We can all benefit from an additional dose of chi or life force. Feng Shui experts recommend houseplants to increase the chi around us, boosting our energy levels and drawing good vibes. While cut flowers can do the trick in the short term, it is best to throw them out once they start wilting and their life force starts to diminish.

They absorb carbon dioxide and produce oxygen. In addition to creating oxygen-rich environments potted ones in the house or work environment have been credited with absorbing harmful volatile organic compounds like formaldehyde, benzene and trichloroethylene which are given off by carpets, upholstery, wall paints, and office printers and photocopiers. These toxins are drawn through the plant to the roots, where they are broken down for food in the soil.

Germs thrive in poorly ventilated, air-conditioned and or heated premises. These environments dry out nasal passages and throats leaving them more susceptible to infections like coughs and colds. You could buy a humidifier to solve the issue, but leafy ones are cheaper and more fun. Potted ones have been documented to increase the moisture around them by as much as per cent.

If your workspace has you feeling bogged down some flowing ones can add some cheer and increase your wellbeing with bright cheery colours. Researchers from around the world have recorded that having these in pots around puts us in a better mood, raising dopamine levels. Dopamine regulates our ability to process the information. Begonias or hybrid azaleas are a welcome addition to any room or workspace in need of brightening up.

Why use air-fresheners to keep your surroundings fresh when they can do the job just as well? Rose or lemon scented geraniums can have you feeling like you’re in a garden. Rosemary enhances alertness and concentration and you can always pick a few leaves and use them for a pick-me-up herbal tea.

To make sure they thrive, ask at your local plant nursery or garden center which ones are suitable for indoors. You can switch them around every so often to make sure they get enough direct sunlight.

Houseplants are great companions cause they won’t nag about your choice of music or tell you their problems, though they may well listen to yours. So if you can’t afford to redecorate, cheer up your home with a houseplant or two.

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Do mosquito plants do the trick?

In short, yes. Before I divulge into that though, let?s look at the background of mosquito plants.

The mosquito plants has two main ingredients in it. Made from citronella grass and scented geranium, it gives out an odor that keeps the mosquitoes far away. These are sold right before the summer months across the world.

When buying mosquito plants, you need to think of where you want to put them. Most claim they work the best in areas with a lot of people walking. The odors are put out at a higher rate with such interaction.

Bug sprays are usually made from chemicals, but rubbing the oil of the mosquito plant on you can act as a natural spray. The only thing I suggest though is you test to make sure you are not allergic to the product.

Planting a new mosquito plant also needs to be done somewhere that is warm and dry. This is so it will grow to be big, thus putting out more mosquito repellent.

The cost of these mosquito plants vary depending on the size you want. A small one can cost just 5 dollars, while big ones cost around 50 dollars. These are available at all the local nurseries and green houses.

Surprisingly, online retailers sell these plants as well, and for very cheap. They will ship them to quickly and safely as well. This comes in handy if your local nursery is a little low on inventory.

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One of the advantages of garden ready plants is that there is no root disturbance when the plants are potted on, and Garden ready plants are easy to look after. They can be planted directly into pots and hanging baskets, but should not be placed outdoors until after the risk of frost has passed.

When you receive our garden ready plants they will usually measure approximately 610cm in height from the root of the plant to the top of the stem. Garden Ready Plants are also swell value with prices frequently starting from as little as ?9.99 for 50 plants. The price per plant can be from as little as 5p each, which is great!

Garden Ready Plants are supplied in a variety of summer and winter flowering plants. Summer flowering garden ready plants are usually despatched by gardeningsuppliers in the Spring. The varieties include geranium plants Begonia, Impatiens, Antirrhinum, Pansy, Petunia, Lobelia and more. Most varieties will begin to flower from May through to the first frost.

Winter flowering garden ready plants are usually ready in the autumn. Varieties include Wallflower, Primrose, Pansy, Viola, Sweet William, Polyanthus and more. The majority of varieties will flower from the autumn through to the spring and bring lots of colour to your winter garden.

