As a Northern California gardener for the past 22 years, stumbling on your channel was one of the best things that ever happened to my gardening world. Your advice is pure gold. You don't just give a couple tips, you give a cornucopia of knowledge to your viewers! I shall gladly give a "Thanks" donation, and subscribing was a definite! Thank you!
What refreshing humility and graciousness you possess, Alexandra! Even when someone seems "very cross about" your advice, you are determined to seek the correct answers (there are often more than one) and share it with your viewers. Thank you. As to pulling out the lavender hedge, could you just pull out the parts growing over the path and then simply plant a shorter plant that won't spill onto the path? Perhaps even surrounding the entire hedge with it? I love the lavender and would hate to see it go. 🌼🌿
Also thank you for Sarah Raven suggestion about planting salvias next to roses, to inhibit black spots. Will be definitely doing that on some roses that have more black spot.
I saw this tip last year, and I tried it out in my garden almost every rose had at least a salvia. And this year I see the ones with are almost ( next to one leaf) free from black spots. The ones that didn't are still struggling with black spots. So out of this experiment, I would say it's successful. And plus salvia's are really beautiful and some of them smell really lovely :)
@@estardeepbrown thank you very much for sharing your experience. That was so reassuring and useful 🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻I don't have black spots with every rose. Only 2 of them are affected. Some black spots disappeared after I manured some roses and watered them regularly from below directly, avoiding leaves. They developed very healthy foliage since. But 2 of them persist with black spots, so I will definitely try salvia.
It was lovely to see your garden in real life when it was open 2 weeks ago as part of the Faversham Open Gardens. It was the first day of our holiday in Kent and my husband and I had a lovely time in Faversham. I did tell you I watched your UA-cam videos, so although you didn't know me, I knew you and your garden! Thank you for your tip about salvias and roses, I must try that next year, my roses have dreadful black spot this year.
I've cut one of my lavender plants completely down to the wood because it didn't look good anymore. It came back and now it looks really beautiful 💜 I should do it with the others as well.
Some really excellent advice! I am in Northern Canada in a Zone 0 or 1 depending on who you ask. I think pinching out Cosmos is really a personal choice of how you want the plants to look. Since I am in such a cold zone with a very short season, I never pinch my cosmos. The Cosmos can then grow really tall and become a real statement. I always have learned that if a plant down south will grow to three feet, I might get 1 to 1 1/2 feet in a growing season. But I do have an (Sometime) advantage of lots of sun. At its peak it will rise at 3 am and set after Midnight. Longest days never really get dark! I say it is sometimes an advantage because a lot of plants that say "Sun Loving" do not love that much sun. Such a different climate.
In the Pacific Northwest we've had hardly any sun until mid-July, and yet flowering plants are much happier and more abundant than usual. Temps have been in the upper 60s!
I thought your humble response to the, well, rude comment about your advice was lovely. Yet you put the rudeness aside and looked into the question in a measured way in order to find the answer(s). Well done, and a good example of civil behavior.
Thank you. It was slightly upsetting to read at first, but of course this person may have had problems in their life (one of which cannot have been me pinching out salvias!) and had been feeling grouchy.
Hello Alexandra, I just wanted to say a huge thank you for your weekly tips and encouragement ! You have a realistic approach which helps people like me that could feel totally overwhelmed by the tasks in my garden ! Your recommendations for garden tools have been very useful , I am now the proud owner of a very robust wheelbarrow !
Would you kindly explain in more detail? Do you use flour (cornmeal), masa harina, or cornstarch? Do you apply early spring or mid-summer? I'll research it, but it'd be great to hear from your experience. Thank you!
@@irairod5160 I sprinkled it round the stems in spring (April time) quite thickly. I believe our cornflour might be your cornstarch. Hope it works for you.
@@margaretstephens7614 I appreciate you taking the time to reply! I will make a note for next spring and see if it prevents the black-spot on my roses. As for the magic ingredient...corn flour, for me, is yellow and grainy (similar to polenta) and usually labeled "cornmeal". I make cornbread, muffins, pudding, pancakes, and fritters with it. Masa-Harina is finely-milled white corn preserved with lye, and is used for tamales, tortillas, pupusas, and arepas. It's also the main ingredient in a drink called "atole", very popular in Mexico and Central America. Cornstarch is a very fine white powder, used to thicken sauces and to make gelatin-like desserts, like Hawaiian "haupia" and Caribbean "tembleque". I will do a little bit more research to see which is the one I should sprinkle around my roses. Or, since I only have 3 bushes, maybe I'll conduct an experiment and use a different corn flour around each one and see what happens! Thanks again for your kindness.
I always give my cosmos a good chop back here in NZ. It comes away well every time. It’s such a great filler in borders. This week I am pruning roses and so looking forward to spring growth and this years blooms. Thanks for your garden tips - so look forward to seeing you whenever your able to film.
I had also learned of Sarah Raven growing salvias by roses to help deter the spread of blackspot so I gave it a go this year and planted the short leaved varieties Sarah recommends and so far its been a success. Crossing my fingers all will be well right through the growing season and if so will plant more salvia.
When I saw you walking through the lavender I thought: Oh, how lovely! Finally she will erase a cloud of beautiful smell when she walks that path and it will cling to her clothes for a while so she can actually enjoy it longer. Before, the lavender was too short for that. But now she has it in abundance. - So, I would not take it out! When you cut it back the structure of your parterre will be obvious again for many months. Just now you have the opportunity to really smell it when you go through, wheras you otherwise would not smell it if you did not intetionally touched it, wouldn't you? (People who went around it just were considerate and did not want to destroy it or where afraid of spiders😄.)
I have trimmed the coleus back and am rooting some in water in my kitchen, rooted basil too. We cut roses back to the next stem with leaves of five. Am collecting the seed heads of cilantro too. Thanks.
I actually enjoy deadheading, it makes me look at the garden even more closely snd I find it relaxing. I am a bit reluctant to 'pinch' plants but determined to overcome this fear of ruining the plant as bushier plants would be better. Will certainly try salvias with roses although blackspot not too bad this year here. Have a lovely week Alexandra.
@@TheMiddlesizedGarden A nursery owner once told me that many plants (among those that he had in his nursery, anyway) evolved to be browsed by animals. That action made the plants more compact and stronger. A lot of times, especially in home gardens, those browsers are no longer present, so it becomes our responsibility to mimic their behavior. It gave me a new perspective on pinching back.
