about this time of the year in this ole texas heat my beds & containers start looking .....
well, BAD.....i have planted perennials, tropicals and supplement with annuals and that is petunias, begonias, impatiens.....i buy flats of those...and hate to buy more of them because they will die at the end of the season.....i supplement by growing 300 to 500 coleus cuttings and plant caladiums(that is a whole nother story...i dig them back up so i can keep them for next year and half of them don't make it thru the winter).....all for my yard and my containers....; so what do you do when your beds & containers start looking awful due to the heat, wear and tear.. and pests, ......; i don't want to invest more money in annuals....and i also don't want to plant perennials till it gets cooler.....any ideas for me??
Droopy, tired, limping along beds, borders&pots what to do
Great question. my husband told me this weekend that there was an area that needed some"punch" and what could we plant there? Hot tired and thirsty I told him nothing until it got cooler.Even with all this rain it is too hot to work much outside and I'm doing more looking at the window than actual gardening.But I do have some sale coming up at a local nursery that I plan to get a new big container to provide a focal point from our french doors.nancy
I do a little pruning, pull up the annuals that aren't looking great and just keep giving everything a little boost with superthrive or the fish emulsion. I have one bed that the sun beats down on HARD so I put a little umbrella near it in the hot afternoon.
knolan...what is in the bed that the sun is cruel too? also where do i buy superthrive....is it different than super bloom?
My impatiens, in particular. Poor babies need rest from the filtered sun they get in the afternoon.
You can get Superthrive at HD or HGC. Comes in a little bottle and you only add a drop to a gallon of water. I love that stuff.
knolan....i SO didn't want to sound like a wendy whiner...but YES, my impatiens are looking awful....yikes...
will get some superthrive....is that the stuff that is in recycled pop bottles?
Giving them some Superthrive sounds like a good project for this weekend. I can water myself while I fill up the watering can..
Esparanza is great! This time of year it really comes into its own. But it is an annual.
Actually, Esperanza is a perennial but it's desiduous....loses all it's leaves in the winter. It will pop right back out in late spring. It's blooming festival tends to begin in mid summer and it does seem to thrive on a little Superthrive! I'm experimenting with a little fish emulsion and seaweed but I haven't seen a noticeable improvement yet. Gotta love that plant! It's a Texas Superstar.
Sticks - I'm sorry I lost this thread. I had gone on vacation right after your last post. You know, I don't know if the bottle is made of recyclables or not. I would hope so.
I was gonna say, another way to perk those impatiens up is just to give them a good chop off the leggy tops. They'll bush out and you'll get great, healthy new growth.
Have you used the Superthrive yet? I love that stuff cause a little really goes a long way. I use it in place of Miracle Gro. I had read somewhere that using too much Miracle Gro can give yourplant too much nitrogen over time. I think it was nitrogen. Oh well, I read it and was also told that by the extension office so I tend to go with what they say.
Do you know that I haven't had to replant my impatiens in the last three years and they have spread? Even with the freeze. I think providing them with shade in the hottest part of the day and using pine straw mulch really protected them. Sure they looked horrible in the winter but, come spring time, I cut off all the old stuff ad the came back like crazy!
knolan...do yall freeze in the winter? that is amazing about the impatiens....i may have to try the mulch thing.....and stupid me...i never thought about chopping them down for them to grow back well....i have to do my petunias several times a season, why wouldn;t it work for the others....
i tried superthrive....can't decide what it did/didn't do...really didn't notice anything (i think)
We freeze. As a matter of fact, this past year was un unusual one for us with all the freezes we had. I lost a lot of stuff. Sniff, sniff.
It takes time on the Superthrive to see te results. Several applications and a good month (at least).
well it has been a month...and i still can't tell.....; i did however get some fertisorb and OH MAN...i am liking what i see.....
I've never used Superthrive before, but I got a bottle and I let you know how it works.
please do...i think it worked.....but i am just not so sure
I got a little lost--sorry. But I did get the Superthrive and I am impressed, and this is from a very dry hot period from late August through late September when we didn't see the cool (relatively) and wet (likewise) rebound we often do, because this year the big Bermuda-type high that murders North Texas in the summer seems to have favored us this Fall. Anyway, thumbs-up! Then again, I believe in homeopathy.