Q. My perennials are looking shaggy with brown leaves, and leggy branches. Do I have to wait until spring to cut them back or can it be done now? Also, what perennials can I plant for year-round color? I don’t want to mess with annuals anymore because I’m tired of replanting them.
A. Perennials are groomed now, or you could wait. I’d groom the spring blooming ones now, so they are ready to take off as the temperatures warm up in March. Most of the Sages, Evening Primrose, Shasta Daisy and Penstemon can be pruned off to the ground as they produce basal shoots while others are trimmed back for shaping. You’re correct in that perennials don’t need to be replanted like annuals, however their blooming cycle is seasonal and I’m not aware of any herbaceous perennial that blooms year round. Flowering ornamental plants such as Floral Carpet Roses or Euryops have a very long bloom season. Garden Mums, Cyclamen, and English Primroses are the primary fall perennials. Mums have the shortest flowering season while Cyclamen and English Primroses bloom continuously through May. Next spring and or summer, you could add Iberis, Foxglove, Coreopsis, Penstemon, Verbena, Phlox, Bacopa, Million Bells, Rudbeckia, and Echinacea, the Coneflower just to mention a few. Also, don’t overlook the contribution from variegated foliage from landscape shrubs and grasses. Your favorite garden center now has a selection of small perennial plants in packs. Planted now, these varieties will bloom next year. If you wait to plant in the spring, these plants won’t bloom until the following year. You avoid this with those plants growing in four-inch pots and larger sizes. Your first step might be to step back and evaluate the blooming pattern of the existing perennials to see which season needs to be enhanced. Also give some thought to the type or shape of flowers you prefer—daisy shape, columnar, or just dainty-type flowers. Do they need to be large, small, or somewhere in between? There are lots of right answers but what is the right one for you? The areas do not need to go colorless as you would mix in a few annuals. I’m a believer in mixing annuals and perennials to bridge the color gap. You could add Primulas, Primroses, Calendulas, Pansies, and Violas for next color. Planted now, they will continue blooming until next April/May. I’d plant them close to one another as they’ll grow very little between now and next February and add some nutrients with a Starter Fertilizer to prevent the leaves from turning yellow. You now have year-round color with a minimal amount of replanting. And finally, as the leaves drop, be sure to gather up all the debris that accumulates at the base and around the plants. The foreign material packs down around the crowns with the winter rains. It can cause the plants to rot during the rainy season. It’s repeated as needed during the fall and winter. I think it’s only time a think a blower make sense.
Q. Two years ago, I dug up ten little Rugosa rose seedlings and planted them. One of the bushes is four times larger than the others and never bloomed. Can I rectify this problem by adding extra phosphorous? Also, is it possible that a hybrid wild seed produces a seedling(s) that is not capable of blooming?
A. Adding additional phosphorus is not going to correct this problem. With nutrient deficiencies, all the bushes would be experiencing the same problem, not one out of ten. Your second assumption is correct. You’re dealing with genetics. Seedling roses like many other plants are unpredictable when started from seeds. The genes from one parent combine with a second. Flowering is one of the many characteristics that may or may not transfer from seedling to seedling. Hence, vegetative plant parts are used to produce commercial plants such as cuttings, budding, grafting, divisions, etc. Vegetative reproduction guarantees that every cutting will mirror the parent or donor plant. I’d then select the most vigorous cutting(s) to replace the non-blooming plant.
Q. I started a compost pile and was amazed at how fast everything decomposed once the pile got going. I used food scraps and yard clippings including the pruning from my peach tree that had leaf curl. Before planting this spring, I added the compost to my vegetable garden. Now, my bell peppers and pole beans have what looks to me to be leaf curl. Is my soil contaminated?
A. As a general rule, we don’t compost diseased plant parts. The internal temperature of a compost pile doesn’t get hot enough to destroy the disease organisms or weed seeds. Diseased plants trimmings are disposed of in your garden trimming container for weekly pickup with the other household solid waste and recyclable. Although in this case, the diseased leaves have done no harm and your soil is not contaminated. The leaf curl on peaches is called Peach Leaf Curl. It’s a water-activated fungus that attacks only peach and nectarine trees. It will not affect any other species. Also, the fungus spores overwinter above ground not in the soil. Curly leaf on plants can be caused by many different things such as insects, herbicide damage, and changes in temperatures along with the fungus diseases. On apple, cherry and plum trees, Aphids are the primary cause of leaf curl. Aphids are sucking insects, and you’ll find them on the new growth. They cause the leaves to curl up like an Italian cookie. The herbicides in Weed and Feed turf products cause curly leaves with Mulberries and other shade trees planted in and near a lawn. The leaf curl is a reaction to the chemicals absorbed by the roots. Citrus leaves curl up from cool temperatures in the winter months. So, again there are many reasons for leaf curl. The good news is that Peach Leaf Curl hasn’t contaminated the compost or vegetable garden soil. I’d take a few samples of the curly leaves on the peppers and beans to your local garden center and have a nursery professional help identify the problem(s). My guess would be you have some type of sucking insect problem.
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