It's weed season!

(photo by Better Homes & Gardens)

WEED! 

That dreaded 4 letter word that all gardeners fear! This is weed season! It’s that time of the year where the weeds are happiest, and this year, surely is not disappointing us in the Inland Northwest! We have a very lush crop of the hated enemy of every garden lover! There are no simple ways to eradicate weeds! There are, however, tips we will share with you to help you win the battle in your organic garden!

Your best bet to eradicate weeds is through rototilling your soil, unless it is a grass type of weed and then you should hand pull them. Removing the weed seed and roots from most weeds to prevent the regrowth and spreading of the weeds. Rototill your soil up to 6” deep. Once you have the soil loosened, remove the weed before the roots get beyond 2” deep.  Weed seeds can be viable up to 80 years, so rototilling the soil and getting them up is your best chance of success.  

You can also cover your beds with mulch, which will help control the growth of weeds, and can be tilled in the fall. Do not use certified weed free hay, if you are an organic gardener, as it contains herbicide.

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On a happy note, another truck filled with perennials arrived this morning to the nursery! 

Along with lavenders and hydrangea, we received 7 amazing varieties of hibiscus! Cranberry Crush, Candy Crush, Cherry Choco Latte, French Vanilla, Holy Grail, Spinderella and Summer in Paradise.

Hibiscus Cranberry Crush (photo by Proven Winners)

Hibiscus Candy Crush

This hardy Hibiscus shares all the great traits that made 'Cranberry Crush' popular: upright, columnar habit, fantastic garden presence, and excellent flower coverage. 8", bright bubblegum pink flowers have a near-black, dark red eye and are produced all over its habit of rich, bright green leaves. (photo by Garden Crossings)

Hibiscus Cherry Choco Latte (photo by Garden Crossings)

French Vanilla Hibiscus boast huge 7-8", creamy custard yellow, ruffled flowers. Flowers are more yellow in cooler conditions, whiter in hotter conditions. (photo by National Garden Bureau)

Hibiscus Holy Grail (photo by Garden Crossings)

Hibiscus Spinderella (photo by Proven Winners)

There's no sight quite like a hardy hibiscus blooming in late summer, and 'Summer in Paradise' delivers the most amazing coral red flowers to your garden. Deeply colored buds open to 7-8” flowers. Medium green, maple-like leaves are accented by olive green edges. An award winner in anyone’s garden! (photo by Walters Gardens)

So, get in and grab these beauties before they disappear! They are all amazing show stoppers for your garden!

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Looking for grasses to finish off your landscape design?

We got loads of them! Five sought after varieties in various sizes!

Miscanthus 'Purpurascens,’ commonly called flame grass, is noted for its superior orange-red fall color. It is a compact, upright, warm season, clump-forming ornamental grass that offers great winter color is also one of the drought tolerant plants available at New Leaf Nursery! (photo by Conservation Garden Park)

Gracillimus ‘Maiden Grass’ (photo by The Tree Center)

Huron Sunrise grass is one of the most popular grasses we carry and it is the most prolific of the grasses; the plumes turn to burgundy in the fall! (photo by Walters Gardens)

Morning Light Maiden Grass (photo by The Greenhouse)

Strictus Grass (photo by Hoffman Nursery)

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And the best news of all, we received a large order of buddleia, or butterfly bush! 

We received three varieties: Miss Molly, Miss Pearl, Miss Ruby and Lo & Behold! Pick one, or two, or take them all! They will bring stunning color and beautiful butterflies to your garden!

Keep your eye on our EVENTS page of the website! Always new things to see!

Happy gardening!

Summer is here!

The peonies are exploding with color, the iris are strutting their stuff, and it’s time to get into the garden!

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Mark your calendar for two very important summer dates! 

Sunday, July 11th is the 23rd Annual CDA Garden Tour, sponsored by the CDA Garden Club, welcoming all of us back to visit six of the loveliest gardens in our area. Stifled by 2020, the garden tour was sadly cancelled, leaving us all to create amazing gardens of our own. The second special date in July is Thursday, July 8, which is our first annual Summer Festival as a kick off to Garden Tour Weekend!