When your garden ready plants come -

• Upon arrival, keep the trays inside in a well-lit, draught free area for 24 hours.
• If the compost is dry, stand the tray in shallow water. If you can’t water from beneath, spray water lightly over the tray, and then place in a position where there is adequate airflow to dry the excess water from the leaves.
• Once the compost is moist allow the tray to drain.
• There may be some loose compost or a yellowing of the leaves which is due to the plants being shipped. This will not impact condition of the mature plants.

Growing On -

• Water the plants approximately 1-2 hours prior to growing on.
• Carefully remove the garden ready plants from the tray by pushing up from the bottom using a pencil or something similar.
• Transfer the plants into small pots or seed trays filled with good multi purpose compost.
• Water the plants well once, and then do not water again until the compost is nearly dry or the plants are wilting.
• Place the plants in a warm well-lit area but out of direct sunlight.
• Apply a liquid fertiliser after 2-3 weeks.
• If there is a risk of frost pot on the plants and keep them indoors until the risk of frost has passed.

Planting Out -

• Once the risk of frost has gone your bedding plants are then ready to be planted outside.
• Harden off the plants prior to planting out, by placing the plants outside during the day and bringing in at night for 2 weeks.
• Water plants 12 hours prior to planting out
• Once planted be sure to water the plants well.
• To establish the growth of your young plants, it is very important that you water regularly especially during dry sunny spells and again in late evening.
• If after planting out there is a risk of frost, cover the plants at night with an old sheet.

“If only I had a little home greenhouse, or some space that could be converted into a hothouse…” she remarked one day while her daughter and son-in-law were visiting.

“How about a small greenhouse built onto the back corner of the house? You hardly ever use that outside cellar entrance…” and Bill Pyle, her son-in-law, began to draw on a scrap of paper a plan for the kind of greenhouse he had in mind. Mrs. Phelps agreed that it was a good idea, and so the project was started.

The vertical cellar door was removed, and the rickety, steep wooden stairs which had always seemed hazardous anyway, were thrown out. The frame of the greenhouse was built around that former doorway with 2″” x 4″” lumber, measuring 9 feet in width, three feet in height against the wall of the house, and diagonally forward the length of a regulation coldframe sash, which is six feet. The most expensive purchase the Phelps made were the three regulation coldframe sashes, equipped with small panes of glass that slide in and out easily.

With the frame and foundation of the greenhouse completed, the three glass sashes were fitted into place, and the two end sashes were nailed fast. The middle glass sash was put on hinges so that it opens up and outward.

Wooden shingles were nailed around the frames of the sashes, making the entire top of the greenhouse weatherproof. The right side of the greenhouse used the chimney for a wall, and where it extended beyond the chimney, the shingles were nailed solidly into place to cover the corner completely.

The left side of the greenhouse was shingled too, except for a space 29″” wide and 31″” high. A removable window-frame was built for this space (29″” x 31″”), and fitted with a pane of window glass. After the cat broke this window on a cold night when he tried to get into the cellar, chicken wiring was put on this removable window when it was repaired. Roofing compound was poured into all crevices and cracks, especially where the shingles of the greenhouse met the stone wall of the house, making the greenhouse completely watertight.

The inside of the greenhouse has three wooden shelves, each measuring eight feet in length and 24 inches in width. On the top shelf are kept all the succulents and begonias. The middle shelf is used by this gardener for potting and as a working shelf. Mrs. Phelps calls the bottom shelf, “the sleeping shelf,” for here are the geraniums and the amaryllis, dahlia, gladiolus and canna bulbs, as well as other plants like the mandevilla plant that sleep all Winter.

The Phelps’s old stone house has a hot-air heating system so that the cellar is just as warm and often warmer than the rest of the house.

“It’s amazing how much warmth that Winter sun radiates through those panes of glass,” Mrs. phlelps tells friends when they ask how she keeps the greenhouse warm enough all Winter without any special heating system. The thermometer registers 50 to 55 degrees all Winter long.

