Last Friday, I wrote about a new hybrid lavender, called ‘Phenomenal,’ that, according to Southern Living magazine, reportedly grows well in the South. New Orleans-area gardeners took note — and flooded my inbox.

There is definitely a pent-up desire for lavender plants that can stand up to South Louisiana’s heat and humidity.

Most of the local garden centers I called haven’t heard of ‘Phenomenal,’ and several sources said it wasn’t really the type of lavender that was the problem in local gardens — but how it’s planted.

“I have French lavender that I’ve had planted in my yard for two years, and it does well,” said Chad Harris, owner of the Garden Gates nursery and boutique in Old Metairie. “If you want to grow lavender in New Orleans, you have to plant it in gravel. Mine is in all pea gravel, with no soil at all. That’s the secret.”

Audrey Driscoll, a member of The Herb Society of America, New Orleans Unit, said her group offers a similar “prescription” for planting lavender and other Mediterranean herbs here.

“We suggest a layer of pea gravel at the bottom of the container, followed by coarse sand, then potting soil,” she wrote in an email. “Finish the top surface with a thin layer of the pea gravel. This can work in the ground as well. The gravel at the bottom followed by the sand provides drainage. These plants want water but want the water to drain off. The gravel on the surface keeps the plant’s underside away from a ‘wet’ surface. A little lime can be added to the potting soil. Think of when you see lavender growing in the cracks of buildings in Europe. It is the lime in the mortar that nourishes them.”

Harris, though, doesn’t think lavender should be watered at all. “There is more than enough water in New Orleans to keep those plants alive,” he said.

Harris’ Garden Gates nursery sells lavender in the fall, not the spring. “If you plant it in the fall it has a better chance of surviving,” he said. “Our falls tend to be cooler and dryer than our springs, so if you get it established you have a better chance of it making it.”

Photo: Maryanne Ventrice, Flickr

If you live in a city, the idea of personal outdoor space might seem like a luxury to you. Chances are much slimmer that you’re sporting a garden out back. But for those longing to see green space in their apartment, hope is not lost. All you need is a windowsill.

Read on to learn five tips for a healthy apartment window garden and how to make your landscape a bit more bearable.

1. Shape and space

Choosing what to grow in an apartment mini-garden is an important — and exciting — decision, but one that is determined by several factors. First up is determining the space you want to grow in. For many, this might be as simple as a window and windowsill, while others may be interested in expanding outside of their apartment and utilizing their fire escape or window bars. Though the latter is certainly possible, it’s important to remember to leave space for footpaths. Hanging planters on handrails is an option around this, should you be interested in putting plants solely outdoors. Once you’ve determined where you’ll grow, it will help you decide what to grow.

Home Lotus Plant Care Tips

While caring for these plants, you need to indulge in pruning and trimming techniques as well. This will ensure that the plants grow with the perfect structure which is essential. Here are a few trimming tips that will help you understand, when to trim and how to conduct trimming.

Individual Needs
This is something you need to remember when trimming the plants in your garden. The trimming needs for individual plants differ from the other. This is why you need to ensure that you are performing the right trimming as per the plant requirement. In case of a mismatch, you will be playing around with the structural integrity of the plant in question.

Use Sharp Tools
When looking for tips for trimming plants, you will find that most people suggest using sharp tools. When you use dull or rusty tools for this process, you might just affect the plant and injure it by pulling in too many efforts to trim the plant. You will need to make sure that your trimming and pruning tools are sharp just before the season begins. You have hedge trimmers, in case you have grown a hedge. For other purposes you will need to use sharp shears that will make both trimming and pruning as easy as possible.

Sterilize the Tools
Your plants are as prone to infections as you are! Always remember this! If you tend to use tools that are not properly sterilized you may cause infections in the plants. This infection can spread rapidly causing death of the plant. In case you want to avoid any such thing, it is always good to use tools that are sterilized to trim or prune your plants.

Remove the Diseased
You don’t directly begin working on the entire plant. You begin with inspecting the plant properly. You should ideally look out for the broken, damaged or diseased portions of the plant. This is where you will begin trimming your plants from. There are many plants that suffer broken limbs as they begin growing. For perfect growth, you need to remove this portion of your plant.

Check the Progress
While you are calculating on your trimming techniques to control the growth of your plant, you may want to check on the progress caused by the trimming. This is one of the most beneficial tips for trimming plants. You will need to step back and see how your plant looks. Is trimming necessary or it can be stopped? You will need to verify the technique you have implemented too. This way you would be aware of how the trimming technique is helping you.