Confess the stupid gardening mistakes you keep making

Today I went out in the garden for just a short time and committed two of my perennial mistakes. First I hit my head on a hanging basket. They're all over the garden, I've literally knocked myself silly numerous times, but I still raise my head up quickly without thinking.

The other thing is so stupid that I feel ridiculous admitting it. I was pulling a long weed and wondering why it was being so tenacious when I finally realized I was standing on it. I do this all the time. I start pulling weeds and come across one that refuses to be pulled, but only because I'm standing on it and it's sort of like trying to lift yourself by your shoelaces.

buying too much. Planting them too close. Losing interest in weeding until to truly clean up means a really sore back. Falling in love with plants that won't make it through our winters.

Oh, and forgetting to put the wheelbarrow sideways so that it goes rolling at pell-mell speed down the hill before I can grab it. Meaning I have to pick up weeds, tools, discarded sweatshirts, and anything else I was dragging along in it again.

There was a commercial once that showed a woman pulling wildly on her garden hose until she knocked the outdoor barbecue into her swimming pool. I was always amazed that I've never done that. It looked so much like something I would do that it almost seemed familiar. I guess the only thing that has saved me from that is the lack of a barbecue and a pool.

Buying more than one plant for a vacancy after forgetting I had a replacement.

Losing labels for plants. Some have three, others have none. I hate finding them on the ground and not attached to any specific stake or plant.

Another mistake is foolishly believing the coffee will stay hot. It never does.

I pot my plants under a tree, and I'm always standing up without thinking where I am and hitting my head on a huge branch.

Pirl knows about this, but I once threw bags of lilies under pine trees to keep them in the shade until I planted them, and then forgot about them until they sprouted in spring, all a jumble of matted lilies. It made it easier to plant, as I just planted them all in one clump (per bag). And not lilies, but I'm always throwing stuff under the pine trees and forgetting I did.

When I'm weeding, I throw the weeds into the pathways between the beds and sometimes leave them there so long that they root and start growing again.

I also set my pathways on fire occasionally. I usually smoke inside, but I occasionally finish a cigarette in the garden, drop it on a pathway, and stamp it well into the soil. My cigarettes are unfiltered, so that never causes any problems except when I've just received a new truckload of shredded bark. I spread it on my pathways in a layer several inches thick and forget how dry it is in the middle until I come outside and smell a fire. It's never a big burn and it just smolders instead of actually going up in flames, but it's redwood bark so it smells just like a forest fire.

Has everyone noticed that my mistakes sound much stupider than everyone else's? Come on, people. Confession is good for the soul. Tell me something really stupid.

I am a compulsive seed saver. I wear clothes with pockets, and when I pass by a seed head....doesn't have to be in my garden, anywhere will do, I nab the seed head. Then I forget to take them out of my pockets.

I have the number of my washer repair guy on my fridge.

Oh my, these are funny, I don't even think I have anything to add because most have already been covered. The first thing that came to my mind was buying a plant and then finding the same one already in your garden, still waiting to be planted. I do the lost label thing too.

Now then, Zuzu, you sound like you're a danger to yourself out there!

Polly's post reminded me that I have astilbes dug and lying at the edge of a path...for months now...probably from September or October. I can't even remember why I dug them or if I replanted that spot. Then there's an entire tray of astilbes I dug last summer. I know where they are but I've forgotten the color, height, etc.

Oh there are so many stupid things I do on a regular basis in the garden. Turning on the the wrong nozzle and spraying myself in the face, finding plants or tools laying around the garden that some distraction pulled me away from, and always forgetting to label something. I've had the run away cart and washing seeds experiences too, LOL. I often feel like a clown in the garden!

Planting Tithonia as little seedlings never realizing they'd grow up to cover my beautiful lilies!

I'm also guilty of buying plants I already have without realizing it...and often I still hadn't found room in my garden for the first plant that I'd bought let alone the second. One time I was drooling over this one plant on Kartuz's website--it was gorgeous and I had to have it but it was out of stock! So I religiously checked their website every week waiting for it to come back in stock. Then when I was moving things into the greenhouse for the winter, guess what plant I found on my front deck! LOL

I'm also guilty of repeatedly buying and planting things that I know don't like my climate and won't do well--there are some plants like Tibouchina that I just love and I know if I try enough times someday one of them will decide it likes cold winters and hot summers! My problem is I could grow them at my old house 25 miles north of here (which had slightly cooler summers and slightly warmer winters) so I'm convinced that they should grow here too even though a pile of Tibouchina corpses clearly proves that they will not! I do have a "3 strikes" rule on plants where if I kill it three times I'm not allowed to buy it again, and except for the Tibouchinas I tend to follow that pretty well (at least when I remember that I've already tried that plant 3 times!)

LOL, Liz, I now have that third Tibouchina corpse in my yard! I want climate like Berkeley or Santa Cruz!

Me too! LOL Although Martinez was OK for the Tibouchinas too, that's where I lived before I moved down here and I definitely had better success with them there than I have here. I think if I'd known how different the climate was here I might have decided the long commute wasn't that bad after all!

Does it help that Tibouchina's DEFINITELY don't like Cincinnati weather, but are so lovely that I'll buy them each year as an annual?

I didn't even know they sold Tibouchinas in Cincy! I used to live there and don't remember ever seeing them, but I guess most of the time I was there I was living in apartments so I didn't do a ton of gardening.