An old goose-neck lamp which Mrs. Phelps painted white so that it is easily seen, is the only additional heat used in the greenhouse, and that only in 12 degrees to zero weather. The bulb in this lamp is the regular infrared type, familiarly called a sunlamp. When the temperature in the greenhouse drops, Mrs. Phelps lights the lamp (which she puts on a stepladder) so that the bulb faces up toward the windows of the greenhouse, and then the heat reflects downward.

This greenhouse has good humidity, for the cellar wall is stone, and when it is wet down with a water hose, this wall throws off the necessary moisture so hard to achieve in the rest of the house during the Winter months. Because this part of the cellar floor had never been finished off with cement, cinders were spread over the old dirt floor.

“That greenhouse takes a terrific beating from Winter weather,” Mrs. Phelps explains when people say they couldn’t have a similar arrangement because their homes do not face in the “proper direction”. The Phelps house faces southeast, and with the greenhouse built against the back corner of the house, northwestern winds have fall play. While the greenhouse does get the afternoon sun, it also gets a full share of wild North winds and Pennsylvania Winter weather. For that reason, there are always some extra panes of glass stored in the Phelps household. Falling icicles often cause breakage, and as long as the little glass panes are on hand, it’s an easy matter to slip them into place when needed.

With the return of Spring and warm weather, the plants, bulbs and foliage Are taken out of doors and the greenhouse is fumigated. Mrs. Phelps hangs a bed sheet in the opening that leads from the greenhouse to the rest of the cellar, thus closing off the fumes. The greenhouse is sprayed with a chemical to kill all fungi, and is aired during the Summer by leaving the middle and side windows open.

“The most wonderful part of having such a greenhouse is the fact that you have foliage all Winter long for indoor arrangements.” Mrs. Phelps says.

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If you start daylily (hemerocallis) seeds in the greenhouse in November or early December, it is possible to have some of the seedlings flower by August or early September of the following year. The bulk of them will take two years to flower, but garden grown seedlings take a full three years to mature. The iris hybridizer can lop months off maturing time.

There are two methods of planting and caring for seeds of dormant or northern varieties of daylilies. Most of the southern varieties (evergreen) are too tender for harsh northern winters.

With the first method, prepare flats of good soil containing at least one third peat moss. Plant the seeds about one-quarter inch deep. Cover them lightly with soil. Moisten the planting and set it outside to freeze. This is known as stratification. If you want to plant a large number of seeds, stack the planted flats one on top of the other.

After the soil has frozen (about two weeks) bring the planted flats into the cool greenhouse. The seeds won’t need light to germinate, but when you notice green blades dotting the surface, (usually a week or two with daylilies), longer with irises, start giving the seedlings light. I have had good success using fluorescent grow lights.

Keep them moist and give them biweekly feedings of one-quarter teaspoonful of muriate of potash to a quart of water, along with their regular monthly feeding of an all purpose fertilizer.

Method number two is just fine when you garden in small quarters or when the seeds you are working with may be a bit on the old side.

Fill ice cube trays in your refrigerator about half full of water. When the ice forms, add a few seeds to each cube, then fill with water. With this procedure the seeds will not float on the surface of the water.

Leave them in the trays about a week, then thaw them out and plant in well drained bulb pans or small flats of good soil. This too works well with iris seeds (other than the Louisiana irises).

If you don’t have a greenhouse, try growing some of them under 40-watt fluorescent lights. They should be placed up close to the tubes-four to six inches away if possible.

When danger from frost is past, plant the seedlings in the garden.

If you failed to pollinate your own plants, purchase seeds from one of the specialists. Unless you have excellent stock, you will get superior seeds from them. You’ll be amazed at the array of color and form you can obtain from one packet of daylily or iris seeds.

Of course, the greenhouse is just made for hybridizing African violets, amaryllis, begonias, geraniums, gloxinias and many other exciting house plants and perennials. In the greenhouse it is possible to provide them with optimum conditions of temperature, moisture, light and space.

