I'm not sure if there's a better way to nominate a topic, but I would love to have a thread on shade gardening - like deep shade and dappled shade, not "partial sun" - if only I were so lucky! I have a woodland backyard and am always looking for ideas beyond hostas.
Maybe do zones 4-6 and 7-9 since options are so different? I would also love that as a split in the newsletter (at least designated for organization). Another wonderful topic would be which native plants by region are total bangers. I will be honest, I really miss the Discord for this stuff!
Shady foliage is so lush and varied, so many good suggestions on this one! I'd love to add beesia, strawberry begonia, jack frost brunnera, and any dark-leaved bugbane << this last one is just the most stunning deep purple foliage. Edgeworthia has a beautifully fragrant late winter bloom, and it can handle dry shade. (not sure your location but all thrive in seattle area, zone 9a)
Wait, hydrangeas do fine in full shade? Bleeding hearts do great in my 7A deep shade rental backyard, and I was already planning to add hellebores this fall. But hydrangeas are one of my favorite flowers, so wondering why I thought they needed partial sun.
Certain hydrangeas (oakleaf, climbers) will do fine in full shade, though yes most others need a couple hours of sun. I need to move my hydrangea into a shadier part of my garden as it’s currently in full sun which, while causing plentiful blooms, also causes them to dry out and brown very quickly.
Ferns! I have a dry shade strip that is all ferns, sweet woodruff for groundcover, bleeding hearts, and Solomon’s seal. One of my favorite garden sections and so easy to maintain, plus basically deer proof (if that matters in your corner of the world)! PA, 6B.
I love the foliage of the woodland plants around here: mayapples (come up like little umbrellas! I love seeing the sprouts in early spring) wild ginger, jack-in-the-pulpit, jacob's ladder, solomon's seal. A lot of them have small, odd flowers that you have to catch at the right time to see, and I love that, too. Wild ginger especially hides this beautiful fuzzy dark-red flower with white veins running through it.
Sweet woodruff is beautiful, and I love it - but it forms such a thick surface mat of roots that it prevents the shrubs and perennials it surrounds from getting any water. Pulling up square feet of solid mats of fine red roots is periodically required in the NW if you want the other plants it surrounds to thrive.
Maybe it’s cold? New England sweet woodruff devotee here, and it spreads but not by much. Also, mine is all in marginal places where it’s not bothering anything else that isn’t hardy/left to its own devices to thrive or die
Fellow Sweet Woodruff lover here! It does so well in shady spots in my Zone 4/5 (MN) garden. AND it's a fave as it reminds me of childhood summers in Germany where Sweet Woodruff is known as "Waldmeister" ('master of the forest') and is supposedly the flavor behind delicious green treats like ice cream and gummy candies. For more adult palates, Waldmeister is made into a syrup for Berliner Weisse (wheat beer with flavored syrup) and Maibowle (white wine infused with Waldmeister, made in May). The scent/flavor of woodruff is subtle but divine.
(A PSA though to any foragers - It's important to harvest at the right time as more mature Woodruff becomes a natural form of a blood thinner and is therefore dangerous)
There’s a historic neighborhood in my city called Woodruff Place that I love to walk around and I never thought to look into the name origin, but reading about everyone’s memories and fondness for the plant is making me appreciate that place and its name in a whole new way!
Zone 9a here. Central Texas. Y'all know we get everything from scorching hot and drought to spring hail storms (and lately, some Pacific Northwest-like weather) to mild winters punctuated by Arctic blasts. So what seems to survive it all? My tried and true are:
Lantana - these die back each winter and you can prune the canes back a bit in the spring. By late spring they'll have filled out and tripled in size. They survive the heat, the freezes, the pounding rain, the drought, you name it. There are low and high growing varieties. Lantana urticoides Hayek is native to this state. (https://www.wildflower.org/plants/search.php?search_field=Lantana+&family=Acanthaceae&newsearch=true&demo=)
Prairie coneflower - this is a seed it and forget it native wildflower. Also deals perfectly fine with all our weather challenges and beautifully filled out our lawn. Does well in flower beds too. (https://www.wildflower.org/plants/result.php?id_plant=RACO3)
Iris and Daffodils - these two particular bulbs are very forgiving, come back year after year with no digging up/storing/or general fuss, and are deer resistant. Worth the work of plants the bulbs, just watch out that the armadillos don't dig them up. (Lay some chicken wire over them.)
I remember the gorgeous lantana all over from my grad school years in Texas — and because of that can never quite bring myself to buy the annual pot form they sell here!
I'm in New Orleans (Zone 9b)--we call that Texas native lantana you linked to: Ham and Eggs!
Thanks for the drought-resistant, full-bore-sun suggestions!
