How To Check If Cut Flowers Are FreshWritten by Gerry Belvedere
Fresh flowers should feel crisp or firm. Before you buy, run your hand under flower heads from stem to petal tip. Proceed gently under petals so as not to bruise them.If flower vendor objects, give them a withering look and enquire in a loud voice, "Are these flowers fresh?" If flowers feel soft, cool or damp, don't buy them. Keep testing other bunches until you find a good one. Often there are only one or two bunches older than others. Look and listen. Really fresh flowers will make a soft rustling sound as you stroke them.
| | 5 Perennials For Shade GardensWritten by Lee Dobbins
We all know that flowers love sunshine, but did you realize that there are perennials that love shade? You can create a beautiful garden in shade that can act as a cooling retreat on those hot summer days. By using perennials, your flowers will come up year after year for a lifetime of enjoyment. Shade gardens offer much more than gardens that sit in blazing sun all day. You can actually sit in them and enjoy them. Pull up a nice lounge chair or have a beautiful granite bench installed. Sit and read on a hot day, or just sip a drink and enjoy birds and butterflies. Like any other garden best shade gardens will have taller plants in back against house or woods, medium growing plants in middle and shorter or ground cover plants on inner edge. Since most perennials bloom for a short time, you ‘ll want to plant them so that you always have color in garden. Stage planting so that each area has a blooming plant at all times of season. Here’s a list of some perennials that thrive in shade:
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