Southern Gardening

After reading about ornamental vegetables several years ago, I became interested in expanding the selection of ornamental bedding plants in my landscape. Then I saw a planting of ornamental peppers.

I am a true “chili head” with a passion for hot peppers, and I have even made an apple and habanero wine. I have grown jalapeño, habanero and the like as bedding plants, as many of the extremely hot peppers produce very colorful fruit.

It may be early September, but now is a good time to start thinking about growing fresh herbs to harvest during the winter months.

Fresh herbs are relatively easy to grow in containers. In addition to offering a feast for the palate, herbs can offer a feast for the eyes. Many of the basic herb species are available in variegated or multicolored foliage. The multicolored ones work well in recipes, but they also make flavorful garnishes.

We all know annuals such as petunia or million bells are great container garden plants, but have you ever tried including perennials in container gardens? This important group of plants can and should be an ingredient in every container recipe.

Many gardeners have a strict mindset about using annuals and perennials in container gardens: annuals are annuals and perennials are perennials, and never the twain shall meet. But if you base all your buying decisions on whether a plant will come back the next year, you will miss out on some beautiful flowers and foliage.

Liriope is an old standard when the Mississippi landscape calls for a groundcover. It is reliable in both full sun or shade, and as long as the soil is well drained, liriope will thrive in heat and drought.

Liriope is commonly known as monkeygrass or lilyturf. It is a versatile groundcover, effective under large trees where sunlight is limited or mass planted on slopes. It also creates soft borders for paved areas and foundations.

When we hear the word “daisy,” most of us think of the flower with white petals and a yellow center that we used as children to play the “loves me, loves me not” game.

Growing the Shasta daisy in your garden can bring back some of those old memories. Known botanically as Leucanthemum x superbum, Shasta daisy is a classic garden plant that is as at home in the modern landscape as it is in the cottage garden. It really shines in the garden.

I spent last week in Palm Desert, Calif., where the daily temperatures were 110 degrees or more and the humidity was less than 20 percent.

The landscapes I saw there are completely foreign to our lush, green gardens. Yet the landscape was quite beautiful, not bleak as I had imagined. There were lots of flowering desert plants, and I quickly realized that one of the first things I needed to get was a desert plant guide.

As we enter the most active part of hurricane season, now is a good time to think about ways to help landscape trees recover from storm damage.

A common myth is that the root system mirrors the top growth of a tree. While some trees do put down deep roots, most of a tree’s root system is in the top 12 to 14 inches of soil. Roots need to be near the surface to exchange carbon dioxide and oxygen gases and to ensure healthy root and tree growth. These roots also help stabilize the tree. You can see their presence and arrangement in trees that have been blown over.

Deadheading is an important garden maintenance activity, but many gardeners overlook the importance of removing spent flowers.

We deadhead flowering plants to extend the bloom period, to remove the seed source of species that could become weedy and to maintain the health of flowering garden plants.

What relative of the morning glory makes an ornamental ground cover featuring beautiful, colorful foliage?

If your answer is ornamental sweet potatoes, then you are right. Ornamental sweet potatoes, known botanically as Ipomoea batatas, are actual sweet potatoes selected for their vivid and attractive leaves. The plants produce a flower that resembles a morning glory but is hidden by the foliage. They also produce edible tubers.

Gardeners who want color in the landscape usually concentrate their efforts on flowering annuals and perennials, often overlooking plants with colorful foliage like caladiums, striped cannas or gingers.

But plants with colorful foliage can be used instead of flowering bedding plants or even in the shrub border. They have always been popular with some gardeners, but there seems to be a growing interest in these colorful foliage plants.

Angelonia and caladium should top your shopping list when you visit your favorite garden center looking for summer color.

For full sun, select Angelonia, also called summer snapdragons. These plants begin flowering in late spring and continue to bloom profusely until frost. They require very little deadheading.

Because plants with round flowers dominate the garden world, the spiky texture of the Angelonia flower stalks offers welcome contrast in any summer garden.

Compost is nature's gift to our gardens, helping retain moisture and aerate the soil, and it is easy to make and totally free. Compost is one of the greatest bargains for both experienced and novice gardeners.

Compost is the dark, crumbly, partially decomposed form of organic waste material on its way to becoming humus. Compost is an excellent soil conditioner. It is easy to handle and stores for long periods.

Many gardeners wouldn’t dare plant a bed without having at least one variety of phlox present.

Gardeners enjoy several spring-flowering phlox such as woodland phlox and creeping phlox. But I am referring to garden phlox, Phlox paniculata, which is a special plant to have in the garden.

The flower display of garden phlox is spectacular, and the showy panicles can have up to 50 individual flowers each. Colors range from soft pastels to surprisingly brilliant hues in pink, purple, lavender, red and white. Bi-colors have an eye in the center.

I read once that many flowering plants we use in our landscapes are really only one or two steps out of the ditch. This is especially true of some of the new varieties being introduced to the market.

Purslane is one of the newer plants that I have been interested in that is really an old plant. It is a succulent that thrives in high summer temperatures. Purslane has long been regarded by many as a garden weed, and I have removed many of these from the garden and landscape.

If you’re looking for a way to keep your flowerbeds pretty after your pansies have worn out, consider using lantanas as your transition. They will provide fantastic color through the hottest temperatures.

Lantana has been selected twice as a Mississippi Medallion winner. The very first medallion plant in 1996 was New Gold lantana, and its bright, golden-yellow flowers are outstanding. The second Medallion win came in 2003 to Sonset lantana, whose flowers start as yellow and transition through orange, red, magenta and purple.

The Chastetree has begun flowering, and its brilliant blooms are causing many to stop and take notice.

The native range of Chastetree is the low woodlands of southern Europe and western Asia. It was first introduced to the United States by settlers in the 1500s. Known botanically as Vitex agnus-castus, the name dates back to ancient Greece, when Athenian woman lined their beds with the leaves during the feast of Ceres. It also known as chasteberry and monks pepper.

Verbenas are great flowering plants that have been garden staples for many years. They will provide you with three seasons of color if you provide a few necessities for them.

There are more than 250 species of verbenas with many native to the New World. Breeders have been hard at work, and most new selections bear little resemblance to their forbears.

As spring turns into summer, gardeners start looking at flowering plants that take the heat while putting on a good floral display. Annual vinca is always a good choice.

Annual vinca’s foliage is a dark, glossy green with a prominent rib in the middle of the leaf. This dark background really sets the stage for showing off the white, pink, purple and red flowers.

Annual vinca is available in both upright and spreading growth habits. Various series have been studied extensively in the Mississippi State University trials at Crystal Springs and Poplarville.

Those who love plants have surely been to their favorite garden center this spring and noticed calibrachoa, the great warm-season performer with small flowers that look like petunias.

Calibrachoa (pronounced kal-ih-bruh-KO-uh) is more commonly called Million Bells. These plants are related to petunias and should be grown in full sun. They produce an unbelievable number of 1-inch-wide flowers from spring until frost.

There are many excellent petunias on the market—too many to detail in this column—so I am going to concentrate on what I consider one of the best petunias series: the Supertunias.

There are two groups in this series, the Supertunias and the Supertunia Vistas. Supertunias grow to about 12 inches tall and have a vigorous spreading habit. The Supertunia Vistas are bigger and can reach 24 inches tall. Both types are hummingbird and butterfly magnets.