The climate has changed so much since we moved here (from Maryland) in 1992. [And I so miss those mid-Atlantic spring flowers: lilacs, tulips, daffodils, forsythia, pussy willows, snow drops, rhododendrons, peonies (especially the peonies), hyacinths, and more.] It used to rain every summer afternoon for 20 minutes. That hasn't happened in a good 10+ years, and summer heat (and humidity) has gotten so excessive, and the winter freezes are more common, nearly annual now, which takes out all the fun tropicals (those plants everyone else grows as house plants, such as monsteras).
I hear ya! I'm from Houston and my family has been gardening since the 1970s - things have changed a lot. We used to rely on hibiscus and oleander in our garden but the hibiscus can't take the heat or occasional stretches of drought and the oleander was wiped out in the freezes. Even Dad's citrus has struggled. At least the azaleas and camellias still thrive. (That would be my tried and true for the New Orleans to Houston area. Azaleas! Perfect too if you're missing the rhododendrons from the northern areas. Camellias also make a somewhat/kinda substitute for the peonies.) Also, if you haven't tried them yet, check out Lady Banks roses. Those have also dealt well with the wild climate changes at my parent's place and are just gorgeous spilling over a fence.
Also the Peggy Martin rose. It is also known as the Katrina rose because it survived some of the flooding in New Orleans after Katrina when nothing else did. It is a fad climber and absolutely puts on a show in the spring.
Also Houstonian. My loropetalum also is a show stopper in the spring and has survived over 22 years without much attention at all. Hurricanes, droughts, freezes.
Zone 5a. I'm can always count on the autumn sedum, bleeding heart, lamium, and wild geraniums.
I grew up in Texas, so I'm amazed at some of the plants I can grow now (lilacs, kale, peonies). I call the plants my mom has growing outside in zone 9 "house plants"
i used to hate hostas and then I spent time in my favorite nursery's massive hosta greenhouse and found so many beauties — I channel Virginia Sole-Smith's BIGGER IS BETTER hosta mantra
The interim owners of our house (between the people who owned it for many, many decades and us) made a wild decision to plant a MASSIVE hosta into an eroding shade slope that was held up with pieces of drift wood. When I had it terraced / put in a retaining wall, the guy doing it yanked it out and threw it into the corner of the shade area. I discovered it a month later, its roots fully exposed, still doing just fine — and planted it, in late August, alongside the "hosta row" on the far side of the property. This year it's THRIVING, and the leaves are absolutely Totoro umbrella-sized. LOVE A HOSTA.
I love a good hosta now, after years of turning up my nose at them… but the wee little mouse ear ones are my favorites. They’re so sweet! They collect marble sized droplets of water! They’re so blue!
I have been irritated by the hostas all over my yard for years, but I learned this spring (from the incredible @blackforager on Instagram) that they are edible, with a ton of ways to cook them?? The young rolled shoots were described as "better than asparagus" and I was VERY skeptical but they were! So this year I'm still shrinking their footprint, but with so much less resentment, by eating them.
Oh dear, AHP, prepare yourself to be inundated with pics of my houseplants. So many of them are perplexing me! lol
I do have a query for the larger Garden Study community with houseplants and not great natural light. Do you supplement with grow lights? And if so any recommendations?
Hi! I have my fiddle leaf fig under grow lights because it loves light and I really don't have any good "bright" places in my house, but I still want to grow it. My preferred growlights are the ones from Soltech. I have the Aspect (https://soltech.com/collections/all/products/aspect-plant-light) and love it. My issue with grow lights is that they always seem to emit a blue-ish cool light and I hate that light tone in my surroundings. The Soltech lights are expensive but they give off such beautiful sunny light that its worth it to me. I bought a couple of their flood lights around Black Friday to supplement my kitchen can lights with (I have one that is right over where my kitchen plants live) and it's such different light. Swoon. I think they also help with my mood.
Just popping in to say that Sansi grow lights work just as well as SolTech but they’re much cheaper! Not to cast aspersions on those beauties though (in fact, Mother makes incredddddible lights but they’re a gorgeous splurge). Sansi lights are bulbs only so you’ll need a mount, and I usually go with metal clip ons and just string em up. Good luck!
So helpful!! My housemate bought a grow light and our other housemate haaaaaaates the light (doesn't bother me bc I'm at work during the day! Ha). This is a great tip!
Allllll the grow lights! I moved from a place with walls of W, S, and E facing windows to a place with only NE facing windows and I very quickly had to give in to grow lights to keep all my houseplants alive. I hate hate the pink/blue lights that are for serious grow tents. Not worth the concentrated spectrum of pink/blue lights if they’re going to be in your living area, in my opinion. I’d reserve those for a basement or garage or grow tent where you won’t see them often.
After slowly spending a fortune on specialized grow lights, I learned that pretty much any lightbulb in the white spectrum is considered “full spectrum”—you don’t have to subscribe to fancy bulbs. Any interior lightbulb that points downwards toward your plants will work. I like the Sansi bulbs someone else mentioned and they’ve worked fine for me, but my new fave is buying a 6-ish pack of flood light bulbs from Costco that have a fancy switch on the side that allows you to pick which temp of light you want, all the way from 2000k (very warm) to 6000k (very cool). I think the pack was $11 at my Costco?! I love them and I love swapping them into fun hanging lampshades or floor lamps that don’t look like grow lights!
