By Jackie Sledge
Big Country Master Gardener Association
Today I’m confessing my gardening mistakes and starting fresh in 2025. Well, actually I had listed this as a New Year’s Resolution, but I’m just now working my way to it on my “to do this year” list.
I admit that I buy a plant without a plan on exactly where to put it, but I know I have a place somewhere in my landscape because it’s a wonderful plant that needs a home. I have lots of space, so I know it will fit perfectly in one of the beds. Right now, I have a wading pool full of wonderful plants that need to be planted, and, so far, I have set the pots in various flower beds several times and then moved them back to the pool because I couldn’t decide where to plant them.
The answer to my problem would be to go to my garden journal to see what is already planted in the beds and then determine where to put my new plants. What’s the problem? My garden journal hasn’t been updated with plant information since I added the last 4 beds several years ago. That can’t be true! But . . . unfortunately it is.
Let’s talk about garden journals and the importance of having one that is kept current so you always have a valuable tool to help you make wise purchases that will fit in with your landscape plan. Garden journals come in all sizes and can be as simple as a list of plant names to very detailed with multiple entries for each plant as well as for the landscape as a whole. The information can be captured in a spiral notebook, on pages printed from internet sources, or in purchased garden journals and planners.
These are some overall landscape entries that are important:
- Monthly garden calendar
- Monthly garden tasks
- Seasonal tasks
- Seed purchase and inventory
- Plant purchase and inventory
- Garden tool inventory
- Soil preparation – compost, amendments
- Fertilizing dates and types
- Pest and disease list and treatment
- Watering – rainfall dates and amounts, irrigation, sprinklers
- Gardening budget
- Garden layout – include sun, utility/water lines
- Future garden design ideas – a wish list
- Plant log
Some of the suggested plant log entries are:
- Common plant name
- Botanic name
- Mature size of plant
- Color of bloom
- Where you got the plant – name of store, name of friend, seed library, location of plants or seeds that were foraged
- Date planted as well as whether from seed, start, or transplant
- Where planted – which bed and location in the bed
- Annotate plant performance – flowers, vegetables, herbs, etc.
- Plant details – when and how watered, when fertilized, diseases, pests, etc.
Additional useful journal tips:
- Take pictures of plants and flowers so you can remember landscape details better.
- Purchase a journal with pockets or put envelopes with your journal to keep seed envelopes, plant tags, and pictures available for quick reference.
Now back to my problem. I added plants to all flower beds the last couple of years, but I never put the information in my garden journal. Unfortunately, I don’t remember which varieties and colors I have. For example, there are about 24 daylilies in a large bed, but I can’t remember which varieties were planted in each area. I didn’t take pictures when they were blooming, and the plant tags are all together in an envelope. I don’t want to wait for them to bloom before I plant the new ones, so I will make a guess and get them planted in areas that need additional plants – whether or not they fit the plant and color scheme. I did the same thing with a different plant 2 years ago, and I have a beautiful yellow flower in the bed designed with a pink/purple color scheme. The plants are well-established now, and the random yellow doesn’t really bother me. In fact, maybe I’ll add another yellow flowering plant to keep it company!
Solution. I am going to get all the plants in the ground within a week, and then I’ll update my garden journal with what I planted and where the plants are located in each bed. This will be important because I plan on buying more plants in April.
Where will I get more plants? The Big Country Master Gardener Spring Plant Sale is coming up in April, and we will have a lot of plants that survive and thrive in our area. The online sale will start at 8:00 a.m. on Wednesday, April 9th and end at 12:00 noon on Friday, April 11th. The plants purchased during the online sale can be picked up on Friday afternoon between 2:00 and 6:00. There will be an in-person sale on Saturday, April 12th beginning at 8:00 a.m. and ending at 1:00 p.m. in the Modern Living Mall on the Expo Center grounds.
We hope you keep in touch with us. There is a Library Program at 6:00 p.m. on the 1st Tuesday of the month at the South Library Branch in the Mall of Abilene, and the same program is offered again at 10:00 a.m. on the 2nd Friday of the month at the Downtown Library. There are also Saturday Seminars at 9:00 a.m. on the last Saturday of the month through August in the Taylor County Extension Office Conference Room. Watch the BCMGA website and Facebook page for topics and dates of these programs.
We hope you visit bcmgtx.org for information on all Big Country Master Gardener events, like us on BCMGA Facebook, and check out training presentations on BCMGA YouTube. We are here to help you. If you have any questions, call the Taylor County Extension Office at 325-672-6048 or email us at BCMGardeners@yahoo.com.
Until next week, happy gardening! And remember to either start or update your garden journal/planner.
