Michele Lee

I know I promised this yesterday but I completely forgot until I was collapsing for the night. So here it is.

Please keep in mind that I live in the USDA Hardiness Zone 6 (you can find your zone here) so my advice on plants is based on my climate and what I’ve grown. For example my aunt Lives in Las Vegas and her growing season goes from March-July. By August it’s just too hot there and she has problems keeping plants watered. Here you can’t put anything in the ground until late April or May because it’s very common for there to be a mid or even late April cold snap that will kill off tender plants.

Bleeding Heart (Dicentra)- Shade based it grows to about 4 ft. tall and comes in red, pink and white flowers and standard and fern-leaf leaf shapes. It’s one of my favorites is because it’s unusual, beautiful, one of the first plants to flower (mine is flowering already this year) and largely maintenance free. I moved mine last year and it hasn’t affected its growth at all. It’s a perennial.

Azaleas (Rhododendron)- These are actually shrubs, but the ones that came with my house are mini versions. They are fabulous because they stay about 2 ft. tall (no trimming!), they grow along the side of the house that gets almost no sun, prettying it up, and every spring they just explode in these flowers. Azaleas come in larger sizes, other colors and these flowers are “doubled” so they come in a less frilly version too.

Hostas (Hosta spp.)- Another shade perennial it flowers once a year on tall pretty stems (like yucca plants do). Again, real hardy and available in a variety of colors and shapes, some gardeners have shade gardens entirely of hostas. Above is a blue hosta (which is blueish compared to my other hosta, which is bright yellow-green).

Irises (Iris spp.)- Both of mine came from other people in the neighborhood (the top picture came from my next door neighbor’s garden and the paler irises in the bottom picture came from friends a few blocks away). They’re beautiful and of course, easy. The only thing I’ve had to do to take care of them so far is I’ll be dividing them this year to make sure there’s enough room. Irises bloom on new growth, which means that the sections that bloomed last year will not bloom this year. Instead the root sections which grew last year will put up flowers. This is why I have to wait until after they bloom to divide them. They are great for bare areas, like around tree roots or areas that get tons of sun and other plants might have a problem growing in. They grow fast and mine don’t always completely die back every year.  The large, pale irises (bottom picture) bloom in mid spring and when the flowers die back there’s still the interesting sword-shaped foilage. (Some gardeners completely cut back irises like this once they bloom.) The top irises have smaller blooms, and bloom later, but have flowers for most of the summer.

Petunias (Petunia spp.)- One of my favorites to stick in the planter box on my porch. Petunias are annuals, so they’ll die at the end of the growing season (but that means if you endd up not liking them you’re not stuck with them) and are very versitile. I grow mine in containers that get mostly shade, but down the street there’s a man who plants them along his fence every year in full sun. They come in lots of colors (we went with white this year). Keep them watered, especially when the temperatures reach over 90 degrees and they’re largely trouble free. They were also fairly inexpensive (I paid less than $2 for a planter of six).

Impatiens (Impatiens spp.)- I didn’t particularly like these, but they are also easy to grow annuals that come in a wide variety of colors and shapes. I bought mine (the above picture is of red and white “double flowering” impatiens) as last minute, cheap filler my first year gardening here at the house when I didn’t know where to start. They were pretty resistent to dry and hot conditions and easy to care for.

Lilies (Lilium spp.)- Above is a shot of my pink stargazer lily. Day lilies are also very popular around here because of their ease, cost and strong growth. This particular lily is in my shade garden and my sun garden and grew/bloom almost exactly the same in both spots. Again, effortless on my part and they didn’t demand a lot of watering (I planted these as bulbs, not transplants.)

Gladiolus (Gladiolus spp.)- These are the infamous “Not Pink” flowers in our garden (I bought them for my daughter for her 4th birthday. The package said pink. They bloomed and they were orange. She responded with “Oh shit! they’re not pink!”) this year I bought green ones to add to our collection. They’re like the lilies and irises, almost completely trouble free. Plus they attract butterflies and bees which is good for our other plants.

Last one:

Sunflowers (Helianthus annuus)- Again, real easy, the birds love them and last year when the August heat wave hit the sunflowers where the only flowering plants that held up with no help from me. They are annuals, but we saved seeds from last year’s plants so it’s relatively easy to keep plants going without having to buy more every year. I did buy red sunflowers to add to the garden this year. They also come in various colors (mixes of red and yellow) and sizes, so if you don’t want the giant Mammoth there are other options.