Happy to see someone not me doing hardcore organizing. Right now, it's all about giving the garden over to the critters.
In the 10 years that I've gardened here (sure let's count the 2 years of solarization to kill the grass), we've seen bird species explosion. I leave the leaves, and the ground birds get fat on grubs, while above chickadees are ravaging the cardoons and echinops. It's like nearly free and instant entertainment when a new bird visits. It's always now when I thank myself for planting so many grasses and interesting seedheaded-forms.
I was so excited to see a blue jay in the yard this morning. I’m in the Chicago area and assumed the colorful birds were gone for the winter! I’m learning from y’all that leaving some leaves--we have three maple trees in the backyard--is a good strategy. I’m a gardening newbie, so I’m here to learn.
I do the same, the birds are so happy to have leaves to toss around. I did just filled up my feeder today and have about 50 birds waiting their turn in my Japanese Maple which still has lots of its leaves due to an unusually sunny, dry November here in Seattle. I have a large rain garden in my front yard that has lots of elemental grasses that I just leave to die and do not cut till about February/March. Being in Seattle, I am fortunate to have a wonderful mix of evergreens with my deciduous so lots of color and texture all year round. There is nothing manicured in my garden...it's a bit of a jungle, but I love it. We also get the occasional raccoon visiting...I can always tell by the holes in my moss and thyme where they were looking for grubs.
Hello fellow Seattle jungleite! It's so surprising to see acers with their leaves still--we're in a bit of a weathery spot, so ours are long gone, but I just noticed that a well-protected viburnum in a back corner still has its (scarlet) foliage.
Occasionally I think about moving somewhere else, but really, we have great color even through winter, not the case in a lot of the rest of the country.
Same here! We've only been in our house 7 years, but the explosion in birds is amazing. I think the previous owners had a blower crew "clean" the yard, leaving it tidy, but sterile. We leave big piles of leaves and mulch, plus as many bedraggled seed heads and dead stuff as we can bear to look at for months. Now there is so much buzzing and chirping.
Here in my neighborhood of LA (San Fernando valley zone 9b) winter is when we go wild with greens. We’ve only got bok choy and lettuces going this year (bc toddler + 2 working parents) but I can’t wait to have my first garden salads. We’ve also got the citrus coming in in stages - right now our Clementine is going wild, plus the Meyer lemon, but soon the grapefruits and the navel oranges will be ready too. Winter is a very nice time to be a gardener here in LA.
I resonate so much with this because I too am spending A LOT of time planning and daydreaming about a very small flower operation. This year I had two garden beds of cut flowers and I wanted so many more. So I'm making a tiny flower business to have flower subscription all so I can grow more and make bouquets for people. It involve graph paper mapping! Spending time with my mom so I can plant in her yard. So many spreadsheets of all the seeds and when to plant then. Google docs with pictures of every flower and how they will look together. Graphic design and art projects so I have fun branding. Soon I need to learn how to make a website. I'm leaning so far in to being ambitious about a hobby and I couldn't love it more.
THE WEBSITE! I'M SO NERDILY EXCITED FOR IT! Do you follow Micro Flower Farm on Instagram? She's my inspiration (for dahlias) but also for the rest of her really wonderful cut garden (she also has great planning materials)
Yes! I love her! I'm in the PNW too and am love the abundance of inspiration. I'd also recommend Sweet Delilah Flower Farm. She is small on Sauvie Island in Portland and was my introduction to being a flower subscription customer. Recently she offered dahlia clumps, meaning I got to go out to her farm and to come dig up a whole dahlia clump! I got so many Bloomquist Alans for $25! And a Coralie. I'm very excited about both!
We just finished with a complete garden rehaul. Literally, YESTERDAY. It's been a month-long endeavor of ripping up astroturf and tiles, taking down trees, weeding, installing a new fence and borders, etc.
While the gardeners' job are officially done, I am still working on planting 100+ individual plants for the Japanese garden and meadow border in freezing sub-zero weather. I also have 4.8 meters within a newly raised bed for annual flowers and veggies. This is my first time ever owning a home, much less a garden. And I am absolutely thrilled (and honestly a little terrified).
I've got my work cut out for me and I'll be taking a break as soon as the plants are in, but for next spring, I have a couple of seeds I want to presow for the raised bed and having salvaged tubers from my mixed-success dahlia planting this year, I'll also be giving dahlias another chance!