New Leaf Nursery has been an industry leader for many years in our neighborhoods, and this year the Summer Festival promises a great evening of fun with your friends and neighbors in our beautiful garden nursery! Hot air balloon rides (weather permitting) and live rockin’ music from the 70s, 80s & 90s by LakeTown Sound will move and groove you! Come enjoy summer culinary treats from The Clementine Food Trailer (all plant based, perfect in a nursery, eh?), Unlawful Waffle, and some all time faves from O’Houlis Kettle Corn and Hello Sugar! Enjoy our beer garden hosted by Lone Mountain Farms and make s’mores around a fire pit!

And be sure to make time to take a private tour in the nursery early in the evening, hosted by our amazing landscape design team! Learn the insider’s tricks to everything gardening in the inland Northwest and lots more!

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So what’s new at the nursery? Smoke Bush!

As most of us feel about kale as a food source, deer seem to feel this way about smoke bush! The most popular of all the varieties of “cotinus” is Royal Purple and most deer turn their noses up. We have lots of them waiting for you at the nursery too! Smoke bush is a magnificent color producer year round and floral designers love using cut smoke bush foliage in their floral creations. If you’re not quite a floral designer, try cutting a few branches and put them into a tall vintage vase and set it in your window to experience the light passing thru the leaves. This plant is a garden staple, and because the deer don’t like it, you can make quite a statement. These can grow between 10-12 ft tall and wide.

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Blushing Bride Hydrangea

As the summer goes along, more and more hydrangea come into the nursery, looking for a home at your home! In our previous post, we discussed the paniculata varieties of hydrangea. Now. it’s time for the macrophylla hydrangea! Our three favorites in the Endless Summer varieties are Blushing Bride, BloomStruck and Summer Crush, and they will be in mid week so plan to come early for the best selection!

Blushing Bride, and other macrophylla, has been known to bloom on old wood in the Spring, and later in the summer, bloom on new branches! A faint hint of blush in the white blooms makes this variety easy to find in the nursery!

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BloomStruck Hydrangea

BloomStruck is that classic lavender and purple and blue palette of color that grandma always had in her garden! And yes, hydrangea macrophylla, have a unique ability to change flower colors from pink to blue, or vice versa. This change is a response to the amount of aluminum in the soil that the plant can use. In acidic soils, aluminum is readily available and a hydrangea's roots can absorb this mineral. And yes, we have what you need inside the garden center to help you have the most enviable hydrangea on the block!

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Summer Crush Endless Summer® Hydrangea

Summer Crush is the most vibrant of the trilogy! How can you live without it! These varieties of hydrangea are nearly fool proof. Endless Summer® hydrangeas grow in Zones 4-8, able to thrive in more parts of the country than other hydrangea varieties. They are cold-hardy enough to withstand frost and can tolerate some heat. However, keep the afternoon sun to a minimum when the days are hot!  

The greatest thing about Endless Summer® hydrangeas is that you don't need to prune them back to the base like other hydrangeas. Since they bloom on previous year’s growth AND the new season's growth, you can leave them all winter long to achieve double the blooms next spring. Do NOT prune the hydrangea back in fall. Instead, prune them only in May. This will ensure the flower buds that have made it through the winter have emerged. Prune out only dead wood and leave any green buds or leaves. They grow to between 3-5 ft tall.

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See why we are excited when the trucks show up loaded with Endless Summer® Hydrangeas?

Looking forward to seeing you soon!

Happy Memorial Day Weekend! The perfect time to remember our heroes, enjoy family BBQ's and plant in our gardens!

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And finally, the wait is over! The hydrangea have arrived!

An amazing truckload of paniculate hydrangeas are living in the nursery, waiting for you right now! 2 gallon pots are priced at $39.99 each, you’ll find four varieties of our all-time faves: Limelight, First Editions Vanilla Strawberry, Bobo and First Editions Berry White.

