I put my sugar water in the fridge. I hang the feeder in the shade so it won’t grow algae or anything. I leave the water out there until they drink it all-5 to 7 days. Sometimes it’s faster when there are more hummers. The recipe makes enough for filling the feeder twice. SO I end up making a recipe every two weeks.
My husband is the hummingbird man! He makes his own sugar water and keeps it in frig. This helps for quick refills because they’re very sad when their feeder is empty!!! He’s getting another feeder for Christmas too! So much fun to watch them!
I figure every growing season is different. My sunpatiens did really well. My climbing roses were chewed on by the deer. I pruned them back, dug them up and planted them in containers like bare root roses. I put trellises in the pots, which I put right by my garage door. They have beautiful flowers on them in December! ( I'm in southeastern NC, zone 8a.) I had great luck with cherry tomatoes, not so much with Italian ice roses. You win some, you lose some. I just keep experimenting, and do what brings me joy in my garden. Happy planning for 2023!
You can make up your hummingbird nectar ahead and keep in the fridge. Also you can buy a preservative (that is safe for them) to help the nectar last longer.
This video was great! I too live in Zone 5b, in CNY. Your experiences are a great reference to use. And your gardens are so beautiful. End-of-year assessment is just what we all need to do. Thanks for modeling it for us.
Great info Roxana! Appreciate the recap ... I do this too (on paper)! Last year was very rough for me in the garden, as my weather just was not cooperating. This year ... high tunnels! For the hummers, I have 2 large glass and 3 small plastic feeders. I have taught the birds that they will be refilled on Saturdays, and I think they get that now! And on Saturdays, I just dump what's left and rinse them out ... I soak and clean the feeders only once a month. The small feeders require filling to the brim, but on the large glass ones, I only fill halfway or so. I just don't have time for more often than that with my feeders. I make up enough sugar water to fill them all, and enough more to have a large vessel in the frig; that way I don't have to make it weekly. I've seen others on YT who are literally refilling and completely sanitizing their feeders every day! The birds do not seem to mind my behavior, but they have been known to dive bomb me as I'm going to tend them! They are quite entertaining!
I enjoyed this video! I also grow dahlias from tubers, here in 6A central Ohio- probably similar to your growing conditions. I wait until a dahlia tuber shows a live growing point, and then pot it up in an old nursery pot, keeping them out of freezing weather as we approach the last frost date. I let them grow up several inches until they’re pretty sturdy and then plant them out in the ground. Any tubers that don’t show signs of life/starting I dump in a big hole, cover with soil and water, and usually get a fun mixed dahlia patch out of that!
I love, love, love this video! Thanks for chatting with us! I need to assess my growing year like this. Every spring it’s like I am starting over because I don’t review my previous year.🤦🏾♀
I stopped this video for a bit and hopped over to your winter sowing update and I really think I'll try this method in this container for winter sowing this time - so much easier than all those other containers and taping them etc. Thanks for this video - so nice of you to share your gardening season recap with us!
There is nothing better than starting my Saturday morning with coffee and this 2022 Garden recap! Watching it has been a good reminder for the prep I need to start for 2023 :) Great video!
Love this video! For the hummingbirds - I wonder if you could freeze the sugar water into ice cubes? That way you could toss a few cubes in every couple days and the heat will melt it pretty quickly.
I came here brand new from the video you did for Janey at dig plant water repeat channel. Subscribed right away because your garden is so lush and beautiful. I grew up and went to college in the Ball State U area in Muncie. I know how hard it is to grow in such a short season. I now live out in Oregon 8b and many of your ideas will work here on my small suburban plot. Great channel and thank you for sharing your experiences!
I think everyone had some weather issues this year - I had a late hard frost that set some of my younger shrubs and trees back quite a bit followed by a really dry spring and early summer. I am glad you persevered through the fountain episode - it would have been a shame to not have it running. Next year will be better!
I really enjoyed this video. I started watching your channel just before you started your ginger and loofas. I also grew ginger and loved it! I live in 5b and started my ginger the wnd if Feb. I will try and start a few weeks earlier this next season. I bought a mini greenhouse from Aldi to help harden off my seedlings and it worked very well. Especially helped with all my dahlia starts. I have already purchased Coleus seeds to start indoors, after seeing your adorable seedlings
Oh how exciting! I thought about buying a small stand-alone greenhouse but I have the beds and I can jut hoop-house the heck out of them :) I also got more NEW coleus seeds :)
Great video. I tried soil blocks for the first time this year too. I actually am going to keep using the tiny blocks for seed starting, but I am not going to be using the 2 inch blocker. I'll use small pots instead. I'm looking forward to following along next year. Thanks for sharing.
