In the summer, it’s great to have a yard full of flowers. You can enjoy beauty and interest in your garden all year long, though, if you learn how to grow an all-season garden.
A garden is more than just flowers in the summer. It can also have delicate shrubs that bloom in the spring, dramatic leaves that change colors in the fall, and colorful stems that are full of berries in the winter to draw birds. No matter where you live, you can still have a beautiful garden in the winter.
1.Research Native Plants
Do some study before you prepare a garden bed or buy a plant. “I really think people should take time looking at public gardens and local private gardens for ideas that work in their specific area,” says Putnam.
To start your study, look for plants that grow well in your area. Native plants, in particular, are good choices because they know how to live in your area.
When you’re looking through a catalog, make sure you write down the USDA Plant Hardiness Zone of each plant to make sure it will grow where you live.
2.Survey Your Garden
Make a list of all the plants in your yard right now and write down when they bloom. This can be done with a simple book or spreadsheet that has the name of the plant in the first column and the months (or weeks, if you like to be more specific) across the top.
Put an X under the month in spring that your flowers or forsythia bush bloom. Put an X through the whole summer if you have daylilies. Once you’ve made a list of all the plants that bloom in your yard, the spreadsheet will show you where other annuals, perennials, and shrubs can be planted to fill in the gaps.
3.Invest in Year Round Perennials
Even though perennials cost more than annuals, they are worth it because they come back year after year with the right care. You can build your garden’s structure with perennials, and then use annuals to fill in the gaps and add more color and interest.
4.Think Beyond Evergreens for Winter Interest
“Unfortunately, some people only define a year-round garden with flowers,” he says. “We can use stem color, fall foliage, conifers, and plant structure to create beautiful spaces as well.” This is very important for people who garden in places where winters are hard.
Annual plants don’t do anything in the winter, but perennial tall grasses stay interested and provide cover and food for animals that come out in the winter. In Zones 4–11, some types of yucca stay green all winter, poking their hooked leaves through the snow.
5.Opt for Early Blooms for Spring Variety
You should now understand what a year-round garden is all about. It’s not so much the order of the blooms as it is the order of the interesting parts, since plants are beautiful in more ways than one.
Here are a few examples of plants that look nice in the spring. Pansies are a famous annual flower that blooms in the spring and can handle some frost. In the subtropics (Zones 7–11), they flower all winter.
In most of the U.S., they add color to the scenery in the spring and fall, but they die back in the summer.
6.Mix Annuals and Perennials in the Summer
It shouldn’t be hard for you to find plants that look good in your summer yard. These ideas aren’t meant to be specific to your yard, but they should help you figure out how to mix annuals and perennials to get the most color and interest from them.
Marigolds, petunias, and zinnias are some of the most popular summer annuals for their bright color. Even though summer is full of flowers, don’t forget about annuals like begonias, coleus, and purple basil that have brightly colored leaves.
7.Embrace Colorful Fall Foliage
Your garden will look interesting and have lots of different textures and colors of leaves all year long. “The use of foliage colors in chartreuse, purple, and shades of green in the garden is as good as flowers,” Putnam says.
Can’t decide what to read this fall? Asters (Zones 3–8) and chrysanthemums (Zones 5–9) are two of the most famous fall flowering perennials. But there are other options, like ornamental kale, which has leaves that are curly, frilly, or ruffled, and ornamental cabbage, which has flat leaves that are different colors.
In Zones 2 through 11, these cool-season perennials are grown as annuals. They have bright, many-colored leaves.
8.Enlist Planning Assistance
With so many factors to consider—growing zone, moisture, colors, sunlight, flowering schedules—planning a garden with year-round interest may seem impossibly complex, but it doesn’t have to be.
9.Keep Up With Maintenance
Mulching, pulling weeds, watering, and fertilizer are all good gardening habits that will help your garden grow all year. “Mulch is the most important component to a healthy landscape,” Putnam says. “It feeds the plants as it breaks down, keeps the roots moist, suppresses weeds, cools in the summer, and warms in the winter.”
If a plant has flowers that are past their prime, don’t be shy about leaving them on. “Spent flowers are a super way to add color and interest in the winter garden,” Putnam says. “Also, spent flowers and grasses offer food and cover for birds and overwintering pollinators.”