Thank you so much. I cleaned up an over grown bed last weekend, and pruned back some old nasty junipers, and though the job was miserable, I ran into just beautiful decayed leaves, under the branches that I imagine are 4 or more seasons old, that I gently set aside to have ready for amending and protecting.

Reading these tips............I just appreciate the reminder to shred this years leaf fall and hurry the process to encourage such a priceless mulch and amendment. Of course, mowing. I have a couple cans just for when I use to do this.

I have not been able to garden for a few years, and this year is my first really getting back into it. There really is nothing like gardening to wake up so many senses, and awaken how good it feels to work hard. I can say, without you guys sharing a wealth of knowledge, and helping me remember things I seem to have forgot, I don't think I could have accomplished so much.

I have to say, thanks for all you share. It really has been a god send.

@RoseBush1. I loved heuchera when it was new to me, but found them so short lived. I moved them all over the place, every few years, trying to find a permanent spot, where they would not get woody and out of control.

In my neck of the woods, the only way I have managed to stop losing them, and keep them attractive is to dig them up every few years, and divide them, giving them the royal treatment in compost and amendments, and winter protection.

If this last move is short lived, like the others, I am going to dump them on the neighbors porch in the middle of the night. He get so delighted when he finds freebies on the porch. he he.

I also cannot keep heucheras alive. I love them but they just don't seem to do well here. I ordered some plants from an outfit in TN that were supposed to be anemone nervosa and a couple of other things. Horrible outfit. Things arrived wrapped in grocery plastic bags with illegible writing and mostly not what I ordered. Pretty disgusted. I actually got some heucheras that seem to have survived the summer which is not unusual. It is in spring that they die.

@lauriebasler, Laurie ...

I'd love to give you more time and ask more questions about your heucheras, but I am having a very time stressed week, but I have a hunch giving them a lot of compost is the wrong direction for heucheras. Of course, I am a newbie and what do I know ?

The species heucheras are found in rocky, lean soils. When I planted mine, I put a lot of native soil, crushed rock and decomposed granite in the planting hole. I put the compost rich soil just in the top few inches of the planting hole where most plant's feeder roots are located. Again, in nature, nutrient rich soil and water is usually found on top of rocky soils.

In winter, I plop some leaves on top of them and forget them. In spring, I push the leaves back and feed them a little bulb food.

That's the good care I give them. Then, I mess up. They are in a corner of the garden where I tend to get to them last ... so they don't get watered regularly and often get dry and I happen to walk by and get one of those "OMG" moments and put a hose on them to dribble water on them to give them a good soaking.

I've been meaning to divide them for the last two years, but health-wise I haven't been playing at 100%, so that has been one of my pending items. I can't say they are thriving, but they are not dying. I think if I got them divided, they would be much happier ...

Based on my neglect ... and that has been pretty consistent ... I find myself asking if you are killing them with kindness ?

Just a thought.

If you tell me which ones you have tried, when I have more time, I have a spreadsheet I made up with the lineage of many of the heucheras to give me an idea as to which ones might do best in a more arid climate. I'd be happy to share my guesses.

This is 'Amathyst Myst' and it has needed to be divided for the last three years. It keeps coming back.

@Oberon46, Mary Stella ...

I don't know enough about your climate as to why heucheras would die in spring for you. One thing I have learned about mail order plants is that I need to pot them up and let them grow a larger root mass to recover from the stress of being mishandled and by a lousy nursery and shipping. Once I have a healthy plant, then I can plant it out. Otherwise, more often than not, it will never really thrive. It will just limp along.

However. plants have a will to live and many have proved me wrong.

Lin, I have only bought locally for the last several years. I used to order massively from 'outside' in the past but finally wised up and figured the local nurseries would carry what works here. Not as wide a selection as I would like but at least they mostly live. I believe my problem after reading here is that I massively overwater in the spring, plus my soil is fairly heavy. Both would certainly spell the demise of many plants, in particular heuchera.

But not a bad idea about babying them for a bit in pots. Then I would only have to figure out how to keep them alive over our rather long winter. In the crawl space where it is cooler? Upstairs and water lightly all winter in a window??

Mary Stella .......

I have similar problems finding plants that will work in my climate, but don't have any local nurseries ... I have to do lots and lots of research about the plants.

It must be a real challenge to over winter your plants. I wouldn't have a clue as how to start. It's taken me years just to begin to understand this climate and now it's changing ..

A quick Google search of species heucheras indicated that there were a few native to Alaska, but I don't know if they have been used in any of the breeding programs of the recent releases to commerce.

Hi Lyn. Actually we have lots of plants and flowers that overwinter wonderfully well. But if you are trying to push the zone a little or see one that you 'just have to have' only to find out it is a zone 5 at the lowest, and the best I can hope for is zone 4 (microclimate here as most are zones 2-3.) Used to garden in Fairbanks, Alaska in the interior and that was a challenge. Except if you grew up there, as I did, you don't know the difference. You just grow what you see around you.

Running about 25F in the early AM warming to low 50'sF in the later afternoon. Finally got the garage cleaned up from gardening since March and my car is nice and snug inside.

Thanks Lyn. I live in a part of the Northwest fairly close to the pacific Ocean. The soil in this area is the color of the grand canyon, and sticky. I have amended it to a lovely workable state, but it took time. Back when I had Heucheras, I had a dark purple variety and I had Coral bells, and I had a Iot of them. I loved their clouds of flowers. Bug issues left the leaves turning brittle and off color. They were magnets for a black vine weevil, which required chemical warfare. When I finally got rid of the weevil, I sort of dumped heuchera like a cheating boyfriend. Blue fescue has taken it's place in my garden. I don't see people growing them around my area much any more. But thank you for all the input.

But I do totally swoon over the beauty of this plant, all year. If there is something you love that I can grow in a pot, I think it would be fun to fill up a big o pot of them.

Laurie ...

I used to think I was a methodical and very organized person. That was true in my former life as an accountant in the city. I can honestly tell you that is not true in my life in the mountains as a fairly new gardener. There is nothing organized about how I garden. It's amazing to me that nothing I have planted has died.

I am so very grateful plants have this stubborn will to live. In my garden, I do not have enough shade for the heucheras I love. They get sun scorched. I'll never be able to have as many as I would love to grow. That's why they are tucked away in that one spot that gets tended to last. As much as I love them, that's the one part of the garden that has shade ...

I'd love to grow blue fescue, too, but I have a hunch it would fry in my heat.

Gardening is certainly an adventure ...

I have found that blue fescue will grow in my chicken yard without the birds bothering it. Makes for a nice look, I plan to let it colonize.

Let me know if u want some Deb. I will let them go to seed, and you will have a coop full in no time.

Laurie B

Thanks, Laurie, but mine are reseeding themselves at a pretty good clip. It sure beats a yard of bare dirt. The hens also leave alone feverfew, sweet Annie, and vervain. Unfortunately, also nettles and dock. Who would have thought a chicken yard would be another garden to care for?

When I had chickens, they left the little cottonwood starts that came up. Other than that, it was scorched earth in the chicken yard. I never let mine roam free so that might have broadened their palate to what was available.