It is hard to get in the mood for gardening or even planning for your garden when the temperatures are soaring toward the century mark.
That’s when it is nice to take advantage of previous foresight and sit in the shade of a tree.
We have enjoyed the shade of the big sprawling Amur honeysuckle at the south end of our terrace ever since the third summer after we planted it.
Using a comfortable aluminum folding chair, it is a nice place to dictate the garden columns during the summer.
Plan For Bulb Orders
This is also where I go to plan for the bulb orders to be sent in immediately for fall delivery.
As I look over the garden into the shaded areas, covered with Japanese spurge, periwinkle, and English ivy, it hardly seems possible that this past spring, they were a mass of color with a multitude of daffodils, English squills, hyacinths, and other spring bulbs.
And I have jotted down in my garden notebook notes of those particular spots that didn’t have enough bloom last spring so I can order an extra supply of bulbs to put in them this fall.
A range of varieties of narcissus, starting with the early trumpet types, going on to the short trumpets, and finally ending up with the poet, will give us almost six weeks of bloom here in our climate in normal seasons.
Naturally, in competition with the oak tree roots, the shrub roots, and the ground cover roots, you don’t plant expensive varieties, but you can have just as lovely effects from the older, less expensive ones.
About late tulip time, you will enjoy the blooming of the white, pink, blue, and purple English squills.
Hardy Primroses
Just back of the main lawn, I ripped a big regal pivot out of bed last spring and polled up quite a patch of English ivy and periwinkle ground cover to make a delightful home for several hardy primroses last summer.
In almost pure peat moss in the cold frame, I have many more primroses grown from seed last spring. They will be ready to plant in this bed in early September.
By keeping them dusted all summer long with dust-containing malathion, I have kept down the spider mite or red spider, as most of us still call it, so that the foliage is a dark, rich green instead of the sickly grayish brown that it used to be.
Since I don’t like the effect of all the daffodil foliage among the primroses, I will put the new daffodils in the back of them instead of among them.
I do hope to have a few open spots between the primroses where I can put in a few patches of common crocus and grape hyacinths.
Getting New Tulips
Tulipa dasystemon, T. Clusiana, and Fritillaria meleagris. None of these has coarse foliage interfering with our enjoyment of the primroses.
Since tulips only last two or three years at the most in my garden, between the competition of tree roots and some 50 years of accumulation of root diseases in the soil, I plan on getting new ones at least every three years.
I particularly want to order some new double early tulips and some single early ones, particularly General DeWet, to put in that little 1-foot strip between my drive and the little boxwood hedge I have started along the way property line.
And in between, they will be tucked crocus, grape hyacinths, and some water lily tulips (Tulipa Kaufmanniana), the latter for early bloom.
Fixing The Neglected Flower Bed
The flower bed in the front corner of the lawn has been looking pretty neglected. And it has been neglected for several years.
The work schedule calls for digging out everything in September and giving it a large part of the compost in the back part of the yard.
Into this bed will go a collection of newer Darwin, lily-flowered, parrot, and peony-flowered tulips and the new varieties of daffodils that I blow myself to each fall.
I got some quack grass into that bed some years ago with one of the perennials I planted, and it will take some very careful working over the soil to get every piece of that underground white stem out of the soil.
The bed, roughly 20 x 20 feet, will get some 25 or 30 wheelbarrow loads of compost, plus a complete commercial fertilizer.
Using Compost Pile
It is rather hard to understand why so many people think having a compost pile is a terrific problem. There is absolutely nothing to it!
All you have to do is pile up all of the dead leaves in the fall when they drop onto the lawn and more in the spring after you have raked them out of your flower beds and hedges.
Then during the summer, you throw on any weeds you pull, provided they haven’t gone to seed, and any vegetable garbage, such as pea pods, lima bean pods, corn husks, and what have you.
If you don’t have enough, get a truckload of sawdust from the mill, and mix that in with the other things.
If the pile is shaded, it won’t dry out as much and will therefore decompose a little more. If the pile is above ground, it will decompose faster if it is in a hole because the bacteria will get the oxygen supply they need much better above ground.
There is no need to add a lot of fancy bacteria because unless you put all the compost in the oven and sterilize it, it has plenty of bacteria.
There is no need to add lime and fertilizer unless you want to brag at your garden club meeting that you are making artificial manure.
