How is your garden looking today?

I hadn't seen Beth's pix either!

Great pics, Beth. I tend to be the same way with putting in a single specimen or maybe a pair and then happily waiting as they multiply and need to be divided.

Soz, have you given your million-bells a dose of fertilizer lately? A wash of miracle grow on the leaves and into the soil every few weeks should help rejuvinate the containers - they need more fertilizer than plants in the ground because they get watered more often.

I planted 3 Annabell hydrangias and another 3 dicentra over the weekend. I'm done with the garden planting, but still need to do most of the containers.

Gave my grass a little feed, watered the backyard plants, and cut back on my apricot tree that seems to grow inches every day.

I was just going to ask about fertilizing container gardens, thanks, (yet again!!!), J_B. Miracle-Gro is your recommendation?

c.i. reminds me that yesterday I did some lilac pruning -- the people who lived here before us would prune EVERY sucker off every year (from the evidence), so the lilac is this weird thing with bare trunks and then up at the tippy-top leaves and some flowers. Did research and found that 3-5 suckers should be left per year to fill it out. Did that, pretty happy with my handiwork. Would love to rescue the lilac, the amount of suckers seems to indicate it's rescue-able. Will be cutting some dead branches off of it soon.

sozobe, Most plants are pretty hearty; no matter how much I chop them up, they seem to keep adding growth. Sometimes I try too hard on flowering plants, and they die on my in a fortnight.

Planted lavender, lisianthas, coleus, and lantana this passed weekend. I still don't have the showstopper yet, tho. Checking out a new nursury tomorrow which is supposed to be pretty great. We'll see.

Oooh, lavender....

It depends on if you're trying to stay organic or not. If I'm going to eat it I use fish or kelp fertilizer, if I'm just going to look at it I use Miracle-Gro.

on my hard drive

You need to join a photo hosting website. There are tons of them out there with free usage. Yahoo, msn, and a variety of other spots allow you to store your pictures on their websites. That's the first step. Craven and I have msn websites you can use.

Mine are still in my camera...some people are further along then others

Went up to the mans place this weekend to see all his stuff in bloom, he picked out more stuff and planted too..so, I'll have to go back up to see it all so lovely and wonderful.

Myself...the usual containers outside the door.
My seedlings of Morning Glory, Bells Of Ireland, Impatients, and 4o'clocks didnt make it...dang weather!...so, while inspired by that guy with all the stuff..I picked some up myself. Some really really lovely type of Impatients...New Guinea, Double..and a couple other things. Will have to take pics as we go along.

Nice to see everyones pics...so nice to have room for it...well, room that doesnt become a jungle at least.

I do the little containers every year and just keep them watered and dose with Miracle Grow here and there and its all wonderful.

Just a difference of opinion I am sure but I find that Miracle-gro is like sugar water, the plants love it but it doens't seem all that good in the long run, I much prefer Osmocote.

dys, That's good information about Miracle-gro. Been using it all my life, but it seems it's the wrong stuff to use. Just fed it to my grass today. Osmocote, heh? Will go to OSH tomorrow to pick some up.

I use both. I use Osmocote when I'm first putting them into the ground or containers and I scratch it in around my perennials in the spring, but then I switch to a liquid fertilizer after 8 weeks or so. I've found that containers need it sooner because of the extra watering they get. Dys, do you use a second dose of Osmocote later in the summer, or do you switch over to liquid?

nothing wrong with using M-gro now and then for a quick green-up (do it meself) but it doesn't feed the lawn what it needs for health, another thing is don't use much on anything in late july and all af august (when most people put it on heavy) cause the grass is trying to build up root sturcture for the winter and fert of most any kind spends all the plant energy on top growth rather than root growth. an good winterizer (slow nitrogen) and then a good pick-me-up in early to mid spring is great.

As you prolly know, my wife or son didn't water the grass during my 30-day absense, so it was kind of brown. I fed the m-gro to get some green back to my grass. Planning on doing it again next week until it gets to a darker green.

yeah I hear that but really 2 x m-gro should be a max

For grass, but can't matter much for annuals...?

I never use M-gro on annuals. I do use Osmocote for container, both indoor and outdoor.(and veggies and such)

Gotcha.

It's nice to start to have a clue about this stuff.

My next-door neighbor said helpfully, "you forgot some of these" and started to break off the lilac suckers I had painstakingly left. I said "noooooooooo...!" and rescued them. She was very disapproving. That's not how the [previous family] did it. I said yeah, that's why the lilac is a bare-branched freak. Or something. Anyway, I explained the whole thing, and she was like oh, OK.

I took an "after" picture of my backyard (shady area) grass, it's a bit wild back there because of the poison ivy scare but it's a nice after picture as they go. Pretty green. Will post both when I get 'em developed.