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oliveoyl3

bargain crispy Astilbe?

oliveoyl3
12 years ago

Be on the lookout for potted Astilbe on the markdown racks at big box stores.

I'm looking outside now at a sea of colored buds of Vision in Pink that I bought as two-gallon pots for $1 each at the end of August last year. Now, the 5 staggered plants are completely covering a 3'x 5' area for only $5 + my time in caring for them.

To save the markdown pots it looked tacky for awhile with the buckets, but I wanted to be sure to revive those roots before I planted in the fall, so in partial shade I -

-immersed in buckets of water holding them down under until the water sunk the pots & let soak for a few hours

-kept in shallow water in the buckets for about 2 weeks during late August

-now & then lifted them out of the buckets while doing garden chores for a few hours, then put them back in

Once the fall rains began we layered composted horse manure right on top of the woodland soil. I whacked at the swirled roots with a hand cultivator to pull some of them loose. Mulched with shredded maple leaves & more of the worm filled compost.

Comments (5)

  • odellohio10
    12 years ago

    Astible must be hard to kill. I bought some two years ago, and the first year, took forever to get them planted, so they looked terrible. But they came back. Last summer, it was so flippin' hot here, and I don't think I watered them enough. Yet, this year, they are still alive. And I didn't even do everything that you did to revive mine! I'm probably going to pick up some more for a shade garden I'm creating this fall!

  • madeyna
    12 years ago

    Its great to hear that they are so hardy. I bought one home a few days ago and put it still in its pot in a semi shaded lacation and it went totally crispy in one day. Should I cut all the foliage off to the crown to revive it?

  • pizzuti
    12 years ago

    I transplanted some Astilbe this summer. It was a hot week, but most of the directions I had been reading recommended transplanting Astilble immediately after they bloom.

    Due to transplant shock, they lost most of their existing leaves. I was expecting that, and then a new flush of leaves began to emerge from most of them, so I figured no big deal. I was expecting new leaves to replace the old leaves, but they only reached about 1/3 the height of the former leaves.

    Then, the astilbes dried out again. I do my gardening at my parents house because I live in an apartment, and my dad said "yeah I don't know why the shade garden looks so dry." I asked if anything there had been watered in the last week... the answer was no. Well *smacks forehead* there you go. 95-degree weather plus no water for a week will dry stuff out, and it apparently cancelled out all the time they'd spent establishing themselves.

    I put down layers of newspaper and mulch and watered as much as I could. That put the breaks on the dying... some leaves got broken during the mulching, but after that the leaves that were there remained. They look bad: some of the astilbes have no leaves at all (the plants appear completely dormant), others have about 1/3 of the mature leaves they were transplanted with, just with crispy edges, and others have 1/3 to 2/3 of their additional crop of leaves left.

    As for the "dormant" ones: will they survive? Or did they use up all their stored energy on the flush of leaves that didn't pan out?

    As for the ones with a few, scraggly leaves: will they be able to re-generate next spring (assuming they get lots of water then) in time to bloom in the summer?

    Or should I just write these off?

  • Jennifer_Ruth
    12 years ago

    Plants can surprise you. I had a lovely shade garden along the north side of the garage in Indiana--hydrangeas, hostas, lady ferns, astilbe, lady's mantle, and Checquers lamium. I neglected it shamefully, but it pulled through hot spells very well anyway.

    The way I see it, you have nothing to lose by leaving the crispy astilbes in place. They may look a little tacky this season, but if you keep them watered (maybe you can train the parents?), I bet you'll find that a lot of them bloom for you next year. Even the ones that look "dormant" right now may be busily rooting underground.

    Jennifer

  • oliveoyl3
    Original Author
    12 years ago

    I agree you'll be surprised with the results next year.

    Astilbe goes dormant if dry, but the roots should survive. I've read to get good bloom you'll need to feed them in October, so I'm going to add a shovelful of rabbit manure between the plants. If you don't have access to that try compost or used coffee grounds mixed in the mulch & let the winter rains water it through the layers.

    I've used a lot of coffee grounds around my gardens with excellent results. It sounds funny, but it really works to improve the soil with little effort.

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