Love that you pursued the why behind the cosmos comment. Makes sense from the different perspectives, doesn’t it! Do you chop and drop your deadheaded or cut back plant material or take it to the compost? Are you completely removing your older lavender plants? Is that what you,rant by ‘they have to go’ or did you mean the majority of the top growth has to go? Finally, absolutely adore the new hairstyle. Brilliant! Thank you for another wonderful vlog, Alexandra.
Thank you, very informative as always. I'm so glad to see how you dead head now I know I'm doing it right. Black spot - again thank you I will stop worrying too much about mine, and will continue to take out bad leaves clean my snippers, and dispose of the leaves carefully. Your dog is lovely.
With respect to Lavender, I’ve taken to leaving it & pruning it back in Spring. When I do that Yellow Finches come for the lavender seeds and since my plants are up close to my house I get to enjoy watching them. If I want the stems, for fragrance or potpourri then I will cut them back in August, too. Love watching & saving your videos for Winter months when snow covers my gardens, and I can plan for another season the following year. Watching near Niagara Falls Canada
Here in a US zone 6b public garden my motto at the moment is stake, water and weed sung to the tune of shake rattle and roll. Searching for a good tune for the constant deadheading ....shirley poppies, california poppies, dahlias, sweet peas, daylilies etc etc.
I latched on to Sara's idea of using the salvias under the roses (and any other plant susceptible to mildew issues!) about a year ago, but have yet to try it as I still haven't added my rose selections to my garden. I WAS planning on doing it this year, but... I'm in Texas, and our Summer heat arrived VERY early this year, which threw all my plans off track. (I often marvel at your delightfully low Summer temperatures accompanied by your same Winter temperatures that we have! How wonderful it must be!!) Back to reality in Texas... At 1st I thought it was just going to be a short lived heat wave. Alas, the heat decided to stay! (We're now in excess of 100° as a "norm". phewww! 🥵 ) So all my new rose ideas were moved to the back burner. Actually, many things are now waiting for the cooler temps of Fall. However, I'm very glad to see your video today bringing this Salvia idea up. We have consistent high humidity year round, so anything keeping the powdery mildew at bay is welcome in the garden! I see in the comments others have tried this great trick, and it's working!! This is really good to see!!!!! I now have even higher hopes for this plan, mostly bcuz I too don't use chemicals in my yard. Thank You so much for sharing this info! ❤️ Oh- One question creeped into my mind about using the Salvias... I kinda wonder if certain varieties of Salvia work better than others in this regard? I mostly wonder this bcuz so many salvias have been bred to create certain characteristics that we like to see visually, it makes me wonder if the sulfer aspect of the salvia (which I believe is what Sara explained keeps the mildew away) has been bred OUT of certain salvia varieties, or perhaps been made a little bit weaker... ? In Texas we have access to SO MANY varieties, as our climate is perfect for them. While this is fantastic, it can also get overwhelming when trying to choose! It's not as if the sulfer content of each variety would be listed on the plant tag! Anyway, maybe I'm over thinking the whole plot of using the salvia for this purpose!? I really don't know! I welcome all opinions on this subject! Does anyone have any ideas, or experience with using any Salvias that did NOT work as well for this purpose?
Things are late here in the North of France and therefore so is dead heading. It has been so dry and chilly. But when things really take off then it is a pleasure to wonder around the garden on a summer morning dead heading. Thanks for your video, it's lovely as usual.
As for deadheading, I make an attempt to stay on top of my osteospermum, arctic poppies, and Shasta daisies. My Pacific Northwest 8b garden is largely part shade, so I rely a lot on foliage.
I don’t pinch my cosmos because I want the tallness in the back of my garden 💞😃 so beautiful swaying in the breeze. I do stake them. 😊 I’m going to start pinching them for the front or center of my garden 😊 great tip 👍💞
The salvia trick with the roses has worked incredibly well with my Rosa Mundi hedge. It suffered terribly with black spot and mildew and with just 3 small salvias the whole hedge ( 4 mature plants) is free of both for the whole season.
I will definitely try this. I already love the blue/purple of salvia paired with the rose colors I favor (mostly white to pink and deep rose), so this is no hardship at all. Thank you for confirming this tip!
Thanks for the tips. I was thinking this morning, while enjoying my breakfast in the garden, that with global warming we might have to change our mind on what plants are suitable for our zone...My garden is in our vacation house in the south of Brittany. I visit every school break (I am a teacher) but there is always at least 6 weeks between my stays. Although in winter and early spring it is not a problem, it has become one for late spring...The signature shrubs in Brittany are hydrangeas and I find that they are struggling with the heat (every second week since the beginning of June we've had temperatures that go up to 37°) they really need watering and if no one is there to do the job it's problematic...I am even considering getting automatic sprinklers but they are costly... But my thoughts were that my little seaside corner of Brittany might become a Mediterranean zone...
I think that's an interesting direction to take - I have been watching my hydrangeas too, and they haven't wilted yet, but they may do with next week's heatwave.
I'm located in southwestern Ontario at the base of the Bruce Peninsula. I believe I am a zone 4-5 garden. My Shasta daisy's are the highest they have ever been and so are the hosts. We have had a fairly mild start to summer with not a lot of hot days. That being said we could use a little bit more rain.
Well now I've just spotted your beautiful hound - gorgeous! Yes I think I'm going to follow up with the salvia advice as well - I do a similar thing with chives around the apple tree and it really helps guard against scab. Thanks Alexandra - really enjoyed this.
Thank you in particular for explaining the reasons to pinch out - or not pinch out - cosmos. I think the same principle applies to the chelsea chop, which I find works well in a border if done to only a proportion of each type of plant, so that you have some larger earlier flowers on taller stems, followed by smaller, later flowers on shorter, bushier plants. You are so right that the methods we use depend on the outcome we are working towards, not on what’s right or wrong 😊
I watched a video yesterday of a tour of David Austin’s private rose garden. I noticed beautiful salvia plants in the garden with roses. Now I know why. Great video. 😊
Good morning Alexandra, so nice to see you and listening to your own gardening experience. I have decided to cut "down" two trees, they have seen better days and are making a enormous mess on the grass and is killing it. They do give much shade which effects the light and sunshine coming into the or over the house. Things in the garden seems to work then you realise it is not. The advantage is we can always change or replace. I would snip the lavender down at the side close to the centre, keeping the height just making them more slender! Miniature conifers would look good in the square, but keep the lavender thereby saving money and you can still enjoy them. Regardless we learn so much daily whether cooking, gardening, investments etc., and we learn by our unwise doings. Do what makes yourself happy and contented, I would pull off those rose leaves, but it you can allow them then so be it. Be happy, enjoy your garden, I love your gardening style and you make a picture in your pink outfit showing off the shrubs on either side. Looking forward to your next garden chat, thank you for sharing. Kind regards and many blessings.
