Garden Talk: Your Garden Mistakes

Heidi

I have White Italian sunflower seeds, I'll be happy to send some your way if you want more.

When I was a young gardener I found a pretty little ground cover with purple flowers growing under the apple tree, I wanted to plant something else with it to accent the cute little purple flowers, so I went to the garden center and bought something called Bishops weed I thought the light green and white leaves would look so nice with the litle purple flowers. AHGGGGG!!!!! creeping charlie and bishops weed in the same spot!!! I'm still fighting them both, but the creeping charlie seems to be beating the bishops weed. If I could harvest and sell either one of them I would certainly be a millionare!!!!

My biggest mistake happened right off the bat. I had never planted seeds inside before, and I got my DS to help me build a light stand. Then, I couldn't wait. I had ordered some annual and perennial seeds for the spring (This was in beginning February) and sowed them all, expecting only about 1/2 to come up. They all came up, every last one of em. I transplanted them all (still under lights) and they started to grow, and (the annuals)grew, and grew, and.....it was only the end of February. Then they grew some more and it was only the end of March. And I had to wait until May 9th to plant them out!!!! I spent the rest of the time until May desparately repotting them up into bigger and bigger pots and watching the Nemesia start falling down the sides of the pots in true perfect fashion. Well, I learned my lesson. 6-8 weeks before last frost from now on!

This message was edited Friday, Jun 15th 10:38 AM

Thanks Tim. If these two don't produce any seeds for me, I may take you up on that offer! I'm treating them like royalty right now. :o) I still can't believe I was pulling them!
Heidi

Birdie had a post that reminded me of a funny "mistake" story. Years ago I planted a very nice garden, so I thought, mostly from seed. I oohed and ahhhd at eveything sprouting so quickly. Upon further inspection, I noticed that ALL of the seedlings looked alike even though I knew I had many different varieties planted. I was stumped to know what seedlings took over my flower garden...sure enough..they looked like TOMATOES...? Where the heck did hundreds of tomatoe seedlings come from in a flower garden? Well, after hitting myself on the head for about 1 month..I figured it out! My rabbits were given the left over tomatoes from our table..>..they ate the tomatoes but don't digest the seeds..>..the seeds pass in the manure..>..I spreaded the manure in my flower garden without composting it first..>..hence, hundreds of tomatoe plants growing amongst the perennials...lol.
Trish
ps..I heard of a guy who used fresh rabbit manure to amend his soil before putting a new lawn down. He got his new lawn alright...lol..complete with a multitude of tomatoe seedlings!

Your bunny surpise brought back a memory here - not that it was in MY garden! In 1971, I was attending a National Science Foundation Summer Institute for teachers, in Santa Rosa, CA. One of our field trips was to the municipal sewage treatment facility, where some new testing of the use of "dried solids" was underway.

Behind the cyclone fence was an area in which the drying had been ongoing for long enough that the entire mess had sprouted and grown - and there they were - all several feet tall - the tomatoes!!! AND the marijuana!!! AND the jimson weed!! It was interesting to speculate on the circumstances under which the seeds of those last two became part of the flushing!

simply put... Phlox. The small corner (2'x3') of seedlings has migrated to the entire hill. They remind me its time to mow, no I'm not real hung up on the weeds in the lawn theres 3 acres to mow so they only bug me when they, the Phlox take my roses attention with their loud racket in the grass.
My first farming faux-paux I still have not altered, one of my front beds has a little morning sun and thats it well I put Elephant ears towards the back cannas in the center and calla lilies in front. SShhh don't tell my cannas they need more sun, they don't know it. I get the best blooms from the Lucifer ( red & yellow)It's still one of my favorite beds, so lush and tropical feeling all summer. I fill in the bottom with coleus, catnip,dianthus and salvia..yea I know it needs more sun too.
Oh and one last bummer Gardenia, I've had three die.

HI ALL!! I have been so busy with gardening I have not stopped by.
Diamondwife,,,,as much as you don;t like the EX..please leave the violas, take some time to investigate wild flowers you will adore them and want more!!~
AS for my mistakes,,,,,their are many!!~~
I learned the mint mistake 24 yrs ago. A dear friend wanted a mint garden for her bday, so i planted her a mint bed 10x10. I put different mints such as.....orange mint,apple mint, spearmint, old fashion wooly peppermint, pineapple mint, and black spearmint!!
My friend had wonderful old farm loamy soil!!This garden took off!!~
After about 10 yrs,,,,she decided to let her *new* boyfriend,,clean up the *MESS** i had made,,,,so he tilled the mint.... all in**EVIL GRIN*,,,,,needless to say,,,,*S*
it was a long lasting bday gift!!~