I find that things I put on the pile-up through mid-June are usually sufficiently decomposed for use by late September. It is not powder, of course, but you get more for your money if it isn’t.
I sharpen my short-handled round-pointed shovel and simply chop it down to the base of the pile in 1- or 2-inch widths. I find that this crumbles up beautifully.
Our agronomists tell us that we get far more value out of this material using it when it is only partially rotted than if we wait until it is rotted down to powder.
I do find that I get far more compost. However, if I put a pound or two of chlordane or DDT in the compost pile to kill the earthworms, they surely eat up the compost!
Summer Problem In Lawna
Lawns are always a problem in summer unless you live far enough north so that you have cool days and nights. Even though you apply the equivalent of 1 inch of rainfall per week, using some sort of a sprinkler.
It won’t help if your soil temperature is up into the low 80s so that your bluegrass roots go dormant. Under this condition, fertilizer will be of no value.
But it is a good idea to have it on hand so that as soon as your soil temperatures drop down into the low 70s, you can give your lawn an application of a complete fertilizer such as a 6-10-4, 4-12-4, 5-10-5, 5-10-10, or something similar.
It is amazing how much a poor lawn can be pecked up during the cool fall weather, especially if you give it water when it doesn’t rain. The spots where you take out weeds with 2,4, D will grow over in a hurry.
Controlling Crabgrass
Most of us probably have a good crop of crabgrass, wild grass, or water grass (whatever you want to call it) that is nice and green now but will turn brown and die with frost. Right now, it has started to go to seed.
And it will do so no matter how much you take it with a crabgrass rake or kid yourself into believing that your new power lawn mower is cutting off all the seed heads before they get started.
You may find potassium cyanate of some help. This material, sold under various trade names, has to be put on in about three applications at ten-day intervals.
Fall Planting
While sitting in the shade with that cool drink, why not plan your fall planting of rhododendrons and azaleas (if they will grow in your locality) or of ordinary evergreens, shrubs, trees, and vines?
The broad-leaved evergreens—the rhododendrons, boxwood, firethorn, Oregon holly grape, Pieris, hollies, and many others—can be planted during September. Of course, you should water them if the soil is not sufficiently moist.
I like to plant the acid soil forms, such as rhododendrons and azaleas, in almost pure peat moss, especially if the soil is not naturally acidic and requires some iron sulfate to acidify it.
The needled evergreens, such as the pines, spruces, hemlocks, yews, and others, do not have to have acid soil, but like the broad-leaved evergreens, they must have good drainage.
I always like to go directly to the nursery, wait for my order to be dug, then take it home and plant it.
Except for the very windy sections out in the plains, fall is a better time to plant deciduous trees and shrubs than spring in many ways. You will find the soil is in a much better condition to work.
You will have more time, and you can be sure that trees and shrubs have been freshly dug at the nursery and have not been stored in their big storage cellars or sheds over winter.
Flowering Shrubs And Trees
Why not be a little venturesome and try some flowering shrubs that others in your neighborhood do not have?
Try some of the different viburnums, some of the species of lilacs, and some of the wide varieties of cotoneasters.
From the catalogs, select shrubs such as the Chinese witch hazel that blooms in February, others that bloom during March, April, or May, and so forth until you finally end up with the native witch hazel in November.
I like to select interesting fruits, berries, and attractive autumn colors. With this kind of shrub, you get more for your money.
And in trees, don’t stick to those that everyone else has! Try some of the other varieties of flowering crabs, some of the different Japanese flowering cherries, and the golden rain tree, the golden chain, the Chinese scholar tree, the redbud.
With our ranch-type houses, we often do not need the big shade trees like the elm and the sugar maple ‘but can use the smaller ones to better advantage.
The Fun Of Gardening
And during these warm August days, sitting in the shade of the big bush honeysuckle or back under the big red oaks, I like to look around my yard and ask myself what strangers coming into it think of it. What criticisms do they have?
What would they suggest that I do that I haven’t already done? But, then, as I look around, I always see some spots that have not been worked on for maybe 15 or 20 years that I figure could well be decorated.
After all, that is half the fun of gardening. You can change it from year to year.
You don’t have to do it all one year, but a bit this fall or next spring. Pull out this old shrub that you are getting tired of. Put in a new one.
Pull out this bit of periwinkle ground cover that has been there for years and try something else in its place. After all, variety is the spice of life. And planning is the key to achieving variety.
44659 by Victor H. Ries