Page 18 - Newswatch April 2019,jpdf

Mark your calendars: SHA Board Meeting | April 9th | 7:00pm | Jones Creek Library
Louisiana gardening by the month
from nola.com
April: Excellent hot weather vegetables that can be planted now include cucuzzi, cushaw, eggplants, peanuts, pumpkins, Southern peas, hot peppers, lima beans, luffa gourds, okra and yard-long beans. Continue to plant transplants of tomatoes and peppers and seeds of snap beans, squash and cucumbers.
If you need to, prune spring-flowering shrubs, such as spirea, viburnum, quince, azalea, camellia, jasmine and mock orange as soon as they finish flowering.
Evaluate your flower beds of cool-season bedding plants carefully in late April and early May. When they are past their prime, pull them up and throw them in your compost pile. Then prepare the bed and plant warm-season bedding plants that will thrive here in summer.
Plant caladium tubers or started plants in shady areas this month.
The LSU AgCenter’s Louisiana Super Plant selection this spring is a lovely low growing golden-green perennial plant called Lemon Coral sedum (Sedum mexicanum ‘Lemon Coral’). It looks great bordering the front of beds or in containers. Golden flowers in the spring add to the display.
Do consider the use of gold, gold-green and chartreuse foliage plants in your landscape. In combinations with other colorful foliage plants (such as the purple foliage cultivars of Chinese witch hazel - Loropetalum chinensis), they can do a lot to brighten a landscape without the high maintenance involved with many flowering annuals and perennials.
Local nurseries generally carry a variety of gold leaved plants. The following list includes a small sampling of the plants you might consider using that grow well in this area. If you don’t see them at your local nursery, check out the Internet for mail order sources.
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