2022 April Garden Sustainable Maintenance Practices for the Southeast
Virginia bluebells, Mertensia
APRIL
I love April! I really love all months for what they are. I also hate April for what it does—the pollen is upon us. Hopefully we will have regular rain to clear it off all our stuff!
Up until now, and in April, it has been too crazy. After the plant sale, I will relax some at my beach house, The COTtAGE! Speaking of the plant sale, I have a list!
First off, the date of the sale is Saturday, April 16, 2022 from 10 until noon. All proceeds for sales and donation will go toward signage and building an home for native bees.
Not looking for any plants? Come by to tour the garden, anyway.. I’ve made a lot of changes. I’m opening for the North American Rock Garden Society, Piedmont region. So I might as well open it to all!
2022 Bee Better Naturally Plant sale list
Bear's Breeches, Acanthus mollis
Hardy banana
Thornless blackberry
Dwarf iris, Iris ‘Eco Easter’
Cut-leaf coneflower, Rudbeckia Laciniata
Evergreen Solomon's Seal, Disporopsis pernyi
Grape hyacinth, Muscari armeniacum
Hellebores, Helleborus ‘Pine Knot Selecti’
Siberian squill, Scilla siberica
Sweet Flag, Acorus gramineus ‘Ogon’
Toothwort, Cardamine diphyylla
Tomato ‘Cherokee Purple’
Tomato ‘German Johnson’
Tomato ‘Sun Gold'‘
Sensitive fern
Milkweed, Tropical
Milkweed ‘Hello Yellow’
Herbs—Basil
Stump air plant design—$65.00
Stump air plant design—$39
Stump orchid with bunnies—$45.00
I will be selling some cool finds. Over the years as I produced and wrote to our Nations top gardening magazines, I’ve amassed a collection of props to use in styling shots. Most are garden related.
I will be updating soon, so stay tuned.
Plants all be marked with a very reasonable price.
The Back 40 (ft) — by design, I don’t have much to do here. Happy to report the native dogwood, Cornus florida, and yellow and red buckeye bloomed, Aesculus flava and Aesculus pavia, respectively, are bloom!
Gazebo Corner!
Gazebo Corner—The Lady Banks rose, Rosa banksiae, will soon be in full bloom!!
The Epimedium Patch —Still nothing. But the plants I ordered will be here soon! I will be adding mulch.
The Wildflower Patch Extension—Transplanted more Toothwort, Cardamine diphyylla. We will also be selling this at the plant sale.
The Wildflower Patch.—The the Virginia bluebells, Mertensia virginica are blooming!!! Such an unusual blue.
Hardy Kiwi
The Southside—The Brown Turkey fig is sending out foliage as is ‘LSU’ purple and ‘Celeste’.
The Ostrich ferns are really filling in!
The Ostrich Fern Garden—They are coming up! The lightness of the delicate green fronds stays that color most of the season. I need a piece of art here. I’ll be on the lookout.
The Front Fountain Garden—Tulips are blooming the the pots.
The Food Forest Typically the henbit runs rampant, but this year isn’t so bad.
The Food Forest Extension—This soil will warm up soon, and I’ll be able sow alpine strawberry seeds. The lettuce is coming up n nicely.
The Front Beds plus The Parterre Weed, weed, weed.
The Raspberry Patch—the raspberries have a nice fresh foliage.
The Pollinator Garden—Waiting to see what might need to be done here.
The Blackberry Patch—I need to tie up the canes that are growing strong!
The North Side—Bear’s Breeches are looking mighty fine! These will also be for sale during the BBN plant sale.
The Rock Garden
The Girl’s Garden—I had a predator attach on March 26th. We didn’t see anything on the cameras. So sad. This leaves us with only six girls.
The Wildlife Pond—Added more evergreen Solomon’s seal around the pond’s edge. These will also be available for sale durning the April 16th sale.
The Mixed Border—It’s
APRIL Everybody is a gardener in April—if not of one’s own home or volunteering in another, or even just being an admirer of all that April brings. I love the trifecta effect—azaleas, dogwoods, and redbuds. Your garden should be prepped and ready to roll and grow!
