Landscape accents have become increasingly popular as many of us have discovered the joys of outdoor living. Used creatively, accents can turn your garden into a magical wonderland. This summer, we invite you to view our many new and exciting garden accent product lines, including popular items such as…

• Gazing Globes and Stands
  Old-fashioned Victorian gazing globes have made a comeback and we carry them in an assortment of colors and sizes. In addition, numerous gazing globe stands, in both metal and resin, are available.
• Bird Baths
  A wide assortment of bird baths are available in a variety of materials: concrete, cast aluminum and terra cotta. Place your bird bath in a location where you can kick back, relax and quietly observe the bathers.
• Statuary
  Set against a simple green background or placed on a garden pedestal amongst the flower, statues become a striking accent in the garden. Stop by and enjoy our wide variety of statuary with many different themes in durable resin and cast stone.
• Garden Furniture
  Just the sight of our line of garden benches will tempt you to sit down and rest a spell. Choose from several styles of benches made of cast iron, eucalyptus wood, concrete and bamboo to add a sweet seat to your garden.
• Trellises and Arbors
  Traditionally, trellises and arbors have primarily been used for their functional purpose, support. Today, no garden is complete without one of these structures. They may be used for their designed intention or simply as an ornamental accent, pathway definition or focal point. We carry pvc, wood, powder-coated metal and forged iron trellises and arbors.
• Pots and Planting Containers
  We have a wide variety of planting containers available, including…
  • Hanging Baskets – Choose from willow, moss, metal, plastic and ceramic.
  • Pots – We have pots from Italy, Malaysia, China and more. Choose from our selection of clay, plastic, cement, tin, zinc, lightweight insulated and self-watering pots.
  • Planters– Choose from lined hayracks, cradle planters and cauldrons. We also carry plastic railing/fence/deck planters and plastic or glazed ceramic wall planters.
  • Window Boxes – Available in cedar, pvc, plastic, metal and light weight insulated material with different sizes for different windows.
• Wind Chimes
  The soothing and melodious sound of a wind chime is sure to enhance your outdoor experience. Indulge with wind chimes in aluminum, pewter or bamboo.
• Lighting
  Lanterns and torches are a gentle way to light areas for entertainment in the garden. Candles add a serene ambiance that is unmatched by any artificial light. Lanterns, torches and candles are captivating as their flame flickers in the evening breeze.
• Garden Novelties
  Add a little whimsy to your garden with the addition of garden novelties. Choose from garden pixies, toadstools, Victorian water bells, wall plaques, glass bee catchers and much more. Stop by and see our great selection.

No matter what your garden size, style or theme, we have the accents to give it a personal, fun touch all your own!

As the days heat up, watering can become a dreaded garden chore and too many gardeners use wasteful techniques that use plenty of water but don’t give their plants the moisture they really need. Make watering plants easier and more efficient with the proper practices and tools…

• Mulches not only make plantings look more attractive, but their most important functions are to help retain soil moisture and minimize weeds, which would also usurp moisture from your plants. Mulch around plants to a depth of 2-4 inches, refreshing mulch as needed to maintain that depth and attractiveness.
• Watering cans and small containers work great for spot watering plants with different watering needs by hand. You don’t always need to get out a hose or sprinkler to get the watering done.
• Check to make sure that you have the proper length hose(s) to reach every corner of your garden. Take into account any obstacles in the way, and be sure you aren’t dragging the hose over any delicate plantings to reach more distant dry spots.
• Add a water wand to the hose to get the water where it’s most needed – the base of the plants – without needing to bend over repeatedly, which can cause back strain.
• The best time to water is during the early morning hours of a sunny day. This will allow plants to absorb more water before it evaporates when temperatures rise, but won’t leave water to sit on plants overnight when mold can develop.
• Always water plants and container gardens thoroughly and deeply to encourage deeper, more drought-tolerant root systems. It is better to water less frequently but more deeply rather than more often but with less water.
• In the landscape, a good rule of thumb is to provide an inch of water per week minimum. Keep track of precipitation with a rain gauge to avoid wasting water by overwatering when Mother Nature does the job.
• New individual plants that are set out, direct sown seed beds, sodding, etc. often require daily care, including watering, until established. Check moisture levels carefully during this period so the plants are well cared for.
• Use soaker hoses to provide slow drip watering. This allows plants to absorb water easily without wasting water by evaporating from foliage or spraying into the air. Soaker hoses can even be layered beneath mulch to preserve as much moisture as possible.
• Pay extra attention to plants in containers and hanging baskets as they tend to dry out faster and with greater frequency. These plantings will likely need to be watered daily or even multiple times a day during heat waves.
• Place Tree Gators, a drip irrigation bag, on newly planted trees for slow, steady watering that will soak down to the root system without draining away along the surface of the soil.

