If it wasn’t for Gail’s lists and ability to prioritize, I’d probably have lost my tiny mind by now. There is so much to do that seems to need doing right-this-minute that without the lists, I’d feel pulled in a gajillion different directions at once. Like I am at home. (Let this be a lesson to me.)

Our priority for this week was to plant annuals and tender perennials — to get them out of their confining nursery pots and into the ground, now that the nights are suddenly and consistently warm. But first, before we could do that, we had to take the tulips out of the gardens. (We plant annuals in the tulips’ place, which is great because it keeps the soil we plant in fluffy and easy to dig.) The timing worked out perfectly: most of the tulip flowers that held on into this week were shattered by rain so we had no remorse digging them up for summer storage down cellar. (We’ll let the foliage die back for a week or two before detaching it from the bulbs. Then we’ll keep the bulbs dry and dark in labeled paper bags until we’re ready to plant them again in the fall.)

But first, to make room downstairs for the tulips, we had to bring up the dahlias. Again the timing was just right because they’re beginning to grow. We potted some up and will plant the rest directly in the ground in the next week or two.

But first, to make room in the greenhouse for the dahlias — and to harden off the plants that needed planting this week — we had to move them outside. And then we had to place them where we wanted to plant them in the gardens. I wish I had gotten pictures of everyone working so hard to accomplish all of this but I had plants or a spade in my hand the whole time too. (I wish I was better at multitasking…) Instead here are the Rose and North Garden after tulips-out and planting.

If planting (with its attendant to-dos) was all we had to keep track of I could probably keep my head and post a blog or two. But we were also pulled towards the plants already in the gardens, which have responded to the change from spring to summer with a burst of growth. Keeping up with the weeds is one thing but it’s also time to do the Chelsea Chop (so named because the timing coincides with the world famous Chelsea Flower Show in London). Mid-to late-summer bloomers can use a trim by a third to a half now (and even again a time or two before the end of June) to keep them from becoming leggy or top heavy and splaying open as they bloom. It takes hard-core optimism to whack back beautiful new growth but after forgetting to do it, I can say it’s well worth it. Especially for plants like agastache, beebalm, rudbeckia, coreopsis, asters, boltonia, helianthus, kalimeris, Sedums like ‘Autumn Joy’, … Their flowers might come out a little later and they might be smaller but there will be more of them and the plant will look lush. And if we don’t have to run around staking things later, it’s time well spent.

And to top off “planting week”, Betsy and Gail added container design to yesterday’s list so that we could plant them today while a little more rain waters the gardens in.

What’s on your to-do list right now? (Do you write one or do you go a little nuts like me?) Do you remember to stop and enjoy it?

I think we outdid ourselves. In the last couple of weeks Gail, Betsy, the volunteers, and I planted about 700 perennials and a handful of shrubs. Going into our planning season this past winter, Gail and I both thought that we wouldn’t place big perennial orders this year. Then the catalogs arrived and we couldn’t help ourselves. Our excuse is that we want these gardens to be wow-full and inspire visitors. We want to stay au courant, plant what the kids are planting now, try new things to see if they really are as great as their write-ups, and retry old favorites that might deserve a comeback. So we didn’t hold back when we went to nurseries and plant sales either.

I’m pretty excited to finally try bowman’s root (Gillenia trifoliata a.k.a Porteranthus), a native described as “tough” with delicate gaura-like flowers and red fall foliage. We placed it both in the pollinator garden and the Rock Garden where seriously tough conditions will give it the true test. I can’t wait to see if the ‘Blonde Ambition’ blue grama grass (Bouteloua gracilis) is the stunner I think it might be, and I have wanted blackberry lily (Belamcanda chinensis) for ages but had trouble finding it. Here’s hoping it takes off like this regular old passalong plant is supposed to.