I look forward to Spring. While it may last a week or a month, the duration is unpredictable, so every fine day should be taken advantage of. I know I try to!
For us, April is the last month for a frost of the season. Mine, in particular, is April 8th. If in NC, click HERE to see yours. I’m hoping last evening, April 1st was the last for this year, and it skirted us to the north from the prediction.
Hellebore seed heads ready for deadheading
Most of our other grooming has been complete. April is a good time to be in the moment and note the quiet before the flower-wildlife-food-production storm.
I’m really looking forward to this gardening year. Since I redesigned the Mixed Border last December, I’m anxious to see how it all turned out!
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SUSTAINABLE GARDENING STEWARDSHIP:
There are many definitions of sustainable gardening, and through my decades as a sustainable gardener, I’ve summed it up to mean…wait for it…a garden that sustains itself and the life within! By that I mean, doing less, so much less, that it can take away the stress and much of the labor, bringing back the joy of gardening and bettering the environment.
Sustainable gardening is a concept of using gardening practices that cause no harm to the Earth and its inhabitants while working in a way to enhance it. But there is more. To me, sustainable gardening is to have within all the aspects to sustain life. For example, to have a butterfly garden, it’s not enough to just have pretty nectar-rich flowers. For a butterfly garden to be fully sustainable, plants are required to sustain all aspects of the butterfly’s life cycle. That means providing host plants, specific plants that area butterflies need to lay their eggs. So yes, you will have holes in your leaves; that’s the goal!
Simply put, sustainable gardening is designing your garden to sustain itself and allows us to secure our future to make the Earth better than we found it. Think of it as organic gardening taken a step further.
Design becomes an important aspect for a garden to sustain itself, as well as providing the plants necessary to fully sustain wildlife in all respects of their lifecycle. You could just plant plants that are regionally native and provide exactly what nature does. No supplemental water, no cutbacks, no added mulch, and no pesticides or herbicide. Yet, many want more from their gardens, so we add plant diversity. What is key is the placement of these plants.
SOIL
FERTILIZING SUSTAINABLY
WATERING SUSTAINABLY
WATERWISE
WILDLIFE
CREATING A WILDLIFE HABITAT AT HOME
FOOD:
Our bird friends don’t need supplemental feed if you have a diverse garden. but we begin to heat up, keep up the feeder so you can watch your feathered friends from the inside of the home..
One of the best all-around seeds for birds is the black-oil sunflower. This seed has a high meat-to-shell ratio, it is high in fat, and it is sized perfectly for many seed eaters, including black-capped chickadees, cardinals, mourning doves, finches, juncos, jays, woodpeckers, and sparrows.
COVER:
Wildlife welcomes cover, year-round.
WATER:
As the berries in our area ripen, the birds are having a feast. Keep your birdbaths filled with freshwater, changing out at least every four days to break the mosquito larvae cycle.
PLACES TO RAISE THEIR YOUNG:
Plant diversity is key!
BIRDCARE:
Do you deadhead? Click HERE to learn more.
Check out this really nice bird identification and preferred foods for each bird from The Cornell Lab! Click HERE!
Are you familiar with how we can bring the birds back? Click HERE for starters.
As long as you are enjoying seeing the birds from your window, continue to Feed The Birds!
I also fill wire suet cages with native grasses.
HUMMINGBIRD UPDATE:
The males left last month. Females will leave in a month or two afterward. To learn how to attract hummingbirds to your garden, click HERE.
INVASIVE PLANTS:
Invasive Plants:
By definition, did you know there is a different meaning between invasive plants vs. aggressive plants? A simple definition, invasive plants are introduced species, not native to our area, and show a tendency to spread out of control. Aggressive plants are those native to our area, and some can easily take over. We in. The Bee Better Teaching Garden keep an eye on both!
Clover
We don’t all think of clover as a weed. I certainly don’t! Do you think white clover is a weed? Think again. if you are one of the ones who want it gone in your turf, click HERE.