Alexandra I’ve loved watching your channel over the last year or so and as your video styles has become more intricate so has my garden become more intricate. Directly an outcome of your work!
thank you so much for your wonderful advice; going out to cut my cosmos as it's too tall and unstable. Didn't know I could do that; would rather have it bushy. You are such a joy to watch as I always learn something new.
Alexandra, thank you so much for your videos. You have been such a wealth of inspiration and wisdom on all things gardening. We lost about 5 trees this year and it opened up a lot of our land to the sun and I'm looking back into your previous videos to get ideas for gardens I might want to put where the trees were. I just wanted to say thank you!
I pinched out mt Cosmos this year, for the first time & i must say I shall be doing it again ! It's been a great display. I even have some decent length in some of my stems. I'm in south east Cheshire with a very sunny, south facing garden. I'm deadheading every evening, it's my wind down time :)
Thank you Alexandra for the salvia tip. Most of my roses have salvia planted close by, with the exception of one small bed. It is this bed with no salvia that I have black spot showing up. I didn't make the connection until this video. I am going out to buy a salvia and will just place the potted salvia next to these roses as there is not enough room to put it in this garden bed. I also appreciate your cosmos deadheading info.This is the first year that I have started performing what you call the Chelsea Chop with my perennials and also deadheading my petunias frequently. It has made huge difference.
Ohh thats why my cosmos grows too tall with fewer flowers. Thank you for that. Don't suppose there is any point in doing that now. Things slow here and only have a few flowers so far. I love your lavender. It's beautiful. Thanks for another wonderful video. My favourite garden you tuber.
Way to get to the bottom of the pinching out issue. I appreciate someone who will investigate both sides of a story. Thank you for this lovely videos. I found it very interesting and informative.
Dianthus for me in dry (except for this year’s unusual weather) US Zone 5b - it has made me a deadheading believer! I’m growing Cosmos for the first time and will compare pinching or no-pinching. I appreciate your tip about growing salvia amongst roses to discourage black spot. My perennial salvia are about 12 feet/3 meters from the roses. I’ll move some directly between the lovely yellow shrub roses. Always a pleasure to see your garden and hear your advice.
I enjoy your videos so much Alexandra. You do such a very nice job making it easy for us to watch and learn and refer back. Thank you. Your own garden is just gorgeous and I am so intrigued by the loud sea gull cries in the background. You seem to have the best of all worlds!
Thank you, yes, we are about 10 minutes or so away from the sea, which is lovely in summer (and far enough away in winter not to be too buffeted about)
I also keep a sniping scissors ✂️ of some sort with me at most times. A farmer always has a pair of pliers in their belt holder 😊 their most important tool 😀 A gardener always has a sniper in hers/his holder 😃💞😃 ✂️😃 Love your videos! Nebraska USA 🇺🇸.
@@TheMiddlesizedGarden after watching your video I went out and pruned the front row of cosmos. I really like how it looks 😃 as they now gradually get taller in the back! 😃 💞
Wonderful tips as usual 🙂. I thoroughly enjoy a good garden experiment such as what you did when pruning the roses as well as your very simple tip on deadheading them by visual cues without knowing the variety. Thanks!
Thank you so much, always, for your informative and beautiful garden tours and tips. I’m in Zone 9a US and had a gorgeous spring flush of my ‘Blessed Child’ rose, deadheaded, and somewhat disappointed not to see another rose yet this summer. I’ll have to re-watch your Rose Expert video again for tips. It is a delight to watch the show again, regardless of outcomes here in FL! ☘️
This was so helpful and sensible. Thank you. What I like that you put a label up for each flower. I like to leave the flowers of my Catmint for a while because our Goldfinches love them.
such great advice! I just bought a house in april in the pacific northwest and I've already planted so many rhododendrons (10!), roses, hydrangeas, azaeleas, camellias, and I'm just getting a grip on how best to prune and take care of all of them. my plant to build my border is to start with the larger shrubs now, plant tubers/bulbs in the fall, and grow the rest of the perennials from seeds in spring. I would love tips on how to build a flower bed for the front yard! I'll definitely keep your tip about pinching cosmos in mind
Although it's not specific to a front garden, the points made in this video apply to building a flower bed in either a front or back garden, so this may help: ua-cam.com/video/7cyPuZ_YQPA/v-deo.html and this one on creating beautiful flower borders may help too: ua-cam.com/video/SQRTVeCLHmE/v-deo.html
Even if I were to not pinch my plants like scabiosa or gomphrena, the ground hogs do so. It's almost like they're helping (or its an evolutionary symbiotic relationship) because they don't come back and eat the seedlings once they've rebounded. Of course, the ground hogs don't touch snapdragons or zinnias so those I pinch as needed to manage successive blooms.
Thanks for all the good tips, especially the cosmos one. I have these growing in different parts of my garden so I’m going to try this on some of them and see which I prefer.
Yay, Neil!! 😁 Zone 7, USA here. I decided to not deadhead my roses this year because of wanting the hips but was slightly reconsidering recently now that it's in the ugly phase so thanks for the needed encouragement to persevere. 👍 Oh yes, and I just recently started to always carry snips AND tie string in a pocket when I go out into the garden. (I bought a garden apron with big pockets for my dresses that don't have pockets). I also agree on the decision of the lavender. Imo, there's a big difference between "spilling over" and "taking over". I was also recently wondering about deadheading the cosmos so that was timely advice, too!
Regarding lavender I was always cautious not to prune back too much to the old wood but it became so leggy. Last year a gardener advised me to prune back harder and although it took a while to come back it looks healthier than ever now. I would have pulled it up if I hadn’t given it a chance so I’m very grateful for the advice.