I have made alot of the same mistakes you all have made,,,that is the learning process of gardening!!~

HEY MOM2cats,,,,,,,we have to do lunch soon!!
I miss all you great gardeners in chat!!~~

please keep sharing you mistakes with other gardeners,,,*S* it helps us all learn!!~

MOTTO of the day:......NEver Never by a 6 pkg of mint!!~~LOLOL

Invasive- Violets! Wild Daylillies.
My worst is parsley. I had parsley last year that was SIX, yes SIX feet high filling a space about 5 x 5 feet in a shady garden about 24 x 5. I trimmed it like a hedge! I finally cut it down at the end of the year and thought I killed it. I have millions of parsley plants this year. It is filling the whole 24 foot long bed.

My mistakes include-
not paying attention to color when planting. The results can be jarring. On the other hand- plant the colors you like and are pleasing to you, even if unconventional.

Trying to plant sun lovers in shade and vice versa. I have learned that plants do so much better if planted where they are supposed to be planted. makes sense, right? Well- I tried to get around it for years.

Everything eats hardy hibiscus no matter what you do. Yes they are beautiful but plant rose of sharon instead and keep tropical hibiscus inside year around in the north for those great flowers.

I have a bad section of the garden that only daylillies will grow in (and one odd survivor hydrangea). I have finally learned to stop trying to plant other plants there. Nothing will grow. I am using it now for daylillies only. Everything else dies for some reason.

Spend the time to amend soil. I finally learned this and it makes such a difference.

Those are just a few of the errors....

Hi everyone! I'm brand new to this site and love to hear your mishaps. I might as well jump in and tell you of mine.
When I first started gardening I went full goose and just started to plant everything. My first lesson was not to plant nicotinia unless thats all you want. I also loved lupines and got plenty of seed and waited impatiently for spring for them to grow, but they never came and in the meantime I had some really strange weeds coming up in my garden that I had to keep pulling. Well, my jaw dropped and I couldn't stop hitting myself in the head when I got my first plant catalouge and saw that I was pulling up my favorite flower by the handfulls.
I have also learned that old fashioned columbines belong outside the flowerbed, preferably near the edge of the lawn. Also, just because it says ground cover doesn't actually mean it's going to stay low to the ground.
For all you new gardeners out there, don't worry, I started out 13 years ago with these mistakes and now I have my neighbors coming to me for advice and asking for any extra plants I may have. Hang in there!! You grow and you learn!

This message was edited Saturday, Jun 23rd 10:37 AM

Interesting reading.

A gardening mistake partially avoided is Oca, nope I haven't spelled it wrong :) Oca is a root crop from New Zealand and tastes a little like potatoes. Now I'm usually a stickler for botanical names but in this case I didn't ask. Only when the leaves appeared did I realise its botanical name is Oxalis tuberosa. Fortunately it was still in its pot when the leaves came through. However it was only a partial success because I now have 5 big pots full of little ocas and I have no idea how I'm going to house them all next year, theres only so much oca a gal can eat! Letting the ducks and chickens loose on them only serves to make more leaves and more ocas, I would scream but lets face it I'll never be hungry again LOL.

We have mint and violets running wild and free too but it doesn't matter because being on heavy clay and using close planting techniques (born of having too many plants for the size of garden) tends to keep them all in check, and theres nothing nicer than weeding with the scent of mint. Iris sibirica has thrived and made a nice clump as have the japanese anemones another 'invasive plant'.

well mints where not my mistake yet. I love them. and they can be contained either by potting them or burying barries which is what I have done and you can even cut the bottoms off of hugh pots and sink then and plant in those. But they have to be big pots . My mistakes have been 4 oclocks can't get rid of them..... Trumpet vine I cut it down and it still comes up out in my yard any everyplace. can't dig the darn thing up I think the root goes to China. Also yucca they just keep on coming I have dug and dug ...I think its another one that the roots go to China. lol.

Just wanted to share my passion vine story. It took over the chain link fence and started coming up in the garden 10 feet away! The only way I got rid of it was by selling the house and moving!

So funny Bulblady..lol.

