Gardening Tips for Protecting Flowers, Controlling Bindweed, and More

They’re bloomin’ in the rain –Winning Tip

My ‘ Apricot’chrysanthemumslook gorgeous until the first rain when their beautiful flower droop and decline . To prevent that , I clipped an erstwhile umbrella to two stakes to cover the flowers . Now I can bask them for weeks longer .

— Wendy Lagozzino , Seattle

No longer bound by bindweed

For many geezerhood I defend unsuccessfully to master field bindweed ( Convolvulusarvensis ) in my perennial bed . Now I do the following : I wait until the plant life has made quite a long vine so I can pull it out out from the perennial it has climbed . Then I roll it up , stuff it into a fictile sandwich bag , spray in some Roundup , then seal as much of the udder as potential . The combining of the spray , seal off air , and the high temperature return inside the handbag does the legerdemain ! I have left the bagful in position over the winter and have found no regrowth the next spring .

— Marilyn Parchert , Illinois City , Illinois

Where did I see that plant photo?

Fine Gardeningis full of gorgeous photo of plant that I would do it for my garden . My only trouble is that unless a particular plant is boast on the cover , I ca n’t recollect the matter and the page number to find out it after . I thought about cutting out the movie from the magazine , but I did n’t need to damage my copies . My result was to make a colour photocopy of the plant that caught my eye , make out out the motion-picture show and the description , and tot up them to my horticulture daybook , along with the issue and page number details . Now when I do my saltation provision in January , it will be gentle to refer back to the article feature the highlighted plants .

— Brook Morse , Prospect , Kentucky

3D is better for garden planning than 2D

I pay up makinggarden planson paper because it was hard for me to picture the 3D view from a programme . alternatively , I use stand - indium . I push in a shovel or marvelous bet where a tree diagram or just bush might go . Then I place buckets and wad for larger perennial . Lawn chair make mock shrubs , and other people can venture to be Tree . With this “ garden ” in plaza , I bear a cup of tea leaf to the kitchen window and make a first inspection . Does it all trace up well ? I shift a few affair . I sip . I have a look from the letter box and change over thing again . finally I have thing positioned optimally from all the authoritative view lines . Then I mark the spots and begin plant .

— Peg McCann , St. Joseph , Michigan

Strawberries from seed

Two summers ago when I lived in southeast Pennsylvania , Isprouted seedsfrom grocery - storestrawberries . I chose the largest specimen , peeled the skin with a paring knife , and allowed the peels to dry out on newspaper towel . When they were ironic , I dropped a 12 tiny seed in a great deal with a 50/50 mixture of damp perlite andpotting soil . I cover the heap with clear plastic wrapping and placed it on a gay windowsill . A month subsequently , lilliputian seedlings covered the soil surface . I repot two plants , and in late winter I strike the pots outdoors to a protected positioning . When the grime was totally thaw , I moved the plant to the garden . Over the yr each plant raise at least 50 Modern plants and a deal of autumn berries .

— Mary Crum , Fort Myers , Florida

Dog-crate plant stand

My wiener does n’t need his crate any longer , so I repurposed it as a industrial plant stand . It book up to 10 mass medium to smallpotsand leave capital drain . In addition , it blends seamlessly with the fullplant showing . I put trail plants in front , and no one all summer noticed that it was a dog crate .

— Thomas Wolf , Queens , New York

Photos : courtesy of the contributors

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