My top plant favorites usually change from season to season and from year to year. This year my favorites are showstoppers! 

Dahlias

Dahlias can be a lot of work initially and require some patience, but when they get going they really get going. 

The variety of patterns and color combinations are astounding. It is difficult to have just one favorite color or form. I love the ball types because they hold up well as cut flowers. Creighton Honey and Ice Tea are two of my favorites! Order your favorite tubers over the fall and winter for spring delivery and early summer planting.

Hydrangeas

There are multitudes of different hydrangea varieties. I love the panicle types for their durability and no fuss blooms. 

Many varieties start with green blooms in mid summer. The bloom color transitions as the seasons change from summer into fall. 

Some of my favorites are Limelight, Limelight Prime, Little Lime, Bobo, Firelight, and Quickfire. Plant container plants in spring, summer, or fall for beautiful blooms next season.

Chrysanthemums

Mums are not just little shrubby annuals and perennials anymore. Many of the older types are making a comeback.

Depending on how they are pinched, many varieties are great for cutting. The blooms can vary from spidery spikes to button-like globes. With the large variety of colors and patterns, it will be tough to pin down one favorite. 

Some of my cut flower favorites are Feeling Green, Coral Reef, and Evening Glow. You can cut them for bouquets or leave them blooming in the landscape. Either way, you can’t go wrong.

Sedum

Most people don’t think of Autumn Joy Sedum when it comes to fall color, but this is my favorite upright sedum. 

As a perennial this oldie but goodie really performs all growing season. The green blooms start to erupt by midsummer. The blooms slowly transition to a pretty pink, but the show doesn’t stop there! Bronze and russet tones take over as autumn continues on. The blooms can be cut at all stages and used in bouquets or dried. 

I especially love these perennials planted in mass for a striking autumn display.

Ornamental Kale

Another lovely fall annual that can be started by seed in spring or early summer or can be purchased as small plants. 

Ornamental kale appreciates the cooler weather of autumn. They can even handle frost with ease.  In fact, the colors intensify as the nights get cooler.

They also make an interesting cut flower/foliage.

What defines a native plant has been debated for many years. An acceptable and widely used definition of Midwest natives has been defined as those plants that grew in the area prior to European settlement in the mid-1800’s.

Contrary to common belief, natives are not weedy plants, they are quite beautiful. When sited similarly to where they naturally would grow, they flourish. Besides their pleasing aesthetic, they provide food for birds, insects, and other animals. In other words, they help support the natural food chain. Not only do they provide sustenance, native trees and shrubs provide nesting areas and hiding spots for our wildlife. 

Indigenous plants each have their own ecological niche in the landscape. Basically, they work together to support each other. Not only that, but many insects are host specific for their food source. Meaning that they need specific plants to survive during one or more of its life cycle stages. Each plant community provides for the needs that are important for native wildlife.

Biodiversity is vital to create a more resilient habitat. The use of natives leads to sustainability and lower maintenance needs. Natives seldom require fertilization and once established they require less watering. Local plants are quite simply built to thrive in their native environment. 

One of the most common requests for a landscape plant is for the plant be easy to maintain. What is easier than a plant that was here before human intervention? With over 1800 Wisconsin natives to choose from, there is something for everyone!

With my cold zone 5b, it is necessary to dig up my dahlias in the fall and store them over the winter. Over the years, I’ve tried a few different methods to preserve my tubers. The method that works the best for me is to dig up my dahlia clumps, remove the excess soil from them, dry them for a few days, and then store them in whole, unsplit clumps in cardboard boxes in my basement. 

When the cold, dark days of January arrive, it is a great time to break out some sunshine and start splitting dahlia tubers. I start with one clump and use a high quality needle nose pruner to begin splitting off one tuber at a time from the clump (Photo 1). I ensure each tuber has an intact neck, an eye (Photo 2), and a body.

I discard any tubers with broken necks or missing eyes. It’s tempting to keep them all to see if they will be viable, but it is vital that each healthy tuber has the 3 needed parts. Each type of tuber can look very different. Some tubers are large and fat and others are small and skinny with every variation in between . 

After all the tubers are separated, I thoroughly wash them (Photo 3) and remove any dirt with a sprayer. Then they are laid out to dry for a couple of days (Photo 4). Once the tuber skin is dry enough to write on, I label each tuber with a Sharpie marker. They are then packed back into cardboard boxes with no packing material. I will take them back out in March to presprout them before planting or selling. 

To renew a large overgrown shrub, remove 1/3rd of the oldest and/or largest branches near the base of the shrub. Continue this process over a 2 to 3 year period until all the old branches have been removed. In following years, maintain the shrub yearly by removing one or two of the oldest and/or largest branches near the base. This process is best done during dormancy. Either early spring or mid-late fall is typically the best time for this type of pruning in our Wisconsin weather. If done in early fall, pruning may stimulate tender growth that is then damaged by frost or cold weather.

Some shrubs that respond well to renewal pruning are-

• Red Osier Dogwood 
• Gray Dogwood                                                   
• Spirea
• Pussy Willow
• Ninebark
• Privet
• Barberry
• Hydrangea
• Chokeberry
• Forsythia
• Kerria
• Mockorange
• Quince
• Lilac
• Euonymus and many more!