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Nevertheless, I’ve discovered an perfect method to enable thwart among essentially the most time-consuming chores in the garden – that of weeding.

This came about nearly by accident, as I’ve a cat who thinks that any uncovered ground can be a glorious litter tray! I speedily had to find a solution to include up as much of the soil as feasible, but soon realised that soil cover facilities gave me the even greater benefit of vastly reducing the number of weeds.

Naturally, there are lots of gardeners who take pleasure in the time spent weeding, and I admire them tremendously – you will find fantastic physical and mental benefits to spending time outdoors among your plants.

But for those of us whose time spent inside garden must be limited because of work commitments or perhaps physical limitations, there is usually a solution to get pleasure from our vegetation having a minimum of fuss. Naturally, time has to become spent on the initial terrain preparation and planting, on the other hand, this would probably carry far less time than laying decking and gravel!

Weeds are good survivors and they extremely swiftly consider above any bare patch of soil. As soon as they acquire hold they are able to really quickly smother existing plants and turn out to be notoriously challenging to obtain rid of.

So the idea would be to find factories that form dense clumps or spread via their roots to cover the ground. As with most plants, you’ll find terrain include facilities for each season when they’re at their greatest, and some that look great all year round.

One particular word of caution. Since some of these vegetation spread quickly – which is needless to say what we want – they also do not in fact know when to stop! So you could possibly need to cut them back occasionally to keep them within their allotted space.

What to plant?

I have discovered that vegetation just like bugle (ajuga) – you are able to get plants with purple, bronze or variegated foliage; euphorbia – with stunning acid-green flowers in early to late spring; lesser periwinkle (vinca minor); bergenias – frequently identified as elephant’s ears; as well as small-leaved variegated ivies, all present year round terrain cover. Yet another benefit of these particular factories is that they’re also slug and snail resistant!

In spring and summer, you can use aubretia, arabis, alyssum and candytuft (iberis), which all hug the ground. And particularly useful, and providing some height to a border, is aquilegia – the old-fashioned cottage garden wide variety – which immediately after flowering retains its foliage in attractive clumps. They also self-seed prolifically, giving you added factories every single year.

One more favourite plant of mine is the hardy geranium. Some varieties do die down from the winter – weeds do not develop significantly then anyway – but the factories soon romp away in spring and offer floor cover and masses of flowers all summer.

Other practical factories to use for soil cover are herbs. Among a wide wide variety to select from are comfrey, feverfew, catmint, golden marjoram and mallow.

So there you’ve it! After your floor include crops are established, you’ll no longer need to devote hours on your knees, but can invest top quality time within your garden.

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A pergola makes a striking accent to any landscaping theme; not only are they eye-catching, but functional too. Depending on their size, pergolas often turn out to be an extension of the primary home, and may be utilized for entertaining, dining, or like a getaway or quiet oasis for reading or enjoying morning coffee.

Tips for Pergolas:

1. The most typical version is really a simple post construction with wood cross-pieces or lattice for the roof, and employed to cover a deck or patio. It could be painted or stained, and accented with lighting, plants, and other accessories.

2. Install your pergola along the whole length of the house, similar to an awning. It can extend out farther at different points to generate interest and seating areas underneath.

3. Use it to cover a hot tub.

4. Location inside a random region from the yard to generate a shady area to escape in the afternoon sun. Add a nice small bench, and plant climbing roses or other scented vines nearby. Cover it with tin or shingles, to create additional coverage.

5. Create road appeal by placing your pergola over a front porch in location of a regular roof. Paint or stain it the same color as your shutters or house trim. It won’t entirely keep out the rain, but it will offer a certain amount of shelter, and create an impressive entrance.

6. Instead of the standard lattice look on the roof, use strips of bamboo placed side by side. It creates extra shade and gives the structure a twig furniture search.

7. Your pergola may be the ideal place let those showy vines grow wild; creating a thick natural canopy. Vines that work properly contain Hops, Wisteria, Jade, Grapes, Morning Glory, Cypress, and numerous types of climbing roses. It’s also a fantastic spot to develop vegetables such as peas or Scarlett Runner Beans.