Aloha Alexandra, your rose colored top is a great color on you! Many thanks for the tips on deadheading. It gives me confidence to know that I’m doing it correctly. I’m in zone 11b/12a and let me tell you, 80% of “gardening” here is editing-pruning, deadheading, shearing, keeping plants at bay!
Good tips - and what GREAT manners you have! You are so gracious. I struggle with pinching irrationally. I get so anxious that they won’t recover sufficiently in the growing time left to provide the flower blooms. Silly, I know. This year my cosmos are not setting buds ….have your ever experienced that? Great foliage but very few buds. ☹️ Thank you for the great gardening advice.
Oh dear, I'm not sure about that...maybe they're a bit behind and the buds will come? I know what you mean about pinching, I literally can't believe how bushy my pinched out cosmos have become.
Thank you for giving the USDA equivalents for the UK. It’s always been a question while I’m watching UK based garden shows. I’m gardening in zone 9 as well, but in the Houston, TX metro area so my summer temps are well above your average, although you seem to be getting a taste of my usual temps this year. Summer can be a bit rough on the full sun borders this time of year, although I have a plan for a gray-watering system that should help in the future. I tend to use a lot of native plants even in my cottage garden border, since they’re better suited to the weather. I love that your Byzantine glads are still blooming. I get them for a few weeks in spring and then they’re gone until next year.
Thank you so much for the practical tips on deadheading. It's interesting to hear you say, it seems as much a matter of how you want your garden to develop and how you personally use your garden, as it is a matter of "when" to deadhead. I am forever questioning when to deadhead my hydrangeas, in the early Spring or in the Fall. I've experimented the past few seasons pruning some identical hydrangea plants in Spring, others in Fall. I am happy to report, there is virtually no difference in the next season's product. Thanks again from Niagara Falls, Ontario.
Thank you. I take some of my hydrangea heads off in autumn, too, it depends on whether the flowers hold together nicely and look gorgeous in frost (in which case I leave them on), but some just seem to fall apart and might as well come off earlier. It's good to hear there's no difference in the next year's flowers
I’m in Maine in the USA. And I am dead heading just barely because our spring has been so delayed and the flowers are just now starting to go by. But some things are just not there yet either so I hadn’t thought about which plants I don’t deadhead but I don’t deadhead my wild roses I have several mille Fleur and the birds love them and nest in them and feed over the winter on the rose hips so I just judiciously get rid of them where they aren’t wanted but they are difficult to keep down and so I’ve been using my hedge trimmers to just weed whack the top off and trim down the sides after the nesting season which I think is coming to an end. I also don’t deadhead my sedums I have Matrona sedum‘s which I like the seed heads in the winter they have a sturdy stock and will stay up all through the whole winter no matter how much snow we have. Good tips and research thank you.
I didn't know you had to pinch out cosmos - the ones at my front door are over 4ft tall on spindly, arched stems with big purple flowers. Not quite the look I was seeking, but they do make quite an impression!
I’m one of those new - ‘covid19 gardener’ 😀 - I absolutely love gardening my small 8m square townhouse garden. I would add pruning the crazy climbers to your summer list. I set aside a day every week to keep control, pest and fungal check my grape vine, x3 passifloras, x3 jasmines, x4 clematis, x5 honeysuckles and various climbing roses as well as an assortment of scrambling berries! The thugs are Passifloras and Montanas.
Loved the helpful video as always! I find deadheading very relaxing and I feel it makes my garden look refreshed and my plants do so much better if I deadhead. I garden in Virginia USDA Zone 6
As a Northern California gardener for the past 22 years, stumbling on your channel was one of the best things that ever happened to my gardening world. Your advice is pure gold. You don't just give a couple tips, you give a cornucopia of knowledge to your viewers! I shall gladly give a "Thanks" donation, and subscribing was a definite! Thank you!
Thank you so much!
I enjoyed this. I like it that she is open minded and civil to people with different opinions. We need people like her in the US!
I was a bit upset at the time, but it's much better to use that energy to find out more!
Watched this again as a reminder, now that NZ is in the heat of summer😢Thanks again Alexandra, and happy 2023.
Happy 2023, hope you are having a good summer.
What refreshing humility and graciousness you possess, Alexandra! Even when someone seems "very cross about" your advice, you are determined to seek the correct answers (there are often more than one) and share it with your viewers. Thank you.
As to pulling out the lavender hedge, could you just pull out the parts growing over the path and then simply plant a shorter plant that won't spill onto the path? Perhaps even surrounding the entire hedge with it? I love the lavender and would hate to see it go. 🌼🌿
The bees love it too and it’s so lovely to hear their ‘humming’ during the Summer months
The comment on getting trolled about cosmos pinching cracked me up. “Well that’s a bit extreme”. Great attitude, I love her.
Also thank you for Sarah Raven suggestion about planting salvias next to roses, to inhibit black spots. Will be definitely doing that on some roses that have more black spot.
Me too! It also is deer resistant so no black spot and keeps deer from eating my roses . Awesome!
I saw this tip last year, and I tried it out in my garden almost every rose had at least a salvia. And this year I see the ones with are almost ( next to one leaf) free from black spots. The ones that didn't are still struggling with black spots. So out of this experiment, I would say it's successful. And plus salvia's are really beautiful and some of them smell really lovely :)
@@estardeepbrown thank you very much for sharing your experience. That was so reassuring and useful 🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻I don't have black spots with every rose. Only 2 of them are affected. Some black spots disappeared after I manured some roses and watered them regularly from below directly, avoiding leaves. They developed very healthy foliage since. But 2 of them persist with black spots, so I will definitely try salvia.
Love the Chelsea Chop on your hair!
It was lovely to see your garden in real life when it was open 2 weeks ago as part of the Faversham Open Gardens. It was the first day of our holiday in Kent and my husband and I had a lovely time in Faversham. I did tell you I watched your UA-cam videos, so although you didn't know me, I knew you and your garden! Thank you for your tip about salvias and roses, I must try that next year, my roses have dreadful black spot this year.
It was very nice to hear from you, I enjoyed meeting a few Middlesized Garden UA-cam viewers. I hope the rest of your holiday went well.
I've cut one of my lavender plants completely down to the wood because it didn't look good anymore. It came back and now it looks really beautiful 💜 I should do it with the others as well.
Your hair is beautiful. And, of course, your information is very welcome. Thank you.