I have this, which is out of stock but nice if you can find a similar style. It’s adjustable, blends in nicely with my existing plant setup (everything clustered around the one sliding glass door that gets SE light in the house), and being able to easily twist the arms means it’s easy to point it away from inside the house if I realize it’s shining in eyes from wherever we’re sitting. It’s also currently doubling as support for a leggy begonia.
Hello from the UK! I didn’t know Zones could be applied to British gardens, I don’t *think* it’s something we use regularly here (we just go with vague descriptors like “coastal” or “cottage” and you have to work it out for yourself) though it seems super helpful - apparently I’m in Zone 8.
I also didn’t know Masterwort was a name for what I know as Astrantias, they are having SUCH a moment here over last few years - I was lucky enough to go to the Chelsea Flower Show last week (!!) and loads of the show gardens featured them, they’re such reliable planting/colour esp in shade/crappy conditions and I think there’s a real move toward this more… sustainable? longevity focused? way of gardening. Maybe because people have less time/spare cash for replacing plants every year!
In my own space I’m trying to be influenced by the British garden legend Beth Chatto, who was focused on accepting your garden’s conditions and planting for that rather than forcing unsuitable plants to try and grow somewhere they’re not happy - again, lucky enough to live near her gardens and got to visit her amazing “car park” garden which has never! been!! watered!!! and which looks incredible because of planting drought-tolerant plants. I also love Derek Jarman’s coastal garden where he worked with the landscape and native plants - since thinking about these two approaches I’ve discovered that things like sedums or grasses, and coastal plants like sea kale or horned poppies, LOVE the dry east Anglian conditions where I am, and I’ve never been happier with those bits of my garden where I’ve adopted this - I guess it’s a sort of philosophy about accepting where you are/seeing the beauty that is around you and going with the flow rather than forcing your will… anyway! Unexpectedly rambly comment. But Beth Chatto and Derek Jarman are really worth googling just to see the spaces they created, stunning and so inspirational.
Love, love, love this philosophy and wish it was more prevalent in the US, although native gardening is a massive trend right now. The only way forward, IMO, as the climate changes for everyone.
Tangerine marigold: full sun to full shade, it grows more if we water it, but it survives if we don't water it at all. Deer don't touch it. We have it growing in the un-irrigated front yard in both full shade under an oak tree and in full sun.
Agave: These are huge and happy, and sort-of pests because they make so many pups. About 4 years ago we divided one that had become super crowded into its individual rosettes, and now we have about 12 of them, each about 2 feet across, making a tidy grid next to the garage. They require zero water, zero maintenance except for pulling off dead leaves about once a year. The tips do die back a little on the rare occasions temperatures go below 30.
All the native salvias: sonomensis, black sage, white sage, hummingbird sage, celestial blue. As long as they have full sun, they need no water and look really nice.
Russel lupin: it's in an area that we water occasionally, but it gets no special treatment and makes an absolutely stunning flower. I grew it from seed a couple years ago, and am planning to grow about 30 more this summer for transplant in the fall.
Ground covers: yarrow and roman chamomile. I grew both from seed a couple years ago and planted them on a really sad, sunny, dense clay slope where everything else died. Now they hold the water and soil on the slope and other things are starting to be able to grow too. And they both make really nice flowers this time of year. Not to mention the chamomile tea!
Oh also, can I query the gardening hive? Those stretchy hoses- are they any good? Is one better than another or am I fine to just grab a job lot (discount store) one? I HATE coiling up the hose and my partner asked for garden things for Father’s Day!
Gonna be the counter-argument here and say that mine sprung a leak after one year — but I think if you invest in a good one (not just the first one you saw at Lowe's, like me) that might not be the case.
Oh my lord yes. Worth it. I got a few and got rid of all my rubber hoses except for one really long one. Just note that they grow and shrink, so if you want to do something with a sprinkler attached that stays put for a while, these are not the hoses for that! The sprinkler will get dragged across the ground and end up in the wrong spot as the hose shrinks.
Baaaaahahaha! I took my morning coffee and pj’s walk through the veggie garden this morning and thought “oh those lists this transplants need a little water!” So I pulled my stretchy hose over, turned it on, and…the whole thing exploded alllllll over me.
They are not as durable as other hoses but for me it's worth it for the tidiness. Fighting with hoses is one of those things that makes me irrationally rage-y.
I just bought my first one and I love it! It coils up and I tuck it into a pot. I notoriously never coil my hose back up so I'm very excited for mine. Since I bought it, I haven't had much use for it since it's been raining a ton lately. I have heard they don't last forever but since I never even put mine away in the winter, I don't even care. Worth it. Also, since it gets so small, I'm more likely to put it away for the winter. Maybe. We'll see.