Also - "finished" is such a relative term. We ripped out a lot of the old garden that was here when we moved, and every year we find a new section to rebuild. It goes on forever which is both horrible and the very best thing in the world.
Thank you! It hasn't been one month yet, and your insightful words are already resonating strongly with me. It feels like such a gift to be a steward of this property.
The thing currently giving me the most joy in my winter garden is my coral bark maple (Acer palmatum Sango Kaku). We've had a lot of stormy weather here in the UK, so pretty much all the leaves have blown off the trees, but this little maple tree is stunningly beautiful year-round, even without leaves. Our kitchen window looks out onto our tiny urban garden, and even though it's very sodden and leaf-strewn out there right now, I like gazing out as I make coffee in the morning and seeing the brilliant red branches of the maple positively glowing in the low winter sunlight.
I solarized ONE WHOLE QUARTER of my city yard this year (it's a small space but it feels big to me!) to prepare for a big giant sun-loving natives patch. Planting will start in April. I'm both horrified and excited to see if the change in USDA zones will open up any new and interesting opportunities for what I can plant there. Researching and planning what will go into the new bed is the goal for 2024 Q1.
My partner and I were just talking about how our space seemed so large when we were solarizing--once it's filled with plants, you'll wonder how you ever thought that. We have the smallest plot on the block, but you can't tell because it is packed: the illusion of space!
Plus, if you live near anyone with big trees, you can create a borrowed view by plating up at the back.
I really wish there were a Canadian equivalent of Gardener’s World. Or maybe there is, and someone here will enlighten me? Since following British gardening programs, I never rake leaves and leave stalks intact. So even in winter, I see lots of visitors, including once, a fox who had a cozy nap in a flowerbed!
I would watch that! Even though where I am hovers around zone 8, it seems like it would be extremely worthwhile for someone to do a zonally-appropriate Canadian show. How many of us were doing a Chelsea Chop despite not living anywhere near Chelsea? (raises hand).
A friend's parents just moved to Winnipeg, I'm assuming they know they're in for a gardening shock.
My husband got a new tablet for work and gave me his old one, so I downloaded a basic drawing app and have been sketching and planning all of my garden dreams for next season! It's so fun and I keep moving things all around so it may actually be helping me work out best placements??
I also made a seed spreadsheet and realized I've overcommitted (ha!) but it will be fine, I hope.
It's called Concepts. After a while I got the paid version because it's easier to move things around but I think the free version is good too. Tablet is an Android if it matters.
No gardening thoughts today, but I volunteer in a school library and bought a laminator last year and my first thought was OMG WHY DIDN'T I BUY ONE OF THESE YEARS AGO!?! I love it so much. I was shocked at how inexpensive it was and how much of an impact it made.
About 3 weeks ago, I finished what's become an annual ritual - planting native perennials. Some years I've done a good job of starting from seed in June - August, but this year I didn't. We just went to ALL the native plant sales and spent a lot of money. It's really remarkable how you can plant dozens of plants one year, and then again the next and the next, and STILL you have room for more the next year. Our yard isn't that big, it's just great when the plants are really dense and you can't see the dirt.
I'm planning tons of seeds for spring and summer, mostly veggies because the results are so much better than when I buy starts. I waited too long to start my kale from seed this year and put in starts instead and am now regretting it. They're not nearly as vigorous as the kale I grew from seed last year.
Here's a planner I made to help figure out when to sow which veggie seeds: https://tinyurl.com/yc4m94a7. I always found that most planners had too much info and I would get lost, so I made a really pared down one that only takes a few minutes to use.
And, laminator! A friend loved the planner so much she laminated it! And laminated a copy for me too, so now it's a re-usable worksheet. Genius!
I can share some Zone 6 dahlia insight. You really cannot plant them here until all danger of frost is past, which means Memorial Day at the earliest. You can buy them before then and store them in vermiculite. You must be careful not to damage the “eye” because that is where the stem grows from. Also, don’t seal the box where they are stored, it needs some air flow. I just fold the flaps crosswise on top.
Same zone and I was delighted to learn you can however give the tubers a head start a month prior by potting them up indoors and placing them near a window inside. Then as soon as frost date passed and ground was warm enough I planted them outside.
Yes, they spent a week or two in the pots in my laundry/furnace room and once I saw shoots emerge I started putting them near a window and even outside on sunny days until it was safe to plant them in the ground. Now I need to figure out where to keep the tubers over the winter but also I tend to forget where I put things lol.