You may know pokeweed as American pokeweed, poke sallet, or dragonberries. All parts of the plant are poisonous, except when the foliage is about the height of a spread hand. Then it can be boiled with two water changes and eaten like cooked spinach.
The berries are highly desired by birds in the fall, and this helps the spread of pokeweed as they drop the seeds—everywhere! After consuming the berry, the seeds are spread by birds and frequently are found around the driplines of trees, shrubs, and along fencerows, and a massive amount around the plant.
If left too big, they can be hard to remove since they have a deep taproot. Try to note and remove seedlings early for an easier pull.
Pokeweed shoots can be composted in cold piles if berries are not present. Roots should not be added to cold piles, either. We cold compost in the Bee Better Naturally Teaching Garden. Cold composting is essentially letting a pile build and decompose.. It requires less effort from the gardener, yet the decomposition takes substantially longer—a year or more. We have a designated area behind some shrubs where we pile our biomass to slowly break down.
I thought you might be interested in learning how the dreaded Bradford pear had its beginning.
Lesser Celandine or Fig Buttercup, Ficaria verna
Creeping Charlie, Glechoma hederacea
Greenbriar, Smilax rotundifolia
Hairy Bittercress, Cardamine hirsura
Marsh Pennywort, Hydrocotyle sibthorpioides
GOOD BUGS:
An Introduction of Green Lacewings
Mysteries of the Dragonfly and Damselfly
BUTTERFLY UPDATE:
I’ve seen a few, but this oh-so-nice spring, they are slow to arrive full force.
We offer Caterpillar Support to those who are in need of butterfly caterpillars rescued. If you have butterfly caterpillars and are running out of host plants, or if you don’t want your plant defoliated, just email me at helenyoest at gmail.com. We can arrange for you to drop them off, and I will raise and release them.
Host Butterfly Plants
Bronze fennel is the host butterfly plant for the Eastern black swallowtail butterfly. The caterpillars feed on the fennel until time for the metamorphosis.
In our area, we don’t tend to see Eastern black swallowtails until a little later in the summer. But they will come. It’s not too late to plant their host plants. While they like fennel best, the caterpillars will also feed on curly parsley, dill, and carrot tops. To purchase the full list of host plants for butterflies within our Raleigh and Ecosystem 231, click HERE.
MONARCH UPDATE:
It is possible to see monarchs in the Raleigh area in the early summer, but we are more likely to see a bunch of them in the fall as they migrate south again. Have you planted your milkweed?
BAD BUGS:
Mosquitoes are out, these are buggers one never gets used to. Controlling mosquitoes with traps has been most helpful. To learn more, click HERE!
Tent Caterpillars
Leaf Miner Flies
Mosquito Control—Is there Such a Thing?
Naturally Controlling Japanese Beetles
Bagworms
Do yourself a favor and never look into the “eye” of a bagworm. Bagworms have got to be the most disgusting-looking pests ever — to me anyway.
Bagworms can be treated by removing them by hand and dropping them into a bucket of soapy water. If the bagworm infestation isn’t within easy reach, they can be sprayed with Bacillus thuringiensis or Bt for short.
Bt is a microbial insecticide that’s commonly used to control various caterpillars such as the red-headed azalea caterpillar along with many other caterpillars, as well as those nasty bagworms. But remember, it will kill our moth and butterfly larvae, as well!
Black Widowed Spider, Latrodectus mactanse
Cicada Killer, Sphecius specious
Japanese Beetle, Popillia japonica
Be sure to check them FIRST to see if they have any tanchid fly eggs on their shoulders. If they do, let them go and the flies will hatch out and consume them from the inside — and produce more flies to dispatch more Japanese beetles. If you see those opaque white dots — one or two or three or more — let them go.”
Brown Recluse Spider Loxosceles reclusa
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SPECIFICALLY…
CAMELLIAS
LAWNS
ROSES
TREES: Check out the latest advice from Leaf & Limb!