Commenting here because it’s on the topic of hoses. I haven’t tried the spiral hoses, but I did take wirecutter’s advice and went with Continental Commercial grade rubber hose. I brought it and another slightly less expensive brand home. Continental was way better. It doesn’t kink and the rubber just feels high grade and strong. I’ve been very happy with it.
Yes they are great! The only issue is that neighborhood creatures can easily chomp a hole in them and then they will vigorously spray water out the hole so in that sense once they get a hole they’re trash, but I find that if I deposit the pile of hose all in one blob near my house it’s less tempting than when I used to leave it straight out across the back yard. Small price to pay though for not having to reel up a stiff hose every time!
We’re creating a hedge of lilac and spirea because they both spread and are easy to move! Also, moss phlox does well here (recently changed to 7a but we live on the bay and I think we get some kind of “bay effect” in our yard that makes it more 6b ish- a little windier and chillier than the rest of the neighborhood). I’m anxiously awaiting my next weekend with a babysitter so I can rip up a few more feet of lawn and replace with perennial wildflower seeds and hopefully some will do well to be added to this list. Yarrow (I think?) is doing super well in my backyard!
Just came here to say we need a "hit me with your best pot" thread, too. 🤣🤓 That's the first thing that came to mind when I read "tried and trues."
And also, I just moved from intown (7200') to a few miles outta town (7500') and the conditions are massively different. My yard and garden in town were lush and sheltered, though the season is mighty short. Out here, the game is protecting from wind, wind, wind, and also...according to the neighbors, elk. (Nice problem to have.) I don't know what will be true out here. I may be coming into an era of intensive shrub cultivation. 🤣
I remember visiting a ranch out in Montana where they complained about all the mess the elk made out in the fields — such destructive beauties. And yes, we should absolutely do a best pot!!!
Yeah, I believe it! I assumed deer would be the problem for me...that's what I've dealt with out-of-town in other places (including 3 in Montana). But, we don't have many whitetail deer right here (mostly mule deer). And, apparently elk like lettuce and flowers?!? (I'm not saying I have a best pot...but I'd love to!)
We have elk roaming and jumping our 5-strand fences on the west side of the Jemez. They love tender lilac tops, any willows - an elk analgesic and helpful for the rheumatism they are prone to, my native feather-bushes (I had to fence around these when I put them in.), and all my fruit trees (now coyote-fenced for the plums and 6' fenced for the apples. Go slow, put up with the look of circular fencing to protect the newly planted (or orchard fencing) and plant close to the house where people and dogs coming and going keep the elk away.
Thanks for these tips, Ellen - very helpful! And, you're right that I'm going to have to adjust to being okay with every plant being surrounded by a fence! 🤦♀️🤣 Good to know they really like lilacs and willows, as we were thinking of planting some. Have you found they'll jump a 6' fence!?!?!
They can but have to really want whatever is inside. But elk necks are long so put them whatever way out and make the fending taut and hard to “bend” down.
We "borrowed" our neighbors' sweet woodruff (and bleeding heart) when it migrated through our shared fence this spring and I am really loving it - I am not sure whether to credit it for the thing that ate my daisies last year not showing up this year but it's much nicer over on that side of the garden this year.
Zone 7a here in NJ. The surprise tried and true for me has been irises. I longed to have them for years. My sister in law gave me bulbs/roots from hers. She gave me about 5 clumps, each about a hand span across, which I placed hopefully in corners of my front beds. Three years later, they have expanded across all empty spaces in the beds. I talked to a guy who recounted, when he was a kid, helping his dad cut them back in the fall to keep them under control. PSE&G had to dig up part of one of my front beds recently, and several of the guys took some for their gardens (at my invitation), which made me feel warm & fuzzy.
Here in Toronto (zone 5USDA/zone 6CA), my tried and trues are petunias. They bloom great all summer long, bounce back if leave them unattended for a bitch in scorching heat and don't need much in terms of maintenance. But ask me again how I feel about them in late August when they're covered in aphids! 🤪
I'm not sure if there's a better way to nominate a topic, but I would love to have a thread on shade gardening - like deep shade and dappled shade, not "partial sun" - if only I were so lucky! I have a woodland backyard and am always looking for ideas beyond hostas.
I planted a whole shade garden last year so I have lots of (Zone 8) recs, will definitely do this!
Maybe do zones 4-6 and 7-9 since options are so different? I would also love that as a split in the newsletter (at least designated for organization). Another wonderful topic would be which native plants by region are total bangers. I will be honest, I really miss the Discord for this stuff!
Also thank you!!!!
Shady foliage is so lush and varied, so many good suggestions on this one! I'd love to add beesia, strawberry begonia, jack frost brunnera, and any dark-leaved bugbane << this last one is just the most stunning deep purple foliage. Edgeworthia has a beautifully fragrant late winter bloom, and it can handle dry shade. (not sure your location but all thrive in seattle area, zone 9a)
I almost included Jack Frost Brunnera in my tried and trues, I love it so much!
Hellebores! Hydrangeas! Bleeding hearts!
