245 Gardening Trends for 2023 Pt. 1

Show Transcript

GB 245 Garden Trends for 2023 Part 1 TRANSCRIPT

Farmer Fred  0:00

Garden Basics with Farmer Fred is brought to you by Smart Pots, the original lightweight, long lasting fabric plant container. It's made in the USA. Visit SmartPots.com slash Fred for more information and a special discount, that's SmartPots.com/Fred.

Welcome to the Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast. If you're just a beginning gardener or you want good gardening information, you've come to the right spot.

The term gardening has many facets, many meanings. And, as you might imagine, all gardeners are local, too. So what are the gardening trends sweeping the country right now? And What can we look forward to as far as garden trends in the coming year? The Pennsylvania Horticultural Society has a pretty powerful Magic 8-ball to figure out those answers. Today, as well as in the next episode of Garden Basics, we talk about the future of gardening in 2023 with Andrew Bunting, vice president of Horticulture with the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society. And we’ll find out about the big Philadelphia Flower Show coming up in March.

We’re podcasting from Barking Dog Studios here in the beautiful Abutilon Jungle in Suburban Purgatory. It’s the Garden Basics with Farmer Fred podcast, brought to you today by Smart Pots and Dave Wilson Nursery. Let’s go!

This is the time of the year when you might be planning your 2023 garden. And maybe you're looking for a little bit of inspiration looking maybe for something new to try something along those lines. One place for inspiration is the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society. They have released their list of the top trends that gardeners can expect to see in 2023. And these trends are reflective of a growing popularity of several popular gardening practices that include taking into consideration the climate, new gardening ideas for the fall season. And of course houseplants. So for a little bit of inspiration from the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society. We turned to Andrew Bunting. He is the vice president of horticulture, and he leads the utilization of planting and designed to promote environmentally sound gardening practices at the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society. And of course, they're busy back there, getting set for the Philadelphia Flower show coming up in March. So, Andrew, thanks for spending a few minutes with us to talk about gardening trends.

Andrew Bunting  2:34

Thanks for having me.

Farmer Fred  2:35

let's talk a little bit, first of all, some information about the Philadelphia Flower Show that's coming up in March.

Andrew Bunting  2:41

So it's coming up in early March, March 4, through the 12th. If you're interested in coming, go to our website, which is PHSonline.org, and buy your tickets there. And they're actually cheaper now than they'll ever be. They're currently $38. And the prices will steadily go up towards the start of the show. So if you've never been it's one of the largest indoor flower shows in the world, it's the longest running power show in North America. For us, it's kind of the kickoff of spring, while it's still late winter. I think everybody in the Philadelphia area, going to the Philadelphia flower show does signify kind of the official start of spring in the Philadelphia area, as well as the Mid Atlantic.

Farmer Fred  3:30

And for people who want more information. What's a good website to go to?

Andrew Bunting  3:35

PHSonline.org

Farmer Fred  3:39

All right. We'll have a link to that in today's show notes as well. Andrew, let's talk about some gardening trends that you foresee happening in 2023. People are very concerned about climate change in some parts of the country, water is a big issue, maybe working more in sync with nature. And this is all part of the gardening trends that you foresee for the coming year.

Andrew Bunting  4:04

Yes. So one of one of the trends that I think has been happening and will continue is paying attention to global climate change, whatever that might be in your area. So in our area, we are seeing increased, or longer periods of drought and hotter, drier, longer summers. Also sometimes winters  that are drier. if we go into the spring or summer and we're already dry, that problem just gets exacerbated with hot, hotter and drier conditions during the summer. So we're really promoting plants that can withstand those conditions. So they might be a native plants that perhaps are already adapted to those conditions, or they might be non natives as well. So,  plants that we are playing around with and I have some of these in my home garden, would be things like yucca, Adam's needle, or a myriad of succulents including sedums. I'm trying out different hearty cactus. That might not be a plant for everyone. But it is a plant that does quite well, and actually in many parts of the United States. And there's many species, there's actually quite a few native cactus species to areas of the country like Colorado, Western Nebraska,  Nevada and Utah, and Oregon and Washington that would do well in almost any parts of the country. We use a lot of plants that are native to the prairies in the United States. With that said, things like a lot of the native grasses, rudbeckias. We have a program called the gold metal plant program where we actually look at plants that have ornamental attributes and have ecological functions. They are resilient, and can be found in local nurseries. So if you're interested in that program, a lot of these plants, they're good natives. Water wise plants can also be found on on that website, which you can also find at PHSonline.org. So like you said earlier, I think if you are mindful, whatever your local conditions are, and how they might be trending and changing, and then trying to be more mindful about your plant choices.