8. Give your pergola some model by adding architectural accents for instance a curved top, cylindrical wooden column supports, or design a top that flows using the roof lines of one’s property.

9. Dress up the open sides with outdoor fabric curtains, bamboo shades, or a manicured Boxwood hedge.

10. Use your pergola to produce a garden filled with your favorite shade-loving plants. You might desire to try Hostas, Bleeding Hearts, Yellow Corydalis, Bigroot Geranium, Monkshood or Lungwort.

11. Give your pergola a rustic appear by making use of rough logs and unstained beams. Weave willow or alder twigs within the roof and display your twig furniture below.

12. A pergola could be the ideal spot for that hanging swing, chair or hammock. Add a small table, a cool drink, a great book, and you’ve got the perfect recipe for a lazy afternoon.

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Perennial plants grow on, year after year, as compared to annuals, which bloom and die in a single season, and biennials, which complete their life cycle in two seasons. Woody plants are perennial; but when gardeners say “perennial” in reference to flowering plants, usually those that die to the ground each year, that brighten our beds and borders from spring until fall.

A perennial plant that freezes back each fall is called a herbaceous perennial. Examples are garden peonies, balloon-flowers and Japanese anemones. Not all herbaceous perennials stay green until frost; some die back soon after flowering, as Oriental poppies and Virginia bluebells. Other nonwoody perennials may be evergreen, at least in certain climates; the hellebores, Shasta daisies, certain day-lilies and statice often maintain at least a rosette of green foliage through most of the winter.

Begonias, pelargoniums (garden geraniums), shrimp plant and several other “annual” bedding plants are quite perennial, perhaps even semi-woody, in their tropical, native habitats. Snapdragons and petunias frequently go on for two or more years in the Pacific Northwest.

We have to think of perennial plants in two ways: how they behave in our gardens and how they behave in the place where they grow natively. Perennials are the backbone of the garden. In a rock garden, almost every plant is a perennial. Most of the flowers in the wild garden are perennial. Our lilies, daffodils, hyacinths, tulips, crocuses and similar dependable bulbs, corms and tubers, are, of course, perennials. So are the more tender sorts, as dahlias, gladiolus, acidanthera, cannas and crocosmia; obviously, these go on year after year. But they cannot stand frost. It is hard to think of a home garden without perennial flowers. Perennials mean home gardening.

A careful selection of perennials provides flowers month after month. Very early in the spring the low-growing perennials begin to bloom. Hellebores often bloom in the snow; in the rock garden arabis species, the earliest dianthuses, some primroses and candytufts come out in March or early April. At the same time, marsh-marigold and skunk-cabbage blossom in the bog garden and a few miniature irises bloom in the border. In most climates the greatest showing of perennials comes through May, June and July. Autumn is climaxed by displays of chrysanthemums, Michaelmas daisies, the artemisias and Japanese anemones.

When working up a landscape plan, contrive various habitats. The perennial border gets full sun and requires a well-drained site. Two or three closely planted shade trees, closed in toward the east, south and west by low-growing, trees such as dogwood, redbud or black-haw, provide a site for the woodland and woods wild-flower garden.

If you are lucky enough to have a low place where the ground is soggy throughout the year, you may make a bog garden, with or without a pond for aquatic perennials. A rock garden is a wonderful thing provided you have the time to maintain it; quite a few rock-garden perennials thrive in a properly laid-up dry wall and the maintenance is very light. By all means, contrive growing sites for perennials.

Perennial plants have strong root systems. Going on, year after year, the roots of perennials grow outward toward moisture and nutrients. Some perennial plants develop at the ground line a mass of stem-root tissue, more or less well defined, called a crown. Delphinium crowns, for example, are somewhat woody, producing thick, very tender shoots above and rather weak but longish roots below. Summer phlox and hardy aster crowns become extremely woody with age; so woody, in fact, that movement of water and minerals from roots to shoots is retarded, and bloom becomes poor. The crowns of primulas and forget-me-nots remain soft.