Everyone has their own storage method - I happen to have a root cellar type space and lots of waxed vegetable boxes (I grow a double 60’ row of dahlias and give away dozens of tubers to anyone who wants them every spring) but any space that’s cool-ish and not too dry or damp could work. Some people do sandwich bags or plastic wrap method but I use wood shavings.
Hi! I guess this is another reminder for me to say a prayer of thanks for the various seeds that didn't take and sorta clean up everything. The edible flowers are ready to be eaten, the snake plant really does need to be split into a second pot, and the evening primrose is doing its best. There's a couple of other little ones that peek through the soil but for the most part I don't really have anything to plant until February.
I did buy some carrot seeds on a whirl that I'll start then (although I could probably start now in zone 9b). I'm toying with the idea of a raised bed since I have the space for one but I also have no idea how that works actually.
I’m going to start a vegetable garden next year! This is a first for me. We’ve been in the house two years, and have done some landscaping, adding some color, some ornamental pear trees for privacy, though a lot we inherited from previous owners. I’m basically clueless but ready to learn and get dirty. I plan to make a spreadsheet of all the plants and bushes so I can keep track of them and learn how to care for them. And I want to learn about companion planting for the vegetables (raised bed). I’m not ready to start from seed, but I hope to get there someday!
After discovering that I ordered more than 300 anemones, ranunculus, and tulips during the summer, I quickly decided to install a raised bed, and I will try to grow anemones and ranunculus there as a spring crop and then do a summer crop of tomatoes and one zucchini. We will see.
I'm in the PNW, Seattle, newly minted 9a.
Now, I'm also starting my sweet peas, lisianthus, and sarracenia from seeds—a massive leap of faith.
I took lots of cutting from Fuchsia, calibrocha, mums, and other summer annuals, and they are in a small greenhouse outside. So I get to visit with them every day.
I am also trying to decide on buying a soil blocker. Opinions?
I was so bereft at the end of the season that I did everything like organizing my collected seeds really quickly and now I wish I still had those tasks to complete. I didn't do much garden cleanup this year either and I really miss the busy-ness of being in the garden all the time.
I'm mostly planning for winter sowing right now. Last year I used that method for the first time and had mad success (it's pretty foolproof). It's a really good method if you want to start seeds indoors but tend to travel for more than a week at a time in the winter or early spring, which I generally do. You don't have to check on anything in the way that you do when you start seeds indoors.
YES! I am waiting for solstice and getting my gallon jugs ready. So satisfying and has gotten me many fabulous perennials for the price of a few (hundred, who am I kidding here) packets of seed!
You can put them out earlier but the containers won’t do anything until the seeds know it’s time to wake up! As long as it isn’t waaaay too early you should be fine.
Twenty-some-odd years ago when I lived in Seattle I fell in love with the flowers on Jerusalem artichokes. God only knows why the small patch in my backyard of my rental didn't spread like wildfire, but they never did. So, I put some in my side yard here in Upstate, looking forward to the bright yellow, sunflower-like blooms. Now I've created a monster, which I never mind when they're growing exponentially and shading the mess that is my back porch from passersby, but inevitably before they flower they get so tall they start to fall over. For at least 6 weeks every year it looks like someone's dropped a bomb in the middle of the patch as they flop about.
I pull a bunch every year so they don't take over my whole yard. I should dig them out entirely, but I just don't have the energy. And I keep hoping maybe they won't get so leggy one year and I can just enjoy them like I did in the PNW.
Happy to see someone not me doing hardcore organizing. Right now, it's all about giving the garden over to the critters.
In the 10 years that I've gardened here (sure let's count the 2 years of solarization to kill the grass), we've seen bird species explosion. I leave the leaves, and the ground birds get fat on grubs, while above chickadees are ravaging the cardoons and echinops. It's like nearly free and instant entertainment when a new bird visits. It's always now when I thank myself for planting so many grasses and interesting seedheaded-forms.
I did some mild clean-up last year but this year I'm letting it all hang out and feed the critters, it's fun (for all)
I was so excited to see a blue jay in the yard this morning. I’m in the Chicago area and assumed the colorful birds were gone for the winter! I’m learning from y’all that leaving some leaves--we have three maple trees in the backyard--is a good strategy. I’m a gardening newbie, so I’m here to learn.
