The first weekend of our first annual Peaches n' Plants Festival was a success! The festivities started early Saturday morning with free gardening classes from the staff of Stargazer Perennials, a canning class taught by April Simpson and a lecture by our local bee keeper, Dale Borum.  Delicious peach desserts courtesy of the Dutch Oven gals and a variety of delicate cookies provided by April Simpson were enjoyed by all. The stars of the weekend were the beautiful Red Globe peaches and our own locally grown perennials and plants. The Peaches n' Plants Festival runs through August 29th.

Photos from August 21st and August 22nd -

     

Peach canning class taught by April Simpson                        Fall blooming perennials in our retail nursery


    

Enjoying Dutch Oven peach desserts!                                     Nick consulting on plants in our retail nursery

        

        

When we first started growing Living Easy rose we knew we were going to love just as much as Easy Going rose , Hot Cocoa rose and Home Run rose . Living Easy rose is a very hardy and vigorous own-root floribunda rose that blooms a stunning shade of orange-apricot. Living Easy rose opens up in nice tight blooms as shown in the picture and becomes fuller as the rose completely opens. The blossoms on Living Easy rose are full with a petal count of about 35. Living Easy rose resembles those lovely old English garden roses that are focal points in country and city gardens alike.

We now grow Living easy rose in an affordable 1 gallon size that will perform wonders in the garden when planted. You can shop for Living Easy Rose on our website or stop by our farm if you are in the area and pick up your own Living Easy rose.

        

Years ago we started taking high quality photos of our plants and our farm to use in our plant products at our online store, to use in our blogs and for use in our garden articles. This winter while searching for a photo we decided it would be nice to put our images in slide shows so other gardeners could view them also, thus started the major project for this winter! We started cropping and uploading a nice selection of the thousands of original photos that we have taken of our plants, our farm and our nursery over the past few years.  We have organized our photos into 2 different slide shows for your viewing pleasure. One slide show is just plants and the other slide show highlights pictures of our farm, our nursery and the surrounding countryside where we live. You can access our photos from our homepage by clicking on the link button shown here or through this blog. The plant slide show is at the top and you can view the other slide show by scrolling down just a bit. To start the slide show just click on any image and a larger photo will appear and the slide show will begin.

We were amazed at the amount of photos that we have accumulated over such a short span of time! Each week we will be adding new photos for your viewing pleasure. Click here to View Our Slide Shows!

NOTE: Please respect our request that all of our original photos are copyrighted and are not to be used for any purpose, and we mean any purpose,  without our expressed consent in writing.

Happy Gardening, Karyn & Nick

        

You can successfully grow a wide range of vegetables and small fruits organically in containers on your patio or in a very small garden space.
Many vegetables and small fruits lend themselves well to organic container gardening. Even at our farm, we tend to prefer to grow many small fruits such as dwarf blueberries and alpine strawberries in containers that are adjacent to patio areas rather than out in the main vegetable garden. With some thought to selecting bush or dwarf varieties, almost any vegetable or small fruit can be adapted to growing in a pot.  When you think about what container to use, don't forget to keep in mind that many vegetables and small fruits also grow well in hanging baskets. Ideal hanging basket varieties include: Supersweet 100 Cherry Tomatoes, Sunsugar Cherry Tomatoes and Alpine Strawberries. Vegetables that take up little space, such as carrots, radishes and lettuce, or crops that bear fruits over a long period of time, such as Early Girl Tomatoes and peppers, are perfect for container vegetable gardens.

What you decide to grow in a container vegetable garden is limited only by the size of the container, the time you have to care for your plants and your imagination. A few of our favorite container vegetable gardens that we grow at our farm are:

• Garden in a Barrel: Requires 1 whiskey barrel or similar size container. Fill container with organic potting soil for vegetables and work in a small amount of Down to Earth All Purpose fertilizer. Plant one 4" plant of each variety: Bush Early Girl Tomato, Cal Wonder Pepper, Purple Basil, Chives and Oregano. Water well. Fertilizer every 2 weeks with Maxicrop Liquid Kelp Fertilizer.

