Fall Bargain Time for Shrubs and Bulbs

Now’s the time.  It’s not too late to plant bulbs, perennials and shrubs, and right now there are fantastic bargains on the site.  Selected tulips and daffodils are at half price while they last.  Among the shrubs, hydrangeas are also 50% off right now (including the spectacular red-flowered one).   And even lily bulbs and Stella D’Oro daylilies are at prices you rarely see in fall.  So click over to AmericanMeadows.com and scoop up some big bargains before snow flies.  Remember, if you plant shrubs now, their roots keep growing until the ground is frozen solid, giving them a great jump on growth and bloom next spring.

Not your ordinary Amaryllis.

Here are just some of the Amaryllis Hybrids we have on the site for this fall and winter.   Of course, we have the classic reds, whites, and pinks in bulbs alone or complete kits, but how about some of these new ones!  (There are 40 choices this year, including paperwhites and hyacinths–the photos just show a few–some singles, some  doubles.) Imagine a couple of these beauties blooming indoors for you (or your friends) this fall or winter.  The Dutch hybridizers keep outdoing themselves.  Click here to see them all.

Singles above, l to r, top row:  Red Lion, Neon Rose, Picotee; bottom row: Christmas Gift, Lemon Star, Full House.

Doubles, top row: Cherry Nymph, Nymph,  Blossom Peacock. Second row: Lady Jane, Pasadena, White Blossom Peacock.

The Fall Bulb that’s not Dutch.

 

 Of course, lots of the bulbs we consider Dutch Bulbs for fall planting aren’t Dutch at all. Tulips are native to the middle east, and daffodils originally came from Spain and France. (Read our History of Tulips and Daffodils.)  But did you know that one of the lovliest fall bulbs you can plant is a North American native?  It’s a bulb many gardeners have never heard of–the magnificent Camas Lily, or simply “Camassia.”  It was “discovered” by Lewis and Clark on their expedition west in the early 1800’s, and at that time was a major source of food and other uses by large numbers of native Americans.  Lewis and Clark actually gathered camassia bulbs for a meal on the Weippe Prairie in Idaho in 1806, and described it all in their journals.  As you can see by the magnificent photo above right, Camassia still blooms by the thousands in the wild today, but you’ll have to travel to the upper Rocky Mountain west to see the spectacle in spring.  (That photo is used with permission from the Lewis and Clark Herbarium website.)  This fall, we have two camassias to add to your garden–the original which grows to almost 3 ft, and a newer dwarf that rarely tops 1 ft. called “Blue Melody.”  So along with your tulips and daffodils this fall, add a little American history to your garden.  With the legendary western beauty, Camassia, one of the best-kept secrets in American gardening.

To a gardener Labor Day isn’t the last day of summer.

It’s the first day of  Spring!

Nice cool days. Beautiful leaves.  To a gardener, it’s always the golden opportunity to begin planning an even better season next year.  From now on, we all have a few delicious weeks to put in seed and bulbs to create an almost automatic spectacle for next spring and summer.  Yes, fall is the preferred time for planting wildflower seeds to many experts…after all, nature plants seeds in the fall.  And no good gardener lets fall go by without putting at least a few tulips, daffodils and lilies into the ground.

Several years ago, we at American Meadows came up with a new product that combines the two–wildflower seeds and daffodils–into one simple fall project.  If you buy the combo, (50 golden daffodils plus a pound of seed for your region) it’s not only bargain priced, but you have just one simple project to have it all.—-pick the spot, bare the soil, stick in the daffodils, overseed the wildflowers, and you’re done.  The photos above show you how it will look in spring–Dutch Master daffodils first, and then when they’re gone, your wildflowers in early summer.  A couple of hours work now gives you

Go with nature’s flow–plant Wildflower Seeds this fall.

Two Great Articles with more Info: Why Many Experts think Fall Planting is Best.    Late planting dates for Seeds and Bulbs, by region.

SALE NOW: We’ve just added our “Fall Maximum Mix” which is a big bargain every fall.  This year, it contains a whopping 43 species, and is great for all regions.  Best of all, it compares to other mixtures at 26.95 lb, but it’s on sale now for just 16.95  lb.  Click here and choose your region.

Why is fall a great time to plant wildflowers?  Think about it–that’s what nature does.  As wildflowers die down in late summer, their seeds ripen and fall to the ground.  When you plant in fall, you’re right in with the rhythm of the seasons, and your seeds will have a head start on spring.  Here’s how it works.