I do the same, the birds are so happy to have leaves to toss around. I did just filled up my feeder today and have about 50 birds waiting their turn in my Japanese Maple which still has lots of its leaves due to an unusually sunny, dry November here in Seattle. I have a large rain garden in my front yard that has lots of elemental grasses that I just leave to die and do not cut till about February/March. Being in Seattle, I am fortunate to have a wonderful mix of evergreens with my deciduous so lots of color and texture all year round. There is nothing manicured in my garden...it's a bit of a jungle, but I love it. We also get the occasional raccoon visiting...I can always tell by the holes in my moss and thyme where they were looking for grubs.
Hello fellow Seattle jungleite! It's so surprising to see acers with their leaves still--we're in a bit of a weathery spot, so ours are long gone, but I just noticed that a well-protected viburnum in a back corner still has its (scarlet) foliage.
Occasionally I think about moving somewhere else, but really, we have great color even through winter, not the case in a lot of the rest of the country.
Same here! We've only been in our house 7 years, but the explosion in birds is amazing. I think the previous owners had a blower crew "clean" the yard, leaving it tidy, but sterile. We leave big piles of leaves and mulch, plus as many bedraggled seed heads and dead stuff as we can bear to look at for months. Now there is so much buzzing and chirping.
Here in my neighborhood of LA (San Fernando valley zone 9b) winter is when we go wild with greens. We’ve only got bok choy and lettuces going this year (bc toddler + 2 working parents) but I can’t wait to have my first garden salads. We’ve also got the citrus coming in in stages - right now our Clementine is going wild, plus the Meyer lemon, but soon the grapefruits and the navel oranges will be ready too. Winter is a very nice time to be a gardener here in LA.
I grew up there with a very mature Meyer lemon and didn't realize until much later how lucky I was.
I resonate so much with this because I too am spending A LOT of time planning and daydreaming about a very small flower operation. This year I had two garden beds of cut flowers and I wanted so many more. So I'm making a tiny flower business to have flower subscription all so I can grow more and make bouquets for people. It involve graph paper mapping! Spending time with my mom so I can plant in her yard. So many spreadsheets of all the seeds and when to plant then. Google docs with pictures of every flower and how they will look together. Graphic design and art projects so I have fun branding. Soon I need to learn how to make a website. I'm leaning so far in to being ambitious about a hobby and I couldn't love it more.
THE WEBSITE! I'M SO NERDILY EXCITED FOR IT! Do you follow Micro Flower Farm on Instagram? She's my inspiration (for dahlias) but also for the rest of her really wonderful cut garden (she also has great planning materials)
Yes! I love her! I'm in the PNW too and am love the abundance of inspiration. I'd also recommend Sweet Delilah Flower Farm. She is small on Sauvie Island in Portland and was my introduction to being a flower subscription customer. Recently she offered dahlia clumps, meaning I got to go out to her farm and to come dig up a whole dahlia clump! I got so many Bloomquist Alans for $25! And a Coralie. I'm very excited about both!
BLOOMQUIST ALAN!!! I have just *one* and am so excited!
We just finished with a complete garden rehaul. Literally, YESTERDAY. It's been a month-long endeavor of ripping up astroturf and tiles, taking down trees, weeding, installing a new fence and borders, etc.
While the gardeners' job are officially done, I am still working on planting 100+ individual plants for the Japanese garden and meadow border in freezing sub-zero weather. I also have 4.8 meters within a newly raised bed for annual flowers and veggies. This is my first time ever owning a home, much less a garden. And I am absolutely thrilled (and honestly a little terrified).
I've got my work cut out for me and I'll be taking a break as soon as the plants are in, but for next spring, I have a couple of seeds I want to presow for the raised bed and having salvaged tubers from my mixed-success dahlia planting this year, I'll also be giving dahlias another chance!
THIS IS SO EXCITING!!!!
Congratulations!
Also - "finished" is such a relative term. We ripped out a lot of the old garden that was here when we moved, and every year we find a new section to rebuild. It goes on forever which is both horrible and the very best thing in the world.
Thank you! It hasn't been one month yet, and your insightful words are already resonating strongly with me. It feels like such a gift to be a steward of this property.
The thing currently giving me the most joy in my winter garden is my coral bark maple (Acer palmatum Sango Kaku). We've had a lot of stormy weather here in the UK, so pretty much all the leaves have blown off the trees, but this little maple tree is stunningly beautiful year-round, even without leaves. Our kitchen window looks out onto our tiny urban garden, and even though it's very sodden and leaf-strewn out there right now, I like gazing out as I make coffee in the morning and seeing the brilliant red branches of the maple positively glowing in the low winter sunlight.