Wait, hydrangeas do fine in full shade? Bleeding hearts do great in my 7A deep shade rental backyard, and I was already planning to add hellebores this fall. But hydrangeas are one of my favorite flowers, so wondering why I thought they needed partial sun.
Also, annoyingly, it seems most nurseries (at least near me) only sell hellebores for a brief period of time around March.
Certain hydrangeas (oakleaf, climbers) will do fine in full shade, though yes most others need a couple hours of sun. I need to move my hydrangea into a shadier part of my garden as it’s currently in full sun which, while causing plentiful blooms, also causes them to dry out and brown very quickly.
Ferns! I have a dry shade strip that is all ferns, sweet woodruff for groundcover, bleeding hearts, and Solomon’s seal. One of my favorite garden sections and so easy to maintain, plus basically deer proof (if that matters in your corner of the world)! PA, 6B.
I love the foliage of the woodland plants around here: mayapples (come up like little umbrellas! I love seeing the sprouts in early spring) wild ginger, jack-in-the-pulpit, jacob's ladder, solomon's seal. A lot of them have small, odd flowers that you have to catch at the right time to see, and I love that, too. Wild ginger especially hides this beautiful fuzzy dark-red flower with white veins running through it.
+1 to this!
Coleus almost feels like cheating because they grow so well and are so show offy in he shade.
Ajuga! Periwinkle!
<inhales> Lungwort, Solomon’s seal, astilbe, snakewort, spiderwort
“Dies back in winter, comes back strong in Spring, frizzles in strong direct sun. Would be great for under big trees or rhodies.”
I feel seen.
Sweet woodruff is beautiful, and I love it - but it forms such a thick surface mat of roots that it prevents the shrubs and perennials it surrounds from getting any water. Pulling up square feet of solid mats of fine red roots is periodically required in the NW if you want the other plants it surrounds to thrive.
Thank you for this caution! When I saw it out in the wild in Norway, it was always in sparse chunks; I wonder what mitigates it there
Maybe it’s cold? New England sweet woodruff devotee here, and it spreads but not by much. Also, mine is all in marginal places where it’s not bothering anything else that isn’t hardy/left to its own devices to thrive or die
Fellow Sweet Woodruff lover here! It does so well in shady spots in my Zone 4/5 (MN) garden. AND it's a fave as it reminds me of childhood summers in Germany where Sweet Woodruff is known as "Waldmeister" ('master of the forest') and is supposedly the flavor behind delicious green treats like ice cream and gummy candies. For more adult palates, Waldmeister is made into a syrup for Berliner Weisse (wheat beer with flavored syrup) and Maibowle (white wine infused with Waldmeister, made in May). The scent/flavor of woodruff is subtle but divine.
(A PSA though to any foragers - It's important to harvest at the right time as more mature Woodruff becomes a natural form of a blood thinner and is therefore dangerous)
There’s a historic neighborhood in my city called Woodruff Place that I love to walk around and I never thought to look into the name origin, but reading about everyone’s memories and fondness for the plant is making me appreciate that place and its name in a whole new way!
Zone 9a here. Central Texas. Y'all know we get everything from scorching hot and drought to spring hail storms (and lately, some Pacific Northwest-like weather) to mild winters punctuated by Arctic blasts. So what seems to survive it all? My tried and true are:
Lantana - these die back each winter and you can prune the canes back a bit in the spring. By late spring they'll have filled out and tripled in size. They survive the heat, the freezes, the pounding rain, the drought, you name it. There are low and high growing varieties. Lantana urticoides Hayek is native to this state. (https://www.wildflower.org/plants/search.php?search_field=Lantana+&family=Acanthaceae&newsearch=true&demo=)
Prairie coneflower - this is a seed it and forget it native wildflower. Also deals perfectly fine with all our weather challenges and beautifully filled out our lawn. Does well in flower beds too. (https://www.wildflower.org/plants/result.php?id_plant=RACO3)
Iris and Daffodils - these two particular bulbs are very forgiving, come back year after year with no digging up/storing/or general fuss, and are deer resistant. Worth the work of plants the bulbs, just watch out that the armadillos don't dig them up. (Lay some chicken wire over them.)
There's more but that's enoguh to start.
I remember the gorgeous lantana all over from my grad school years in Texas — and because of that can never quite bring myself to buy the annual pot form they sell here!
I'm in New Orleans (Zone 9b)--we call that Texas native lantana you linked to: Ham and Eggs!
Thanks for the drought-resistant, full-bore-sun suggestions!
The climate has changed so much since we moved here (from Maryland) in 1992. [And I so miss those mid-Atlantic spring flowers: lilacs, tulips, daffodils, forsythia, pussy willows, snow drops, rhododendrons, peonies (especially the peonies), hyacinths, and more.] It used to rain every summer afternoon for 20 minutes. That hasn't happened in a good 10+ years, and summer heat (and humidity) has gotten so excessive, and the winter freezes are more common, nearly annual now, which takes out all the fun tropicals (those plants everyone else grows as house plants, such as monsteras).