The Hydrangea Paniculata Limelight has an upright growing structure that will get up to 8 feet tall and 8 feet wide at maturity. It is also drought tolerant. It performs best in loamy, moist, well-drained soil types and unlike many other hydrangeas, it prefers full sun to partial sun.  A slow release fertilizer will make those blooms even more spectacular, and we have just what you need in our garden center!

Need a perfect pop of color in small yards or as a thriller in large decorative containers? Try the easy care First Editions® Strawberry Sundae® Panicle Hydrangea With a rounded, compact bloom, this gorgeous Hydrangea fits beautifully in small space gardens and makes a lovely accent in larger landscapes. If you’re planting your garden for a wedding in summer of 2022, wouldn’t all of these be the perfect backdrop for the wedding party?

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Along with the hydrangea, much sought after varieties of lavender are in! We have 9 varieties! Yes, 9! If you want the lavender fields of Senanque in your garden, try the Provence variety.

Lavender for all, come see! A superior selection, Super Blue Lavender produces armloads of intensely fragrant lavender wands from early summer into fall. Only growing 10-12 inches tall, its short stature makes it ideal for containers and edging. An extra tough variety it withstands cold winters, heat and humidity. Deer and bunny resistant, and repels mosquitoes.

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Looking for the perfect privacy screen between you and your neighbors, that the deer won’t eat into oblivion We have them! The Moonglow Juniper is just what you have been looking for.

Their silvery blue foliage seems to reflect light. They max out at around 18 feet high and gain approximately 1 foot every year. Magnificent trees!

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Come in and see us soon! We always love to see you!

Happy Memorial Day Weekend!

New favorites have arrived for spring!

Welcome to the New Leaf Nursery Garden Center mid-May newsletter!

If you haven't been to the nursery in a while, it's time to come in and see how we are growing! The changes are quite amazing! As our community grows, we too, are striving to meet the unusually large demand for landscape materials. Along with having the largest selection of trees, shrubs, perennials and annuals, we also offer the finest soils and mulch in the area. And, we have added 2 new greenhouses to increase our production.

Spring planting is in full swing, and the trucks are coming in nearly daily, loaded with gorgeous flowers and plants. Mother's Day weekend brought us so many thoughtful folks looking for the perfect gift for their mom and the other beautiful women in their lives.

From hanging baskets brimming with color, to fresh veggie plants, to gorgeous peony bushes, it's a gardener's dream location!

Some of the newest arrivals are Butterfly bushes. Did you know they are commonly called “summer lilac”? See one in full bloom and you will understand why. Simply stunning!

Miss Molly Butterfly Bush is a new, non-invasive variety of this popular garden perennial. It is very easy to grow in a sunny location in well-drained soil, and it will bloom continuously from mid-summer to the end of fall. It is a medium-sized bush, growing no more than 5 feet tall, and the same across.

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Miss Ruby Butterfly Bush is an ornamental shrub with particular allure to butterflies. Plant one near a path or patio where its vivid color and enticing fragrance is sure to delight you throughout the summer.

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Low & Behold is a dwarf variety of Butterfly Bush, growing between 2-3 feet tall and wide. Like its larger cousins, it loves the sun and will enhance the garden through the summer months.

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Another favorite to gardeners in the Inland Northwest, are the Lupines. The lupine family is huge, including some amazing Manhattan Series of the genus. In this newsletter, we are featuring Red Rum and Gallery Yellow as two of our favorites.

These perennials and their tall towers add so much interest to your summer garden! There is nothing subtle about hybrid lupines. The telltale look is a tall, showy spire of flowers that can come in a multitude of colors. The foliage resembles palm leaves with seven to 10 leaflet segments each. This fast- growing, sun loving flower will soon become one of your garden favorites!

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As the season matures, more favorites will be available. Make our nursery your “one stop shop” for all your gardening needs. Plan to visit us regularly to get in on the very freshest product!

And if you haven't already done so, be sure to sign up for our Seed Rewards Program.

Every dollar spent at New Leaf Nursery takes you closer to rewards which saves you money. And be sure to watch for more information on our website in the next few weeks to reserve your place for our next fun event, Summer Festival on July 8th!

Here's to a fantastic gardening experience! To plant a garden, is to believe in tomorrow!