It has been a wild roller-coaster ride of spring weather in northeast Wisconsin, but hang on, plant-buying temperatures are on the way.
If you’re looking for some inspiration and guidance on what to add to your gardens this year or put in your raised vegetable bed or combine in a front porch planter, we went to the greenest thumbs we know: Green Bay-area greenhouse and nursery owners.
We asked each of them for the one plant they couldn’t imagine not growing in their own yards. Here’s what they said, and because these are plant lovers, forgive them if they couldn’t always choose just one.
Meadow blazing star: A native nectar plant monarchs love
Recommended by: Justin Kroening, owner of Stone Silo Prairie Gardens, 2325 Oak Ridge Circle, Ledgeview.
“It is a monarch magnet. It kind of reminds you of something from ‘The Lorax.’ It’s very pretty. The number of butterflies it attracts is quite amazing.”
The native plant grows tall, 3½ to 4 feet, and blooms late in the summer with tufted purple flowers up and down the stems. It’s a favorite and important nectar source of monarchs as they fuel up ahead of their long journey back home for winter.
“We always focus on milkweed, and milkweed is great for the butterflies, obviously. It’s a necessity [as the host plant for monarch caterpillars], but I like to see people focus on the nectar plants, too,” Kroening said.
Growing tips: Meadow blazing star prefers full sun and slightly dry conditions. Protect it from rabbits the first year you plant it, but Kroening said it holds its own after that. A well-behaved native, it makes a nice addition to perennial beds and borders, adding height and structure.
‘Limelight’ hydrangea: A showstopper shrub that’s no fuss
Recommended by: Steve Frankow, owner of Ivy Trails Gift & Garden, 3200 Main St., Green Bay.
“The ‘Limelight’ is one of the easiest growing in our soils. It’s almost always a successful plant to put in your yard. They bloom from July [with large, cone-shaped flowers] all the way up through frost, and then you have the dried flowers all winter long as an added feature. The birds can eat the seeds in the springtime.”
It’s a vigorous grower and can reach 6 to 8 feet. It works well to screen a neighbor or as an accent plant. It can be pruned a bit to maintain size, but Frankow likes it large so it can make a big statement.
Growing tips: It prefers at least a half-day of sun, but it’s also pretty forgiving. It doesn’t like real wet conditions. If you’re planting it somewhere with a lot of clay, amend the soil before you put it in the ground.
Dahlias: A cut flower favorite and so pretty in pink
Recommended by: Sam Stascak, co-manager at In Bloom Greenhouse, 1581 Bellevue St., Bellevue.
“They’re probably one of the prettiest plants you can have in your yard. They’re gorgeous. They make a statement. It’s just a nice pop of color for your yard. We have every color you could possibly imagine.”
Dahlias, which are grown as an annual and can grow anywhere from a foot to 3 feet tall, depending on the variety, work in gardens or containers. They make a beautiful cut flower all season.
“It’s called a cut-and-come-again flower, so you cut a flower, you’ll get more flowers,” Stascak said.
The one turning heads at In Bloom this season is the fancy new “Venti PinkBurst” with its anemone-like center, but there are all kinds of varieties, including “MegaBoom Passion Fruit” (a two-tone soft coral and yellow) and “XXL Veracruz” (cream and bright pink).
Growing tips: Dahlias can be prone to powdery mildew in humid conditions. Make sure not to plant them too close together to allow for air flow between plants. Check regularly for signs of powdery mildew and remove infected leaves.
Tomatoes: You have to have a ‘Celebrity’ and a ‘Big Boy’
Recommended by: Larry Rabas, owner of Larry’s Bellevue Gardens, 2620 Continental Drive, Bellevue.
“Well, you know everybody wants to grow a tomato … or two … or three. We’ve been experimenting, and we’ve come up with ‘Celebrity’ being really good. It’s a nice, easy, medium-size tomato. We still do a lot of the ‘Big Boys’ and ‘Better Boys.’ Those are kind of the hybrids, the old standbys that have been around forever.”