Note: Evergreens, in general, do not respond well to renewal pruning. Do not renewal prune your evergreens. Most evergreens do not grow from pruning cuts made deep in the interior.

Before – overgrown hydrangea, infiltrated with seedling tree volunteers.

After – renewal pruning done after hard frost as the shrubs were entering dormancy

I forgo most of the expensive annuals for my planters and instead primarily use foliage plants (aka houseplants). Not only do many houseplants add color and life to the inside of our homes, they can do the same in outdoor containers. One of the main purposes I use houseplants for is as foliage fillers for containers. The picture above shows Wandering Jew mixed with white Petunia.

One great vining house plant is Pothos. It can be used as a hanging plant in containers as well as a vining plant trained onto a trellis. My main Pothos was my Grandmother Nita’s. I have had it since she passed away years ago and it is still in the same pot. I keep the main plant safe in my house during the summer, but I take cuttings from it and pot them up for use outside and to give away. To get a head start on establishing the plants before planting outside, the cuttings can be potted up indoors during early spring. If you are like me, I don’t always plan that far ahead, so I often just take cuttings and plant them directly in their summer container. Make sure to ease them into their outdoor conditions by hardening them off. For more information on taking cuttings, take a look at one of my previous blogs on cuttings at https://www.shawnlvieth.com/easypropagation/  .

Many other houseplants are great in outdoor containers. Some suggestions are Asparagus Fern, Wandering Jew (more correctly known as Tradescantia Zebrina), Spider plants, and Philodendron. Other easy care plants that offer interesting foliage, but don’t necessarily trail or vine are Polka Dot plant, Jade, Aloe, Rubber plant, and Mother in Law plant. Some, like Kalanchoe, offer easy care succulent foliage along with a long blooming period. If transplanting houseplants and taking cutting seems too complicated to you, you can make things even easier on yourself by just putting your houseplants outside in their current container. Houseplants can put on an amazing amount of growth when they are outdoors. Just keep in mind that the sun is much more intense outdoors. Partial shade is typically advised for most houseplants outdoors.

At the end of the growing season, you can save your plant for reuse next summer. Simply pot up a cutting at the end of summer and bring it inside to preserve it over winter or bring the whole plant in if you have the room. Utilizing plant hangers can help save space and take up almost no room. Just make sure to hang it near a sunny window to give it adequate light over the winter. 

What is Propagation?

Simply defined, plant propagation is the process of creating new plants. There are many types of propagation. Propagation can be achieved through stem cuttings, leaf-bud cuttings, division, layering, budding, grafting, root cuttings and more. Most plants have a preferred method of propagation that is most successful. In this case, I will focus on methods of propagation with a high probability of success and ease. The types of plants I suggest are also those that are quite easy to propagate.

Division-

Division is a straightforward way of propagating. It is just as its name implies, creating new plants through the division of the mother plant. For instance, Asparagus Fern can be multiplied by taking the main plant and separating it into chunks. Each chunk should have a top fern-like portion with at least a few stems as well as a root portion with tubers and roots attached. The tubers look like small white balls that are usually between a nickel and quarter size. They can be rounded or more egg shaped. I use a small hand saw and cut the plant like I am cutting a cake into slices. Each “slice” can then be repotted in a new pot with fresh potting soil. The plant should be situated in the pot just like the mother plant had been. The fern portion should be above the soil line and the roots and tubers should be beneath the soil line.  A plant pulled out of an 8 inch pot can easily be sliced into eight 1 inch sections and likely more. 

Cuttings-

Using cuttings is another easy way to propagate plants. There are several types of cuttings including root, softwood, hardwood, semi hardwood, and leaf. Some plants can be propagated using different types of cuttings depending on where the cut is made. Here I will discuss softwood cuttings. These are taken from actively growing plants. Simply cut a 4-5 inch long section off the tip of a plant such as Jade, Pothos or Tradescantia (formerly known as Wandering Jew). Remove the bottom leaves (2 inches or so) from the cutting so no leaves will be under the soil. Make sure to leave at least a couple top leaves. Dip the leafless section of the cutting in rooting hormone. Use a pencil to create a hole in your pot full of potting mix. Stick the cutting with the rooting hormone into the hole you just created. Pat the soil around the cutting. I don’t find it necessary to put a bag around the plant to increase the humidity since the humidity level is usually significant in my house in spring when I am propagating. However, If you have low humidity in your home, you can cover the cutting with a plastic bag or cloche to increase humidity until the cutting roots.

Offsets, Suckers, and Runners-

Runners grow horizontally from the crown of a plant, like strawberries. Offsets develop from the base of a parent plant and suckers come up from below the surface of the main plant. In any of the scenarios, if the baby has developed roots, cut the connection from the mother to the baby. Plant the new plant similar to a cutting. Depending on the plant, you will rough up the soil in the new pot a bit and wiggle the new baby into the soil so the base is in contact with the soil. Securely pat down around the base of the plant in its new location. Similarly, you can use this same process for planting baby Spider plants that hang off your Spider plant. 

Final Words-

In all these scenarios, I use these houseplants as my foliage fillers for my summer outdoor containers. I simply make sure to save one or two of each plant (or part of each plant) at the end of the growing season to bring in as a houseplant over winter. This ensures I have plenty of material to propagate the plants again the following spring for use in my containers to enjoy the following growing season.