Our new “foliage bed” was too much fun to shop for. Of course we have to try new heucheras and were assured that ‘Citronelle’ (both Gail and I are suckers for chartreuse foliage), ‘Encore’, and ‘Dark Secret’ are as awesome as they come. We finally have the perfect spot to try shredded umbrella plant (Syneilesis aconitifolia) but we still haven’t found the exactly right place for sycamore-leaf false nettle (Boehmeria platanifolia), which by all accounts is one of the coolest, hippest foliage plants for partial shade. (Why didn’t we have that yet? It doesn’t matter. We have it now. ) Catchfly (Silene latifolia ‘Rollie’s Favorite’) is already earning its keep in the Rock Garden. Even if it doesn’t survive (and why wouldn’t it? — drought maybe?) I’d use it like an annual especially if it continues to bloom all season like the description says it will (after a shearing).

Even though it seemed last year like our gardens were getting saturated perennial-wise, somehow, miraculously, there’s always room for newbies in May. (It’s not so miraculous actually. Removing giant patches of place-holding rudbeckia and Shasta daisy is my favorite way to open up new plant slots, especially at home.)

Have you been planting perennials too? Any you’re especially excited about?

I have bad news and good news. The bad news is there’s a fungus among us. Impatiens downy mildew (Plasmopara obducens), the mysterious ailment that denuded and killed almost every busy Lizzie (Impatiens walleriana) back in July or August of last year, is here to stay. It’s in our soil now and unlike other downy mildews that attack other species of plants, this one is happy to overwinter here in the soil. Add to that, our native woodland wildflower and poison ivy remedy, jewelweed (Impatiens capensis), obligingly harbors it without dying or even becoming particularly disfigured by it.

This coming summer impatiens downy mildew will spread by spores that germinate in humid conditions, just as it did last year. Four hours of standing water (a sprinkler system or a good soaking rain) is all it needs to move from soil to plant where it then becomes airborne. And there is no fungicide that will control it once lesions form on the leaves. Despite that, some growers are determined to keep selling the species that has been their bread and butter ever since petunias fell from favor. But their impatiens will have to be pumped full of expensive systemic fungicide in order to ensure a mere six weeks of immunity in your garden. It’s a heavy price to pay for what has been one of the least expensive and longest blooming bedding plants. Expect that cost to be passed along. Other growers are boldly refusing to propagate an ill-fated best seller and will be offering healthy and more sustainable alternatives instead. And meanwhile, breeders are working to create downy-mildew-resistant impatiens. But don’t hold your breath. They’re still years away.

The good news is it’s time for a change. Monocultures of impatiens have been planted in industrial parks, corporate and private landscapes, urban and suburban yards for quite long enough. In fact, being planted so exclusively and densely sped their demise, first in the UK back in 2003, then in greenhouses, Florida, up the Eastern Seaboard, and all the way across the more humid portions of the country in the last couple of years. And I, for one, am looking forward to seeing a little more variety in yards, gardens, and landscapes in the years to come. But then, I have never been impatiens’ biggest fan.

I understand that a flat of Impatiens walleriana was wicked cheap to buy. But didn’t those starts need water and fertilizer all summer long? I understand that, if given those things, impatiens bloomed non-stop, and in the shade no less. But did you ever see a bee work the blossoms? And didn’t you get a little bored with them by August? I have never planted them in my own garden and we don’t use them at Blithewold because—and this, really, is the good news—there are so many other gorgeous plants in the world. Some are just as, if not more, colorful; a few might bring out the gardener in non-gardeners; others will be much easier to care for. That’s the truth.

My advice to hardcore impatiens devotees: If you can’t live without them, try them in hanging baskets. And for your garden beds, rather than choosing one alternative stand-in from a long list of shade-loving bedding annuals that includes (and is by no means limited to) New Guinea impatiens (those noisy cousins are immune), begonias, torenia, lobelia, coleus, browallia, oxalis, and nicotiana, plant a kaleidoscope. Variety isn’t just the spice of life, it’s more sustainable. Celebrate all the months of summer — and treat yourself to late season surprises too — by planting tender perennials like spurflower (Plectranthus ciliatus) and fuchsias that bloom into fall and can even be overwintered indoors. And then why not add in a few perennials with fabulous foliage like heuchera, hosta, lady’s mantle, brunnera, pulmonaria, and lamium? Nowadays they don’t cost much more than annuals and, more often than not, live to brighten your beds and borders for years. Please don’t just take my word for it. Ask at your favorite local nursery for suggestions. (No doubt, they will be more sympathetic than I.) And take the good news over the bad.

