Episode 151: Underappreciated Plants for Winter Interest

We’re visiting with Bonnie Plikaytis in north Georgia today.

Although it would be nearly impossible for any plant lover to choose just one favorite, here are a few of the standouts that look especially good in my Zone 6 Michigan garden at the peak of the growing season.

No garden is complete without at least a few containers for seasonal color. I always specify locations for planters when I create a new landscape design, with the intention of keeping them filled in every season. Although many gardeners keep their containers filled with annuals in summer and cut greenery in winter, there is another option. Planting a dwarf evergreen that can remain in its pot for several seasons will provide structure and texture every month of the year.

After the torrential rains of December, it is a wonder that anything is blooming in Pacific Northwest gardens. Thankfully there are great plants that survive the downpours and even flourish when everything else is a soggy mess. Along with the plants surviving, there are insects that winter over in the trees, and they love to see the sunshine just like we do. As soon as the lukewarm sun starts hitting the trees, the groggy bees stumble out looking for some food (kind of reminds me of teenagers). It is essential that we gardeners provide early-blooming plants for these very important members of our planet. Interestingly, some bees are not at all particular about their food supply, while others are. Our goal should be to provide both native food sources and ornamental garden food sources. Nature’s creatures have a way of adapting to what is available, but they also search for specifics. The following are a few of my favorite late-winter-blooming plants for pollinators.

Selecting a perfect indoor plant gift is made easy with our Best Indoor Plants for Gifting! From the lucky Jade Plant to the low-maintenance Peace Lily, each plant, like Orchids or Poinsettias, offers unique qualities for meaningful gifts.

It is important to differentiate between pepper plants and their look like weeds to keep your garden clutter free and safe.

In his classic book Mormon Country, author Wallace Stegner noted that nineteenth century Mormons planted rows of Lombardy poplar trees wherever they established settlements in the territory that is now Utah. The trees served as windbreaks and boundary markers, but they were also the flags that marked the advance of Mormon civilization in a hostile territory. In my hometown and lots of other towns all over the United States elm trees served a similar function, marking the spread of middle class residential neighborhoods during the end of the nineteenth and the first third of the twentieth centuries. In the 1960’s almost all of those tall elegant trees fell prey to Dutch Elm Disease, making each municipality a little poorer.

Many attractive plants are suitable for cultivation in suspended baskets. For this purpose plants of a drooping habit of growth are preferable, as their pendulous stems, falling over the sides of the baskets, display the flowers or foliage to the best advantage. Hanging baskets are made of various materials; those of galvanized wire are the most popular, as they are light and last for many years. Teakwood or cypress wood baskets are used for orchids of drooping growth.

I have given up indoor seed starting completely on several occasions. The first time it happened I was a novice gardener. I had ordered seeds of just about every plant that I saw in the garden catalogs without thinking about such practical things as gallons of potting soil, hours of daily watering, and square feet of windowsill space. It also did not occur to me to determine whether or not I had room in my garden for even a fraction of my seedlings. My chaotic efforts eventually produced some wonderful plants, but the process was so exhausting that I said: “Never again.”

Planting a tree takes a lot of thought. We may have to consider if we want a tree that is:

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Today I went out my back door and noticed that one of my rosebushes was, unexpectedly, sporting a fresh new flower bud.  It was within a day or so of opening up–small, greenish and obviously defiant of the season.  The bud was an oddity on a rosebush that is itself an oddity.  When I bought the small white-flowered shrub last summer it had one blossom that was half white and half red, and looked as if it had been half-dipped in red paint.  Though my February bud was not a “half and half” flower, I took its appearance as a harbinger of spring, plucked it, and delivered it to a friend who shares my belief in such things.