Tracilee's gardens and questions

This is an email from a new gardener, Tracilee, they had been here for the tour. She is in a home with some established plantings, and is just beginning to learn about gardening.

Thanks Marna! We had such a great time!!!! Attached are some photos of our gardens, pretty base, but you can see the retaining wall that I want to fill with wildflowers. I also found a double lily today!! How fun! And our leaf had 3 caterpillars on it - Ed, Fred, and Ted!!!! I'm so excited! thanks again, talk to you soon!








Her double orange Daylily







The retaining wall that has great potential as a backing for plantings! We will definitely be able to help her plan for a new garden there.



And the wonderful foliage of a non-blooming Hydrangea! Great topic for a future post.



An update on her Monarch caterpillars:

Just want to let you know the caterpillars are doing wonderful!!! We actually have 3!!!

Thanks again for giving us such a special experience!

And a question on identifying a vine:
attached are pic of the ivy stuff hanging from our trees. upon closer look, there are two types, a 5 and 6 leaved version... any ideas?

In this picture it is clear that there are 5 leaves. This is Virginia Creeper, Parthenocissus quinquefolia, which is a member of the Grape family, Vitaceae. It is a native vine, to 50+ feet. It has great fall color, often peaking before the trees begin to turn. It has greenish white flowers which turn to bluish back berries on bright red stalks. It is listed on the MA State Native Plants list.


This photo does look like there are 6 leaflets, but it's hard to distinguish with so many leaves in the photo. Did you actually get up close to the vine and determine there are 6 leaflets? They look like the same vine, but it is hard to tell from the photo.





Questions from Diana M.

Hi - My Pink Bleeding Heart doesn't look very good. The leaves are all yellow. Am I supposed to cut them back?

Bleeding Heart does not last all season. Because of the frequent rains this year they have lasted longer than normal. Usually, in the past, bleeding heart would be dying down as Hosta come up, which is why they are such good planting companions. It is up to the individual gardener to decide at what point to cut back dying plants. For Bleeding Heart, I have found that if I cut back the yellowing stems down to the joint where there is new growth, that I can prolong the foliage for quite some time. Even after letting my plants go to seed this season, I just cut back some of the yellowing foliage and found a lot of new growth at the lower joints, so I decided to leave the bottom part of the plants for the new growth to have the opportunity to develop.
Regarding the mums(Chrysanthemum), I have found differing opinions. In order to promote a bushy lower plant, you need to pinch back your mums. When they get to be 6" tall you pinch off 1 inch from the top of each stem, all around the plant. When these new shoots reach 6" you do it again. Crockett's Victory garden says to stop by July 15th. The mum.org site says August 1. If you pinch back too late you risk taking off all the buds and not having enough time for them to develop new ones. You could try a few stems to see how they do this year. If they do not produce new buds you will not have lost the whole plant bloom. Then you'd need to make a note of the date you did it to have that info for next year.

Also, is it to late to trim back my mums?

I don't use mums any more. I find them too time consuming, and I would often forget to so the pinch back and would have spindly, miserable looking plants. I changed over to asters years ago. Yhose you can pinch or not and they always look great tall or shorter.