Some really excellent advice! I am in Northern Canada in a Zone 0 or 1 depending on who you ask. I think pinching out Cosmos is really a personal choice of how you want the plants to look. Since I am in such a cold zone with a very short season, I never pinch my cosmos. The Cosmos can then grow really tall and become a real statement. I always have learned that if a plant down south will grow to three feet, I might get 1 to 1 1/2 feet in a growing season. But I do have an (Sometime) advantage of lots of sun. At its peak it will rise at 3 am and set after Midnight. Longest days never really get dark! I say it is sometimes an advantage because a lot of plants that say "Sun Loving" do not love that much sun. Such a different climate.
In the Pacific Northwest we've had hardly any sun until mid-July, and yet flowering plants are much happier and more abundant than usual. Temps have been in the upper 60s!
Interesting! Of course, once I said that our summers were generally mild, we were hit with the heatwave of a lifetime!
Thanks for the great tips. I enjoy deadheading, and find it theraputic,and it does keep the flowers going for longer.
I thought your humble response to the, well, rude comment about your advice was lovely. Yet you put the rudeness aside and looked into the question in a measured way in order to find the answer(s). Well done, and a good example of civil behavior.
Thank you. It was slightly upsetting to read at first, but of course this person may have had problems in their life (one of which cannot have been me pinching out salvias!) and had been feeling grouchy.
Hello Alexandra, I just wanted to say a huge thank you for your weekly tips and encouragement !
You have a realistic approach which helps people like me that could feel totally overwhelmed by the tasks in my garden ! Your recommendations for garden tools have been very useful , I am now the proud owner of a very robust wheelbarrow !
Thanks for the tip. I’m compulsive about dead heading and you taught me new things.
Thank you!
Wow; never knew salvia could help with the black spot. I will surely try this!!!
I followed someone's advice and sprinkled cornflour round the base of my roses to stave off black spot. It seems to have worked. Love your videos.
Great tip!
Ooh! When do you need to do it? How often?
Would you kindly explain in more detail? Do you use flour (cornmeal), masa harina, or cornstarch? Do you apply early spring or mid-summer? I'll research it, but it'd be great to hear from your experience. Thank you!
@@irairod5160 I sprinkled it round the stems in spring (April time) quite thickly. I believe our cornflour might be your cornstarch. Hope it works for you.
@@margaretstephens7614 I appreciate you taking the time to reply! I will make a note for next spring and see if it prevents the black-spot on my roses. As for the magic ingredient...corn flour, for me, is yellow and grainy (similar to polenta) and usually labeled "cornmeal". I make cornbread, muffins, pudding, pancakes, and fritters with it. Masa-Harina is finely-milled white corn preserved with lye, and is used for tamales, tortillas, pupusas, and arepas. It's also the main ingredient in a drink called "atole", very popular in Mexico and Central America. Cornstarch is a very fine white powder, used to thicken sauces and to make gelatin-like desserts, like Hawaiian "haupia" and Caribbean "tembleque". I will do a little bit more research to see which is the one I should sprinkle around my roses. Or, since I only have 3 bushes, maybe I'll conduct an experiment and use a different corn flour around each one and see what happens! Thanks again for your kindness.
This is such an informative video! I now realize I haven’t been deadheading enough or cutting back stems to make bushier plants. Thank you.
I always give my cosmos a good chop back here in NZ. It comes away well every time. It’s such a great filler in borders. This week I am pruning roses and so looking forward to spring growth and this years blooms. Thanks for your garden tips - so look forward to seeing you whenever your able to film.
Thank you!
Flowers are my favorite things to grow, can't get enough of them, they last a long time into the winter here in far northern Ca
I had also learned of Sarah Raven growing salvias by roses to help deter the spread of blackspot so I gave it a go this year and planted the short leaved varieties Sarah recommends and so far its been a success. Crossing my fingers all will be well right through the growing season and if so will plant more salvia.
Excellent, I'm glad to hear that.
When I saw you walking through the lavender I thought: Oh, how lovely! Finally she will erase a cloud of beautiful smell when she walks that path and it will cling to her clothes for a while so she can actually enjoy it longer. Before, the lavender was too short for that. But now she has it in abundance. - So, I would not take it out! When you cut it back the structure of your parterre will be obvious again for many months. Just now you have the opportunity to really smell it when you go through, wheras you otherwise would not smell it if you did not intetionally touched it, wouldn't you? (People who went around it just were considerate and did not want to destroy it or where afraid of spiders😄.)
I have trimmed the coleus back and am rooting some in water in my kitchen, rooted basil too. We cut roses back to the next stem with leaves of five. Am collecting the seed heads of cilantro too. Thanks.
Taman yang indah mom, mengesankan sekali . . . . . 👍
I purchased a pair of these snips having watched the video, they are brilliant thank you, my sister tried them and immediately ordered her own!
Glad you like them!
What a marvellous youtube discovery, a beautiful presentation, well done
Glad you liked it!
I actually enjoy deadheading, it makes me look at the garden even more closely snd I find it relaxing. I am a bit reluctant to 'pinch' plants but determined to overcome this fear of ruining the plant as bushier plants would be better. Will certainly try salvias with roses although blackspot not too bad this year here. Have a lovely week Alexandra.
Thank you, and I know what you mean about pinching out, I'm always convinced that the plant will be ruined.
"actually"
@@TheMiddlesizedGarden A nursery owner once told me that many plants (among those that he had in his nursery, anyway) evolved to be browsed by animals. That action made the plants more compact and stronger. A lot of times, especially in home gardens, those browsers are no longer present, so it becomes our responsibility to mimic their behavior. It gave me a new perspective on pinching back.
One of my highlights of the week, thank you Alexandra. 👌💕🌿🌺🌱🌷🌾
Love that you pursued the why behind the cosmos comment. Makes sense from the different perspectives, doesn’t it! Do you chop and drop your deadheaded or cut back plant material or take it to the compost? Are you completely removing your older lavender plants? Is that what you,rant by ‘they have to go’ or did you mean the majority of the top growth has to go? Finally, absolutely adore the new hairstyle. Brilliant! Thank you for another wonderful vlog, Alexandra.
@Christopher Johnson Virginia now. Raised in Idaho.
Thankyou Alexandra for all your wonderful tips. I adore your garden. Thankyou for sharing with us.
Thank you!
Loved the rose pruning experiment!!
