Gardening Article

This from the Cumberland County Master Gardeners...

Preliminary Steps Help You Pick the Right Plants

By C. Rae Hozer, Cumberland County Master Gardener

Pick the right plant. Put it in the right place. Then treat it right.

That’s sage garden advise. All three factors are important to success.

Preliminary Steps can Help You find the Right Plants for Your Landscape

Do up-front fact finding before trying to pick the proverbial “right plant” or before asking someone else to recommend plants for your landscape. Keeping notes and using a digital camera to record plants or gardens with a look that appeals to you can make planning and shopping for a landscape project easier. Recommended preliminary steps:

1. Know conditions at your site. Draw a sketch showing the property with buildings. Give a rough estimate of distances. Include compass directions (to help determine sun exposure). Make notes indicating windy, hot, or shady locations. Make notes about slopes, poor drainage, etc. Have a soil test done to determine the need for lime or fertilizer once you have a general idea of the type of plants to be grown in the area being planned.

2. Note the maintenance level you’ll be able to/wish to provide.

3. What ornamental plant features do you like– foliage color, texture, evergreens; flowers; exfoliating bark? What favorite plants should be included? Are there plants you don’t like?

4. Notice what grows well in your neighborhood and region. If you see appealing specimens/landscapes, snap a picture. This helps in plant identification and shows whether a plant’s growing conditions are similar (sun/shade, etc.) to the site you are developing.

5. Plant specimens are labeled in display or botanical gardens and arboretums. Write down Latin plant names (as well as common names). Note outstanding features (example, big red flowers). If that exact variety isn’t available find another with the same attribute.

Fall Gardeners’ Festival may help in Quest for Right Plants

Cumberland County Tennessee Master Gardeners (CCMGA) are hosting a Fall Gardeners’ Festival Tuesday September 29 from noon until 6pm on the grounds of Discovery Gardens within the UT Plateau AgResearch and Education Center, 320 Experiment Station Road off Hwy 70N north of Crossville. Admission is free. Garden talks by UT experts and local Master Gardeners. Many plant recommendations. Hear about ‘Magnificent Flowering Trees for Appalachian Gardens’ and ‘Great Plants for Fall Gardens’ (noon & 3pm), ‘Tough Enough: Low Care Roses for TN’ (1pm & 4pm), ‘Woody Ornamentals for the Plateau’ and ‘Well Designed Mixed Gardens’ (2pm & 5pm). Other gardening sessions: ‘Making Hypertufa Planters’, ‘Tennessee Yards and Gardens’, ‘Plant and Garden Photography’, and ‘Working with Nature: Organic Gardening’. Tours of the UT Plateau AgResearch and Education Center as well as of Discovery Gardens (Tree & Shrub Garden, Sun Perennial Garden, Celebration of Life Memorial Garden, Passive Composting Exhibit, and Rose Garden) will be held throughout the afternoon. Bring samples of yard & garden problems to Ask-the-Expert booth for diagnosis. The Master Gardeners (MGs) have developed an interactive computer disc with color photos showing hundreds of plants suitable to Tennessee’s Cumberland Plateau (all successfully grown by MGs in Cumberland County). This resource CD will be on sale ($10). Details at Cumberland County Tennessee Master Gardeners website, www.CCMGA.org.

Plateau Gardening is written by Master Gardeners for those tending home landscapes and gardens in Tennessee’s Upper Cumberland Region. Contact UT Extension Cumberland County, P.O. Box 483, Crossville, TN 38557, (phone 931-484-6743) for quick answers to specific questions, free publications, or to learn about becoming a Master Gardener. Email comments or yard and garden inquiries to Master Gardener Rae, mgardenerrae@frontiernet.net.

From the Cumberland County Master Gardeners

What To Plant/Transplant (Part One)

By C. Rae Hozer, Cumberland County Master Gardener

The first step in making plant recommendations for any landscape is to clarify the needs, likes and dislikes of the property owner and to learn about conditions at the site.

A homeowner request for a list of plants that would survive at one of the highest elevations in the county (about 3,000 feet above sea level) was received by our local University of Tennessee Extension office. The message was waiting when I came in one morning for Ask-a-Master-Gardener work. Someone had scribbled “Rae ?” at the top.

Gathering so much information wouldn’t be easy or quick. A phone call to narrow the search scope was a necessity. Tennessee supports a rich diversity of plant and animal life. Listing just plants native to middle and east Tennessee could fill a very large book. Beyond native species, many ornamentals which originated in similar climates in other parts of the world (“exotics”) would be hardy here, as would a lot of hybrid plants and cultivated varieties. What plant categories should be considered—trees, shrubs, and/or herbaceous perennials? flowering and/or foliage plants? evergreens and/or deciduous trees and shrubs? Were there particular “must have” plants? Knowing roses or a ground cover were desired, I could suggest plants in either category that should perform well in our area.

Then the office telephone started ringing. That diverted my time and attention. Home gardener phone-in questions, walk-ins and call-backs left no time to work on a plant list. Wet, humid weather has caused yard and garden problems from flower beds to the vegetable patch. Lawns are being overrun by weedy grasses. Poor soil drainage is showing up in places that never had those troubles before. We’re advising homeowners whose needle evergreens develop dead branches but show no sign of bugs, to dig down and check for dark or slimy roots (root rot) before spraying insecticides. One caller described creeping phlox plants that had been growing so well they needed thinning and were transplanted to new areas every year. This spring and summer those same plants turned gray from fungus and died. Tomatoes are showing leaf spot disease and every kind of blight imaginable.

I also took calls from two (new) vegetable gardeners whose tomato plants were tall, healthy-looking and a nice green color– but had no fruit. I suspected an overdose of nitrogen fertilizer. That pushes plants to make lots of leaf and stem growth rather than producing flowers and fruit. Too little sunlight hurts tomato production, too. Clouds blocking the sun during June and July have delayed fruit development on some tomato varieties. These gardeners were using organics- one chicken manure, the other horse manure. Vegetable growers using synthetic fertilizers may find it easier to measure the amount of nitrogen being applied. With more experience, organic gardeners usually develop a better feel for how much is too much.

I telephoned. A lady (the adult daughter of the gardener who asked for the hardy plant list) answered. I explained the need to narrow the focus to the types of plants her father wished to grow. Her accent indicated the family might be from the British Isles, Australia or New Zealand and not familiar with USDA Hardiness Zones. I suggested they visit Discovery Gardens, demonstration gardens planned and planted by Cumberland County Master Gardeners during their initial training. These gardens are open to the public daily during daylight hours.

Plateau Gardening is written by Master Gardeners for those tending home landscapes and gardens in Tennessee’s Upper Cumberland Region. Contact UT Extension Cumberland County, P.O. Box 483, Crossville, TN 38557, (phone 931-484-6743) for quick answers to specific questions, free publications, or to learn about becoming a Master Gardener. Email comments or yard and garden inquiries to Master Gardener Rae, mgardenerrae@frontiernet.net.