Viewing comments posted by SCButtercup

Grows really large and has many flowers. One problem is that some of the seeds blossom all purple and some all white even though my original seeds produced plants with broken-color flowers as in the pictures. I love it all the same, and if it gets out of control it is easy enough to pull out. Also benefits from a spraying of Bt, a natural control for the caterpillars that sometimes infest it ... but some folks like caterpillars and the butterflies they turn into, so to each his own.

Tall and proud, this Daylily really stands out for its double blossoms and overall vigor. In my zone 8 garden this is the fastest-spreading variety I own. I was surprised because I thought a fancy double flower would make it a finicky plant, but it is easy and showy at the same time.

Seems to tolerate sun better than many hostas, and its pointy leaves provide variety when interplanted with more oval-leafed hosta varieties. Leaves also make great greenery in flower bouquets.

Foliage makes it stand out in the shade, and the changing colors spring through fall are a real treat. Seems to be a little more hardy than other heucheras, which seem to be a bit fragile after transplant, but this variety just started putting out new growth right away.

Hummingbirds love these! Extremely tough plant, but needs to be grown where it won't be a nuisance. I put mine next to my deck. The railing gives support to the beautiful 6-8 foot flowering plants. Usually, by July I have to run some twine around them and tie them to the deck to keep them from flopping. As we sit on the deck, we enjoy the flowers and hummingbirds, which are probably eating insects. Then in the fall the roots are food! It's a great plant as long as you take care in siting it.

Excellent for dry areas! In my garden, because of heavy mulch, it does not reseed. Also, the seeds are probably very sensitive to cold even in my zone 8 mild winters. But the seed can be saved, and it blooms true to seed. Flowers also are great for drying. Just cut clumps and hang upside down. I really love this plant for its ease and how it keeps on blooming into the late summer and fall.

Beautiful shrub that needs a little shaping, and take care that you don't let branches drape over unless you want to let them root and spread. Very easy to grow from cuttings in early spring. A few twigs make a great gift idea for Easter baskets. After it blooms, I try to dress it up with a tall companion annual, such as cosmos or tall zinnias planted in front of it. You can even let morning glory vines climb over it, and this tough shrub will survive as long as you don't do that every summer.

Figs are ripe when they are purple/almost brown and curve downward. It is hard to wait, but unripe fruit does not ripen after picking, so wait! After rainfall, be especially vigilant for ripe fruit because rain tends to accelerate ripening, and ripe figs may burst after rain if left on the tree. They make great fig jam if paired with lemon and peaches (which ripen at the same time). Prune in winter or early spring just before the buds leaf out. If you prune in spring, you can root the cut branches and start more trees.

This is a tall variety of echinacea and looks great next to the equally tall echinacea 'Fragrant Angel' (white) or as a backdrop for echinaceas of the PowWow series, which tend to be pretty short. Magnus comes true to seed, which is another plus because you can expand and fill in your garden economically.

Tough plant, grows well in dry or wet years, and yes: It does have a lovely scent, especially in the afternoon. The first year the scent was not noticeable, but now that I have a mature plant the scent is strong and adds to the beauty of this plant. Taller than I expected, so take note of 3' height when planning where to put it.

Can be used as summer type squash if picked when green OR as winter squash if allowed to mature on the vine to creamy beige and hard skin. Its curled form can make it difficult to handle in the kitchen, so trellising (try growing on a bamboo teepee or cattle panel archway) is a must. When the vines climb up, gravity makes the squash hang down and grow straight. These straight necks can be 2 feet long and have no seeds (seeds are in the bulbous end at the bottom), so they make great eating no matter how large the squash. You can't mess these up the way you can with zucchini, which must be picked while small so that the seeds aren't tough. Great plant for a beginning gardener because it requires little care aside from tying up the vines as they grow. Also, it is open pollinated, so you can save the seeds to share and grow next year. Holds up well against squash bugs and seems resistant to squash vine borers. Early in the season I sometimes spray with Bt, which is a natural caterpillar/bug control.

Very tough plant that makes attractive 12"-18" mounds of flowers. It's great for dry areas. Looks best if cut back in late summer when flowering slows down. May send out more flowers in late summer. Even if it doesn't, the foliage looks better when all the dead flowers are cut off. The mounds expand each year. I divide them and give away baskets full of divisions as gifts. This can be can done in fall or early spring -- there's always a birthday or special occasion, and anyone, even people with no gardening skill, can grow this.

When I grew this for the first time, I was surprised by the speckled foliage and thought it was a disease. It is simply the "stars" that give the plant its name and are also found on the speckled melons. The moon in their name refers to the white split where the melon sits on the ground. By the way, that "moon" spot turns from white to creamy yellow as the melon ripens. Another sign that it's ripe: The vine dries up where it attaches to the melon.
Excellent sweet taste. I know gardeners who will only grow this variety because, once you taste it, you never want any other kind.

A very fun plant that is not commonly found. The fun is in how you can drape the vines by looping the vines back into the soil. The plant can be "shaped" by this draping effect. The vine itself will root if you just plop the middle or end of a vine back into the soil in the pot. No cutting needed. It will root from the middle of the vine. When you have achieved a full, draping plant, then it's time to share cuttings with friends.

This plant is easy to share because a cutting will root if stuck in a pot of soil. This makes the vine easy to manage: If it trails too long, just clip the long piece and stick the cut end in the pot. This gives it a fuller look. It gets its name from the little seed balls that form along the vine, like rosary beads. These balls can be planted or shared to form another plant. To achieve the draped effect in some of the photos, take the part of a vine that has a seed ball and plop it into the soil with vine still attached. The vine will drape attractively and put out more growth from the pot.

Brightens up the early spring garden and looks better every year! One really wet spring my centaurea up and died of some black mold type disease, but I cut it down to the ground, sprayed it with copper fungicide, and applied fresh compost, and it came back a week later looking great. Very tough plant. It's an old variety that I remember my mother growing when I was a child 50 years ago in zone 5. It does just as well in zone 8, where I am now. I will always have one of these in my garden.

Contrary to the information in an earlier comment, this plant keeps its golden foliage and does not usually revert to dark green. Sounds like a fluke. I've had mine for 3 years and it always comes back golden. Dried leaves have a slight licorice flavor. Makes great herbal tea mixtures. Try it with chamomile.

Its flowers turn into bulbils, which are like miniature onion bulbs. The weight of the bulbils causes the flower stem to lean over. Wherever it touches the ground, it roots and produces a new plant. This is how the onion "walks" and expands itself. Cut a few leaves to use in cooking as green onions (I do this later in the spring when it begins to flower so that I won't cut off the precious flower stalks by accident). Also, in late summer pull up and harvest the bulbs, but leave some bulbs and bulbils in place so that the onion patch will come back next year. Give some bulbils to friends to share the fun.

I have grown this for years and my advice is to watch for harvest-ready pods every single day. At the height of the season, the pods can grow more than an inch a day, so they can grow from teeny to too big to eat in 2 days. When they are over 4 inches, they start to get tough and woody. This is a great veggie for small gardens because the plant grows tall and narrow, so you make use of vertical space and save on square footage.

I winter-sowed this from seed in February and I now have a small plant that is thriving in a container in part shade. The plan is to transplant it in the fall with some protective leaf mulch when my zone 7/8 cools down and weather gets rainy. Will post more info in spring.