By late summer, my perennial garden is showing its age. After months of North Carolina heat and afternoon storms, the goldenrod, Russian sage and verbena, to name a few, aren’t standing quite as proudly as they did earlier in the season. Some lean,
while others sprawl after a heavy rain. Yet the bees and butterflies continue to move among the flowers. I love this stage of the garden. It reminds me that a perennial’s value doesn’t end when it stops looking perfect. Fall also brings one of my favorite gardening traditions: dividing and sharing plants. Perhaps that’s one reason perennials are so special. Unlike a bouquet that eventually disappears, a perennial can become part of someone else’s garden.
Here are five things you may not know about them:
1. Bigger isn’t always better. N.C. State Extension notes that many perennials growing in the same location for more than three years can become overcrowded. Division gives vigorous portions of the plant more room to grow while creating additional plants.
2. The oldest part may not be the part worth keeping. In mature clumps of plants such as iris, the center can lose vigor and flower poorly. N.C. State recommends replanting healthy growth from the outer portions and discarding the declining center.
3. You can divide a perennial too much. More divisions don’t necessarily mean better results. N.C. State recommends that divisions of some mature clumps contain three to five shoots. Pieces that are too small may provide little color the following year.
4. Not every perennial wants to be divided. Some plants prefer to remain undisturbed. N.C. State lists blue wild indigo, baby’s breath, goat’s beard, globe thistle and sea holly among perennials generally best left in place. Knowing your plant is more important
than following a blanket garden rule.
5. One perennial can help grow an entire community of gardens.
Dividing established plants is an economical way to fill bare spaces, but its value extends far beyond saving money. Divided plants can be passed between family members, neighbors and fellow gardeners, carrying both plants and their stories into new landscapes.
We see that tradition on a larger scale through the Rowan County Master Gardeners Plant Sale. Much of what makes a community plant sale possible begins in individual gardens. Gardeners divide established plants, nurture the new divisions and share
them so someone else can take them home and begin again. There is something wonderfully circular about that. A plant that once grew in one Rowan County garden may be divided, donated to the sale and eventually planted in another. Years later, that gardener may divide it again and pass it to a neighbor. That is horticulture, but it is also community. When I look at Solomon Seal from my mother’s garden or the Cannas Allison shared with me, I don’t simply see another plant. I see where it came from and the person who thought enough to share it. So, as our gardens begin to look a little tired this fall, don’t be too quick to see an ending. Beneath the rain-bent stems and fading flowers are roots preparing for another season…and perhaps the beginning of a garden that hasn’t even been planted yet.
Ellie Goodnow is an intern with the Rowan County Master Gardeners.