If you live in a cold area, wait until killing frost, and then plant your seeds in the same way you would at any time of year.  (For details, visit our step-by-step planting instructions, “How to Create your own Wildflower Meadow”)  And there are some other real advantages to fall planting versus spring:

1. Fall-planted seed blooms about 2 weeks earlier than the same seed planted that spring.

2. There’s much less gardening work to do in fall, and much less interference from the weather. Many gardeners plant their wildflower seeds on the same beautiful fall days when they plant their fall bulbs.

As for the seeds, they’re perfectly happy to wait through the winter and sprout for you in early spring.   Perhaps spring will always be the number one time for planting, but October is the only month in the year when the entire continent of North America can plant wildflower seeds successfully.  There’s no snow or frozen ground in the east.  And in California, the winter wildflower seed planting season has begun. 

In frost free areas such as South Florida and far south Texas, wildflowers are planted in fall for winter bloom.  Here’s an example in Orlando, FL.

So if you can, wherever you live, get your wildflower seeds in this fall.  And enjoy having less work and earlier bloom that you’d have if you waited until spring.

Where are the bees?

You may have heard that over the last few years, our gardening friends, the honey bees, have been disappearing.  It didn’t seem that important at first, but at this point, it’s developing into something that could lead to a real environmental crisis.  During the last 3 years, a full 1/3 of the bee population in the United States has disappeared! Scientists talk mostly about how alarming this is for food crops, but as a flower gardener, you should be concerned too.  After all, without pollinators, no food or flower plant can produce seeds and propagate itself.  Think about it. The entire system that supports our healthy forests, grasslands, farms and gardens is undergoing great change. 

No one’s sure why it’s happening, but some of the best research is going on at the University of California at Davis.  Here’s their “Bee” page for the latest information.  And to help out the bees, we at American Meadows have created a new super-colorful quick-bloom mixture of wildflowers that you can plant to do your part–and we’ll make a donation toward Bee Research with every order.  Meanwhile, these nectar-rich flowers will make the daily work bees do easier in your area, and lessen the stress on nearby hives.  

So take a look at our new “Save the Honey Bees Seed Mixture”  –it works well in all regions–and visit our Bee Info page here, to enjoy a fascinating video about bees from “Nature” on PBS.  Most important, keep your garden colorful and in bloom.  It helps.

The latest, greatest Hydrangeas

In working up the products for our all-new list of Flowering Shrubs for fall shipment, I learned a lot. 

I knew there were several kinds of hydrangeas (some native), but the big news in recent years is about the colors.  Among the “mopheads”, the most popular group, everyone has seen the pastel pink and stunning blue hydrangeas in pots for gift-giving on Easter and Mother’s Day.  But recently, we’ve been offered red.  There are a whole group of new hybrids with names like “Lady in Red”, “Red Sensation“, and “Cardinal Red” since in the world of hydrangeas, red is hot and new.  Some of these open white and age to “red.”  Others like “Red Sensation” (photo above),  the one with the best “real red” reputation, open really red, and age to

The Goddess of the Rainbow

Who was Iris? You guessed it.  To the ancient Greeks, she was the Goddess of the Rainbow.  And no wonder.  Just take a look at the magnificent Bearded Irises we now have on sale. “Immortality” is the classic white, and one of everybody’s favorites.  But “Orange Harvest” (third row) and “Monet’s Blue”(top row) are our most popular.  They’re all 35% off for a very limited time right now, and will begin shipping in August.  Invite the goddess to your garden this fall for a big rainbow next spring.

Why Fall is the best time to plant shrubs.

We hear it every year, but do you know why the experts always insist fall is a better time than spring to put in shrubs and perennials?  It’s actually very simple, and well explained by Dr. Douglas Welch, a well-known Professor and Extension Horticulturist.  In his article, “Fall is Ideal for Planting Trees and Shrubs,” he makes it all clear: 

When a plant is put into the ground in fall, it may be facing the cold above ground, but over most of the country, root growth below ground goes right on until the deep soil temperature drops below 40 degrees.  (In about half the country, it never falls that low, and even in the coldest areas, the roots have several months to grow before the temperature underground drops to that point.) 

So the comparison is simple. If you plant a shrub in spring, it must acclimate itself to its new home and begin growing immediately.  At the same time, it has to produce leaves, flowers, and then endure the rapidly arriving summer heat.  Plant the same shrub in fall, and

The Heat is On!

Now that summer heat has arrived, we may suffer from discomfort, but wildflower meadows really don’t.  This is one of the great advantages of wildflower gardening:  As one expert put it, wildflowers are famous for “Waiting for the Water.”  When heat hits them, most established wildflower plants may wilt a little, but it’s something they’re expecting, and unless the heat is prolonged, it doesn’t hurt them.  Of course, you can help.  Regular watering during a heat wave helps, especially to keep the bloom going. (The blooming process may slow