Author: Debra Stinton Othitis
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Year-Round Gardening: An October checklist for gardens, lawns
As we move toward lower temperatures, now is the time to focus on general garden cleanup, soil preparation and plant protection in order to ensure a successful growing season in 2021. Perennials and annuals • Remove dead annuals. • Cut back perennials, leaving about a 3-inch crown. Exceptions are ornamental grasses, butterfly bush, Russian sage,…
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Year-Round Gardening: Preserving perennials through the winter
After pampering garden plants throughout the growing season, it is difficult to watch them die from that first hard frost. Although the Colorado Springs area did endure frigid weather this month, that light frost likely wasn’t enough to do damage to most of our tender perennials. If yours survived, they can be over-wintered with proper…
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Year-Round Gardening: Enjoy beauty of ‘the poor man’s orchid’
The bold sword-shaped foliage of the iris makes an excellent contrast to the more mounded forms of many garden plants. Irises are dependable, long-lived perennials with graceful flowers that come in an endless array of brilliant colors. By selecting and planting several different species, gardeners can enjoy blooming irises from April through July. There are…
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Year-Round Gardening: August is no time to relax in the garden
This is a good time to audit your gardening efforts and make notes for next year about what worked and what didn’t. Were you happy with that new tomato variety? Did that perennial get enough hours of sun or should it be moved? Meanwhile, here are some late summer tasks to undertake. Vegetables • Harvest…
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Year-Round Gardening: The beauty of begonias
Having a shady garden, I was delighted to discover begonias a few years ago. They add constant color and beautiful foliage throughout the season in places with little to no direct sunlight. They can be used as bedding plants, in window boxes and in hanging baskets. Begonia is a genus of perennial flowering plants in…
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Year-Round Gardening: June checklist for your lawn, garden
There has never been a time when we needed de-stressing and social-distancing activities more than now. Gardening can offer both. Here are a few June gardening tasks and projects that you can do to help keep your lawn and garden looking it’s best for the rest of this season. General maintenance • Check all containers…
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Year-round gardening: Grasses add color, drama to your landscape
Grasses can fill large or small spaces in any type of landscape with dramatic color, texture and movement that changes with the seasons. Ornamental grasses are adaptable and are easy to grow. Grasses can tolerate a wide range of soil types, even poor, and few pests bother them, including deer. Grass heights range from less…
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Year-round gardening: When to plant annuals and perennials
Many novice gardeners likely have posed some form of this question: Why plant annuals that are going to die in a few months when perennials come back for multiple years? Experienced gardeners know that combining reliable perennials with colorful annuals provides the most interest to a garden throughout the growing season. Each has its own…
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Year-round gardening: April checklist for lawn, flowers, plants and more
If you’d like a distraction from coronavirus why not start planning for gardening season? Here are some suggestions to get you started: • Order mulch now, preferably a bulk delivery — skipping all those plastic bags and ideally choosing a locally produced material. Also, hail cover often sells out early online so order that now,…
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Year-round gardening: Clearing up some cactus confusion
Does your Christmas cactus bloom before Thanksgiving? Maybe it starts budding in February or it blooms periodically throughout the year but not in December. Is your cactus confused, or are you? The fact is, you may not have a Christmas cactus at all. There are three species of cactus that are members of the leaf…