Farmer Fred  6:43

And the plants you mentioned, especially succulents, are very popular here. Nurseries have a hard time keeping them in stock. Another trend, and we talked about this last year, is gravel gardens. Are those still popular back East?

Andrew Bunting  6:58

They're becoming more popular. I think it's an aesthetic that is maybe not known to people, especially on the East Coast. Because we're not naturally an arid climate. I think those parts of the country where it is already arid, like California, or the southwest, or even Texas, places like that, a gravel garden aesthetically, make sense already. For us, It's a little bit of a change of how people might garden, but I put in a gravel garden in my front yard. So instead of lawn, I have my entire front yard as a gravel garden. And I used to get a few people stopping by and asking me about my garden. But now I get a lot of people asking me about my garden, and what I'm doing. I've got now two to three years invested in the gravel garden, and a lot of plants are establishing. So I have things out there like the yucca, and cactus, and euphorbias and other succulents, but I also have plants like the threadleaf bluestar, Amsonia hubrichtii, which has a long taproot, and that does well out there. I have a few ornamental grasses as well, I have the giant coneflower Rudbeckia maxima, that also does well out there. Other than watering the plants to establish them in the first year, even in the most droughty parts of  the year, I haven't done any watering. And the maintenance for Gravel gardens is relatively simple. At the end of the season, you might leave things up for winter interest. But say around the end of the winter, subsequent early spring, you want to cut back every everything and remove all the organic matter. The key is not to let any organic matter fall on the gravel and decompose into the gravel, because then it creates little pockets of soil. And it's in those pockets of soil that you might get weeds coming in. So over that three year period, if I've pulled a weed out of that garden, I don't recall doing that. I mean, you will get weeds sometimes where the ground will come up the sidewalk or maybe there are little vestiges of soil. But other than that, once established, it is pretty low maintenance. And I like the kind of the modern aesthetic of the gravel garden.

Farmer Fred  9:18

We did a deep dive on Garden Basics last year into gravel gardens. we profiled a rather extensive one back in the state of Wisconsin.

Andrew Bunting  9:28

Yeah, yeah. Actually, Jeff Epping is one of my colleagues and  he's actually called the gravel guru. And there was a New York Times article  in May, and his gardens were featured, also his home garden. He does some other public spaces. And then my home garden in Swarthmore was also featured in that New York Times article so that was, obviously a good deal. I call for really promoting the use of gravel gardens. But the nice thing about gravel gardens is, while I did my entire front yard, if you just have a little sidewalk that might parallel the front of your house or between the sidewalk and the house, maybe there's a planting bed that's three feet wide and 15 feet long. A space like that would be perfect for a small gravel garden. And while most gravel gardens are full sun, they're not exclusive to full sun, you can actually do a gravel garden in shade and just adapt the plants accordingly.

Farmer Fred  10:35

We will have a link in today's show notes to that previous episode where we talked about gravel gardens and how to do it. So you can maybe try it for yourself. And probably out here, because of the intense heat in the summertime, toing it in park shade, especially afternoon shade, makes a lot of sense.  One of the gardening trends that the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society is promoting for 2023 is gardening with more ecological functions, and basically surfing with nature, creating habitats for insects and birds with special attention being paid to endangered species, putting in the plants that will attract them, basically the good bug and good bird hotels.