If you’ll be away on an extended vacation, or even just for a few days, make arrangements with a trusted friend or neighbor to “plant sit” while you are gone. There’s nothing worse than worrying about your garden while you’re away – except coming home to crisp plants that haven’t been watered properly!

Is your landscape afflicted with poor, low-quality soil? Areas of scorching sun? A problematic bank or steep drop? Sedums can be the answer!

Why You Will Love Sedums

There is no reason any area of your landscape should go bare when there are so many spreading sedums that thrive under what would otherwise be adverse conditions. Easy-to-grow, sedums are available in a wide variety of leaf textures and heights to fit even awkward corners, narrow terraces or thin alleyways. Low-growing sedums not only act as a great ground cover for problem areas but also work well in unusual landscape designs such as rock gardens or on green roofs. Taller sedums look great when planted with ornamental grasses and easy perennials such as cone flowers and black-eyed-susans.

The thick, lush succulent can have any shade of green, gold, purple, red and even blue leaves, adding stunning color to your yard. Variegated foliage varieties add visual interest even when the plant is not blooming, ensuring a beautiful plant for a much longer season. Once planted, sedum varieties require very little care and do well even if neglected.

Our Favorite Sedums

Because sedums come in a variety of sizes, be sure to choose a plant with a mature size that will match your landscaping space. In addition to considering the plant’s horizontal spread, also consider its height to get the full visual impact of these great landscape additions.

The best tall sedums include…

• Autumn Joy – 2’ tall with pink flowers
• Autumn Fire – 2’ tall with rose flowers that mature to a deeper coppery red
• Black Jack – 2’ tall featuring deep purple foliage with brighter pink flowers
• Carl – 2’ tall with magenta flowers that bloom in late summer
• Matrona – 3’ tall with pale pink blooms and gray-green foliage that shows a hint of pink
• Purple Emperor – 1 ½’ tall featuring red flowers and dramatically deep purple foliage

For smaller spaces when a low-growing plant is needed, consider these low-growing sedums…

• Angelina – needle-like, yellowish-peach foliage with yellow flowers
• Blue Spruce – needle-like blue foliage with contrasting yellow flowers
• Bronze Carpet – green foliage tinged white and pink and featuring red flowers
• Dragon’s Blood – dramatic bronze-red foliage with deep pink flowers
• John Creech – scalloped green foliage with pink flowers
• Larinem Park – grey-green rounded foliage with white flowers
• Vera Jameson – pink-tinged grey-green foliage with coordinating pink flowers

No matter what your landscaping needs and preferences – filling an awkward area, opting for an easy-care plant, adding drama and color to your garden plan – sedums can be the perfect solution.

Do you work all day in an office, on the road or even in the garden, but never have the time to enjoy the beautiful plants you spend time nurturing? Evening gardens are meant to help us relax, encourage savoring a refreshing evening and wrap us in their brilliance, and one of the best ways to enhance your nighttime garden is with the right lighting to make it shine even in the darkness.

Natural Light in a Nighttime Garden

 Extending the pleasure of your garden immensely, moonlight and star shine will illuminate flowers and foliage making the garden at night a different experience, almost surreal and magical. It can be especially enchanting when fireflies gently meander through the air, adding their ethereal glow to the landscape.

