Working on Future Garden Goals

With fall planting season just around the corner, late August is the perfect time for evaluating our flower gardens and planning for any changes we’d like to see next season.

Start by taking a good look at your garden space(s), preferably with a notebook in hand, and jot down what you liked about this year and what needs changing. Ask yourself a few questions: What were your best performers this year and would you like to add more? Is it time to divide some overgrown perennials? Would you like to attract more birds, butterflies and bees? Do you need to focus more on xeriscaping with plants that require minimal water? And, what about adding some spring bulbs to extend your garden season with early color? Defining your garden goals and writing them down provides a convenient checklist to work from.

Now is also a good time to think about garden color, whether you grow perennials, annuals, or a combination of both. Do you love bright pops of red, orange and yellow or is a soothing pastel palette more your style? If you’re like me, you may want to use all of these colors over the season. For example, my earliest spring flowers and those that bloom through June tend to be pale yellows, pinks, purples and blues, while July through September blooms lean towards bolder and warmer colors.

When cool and warm colors are used together, they can really enhance one another such as the blue hardy geranium with golden Rudbeckia in the photo above. I also like to use white as it adds softness and elegance to any color scheme. Looking at a color wheel for reference will help you easily find colors that work together, whether analagous and side by side in the same color family or complementary at opposite ends.

As you dream about next year’s colorful flowers, don’t forget the importance of having good garden soil. Try to get into the habit of adding compost to your garden every fall for its valuable nutrients and moisture-retentive qualities. You can just layer it on top of your garden, around existing plants, and let the rain and snow of winter do the rest of the work. In the spring, add a generous layer of shredded bark mulch. Trust me, if you do these two things every year, it will make the difference between a garden that’s just surviving and one that’s thriving!

Successful gardening requires devotion and commitment, but even with all that enthusiasm, it’s easy to become overwhelmed by the sheer work involved in dividing and moving plants, improving soil, creating new flower beds or restoring old ones. However, by writing your goals down and prioritizing what’s most important, you can tackle one task at a time over months or even years, eventually ending up with the beautiful garden you’ve always wanted!

All photos by Nancy Marie Allen