Andrew Bunting  11:17

I mentioned earlier our gold medal program, one of the criteria that we have for selecting the gold medal plants is that the plants have to have either one or many ecological functions. So we're looking especially towards plants that can support one or many pollinators. And every state in the United States has more pollinators  than you would imagine, between native bees, native  moths, and butterflies, and so forth. So we're looking at that . We're looking at plants that maybe are a food source for either local overwintering birds or for migrating birds to those that are seed eaters or berry eaters. So any plant that can kind of support the local fauna gets kind of high approval rankings for us. And a lot of those tend to be native plants. They don't have to be exclusively native, but that might be a group of plants to look towards, because if it's native, it's most likely already adapted to the local climate. And if it's native, it's already co-evolved with many of these pollinators especially. It's not as though you're introducing a plant that the pollinator is familiar with. A great plant that we've really been promoting in this area that has gotten our gold medal status is one of the mountain mints, so that genus is Pycnanthemum, and one in particular, Pycnanthemum muticum, is incredible and has these kind of white brackets which actually make for the ornamental part of the plant. The flowers themselves are actually very small and kind of lavender in color, but I don't know what it is about that plant. But when it comes into flower, and again, the flowers are fairly nondescript, it literally is abuzz with pollinators. It's It's really unbelievable. How many different insects are on that plant pollinating. There's many different mountain mints, the Pycnanthemum. People might think of its common name, and be a little afraid of it.  if you planted one of the more  culinary mints like Spearmint or peppermint or any of those mints in your garden, as you probably know,  your entire garden would become filled with it, because it's very rhizomatous and spreads very quickly. The mountain mints do spread and they will kind of colonize parts of the garden, but they by no means have the kind of rambunctiousness of some of their more culinary relatives. That's a great one. Of course, any of the members of Aster family, so asters themselves, but also the coneflowers, Echinacea, are great pollinator plants. I mentioned the giant coneflower earlier, that's Rudbeckia maxima. They ar both a good pollinator plant as well as a good seed source. So in this area, we have American goldfinches, and different other finches, and many different species of sparrows, and they all love Rudbeckia maxima. Vernonia, that’s the iron weeds. That's another great pollinator plant. That's an Aster family member that has purple flowers generally towards the end of summer and into early fall. The hallmark or the granddaddy of pollinator plants for the Monarch butterflies tend to be that Asclepias, and their common name is the butterfly milkweed. So Asclepias tuberosa, which has orange flowers is one of the primary plants for attracting the monarchs. You know, it's not just that Asclepias. there are many, many native species of Asclepias to consider as well, but that also be attracted to any of those aforementioned pollinator plants that that I suggested.

Farmer Fred  15:33

I believe the mountain mint botanical name is Pycnanthemum. Is that right?  And there is a native one here in California, commonly called Sierra mint. And it should be one that should be considered for a garden here.

Andrew Bunting  15:52

Yeah, I've grabbed maybe half a dozen Pycnanthemums, or mountain mints in there. And they're all good for different reasons, especially their ability to attract a myriad of pollinators. And I suspect the one you're talking about the Sierra mint one,  probably falls into the same group where for whatever reason, it it really is a host many pollinators.

Farmer Fred  16:18

Yeah, it's native to the low foothills of the Sierra and the coast mountain ranges here in California.

Andrew Bunting  16:24

They're very drought tolerant, and anoher of their great benefit for us is we have  real problems with white tailed deer. And they're one of the few plants that you could honestly say is 100% deer resistant.

Farmer Fred  16:41

You really want to say that?

Andrew Bunting  16:43

Yeah, I'm gonna go ahead, I'm gonna go out on a limb and say, It's deer resistant. I Have it set in my front yard, which is where the gravel garden is, I do have a couple of different Pycnanthemums, and so far, knock on wood, and I get a lot of deer pressure, I've seen zero browse. and I have other things that I would have put in the deer resistant category, but I see browsing from time to time, but not the mountain mint. I would say a general rule with deer and maybe rabbits and other browsing mammals is, if it's fragrant, they tend to steer clear. There is also catmint, Nepeta, which is non native, but are good ornamental plants. The deer stay away from that as well. So in general, for deer, I would say fragrant plants. And they don’t eat grasses for whatever reason. They don't eat most ferns for whatever reason. Or things that have a milky sap, like euphorbias and that Amsonia, Threadleaf Bluestar, both have milky sap and they stay away from that as well.

Farmer Fred  17:49

So that might not be a bad barrier crop to put at the edge of the garden just to get the deer to steer clear.

Andrew Bunting  17:55

Yeah, I don't know that it would keep them out entirely. But I think if you had a buffer, really fragrant plants like a lot of things that are in the mint family, the salvias and so forth, it would probably help to turn them away. They're pretty voracious, so you probably need a fence to really keep them out.

SMART POTS

Farmer Fred  18:17

I’ve told you about Smart Pots, the Original, award-winning fabric planters. They’re sold worldwide.  Smart Pots are proudly made 100% in the USA. They’re BPA Free and Lead-Free, making them safe for growing vegetables and other edibles.

