately for me (or, maybe fortunately, for my wallet and perhaps my future-season sanity!) that time of year is in December, when all thoughts of garden mistakes, woes, and pestilences of various varieties are long gone, and that imaginary future is made possible by the seed catalogs and the barren winter landscape!

So, rosa, some clarification please. I know you are in a different climate than I, and have a greenhouse, but are you sowing these seeds now with the plan to keep them alive through winter in the greenhouse? Or are you planning on planting them out for a return next spring?

Had to google the tagetes lemonii - was expecting some regular old marigolds. Wow. I never heard of this plant and it looks cool!

:)

Dee

Ah, I sow seeds when I get them. I don't pay much attention to schedules. During the next few weeks, anything which germinates will be hardy annuals or not very hardy mediterranean perennials which do not need vernalisation...and will putter away in the greenhouse growing roots. The hardier plants probably won't get sown for another coupla months because bulbs and garden maintenance take up most of my effort during early autumn, so an October/November sowing means time to stratify over winter.

I especially like to tend tiny plantlets over a grey, but not terribly frozen English winter...and my greenhouse is cold but rarely frozen. If I was really concerned, I would throw a bit of fleece over tenderish seedlings.although I will try to get as many hardy annuals in the ground before Xmas. My greenhouse occupies a full third of my garden space at home.but I practice being a gardener at the allotment (digging, laying out, weeding and that sort of stuff).

TBF, Dee, I would have liked to be a nurseryperson above all else - it is raising plants which truly floats my boat although I do always grow far too many for available spaces. It is a bit of a problem, because the garden is always filled beyond sanity with too many pots but hey ho, we do what we love.

I am thrilled with the tagetes lemonii - have waited for quite a few years to get my hands on seed. It seems to be readily available on your side of the ocean...but most of the forum posters seem to hail from chillier zones. I do quite well with mediterranean, some australian and S.African seeds, along with plants from Texas and the SW because I am on the dry side of the UK (unlike Floral, who gardens in a much wetter part of the UK). I sowed several agaves, dasylirion and anizoganthos which will be going into the open ground this coming spring, I hope. It is hard, trying to keep small pots of plants alive for a couple of years...and I do lose A LOT between sowing and the eventual planting out. Which is why I am trying to split my priorities between growing interesting plants I quite like the look of...and allowing the allotment to become a wilder, freerer and more chaotic space which is, I hope, somewhat self-sustaining with wild flowers and simple, self sowing species.

"... I do always grow far too many for available spaces. It is a bit of a problem, because the garden is always filled beyond sanity ..."

Gosh, don't we all lol! I think we need to start a support group. SSA - Seed Sowers Anonymous, or something like that lol.

My garden is pretty darn free, wild, and chaotic lol. But for some reason that look always plays better in photos than in my yard! This year I'm actually finally starting to rip out some of the prolific self-sowers. I will make myself happy with smaller patches of them and try to keep them in some kind of well-behaved boundaries.

Good luck with the tagetes lemonii. And with all your seeds, for that matter!

:)

Dee