I hear ya! I'm from Houston and my family has been gardening since the 1970s - things have changed a lot. We used to rely on hibiscus and oleander in our garden but the hibiscus can't take the heat or occasional stretches of drought and the oleander was wiped out in the freezes. Even Dad's citrus has struggled. At least the azaleas and camellias still thrive. (That would be my tried and true for the New Orleans to Houston area. Azaleas! Perfect too if you're missing the rhododendrons from the northern areas. Camellias also make a somewhat/kinda substitute for the peonies.) Also, if you haven't tried them yet, check out Lady Banks roses. Those have also dealt well with the wild climate changes at my parent's place and are just gorgeous spilling over a fence.
Also the Peggy Martin rose. It is also known as the Katrina rose because it survived some of the flooding in New Orleans after Katrina when nothing else did. It is a fad climber and absolutely puts on a show in the spring.
Also Houstonian. My loropetalum also is a show stopper in the spring and has survived over 22 years without much attention at all. Hurricanes, droughts, freezes.
oh yes, I'd love to try the roses!! I have read about them in the New Orleans garden books!!! (Dan Gill). Thank you!!!
Zone 5a. I'm can always count on the autumn sedum, bleeding heart, lamium, and wild geraniums.
I grew up in Texas, so I'm amazed at some of the plants I can grow now (lilacs, kale, peonies). I call the plants my mom has growing outside in zone 9 "house plants"
thank you x a million for including ground cover plants that are not hostas (which I have an irrational hatred toward)!!
i used to hate hostas and then I spent time in my favorite nursery's massive hosta greenhouse and found so many beauties — I channel Virginia Sole-Smith's BIGGER IS BETTER hosta mantra
My neighbor has gigantic ones I refer to as “Jurassic hostas,” leaves big enough for a Totoro umbrella. I covet them fiercely
The interim owners of our house (between the people who owned it for many, many decades and us) made a wild decision to plant a MASSIVE hosta into an eroding shade slope that was held up with pieces of drift wood. When I had it terraced / put in a retaining wall, the guy doing it yanked it out and threw it into the corner of the shade area. I discovered it a month later, its roots fully exposed, still doing just fine — and planted it, in late August, alongside the "hosta row" on the far side of the property. This year it's THRIVING, and the leaves are absolutely Totoro umbrella-sized. LOVE A HOSTA.
I love a good hosta now, after years of turning up my nose at them… but the wee little mouse ear ones are my favorites. They’re so sweet! They collect marble sized droplets of water! They’re so blue!
These are my favorite too! And I love that they multiply so readily :)
I have been irritated by the hostas all over my yard for years, but I learned this spring (from the incredible @blackforager on Instagram) that they are edible, with a ton of ways to cook them?? The young rolled shoots were described as "better than asparagus" and I was VERY skeptical but they were! So this year I'm still shrinking their footprint, but with so much less resentment, by eating them.
My mind is BLOWN by this
that is incredible! thanks so much for sharing!
My husband can't stand them either, so I am always looking for shade/partial shade plants that are NOT hostas!
Oh dear, AHP, prepare yourself to be inundated with pics of my houseplants. So many of them are perplexing me! lol
I do have a query for the larger Garden Study community with houseplants and not great natural light. Do you supplement with grow lights? And if so any recommendations?
Hi! I have my fiddle leaf fig under grow lights because it loves light and I really don't have any good "bright" places in my house, but I still want to grow it. My preferred growlights are the ones from Soltech. I have the Aspect (https://soltech.com/collections/all/products/aspect-plant-light) and love it. My issue with grow lights is that they always seem to emit a blue-ish cool light and I hate that light tone in my surroundings. The Soltech lights are expensive but they give off such beautiful sunny light that its worth it to me. I bought a couple of their flood lights around Black Friday to supplement my kitchen can lights with (I have one that is right over where my kitchen plants live) and it's such different light. Swoon. I think they also help with my mood.
Just popping in to say that Sansi grow lights work just as well as SolTech but they’re much cheaper! Not to cast aspersions on those beauties though (in fact, Mother makes incredddddible lights but they’re a gorgeous splurge). Sansi lights are bulbs only so you’ll need a mount, and I usually go with metal clip ons and just string em up. Good luck!
Cool, never heard of those before!
So helpful!! My housemate bought a grow light and our other housemate haaaaaaates the light (doesn't bother me bc I'm at work during the day! Ha). This is a great tip!
Allllll the grow lights! I moved from a place with walls of W, S, and E facing windows to a place with only NE facing windows and I very quickly had to give in to grow lights to keep all my houseplants alive. I hate hate the pink/blue lights that are for serious grow tents. Not worth the concentrated spectrum of pink/blue lights if they’re going to be in your living area, in my opinion. I’d reserve those for a basement or garage or grow tent where you won’t see them often.