The folks at Smart Pots have added a new product to their lineup, perfect for building the healthiest soil imaginable for your garden: by composting. It’s the Smart

Pot Compost Sak, a large, 100-gallon fabric bag that is lightweight yet extremely durable and lasts for years, and can hold 12 cubic feet of pure compost. This rugged fabric is entirely porous, containing many micropores that allow for air circulation and drainage. The fitted cover is a flexible plastic top designed to increase heat and help manage moisture in the mix, accelerating the composting process.

It’s easy to start a compost pile with the Smart Pot Compost Sak. Just open the Sak, set it on level ground, and start adding your compostable materials: grass clippings, vegetable peelings, coffee grounds and more, as well as fallen leaves, straw, and shredded paper. Next, place the optional cover over the Sak. That’s all there is to it.

Smart Pots are available at independent garden centers and select Ace and True Value hardware stores nationwide. You can find the location nearest you at their website.

And you can buy it online from Smart Pots!  Just Visit smart pots dot com slash fred. And don’t forget that slash Fred part. On that page are details about how, for a limited time, you can get 10 percent off your Smart Pot order by using the coupon code, fred. f-r-e-d, at checkout from the Smart Pot Store.

Visit smartpots.com slash fred for more information about the complete line of Smart pots lightweight, colorful, award winning fabric containers and their new Compost Sak.  And don’t forget that special Farmer Fred 10 percent discount. Smart Pots - the original, award winning fabric planter. Go to smart pots dot com slash fred.

DAVE WILSON NURSERY

Farmer Fred

The weather may not be perfect for outdoor gardening, but it is perfect for planning your 2023 garden. Now’s the time to plan the what and the where of you want to plant for the future. To help you along, it pays to visit your favorite independently owned nursery on a regular basis throughout the fall and winter, just to see what’s new. And coming soon to that nursery near you is Dave Wilson Nursery’s excellent lineup of Farmers Market Favorites of great tasting, healthy, fruit and nut varieties. They’ll be already potted up and ready to be planted.

And we’re also talking about a great selection of antioxidant-rich fruits such as blueberries, blackberries, raspberries, Goji berries, Grapes, kiwi, mulberries, gooseberries, figs and pomegranates.

Wholesale grower Dave Wilson Nursery has probably the best lineup of great tasting fruit and nut trees of any grower in the U.S. Find out more at their website, DaveWilson dot com. While you’re there, check out all the videos they have on how to plant and grow all their delicious varieties of fruit and nut trees. Plus, at dave wilson dot com, you can find the nursery nearest you that carries Dave Wilson plants. Your harvest to better health begins at Dave Wilson dot Com.

GARDEN TRENDS 2023, cont.

Farmer Fred

Let's get back to our conversation about 2023 Garden trends with Andrew Bunting. He's with the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society. And he has tips on how to attract more birds to your yard and garden to help battle the bad bugs. There's a lot of great plants that attract a wide range of pollinators. We know that alyssum is now being used more and more in agriculture to attract beneficial insects to the farm. And they're great in the garden as well. Also, like you mentioned, it pays to attract birds to your garden as well. And that would include I would think, and this sort of coincides with another one of your trends coming up for 2023. And that is, for fall planting, choose some plants with color or interesting fruits or berries. And there's a lot of plants that put on their best show producing berries in the fall and winter that can keep the birds around.