Larry’s also carries 30 or 40 heirloom varieties that are popular with customers, like “Bradywine” and “German Johnson,” for their flavors.
(If you’re wondering about “all these goofy hot peppers” people are into, Rabas says his favorite is “Ghost,” because it brings the heat without being completely off the charts. He likes to put just a bit in pickles, relish or dilly beans.)
Growing tips: If you don’t have a garden, you can grow a tomato plant in a 5- to 10-gallon pot and still get good production. Remember that tomatoes (and peppers) do not like chilly weather, so hold off on planting until the weather consistently warms up. You will not gain much planting tomatoes early in cold soil, said Rabas, who often doesn’t get his own in until Memorial Day weekend or later. They turn out just as good, if not better, he said.
‘Kismet Raspberry’ coneflower: It checks all the boxes
Recommended by: Leo Bordeleau, owner of Rose-Hill Gardens, 472 Rose-Hill Drive, Hobart.
“It’s such a nice coneflower, extremely hardy, vigorous, fairly compact, long blooming. I can’t think of anything bad to say about it. When people come in and if they inquire, ‘What’s your favorite?’ or ‘What’s a good one?’ that’s always the first one I’ll lead them to.”
There’s “Kismet White” and “Kismet Yellow,” too, but there’s something about the vibrant color of “Kismet Raspberry” that sets it apart, Bordeleau said. He has customers who have bought the perennial in the past and come in looking to add more.
It’s a mid- to late-season bloomer and delivers a longer flowering season than most coneflowers, roughly late June to early August, he said.
Growing tips: Full sun is best for optimal flowering. It’s a little slower to come up in spring than some other perennials, so be patient.
SunPatiens, begonias, salvias: Container plants that play nice together
Recommended by: Vicki Rabas, co-owner of Larry’s Bellevue Gardens, 2620 Continental Drive, Bellevue.
Rabas is known for her combination hanging baskets and containers at Larry’s. She has three go-to flowers for keeping the color coming all summer in hers at home.
“SunPatiens, because they can go in sun and shade, and then I don’t have to worry about where I plant them. Any salvias, from your ‘Velocity Blue’ salvia up to the ‘Rockin’’ series that get very large, because those attract your hummingbirds and they help fill out a planter. The third one is the begonias, the ‘Big’ series or the ‘Dragon Wing’ series, because again, they get nice and big. They come in dark leaf and green leaf, so you can mix those, either within themselves or with the SunPatiens and with the salvia. They blend very well together.”
Growing tips: All three are easy care – hardy, forgiving and drought tolerant. You don’t have to deadhead SunPatiens or begonias and only minimally on the salvias, which will want the most sun of the three.
Hydrangeas: So many varieties and so many fun names
Recommended by: Linda Wery-Lambert, owner of Wery’s Sweet Summer Bloomers, 1748 Lenwood Ave., Howard.
“It would be so empty without them. They flower so long. They start flowering the beginning of July and you’ve got them until the beginning of October.”
She carries more than 50 varieties of the shrubs that come in all different sizes. Among her favorites are a pair of panicle hydrangeas, “Berry White,” with big cone-shaped white flowers that turn cherry red in the fall, and “Strawberry Sundae,” a smaller panicle that transitions from creamy white into strawberry pink as the season goes on. She’s also a fan of “the newest kid on the block”: “FlowerFull,” a smooth hydrangea that is similar to the old-fashioned “Annabelle” but has stronger stems, doesn’t flop and blooms all summer.
Growing tips: Some varieties of hydrangeas prefer more sun and others more shade, so check labels. As a general rule, the bigger upright ones with a lot of wood want more sun, Wery-Lambert said. Hydrangeas appreciate mulch to help retain moisture.
Kendra Meinert is an entertainment and feature writer at the Green Bay Press-Gazette. Contact her at 920-431-8347 or kmeinert@greenbay.gannett.com. Follow her on X @KendraMeinert.
This article originally appeared on Green Bay Press-Gazette: Green Bay’s greenest thumbs share their own must-have garden plants
Reporting by Kendra Meinert, Green Bay Press-Gazette / Green Bay Press-Gazette
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