Fall Planting

My garden blog was silent for too long, because I didn’t do much in my garden in August, other than enjoying the blooms. So after a lovely 2 week vacation in the NW, and one week of record rain in Colorado, it is definitely time for fall cleanup and fall planting.

My first step was exerting discipline on my front yard where the salvia, penstemon and coneflowers had reseeded and gone crazy. I still have plenty of these varieties left, but I also cleaned out a bunch of plants to share with friends. And I have added a few moonbeam coreopsis on the border, because I needed more yellow and less purple in the front yard. Also, the coreopsis have a long bloom time, through the late summer and beyond.

Fall is a great time for perennial planting, as they get nicely rooted in before winter and then next spring they will bloom and grow. And many nurseries have perennials on sale this time of year.

But my favorite fall activity is planting pansies. I love their happy faces throughout the fall, then often they bloom a bit after a light snow melts off. They then bloom again in the spring. This year I dedicated more space to pansies and planted 2 flats. I chose yellow and burgundy for my color palette. And just looking at them brings a smile to my face. While I was planting, a neighbor came by to chat. He mentioned that the word “pansy” should really mean “tough” because that’s what these little flowers are, by blooming on when other flowers die. Nothing wimpy about these flowers. So today, I am celebrating pansies and their happy flower faces.

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