Category Archives: Design trends

Design trends

What to do in the Garden in September

Divide overcrowded perennials like bleeding heart over the next few months.

And just like that…summer is nearly over. We’ll get to enjoy our Indian summer for the next couple of months so I really I can’t complain. And I did fertilize my blooming plants this morning so I’m feeling pretty good about myself. Now if I only had more space to garden. Can I borrow some of yours? Here are some of the other garden chores to put on your to-do list for September.

It’s still a little hot to plant cool season veggies starts in the ground. They appreciate conditions later in September when the soil is still warm but temps have cooled. It is OK to plant seeds of beets, carrots, spinach, arugula, mustard, leeks, onions, peas, radishes and turnips.

Fertilize shrubs lightly one last time if you haven’t already done so last month. All shrubs, especially broad-leaved evergreens such as rhododendron, pieris, camellia, hebe, need to calm down, stop growing and harden off to get ready for the winter cold. Some plants have already set next year’s buds.

Roses especially appreciate a bit of fertilizer now, encouraging them to bloom another round in October. To keep them blooming make a habit of pinching and pruning off old flowers. Always cut back to an outward facing branchlet with five leaves. There are hormones there that will cause a new rose to grow much sooner than if you cut to one with only three leaves. You can always cut lower on the stem if you need to control height.

Deadhead flowering annuals and perennials as often as you possibly can. Annuals like zinnias, calibrachoa and cosmos will stop blooming if you allow them to go to seed. The same is true of repeat blooming perennials like dahlia, scabiosa, echinacea and lantana. Santa Barbara daisies will bloom late into winter if cut back now. I know a gardener who cuts back her Santa Barbara daisies 3 times per year and they seem to always be in bloom and look fresh.

These plants know they’re on this earth to reproduce. If they get a chance to set seed the show’s over, they’ve raised their family. Try to remove fading flowers regularly and you’ll be amply rewarded. If you want to start perennial flowers from seeds this is the time so that they’ll be mature enough to bloom next year.

Now through October, divide summer blooming perennials like agapanthus, coreopsis, daylily and penstemon that are overgrown and not flowering well. You can also divide spring blooming perennials like candytuft, columbine, astilbe, bergenia and bleeding heart but sometimes they don’t bloom the first spring afterwards due to the energy they use re-establishing themselves.

Another thing to do while out in the garden this month is to cut back berries vines that have produced fruit. Canes of the current season should be trained in their place.

It’s never too soon to start planning for erosion control in those areas that caused you problems during last December’s storms. You remember that lovely rain we had in October and then in December before the spigot was turned off early for the season? I used to recommend planting mid-september on but our climate is much hotter than it used to be so think October and November as the prime months to plant for erosion control.

Design trends

The Sound of Music in the Garden

Japanese Forest Grass provides a soft rustling sound in the garden. It’s pet friendly and both cats and dogs enjoy nibbling on the foliage.

If you’re like me you hear different things when you are outside. I hear the buzz of hummingbird wings and their little chirp up in the trees waiting to defend their feeder. They bring a smile to my face. Sometimes it’s the silence that gets my attention. Where are the chickadees or pygmy nuthatches or the raucous scolding of the jays? Where is the wind, the rustling of the forest grass leaves? Other times the quaking of the redwood boughs a hundred feet up makes the garden come alive like giant wind chimes. Sound adds dimension to the garden.

I consider the music of the garden as well as plants and people when developing a design. I’m talking about how water, wind and wildlife play a big role in the music of a garden. Even the crunching sound as you walk on a gravel path brings your garden to life.

The sound of moving water in the garden not only attracts birds but soothes the soul. It can drown out unwanted neighborhood noise or sound as subtle as a violin. I enjoyed a table top fountain with a bamboo deer scare for many years until the raccoons discovered it. The sound was incredibly soothing on a hot day. Pondless waterfalls are easier to maintain if you aren’t interested in fish or water plants. Small recirculating garden fountains can be placed on your deck or patio or tucked into garden beds. Urn and jar fountains offer a hint of bubbling water and the soothing sound of flowing water to your landscape.

