Tacoma — The second half of April is green with new growth, so you have the green light to mow the lawn, plant potatoes, peas, lettuce, cabbage, kale and other cool season crops.
Enjoy harvesting daffodils and early tulips for indoors but cut only the flowering stems, never the foliage if you want the bulbs to make flowers for next year.
This is also a good time to visit local nurseries for perennials and cool season annuals to add color to your green landscape.
If you have not yet fertilized the lawn, this is when it is actively growing, so feeding it now will help that lawn to crowd out weeds.
Do you recommend rock garden plants? We were in West Seattle and the rock retaining walls seem to be filled with bright, low-growing flowers. I was told that rock garden plants are perennial and return to bloom year after year. Your opinion please.
— P.O., Tacoma
You got me between a rock and a soft place when it comes to rock garden plants. I am rock solid in my recommendation of creeping phlox (hot pink, lavender and purple varieties), candytuft or iberis (a fluffy pure white bloom), and basket of gold (the brightest yellow with gray green foliage).
But the success of these bright bloomers depends on location and soil texture. They must have well-drained soil such as on a slope held back by rocks, and they flower best in full sun.
Once you get growing with the three easiest rock garden plants, you can branch out to all the hundreds of dwarf alpines and sun-loving groundcover plants that will turn any sunny slope into an extravaganza of color, texture and shapes.
Epimediums are a large group of shade- and drought-tolerant plants that may survive under your trees if you pamper them for at least a full year.
I have dry shade under a tree. Will epimediums survive in such a difficult site? I have tried hosta (deer ate them), ferns (dried up in the summer), and various shrubs and perennials but nothing seems happy.
—Shady Lady
The epimediums or barrenwart are a large group of shade- and drought-tolerant plants that may survive under your trees if you promise to pamper them for at least a full year. You may be losing plants because they require extra water the first summer in the ground, no matter how drought tolerant the label claims.
It is just very difficult for new plants to compete with tree roots, especially in the shade. Add organic matter to the planting hole, mulch on top of the roots and keep that soil moist all summer. Only then can the new plant build up a root system that can battle it out with the trees for water and nutrients.
A simple solution is to set large containers under the trees and grow your plants in pots protected from the invasive tree roots.
Marianne Binetti has a degree in horticulture from Washington State University and is the author of several books. Reach her at binettigarden.com.