• Carrot, Radish & Herb Combo: Requires a container with a minimum size of 24" or a whiskey barrel. Fill container with organic
  potting soil for vegetables and work in a small amount of Down to Earth All Purpose fertilizer. Plant in the center of the container one of each variety in a 4" plant size: parsley, sage and oregano. Sprinkle the carrot seeds around the parsley plant, then sprinkle radish seeds around the outside of the container staying 1" inch away from the container wall. Top lightly with soil and mist. Keep moist until seeds germinate, then thin as needed. The radish plants will mature and be harvested first leaving room for the carrots which can be harvested as baby carrots for salads or stir-fry. The herbs are hardy perennials which can be left in the pot to over-winter with adequate water. 

• Salad Greens to Go: Use any size or shape container. Fill with organic potting soil for vegetables. Sprinkle salad greens, spinach or mesclun seeds and cover 1/4". Mist and keep moist  until seeds germinate. Cut as needed for fresh, organic salad greens!

We you think of container gardening don't forget about including small fruits. Two of our favorite small fruits for container gardens are Northcountry Blueberry Bush and Alpine Strawberry Plants. Northcountry Blueberry was bred specifically for use in container gardening or  very small gardens and is hardy to USDA zone 4. Alpine Strawberries are runner-less strawberry plants that produce all season long and are ideal for containers or hanging baskets.

        

Wisteria frutescens ' Amethyst Falls ' is a popular wisteria vine at our nursery partly because we are always recommending it! Unlike most wisteria plants,  Amethyst Falls Wisteria is a non-invasive native wisteria that will rebloom in late summer. A polite climber, Wisteria Amethyst Falls will not destroy your arbor or pergola or choke out neighboring trees. A vigorous grower, Amethyst Falls will begin blooming typically the 1st or 2nd year that it is planted in your garden. The lovely, fragrant true blue pea-like flowers are produced on 8 inch racemes that cascade down the wisteria. A compact grower for a wisteria, Amethyst Falls will eventually reach 20 feet in height and width. This is an ideal wisteria to drape over an arbor, a pergola or train over an archway. A light mid-summer pruning will encourage a burst of new blooms in the early fall. Other notable attributes of Amethyst Falls wisteria are: high deer resistance, drought tolerance, disease resistant foliage and a bloom time that starts 2-3 weeks late than most wisterias to avoid the later spring freeze. 

You can buy Wisteria ' Amethyst Falls ' at our online store in 1 gallon pots or you can purchase it at our farm and nursery.

Why will my wisteria vine not bloom? To ensure that your wisteria will bloom for you always purchase Wisteria plants that have been grown from cuttings or grafted rather than seed grown plants. Wisteria vines grown from seed typically will remain in a juvenile stage for 10 to 15 years or longer during which time they will not bloom. Wisteria plants that are grafted, and plants grown from cuttings or layered from a flowering plant will usually begin flowering within 1-2 years.

Browse all of our hardy wisteria vines here..

        

Without a doubt one of the most common questions we get at Stargazer Perennials is “What can I grow that the deer won’t eat?”. Unfortunately the answer to that is “Not very much!”.  When deer pressure is high they will browse just about anything. However, there are some effective garden design strategies and some plants that we consider to be “bulletproof” in a deer country garden. Remember, there are no “deer proof” plants. However, there are many garden plants that have degrees of deer resistance.  With a combination of smart gardening practices and the right plant selection you can enjoy a lush landscape in areas of  even very high deer pressure.

Strategy #1: Don’t grow the plants that you like; Grow the plants that deer don’t like!  This probably sounds like common sense, but you’d be surprised at the number of gardeners who decide that they just have to have a certain plant and go shopping for it without doing their research. There is also the impulse buy: Go to the local box store for groceries and come home with a carload of beautiful flowers. Both the “impulse” and the “must have” plants go into the ground and the next morning they are in the digestive tract of a deer. To sum it up: Stop buying pretty flowers and make a plan!

Strategy #2: Establish your plantings with deer resistant plant varieties: Don’t mix! To establish a newly planted border, plant with Tier 1 plants: Plants with proven deer resistance. Don’t mix in other non-resistant plants in the hopes that the resistant varieties will protect them. As deer browse the plants they like they’ll also browse nearby plants, and may develop a taste for ones that were previously resistant. As your gardens mature and the deer lose interest in the plantings then you can begin mixing in Tier 2 type plants: Those that are only minimally browsed, or ones that can sustain some browsing without affecting their garden performance.

