Garden

[Susan Louise]

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@gardenman wrote:

It sounds like $.50 per plant is the new standard. Interesting. That's almost twice what they were selling for two years ago. Ah well, one more reason to start my own from seed each year. I'll have to check out Lowes and Home Depot to see if they're doing the same with prices. I may have to add another row of lights to my plant stand to grow more seedlings.

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@gardenman  We wintersow many plants for several of our backyard gardens in our basement. Additionally, my DH grows veggies hydroponically too...lettuces, kale, etc. If we had a bigger basement I would also wintersow petunias...LOL

Here's a pic of the set up we have in our basement just for our garden plants. The pic was taken last early Spring just before I started to harden them off on our patio...

[gardenman]

@Susan Louise 

I have a four shelf standing plant light unit now with two-four tube shoplights with 6500 degree kelvin bulbs in it now and I started about 300 plants this year. The unit only uses two of the five shelves for plants now, but one, maybe two more shelves will get lit next year.

Each of my planter boxes on each side of the porch use about 150 plants, then I have railing planters and hanging baskets. I'll probably add another shoplight before next spring so I can grow another 150. That'll bring me up to 450 total plants which is about what I need. 

[jannabelle1]

The price of annuals goes up every year it seems. I buy from both Home Depot/Lowes and also my favorite local nursery for special plants that the big box stores don't sell. My biggest problem is the squirrels digging into the 9 planter boxes on my cedar fence and the large pots on my patio. I fight those blasted little critters every year, and one of these days I'm going to just get some plastic or silk flowers and tell them to have at it! LOL!

It's too expensive to buy pretty annuals, plant them and have them laying on their sides in the morning because of the squirrels. I've tried so many things to deter them, but nothing really works. All told, I spent about $200 last year for a big variety of annuals. I'm sure it will be a little more this year.

[1Snickers]

@jannabelle1  I already commented that I put artificial hanging baskets out. I live in a wooded area with an acre lot. 

     There are squirrels, deer, rabbits, moles & voles and ants. Last year I planted a seed mat that was deer & rabbit resistant. But it didn’t deter the squirrels and bugs!

     I put deer & rabbit spray, etc out and they stand by them and munch.

     The front of my house is well back from the street so I do a wreath on the door and two hanging baskets,one on a pole light and one on a garage light.

     With the cute birdhouse hats on my fence and other items it looks better than bedraggled plants.

     I hung two baskets in front of my kitchen bay window on a Holly tree about 15 feet away and they look real.

      No weeding, spraying fertilizing and watering!

[AuntG]

I'll need to buy items for my planters and it might be more than I want to pay. Seriously thinking of rolling out some of those $3.99 pre-seeded mats in my bare flower bed. They provide a lot of variety at a low cost.

[Flatbush]

I pay about $3.00 for a six pack. Often, Home Depot will have specials so I look for those. I like to grow my own marigolds from seeds because they are easy to grow and I can plant the dwarf yellows that I like so much.

[Carmie]

jannabellee   I feel your pain. We have all kinds of critters where I live.  The squirrels dig out my planter boxes and rip apart my cocoa mats liners.  They also dig everywhere to hide the peanuts one of my neighbors puts out for them.

In addition, the deer eat just about everything right down to the ground.  They even ate a newly planted holly tree.  We wrapped up everything in burlap last winter and they tore through some of it and made a big mess.

We used to have one or two, but now we have herds of them, and they are huge. Several neighbors feed all the wild animals which is illegal.  I am holding my breath that we don 't get rats.  One neighbor puts all of their food scraps on the empty lot across the street from him...on Sunday night, there was half of a ham with the bone laying there with all of the trimmings.

I love to work on my veggie and flower gardens, but it's getting to be a disappointment when just about everything gets ruined.

[Spacrazy]

Oh, how pretty. Wish I was close enough to do some “porch sitting”.

ENJOY!!!

[hayseed00]

@Susan LouiseWhat a lovely yard and home !!!