What would fall be without the brilliant colors of Mums?  We have a large selection of regular garden mums in shades of bronze, white, pumpkin, dusty rose--and all the other standard colors.  Sizes vary; choose the best for your needs.

Exposure:  full sun

Water: regular

Feed:  Liquid Gro-Power

These adorable smiling faces will brighten up your low borders.  We have too many colors to list.  Just come in and we'll help you select the right ones to complement your garden.

Exposure:  full sun

Water:  regular

Feed:  Liquid Gro-Power

A good choice for taller background color in borders, as well as providing vertical accents. And they're also good cut flowers.

Exposure:  full sun

Water:  regular

Feed:  Liquid Gro-Power

If you are looking for a little color inside your home, try growing orchids as houseplants. Orchids are fascinating because of their extraordinary variety of sizes, colors, shapes, and habits, as well as the variety of their fragrances. And best of all, orchids can be grown by just about anyone able to grow other houseplants. Different varieties bloom at different times of the year and can be combined to provide some type of bloom almost year-round.

Like any other houseplant, orchids require proper watering, feeding, light, temperatures, and humidity. Plants should be grown in an east, south, or west window, but should be protected from direct midday sun.

In nature, most orchids grow attached to trees, with the roots hanging loose in the tropical jungle air. They usually receive a good rain once a day and then they dry out. In the home, it is best to allow orchids to dry out well after each watering. If the roots are kept too wet, they may start to rot.

Orchids perform best when not fed during their bloom cycle. After blooming, feed with Grow More 20-20-20 Orchid Formula at every watering throughout the growing (non-blooming) season.

Today's question may not have a real answer--we couldn't find one.  So for one time only, we're going to suspend our policy of selecting the winner at random, and choose the most interesting and creative answer.

This Week's Question:   What does the real name of the snapdragon--antirrhinum--really mean.  Not just the word--how does that describe the plant?

This Week's Prize :  1 quart liquid Gro-Power

Cacti and succulents can be repotted at any time of the year, though spring or the end of the growing season are convenient times. Many succulents present no special handling problems, but prickly cacti have to be treated with respect.

If possible, choose a soil mix formulated for cacti, as this will be well drained and have the right sort of structure and nutrient level. A soil-based potting mixture is a practical alternative. Some commercial growers use peat-based potting mixtures, but these are best avoided. Apart from the difficulty in keeping the water balance right, peat-based potting mixtures do not have the weight and structure to support large cacti and succulents. We highly recommend you use Kellogg Palm & Cactus Mix.

Large specimens do not need regular repotting. Simply remove about 3 cm (about 1 inch) of soil from the top and replace with fresh cactus soil.

To handle a prickly cactus, fold a strip of newspaper, thick paper or thin card to make a flexible band that you can wrap around the plant. Tap the pot on a hard surface to loosen the root-ball. You can then often lift the plant out with the improvised handle. If it refuses to move, try pushing a pencil through the drainage hole to break the bond.

If the plant has been in the same soil for a long time, crumble away a little of it from the base and around the sides of the root-ball. But be careful to minimize damage to the roots. Just shake off loose compost.

The majority of cacti and succulents are best in pots that are quite small in proportion to the size of the top growth. It is usually best to move the plant into a pot only one size larger. If using a clay pot, cover the drainage hole with pieces of broken pot or other material.

While holding the plant with the improvised handle, trickle compost around the old root-ball. With some cacti, their shape makes this difficult to do without your hand touching the spines, in which case you can use a spoon.

With a little care in handling, you will have a plant ready to go on decorating your garden for some time to come.

Many homeowners revel in the glory of their garden in spring, only to be disappointed when plants start to dry out and look stressed in the heat of summer. The natural reaction is to pour more water into the garden to "moisturize" the plants. This in turn can lead to root rot and/or the continuous lowering of soil temperature to the point that plants aren't stimulated to grow--or just plain die (overwatering is one of the main causes of plant death). But these problems can be greatly reduced or, in many cases, prevented by summer mulching.

The goal of summer mulching is not only to reduce summer heat stress on plants, but to create an environment for plants that will be conducive to good growth. Mulch is to a garden what a roof is to your home. We couldn't heat or air condition the home without the roof. The same seasonal temperature variance occurs in your garden. A 2" layer of mulch not only retains moisture in the soil but it maintains a cooler temperature in the summer and a warmer temperature in the winter.

Mulching also brings many other benefits to the garden. It gives the garden a tidier appearance and greatly improves the growing conditions for plants. Mulch helps suppress weeds and helps to conserve moisture. It creates an environment where earthworms can thrive and enhance the soil's condition. Nature provides this for us in natural settings; when we apply mulch to our garden, we mimic what is naturally done on the forest floor.

The strategy is to stimulate the growth of good soil bacteria, which in turn digest plant foods that the plant will recognize as nutrients and absorb. By keeping moisture in the soil you will attract earthworms and beneficial microbes and bacteria. The earthworms loosen up the soil, easing compaction, while the beneficial microbes help digest nutrients more efficiently, making them more readily available to the plants. Maintaining "moist" soil as opposed to "wet" soil keeps the temperature of the soil at a more consistent level for optimum growth. Mulch also provides a blanket to the soil that protects against soil crusting, as it decomposes and adds humus to the soil.

We recommend spreading a 2" inch layer of mulch or bark over the top of the native soil. There are many mulching materials available. Color, particle size, and nutrient exchange are considerations when choosing your material. We recommend Gardner & Bloome Soil Building Compost, Blommer's Cocoa Shell Mulch or Gardner & Bloome Planting Mix. Non-organic decorative mulches such as rock or gravel may be an attractive addition in gardens but give nothing back to the soil. Note: make sure not to place mulch right up against plant stems or tree trunks.

When mulching is incorporated with a good organic fertilizing program, the plants in your garden will not only survive the stress of summer and winter, but will thrive in it. Mulch will also give your garden a more "finished" look, adding to its overall beauty.

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