Hi,
I'm Kate. I'm a new member and a first time gardener.
(I might post this same post to a more specific forum for more help. I am so needy!)
Unfortunately for me, I've inherited my mother's inability to keep a plant alive. I've killed everything from mini palm trees to
cactus!! I've even killed air plants, for Heaven's sake! Just another reason I don't have kids! LOL
But I've owned my house (new when I bought it) for three years in April and haven't planted a single plant. My husband has been at Fort Polk in Louisiana for the past two years while I keep our home going here in TN (near Ft. Campbell). Well maybe it's that he's finally coming home, maybe it's that I just can't stand my empty yard any longer, but I HAVE to do something.
I don't want to garden so much as landscape. I think?
(Is that what you'd call it?) I'm more concerned with making the front yard look presentable. More like a home. We live out in the countryside and have 2.75 acres. Most of it is wooded but unfortunately the house sits in the middle of a total clearing, completely void of anything but prarie grass. My dad visited from California and couldn't stand the barren yard any longer. He planted three cypress trees (I insisted on some evergreens because everything looks so DEAD here in the winter) and four cherry trees. Lucky for him, he has an amazing ability to garden and has always had a dozen fruit trees (even in a small yard in California). Now that he's back in CA, the cypresses look like they're dying (in shock, he says). I'll have to wait until
spring to see if the cherry trees survived. The woods are back beyond the backyard so everything is open and barren, right up to the street. I'd like to put bushes/shrubs and trees as a privacy fence/windblock. But I'm not sure what to use.
Also, cost is a big concern. It's a big yard and no one's finances are great right now!
I'm trying to do some research because I don't know the difference between an annual and a perennial! All I know is that I don't want to deal with
seeds, bulbs or anything I have to dig up in the winter. I want something that will last year-round. I don't care how beautiful a
flower is, if it only blooms for a couple of weeks, I don't want it. lol I need plants that are low-maintenance but will last (even if only in leaf/branch form).
I tried to make a list of desirable plant qualities (feel free to suggest some to me, I am in your debt.) but obviously no plant will fit all of them; they're just what I want to keep in mind.
-Low Maintenance
-Fast
growing-Inexpensive
-Cold Resistant
-Heat Resistant
-Deer Resistant (I can't even count the dozens of deer I find in my yard at all hours of the day and night!!!)
I think flowering shrubs and ornamental grasses are my best bet.
Your thoughts??
I place my inexperienced self in all of your capable and kind hands,
Kate