Other perennials do not have well-organized crowns, but thickened, fairly woody main roots. Garden peonies, old-fashioned bleeding-heart and false indigo roots are intertwined and tangled, thick, becoming woody with age; these produce strong buds (eyes) near the soil surface that grow into flowering shoots. Smaller, fibrous roots extend outward from the thickened roots, and these absorb water and nutrients.

Some perennials produce more or less thickened, fleshy stems that creep horizontally just at the ground line. Iris rhizomes are typical. When a creeping rootstock is soft and fleshy, it is subject to decay. Plants with fleshy rhizomes need very well-drained soil. Rootstocks and rhizomes of aquatic plants usually are tough, sometimes woody. Cat-tails, sweet flag, water-willow, pickerelweed and the aquatic irises all have these ropy or woody creeping stems, with a mass of fibrous roots beneath.

Border perennial stems usually rise straight up from the crown or from the roots. Sturdy, well-spaced stems produce masses of large-sized, long-lasting flowers. On older clumps, when the leafy shoots are half-developed, clip out (at the base) all weak stems; it usually pays to remove half of the remaining stems on perennial clumps older than three years. For strong bloom and healthy plants lift and divide border perennials every fourth or fifth year. Some perennials resent disturbance, however; peonies, hostas, the gasplant and bleeding-heart make little or no bloom for two or three years after being lifted. Woodland and aquatic perennial stems usually are not thinned.

Perennials bloom in many ways; delphiniums, lupines and holly-hocks produce flowers on a strong vertical stem. While most of the perennials with flowers in spikes bloom from the bottom upward, a few, notably the Liatris species, bloom from the top downward. Other perennials bloom with flowers in close-set panicles or clusters, as summer phlox; still others bear flowers in looser clusters, as coral-bells, or in very open sprays, as columbine. A few perennials bloom on unbranched stems, or with branching limited to second-crop flowers that originate low on the stem of the primary flower, as Shasta daisy. Remove flower heads of perennials as quickly as blooms fade, to prevent seed formation, which saps the strength of the plant.

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The most important factors are your hardiness zone and the sunlight conditions. It’s possible to use perennials that are outside of your zone, but they should be considered annuals and won’t last more than one season. Whether you have dug the garden out yet or not, make a note of where the sun shines in the yard, especially which areas get full sun and which are shady all day long.

Before you decide which flowers to put where, consider the type of garden you enjoy. Is it whimsical English country gardens or ordered Japanese types? Will you want all of the plants to be spaced well or can they grow into each other with abandon? How about a purpose? Would you like to include herbs for smell and culinary use? Or are you hoping to attract birds, butterflies and other wildlife? Decide what the overall goal and feel is that you are looking to achieve.

Plant size makes a big difference when learning how to design a flower garden. When you’re starting a bed from scratch, you may be tempted to fill every spot in an effort to have maximum impact in the first season. This will backfire and cause you much more work in the end. Space out your perennials following the instructions on the plant tags and fill in the gaps with annuals. You’ll have color and beauty for the first year and leave your perennials plenty of room to grow into their spot next season.

Normally you plant taller types of flowers in the middle of floating beds and against the back of border gardens. Shorter, smaller species fill up the area to the edge of the beds. Why not shake that rule up a little as you open the season? Try planting spring bloomers like bulbs or violets near the middle or at the back. They will be beautiful as the other plants just wake up and then the dying foliage will be covered later on. Experiment and see what works for your space.

Most gardeners aim for a three season show, with something blooming from April to October and even into November if possible. Choose your plantings with bloom time in mind and group flowers that will follow each other together. Spring bulbs like tulips and daffodils are covered well by daisies, perennial geraniums and other summer bloomers. Then aim for those late fall bulbs or colder weather bloomers, such as the obedient plant or English asters.