I use to have a different wind chime at each corner of my house. You can tell the direction of the wind, the intensity, even potential changes in the weather just by listening to the chimes. There are bamboo chimes available that produce a peaceful relaxing sound or musically tuned metal tubes or those made of wood or shells. Enhance the wind with these lulling sounds.

The wind is different in each season. Summer breezes cool you and also catch on a billowy plant to bring not just sound but movement. Ornamental grasses are the stars of the garden when the wind rustles through the leaves and seed heads. My Japanese Forest Grass is one of my favorites. Loose shrubs like butterfly bush, hydrangea, spirea, spice bush and bush anemone also sway in the wind and bring sound to the garden. Allow a larger plant like Japanese maple to spill into the path where you will brush against it slightly to create that sound you hear in the forest when you walk. Enjoy the rattle of seeds in pods like those of iris as they dry during the summer.

The sounds of wildlife are my favorites in the garden. Any type of pond or waterfall with some plants growing in or adjacent will attract tree frogs. Buzzing insects collect nectar and pollinate flowers. My simple birdbath is a magnet for robins, spotted towhees, chickadees, warblers, kinglets, purple finches and jays. The rest of their time they are performing expert insect control elsewhere in my garden .Hummingbirds are frequent visitors as they fight for territory and feed on spiders and nectar rich flowers.

Allow your garden to make music.

Design trends

Hardy Geraniums in the Garden

Hardy geraniums are easy to care for and make lovely ground covers.

Last fall my neighbor planted the slope in front of their house with hardy geraniums- lots of them. Over the winter they were looking a bit scraggly and I was worried that maybe they had chosen the wrong ground cover for their situation. But no, come last spring their rich blue geranium ‘Rozanne’ burst into bloom and it’s a site to behold.

Most people use the common name geranium to describe what is actually a pelargonium. Ivy geraniums, Martha Washington pelargoniums and zonal geraniums are all pelargoniums. Hardy geraniums, also called cranesbill, look very different. Leaves are roundish or kidney-shaped and usually lobed or deeply cut. Flower colors include beautiful blue, purple, magenta, pink or white and often completely cover the plant with color. I’ll bet if you visited a garden on a tour or admired a picture in a garden magazine it contained true geraniums. Here are just a few strong performers available among the dozens of species.

Geranium maderense grows best in shade. This dramatic native of Madeira is the largest geranium with huge 1-2 foot long leaves shaped like giant snowflakes. Clusters of thousands of rose tinted flowers form on a 3 foot trunk. This perennial is short-lived but self sows freely. Add some of these architectural plants to your border for color and structure.

Blue flowers in the garden are always a hit as they combine so well with other colors. Geranium Orion‘s abundant clear blue flower clusters bloom over a long season. Use this 2 foot spreading plant in sun or part shade in a mixed border or as a groundcover. There are other blue flowering geraniums. I grow geranium ‘Brookside’ on my own garden. It’s on the second round of blooms. It’s large bright blue flowers are larger than ‘Johnson’s Blue’. ‘Rozanne’ is another common favorite with stunning blue flowers.

Looking for a fast growing variety? Geranium incanum which covers itself spring through fall with rosy violet flowers, fits the bill. Cut back every 2-3 years to keep neat. This variety endures heat and drought better than other types but needs some summer water. It self seed profusely which might be exactly what you want for a groundcover in a problem area.

Geranium Biokova

If pale pink is your color, plant geranium x cantabrigiense ’Biokova’. This excellent groundcover spreads slowly. The numerous one inch flowers are long lasting and cover the plant from late spring to early summer. Their soft pink color is indispensable when tying together stronger colors in the border and the lacy foliage is slightly scented.

Another geranium in the same family is ‘Karmina’. I’ve been growing this dark pink flowering variety for several years. With lush green leaves on a low spreading plant it’s pretty even when not in bloom.

There are a couple other varieties that are popular and deserve a try. They are Award Winning ‘Mavis Simpson’ and ‘Russell Pritchard’. Both have bright pink or purple flowers and make good additions to your perennials.

Give the hardy geranium a place in your garden.