Cottage Garden Seed Swap & Chat #36

I started weeding and I didnt have my mulch yet and now I am having to weeds them all again since stuff just seems to come up overnight lol wish my flowers grew so fast and big hahahahah but I am winning the battle since I am determined to have nice flower beds and will not give up the fight hahahahhahaha

Same problem here - no mulch! I ruined it the last two years in a row - so I am not getting any untill I know I am pretty much done planting for the year.

Lala, you mentioned that you have lots of gerberas. How do you propogate gerberas?

Meredith, I feel your pain with the grass going into the beds! Even with a grass catcher on my lawn mower the grass flies into the gardens! I just cringe too! Then my mentor helped me the day after the funeral and he doesn't watch the grass at all bless his heart and just knew he was going to cut my milkweeds down for weeds and flew out there cause he got out there before I did and I think I made him mad because he quit cutting the grass lol I just told him I would cut around the beds and my grasses in the field so he would know where to cut :) I wasn't giving my purple milkweeds up at no cost lol

artemiss, I took back a couple of balloon flowers from that girl I gave the plants to and they are getting ready to bloom this year lol I din't even feel bad, don't even think she missed them lol

It's raining AGAIN today! I really need to get my cannas and dahlias in the ground, trying to get things tagged for a yard sale in July now instead of June lol And still making calls for dad not sure if I'm coming or going most of the time here lately but the good news is that I have most of everything I grew this year in the ground or pots, I broke down and bought two long planters for the last two seed trays of snaps that I'm not geting in my orange garden this year, think that orange garden is going to have to wait until next year the weeds have taken over so much in my middle bed that I need to concentrate more on it it's so pitiful looking! Next week is going to be in the 90's so all of this planting needs to get done! This body isn't taking to the humidity like it used to this year and afraid I'm going to run into some trouble lol

I did get my pipe fixed yesterday down in the basement didn't think I was ever going to get that done and now I can use my hose, you just don't realize how much stuff you do with your hose until you can't use it lol Now I can wash my dirty pots out, birdfeeders and wash my garages off before I paint them to begin with. One of my son's friends does plumbing and he came by yesterday afternoon, he didn't leave until about 1:00 in the morning lol We sat here drinking beer and reminiscing about when the boys were growing up, I have know this guy since he couldn't put his pants on right now he is like 30 something lol Gosh time passes by fast doesn't it? He told me he would trade me work for my mom and dad's bedroom suite and the work I need and didn't want mom and dad's bedroom suite to just go to anyone so that will work for me I just need to find out how much it's worth it was the first bedroom suite they had ever had they never bought anything new :)

Veronica, sorry I missed your birthday! Happy Birthday hope you got everything planted that you wanted to but I doubt it with all of this rain we have been having it's getting too wet to plant anything now and I still have my dahlias and cannas! About those orlayas, if you pitch the seeds now they will probably come up but I doubt if they will bloom but you will have blooms for next year and lots of seedlings from the ones you have now :) If you dig the seedlings up to move them for next year just make sure you get them while they are small I think these have long roots I've taken a few up to move them with no success but they do transplants well from pots.

Meredith, I can't figure out this carnation gold yarrow! I thought it was suppose to be 'gold' it's getting tall like it was suppose to, it's like four feet tall, but now it's turning a med. red color! I'm sorry I didn't get the dahlias out to you or the start off of the yarrow I lost it a couple of weeks ago because I didn't have time to transplant it to a bigger pot, just too much going on this year, next year I'll get them out to you I just can't keep up this year with everything I'm hoping next year will be better :)

I lost a big plant of the blue flax in my nectar garden :( Guess I'll trim it half way down and see if it comes back out of it I sure hope it does that's the only garden that I have mulch on so reseeding is out of the question. That's where I had my red flax last year too and I put a bunch of compost around it because someone on here told me to so it would reseed but not one plant came back up and I hadn't WS any for this year :(

Actually I DID propagate some gerberas twbmom (see next paragraph) but the ones coming out my ears were plugs that I purchased in March. I did a wee bit of marketing this year and thought that if I priced them low enough they'd go like hotcakes. I guess I over-estimated my market. LOL

I also have much smaller ones that I grew from seed. Finding viable gerbera seed is a bit tricky, but I did quite a bit of online research and Kelly (klstuart) helped me with the rest. I didn't get them started early enough though so it'll be awhile before they'll flower.

We have been waging the war on weeds too. Every time I turn around they are back so I have succumbed to Preen in the garden. And got my hands on some mulch, too.

Then I went around and sprayed all my daylilies with 'Deer Scram" and "Liquid fence" and then wondered if that stuff would repel my butterflies, too!? Does anyone know?

I planted more of my annual seeds yesterday and today and now have a little plastic container garden filling up the driveway. So far the mexican sunflowers, zinnias, have sprouted in just 2-3 days.

The rain is making everything very green and healthy looking. (I was weeding in the rain yesterday.) Now if the sun would come out and give the plants a boost we will have some real blooms in a few days.

Yup I went to preen for the veggie garden that has just as many flowers as veggies right now lol. I haven't mulched it or any where yet this year.

