The Advantage of Northern Gardens
You know I really hate to read the Net forums right now with all those Southern gardeners talking about their blooming bulbs and getting ready to plant vegetables. It’s hard on the morale to have to sit and wait and watch the posted pictures of spring arriving. Oh yeah, I know our spring is coming as well; once March rolls in you know that winter is a time-limited option. But we do have another month before we can even begin to hope to see anything green out there. In the interests then of promoting Northern gardening, here are the main reasons I’d continue to grow up here rather than trying to grow down South.
Bugs.
Yes, insects of all kinds are the problem-children of Southern gardeners. Up North, we have winter and we kill every one of those problems stone dead. The adults are toast, leaving only the eggs and larva to start all over again.
Down South, the problems never stop. You should see the size of some of those garden pests, they’re right out of some bad Japanese 1950’s horror movie for size. Slugzilla! Our aphids die, theirs don’t. Cold weather puts them to sleep but doesn’t kill them; it takes a hard frost/freeze to wipe out the adults so enjoy a warm winter and you’ve got all the pests all the time. Not so in our gardens. We get a reasonable number of insects but it does take them a while to get up to eating size.
Major Pest Differences
A visit to a deep South nursery was a feature of this year’s holiday trip and I asked the grower what were her main problems. After she got through listing the insects that never died, she told me Iguanas were a major problem because they were hard to control, bred like mice and ate the plants. So they have raccoons, mice, voles and iguanas.
Watching those miniature dragons scuttling across the road from one garden to the other was an interesting hobby. And before you think the South doesn’t have deer, they do. Not only that but there’s a miniature version called Key Deer down in the Florida keys. The Key Deer are a protected species (and really cute to see a 3-foot tall buck with a full rack wandering down the road) and can’t be hurt in any way. There are no local unfenced gardens in those areas because the Key Deer consider anything not resembling a cactus as a delicacy.
We Can Grow More
We can actually grow more species of annual and perennial plants than the South. I have to tell you this speaks right to my gardener’s heart because I do love to grow perennials.
Yes, we have winter that kills off tender perennials but the heat of the southern summer wilts darn near everything it touches. That sun is powerful and the plant palette down there simply isn’t as great as we have.
There is a great deal of ongoing research and plant trials underway to find individual species and varieties of popular species that will not only tolerate the heat but thrive in it. So our perennial gardens are the envy of Southern gardeners who couldn’t reliably grow a delphinium or peony if their lives depended on it.
Southern Gardens Bad??
Are all Southern gardens that bad? It does depend on how far South you go and what your microclimate is that determines what you can grow.
For example, Georgia’s major plant research trials are over near Atlanta but few of those plants will survive for more than a summer or two over in coastal Savannah. I got a serious lesson on plantsmanship from two local expert gardeners on a trip there last fall; they just don’t have the perennial plant range we do. If it’s not the heat, it’s the humidity. If it’s not the heat and humidity, it’s the variable winter temperatures that we don’t have.
In our gardens, the temperature generally goes down in the fall and stays there for the winter. We usually get a snow cover to insulate our plants and the ground doesn’t thaw right out from one end of the winter to the other.
Not so in more southerly gardens. Winter is variable and it can be 70F one week and 30F the next. The ground freezes and thaws regularly and perennials can be encouraged to break dormancy and grow one week and whacked with freezing the second. The poor plants freeze, thaw, grow and freeze and then simply die. I spent some time chatting with a nursery a few years ago about wintering survival tricks and they were stymied about how to increase their rates without cooling the entire greenhouse range to freezing. While we worry about it being too cold, they lose plants to variable temperatures.
Spring Bulbs – Eat Your Heart Out
We can grow great tulips and other spring bulbs that want a cold dormancy. Southern gardeners can’t keep them growing for more than a year or two. There’s not enough cold weather there for them.
Our spring colour explosion is only a month or so away and I’m feeling better already. Those charming species tulips that self-sow, spreading through your garden are an unknown quantity down there. We can consider them weeds once they’re established, they only dream of that kind of weed.
Weeds
Southern gardens growth rate is faster, this means not only do garden plants grow faster on good soil but so do the damnable weeds. You’ve never seen grass grow and invade gardens unless you’ve seen it happen in the South. We have it easy on that score. In fact, the more I think about it, the more I like to garden up here. I’m sure my Southern gardener friends will let me know what they think of this attitude but to heck with them. I like my northern gardens and I’m in no hurry to move them South.
HI Doug:
You are correct about gardening in the south vs north, a whole set of different problems. We have a place in Okeechobee, FL. Lots of different plants and creatures there than in New Hampshire. I like gardening in the North more than I do in the South. However some of the Florida Neighbors are asking how did you get that plant to grow like that and so fast. Should I tell them my secret “COMPOST” they don’t know what that is. Went to buy some compost one day at the local spots, most of them did not know what is was and suggested using some other things.
John
John at JWLWs last blog post..It’s Cold Here
@John at JWLW -
Yeah, compost can disappear pretty fast in the heat of the Southern garden. Not a common commodity although I suspect that’s changing
We grow much of what you grow, we just grow it in a different season, like winter. You should have visited for hyacinths in February.