I never have success with growing anything substantial in containers so most everything I grow is in raised beds. This year I started so many seedlings that I ran out of room and planted quite a few things in the ground....eggplant, cabbage, zucchini and tomatoes. Everything in the ground did better than what was in the raised beds. I am in Zone 5B near Chicago and we had very little rain and a lot of heat. I wonder if the plants in the ground dried out less but I am definitely going to plant more in ground next year. You did an amazing job with this video and I could probably write several paragraphs agreeing with/adding to just about everything you spoke about. But I'll just make one other comment and that is about the humming bird feeders. I put them out this year for the first time as well. What I would tell you is to have two feeders that you can switch out and fill them only about a quarter to a third of the way. You can make the sugar water ahead of time (I make four cups) and it keeps in the fridge for about two weeks. So every three or four days, more often if it's especially hot, just take off the old feeder and put a new one out filled with the mixture from the fridge. That way you don't have make fresh sugar water that often or wash the one feeder right away in order to put it out again. I've subscribed and look forward to seeing more of your videos 😊
This makes sense to me, I am definitely getting so many great advice for feeding them next year and having an extra feeder inside is definitely one I will do too.
The weather this year has been crazy and I think we’re all going have to adapt, I’m definitely trying some hard full sun plants next year due to the severe heat my plants endured and suffered through 🥰 lovely video 💕
Really loved this video. It's wonderful to look back and reflect when planning what to do next season. Plus, the gorgeous images get me excited for the season to come. 🥰 Thanks for sharing.
I make HB nectar ahead and refrigerate it. I have an extra HB feeder. When one is empty, I put the other full one out and clean the old one and get it ready for when I need to switch out. I do not worry about it molding. They have plenty of flowers in my garden to partake. Great video
Thank you Rebecca, I think a lot of people save their extra water in the fridge for refills, I don't know why I didn't think of this this year but I will definitely do next year.
Nice job on the recap of your garden 🪴 I joined your newsletter, great job! Just a suggestion, you have so many lovely pictures, have you considered using a watermark for your photos? This can prevent others using them for their own content without your permission. Looking forward to the newsletter 😊
I love this video. It gives a lot of information. I also had a bad luck with tomatoes this year. I have smaller raised garden then you so I’m planting only cucumbers, tomatoes and string beans. String beans were terrible, almost no crop, tomatoes poor, except cocktail tomatoes which aren’t my favorite because I can’t handle hard skin on them, cucumbers were ok. I love nasturtium, their are easy and gives my containers great look. I planted sweet peas, I love them. Nice delicate flowers and great smell. I planted them indoors, but those I planted outdoors were stronger. They can handle a little frost. I’m in zone 6, my town is, but I think that I’m really in zone 5 , because I’m on the lake so the temperatures are always 2-3 degrees lower then in town. I love cannas, I grow them from rhizomes indoor. It’s pain in the neck, but the summer with constant blooms of cannas is the reward. I grow them for my daughter as well and she was very happy this year. We dig all the rhizomes and we have plenty of boxes in her basement.
I really enjoyed this recap. I usually watch or listen to you when I'm doing something and not always comment. Those baskets were so beautiful to bad that they didn't last. I do the humming birds mix and leave it in the fridge, or you can buy the natural premixed they sell them at Walmart. I used to have a bunch of feeders, but it was a lot of work, so now I plant flowers that attract them and only put one feeder, which they don't care about if there are flowers. I have the same problem with nasturtium flowers, but I still grow them every year as well. Have a blessed day.
Tus plantas son preciosas. Me encantan tus ideas, muchas veces me inspiran, aunque mi clima es más templado. Gracias por tus videos. Besitos desde Galicia, España
I know you mentioned the hydrangeas flopping with the rain in another video. Mine did the same thing as yours and I was thinking it was just mine. I don't have a drip system though so it was probably the weather.
This is an excellent video. Thank you for sharing. It is always helpful to hear other gardeners discuss what worked and what to try differently the following year. I had no success with nasturtiums this year, but last year they did well. Go figure. This was my second year gardening, so that may have been the reason. 😊 I grew dahlias in the ground my first year and had moderate success, but I had good results growing them in a raised bed as part of a cutting garden. I am in a zone 6b, but our last frost date is usually May 22nd. I started the dahlias in mid April indoors and had flowers in late July, early August, depending on the variety. Finally, I grew Proven Winners Rockin Deep Purple Salvia in containers on the deck and that attracted a number of hummingbirds.