Strategy #3: Protect new plantings, even those of proven resistant varieties. There is a “curiosity factor” with deer, which tend to sample everything new. If you foil them until the plant roots are established, they may have moved on to your neighbor’s petunias. After plants are established, Tier 1 and Tier 2 plants can withstand occasional browsing.

Strategy #4: Use a Low-Nitrogen fertilization regime; Save the Miracle-Gro for hanging baskets. There are several methods of achieving healthy plant growth and extended bloom period without resorting to high-nitrogen synthetic fertilizers (deer candy):
·    Use low-nitrogen organic fertilizers and amendments. Example: 4-8-4 NPK
·    Deadhead more often. This will promote new blooms without additional fertilizer and the plant will be “harder”: Less succulent and more resistant.
·    Improve soil tilth with compost and mycorrhizal and bacterial inoculation.
·    Watering deeply and infrequently (after young plants are established) will result in harder plants with less succulent growth.
Using these methods will promote plant health, increase deer resistance and, as a bonus, will naturally prevent outbreaks of insect pests which tend to multiply rapidly on unnaturally lush green new growth.

PARTIAL LIST OF TIER 1 (Very deer resistant) PERENNIALS

PERENNIALS
Agastache species and varieties
Ligularia dentata
Dicentra spectabilis
Nepeta species and cultivars
Baptisia australis
Salvia nemorosa
Stachys byzantina
Lavandula sp.
Pulmonaria sp
Helloborus sp.
Mentha sp
Eupatorium sp.
Potentilla sp.
Artemesia sp.
Echinops ritro
Coreopsis verticillata varieties
Thymus sp.
Rudbeckia fulgida 'Goldsturm'
Perovskia atriplicifolia
Echinacea purpurea
PARTIAL LIST OF TIER 2 (Somewhat deer resistant) PERENNIALS
Astilbe sp.
Aster sp.
Monarda sp.
Rudbeckia hirta
Liatris sp.
Achillea sp.
Aquilegia sp.
Delphinium sp.
Alchemilla mollis
Lupinis sp.
Veronica sp.
Digitalis grandiflora
Helenium autumnale
Gaillardia sp.
Echinacea sp.
Scabiosa sp.
Papaver sp.
Cerastium tomentosum
Boltonia asteroids
Saponaria ocymoides

        

A garden is like those pernicious machineries which catch a man's coat-skirt or his hand, and draw in his arm, his leg, and his whole body to irresistible destruction.
                        Ralph Waldo Emerson from The Conduct of Life (1860)

        

Visit our brand-new organic recipe and cooking site filled with organic fast and easy recipes that we developed on our farm using fresh produce, whole grains, herbs and spices.

As foodies we love to cook and what better way to cook fresh than to use fresh, organic herbs and produce that we grow right on our own farm. Our recipes include new creations and fresh adaptations of old favorites.

We are constantly adding new recipes, so check back every week as we offer new cooking ideas on tips on how to cook fresh, fast and healthy! 

Our recipe site is: FreshOrganicRecipes.com

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Spring is the ideal time to clean up your garden, your yard and your perennials! At our farm we prefer cleaning up our perennial gardens and raised beds in the spring just as the perennial plants start to break dormancy. Cleaning up in the spring rather than in the fall provides perennial plants with necessary crown protection over the winter in case of a heavy snow load or freezing temperatures.

The photo at the right is a clump of Achillea 'Terra Cotta' yarrow just starting to break dormancy. The blue arrow points to the new growth and the pink arrow points to last years dead top growth.

For soft perennial plants, smaller ornamental grasses and herbs we use large shears to trim back the dead growth from last season while leaving the new growth. When cleaning up ornamental grasses in the spring trim last years foliage growth back to 2 inches to 3 inches just as the new green shoots are visible. Leaving several inches of last years foliage acts as a florist frog and helps to  hold young ornamental grasses upright in windy conditions.

When cleaning up perennial plants in the spring be careful not to damage the new shoots that are just emerging. Once the dead foliage is removed apply an application of organic fertilizer, a light layer of mulch and you are done!