You should be here now for camellias as big as a gazebo, with van-sized azaleas and dogwoods following.
Pests are something to grouse about here, not as big a problem as you painted. I keep an armadillo trap handy. Kitty Ike takes care of voles and mice.
I would not trade. You stay ‘up there’ in the cold and snow.
Nell Jeans last blog post..White Wisteria
There is one other advantage for northern gardeners. We can grow Southern tropicals in the house all winter and outside in the summer. They can’t grow perennials that need that dormant cold spell anyplace.
Jan
@prairiepetunia -
Yeah! That’s what I like to hear – rampant enthusiasm and rationalization from fellow northerners.
@Nell Jean – Yes, you have things earlier and later than we do – and there’s no getting around those lovely camellias. The south does have some interesting woody plants we can’t grow but I’ll trade camellias for peonies and big old-fashioned crabapples and lilacs – blowsy azalea for the hardy varieties etc. The fun thing in all of this is that sometimes northern gardeners envy the plant range of the more southerly gardening crowd – my point is that they don’t have to.
I kind of take the view that every place has it’s beauty- although there are some places that require a bit more concentration to find that appreciation;)
There are times I wished I could grow camellias, or even azaleas!(I tried azaleas)… but essentially I love certain things about my Northern place.. and like you, defend those great things.
On my blog now, my transplanted-to-the-South friend (who grew up with me in the North-but always visited her grandparents there in the South) now trades the comparison on this North-South gardening.
One big difference is the good quality of soil up North that we often take for granted (and complain about when clayey). Good soil, more dependable rainfall, the cold dormancy, these are our gifts.
but ( pollyanna alert!) we each have our gifts no matter where we live. USING them to best advantage… there is the art and science of gardening.
Ilonas last blog post..dirt#2- McAdditives
I agree – I sometimes feel I’m the omly one to say great weather! when the snow cover stays on my perennials all winter and there’s no February thaw to confuse them. A long hard winter makes spring especially wonderful – welcome back birds, hello snowdrops, and here come the goldfish from the depths of a previously frozen pond.
@Kate -
I’m not sure I welcome winter. But I surely do welcome spring as do we all.
@Ilona -
No question that you’re right – there are gifts in every region. I simply think we should celebrate our Northern gardens and am quite happy to point that out.
I’d say your right…I especially feel that way in August after 30 straight days of triple digit temperatures…and don’t forget the damage that armadillos can do to a lawn. But I am just ornery enough to argue that shoveling snow for six months cancels all that out,
Jenny Bs last blog post..Spring Fever
THE NORTHEAST ROCKS WHEN IT COMES TO OUR GARDENS. HOW BLESSED WE ARE EVEN WHILE WE WAIT IN ANTICIPATION FOR THE SPRING TO ARRIVE. THANKS FOR YOUR CONTINUED GREAT AND UPLIFTING NEWS LETTERS. I TRULY ENJOY YOUR THOUGHTS AND IDEAS. MANY BLESSINGS, MARGUERITE FROM NEW ENGLAND
@Jenny B -
Snow? Who shovels snow? Canadians go south in the winter to put their feet up and rest up for the next gardening season.
Ha! Pretty smart, I’d say. And we Texans go to Canada for the summer–or we would if we were independently wealthy.
Jenny Bs last blog post..Spring Fever
sometimes in the dead of winter i wish i were somewhere warmer, but as you said, the north has the variety and kills them bugs. but i am about ready to move maybe one zone south, am in zone 4, would prefer less winter!
Kristines last blog post..spring clean up starts
I live 9 months in the South and go to sunny southern California for the 3 winter months where I can keep gardening. Yes, it is the rainy season there and the mountains all turn moss green but seeing all the blooming plants there is a real kick.
Karensgardentipss last blog post..Tintinhull House Garden, near Yeovil, England
@Karensgardentips -
Yeah, I’m not sure I’d want to garden in the deep South in the summer. That’s pretty hard on the plants I love.
I was just wondering what some of you gardeners think is the best seed company to purchase seeds from? I’m living in northern michigan.I usually buy my seeds in bulk but they didn’t get califlower or brocolli this year,so i need to purchase them fast. Thanks
@Sharron -
Pick one – I used to use Stokes for most of my commercial planting
I love to read your blogs but as a transplanted West Virginian I can appreciate both sides of the coin, I LOVE the Lilacs, don’t grow here and crepe myrtle trees don’t have the aroma that they do my neighbor had Dahlias that were beautiful and all I can think of are the azaleas, however I am one of the ones that cannot handle weeds, my hhusband is a great gardner but I was going to help him with the weeds in his potato vines, I used some roundup on it, before you start laughing to hard, we did not have any weeds, we did not have any potatoes either so after that experience I have been relegated to artyifical plants. I just enjoy his garden and my azaleas.
@Lois -
It takes all of us to really appreciate a great garden.
Well – there are gardeners and there are garden-readers and garden-enjoyers.
Winter, summer…can someone tell me if we can winter artichokes in southern maine?