Wayside Gardens Voices

Dealing with Droughts: Xeriscaping

The weather has been going a little crazy the last few years, and each year it seems that more and more of the country is affected by drought conditions.  It's no surprise, then, that drought landscaping (sometimes called xeriscaping) is becoming a hot topic.  There are a lot of easy things you can do in your garden to conserve water.  A rain barrel under your house gutters is an obvious solution, and one that's becoming more and more popular (I'll be installing a 55-gallon barrel at my parents' house tomorrow).  Putting down a thick layer of mulch can help a lot of plants to retain moisture.  Many landscapers are recommending less grass, most types of which require a tremendous amount of water.  In the place of grass natural areas and planting beds are taking over.

Possibly the best way to save water with little effort is by choosing your plants with water conservation in mind.  Many slower-growing perennials need much less water, and can give you just as much beauty.  There are also a huge variety of drought-tolerant plants available that, once established, will do wonderfully with almost no irrigation.

Of course, true xeriscaping requires a great deal more than just putting in some drought tolerant plants.  The most advanced xeriscaping efforts require rethinking the entire landscaping from the bottom up, using specialty grasses, carefully built gradients to channel water in the appropriate ways, and careful balancing of shade and sun.  You don't, however, have to be an advanced xeriscaper to get real water-saving benefits from your garden this year.

Our Amazing Garden

It hasn't felt much like Spring is coming around here lately, but this morning I noticed that my patch of daffodils next to my driveway is starting to come up.  That was very heartening for me.  Of course, I still have a lot to do in my garden before the weather starts to turn, but I can't wait for the growing season to get rolling.  The worst part about a gardening hobby (addiction?) is not being able to do it part of the year.  Planning your upcoming plantings helps a great deal, and looking through garden pictures helps some with that seasonal impatience, I find.  Of course I've looked through most of my own garden pictures several times already this winter, and I've just about worn through my gardening catalogs and magazines.  I find myself searching online for pictures.  I love finding pics of gardens from other parts of the world, but one of my favorite online picture collections is from quite a bit closer to home.  It's our Wayside Gardens Flickr collection, where several members of our team here at our Greenwood nursery post garden pictures that we've taken.  Some of these great pictures are from our gardens at home, but most of them are from our showcase garden, which is just about fifty feet from my office.  It's open to the public, and during the spring and summer it's one of the most spectacular gardens in the Southeast.  If you get a chance to visit us in Greenwood, South Carolina, we'd love to have you come stroll through our gardens and garden center.  Until then, cruise over to our little collection of garden photos at Flickr.

New Wayside Gardens Website

Have you been to WaysideGardens.com lately?

There has been a few changes. The layout was changed to make the site a little easier to navigate. Hopefully it will allow people to find exactly what they are looking for a little more quickly.

All of the categories are now listed across the top of the page so you can just click on exactly what you want. The site has become much more intuitive, breaking each category down into useful subcategories so that you get the plant you need for your individual gardening needs.

For example, if you click on the category “trees,” you will be taken to the Trees homepage. On the left your screen you will see the categories “Application”, “height”, and “color.” If you click on 4-8 feet under color you will only get a list of the 24 trees that mature to 4-8 feet. Your search results are listed in alphabetical order, and each listing is accompanied by a beautiful picture of the particular plant.

The sight looks good, and I believe it is much easier to use. If you would like to leave a comment about the site feel free. I would love to pass compliments over to all those hard workers down the hall.

John Durst
Wayside Gardens Voice

More and More Winter

I just checked the weather report for the whole country for today and tomorrow, and everywhere, except here in the southeast and over in the desert are getting rain and snow. Well, we got our rain over the last few weeks, and it got a little chilly, lows in the 20's, but we don't get much snow here. It was snowing the other week when I woke up and they delayed school that day and canceled it the next at all the local districts. The snow barely stuck in most places. It was gone at my house before I left for Wayside Gardens at 8:00 am. I passed three cars in the ditch on the way here, one truck was almost blocking the entrance to Wayside Gardens. Of course, all of the bread and milk was already gone from the supermarket.

This might sounds insane to someone who lives in a place where it actually snows. That's right, the snow didn't even stay on the ground. But, to be fair, we have problems of our own. This does not happen often, obviously, we are not prepared. Another issue, we do get freezing temperatures, and we have a very wet climate. We commonly have very dangerous alternatives to fluffy white snow in the form of sleet and freezing rain. When you wake up in the morning and everything looks like it's been laminated in glass, and your trees are either bowing to the winter gods or broken in the streets, you know there's been a classic South Carolina ice storm. If you try to drive anywhere without chains or an all-wheel drive vehicle, you will slide right out of your driveway and into someone else's (By the way, In South Carolina, lots of all-wheel drive, not so much on the ice chains). Not to mention you have thousands of high school drivers attacking those frozen rural roads and the school parking lots like nothing has changed. So, while you might think we are weird, we promise, it is for the best.

I say all of this to point out that while all of you who mock our winter habits are trudging through the rest of your winter, here in Greenwood South Carolina, at Wayside Gardens, the sun has come out. The temperature has been in the 70's this week and this weekend will be beautiful and sunny. My lawn is green and starting to get unruly. I will mow the lawn and lay the foundations for my outside projects this Saturday and Sunday. Good Luck with your own gardens this spring, which for some of us, may have already come.

John Durst
Wayside Gardens Voice
jdurst@parkseed.com