After slowly spending a fortune on specialized grow lights, I learned that pretty much any lightbulb in the white spectrum is considered “full spectrum”—you don’t have to subscribe to fancy bulbs. Any interior lightbulb that points downwards toward your plants will work. I like the Sansi bulbs someone else mentioned and they’ve worked fine for me, but my new fave is buying a 6-ish pack of flood light bulbs from Costco that have a fancy switch on the side that allows you to pick which temp of light you want, all the way from 2000k (very warm) to 6000k (very cool). I think the pack was $11 at my Costco?! I love them and I love swapping them into fun hanging lampshades or floor lamps that don’t look like grow lights!
I keep looking at versions of this, but haven’t made the commitment yet: https://www.instagram.com/reel/C7W6ULkvuk_/?igsh=a3owYWxxNW03OXZu
I have this, which is out of stock but nice if you can find a similar style. It’s adjustable, blends in nicely with my existing plant setup (everything clustered around the one sliding glass door that gets SE light in the house), and being able to easily twist the arms means it’s easy to point it away from inside the house if I realize it’s shining in eyes from wherever we’re sitting. It’s also currently doubling as support for a leggy begonia.
Hello from the UK! I didn’t know Zones could be applied to British gardens, I don’t *think* it’s something we use regularly here (we just go with vague descriptors like “coastal” or “cottage” and you have to work it out for yourself) though it seems super helpful - apparently I’m in Zone 8.
I also didn’t know Masterwort was a name for what I know as Astrantias, they are having SUCH a moment here over last few years - I was lucky enough to go to the Chelsea Flower Show last week (!!) and loads of the show gardens featured them, they’re such reliable planting/colour esp in shade/crappy conditions and I think there’s a real move toward this more… sustainable? longevity focused? way of gardening. Maybe because people have less time/spare cash for replacing plants every year!
In my own space I’m trying to be influenced by the British garden legend Beth Chatto, who was focused on accepting your garden’s conditions and planting for that rather than forcing unsuitable plants to try and grow somewhere they’re not happy - again, lucky enough to live near her gardens and got to visit her amazing “car park” garden which has never! been!! watered!!! and which looks incredible because of planting drought-tolerant plants. I also love Derek Jarman’s coastal garden where he worked with the landscape and native plants - since thinking about these two approaches I’ve discovered that things like sedums or grasses, and coastal plants like sea kale or horned poppies, LOVE the dry east Anglian conditions where I am, and I’ve never been happier with those bits of my garden where I’ve adopted this - I guess it’s a sort of philosophy about accepting where you are/seeing the beauty that is around you and going with the flow rather than forcing your will… anyway! Unexpectedly rambly comment. But Beth Chatto and Derek Jarman are really worth googling just to see the spaces they created, stunning and so inspirational.
Love, love, love this philosophy and wish it was more prevalent in the US, although native gardening is a massive trend right now. The only way forward, IMO, as the climate changes for everyone.
Right plant right place! Love Beth Chatto!
That’s it! For some reason my brain wouldn’t recall that very catchy and entirely memorable phrase 😂 she’s a true legend.
I love her book on dry gardening. Prescient!
Zone 10a, Berkeley CA:
Tangerine marigold: full sun to full shade, it grows more if we water it, but it survives if we don't water it at all. Deer don't touch it. We have it growing in the un-irrigated front yard in both full shade under an oak tree and in full sun.
Agave: These are huge and happy, and sort-of pests because they make so many pups. About 4 years ago we divided one that had become super crowded into its individual rosettes, and now we have about 12 of them, each about 2 feet across, making a tidy grid next to the garage. They require zero water, zero maintenance except for pulling off dead leaves about once a year. The tips do die back a little on the rare occasions temperatures go below 30.
All the native salvias: sonomensis, black sage, white sage, hummingbird sage, celestial blue. As long as they have full sun, they need no water and look really nice.
Russel lupin: it's in an area that we water occasionally, but it gets no special treatment and makes an absolutely stunning flower. I grew it from seed a couple years ago, and am planning to grow about 30 more this summer for transplant in the fall.
Ground covers: yarrow and roman chamomile. I grew both from seed a couple years ago and planted them on a really sad, sunny, dense clay slope where everything else died. Now they hold the water and soil on the slope and other things are starting to be able to grow too. And they both make really nice flowers this time of year. Not to mention the chamomile tea!
Oh also, can I query the gardening hive? Those stretchy hoses- are they any good? Is one better than another or am I fine to just grab a job lot (discount store) one? I HATE coiling up the hose and my partner asked for garden things for Father’s Day!
Gonna be the counter-argument here and say that mine sprung a leak after one year — but I think if you invest in a good one (not just the first one you saw at Lowe's, like me) that might not be the case.
Oh my lord yes. Worth it. I got a few and got rid of all my rubber hoses except for one really long one. Just note that they grow and shrink, so if you want to do something with a sprinkler attached that stays put for a while, these are not the hoses for that! The sprinkler will get dragged across the ground and end up in the wrong spot as the hose shrinks.