Will Preen take care of grass and clover in the beds? I have a big bed that has a bunch of different ground covers and I am in the process of digging almost everything out and Rounding Up the bed. The grass I can pull up, but that darn clover! It grows about a foot tall with roots that just snap if you try to pull it up. Heck I found hens & chicks and cactus that were buried so deep in clover that I had forgotten they were even there. I tried to save as much of the ground cover as I could and will replant it again in a few days, but I'd sure like to avoid going through this again next year.

I used the "Preen for Gardens" and it is a pre-emergent so you can't use it where you have direct sown seeds still to germinate. It doesn't kill off weeds that are already up and growing, either, like Round-up. Preen for gardens has helped quell the onslaught of new weeds and renegade grasses that pop up in the our garden since we had a couple loads of weed seed filled leaf mulch delivered. Sometimes I have to give the garden two rounds of Preen in the springtime to get things under control. I don't know about 'clover' specifically, but I imagine Preen would control any re-seeding of it.

Of course, I am no expert on Preen and try to avoid using it by pulling weeds at the right time (before they reseed or get established) but that's not always possible.

They have 'Preen for Lawns', too, but I wouldn't use that in the garden.

Thanks Tabasco. I try to rely on good old fashion weeding as much as possible, but you know that if I'm willing to tear out an entire bed I have gotten to the Drastic Measures portion of the game. I actually bought some Preen a few years ago and never even opened the bottle....I believe today may be the day.

Funny my preen is from three years ago too. I was worried about using it because I want stuff to reseed. Just not the darn grass, and other weeds that were practically a ground cover in the new garden. It was in a matter of a few days they all germinated. I think it says on the box that it only lasts three months. So if you use it now some reseeding can still happen next year. : )

I'm pulling my hair out Meredith so I'm ready to pull out the big guns. Now I need to just figure out what they are. LOL.

I know how you feel! I have much better luck keeping the weeds down with mulch.I would still like to get some but I don't want to gat any until I know I won't be digging in it and ruining it all. That is what has happened the last two years in a row.

I have a question about the Preen, how long do you have to wait to put the preen on after you plant your seedlings do you have to wait? I'm kind of confused on this part and I'm thinking this could be good stuff to put on for the winter too, last winter I had this creeping ground cover weed just take over my beds!

I don't think you have to wait. I put mine down a couple days after planting my tomato seedlings. Like tcs said it is just a pre emergent - it doesn't do anything to already germinated stuff.

Lea, preen only prevents seeds from germinating, once they're up it has no effect on them. If your worst weed is something that is creeping in from runners or roots, it won't help. Late winter may be a good time to treat if that creeping weed is chick weed- they germinate by the thousands around that time.

Thanks Meredith :)

Neal, not sure what this weed was and now I even forget what it really looked like, I thought chick weed was little individual plants I'm probably thinking of something else that is used in salads :) This weed is a creeper by runners like clover I've had to dig it out and really not sure I got it all before it died for the summer it was going full blast in the spring from the winter and had a million seeds on it at the end when I was digging it out :(

I looked chick weed up and can't remember if it looked like that but at that time I was in another world :)

Here's the Preen Garden weed preventer site. It features a 'search' for whether your weeds and/or garden plants will be affected by it.

http://www.preen.com/products/preen-garden-weed-preventer.

Thanks t, I never do any good on those searches, I'll get to it tomorrow :)

We need a new thread , please. This one real hard to load now.

Lebug.. On your Black adn Blue Salvia , I would brign it in if ya want soem for next year. I even have to and in the fall is when I will strat takign cuttign s from it.

My coneflowers ar efinally blooming and they from the prvious year piggy swap . They so pretty . They all a different rang of shade s of pin/pinkish purple and one that like that hot vibrant pink. I don't even now fo rsur e the name of the color is it.

I gerberas out her e some startign to bloom now. These ar enot the one s ya see in stores, thes e are the long stemed big ones. I have to cut the blooms now off uc z th eheta and humidity , don't want to take a chanc e on them molding , but when gets closer to winter will try an dsave seeds form them for folks. Have no idea if they will be viable or not since they a hybrid.

Ella do you have pretty good luck with salvia from cuttings? You'll have to tell me some time how you root them. I'd like to branch out and do a few more cuttings next year.

All the Salvias I've tried rooting have done well, rooted fast and took right off. My Black and Blue Salvia has now overwintered successfully in the ground its 5th year, but the first year I took cuttings in fall, and those grew well under lights.

Lea, here's the chickweed I've had such problems with:

http://images.google.com/images?q=common+chickweed&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&ei=mvs0Ss-oKMOJtgeh0eCqCQ&sa=X&oi=image_result_group&resnum=1&ct=title

Yikes, not the Chickweed! I finally got rid of a huge patch in the lawn several years ago only by digging up the lawn and putting a garden there. I had tried everything. It keeps trying to rear it's ugly head but I'm too fast for it now.

From Chickweed Garden to Partial Shade Garden.

We had an unusually hard winter for us and I lost all of my Hot Lips Salvia that had been in the ground for 4 years. Thankfully, I had taken a cutting from it and it rooted. My Black & Blue died also, no cuttings from it. Dang.

