Location: a secret lab on the shores of lake titicaca
Posts: 23,061
LADIES HELP ME OUT HERE!
since the women seem to be the flower gardening experts
(that aint sexist. thats the way it is)
we have had heavy frost already.
and my flower garden is brown and about 3 feet tall.
can i just take a weedeater to it down to where it is still green?
the short plants will stay green for a long time yet.
__________________ "I don't practice what I preach because I'm not the kind of person I'm preaching to."
If your plants are perennials & are done blooming for the year, go ahead & prune them to about 1/2 feet above the ground (although I will prune them to where they just stick out of the ground)...if they are late bloomers (late summer & into fall), & if you still get pretty warm days, then you may want to cover them at night with something like old sheets, towels, etc. to keep the frost off.
__________________ Love the earth...Love the creator.(Rom. 20:1)
since the women seem to be the flower gardening experts
(that aint sexist. thats the way it is)
we have had heavy frost already.
and my flower garden is brown and about 3 feet tall.
can i just take a weedeater to it down to where it is still green?
the short plants will stay green for a long time yet.
I'm new here and I am a happly married man that doesn't have sugar in my bricthes. I LOVE GARDENING. I do all my plant care around the house, my wife tryes but has a hard time keeping some plants alive. I was given the gift of a green thumb by my Grand mother. Anyway If your pernnials flowers have died back you should remove any dead foliage because of dieases and pest that can over winter.
Location: a secret lab on the shores of lake titicaca
Posts: 23,061
i cut em down and let em rot along with any cottonwood leaves that fell there.
the first sweet williams are blooming!
i love those. they are so pretty.
__________________ "I don't practice what I preach because I'm not the kind of person I'm preaching to."
Cutting back perenials with a weedeater is def a single guy way to go! I have worked in greenhouse and garden industry much of my life, but still leave the flower choices to the wife! Although once we get em' its my job to keep everything she chooses alive and plant in proper locations!
Ya cant go wrong with the wildflower patches Billy. They are easy on eyes, low maintenance and look like you meant do something. Always a good choice for a man.
I can give you tips but wont wear a skirt and dont call me a lady... my wife will get mad LOL.... of course if I found I camo skirt in my size I may be tempted LMAO
__________________ Most of my life I've spent hunting,... the rest of it I've just wasted
Location: a secret lab on the shores of lake titicaca
Posts: 23,061
this year i am doing the DARWIN approach to gardening.
it is well established.
i am just going to let it do whatever it wants.
no weeding,
no nothing but water.
__________________ "I don't practice what I preach because I'm not the kind of person I'm preaching to."
One piece of advice from a guy whose wife spent the four day weekend redesigning an area from a patch of pachysandra into a garden: go to your local nursery and buy perennials suitable for your soil and sun conditions. You don't have to buy a lot.
Her Imperial Majesty hasn't paid money for flowers or ground cover in a decade. Example: she paid $24 for a variety of hosta with HUGE (like a square foot each) leaves. She bought one of these and waited two years, then divided it. New we have about eight of them growing at various places in full shade.
Another example: she bought one groundcover plant that has ivy-shaped leaves but is green and white. That was six years ago and the thing has turned into The Groundcover That Ate Cincinatti. It's choking the hostas out of the front garden, has colonized two garden patches ten feet away and has invaded the gravel walk and slithered out from under the stone border onto the front walk. She just traces each stalk back to its roots and moves it to someplace she wants ground cover.
Same thing with a succulent (whatever that is; all I know is you can't eat it and you can't use it to season food) she got from her BFF. She brought home one measly sprig and today we have the stuff in hald a dozen places, including at least three where she never planted it.
My contribution to this is to chip all the leaves and winter debris and turn it into humus with an ancient Kemp 5 HP chipper, which is a lot harder to do than it sounds. For some reason, although she understands the theory she can't make a humus pile yield humus properly. Plus which, she's scared of the chipper - well, I am too, but not so much I can't deal with it.
I just wish she'd plant at least SOMETHING that was edible!
LADIES HELP ME OUT HERE! 
