Cottage Farms Direct welcomes you to
The Scoop! e-Newsletter.

Hope springs eternal and at Cottage Farms Direct we are pumped up and ready to roll!

Ahh, finally it's the spring shipping season and Cottage Farms Direct is staffed up and ready to process and ship our finest selection of top quality trees, shrubs, perennials, bulbs, edibles, and growing aids that we have ever offered! The beauty of ordering from Cottage Farms is we take the guesswork out of when you should plant this spring by shipping your order at the very best time to plant in your area! Our shipping zone map and tables show you when your order will be shipped, plus you can enter your zip code and find your ship date too. We hope your garden has weathered the storm, and you are ready to dance! We think the following information will help you enjoy your garden and landscape a little more by teaching you a bit of the technical side of plants.  It's all part of our commitment to you. We are excited to send you our finest selection of gardening products!

It’s time to get your garden groove on!

Although the weather is not spring-like all over the country, now is the best time to consider and purchase your plants for this spring. With over 200 new offers from Cottage Farms, you can choose from the cream of the crop products right now while the selection is best. We will reserve your quantity and ship your plants when it is the best time to plant in your area.

Our growing and shipping staff are fired up to ship your plants in peak condition, plus our customer service group has been through extensive training to increase our ability to help you be successful!

Guaranteed to grow!

Buy with confidence. All of our plants are guaranteed to grow and perform. We offer a full replacement for up to one year from the original date of shipment on all plants with the exception of annual plants, which we warrant for 90 days. Simply put, Cottage Farms Direct is not happy unless you are happy! Our goal is to make it easy and fun for you to purchase and grow plants!

What's New!

Garden Collections

You must check out our new groups of Garden Collections! We have done our homework and put together plants that will complement each other for specific garden needs, such as Sun, Shade Moist, Dry, and special groupings including Butterfly & Hummingbird, Deer Proof, and Monochromatic Color Gardens. We devised the collections to help you create that little bit of heaven in your backyard.

Knowing which plants complement and grow well together makes it easier for you to design your own gardens and beds. Our planting instructions will remind you of heights and the space needed to maximize your planting.

How could we make it better?

Well, how about saving up to 30%  when compared to purchasing the plants individually!

• We put the right plants together to make your garden beautiful
• We supply the information to help you design and utilize your plants to the fullest
• We are offering savings of up to 30% off selected Garden Collections over individual prices
• We ship the Garden Collections to you at the best time to plant in your area

I guess the only thing left is to actually plant them for you, and believe me when I say this, we have a number of employees that would love to do that, but we need their help to ship the orders!

You get to do the fun part -- plant them and watch your garden come alive with color and texture!

Gardening Tips

Maintenance Time

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Give your tools some love and they will love you back!

Sharp tools will make the jobs you tackle this spring so much easier. Shovels penetrate soil easier, hoes cut weeds easier and with less effort, and sharpened pruners, loppers, and other cutting tools can save time and your hands! Do not forget the power equipment! Sharp blades use less oil and gas and make your job more efficient.

In almost all cases, when you properly maintain your tools, they will also last longer! So get out the file, turn on the grinder, change the oil, or better yet let a professional show you how it is done so the next time you can do it right. A few hours spent now will pay huge dividends in time and money later this year!

To Prune Or Not To Prune?

That is a common question. Pruning plants in early spring is a common practice, but with certain plants and pruning practices there can be negative and harmful effects on plant health. Let us review some pruning basics.

Question: Should all plants be pruned in early spring before growth emerges?
The answer is most plants should probably receive a light pruning, but there are certain plants that should not be pruned in the early spring.  Here's why...

Plants have a built-in mechanism to balance their above ground growth (shoots) with their below ground growth (roots). By eliminating a percentage of either roots or shoots, it creates an imbalance to which the plant automatically reacts. The timing of this imbalance can create different reactions by the plant.

A number of deciduous plants (plants that lose their leaves in winter) like lilacs, increase their root size in the fall in anticipation of increased top growth in the spring. If the plant retains all of its top growth from the previous year going into spring, then the increased root size tells the plant "I need more shoots to balance this larger root size ."

