Plant Gardens 101

October is the month for planting many kinds of bulbs, perennials and vegetables in the South. Lawn planting, too, is at its height, especially preparing lawns for winter color with overplantings of rye grass.

We have gone through a rather difficult summer season of extremely hot weather and severe droughts in many areas. This has left garden soils badly compacted, enough to restrict root growth of lawn grasses and garden plants. This calls for deep preparation of the soil and pulverizing it thoroughly. Ample quantities of peatmoss should be added to heavy clay and sandy soils to improve their texture and moisture-holding capacities.

Some bulbs such as Madonna lilies, freesias, ornithogalums, zephyranthes and leucojums must be planted immediately. Get these in first. The latter part of the month will be too late. (more…)

For the best house plants you should have the best possible soil for them. This may sound like a big order, but actually it isn’t. Today most home owners buy bagged soil and assume it is good. A potting mixture suitable for most house plants is a combination of loam, sand, peatmoss and/or leafmold. Loam is the name given to a soil which contains clay, sand, silt and humus. It varies from a sand loam to a clay loam, depending on the relative amounts of these two ingredients present. A medium loam is preferred, which may be obtained from arable land such as a cornfield or vegetable garden.

To do a really bang-up job in preparing soil for house plants the loam should consist of turfs cut from a rich pasture. But because the turfs should be cut in the spring and stacked for about six months prior to using the mixture and because many readers will have difficulty in obtaining it, we will forget the ideal loam for the time being. Leaf-mold, too, might present some difficulties because it takes about a year for tree leaves to decay.

The remaining ingredients are not ordinarily difficult to obtain. Horticultural peatmoss can be bought from almost any garden center or garden center. The sand should be coarse with particles ranging from 1/8 to 1/16 inch. Get it from a firm dealing in builders’ materials. If the loam is deficient in humus (ask your county agricultural agent or state experiment station), buy packaged humus to mix with it. (more…)