At nighttime, the garden develops hidden depths as the colors fade in the dusk. Red takes on a deep mysterious glow until it is lost into darkness when only the palest flowers begin to glimmer. Foliage casts shadows that soften the harsh corners of decks, sheds and structures. Scents are more apparent after a warm day as well as a calm, soothing feeling descends, and pesky biting insects retire as well – this is truly a wonderful time to enjoy your garden.

Artificial Light in the Night Garden

Enhancing the moonlight is a great way to create a spectacular night-time garden. Artificial light, besides serving a practical function, can add more interest to the evening garden, illuminating pathways and highlighting specific features.

Accent lighting creates a dramatic effect. Uplight trees, sculptures, pergolas, arbors, or large shrubs with recessed, understated lighting features to create a luminous glow. Create down-light from above to ‘moonlight’ paths or patios with either tall light fixtures or smaller pathway fixtures.

Add portable light with lanterns, torches and simple staked candles. This is great for barbeque areas, decks and entertainment areas, helping increase illumination for better visibility and evening energy. Candles are also nice because their flames flicker in the breeze and create shadows and reflections, but if it is too windy, be sure the flames are protected from vigorous breezes that will blow them out.

For the most dramatic nighttime lighting in your garden, consider specific features that will become showstoppers after dark. An elegant fire pit can be an evening gathering place and just the right spot for roasting marshmallows and chatting with friends. A waterfall or fountain can also be carefully lit to create an elegant, mystical mood with eye-catching sparkles as the light catches every splash.

To make the most of your garden lighting, position lights so they do not shine directly in your eyes as you move through the garden. If you are near a street, make sure your lighting won’t be canceled by streetlights, overwhelmed by passing traffic or distracting to drivers.

You don’t need to stop enjoying your garden when the sun goes down. With the right illumination – making the most of natural nighttime light and enhancing it with carefully chosen lighting – after dark can be when your garden really shines its brightest.

Many gardeners assume that the brightest flowers are only seen in spring, but there are many stunning shrubs that have great color all through the summer. Some feature outstanding blooms while others have equally showy foliage and can brighten up any yard. But which will look best in your yard?

Top Summer Color Shrubs

There are a number of tried-and-true summer-flowering shrubs that never fail to be impressive. Consider these favorites to enhance your landscape all summer long.

• Hydrangea
  This very popular mounding shrub is an old-fashioned favorite, but it doesn’t have to be just your grandmother’s shrub – there are hydrangeas for every situation and taste. Flowers appear in early summer and can last for several weeks. Choose from pink, blue (use an acidic fertilizer to maintain this unusual color) or white blooms. Large flower heads great for drying or make outstanding arrangements and bouquets when cut. These shrubs do best in light shade or sun. One of the easiest hydrangeas to grow is the native American oak-leafed hydrangea has lobed leaves with fragrant, conical-shaped flower heads.
• Butterfly Bush (Buddleia)
  This dramatic shrub is truly a butterfly magnet, and hummingbirds love it as well. One of the most fragrant flowering shrubs, butterfly bush blooms from early summer to autumn frost, and different varieties can thrive in a wide range of growing zones. The flowers can be pink, purple, blue, yellow or white, and often feature elegant spiked panicles, arching branches and interesting foliage. These shrubs do best in full sun and come in different sizes to suit different landscaping areas.
• Spirea
  A generally low-maintenance choice, this shrub features golden yellow to lime-colored foliage all summer with pink or lavender blooms in late spring through summer. Goldmound, Gold Flame and Anthony Waterer are all great cultivars and easy care shrubs growing to about 2-4’ by 3-5’. This truly is the perfect shrub to use anywhere in the landscape, and it can tolerate sun to part shade growing conditions.
• Rose of Sharon (Hibiscus)
  This is one of the showiest plants of the summer, and Rose of Sharon is also one of the easiest to grow. Dense growing and upright when young these shrubs will spread with age, so take care to plant them in appropriate spaces to avoid overcrowding. The dark green foliage contrasts nicely with large, showy flowers that can be up to 4” across. Flowers open in July and will continue blooming through late summer and into fall. Flowers are sterile, eliminating seed problems. This shrub is ideal to plant as a screen, hedge or focal point in full sun.
• Blue Mist Spirea (Caryopteris)
  This shrub is a great plant for late summer color with bursts of purple-blue flowers just when many other plants are growing dull. Its low-growing, mounding habit reaches 2-3’ wide by 2-3’ tall. Blue Mist Spirea is easy to grow and can tolerate some neglect. It should be planted in full sun, and will bloom from summer to fall.