I FOUND another mistake in my garden yesterday, hopefully it won't be too difficult to deal with. Previously we had cut down our Bittersweet vines along a fence to make way for an addition being built. After the addition was finished, I kept the vines cut back almost to the ground, since I was thinking of moving them and I also wanted to keep then under control, since they are VERY aggressive growers. Well, to my surprise...I found UNDERGROUND runners 5 feet away with lots of new vine growth above ground, waiting to take over! One "baby" vine was starting to strangle a tree. I know that Bittersweet vine grows rapidly above ground but I didn't know it also sends underground runners, too. Gardening is always full of surprises..lol.
Trish

My biggest garden mistake was allowing Impatiens Glandulifera, nick named spit weed, to go to seed one year. This plant is beautiful when in bloom, the bees love the lavender orchid-like flowers. But when the seeds get ripe they pop and the seed flies all over. Needless to say, the next Spring I spent most of my time weeding this plant out of every crevis in the garden. Now I only grow a few of these plants, just for the bees. But if anyone is interested in seeds, they will be ready in Sept.
Tabby

I am pretty new to gardening from scratch and this year's big fiasco seems to be planting Nasturtiums along my brick path. They are overhanging the path and there's just a tiny narrow strip where you can walk... if you try to cut them back or move them out of the way they look TERRIBLE and I don't want to rip them out because we eat them in our salads!

I, too have had the heartbreak of mint... ours grew wild and we were delightedly transplanting it along a fence... and it destroyed everything in its path, including irises and French tarragon.

This is such an informative thread, thanks so much for creating it!

Janie Joy

One of my many mistakes was to plant cyprus vine. The first year I was thrilled, but the next year I had hundreds of seedlings. In my ignorance I thought if one vine was pretty just think how beautiful the rest would be. Well, needless to say the next year I had thousands. It has been four years and I am still pulling up seelings.lol :)

Thanks for the memories but you wouldn't believe mine''My husband's answer to anything is either mow or till,YIKES' Yes, we did the strawberry nightmare,still coming up after 5 years and pulling them out,TILLER MAN'' After that we discovered an heirloom morning glory,beautiful,put it by the one shed,by the garden,yep,morning glories everywhere,around the tomatoes,peppers,you name it,was there'Took 3 years to get it out of the garden' He was wanting some rasberries,along the one fence,yep,he did both,mowed the new ones,then tilled them'I gave the back garden to him this year,I've had it'I'm container gardening in the front 2 lots and he only gets to mow under strict supervision,LOL The bird seed in the lawn,OMG,LOL,so sorry for you but oohhh soooo funny'''And of course,the MINT,disaster,I did' Was doing so good by the kitchen and everything I'd read said was good to keep ants out of the house,OMG''I planted from the east(a start)to the west of the house,go ahead and laugh,you know'' Well, after 7yrs.it's gone,pulled out,over and over agin,any wonder we gardeners can't grip,LOL''We won't go into the ornamental grass I planted years ago and didn't come up,yep'I put more seeds and you know,it's ALL coming up,back ta pulling,ugh''Ya might as well laugh because it's better than crying'''Now to move the oenothera(yellow)Happy trails,Sis''

Shaking the seeds of my Black Eyed Susans into my bed where the Momma plants were. Its such a mess I havent even touched them this year!!!!
BEWARE!!!

My biggest gardening mistake, is planting sun-loving perennials in areas that only get part-sun even on the longest days of summer. I knew better, I really did, but was unrealistically optimistic about the amount of sun they'd get. Now I call the entire front bed my horizontal garden, the place I grow such beauties as Coreopsis horizontalis, lavendula stretch-toward-the-lightii and other prostrate favorites!

This is a wonderful and funny thread! I can attest to the mint and nasturtium stories, my mother planted them years ago and they still pop up along the side! Thyme and parsley are also impossible to get rid of.

My biggest newbie mistake was having my gardener plant two flats of red-flowering aptenia cordifolia in our front yard. It's a great groundcover, but I have to thin it EVERY MONTH without fail, or it strangles the other plants. A six-pak would have done fine for all 750 sq. ft. of frontyard!

And like Gardenwife, I keep sticking sun-loving plants in bright-shade places. I've killed three euphorbias so far, so I'm finally being sensible and thinking ferns, Rose of Sharon, and calla lilies instead.

I did plant some pink Oenothera, but since it's in a small bed where everything around it is thriving nicely, hopefully it will have enough competition to keep it within bounds. Pray for me, please.

My most recent dumb mistake was when I bought some California orange poppy (our state wildflower) seeds and sprinkled them around just before our first big rain. Three weeks later, I see all these little delicate green leaves and think, "Eeek! Weeds!" and start attacking them with the trowel. A week later I remember scattering the seeds and start hitting my head against the wall...

I was thinking of planting a nice invasive vine to kill a walnut tree in my backyard -- yes I WANT to kill it and tree removal is very expensive in this urban area -- but will have to rethink this as everybody's stories of rampant evil vines is a warning! Thanks to all!