Andrew Bunting  22:34

Yeah, I think you know, fall as a season for a gardener sometimes gets overlooked because we're so concentrating on spring and summer. Fall, especially going into the winter, there are a lot of great plants with great fall color or berries. There's actually lots of plants,  even though for us on the East Coast, it gets  down to 30-40 degrees, but there are a number of plants that flower in the fall. And then the fruiting plants are great because they kind of serve two purposes. They are a food source for those birds that stay around for the winter, birds like Robins, American robins in particular. But there are quite a few other birds that are here for the winter. And that would be true of any part of the country where the birds are not migrating to more southern destinations. You want to keep both the fruit source for those birds that eat fruit and then the seed sources like Echinacea and Rudbeckia  and so forth for the seed-eating birds. Some of the ornamental shrubs that we use that have gray ornamental berries, one that really comes to mind is the Winterberry Holly. This is a deciduous shrubby Holly, the the leaves fall off in the fall. And it's a shrub that, depending on the cold, can get up to four to six to 8, to 10 feet tall. And it's native. It actually has a wide native range from up in Canada, all along the east coast and into parts of the Midwest and upper midwest. And it grows in native areas along ponds and streams, and lakes. And there's several cultivars that just become laden with fruit from the middle of September all the way to the middle of March. Occasionally some flocks of birds will come through Catbirds, robins, maybe cedar waxwings, etc. and eat the fruit. But generally the fruit stays on for the winter, and provides incredible winter interest. There's one called Winter Red that has great  shiny red fruits, there's one called Winter gold. It's really more of a salmon orange fruit than the gold fruit . One thing to be mindful of any hollies is they are dioecious, which means there's male plants and female plants, the female plants have the fruits and the male plant, you need one, just one, in close proximity to all those females to pollinate or fertilize the female flowers. For us, for the Winter Red and Winter Gold, there's a cultivar with a funny name, called Southern Gentleman. That's the best pollinator I know. There's a female Winterberry Holly called Scarlett O'Hara, and of course the male pollinator is Rhett Butler, of course. And you can find out online what the best pollinator male is for these different hollies. But it's just something to keep in mind. If you have a holly and you're wondering, whether it's deciduous or an evergreen Holly, why it doesn't have any fruits. It's probably because there's not an appropriate male within close enough proximity, but some other plants for good fruiting fall interest include the choke berries, Aronia, which is a good food source. It's actually being promoted as a human food source. So the black chokeberry, Aronia melanocarpa, there's one called Viking, one that I like a lot which is part of our gold metal plant program is Aronia arbutifolia brilliantissima, which is covered more with the  berries kind of on top of the plant versus down the stems like the Winterberry Holly, but that's a great one for I would say late fall and early winter. The fruits don’t last all winter long, like the Winterberry Holly, but that's that's another good one. And both of those species are US natives.

Farmer Fred  27:06

Here in California, one of our favorites for winter berries to keep the birds happy, Is the Toyon also known as the Christmasberry, because it has beautiful red berries in the month of December. Heteromeles arbutifolia. It gets about eight to 15 feet tall and wide and is a consistent performer and does well in a drought.

Andrew Bunting  27:27

Yeah, that's. That's in the rose family.  I think I've tried my fair share of California natives out here, but most of them just don't do well. Our summers are too humid for a lot of California plants.

Farmer Fred  27:43

Yes, Pennsylvania is not California.

Andrew Bunting  27:47

There's a guy I know close by, that has grown a couple of California natives, but I think he must have them under the eaves of the house or something. Something that keep them a little on the dry side?

Farmer Fred  28:03

Well yeah, we have that issue here of people now living in the Central Valley attempting to grow plants that prefer a more mild climate like you would find in the coastal areas of southern California, especially avocado trees, that struggle here but thrive in other areas of the state. Everybody's always pushing the boundaries, trying new things. And that's the fun of gardening. Andrew Bunting is with the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society. We've been learning about trends that are coming up in gardening in 2023. Thanks so much for your time and have a wonderful experience at the Philadelphia Flower Show.

Andrew Bunting  28:40

Thank you for having me.

Farmer Fred

This time of year, it’s hard to resist grabbing a poinsettia plant from a myriad of retail outlets. Nurseries and garden centers, of course, will carry the best selections. But you can also find this colorful tropical plant, native to Mexico, in all sorts of retail outlets around now, including grocery stores and gas stations. And in your hurry to get to that holiday party, you might just decide to pick one up for the host. But before you grab the first poinsettia plant you see, we have tips for choosing and caring for that poinsettia plant. So whether you’re giving one, or receiving a poinsettia as a gift, check out the Friday December 23rd edition of the Beyond the Garden Basics newsletter and podcast.

For current newsletter subscribers, look for the Poinsettia Pointers newsletter and podcast in the Friday, Dec. 23rd edition of the Beyond the Garden Basics newsletter, it’s waiting for you, in your email. Or, you can start a subscription, it’s free!  Find the link in today’s show notes or sign up at the newsletter link at our homepage, garden basics dot net.

Farmer Fred  28:46

The Garden Basics With Farmer Fred podcast comes out once a week, on Fridays. Plus the newsletter podcast, that comes with the Beyond the Garden Basics newsletter, continues, also released on Fridays. Both are free and are brought to you by Smart Pots and Dave Wilson Nursery. The Garden Basics podcast is available wherever podcasts are handed out, and that includes our home page, Garden Basics dot net. , where you can also sign up for the Beyond the Garden Basics newsletter and podcast. That’s Garden Basics dot net. or use the links in today’s show notes.  And thank you so much for listening.