On one of my most anticipated days of the year I thought I would share some of my tips for picking the best plants at the Greenhouse.
1. Come with a Plan: Planning can help you avoid a lot of troubles when planting your garden. I find planning helps me research what I want to grow and cook with while making sure I get all of the varieties and I have space for them all. Impulse buys can be challenging and fun but having a plan can help curb or direct your buys to fit your garden.
2. Check the Hardiness Zone: This is more important with perennials (plants that will come back year after year) but can have an impact on your annuals (live only one year) as well. If you are unsure what your Hardiness zone is you can search the internet for your Town or City it should be able to tell you which zone you are in. Growing Zones are set using a number of factors including number of frost free days and average coldest temperatures. You can plant plants that are not hardy to your zone but they will take a lot more work and some times not produce at all for you. Making sure your perennials are hardy to your zone will help give you the best possible chance of success.
3. Compare Plants: I garden in Zone 3 and have a short and intense season. In this zone I recommend getting the largest plant possible. This will give you the best chance to out run the fall and get produce. In higher growing zones (warmer climates) the smaller plant will take less transplant shock and do better in the long run. That is if the long run does not include freezing temperatures.
4. Leave Room in your Garden Plan for impulse purchases: I know this is kind of counter intuitive to Tip 1 but it is the reality of most gardeners. We have a weak spot that makes it fun for us to grab that cool plant that we did not know about. This year I picked up a Northland and Northcountry Blueberry plants and an honeydew melon plant. They are lots of fun to grab but make sure if you get perennials you have permanent space for them!
5. Carefully Transport them Home: Now that you have your haul of plants you want to make sure you bring them home carefully. carefully packing them together using containers and flat surfaces will give you the best chance of not damaging them when you move them.
I would love to hear your tips for picking plants! Please feel free to post them in the comment section of the YouTube Video or email me through the websites contact me portal!
Happy Gardening!