Thank you!
Thank you, very informative as always. I'm so glad to see how you dead head now I know I'm doing it right. Black spot - again thank you I will stop worrying too much about mine, and will continue to take out bad leaves clean my snippers, and dispose of the leaves carefully. Your dog is lovely.
Thank you!
With respect to Lavender, I’ve taken to leaving it & pruning it back in Spring. When I do that Yellow Finches come for the lavender seeds and since my plants are up close to my house I get to enjoy watching them. If I want the stems, for fragrance or potpourri then I will cut them back in August, too. Love watching & saving your videos for Winter months when snow covers my gardens, and I can plan for another season the following year. Watching near Niagara Falls Canada
I’m in Pennsylvania and wait till early spring to cut back my lavender as well.
It is such a coincidence to see your comment about Yellow Finches. I saw one for the first time yesterday when it came for the lavender.
The garden is so beautiful. I really enjoyed your video. Thank you for sharing.
Thank you!
Here in a US zone 6b public garden my motto at the moment is stake, water and weed sung to the tune of shake rattle and roll. Searching for a good tune for the constant deadheading ....shirley poppies, california poppies, dahlias, sweet peas, daylilies etc etc.
I latched on to Sara's idea of using the salvias under the roses (and any other plant susceptible to mildew issues!) about a year ago, but have yet to try it as I still haven't added my rose selections to my garden.
I WAS planning on doing it this year, but...
I'm in Texas, and our Summer heat arrived VERY early this year, which threw all my plans off track.
(I often marvel at your delightfully low Summer temperatures accompanied by your same Winter temperatures that we have! How wonderful it must be!!)
Back to reality in Texas...
At 1st I thought it was just going to be a short lived heat wave.
Alas, the heat decided to stay!
(We're now in excess of 100° as a "norm". phewww! 🥵 )
So all my new rose ideas were moved to the back burner.
Actually, many things are now waiting for the cooler temps of Fall.
However, I'm very glad to see your video today bringing this Salvia idea up.
We have consistent high humidity year round, so anything keeping the powdery mildew at bay is welcome in the garden!
I see in the comments others have tried this great trick, and it's working!!
This is really good to see!!!!!
I now have even higher hopes for this plan, mostly bcuz I too don't use chemicals in my yard.
Thank You so much for sharing this info! ❤️
Oh-
One question creeped into my mind about using the Salvias...
I kinda wonder if certain varieties of Salvia work better than others in this regard?
I mostly wonder this bcuz so many salvias have been bred to create certain characteristics that we like to see visually, it makes me wonder if the sulfer aspect of the salvia (which I believe is what Sara explained keeps the mildew away) has been bred OUT of certain salvia varieties, or perhaps been made a little bit weaker... ?
In Texas we have access to SO MANY varieties, as our climate is perfect for them.
While this is fantastic, it can also get overwhelming when trying to choose!
It's not as if the sulfer content of each variety would be listed on the plant tag!
Anyway, maybe I'm over thinking the whole plot of using the salvia for this purpose!?
I really don't know!
I welcome all opinions on this subject!
Does anyone have any ideas, or experience with using any Salvias that did NOT work as well for this purpose?
Alexandra - that Acanthus is stellar. Another great video.
Thank you!
How interesting - using salvias to avoid black-spot! Great solution!!
How happy I am to have discovered your channel! Thank you for a great video, and I look forward to learning more from you.
Thank you!
Things are late here in the North of France and therefore so is dead heading. It has been so dry and chilly. But when things really take off then it is a pleasure to wonder around the garden on a summer morning dead heading. Thanks for your video, it's lovely as usual.
As for deadheading, I make an attempt to stay on top of my osteospermum, arctic poppies, and Shasta daisies. My Pacific Northwest 8b garden is largely part shade, so I rely a lot on foliage.
Hello 👋how are you doing?
Another fabulous, brilliant video. Thank you so much x 🧡💛🧡👌🌜🙏😇🇦🇺🕊️
I don’t pinch my cosmos because I want the tallness in the back of my garden 💞😃 so beautiful swaying in the breeze. I do stake them. 😊
I’m going to start pinching them for the front or center of my garden 😊 great tip 👍💞
Thank you - and good idea to have a mix
The salvia trick with the roses has worked incredibly well with my Rosa Mundi hedge. It suffered terribly with black spot and mildew and with just 3 small salvias the whole hedge ( 4 mature plants) is free of both for the whole season.
I will definitely try this. I already love the blue/purple of salvia paired with the rose colors I favor (mostly white to pink and deep rose), so this is no hardship at all. Thank you for confirming this tip!
That's amazing. I will try this as l had such terrible black spot the last 2 summers because of unusually constant wet & cool weather.
I will try this- thanks for the tip!
Wich sort of salvia did you use/recomend?
Wow, I would never guess this for a fungus. Insects, yes, but a fungus? Wow. Going to try this.
Thanks for the tips. I was thinking this morning, while enjoying my breakfast in the garden, that with global warming we might have to change our mind on what plants are suitable for our zone...My garden is in our vacation house in the south of Brittany. I visit every school break (I am a teacher) but there is always at least 6 weeks between my stays. Although in winter and early spring it is not a problem, it has become one for late spring...The signature shrubs in Brittany are hydrangeas and I find that they are struggling with the heat (every second week since the beginning of June we've had temperatures that go up to 37°) they really need watering and if no one is there to do the job it's problematic...I am even considering getting automatic sprinklers but they are costly...
But my thoughts were that my little seaside corner of Brittany might become a Mediterranean zone...
I think that's an interesting direction to take - I have been watching my hydrangeas too, and they haven't wilted yet, but they may do with next week's heatwave.
I'm located in southwestern Ontario at the base of the Bruce Peninsula. I believe I am a zone 4-5 garden. My Shasta daisy's are the highest they have ever been and so are the hosts. We have had a fairly mild start to summer with not a lot of hot days. That being said we could use a little bit more rain.
Well now I've just spotted your beautiful hound - gorgeous! Yes I think I'm going to follow up with the salvia advice as well - I do a similar thing with chives around the apple tree and it really helps guard against scab. Thanks Alexandra - really enjoyed this.