GORGEOUS
This is a wish list tree for me! Can’t wait to have one.
Whoa the bark on that tree is a knockout!
Right?! It's sheer joy. :-)
I solarized ONE WHOLE QUARTER of my city yard this year (it's a small space but it feels big to me!) to prepare for a big giant sun-loving natives patch. Planting will start in April. I'm both horrified and excited to see if the change in USDA zones will open up any new and interesting opportunities for what I can plant there. Researching and planning what will go into the new bed is the goal for 2024 Q1.
My partner and I were just talking about how our space seemed so large when we were solarizing--once it's filled with plants, you'll wonder how you ever thought that. We have the smallest plot on the block, but you can't tell because it is packed: the illusion of space!
Plus, if you live near anyone with big trees, you can create a borrowed view by plating up at the back.
I really wish there were a Canadian equivalent of Gardener’s World. Or maybe there is, and someone here will enlighten me? Since following British gardening programs, I never rake leaves and leave stalks intact. So even in winter, I see lots of visitors, including once, a fox who had a cozy nap in a flowerbed!
I would watch that! Even though where I am hovers around zone 8, it seems like it would be extremely worthwhile for someone to do a zonally-appropriate Canadian show. How many of us were doing a Chelsea Chop despite not living anywhere near Chelsea? (raises hand).
A friend's parents just moved to Winnipeg, I'm assuming they know they're in for a gardening shock.
My husband got a new tablet for work and gave me his old one, so I downloaded a basic drawing app and have been sketching and planning all of my garden dreams for next season! It's so fun and I keep moving things all around so it may actually be helping me work out best placements??
I also made a seed spreadsheet and realized I've overcommitted (ha!) but it will be fine, I hope.
What app, if you don't mind? I'm not sure why I find it so hard to find one that doesn't SUCK
It's called Concepts. After a while I got the paid version because it's easier to move things around but I think the free version is good too. Tablet is an Android if it matters.
No gardening thoughts today, but I volunteer in a school library and bought a laminator last year and my first thought was OMG WHY DIDN'T I BUY ONE OF THESE YEARS AGO!?! I love it so much. I was shocked at how inexpensive it was and how much of an impact it made.
Remember the old, huge laminators that used to be in the teacher's lounges? I bet those were super expensive!!!
Oh my gosh, yes! I worry about how expensive the big copy machine is every time I have to use it and pray I'm not the one that breaks it. 😂
About 3 weeks ago, I finished what's become an annual ritual - planting native perennials. Some years I've done a good job of starting from seed in June - August, but this year I didn't. We just went to ALL the native plant sales and spent a lot of money. It's really remarkable how you can plant dozens of plants one year, and then again the next and the next, and STILL you have room for more the next year. Our yard isn't that big, it's just great when the plants are really dense and you can't see the dirt.
I'm planning tons of seeds for spring and summer, mostly veggies because the results are so much better than when I buy starts. I waited too long to start my kale from seed this year and put in starts instead and am now regretting it. They're not nearly as vigorous as the kale I grew from seed last year.
Here's a planner I made to help figure out when to sow which veggie seeds: https://tinyurl.com/yc4m94a7. I always found that most planners had too much info and I would get lost, so I made a really pared down one that only takes a few minutes to use.
And, laminator! A friend loved the planner so much she laminated it! And laminated a copy for me too, so now it's a re-usable worksheet. Genius!
I can share some Zone 6 dahlia insight. You really cannot plant them here until all danger of frost is past, which means Memorial Day at the earliest. You can buy them before then and store them in vermiculite. You must be careful not to damage the “eye” because that is where the stem grows from. Also, don’t seal the box where they are stored, it needs some air flow. I just fold the flaps crosswise on top.
Same zone and I was delighted to learn you can however give the tubers a head start a month prior by potting them up indoors and placing them near a window inside. Then as soon as frost date passed and ground was warm enough I planted them outside.
I may delight you even more: at first you can just bring them to somewhere warmer, they won’t even need light and soil until the eye starts to sprout!
Yes, they spent a week or two in the pots in my laundry/furnace room and once I saw shoots emerge I started putting them near a window and even outside on sunny days until it was safe to plant them in the ground. Now I need to figure out where to keep the tubers over the winter but also I tend to forget where I put things lol.
