Backyard Garden Plant List

So after a grueling process, I have designed my first plant bed which I will put into action this spring. My backyard gets morning sun in the summer for maybe 4-5 hours, so after finding plants that satisfy that, and the zone requirement (6a) I have come up with a garden that hopefully will provide some sort of interest in most seasons, and my main colour scheme is white and purple with yellow and red accents. I have tracked down where I can purchase all the plants listed and they are all perenials.

* White Lilac
* Hedgehog Rose
* Gooseneck Loosestrife
* Some sort of Hosta
* Lance-leaved coreopsis
* False Blue Indigo
* Crested Iris, among other varieties
* Creeping Chamomile
* Anise-Hyssop
* English Lavender
* White Wood Aster
* Corydalis


I took the dimensions of my garden bed and came up with this, which doesn't include some of the exact plants I want, but is (very) roughly my idea

Time Lapse Video

Edited and completed time-lapse to include 46.18 days:

Notes: There are a few points in time that the camera was moved either accidentally by people other than me that can't seem to watch where they're going or intentionally by me to fix the mistake or move back the camera. Basil started being cut back on around day 30 because it was much too tall. Parsley is the one in the back that did not grow at all. According to the company, they're guaranteed to come up...

The song in the video was made by me too :)

Aerogarden!

For my birthday, I received a 7-pod Aerogarden in the mail to my surprise. It basically is an aeroponic (not hydroponic) system that pumps water (with a nutrient solution) through to each plant. It has special full spectrum fluorescent grow bulbs as well.

Today is 4 days later and each of the 7 herbs (Genovese Basil, Oregano, Thyme, Chives, Parsely, Savory and Sage) has sprouted, most notabley the ones below. For fun I have a webcam focused on the system taking a photo once an hour which I will stitch together once theres more significant changes and will post it here.

Flowers in the Peat

I got a handy little starting kit with 12 peat pellets in a container with a removable clear plastic lid. The first week of February may be a little early to start seedlings indoors, but I decided to do it anyways. I decided to plant flowers because I tried last year and they all died shortly after coming up. I believe their condition was 'bolting' meaning they came up too quickly so they had a thin weak stem that basically snapped. I think that's already happening to the one almost horizontal plant in the picture below. The first two flowers on the list had a sell by date of 15 months before I planted them.

I planted:
Blue Enchantment Morning Glories
California Poppies (Sunset blend)
Globe Amaranths
Pink Sweets ('Rainbow Loveliness' Dianthus)
Evening Stocks

After 3 days the Morning Glories started to pop up, and today, day 6, still remain to be the only ones:

Update: The poppies and pinks came up fast and died within a week. The evening stocks didn't do anything. One out of about 4 morning glories that came up is still living, and both planted amaranths are alive and strong!

Update 2 (April 25): The lonely morning glory has perished, for what appears to be no apparent reason but that's probably not so.

You can see my crocuses and peonies coming up in the background :)

Update 3 (May 23): One of the two amaranths has shrivelled and died. :(

Continuing from 2009

Out of the plants that survived, here's some tidbits of information about last years crop:

I dried mint, african wormwood, tansy and bitter candytuft for use as teas which taste much better than I expected. They all have some medicinal properties. Making a very bitter tea out of wormwood is a bit of an anti-depressant and an energizer for anyone needing to stay awake while studying or something. It really works, I tried it once.

My lemonella balm perished tragically for what appeared to be no reason a couple of weeks ago.

My Japanese Eggplant didn't grow that much last season and since it's an annual (i think) I brought it inside where it's slowly been getting bigger and I noticed today that it had a single purple flower on it! Once the weather gets warmed I'll be sticking it in the ground and hopefully get a couple of eggplants before it dies in the fall.

Hello

Hi there, reader.

So I'm an inexperienced teenage gardener who after buying an assorted pack of pre-sprouted herbs at Costco two years ago became very interested in gardening. Last year I bought seeds for about 25 different culinary/medicinal herbs and flowers from Richters and although only a third of them survived and were harvested that didn't stunt my determination. I'm back this year after a subscription to Fine Gardening magazine, lots of online research and a night course in horticulture.

If you ever have any questions I'll try my best to give you an informed answer, and I'll also be impressed that someone out there has stumbled upon my blog.