Thank you in particular for explaining the reasons to pinch out - or not pinch out - cosmos. I think the same principle applies to the chelsea chop, which I find works well in a border if done to only a proportion of each type of plant, so that you have some larger earlier flowers on taller stems, followed by smaller, later flowers on shorter, bushier plants. You are so right that the methods we use depend on the outcome we are working towards, not on what’s right or wrong 😊
Yes, you're right, it's much the same as the Chelsea chop.
I watched a video yesterday of a tour of David Austin’s private rose garden. I noticed beautiful salvia plants in the garden with roses. Now I know why.
Great video. 😊
Good morning Alexandra, so nice to see you and listening to your own gardening experience. I have decided to cut "down" two trees, they have seen better days and are making a enormous mess on the grass and is killing it. They do give much shade which effects the light and sunshine coming into the or over the house. Things in the garden seems to work then you realise it is not. The advantage is we can always change or replace. I would snip the lavender down at the side close to the centre, keeping the height just making them more slender! Miniature conifers would look good in the square, but keep the lavender thereby saving money and you can still enjoy them. Regardless we learn so much daily whether cooking, gardening, investments etc., and we learn by our unwise doings. Do what makes yourself happy and contented, I would pull off those rose leaves, but it you can allow them then so be it. Be happy, enjoy your garden, I love your gardening style and you make a picture in your pink outfit showing off the shrubs on either side. Looking forward to your next garden chat, thank you for sharing. Kind regards and many blessings.
Alexandra I’ve loved watching your channel over the last year or so and as your video styles has become more intricate so has my garden become more intricate. Directly an outcome of your work!
This is my favorite deadheading video on UA-cam. It's very thorough. Also I'm definitely going to try pinching my cosmos!
I like your hair cut! This was an excellent video, so very helpful.
thank you so much for your wonderful advice; going out to cut my cosmos as it's too tall and unstable. Didn't know I could do that; would rather have it bushy. You are such a joy to watch as I always learn something new.
Alexandra, thank you so much for your videos. You have been such a wealth of inspiration and wisdom on all things gardening. We lost about 5 trees this year and it opened up a lot of our land to the sun and I'm looking back into your previous videos to get ideas for gardens I might want to put where the trees were. I just wanted to say thank you!
I pinched out mt Cosmos this year, for the first time & i must say I shall be doing it again ! It's been a great display. I even have some decent length in some of my stems. I'm in south east Cheshire with a very sunny, south facing garden. I'm deadheading every evening, it's my wind down time :)
Thank you Alexandra for the salvia tip. Most of my roses have salvia planted close by, with the exception of one small bed. It is this bed with no salvia that I have black spot showing up. I didn't make the connection until this video. I am going out to buy a salvia and will just place the potted salvia next to these roses as there is not enough room to put it in this garden bed. I also appreciate your cosmos deadheading info.This is the first year that I have started performing what you call the Chelsea Chop with my perennials and also deadheading my petunias frequently. It has made huge difference.
Thank you!
Ohh thats why my cosmos grows too tall with fewer flowers. Thank you for that. Don't suppose there is any point in doing that now. Things slow here and only have a few flowers so far. I love your lavender. It's beautiful. Thanks for another wonderful video. My favourite garden you tuber.
Thank you! I have a few cosmos that weren't pinched out and they are looking pretty leggy, so I'll definitely stick to the pinching out in future.
You inspired me to go outside today and deadhead some flowers that were declining. Thank you!
Way to get to the bottom of the pinching out issue. I appreciate someone who will investigate both sides of a story. Thank you for this lovely videos. I found it very interesting and informative.
Glad it was helpful!
Dianthus for me in dry (except for this year’s unusual weather) US Zone 5b - it has made me a deadheading believer! I’m growing Cosmos for the first time and will compare pinching or no-pinching. I appreciate your tip about growing salvia amongst roses to discourage black spot. My perennial salvia are about 12 feet/3 meters from the roses. I’ll move some directly between the lovely yellow shrub roses. Always a pleasure to see your garden and hear your advice.
Great video as always & very informative. I always look farward to the weekend to see your great videos.
Thank you!
I enjoy your videos so much Alexandra. You do such a very nice job making it easy for us to watch and learn and refer back. Thank you. Your own garden is just gorgeous and I am so intrigued by the loud sea gull cries in the background. You seem to have the best of all worlds!
Thank you, yes, we are about 10 minutes or so away from the sea, which is lovely in summer (and far enough away in winter not to be too buffeted about)
I also keep a sniping scissors ✂️ of some sort with me at most times.
A farmer always has a pair of pliers in their belt holder 😊 their most important tool 😀
A gardener always has a sniper in hers/his holder 😃💞😃 ✂️😃
Love your videos! Nebraska USA 🇺🇸.
Thank you!
@@TheMiddlesizedGarden after watching your video I went out and pruned the front row of cosmos. I really like how it looks 😃 as they now gradually get taller in the back! 😃 💞
Wonderful tips as usual 🙂. I thoroughly enjoy a good garden experiment such as what you did when pruning the roses as well as your very simple tip on deadheading them by visual cues without knowing the variety. Thanks!
Thank you!
Thank you so much, always, for your informative and beautiful garden tours and tips. I’m in Zone 9a US and had a gorgeous spring flush of my ‘Blessed Child’ rose, deadheaded, and somewhat disappointed not to see another rose yet this summer. I’ll have to re-watch your Rose Expert video again for tips. It is a delight to watch the show again, regardless of outcomes here in FL! ☘️
All my plants and flowers love the Grateful Dead already so job done.
Thank you for all the info.
Very informative as always, love the salvia hint 👌 really enjoy your channel, thank you
Thinking your voice... sounds very similar to Joanna Lumley. Time really does fly, believe she's now in her 70's.
Thanks for the video. I am in Dorset and it seems that all I am doing in the garden at the moment is deadheading and waterering pots ☺
As always, another outstanding episode!
Thank you!
This was so helpful and sensible. Thank you. What I like that you put a label up for each flower. I like to leave the flowers of my Catmint for a while because our Goldfinches love them.
such great advice! I just bought a house in april in the pacific northwest and I've already planted so many rhododendrons (10!), roses, hydrangeas, azaeleas, camellias, and I'm just getting a grip on how best to prune and take care of all of them. my plant to build my border is to start with the larger shrubs now, plant tubers/bulbs in the fall, and grow the rest of the perennials from seeds in spring. I would love tips on how to build a flower bed for the front yard! I'll definitely keep your tip about pinching cosmos in mind
Although it's not specific to a front garden, the points made in this video apply to building a flower bed in either a front or back garden, so this may help: ua-cam.com/video/7cyPuZ_YQPA/v-deo.html and this one on creating beautiful flower borders may help too: ua-cam.com/video/SQRTVeCLHmE/v-deo.html
I love this!!