With any of these shrubs in your yard, your summer landscape can be just as colorful and eye-catching as any spring flowers or autumn foliage.

Are you ready to make the most of your vegetable garden? Try these tips and tidbits for everything from easier weeding to stopping pests to enjoying a hearty harvest!

Reducing Weeds

• Minimize weeds in your garden by covering the soil between planting rows with mulch. Several sheets of moistened newspaper topped with hay or straw works very well, especially if you move your planting areas around a bit from year to year. You can even use carpet scraps placed upside-down. Landscape fabric topped with wood chips or gravel is a good choice if the walkways are permanent. Try to avoid the habit of tilling to remove weeds because this process brings up weed seeds from deeper in the soil and exposes them to the light they need to grow.
• Increase Tomato and Pepper Production
  Fruiting of your tomatoes and peppers may be improved by applying Epsom salts, which contain sulfur and magnesium. Apply one tablespoon of granules around each transplant, or spray a solution of one tablespoon Epsom salts per gallon of water at transplanting, first flowering and fruit set. You can find Epsom salts at drug and grocery stores.
• Supporting Tomato Plants
  Set your tomato supports in place before plants get too large. Smaller determinate (bushy) varieties can be supported with small cages, but larger indeterminate (vining) varieties need large cages or tall stakes. Secure cages with stakes so they don’t fall over as plants grow larger and heavier.
• Growing Larger Tomatoes
  Indeterminate tomato plants, such as ‘Better Boy’, will produce many suckers. A sucker is a new shoot that starts where a branch connects with the main trunk. Removing suckers will decrease the number of fruits produced, but the remaining tomatoes will be larger and will ripen sooner.
• Ending Blossom End Rot
  To minimize blossom end rot, keep soil evenly moist, apply a layer of mulch to conserve moisture, don’t over-fertilize (especially avoid high-nitrogen fertilizer) and avoid damaging plant roots while cultivating. Blossom end rot shows up as dark sunken spots on the blossom or non-stem end of tomatoes, peppers and squash. It’s caused by a calcium imbalance in the plant. The soil may have adequate calcium, but the plant isn’t able to take up enough to supply the rapidly developing fruit.
• Stop Slugs and Snails
  Slugs and snails may be deterred with coffee grounds, diatomaceous earth and even sharp gravel. Spread any of these materials in a ring around individual plants. Wrap pots with copper tape to keep slugs from crawling up. Inspect foliage and pick off any insects that have already passed the barriers.
• Keep Cucumber Beetles at Bay
  Young cucumber, melon and squash plants are easy prey for cucumber beetles. As the seedlings grow, these yellow-striped or spotted beetles emerge to feed on their foliage. The beetles also spread bacterial wilt disease. To control cucumber beetles use a portable vacuum cleaner to suck up them up in early evening, spray beneficial nematodes on the soil or try planting broccoli, calendula, catnip, nasturtium, radish, rue or tansy, which naturally repel these insects. If you want to try marigolds to repel them use the more pungent varieties like African, French or Mexican marigolds. The more common marigolds may actually attract these pests.
• Plan for Late Summer Harvests
  It’s not too late to sow lettuce, beets, carrots, radishes and other short-season crops for a late summer harvest. Shade lettuce, if possible, during late afternoon to keep young plants cooler, or grow them next to larger plants that provide some shade. You’ll need to water more often on these hot days than you did in spring and early summer, but you can easily extend their growing season for later harvesting.
• Grow More Tomatoes, Zucchini and Beans
  Harvest tomatoes, zucchini, beans and other fruiting crops frequently to encourage continued production. Don’t allow any fruits that you won’t be harvesting to remain on your plants, because when mature seeds are produced it’s a signal for the plant to slow down fruit production. Instead, consider sharing, selling, preserving or trading extra produce so you can continue to harvest and extend the growing season.
• When to Harvest Herbs
  Herbs are best harvested just as they are beginning to flower. That’s when they have the highest concentration of essential oils and flavor in their leaves. Harvest entire branches back to within a few inches of the main stem to encourage new, bushy growth.
• Harvesting and Storing Onions
  Begin harvesting onions when about half to three-quarters of the leaves have died back. Then gently dig or pull the onions and store them in a dry, shady place with good ventilation, such as an outdoor shed or barn, for 10-14 days. After the onions have cured, put them in slatted crates or mesh bags and store them indoors in an area with low humidity and temperatures between 33-45 degrees F.
• Enjoying Green Tomatoes
  When daytime temperatures no longer rise above 65 degrees F in late summer and early fall, it’s time to pick the green tomatoes. Wrap them individually in newspaper and let them ripen indoors, or try some fried or in other recipes that call for under-ripe tomatoes.

