Southern Gardening from 2019

This January’s temperatures have been drastically different from what we saw during last year’s first month.

Many home gardeners look forward to this time of year to browse catalogs in search of great new plants to enjoy in their 2019 landscapes.

If there’s one vegetable that could be considered the ultimate home-grown vegetable in Mississippi, it has to be collards.

Collards were chosen as a 2019 Mississippi Medallion winner because they are considered absolutely necessary for true Southern cuisine. As a bonus, they’re really easy for home gardeners to grow.

One of the signs that spring will be sprung in the near future is when the daffodils start awakening and poking up in the landscape beds.

We survived the latest polar vortex, and I join other Mississippi gardeners in being thankful that we didn’t get the really extreme cold our friends up North experienced. But still, it was cold enough for me and my garden. 

This week, we continue our look at the 2019 Mississippi Medallion plants with a fantastic Mississippi tree, the tupelo. Tupelo is known botanically as Nyssa sylvatica and is commonly called black tupelo or black gum.

This week, I want to spend our time considering the last of the 2019 Mississippi Medallion selections, Sweetie Pie blackberry.

I join the gardening world in waiting for the Southern indica azaleas to officially kick off the spring season with their gaudy show of beautiful color. But there’s one landscape shrub that tends to get lost when the azaleas start showing off, and it is actually one of my spring-flowering favorites.

This week, I want to tell you about the Indian hawthorn.

The seasons are playing tricks on us with cold temperatures following warm. While we go through this latest cold snap, which I have high hopes will be the last, I want to address a landscape issue that’s generating quite a few questions.

What a crazy late winter and early spring we’ve had so far this year: warm, cold and repeat.

Many folks have been waiting for this moment - the day it's warm enough and past the main threat of frost to become tomato planting time.

Thank goodness spring has arrived!

After what seems to be an eternity, I finally had a chance to do some much-needed work in my landscape and garden. The pleasant weather we’ve had only adds to my enthusiasm.

There's still plenty of time to plant some butterfly weed in your home garden and enjoy colorful Monarch butterflies as they visit this summer.

I'm sticking with the butterfly garden theme again this week as I tell you about another must-have plant that I'm positive will not disappoint. Pentas are some of the best annual, summer-color plants, and they act like a magnet for butterflies and hummingbirds because the flowers are a rich source of nectar.

Peggy Martin roses are called climbers, but this term is a little misleading as she doesn’t actually climb by herself. This rose is more of a leaner and likes to sprawl. It needs to be secured and trained to grow up and over a wall, fence or trellis.

Last week, I really enjoyed sharing the story of the Peggy Martin rose and showing off this marvelous rose growing in my home landscape. I think Southern Gardening Nation liked the Peggy Martin story, as well, based on the positive response from the various social media outlets.

So I'm staying on the same plant theme this week to discuss garden roses that can bring enjoyment to the home gardener.

Over the past couple of years, I’ve found myself joining home gardeners everywhere in planting more plants to attract pollinators.

In fact, along with being a stop on the Rosalyn Carter Butterfly Trail, my home landscape is also registered with the Million Pollinator Garden Challenge, which has the goal of registering 1 million pollinator gardens. If you’d like to register your garden, go to http://millionpollinatorgardens.org for more information.

One group of landscape plants that is really starting to take off with its summer show is the lantana. These popular landscape plants are available in a dizzying variety of sizes and colors.

Last week, I had the pleasure of being the kick-starter speaker for the Mississippi Master Gardener State Conference. My wide-ranging presentation included some of my recommendations of sure-fire, must-have plants for your landscape and garden, all Mississippi Medallion plants.
 

One of the plant groups I love to grow in my home landscape is the hibiscus. To that end, I'm going to dedicate the next several columns to different options of these beautiful flowering shrubs that are available for the home gardener