Apologies to any of you who might have already read this. — It was first published last week by East Bay, RI and South Coast, MA newspapers for my column, Down to Earth.

A comment from Kira on my last post echoes a sentiment I read recently in an article by Tovah Martin in Horticulture Magazine and something I’m feeling the crush of too: we’ve had a long enough break from the garden. Isn’t a month or two around the holidays plenty of time before we start feeling the pull of plants again? That’s why Tovah so smartly forces spring bloomers inside. And that’s why Kira (one of our volunteers, incidentally), Gail and I and probably the entire population of gardeners exiled indoors devour every word in every seed catalog. Starting about now, we cannot wait for spring.

I suspect I’d be more interested in winter – because I usually love it – if last week’s snowfall hadn’t parked on the garden like a Mack truck. My hopes of seedheads poking prettily up through winter snows were laid flat. Now I can almost see now the virtue in cutting everything back in fall because why not? if it isn’t going to add loveliness to our winter view. But I  have to remember it isn’t just for us. The birds don’t care what it looks like, so we’ll keep keeping as much standing for them as we can.

As gloomy as I’m suddenly feeling about winter, if spring really was right around the corner, I’d probably say I wasn’t ready after all. Gail and I still need the time to go through catalogs and attend classes (maybe bee school for me this year) and even though I’m no good at waiting (a whole week between Downton Abbey episodes makes me crazy) I know that anticipation will sweeten spring’s arrival. Meanwhile there’s nothing to do for it but to go out and find the pretty in winter and practice Zen-like patience. I’m glad to report that it was easier than I thought it would be to enjoy winter this morning as the fog lifted off the snow. Even tipped over and smashed, the garden was as pretty as I could ever hope it would be.

Is the wait of winter weighing heavily on you – or your garden – too?

The plants in the greenhouse are more ambitious than I am. If I possibly could, I would spend the short, dark days of December curled up on the couch. But our plants are making use of what little sunlight is on offer, along with the eternal-spring (relative) warmth of supplemental radiant heat, and actually growing. Go figure. The cuttings we took in September are well-branched and blooming. The ones we took in October and potted up last month have produced three or more sets of leaves. And now they all need pinching to keep their focus on growing more than flowering. And there’s no way I can cut these plants back without turning those beautiful tips into more cuttings. They get full credit for keeping me off the couch.

Taking cuttings of our cuttings is on the list of to-dos every December despite the fact that low light and lower temperatures will make them take longer to root. Some of them might not make it. But from the ones that do, we’ll take more cuttings in the spring. That way, as the plants we already made grow and become pot stressed and unhappy, we’ll have a rotation of fresh plants to take their place if need be. (Though we do often plant even the oldest, woodiest, worst looking plants because they take off like the picture of health once they go in the ground.)

But I can’t let myself go crazy propagating because space is tight in the greenhouse and we don’t need more of everything. We also don’t altogether know what we’ll need because we only have ideas about next year’s gardens so far, not actual plans. That’s for January. I’m confident that we will always plant as many African blue basils as we have, whether it’s a tray-full or 10 trays-full, and Gail and I are both smitten with a new-to-us Salvia called ‘Wendy’s Wish’. (More about that one when I do top 12 for 2012 post.) We also always make a few more heliotrope and assorted cuphea over the course of the winter, but I had to restrain myself from sticking every perfect cutting I pinched. A tray-full will do until we know where we’ll use them next season and how many we’ll ultimately need.

Are you feeling as ambitious as I am this December? Did you take cuttings this fall? Have you been taking cuttings of those cuttings or will you wait until spring?