Butterflies are beautiful summer visitors to your yard, and you don’t have to have a large butterfly garden to encourage them to visit. Just a few select plants will spur some action, and there are endless ways you can design a butterfly garden to attract these fluttering jewels.

Planning a Butterfly Garden

Most butterfly plants do best in full sun, and butterflies are brighter, easier to see and more energetic in sunny spots. Choose a bright location for your butterfly plants, and arrange plants in tiers to create different levels of interest without blocking your view of any visitors. Consider the mature sizes of different plants and flowers, as well as their watering and fertilizing needs to group similar plants together for easier care. More colorful gardens will generally attract more butterflies, so include a range of bold flowers in the bed. Minimize any insecticide or pesticide use, as these chemicals can be toxic to butterflies. Position a shallow bird bath in the butterfly garden and keep it filled to give these bright insects a place to drink, and you’ll be pleased to see them perch and sun themselves just where you can see them best.

If you don’t have room for a full butterfly garden, try a container garden to attract butterflies. Just one large container or a group of several small pots with butterfly-friendly plants can be very effective at attracting these beautiful guests.

Best Plants for Butterflies

Many different plants are attractive to butterflies. Generally, native plants are best because they are easily recognized by butterflies, and they are also easier to care for and require less maintenance so you don’t need to disturb any visiting butterflies. Popular plants to attract butterflies include…

Perennials:

• Achillea (Yarrow)
• Asclepias tuberosa (Butterfly Weed)
• Aster
• Chrysanthemum (Shasta Daisy Type)
• Cosmos
• Coreopsis
• Dianthus (Carnation)
• Echinacea (Coneflower)
• Eupatorium (Joe-Pye weed)
• Helianthus (Sunflower)
• Hemerocallis (Daylilies)
• Lavender
• Gaillardia (Blanket Flower)
• Liatris
• Mint
• Monarda (Bee Balm)
• Phlox
• Rudbeckia (Black-Eyed Susan)
• Scabiosa (Pincushion Flower)
• Sedum
• Solidago (Goldenrod)

Annuals and Tender Perennials:

• Allysum
• Balsam
• Dahlia
• Fuchsia
• Geraniums
• Heliotrope
• Impatiens
• Lantana
• Marigolds
• Petunias
• Portulaca
• Rosemary
• Salvia
• Snapdragons
• Verbena
• Vinca
• Zinnias

Choose a mix of both annuals and perennials for your butterfly garden, and you’ll be amazed at what different fancy, fluttering friends come to visit!