If they weren't supposed to be hardy here then it wouldn't bother me that they don't make it--if I leave a zone 10 or 11 plant out in the cold and it dies then I don't get upset (as long as I left it out on purpose of course...I've had some things just accidentally get overlooked when I'm loading up the greenhouse for the winter and those make me sad). But these are hardy in zone 9 and in most other parts of the Bay Area they do just fine, that's why it bothers me that I can't grow them here! They also don't like my summers much better than my winters--they'll live through them but the edges of the leaves get all crispy and nasty looking even if I keep them out of the afternoon sun.

Yeah, and it drives me nuts driving through Berkeley and seeing them as tall as the roof tops in full bloom!

I either save or start seeds without labeling them absolutely certain I will recognize them. Most of the time I forget. I guess I like surprises or maybe I forget that I forget?

They are very seldom available here in Cincinnati - although once Home Depot got several of them as patio tropicals at Mother's Day. I was SO excited. I usually have to buy a little one online and remember how utterly lovely they were when we lived in Sunnyvale. So enjoy yours especially much for me!

Just considering color and not height and width when buying companion plants.

I do what Polly does, and forget to replant bulbs that I accidentally dig up. Then they bloom in weird places and it throws off my theme.

If I had a dime for every time I've hit my head on arched rose canes or hanging pots I could own this website. There's one huge cane of my Polka cl. rose that has a clump of my hair still attached to it from about 5 years ago.

OOOOHHHHH sounds painful

Biggest garden mistake: purchasing specimens and not checking to see if they are deer resistant. I realize the morning I walk around the yard to find nubs. Must place a sticker on the credit card for the cashier to ask me, "Did you check whether the deer will eat this?"

I do the 'planting too close' thing all the time. You think I'd know better after gardening for 7 yrs, but...oops, I did it again!

Certain sites in the garden are just plant killers - I keep trying different plants and watching them flourish for a while, but then succumb over time. One of these days I 'll have all the "holes" in the bed designs filled up, I swear it!

Have done the whole "forgot the label" thing way too often. I even have a great photo record, so why I don't I label them more consistently?

Planting too close to the walkway. Plants seem to refuse to lean backwards where there's plenty of room, and insist upon leaning into the paths where I have to whack them back. When will I learn to just SITE them back from the border edge?!?!

I was watchung an old episode ov the Victory Garden and they were planting bedding annuals.
They said to put the plant in with the lead bottom stem toward you or the border.

Life would be ideal if the Victory Garden team would just come over and do the planting.

Fun thread! Here are my biggest mistakes...

For gardening, I think my most consistent mistake is planting too many seeds. I do it every single year. You would think I would learn. But no.

And right on the heels of that mistake is...I just really have a hard time culling the seedlings. I feel sorry for the poor little things. (smile)

After the harvest, my biggest mistake for a long time was not labeling some of the foods that I dehydrated. After dehydrating, I store the food in glass jars. I used to think that I'd know what it was just by looking at it. That was not always the case. I still have a few "mystery" jars, but now I label everything. LOL

I understand the culling dilemma completely. I can never pull volunteers out of the pathways. I feel sorry for them and I feel they're owed some acknowledgement for their tenacious will to grow.

Pirl, my life would be ideal if someone would tell me how to kill the Arum that takes over my entire garden for months each year without killing everything else.

Arum hardly moves here. A ten year old clump is about a foot across.

Like a fool, I planted those Arum's once...it took about 10 years to erradicate them all.

I have either Greater or Lesser Celandine (both are evil) and would love to kill it all but not hurt the other plants. Invasive plants are hideous and such a thief of time and energy.

Even if I spent 10 years eradicating all of the Arum in my garden, JD, it would come back within a year from the gardens around me. It has invaded my entire neighborhood and holds us all under its power from about October to the middle of March. I have grown to hate even some well-behaved plants just because they resemble Arum.

I sometimes almost poke my eye while bending over to cut or pull something forgeting there is a green bamboo stake there.

I had to get rid of many plants this past fall becuase I planted to close together.

I also cut my self all the time on my roses because i get to lazy to find gloves.

never plant anyhting in a giant plastic pot. I have a gigantic brug that hast rooted through the pot and and now the side of the pot is breaking.

Not listening to people who said dont plant morning glory in southern california. I have it growing out my ears

ok now i want to look arum i have know idea what that is.

Several years ago - the first time I entered the garden competitions - I had a lot of dandelions and decided to kill them ( chemical) so I gave all the dandelions, front and back a quick shot. Unfortunately I have a habit of not labeling what I put in the squirt bottles and I picked up the wrong one and it killed not just the dandelions but the grass around . Some of the spots were pretty big so I bought a roll of sod, cut out the dead grass and replaced it. But some spots were pretty small and I got tired of trying to deal with them.

Guess what - the judge of open gardens ( which is the whole yard - the only one where the condition of the grass would be considered) thought they were dog pee spots !
Whew! got away with it!

ha ha ha thats pretty fun. I bet it did look like pee spots

I have looked at this thread a few times and felt I had nothing to contribute because I don't repeat mistakes too often. At least I try not to. But there is one that will not let me forget the mistake I made once. IVY. I was new to gardening many years ago and the IVY took over many years ago. The IVY is over the fence, up the trees, in the neighbor's yard, trying to climb up their house, trailed to the back of my yard, over that fence, trying to consume the other neighbor's yard. Yes, IVY will cover anything in it's way. Don't stand still too long if IVY is in sight.

There is one that I do constantly. I have a trigger spayer that has a loose trigger. I toss it on the ground and it sprays me every time. Maybe I should invest in a new one??

My cats shuddered when I told them you had a trigger spayer, Louise.

The trigger sprayer is my mistake too.
Glad its always hot weather so I dry off fast.

Louise's is a spayer. Much more dangerous.

Too late for spaying here .Done when Iwas 36.
lol