Baaaaahahaha! I took my morning coffee and pj’s walk through the veggie garden this morning and thought “oh those lists this transplants need a little water!” So I pulled my stretchy hose over, turned it on, and…the whole thing exploded alllllll over me.
They are not as durable as other hoses but for me it's worth it for the tidiness. Fighting with hoses is one of those things that makes me irrationally rage-y.
I just bought my first one and I love it! It coils up and I tuck it into a pot. I notoriously never coil my hose back up so I'm very excited for mine. Since I bought it, I haven't had much use for it since it's been raining a ton lately. I have heard they don't last forever but since I never even put mine away in the winter, I don't even care. Worth it. Also, since it gets so small, I'm more likely to put it away for the winter. Maybe. We'll see.
Commenting here because it’s on the topic of hoses. I haven’t tried the spiral hoses, but I did take wirecutter’s advice and went with Continental Commercial grade rubber hose. I brought it and another slightly less expensive brand home. Continental was way better. It doesn’t kink and the rubber just feels high grade and strong. I’ve been very happy with it.
Yes they are great! The only issue is that neighborhood creatures can easily chomp a hole in them and then they will vigorously spray water out the hole so in that sense once they get a hole they’re trash, but I find that if I deposit the pile of hose all in one blob near my house it’s less tempting than when I used to leave it straight out across the back yard. Small price to pay though for not having to reel up a stiff hose every time!
We’re creating a hedge of lilac and spirea because they both spread and are easy to move! Also, moss phlox does well here (recently changed to 7a but we live on the bay and I think we get some kind of “bay effect” in our yard that makes it more 6b ish- a little windier and chillier than the rest of the neighborhood). I’m anxiously awaiting my next weekend with a babysitter so I can rip up a few more feet of lawn and replace with perennial wildflower seeds and hopefully some will do well to be added to this list. Yarrow (I think?) is doing super well in my backyard!
LOVE moss phlox!!!
7b here and experimenting with adding natives to my little patch of townhouse yard… tell me about these wildflower seeds!
Just came here to say we need a "hit me with your best pot" thread, too. 🤣🤓 That's the first thing that came to mind when I read "tried and trues."
And also, I just moved from intown (7200') to a few miles outta town (7500') and the conditions are massively different. My yard and garden in town were lush and sheltered, though the season is mighty short. Out here, the game is protecting from wind, wind, wind, and also...according to the neighbors, elk. (Nice problem to have.) I don't know what will be true out here. I may be coming into an era of intensive shrub cultivation. 🤣
I remember visiting a ranch out in Montana where they complained about all the mess the elk made out in the fields — such destructive beauties. And yes, we should absolutely do a best pot!!!
Yeah, I believe it! I assumed deer would be the problem for me...that's what I've dealt with out-of-town in other places (including 3 in Montana). But, we don't have many whitetail deer right here (mostly mule deer). And, apparently elk like lettuce and flowers?!? (I'm not saying I have a best pot...but I'd love to!)
We have elk roaming and jumping our 5-strand fences on the west side of the Jemez. They love tender lilac tops, any willows - an elk analgesic and helpful for the rheumatism they are prone to, my native feather-bushes (I had to fence around these when I put them in.), and all my fruit trees (now coyote-fenced for the plums and 6' fenced for the apples. Go slow, put up with the look of circular fencing to protect the newly planted (or orchard fencing) and plant close to the house where people and dogs coming and going keep the elk away.
Thanks for these tips, Ellen - very helpful! And, you're right that I'm going to have to adjust to being okay with every plant being surrounded by a fence! 🤦♀️🤣 Good to know they really like lilacs and willows, as we were thinking of planting some. Have you found they'll jump a 6' fence!?!?!
They can but have to really want whatever is inside. But elk necks are long so put them whatever way out and make the fending taut and hard to “bend” down.
OK, very good to know! Thank you!
We "borrowed" our neighbors' sweet woodruff (and bleeding heart) when it migrated through our shared fence this spring and I am really loving it - I am not sure whether to credit it for the thing that ate my daisies last year not showing up this year but it's much nicer over on that side of the garden this year.
Zone 7a here in NJ. The surprise tried and true for me has been irises. I longed to have them for years. My sister in law gave me bulbs/roots from hers. She gave me about 5 clumps, each about a hand span across, which I placed hopefully in corners of my front beds. Three years later, they have expanded across all empty spaces in the beds. I talked to a guy who recounted, when he was a kid, helping his dad cut them back in the fall to keep them under control. PSE&G had to dig up part of one of my front beds recently, and several of the guys took some for their gardens (at my invitation), which made me feel warm & fuzzy.
Here in Toronto (zone 5USDA/zone 6CA), my tried and trues are petunias. They bloom great all summer long, bounce back if leave them unattended for a bitch in scorching heat and don't need much in terms of maintenance. But ask me again how I feel about them in late August when they're covered in aphids! 🤪
Wow, some truly unhinged typos in this comment.