dyzzypyxxy said:Keep in mind that you 'miss' a growing season if you don't get things started. eg. you could start some small clumps of different kinds of groundcover in the back corners to see how well they establish and how you like them. Some things may work well, where others don't work at all.
Some perennials and groundcovers do well started in fall, though, but it depends upon how the weather is through the winter if they will develop nice big roots and jump up big and lusty in spring or not.
Don't know about your area, but in Utah where I've planted two gardens for my daughter, we saved a ton of money buying perennials in October when the nurseries will deeply discount things to reduce their inventory. Places like HD and Lowe's will completely clear out their nursery stock, so keep an eye out for that next fall, too. You can really score on evergreens, perennials, shrubs and small trees.
Funny you mention small "trial" areas, we were just talking about that. I may have to make a liar out of myself when I said in another thread I don't really plan. Clearing the area out was the easy part, now I may have to sit down and draw things out.
But first, we have to settle on how we want it to look. I was at a local wildlife shelter this morning to give them a small bird (Chestnut-backed Chickadee) we found injured. (I found it last night when I was strolling the plot I'm working on). They had a mini nature-walk that I really liked and I got to talking to the admissions specialist about what I was doing on our property. She said if I wanted to consider doing something like that, she recommended a book called "Landscaping for Wildlife in the Pacific Northwest" by Russell Link. I ordered a used copy from Amazon. Going "native" for wildlife instead of strictly ornamental would satisfy the "green" desire. It could also be a combination of the two (it would have to be, because I've already planted 8 non-native plants).
Thanks for the tip on waiting for clearance sales, I'm sure the nurseries up here do the same thing, however, by fall it's getting into the rainy season up here, not much fun to work in.
http://youtu.be/r74yyftJvgc