Why Dead Wood is Good Wood!
The Art of Espalier
SHRUBS:
The best time to prune flowering shrubs is right after they bloom.
ANNUALS:
I don’t tend to plant annuals, but I’m big on direct sowing. Zinnia’s are my go-to seeds. There are tall ones, shorter ones, and even ground cover types. Some look like show mums others like pinwheels, and those that look like daisies you will want to pluck to see of you if your love, loves you not.
PERENNIALS:
Coneflowers
Rohdea japonica is sending up new shoots. Now is a good time to cut back old leaves. Same with cast-iron plant, Aspidistra elatior. Cut back dead leaves to welcome fresh foliage.
BULBS:
Divide irises: Did you have success with your new iris planted this year or in the fall? If not, it could be due to several factors: too much shade, too much fertilizer, too deep a planting, or crowding. Now is a good time to correct any of these problems by lifting and relocating or repositioning to a more favorable location.
Plant the iris high with the rhizomes along the surface of the dirt. They can be covered finely and lightly with mulch, but not soil. Make sure you can either see the rhizomes or have the ability to brush away the mulch exposing the root. With the exception of the Louisiana variety, irises need six- to eight- hours of sunlight to bloom and require good drainage. If you have a damp, partial sun location in your garden, plant a Louisiana iris.
Camellias
Caladiums
VINES:
Virginia creeper, Parthenocissus quinquefolia. I find most people absolutely hate Virginia Creeper for the aggressiveness. I happen to find it extremely beneficial for birds in the fall. Did you know Virginia Creeper is a native?
Unfortunately, too many gardeners confuse it with poison ivy, Toxicodendron radicans, which is also a native and feeds birds. I get it. I’m highly allergic to poison ivy and have eradicated it from my property. I remember when I did so, I wasn’t allergic before but became so during its removal. The good/bad news was I did it all in one day, so I was affected even before the symptoms showed up! Otherwise, I may have stopped short of getting rid of it all, and being fearful my entire life in the garden! I had a rash from head to toe!!! It was then, in 1997, that I started wearing long sleeves and pants whenever gardening.
Crossvine, Bignonia capreolata; Lady Banks rose, Rosa banksiae; Carolina jessamine, Gelsemium sempervirens.
POND:
EDIBLE FOODS and FOOD FOREST:
Bee Better Teaching Garden grows at least 30 different fruits. Learn about our Food Forest HERE!
HERBS:
What’s looking good now in the Bee Better Teaching Garden:
Parsley, Petroselinum crispum-
Rue, Ruta graveolens
Thyme, Thymus vulgaris
Oregano, Origanum vulgare
Rosemary, Salvia rosmarinus, formally Rosmarinus Officinalis.
In the Food Forest, the rosemary has spider mites.
Without looking at this plant with a hand lens, it’s impossible to be sure, but this type of mottled leaves is typical of the damage done by either a sucking insect or spider mites. The leaves ended up stippled and paled with such infestations because the insect or mite pierce the leaf repeatedly as they feed, which kills the cells in the leaf. Initially, the leaves look stippled, but over time the entire leaf can die.
Leafhoppers, lacewings, and whitefly are three insects that suck plant juices and cause similar damage. If you look closely, or with a hand lens, and see webs, it’s likely spider mites are the cause.
Since most people want to eat their herbs, you, of course, don’t want to use systemic or other chemical insecticides. Also, mites aren’t killed by some insecticides. You could use one of the insecticide/miticides made from neem or cinnamon, however. Another good practice in such situations is to spray the plant with a hard stream of water once a week.
PERENNIALS:
Salvias
Foxgloves
Phlox
CHICKENS:
SNAKES: Wondering what snake is in your backyard? Click HERE for an easy id.
Glossary
Until soon,
Helen
#WeCanAllBeeBetter!
Ruellia root
The maple snag finally fell. It was useful as a snag for about 15 years. Now will will serve as a log right where it landed!
Eastern Redbud just starting
Until soon,
Helen
#WeCanAllBeeBetter!