Hi, I just inherited my wife Peho's 20 year old perennial gardens. She died last August and I feel compelled to keep them up. They meant so much to her. Problem is, I'm a golfer, not a gardener. But I'm willing to learn. First big challenge is telling weeds from flowers. I had a knowledgable person here on Saturday and got some tips. But in clearing out the dead stuff from last year I'm petrified I'm going to tear out flowers. To make it more difficult, my wife didn't believe in edging, so the perennial beds - there are around 8 of them - all just kind of merge with the lawn. And she didn't believe in pristine lawns either, so the bed and lawn just kind of merge. She believed in having a garden where flowers bloomed from early spring right into the fall. And they did. It was (and hopefully will continue to be) a beautiful garden. There are probably more than 100 different varieties. We identified around 25 in one bed alone o Saturday. Anyway, back to my problem. If someone can direct me to a website that deals with the question "Is it a weed or a flower" I would appreciate it. Thanks in advance and I'm sure I'll be back with lots of questions. Peho's Garden
Depends on where you are. Some weeds are flowers in other parts of the world. Take the guidance from your friend, be observant of other gardens and ask your nursery people by showing them samples. Sounds like your wife had a wonderful free wheeling garden. I would be very suprised if you could do too much damage to it. This web site may help but it seems you are going to need some names. However there are pictures and culture notes for perennials. (come back year after year.) http://www.perennials.com/ http://www.gardenexpress.com.au/ind...lb_IDandDepth/Bulb_IDandDepth.html&lang=en-us Liz
I hope it's alright to give some advice beyond the original question (and yes, please post here with your questions re: plant ID). My thoughts are that you should let the garden run somewhat rampant for a year while you identify / tag / demarcate which things in the garden you associate with the happiest memories, whether it be particular flowers or plants or certain parts of the garden. You may find after the first year that you enjoy gardening as a pastime and are willing to keep all of it up (if so, bravo!). If not, and you decide that you'd like to reduce the maintenance (and perennial gardens are particularly high maintenance), then you've identified that which is most precious, and can plan to scale back the garden to a size that's right for you and your ability to invest time in it while keeping the best of it in memory of your wife.
Excellent recommendation... and how about some pics of Peho's Garden, say, every 3 weeks? Congratulations on your wish to preserve what was important to her.
And this site does have a plant identification forum, as you must know by now. Feel free to post questions there, with pictures preferrably. I know of a number of experts here who can identify most plants, whether they are weeds or ornamentals.
One thing you can make note of is repetitions. A plant that is repeating in many places, including through the lawn, is probably a weed in the garden, whether it is classified that way in the gardening literature or not. Also, something that is obviously prolific is something you can count on seeing again - if it self-seeded to a number of locations already, then there is likely more unsprouted seed around the area that will sprout again. I agree with Daniel that making note of plants you particularly want to save or protect is a good idea. You could shell out for some of those nice metal plant tags that you write on with pencil if the plants are not already labelled. That will save you pulling them up by accident. You can just write things like "big pink flower" on them if you don't know the names. The other thing you might pick up is a book on perennials. I find the Expert Series by DG Hessayon quite good, they are for sale in most garden centres if not in a bookstore. Good luck!
