Perennial Flower Garden MaintenanceTo keep your perennial flowers healthy and looking their best, you need to get in the habit of some routine maintenance. Here are some strategies that allow you to spend more time enjoying your garden, and less time working in it.
Growing Hens and ChicksHen and Chicks are interesting, low-maintenance perennial plants that are rarely troubled by pests. They are also suitable to almost any outdoor garden environment - especially the rock garden. Here's what you need to know to start growing them.
How to Grow Lily-of-the-ValleyThree words that describe lily-of the-valley are beautiful, reliable, and fragrant. Its delightful sweet smelling, spring flowers are reason enough to grow them, but lily-of the-valley also offers reliable solutions to problem areas of the garden.
How to Grow Old-Fashioned Bleeding...The old-fashioned bleeding heart has been a favorite flower for generations of gardeners. In fact, your mother or grandmother probably had bleeding hearts growing in their gardens. A perfect perennial for the shade. Here are some tips for growing them.
Harvesting And Preparing HorseradishIf you like strong flavors, horseradish is one of the healthiest and most versatile perennial herbs to grow.
Tips for Growing RhubarbIf you enjoy cooking with rhubarb, it's worth making space for a few of these plants in your garden. Rhubarb is actually a long-lived perennial vegetable.
Designing With PerennialsWith all of their colors, shapes, and textures, it's hard to imagine designing a garden without perennials. Here are some helpful suggestions for planning perennial beds and borders to help you get the most of these versatile plants.
Tips for Buying and Growing HostasHostas are one of the most popular and versatile perennial plants you can have in your shade garden. As foliage plants, they offer an unmatched range of patterns, colors, and sizes and their leaves. Here are some tips for buying and growing hostas.
The 2011 Perennial Plant of the YearFor the second year in a row, members of the Perennial Plant Association have awarded the Perennial Plant of the Year to a native North American wildflower. This year the honors go to the lovely, and versatile, Arkansas Blue Star (Amsonia hubrichtii).
How to Grow Wild LupineHave you ever gathered seeds from wild lupine plants to sow in your garden and ended up with disappointing results? Stands of lupine are easy to establish this way, providing the conditions are right.
5 Ways To Propagate PerennialsA great way to cut down on the cost of flower gardening is to increase your current stock of perennials using propagation techniques. With only a small amount of time and effort on your part, you can quickly increase your current plant.
Perennial Plants ExplainedFor beginning gardeners, the plant world can seem fraught with confusing, and often hard to pronounce, terminology. Fortunately, and I think most plants would agree with me, it isn't necessary to commit a large number of gardening terms to memory in order to successfully grow something.
Growing and Harvesting BittersweetBittersweet is an easy-to-grow vine famous for revealing a striking display of seedpods and berries each fall. Often used in wreaths or decorative displays, this ornamental vine adds value and interest to the garden all year long.
Cutting Back Perennials in the FallCleaning up the garden in the fall can be a bit confusing, especially when it comes to cutting back perennials. Should you leave them alone or cut them back as soon as they fade? The answer, of course, depends on the plant.
Geranium 'Rozanne', The 2008 Perennial Plant of...Editor's Note: This is such a beautiful plant we decided to republish Ellen's article to reintroduce you to this gorgeous blue geranium.
Recently, The Perennial Plant Association has announced that the 2008 Perennial Plant of the Year is Geranium 'Rozanne' (Rozanne cranesbill geranium).
Perennials For BeginnersIf you're new to planting flowers, you might want to plant perennials, they'll bloom every year without you having to replant them. So make the most of your planting time and dollars.
Ten Perennials For A Variety of UsesTechnically speaking, a perennial plant is a plant that has a life cycle lasting longer than 2 years. But for most gardeners, perennials are more like old friends. When given the proper care, we can look forward to seeing them return to the garden year after year.
The 2007 Perennial Plant of the YearThe Perennial Plant Association is a trade organization made up of nurseries, landscapers, and other garden industry experts, dedicated to educating gardeners on exceptional perennial plants.
A Guide to Deadheading PerennialsOne of the best ways to prolong color in your perennial beds and borders is to deadhead spent flowers. Not only does this encourage reflowering by limiting seed production and self-seeding, it keeps the garden looking neat and tidy by focusing all of the attention on the living flowers.
Five of My Favorite Perennial VinesVines add interest to the garden by providing a variety of shapes, colors, textures, and in some cases, fragrance to your landscape. They can climb walls, cover arbors, hide ugly fences, creep along rock gardens, create a sense of privacy and shade us from the sun.
Daylilies: Growing & Collecting the Perfect...When I moved to my present home, I inherited a big, unruly bed of faded orange daylilies. For a while I contemplated getting rid of them, but the bed was large and well-established and it seemed like a lot of work.
A Guide to Dividing PerennialsIt might seem counter-intuitive, but there are three very good reasons for chopping through the roots of your perfectly healthy perennials to divide them. First off, you'll regain control over the too-vigorous flowers that are trying to conquer every available square inch of your garden.
Growing SedumSedums come in a variety of types-from groundcovers to tall standing mounds. Start with one or two purchased plants and plan on propagating additional plants by division and cuttings. Sedums dislike wet feet so root cuttings in a well-drained medium of 50-50 vermiculite and perlite...
Growing: Coreopsis (Tickseed)Buy starter plants or sow seeds directly into garden in the summer. Seeds can also be started indoors from 6 to 8 weeks prior to the last spring frost date. If plants start to get leggy and ragged during midsummer heat, cutting them to the ground will reinvigorate them.