Everyone has their own storage method - I happen to have a root cellar type space and lots of waxed vegetable boxes (I grow a double 60’ row of dahlias and give away dozens of tubers to anyone who wants them every spring) but any space that’s cool-ish and not too dry or damp could work. Some people do sandwich bags or plastic wrap method but I use wood shavings.
(I also forget where I put things - including seedlings in the garden, unfortunately!)
Hi! I guess this is another reminder for me to say a prayer of thanks for the various seeds that didn't take and sorta clean up everything. The edible flowers are ready to be eaten, the snake plant really does need to be split into a second pot, and the evening primrose is doing its best. There's a couple of other little ones that peek through the soil but for the most part I don't really have anything to plant until February.
I did buy some carrot seeds on a whirl that I'll start then (although I could probably start now in zone 9b). I'm toying with the idea of a raised bed since I have the space for one but I also have no idea how that works actually.
I’m going to start a vegetable garden next year! This is a first for me. We’ve been in the house two years, and have done some landscaping, adding some color, some ornamental pear trees for privacy, though a lot we inherited from previous owners. I’m basically clueless but ready to learn and get dirty. I plan to make a spreadsheet of all the plants and bushes so I can keep track of them and learn how to care for them. And I want to learn about companion planting for the vegetables (raised bed). I’m not ready to start from seed, but I hope to get there someday!
After discovering that I ordered more than 300 anemones, ranunculus, and tulips during the summer, I quickly decided to install a raised bed, and I will try to grow anemones and ranunculus there as a spring crop and then do a summer crop of tomatoes and one zucchini. We will see.
I'm in the PNW, Seattle, newly minted 9a.
Now, I'm also starting my sweet peas, lisianthus, and sarracenia from seeds—a massive leap of faith.
I took lots of cutting from Fuchsia, calibrocha, mums, and other summer annuals, and they are in a small greenhouse outside. So I get to visit with them every day.
I am also trying to decide on buying a soil blocker. Opinions?
Does your greenhouse have heat? I'm trying to figure out if/how I want to do one!
No, I always start with the most basic to avoid overspending and keep it easy to manage. I have this greenhouse right up to the house, so it's protected and shielded by it. With Seattle being 9a, it should be fine. https://www.lowes.com/pd/Forclover-Cold-Frame-Mini-Wooden-Greenhouse-for-Vegetable-and-Flower/5014259163 (similar) I should call it a cold frame.
I was so bereft at the end of the season that I did everything like organizing my collected seeds really quickly and now I wish I still had those tasks to complete. I didn't do much garden cleanup this year either and I really miss the busy-ness of being in the garden all the time.
I'm mostly planning for winter sowing right now. Last year I used that method for the first time and had mad success (it's pretty foolproof). It's a really good method if you want to start seeds indoors but tend to travel for more than a week at a time in the winter or early spring, which I generally do. You don't have to check on anything in the way that you do when you start seeds indoors.
Excited to follow the dahlia farm <3
I did some fall sewing of a bunch of pretty pansies and some hollyhock — waiting with bated breath to see what happens in the spring!
YES! I am waiting for solstice and getting my gallon jugs ready. So satisfying and has gotten me many fabulous perennials for the price of a few (hundred, who am I kidding here) packets of seed!
Yes, I loove that it’s such a perfect method for the cold/moist stratification perennials need (here in zone 6a at least)
I would like to put mine out earlier but the general guidance for my region is late Feb.
You can put them out earlier but the containers won’t do anything until the seeds know it’s time to wake up! As long as it isn’t waaaay too early you should be fine.
Twenty-some-odd years ago when I lived in Seattle I fell in love with the flowers on Jerusalem artichokes. God only knows why the small patch in my backyard of my rental didn't spread like wildfire, but they never did. So, I put some in my side yard here in Upstate, looking forward to the bright yellow, sunflower-like blooms. Now I've created a monster, which I never mind when they're growing exponentially and shading the mess that is my back porch from passersby, but inevitably before they flower they get so tall they start to fall over. For at least 6 weeks every year it looks like someone's dropped a bomb in the middle of the patch as they flop about.
I pull a bunch every year so they don't take over my whole yard. I should dig them out entirely, but I just don't have the energy. And I keep hoping maybe they won't get so leggy one year and I can just enjoy them like I did in the PNW.
I can just picture it and honestly I love it
That actually makes me feel much better. Thank you.