Container gardening, Landscaping decor

Stunning Flowerpots

Creating stunning flowerpots for your patio or front yard takes three things: a thriller, a filler, and a spiller. A thriller is the tallest plant in the center of the pot with colorful foliage or flowers. The spiller is the plants around the outside that spill over the lip of the pot. The filler is the plant that fills in the pot, shorter than the thriller plant. If the container is viewed just on one side, the triller plant is placed on the backside of the pot.

As for the color palette, go bold with either leaf or flower color. You will want to contrast your colors from the triller plant to the spiller plants. Go with the reds, oranges, and yellows.

Dahlia and petunias

The main thing to keep in mind is if the pot will be in the shade or sun, so use the plants accordingly. Coleus, impatiens, begonias, and many vines will thrive in shade. Do not forget that ornamental grasses make a good pot choice.

Tuberous begonia

You can use your imagination on what to use as a flowerpot from cattle tanks, and wooden crates, to an old fountain. Usually, the larger the pot the better, you will be watering it less. They are also heavy and not prone to the wind tipping them over. Just make sure they have drainage holes.

Fountain grass

Place the pots at your front door which creates a sense of destination. Pots in flowerbeds give the dimension of height.

Flowers (annual and perennial), Vegetables

Hardening Off

Have you bought plants at the greenhouse, set them out in the garden or flowerbed and they died? It is the same as you wintering in your house then going outside on a nice spring day and ending up with one heck of a sunburn. Plants are the same in which they will get burnt by the sun because their tissues are soft from growing in a protective environment. Wind will whip their stems along with “burning” their soft leaves. The solution is called “hardening off” where you gradually toughen the plant.

Set them in dappled shade for a couple of days then move them to a sunny place for a couple of more days. Take them inside if the night gets under 50 degrees. Make sure to water them every day. I use a cold frame to place the plants after growing under lights in the house. Gradually I place the plants into another cold frame in the sun. If the nights get cold, I cover the boxes.

If you are in a hurry, make sure you plant on an upcoming cloudy, cool day or several cool days. My mother used to place cutout coffee cans around the little plants to shade and protect them from cutworms. Some use a couple of shingles placed on the south and west of the plant.

Growing vine crops is easy. I start the seeds indoors in 3 or 4-inch peat pots. As soon as they emerge, I move them out to the cold frame. After they get their first or second true leave, I move them to the garden.

Rural life

Wood Cooking

There is nothing like using wood when you are grilling. Wood cooking goes back to the stone age. Now it has become an art. Using different types of woods gives different flavors to what you are cooking or smoking.

Like slow cooking hickory being a hardwood stands up to large cuts of meat like briskets and whole fowl. It has a spicy, smoky profile giving the strongest, smokey taste.

  • Oak is a level below hickory for smoky flavor. Good for any meat which you want a smoky flavor.
  • Maple is good for vegetables especially corn on the cob. It gives a mild, sweet flavor. Sugar maple is used mainly for turkey.
  • Alder is milder than hickory and gives smaller cuts of meat particularly fish a subtle flavor.
  • Applewood gives a mild, sweet flavor to white meats like pork, poultry, and fish.
  • Cherry like apple gives a sweet, fruity flavor to lamb, beef, and gamey meat. Also great for steak.
  • Pecan gives more of a nutty flavor which is good for chicken.
  • Mesquite is the most concentrated, earthly smoke you will have. Like hickory, used for large cuts of meat.
  • Apricot is like hickory but not as strong and sweeter.
  • Black walnut and chokecherry have a bitter flavor. They are used to mix with other woods.
  • Citrus wood will give a milder, fruity flavor compared to an apple or cherry.
  • Lilac is used in Europe for smoking cheeses. It produces a mild, sweet smoke that goes well with poultry and pork.
  • Plum and pearwood give a fruity, mild flavor.
  • What some of you do not know is cottonwood can be used to give a mild smoke for those that do not have a strong smoky smell or taste. The Sioux used cottonwood to remove some of the gamey taste of the bison meat. As with all woods, avoid greenwood.

How much smoke do you want is often a trial by error. So before cutting any hardwood tree down, maybe you might make use of wood by placing it in your grilling recipe.