Even if I were to not pinch my plants like scabiosa or gomphrena, the ground hogs do so. It's almost like they're helping (or its an evolutionary symbiotic relationship) because they don't come back and eat the seedlings once they've rebounded. Of course, the ground hogs don't touch snapdragons or zinnias so those I pinch as needed to manage successive blooms.
Thanks for all the good tips, especially the cosmos one. I have these growing in different parts of my garden so I’m going to try this on some of them and see which I prefer.
Very helpful - thank you
Yay, Neil!! 😁
Zone 7, USA here.
I decided to not deadhead my roses this year because of wanting the hips but was slightly reconsidering recently now that it's in the ugly phase so thanks for the needed encouragement to persevere. 👍
Oh yes, and I just recently started to always carry snips AND tie string in a pocket when I go out into the garden. (I bought a garden apron with big pockets for my dresses that don't have pockets).
I also agree on the decision of the lavender. Imo, there's a big difference between "spilling over" and "taking over".
I was also recently wondering about deadheading the cosmos so that was timely advice, too!
Regarding lavender I was always cautious not to prune back too much to the old wood but it became so leggy. Last year a gardener advised me to prune back harder and although it took a while to come back it looks healthier than ever now. I would have pulled it up if I hadn’t given it a chance so I’m very grateful for the advice.
Please, please please keep your lavender! Love your videos xxx
Thanks Alexandra for a very comprehensive and entertaining video! I'd hate to see the lavender hedge go as it is quite iconic to your garden.
Aloha Alexandra, your rose colored top is a great color on you! Many thanks for the tips on deadheading. It gives me confidence to know that I’m doing it correctly. I’m in zone 11b/12a and let me tell you, 80% of “gardening” here is editing-pruning, deadheading, shearing, keeping plants at bay!
Love your channel! Elise Higgins in America
Thank you!
Your garden is looking fabulous ❤️ 🇳🇿🇳🇿
Thank you!
Good tips - and what GREAT manners you have! You are so gracious. I struggle with pinching irrationally. I get so anxious that they won’t recover sufficiently in the growing time left to provide the flower blooms. Silly, I know. This year my cosmos are not setting buds ….have your ever experienced that? Great foliage but very few buds. ☹️ Thank you for the great gardening advice.
Oh dear, I'm not sure about that...maybe they're a bit behind and the buds will come? I know what you mean about pinching, I literally can't believe how bushy my pinched out cosmos have become.
Thank you for giving the USDA equivalents for the UK. It’s always been a question while I’m watching UK based garden shows. I’m gardening in zone 9 as well, but in the Houston, TX metro area so my summer temps are well above your average, although you seem to be getting a taste of my usual temps this year. Summer can be a bit rough on the full sun borders this time of year, although I have a plan for a gray-watering system that should help in the future. I tend to use a lot of native plants even in my cottage garden border, since they’re better suited to the weather. I love that your Byzantine glads are still blooming. I get them for a few weeks in spring and then they’re gone until next year.
They're such a joy, but fleeting as you say, mine all gone now too.
So good! Thank you!
Thank you so much for the practical tips on deadheading. It's interesting to hear you say, it seems as much a matter of how you want your garden to develop and how you personally use your garden, as it is a matter of "when" to deadhead. I am forever questioning when to deadhead my hydrangeas, in the early Spring or in the Fall. I've experimented the past few seasons pruning some identical hydrangea plants in Spring, others in Fall. I am happy to report, there is virtually no difference in the next season's product. Thanks again from Niagara Falls, Ontario.
Thank you. I take some of my hydrangea heads off in autumn, too, it depends on whether the flowers hold together nicely and look gorgeous in frost (in which case I leave them on), but some just seem to fall apart and might as well come off earlier. It's good to hear there's no difference in the next year's flowers
What an interesting & informative video. THANKS!
Glad you enjoyed it!
@@TheMiddlesizedGarden You are most welcome. Apologies...ua-cam.com/video/3SM9hgvlBaY/v-deo.html - my latest yard video
Thank You
Wonderful 👍🏻
What an informative video :-) We are plagued by couch grass in our beds. They've got the better of us this year, I'm afraid.
It's really difficult to deal with, I know.
I’m in Maine in the USA. And I am dead heading just barely because our spring has been so delayed and the flowers are just now starting to go by. But some things are just not there yet either so I hadn’t thought about which plants I don’t deadhead but I don’t deadhead my wild roses I have several mille Fleur and the birds love them and nest in them and feed over the winter on the rose hips so I just judiciously get rid of them where they aren’t wanted but they are difficult to keep down and so I’ve been using my hedge trimmers to just weed whack the top off and trim down the sides after the nesting season which I think is coming to an end. I also don’t deadhead my sedums I have Matrona sedum‘s which I like the seed heads in the winter they have a sturdy stock and will stay up all through the whole winter no matter how much snow we have. Good tips and research thank you.
Thank you, and absolutely sedums are so beautiful in winter so definitely not ones to deadhead.
Very informative 🙏🏻I will subscribe!.
Thank you!
I didn't know you had to pinch out cosmos - the ones at my front door are over 4ft tall on spindly, arched stems with big purple flowers. Not quite the look I was seeking, but they do make quite an impression!
4ft is impressive
I’m one of those new - ‘covid19 gardener’ 😀 - I absolutely love gardening my small 8m square townhouse garden.
I would add pruning the crazy climbers to your summer list. I set aside a day every week to keep control, pest and fungal check my grape vine, x3 passifloras, x3 jasmines, x4 clematis, x5 honeysuckles and various climbing roses as well as an assortment of scrambling berries!
The thugs are Passifloras and Montanas.
Absolutely. What a lovely collection of climbers you have.
LOVE THIS
thank you
Its 106 degrees and a drought here in the south zone 8a ..... I'm just trying to keep things alive including shrubs and trees.
Loved the helpful video as always! I find deadheading very relaxing and I feel it makes my garden look refreshed and my plants do so much better if I deadhead. I garden in Virginia USDA Zone 6