Butterflies are attracted to bright, open face blooms like daisies and Echinacea. Hummingbirds go for the elongated, trumpet-shaped blossoms, especially in bright red colors. Scatter these flowers throughout your garden in the proper spots to bring these fanciful visitors to your home.

To plant the flower bed you’ve always wanted, be sure you take the time to properly design a flower garden. You won’t be disappointed with the results.

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In Northern United States and Canada

There is still time to plant evergreens. As long as you do this before the new growth is excessively far advanced, and as long as they have a good root ball and are mulched and well watered after planting, they will live and prosper. May is a good time to transplant Magnolias and Tulip trees. Continue to make sowings of hardy annuals and vegetables. As soon as the weather is settled and the ground reasonably warm, make sowings of Corn, Cucumbers, Melons, Squash, Snap Beans and Lima Beans.

When danger of cool nights has passed, set out Tomatoes, Peppers, Eggplants and green Dahlia plants. Geraniums, Heliotropes, Lantanas, Coleus, Cannas, Caladiums and Begonias may be planted outdoors late this month or early in June. Make successional plantings of Gladioli, Montbretias and Tuberoses. Don’t cut off the foliage of Spring-flowering bulbs until it has died completely.

If dry weather prevails, Peas, Sweet Peas and many other garden plants will benefit from copious watering. Remember especially regularly to water trees, shrubs and evergreens planted this Spring. Chrysanthemums, Summer Phlox and some other perennials that tend to grow excessively tall and lanky may be induced to bush out if the tips of their growing shoots are pinched out.

Peony flowers will be larger and more perfect if you disbud them by taking off the side buds when they are the size of small peas. Don’t delay the staking and tying of perennials. Toward the end of the month is a good time to sow seeds of perennials and biennials in a coldframe or sheltered seed bed outdoors. After they have bloomed is a good time to propagate by division Creeping Phlox, Arabis, Polyanthus Primroses and many other rock garden plants.

Thin out young plants of vegetables and annuals that are crowding each other, and keep the hoe and cultivator busy stirring the surface soil. Do whatever pruning is needed to Spring-flowering trees and shrubs as soon as they are through flowering. Poinsettias should now be brought out of storage and started into growth. Continue to feed both greenhouse plants and house plants which have filled their containers with healthy roots.

In the South

Fertilize Roses to stimulate new vigorous growth that will bear a second flush of flowers in early Summer. Mow lawns regularly and fertilize them lightly when the grass is dry. Water copiously if long spells of dry weather occur.

Fertilize annuals that seem not to be growing rapidly enough. Cut back Petunias and Sweet Alyssum that are becoming straggly to induce bushiness and fresh crops of flowers. Make successional sowings of hot-weather annuals. Dwarf Dahlias sown outdoors now will make a fine display of bloom later.

In the vegetable plot sow Soy Beans, Okra, Melons, Watermelons, Corn, Snap Beans and Lima Beans, Squash and Field Peas. Sow Tomatoes for late cropping. Stake Tomatoes, Peppers and Eggplants before they become so tall that there is danger of damage by storms. Apply a side dressing of fertilizer to these and to Cucumbers, Corn, Beans and other vegetables in need of extra nutrition.

On the West Coast

Don’t allow Fuchsias or Begonias to suffer from lack of moisture. Specimens that have filled their containers with healthy roots benefit from feeding regularly with dilute liquid fertilizer also try to know how to root lantana. Plants of Tuberous Begonias set out in May bloom freely from mid-July on. Remove old plants of Cinerarias, Primulas and others that made such a brave show earlier and which are kinds that are discarded after flowering. Replace them with such kinds as Tuberous Begonias, Impatiens, lantana and Fuchsias where the location is shaded, with Ageratums, Petunias, Zinnias, Dwarf Dahlias, Snapdragons and the like in sunny locations.

Fertilize Camellias, Rhododendrons and Azaleas after they are through blooming, and mulch the soil beneath them. Make succession plantings of annuals and vegetables. Prune Spring-flowering shrubs that need such attention. Keep plants staked, tied, sprayed and watered.