Morning Glories of 2012

Morning Glories in Bloom

 Ao muraski zyouhanten shibori Morning Glory

Morning Glories: Weeds or Great Garden Vines?

I love Morning Glories.  I will search out and buy as many colors of Morning Glories as I can find.  They usually start to bloom in late summer, and add color when many other flowers have long since stopped blooming.  I throw them in my containers to add late summer/early fall color.

Morning Glory 'Grandpa Ott' blooming already this week. This one reseeded itself from last year.

Some of the morning glories will reseed themselves, such as the Grandpa Ott pictured above.  They don't reseed like crazy, instead it's usually just one or two plants in my zone 5 garden.

My aunt and uncle were just here visiting from Washington state, and when she saw my morning glory vines growing from my pots she called them weeds (in a very nice way).  I have been to Washington many times, and have seen the wild morning glory growing everywhere choking out other plants.

So what's your opinion?  Are Morning Glories weeds or great garden vines?  I found a great link that on this topic: http://www.gardensalive.com/article.asp?ai=1131

Putting Together Annual Containers

This past weekend was containerpalooza in my garden!  I look forward to the spring day when the weather is warm and the danger of frost is gone, because it's when I can start putting my containers together.  While I didn't finish all my containers, I am hoping to finish up the last of them this week after work.  Here are the elements I try to put into my containers:
1. At least one plant for height (this doesn't always work with smaller containers)
2. Contrasting colors....mix dark colors with light colors, etc.
3. Mixtures of heights and/or textures

Here is the empty planter

I add my plant for height, in this case it's Black and Blue Salvia

Then I start placing plants around and rearranging until I like the colors.

Once I have the plants in place then I add soil and plant them.

Some other containers from this weekend:

Coleus Care

If you have a shady garden like I do, then you know that Coleus are great for adding color to a shady garden.  Sun coleus are also a great way to add color to containers in a sunny location.  Coleus is an annual (meaning it does not come back, it's only good for one summer).  Some people have luck bringing Coleus cuttings into the house in the winter, I am not one of those people.  Once a plant is inside my house, it's as good as dead since I cannot take care of indoor plants at all.  I guess I am just not an indoors person.  Here are some tips to keep your coleus happy and healthy during the summer months:

1. Do not water leaves of coleus at night, this may cause the leaves to rot.
2. Coleus do not require a lot of fertilizer.  The more fertilizer the less color the leaves tend to have.  I use either worm compost tea (available at lots of extension offices) or manure tea (available through http://www.ahavenbrand.com )
3. Keep soil moist, but not overly wet.  
4. Pinch back or trim plants to keep them from getting leggy.  
5. Pinch off blooms to encourage them to be more bushy. (Keeping the blooms on the plant will not hurt the plant, they just tend to grow taller and skinnier, rather than full and bushy).

Coleus 'Saturn'

Bloom on hosta, which should be pinched off.

Pinching off the bloom, simply means removing the bloom.

Here are some flowers buds that should be pinched off.

Pinching off a flower bud.