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But, what if something happened that caused the roots or shoots to start spring with a tremendous imbalance? What if part of the root system was damaged or removed over the course of the fall and winter? Depending on the amount of loss, your top growth will start off slowly in an effort to let the roots catch up to the shoots, unless of course the damage was extensive and then the plant may leaf out but not be able to sustain growth. What little leaf growth appeared would turn brown and the plant would die.  There is also the possibility that the plant would not leaf out at all. Many times root damage from wet soil or other causes does not appear until spring. In this case, it would be advisable to prune some of the top growth to lessen the stress on the root system.

On the opposite side of the spectrum, what if a percentage of the top growth was damaged, destroyed, or pruned off in the fall, winter, or before growth starts in the spring? The roots may have already expanded in the fall so they are going to tell the top growth to "get a move on - we need growth to support the roots and we need it now!"   Depending on the amount of top loss, the growth may be undesirable growth like watershoots (weak, small caliper branches that usually grow vertically from large stems). This growth weakens the plant instead of creating healthy tissue which generates more energy and food through photosynthesis. This commonly appears when someone prunes a large amount of their plant in early spring in an attempt to control the height or size of the plant. In addition to hurting the overall health of the plant, pruning branches larger than 2” in caliper can create cavities which may contribute to insect and disease problems of an already weakened tree or shrub.

What, When, Where?

Spring is an important and effective time to prune most plants. It is not the time to try and control the size of the plant. Spring is one of the best times to shape a plant and to trim off dead, diseased, or broken branches.  Also, remember when you prune in the spring you may eliminate bloom buds which, in turn, lessens the color display. Most nursery sources recommend pruning spring flowering plants after they have bloomed in the spring so that you can enjoy the fruits of your labor!

So, when is the best time to prune a plant to control the size but not stress the health of the plant? When plants are pruned, not only is there an imbalance in the roots and shoots, but there also is an imbalance of hormones which are manufactured in the growing tissue of the plant. The hormones are needed to regulate the growth of the plant. Since pruning decreases the amount of growing tissue temporarily until the plant can compensate, the hormone imbalance that is created can have differing effects based on how active the stage of growth is. In a number of plants there are two seasons when growth is not occurring in either the roots or the shoots: summer and winter. Above, we discussed what could  happen if we prune heavily in the winter. When the weather in the summer reaches temperatures above 86º, a number of plants start to shut their processes down to survive the stress of the temperatures. Although it may seem odd to prune when the temperature is hot, thinking about what occurs, it does make some sense. Pruning top growth off the plant when the plant is not growing in summer reduces the amount of foliage that the root system needs to support, lessening the stress level. At the same time, since the plant is not actively growing, the hormone imbalance does not put as much stress on the plant as when it is in active growth.

This can be an excellent time to start to control the size of the plant. When you prune in the heat of the summer, the plant mechanisms tell the root, "hey, no reason to put on more growth this fall, you have more roots than you need to support new growth in the spring." Consequently in the spring, the growth is more manageable as the plant strives to put the shoots and roots in balance before the heat of the summer.

If your plant has never been pruned or hasn't been pruned in a very long time, you should not prune more than 20-25% of the leaf surface from the plant in the summer. You may have to prune your plant in the summer for a few years to come. Also, be realistic and do your homework. If the plant you currently have grows to 30’ and you really only want a 10-15’ plant, save yourself a whole lot of work and aggravation by cutting the larger plant down and planting a species that will only grow to the desired height.

Do I Need Pruning Sealer?

Most university studies reveal that asphalt based pruning sealers actually do more harm than good. A plant has internal mechanisms to protect itself from different types of injuries. The vascular cambium automatically goes into high gear and the fastest growing cells of the tree, called the callous roll, covers the wound. Never prune a limb back flush to the trunk of a tree. This could cause damage to the vascular cambium and inhibit the callous roll from repairing the wound. The black asphalt pruning sealer inhibits the callous roll from doing its thing and makes the tree more susceptible to insects and diseases. There are waxed based pruning sealers that will help you sleep better at night, but they really do not discourage insect feeding.

Stay Tuned!...

Next week we will discuss pruning herbaceous plants (plants that lose their top growth in winter, commonly referred to as perennials) and deciduous plants that do not increase their root mass in the fall and should not be pruned in the spring. If you have Dogwoods, Magnolias, Rhododendrons, Hemlock, and Japanese Red Maples don’t touch those pruners 'til next week! To learn more about pruning a specific plant, we suggest googling the word pruning followed by the plant name.

Thanks for keeping us coming to your email box and we look forward to making gardening more fun for you!

Thought for the week!

~Bertha Calloway~