I am still planting! Most of my seeds did well WS.

I practically cooked most of my pepper seeds to death. Thankfully, I didn't sow them all. I have been waiting and waiting and waiting for them to sprout. A few emerged, some just died. I was giving up on them and getting rid of the dead looking things in the GH, and I discovered a big boo boo. We had a good week of 90 degree plus weather, (unusual for us), so the GH was very hot, even with fans on. I had 3 flats still on heat mats (I had forgotten they were there). Of course, I did not have thermostats on them either. My poor babies had hot feet! I felt really dumb! and sad

Interesting about the cuttings for slavia. I bought 2 plants at the garden center but would like to have more.

Do I take the cuttings now or wait until the fall? Then just dip them in Root tone and them stick them in a jar or some perlite?

I had good luck overwintering a salvia called red velvet last winter. I brought it in to my garage after a hard frost. Around Feb. I had to give it a haircut and IZ stuck the pieces in the pot. The shortest pieces rooted! All I did was keep it watered. I am trying the same thing with some butterfly bushes now. I got some stuff sown today. Maybe a tad late but they should bloom by August anyway. Hopefully :) Zinnias, Cosmos sulphureus & binnipatus, Morning Glories, Sunflowers, Nicotiana and some Cucumbers, Watermelons. Also Snow in Summer for next year blooms.

I've had very good luck rooting salvias--black & blue and indigo (or mystic) spires, I can never remember which. I haven't tried with hot lips yet, No rooting hormone, just cut off a 4 or 5 inch piece, strip off any blooms and all the leaves except the top few, and stick it in the ground. I just keep it watered and most of the time it roots. I've always heard that butterfly bush roots without trying, but mine never does, and I've stuck at least 10. I don't know what's up with that. I'm a very casual gardener, and I don't bother with rooting hormone or overwintering--if it roots, it roots. Of course, down here they're all perennial. I guess if I had to worry about losing all of it I'd work harder at it.

I've never been able to get 'Black and Blue' salvia to root in water but the 'pineapple sage' roots well for me. I have been digging my 'black and blue' and bringing into the garage each fall.

Thanks. Your reports have given me some good ideas.

I took cuttings of butterfly bush about 3 weeks ago but none have rooted for me, either. Also no rooted perennial and annual milkweeds so far.

Now I want to root my hops vine and also my aristolachia (pipevine).

Some people make it sound easy. In the past I have never had success, but I keep trying.

Veronica is your garage unheated? Our temps should be about the same so if you can overwinter your Black and Blue out there I might be able to do mine too. Well not in your garage, in mine.
:-P

LOL

I planted three black and blue salvias right by the house and they didn't make it but it was really dry there, I bought another one this year and have it in a pot and will try and keep it for next year in the garage, guess I just wait for a hard frost then put it in there?

Yes Neal that's the culprit! I'm going to put some newspapers down this winter and leaves and hope for the best for next year but I know it did reseed I couldn't get to all of it before the seeds got on them, what I'm really worried about is my creeping phlox they were right next to those!

Lynn, sorry to hear about your peppers :(

Star, when you take your cuttings in the fall from your black and blues do you keep them near a window or under lights? I don't have any light in here with these awnigs on the windows and it's so cold in here just running a heater in the living room if I put them on a table in front of the window in here I don't think they would make it without the cats knocking them off jumping to the window lol I'll have to think about this for the fall :)

It's so wet here, I'm wanting to get my dahlias and cannas in the ground and the ground just isn't drying out and we are having more rain this week!

tabasco, I rooted Salvia cuttings in pots of potting soil, and used rooting powder. It seems to help them to drop the pot of cuttings into a plastic grocery bag and loosely tie the top. I leave them in there about a week, then start opening the bag during the day and closing at night for a few days before removing the pot from the bag. I've noted my seedlings don't wilt when I do that. Within a couple of weeks I usually start seeing new growth. A lot of plants send out roots at leaf nodes, so I make sure to dust an area where I stripped leaves off with rooting powder.

I'm almost finished planting the "have to get it planted" stuff! There are a few tiny, straggling perennials that I'd like to get bigger before setting out, but once I get a few yellow tropical milkweeds set out today, all the annuals will be in the ground. Considering the jugs that didn't sprout, the hundreds of seedlings I lost to slugs and bugs, and the unaccounted for disappearances, I guess it's a good thing I sow way more than I'd ever have space for or energy to get planted. It's a challenge as it is!

Gardeners get excited about the funniest things- I discovered the most fabulous compost stash full of worms and castings yesterday! I'd gathered 15 5gallon buckets of partially decomposed cow manure for bottom of my cold frame in late winter (as it decomposes, it provides heat for the seedlings), and while emptying the cold frame found that it was perfectly ready for use. It's gorgeous, LOL! Black, fluffy stuff writhing with scads of worms! I blended it with some used potting soil out of containers that didn't germinate and top dressed my newly planted basils, parsley, dill, and chives with it, and gave a nice top dressing to some Japanese Irises too. I feel like such a good plant parent when I do stuff like that, LOL.

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