The Wisconsin Gardener

cc We are along the shores of Lake Michigan in Algoma at the Flying Pig, part nursery, part art gallery and just part fun. I'm with one of the owners, Robin Mulhaney. Robin, you and co-owner Susan Connor have created just a magical place here that I love visiting. Today we're going to do some therapy for people with brown thumbs. "Brown thumb syndrome." Yeah, and it can be so frustrating. You know if you buy a plant and you kill it you're not likely to come back and buy another plant. We'll start by talking about how to buy a plant that will live. Got it, let's start with spring. Okay, let's do it. Spring comes along, we're all excited. We're driving by the greenhouses. We're driving by the nurseries and they're starting to put stock out and it's really alluring and we stop in and we see plants like this. Mid-April, maybe into May a little bit. And we have no control! We're ready to buy, but this makes me nervous. Why? It's a beautiful echinacea in full bloom. I mean, after a white winter... That's the problem, it's in full bloom. But if you read the plant tag. This is a summer bloomer. Yes, it is. This should be about a quarter of this size, if not less and establishing roots right now rather than bud and bloom. I'm going to guess that this plant was forced in a hot house and I'd question the provenance of this plant. So probably not grown locally. The provenance being regional plants. Outside of our area or grown in an environment that does not have this plant acclimated for our cooler springs and summers. So the roots probably aren't even established is what you're saying. Exactly, it's all top growth. What happens if I plant this? There's a very good chance that it will die. Okay, let's put this back. Well then here's one that looks better then because it doesn't have flowers. This is going to be a common sight early in the season. This is what you want to see in the spring, no flowers. If you look in the root windows here there's no roots yet. That's not good, though? It's not good, because I'm going to guess that the roots in this plant are just starting. I think I'll take a peek. You shouldn't do this at the green house. No, but we can do this right here. Thank you! We have just a few roots, it's not ready for sale yet. If this is stock that came in to our place I wouldn't be selling it. I would be waiting a few weeks until the roots were established. So you would put this in a holding zone somewhere and let it grow some more. That's correct, until it was available. A novice or somebody struggling with brown thumb syndrome would probably kill it, because it's not established. It's not ready. Put in the ground and it could very well die. So what should it look like? This one up here is virtually perfect. But I'm not planting it in April, am I? You're not planting it in April. You're purchasing this and it's closer to mid-June or early June. It's got it's buds set and some of it's blooms. There's a lot going on with this plant. And if we take a peek at the roots. Oh, look at that! Nice roots in every window. This is ready to go. If I'm in doubt, and as a new, brown thumb gardener Talk to your plant sellers. There we go. Read the tags. if the information isn't there on the tags talk to your plant sellers. That's why they're there. That's why you go to a local nursery where there are local growers. They're there to help you. Absolutely. And ask them, "Where was this grown?" You can even ask what practices were used in it's growing. Well, even zones because Zone 4 isn't the same across the country. No, Zone 4 in Washington state is a lot different than the Zone 4 here in Wisconsin. I've been in the rainforest and that was in Washington state. We're unlikely to have rain forests here! Yeah, we don't have rain forests! Okay, so that takes care of spring. Spring into early summer, and then we have mid-summer. One of the things we're going to start running into in mid-summer is plants that you might have got there a little bit late. It's done blooming but it's still a really healthy plant and a good plant. So this is worth buying? This is a campanula that's just spent. It's already done, it needs to be cut back and deadheaded. Just cut those off. It's already establishing new growth. This is a healthy plant, it's just done blooming. Yep, it's done blooming. If I look into the little windows here I see that there's nice roots. They're white, so they're healthy. If pull it out, that's a nice mid-season plant. It's not the prettiest, but it's healthy. That would be a plant that it's okay to buy. Worth purchasing then. Another plant that's worth purchasing mid-summer, even though it might not be pretty, is this lily. I know this is a hard sell, this does not look pretty. It does not look pretty. Blooms are gone, but what it's starting to do is die back. A lot of the early bloomers like poppy and some of your native plants are going to die back in the pot but it's still a healthy plant. This one's actually kind of going dormant. It's feeding the sugars back into the bulbs. Next year, you're going to have double the plant. So it's a good time to plant it. And if I lift it out-- Oh, wow, look at the roots! Nice roots, ready to go, just not very pretty. Fall planting is next. Well, fall is when the sale tables start. Ooh, okay! It can be really tempting to go in and just start piling things into your cart that you take off of the sale tables. But you have to be a little bit careful in fall. What is that? This used to be a sedum. Yeah, that's right, it establishes that. But I'm going to guess the weight is more because of the fact that it's root rot. Shouldn't this have lots of glorious leaves for fall? Yes, it should. Even as it's a little close to my nose, I'm smelling root rot a little bit. If I take a peek in here I'm not going to see any white roots. Ooh, I don't see any roots. No, so that's something for the compost pile. Don't take it from the sale table. Don't even bother. No, you're done, that's done. But what you can run into in fall are some really nicely rooted perennials. Oh, that looks great. It's Adagio miscanthus, setting up it's little plumes. It's a dwarf variety. The roots are crazy. Look at how strong they look. This is a case where planting something like this we might even have to cut the roots to loosen them so they don't keep growing in a circle. Exactly. But yet, a great plant for fall planting. In all these cases, to have success ask the nursery person questions. There's no question that's a bad question. There's is no stupid plant question. Okay, and if they don't know the answer maybe look for another local nursery that can answer your questions about provenance about how old the plant is, and where was it grown. And when it should be blooming. Another was to get that answer is to read the label. Read your labels. Okay, thank you.