I planted ranunculus 'buttered popcorn' in our wonderfully amended, rich and loamy bed out front. *sigh*

Uh oh.
What's wrong with ranunculus? *biting nails*
I have a calamintha variegata that I will now be putting in a POT.
I've planted a twig of trumpet vine by the lamppost the county put in my front yard. I don't care if it takes that over, but is it really going to travel under my yard and eat my house?
My dumbest mistake? I bought a young foxglove plant and was so excited. This is one thing I've ALWAYS wanted to grow. I put it in a 12" pot on my partly sunny/shade porch and waited, and waited, and waited. Finally this weedy stalk started coming up out of the center of it. It was HUGE! OMG! How did I let such a voracious weed take over my poor foxglove! No wonder it wasn't flowering with delicate bell shaped flowers on a long stem! I must cut this horrible weed out now!
Weeeeeell, needless to say the foxglove never flowered. I wouldn't either if someone whacked off my soon to be beautiful flower stalk!
Yeeesh, I figured this out when I finally saw one blooming in person. What a difference reality makes from a picture. I've got 6 plants coming this spring and I promise to give them a chance. :)

Ranunculus is very happy to just spread and spread...If it's in a place you want it to spread, great! :)

It's a bulb - how does it spread? Seed?

It spreads by rhizome (?) and roots easily along the nodes wherever it touches. Fortunately, it's shallow-rooted.

huh. well I've been looking forward to growing the stuff for years, so I guess I'll just keep my fingers crossed for now. who knows, I may be back in here with a tale of rampant ranunculus in 6 months! thanks

Someone gave me a LITTLE bamboo plant. That was 4 years ago. It now is over 20 feet tall and I can't get to the area behind my studio.

Wow - the bamboo that ate Tokyo! Guess the one good thing is, you don't have to weed behind your studio any more. ;)

Calendulas. New ones come up every day of the year. They stink, they're sticky, and the aphids love em. I also found out that you better want an artichoke forever if you plant it. We even went so far as to dig the basic six foot hole and light a bonfire in it. Low and behold next spring, from the ashes arose THE ARTICHOKE. Never again!

Boy, call that artichoke Phoenix, huh? We can't grow them around here, thank goodness! Our biggest mistake was not taking time to kill the grass before we did a lasagna bed in our front yard. Actually, had we made the lasagna bed THICK enough to begin with and waited to plant until the grass had died beneath it, we'd have been okay. But we didn't, and I am STILL having to pull grass out from close around my perennials.

What did you do to kill it? I am taking out lawns and cant seem to get rid of the grass completely. I have enough to do keeping the oxalis at bay without fighting grass too. Thanks

I put catnip (the ornery kind, not nice-mannered catmint) that had gone to seed in the cold compost pile. When I used that compost in a new garden last summer, hundreds and hundreds of small catnip plants sprouted. I am still trying to get rid of them, and probably never will!

Oh, don't EVEN get me started on mints. *grumble* I have two well-behaved clumps of catmint and two billion runners of various other spearmints and peppermints. Aaaargh.

My most recent garden mistake (and believe me I am paying for it this year) is that I didn't bother deadheading the drumstick allium and verbena bonariensis (sp?). I have been pulling up seedlings by the gazillions and still more keep germinating. Normally I would have mulched by now and that would have stopped them but we have had so much rain that I couldn't put any mulch down. And on top of it all I have a million maple seedlings too; I have never seen so many.

Save 'em and send them out in trades. I would love to have some verbena bonarensis one day. What kind of allium?

Very often lasagna beds will kill bluegrass, etc., but they can't kill off creeper grasses like Bermudagrass. That sucker just travels underground anywhere it can come up! Repeated applications of Roundup will kill it -- took us a year before it all died and we could safely plant without it coming back.

Out here in CA so many aggressive plants are real thugs -- aptenia cordifolia, polygonum, morning glory, oneothera, calla lilies -- the list goes on and on! Oxalis is number 1 -- we should make that thing the state plant, it obviously wants to take over the world -- there are many kinds, and all quite aggressive.

Alyssum seems to reseed itself everywhere, as do CA poppies, but at least they're pretty and easily ripped out!

Us gardeners are never satisfied, are we? Either a plant isn't growing enough or it's growing too much, LOL!

Oh, I have SO much oxalis here. So, so much. Oh, and several types of thistle. :: sigh ::

My most embarassing garden faux pas: I had bought about 100 lily bulbs which the catalogue said were good for naturalizing. The catalogue said to plant the bulbs among the grass, which I did.

The catalogue didn't mention what to do when the grass grew tall enough to need mowing.

That first summer we were out in the 'naturalized' lily bulb area with a weed wacker trying to trim the lawn around the lily bulbs. We probably wacked two thirds of the flowers. Note to self: don't naturalize things in tall grass if they bloom after early spring.

Ecobioangie, they are the drumstick allium.