I agree that feeding the humming birds is rather labor intensive with the keeping of feeders clean and filled. One option is to identify the flowers which grow well in your Zone 5 area that humming birds prefer, and plant extra of those varieties. This summer was definitely too hot for Nasturtiums In my area of Arkansas (Zone 6) as we had a summer month of temps in the high 90s and low 100s this year. Don't think I'll try them again. I do think I'll do more one time planting in inexpensive containers which was so successful for you. Really enjoyed this recap video.
Great Video Roxana!! Tu trabajaste muy duro para conseguir lo que más querías! Y yo te felicito de los gran cosas que has completado y lo que vas a completar! Happy Gardening!!💚✨🌿
So interesting and informative! Enjoyed it. Motion lights - going to do that. Nasturtiums - love them but way overgrew. Don't know. Soil blocks - never tried; unlikely to try due to space and light limitations. Going to search for your Instagram. Thanks!
I love Dahlias too. My problem this year was they attracted insects in mass that I didn't want, grasshoppers, earwigs, ants, and a spider ate one of my bees that decided to sleep in one dahlia flower. Big bummer for me, but probably it was happening because it's a tropical flower and we are not a tropical zone.
Great recap! I’m new to your channel & local to your area. In your solar lighting update I noticed the pavers on the walking path. Would you mind sharing where you picked those up? I’ve been trying to source something similar for an upcoming project. Take care!
Hello! These stepping stones were saved by my husband, they were headed to the dumpster and he called me to see if I could use some in the garden, they were a great free addition to this path!
The problem in my area is that we do not have defined seasons anymore. Spring and fall were really short. The established plants did ok, but I had to cover the tomatoes to protect them from heat. It is an experiment every year and hard since I am at 7,000 feet above sea level.
Thank u for sharing n love your garden. I myself love gardening n i also learn tips from u. I live in hot country like Singapore n not all plants is suitable for my country.
@@SoilandMargaritas hibiscus, custard apple tree, two sour sop tree, curry plant, dessert roses, fig, lime tree n chilli plant n pandan plant. I love your hydrangea but mine I try but not successful.
Another great video. Give me some tips for starting nasturtium. Notice you start in your grow room. Soak seeds? On heat mat? What month? I'm zone5 like you. Favorite variety. Thank you for sharing.
I’m definitely trying your winter sowing technique this year. Milk jugs didn’t work for me either, and they’re honestly a pain to make. Plus I have a bunch of clear containers with cracks, so they can have another life! PS Where did you get the hat you’re wearing in the sugar snap pea clips? I love it! I have a hard time finding hats that fit. I also had flower bulbs that rotted. This year I’m planting them in nursery pots and then keeping those inside an old cooler in the garage. That way they won’t freeze…I hope…😬 About the hummingbirds, I can’t be without the feeders. Once the flowers get going, they prefer those, but at the beginning of the season the feeders are great. I keep the feeders in the shade if possible, and like other said, you can keel the mix in the fridge. I find they LOVED the salvias and nicotiana I planted.
Hat was from Target, I actually found it for like $8 believe it or not, they had a huge “accessory” sale when I went bit this one was the only one that fit just right.
I’m an old gardener and for the first time I planted nasturtiums from seeds and I fell in love 🥰 .Yes , the heat made them look bad for a while but I enjoyed them never the less. Just a quick question: how many Honeysuckle to you have growing on your trellis? Good job with this recap
This was another great video. I'm about ready to spend $200 on Johnny's seeds and soil blocking is something I'm debating. I don't want to invest the money and then hate it. That's my concern plus it looks awful time consuming. I think painting raised beds and harbor was a definite plus. It just looked amazing. I also love the idea on how to harden off your seedlings. Again going to be experimenting with seeds this next year and taking trays in and out everyday seems too time consuming. I'm going to make a mini flower farm next spring for fun so I'm going to have alot of hardening off to do. I'll have to watch more of your seed starting video's. I've been wanting to try loofah as well just to say I've tried it but I don't have a huge space in my garden and keep debating do I want to use the space? Love love the solar lights. I've been wanting some for my back path bc it gets so dark. My nasturtium actually love the heat. They took off like gang busters when it got hot and kept on till late fall. Thanks for sharing and giving your do's and don't.😊
I tried soil blocking last year. I found it hard to water them properly. I’m on the fence because you can start a lot of plants at the same time using less space and lights. On the other hand, you will eventually have to up-pot and the bigger cell trays are just less work.
I have so many pros and cons but at the end they are not for me, too much involved and not white “convenient”, if i was starting for bulk they would definitely work but I only do small amounts
@@SoilandMargaritas I do too. I have a very large yard with irrigation but it is overwhelming to decide what to do and where to plant things. I trial a lot of flowers and veggies. Lisianthus is too hard to grow and seeds are so expensive. Two years in and I still can’t grow them. I tend to overwater them I think. They like humid air but not wet roots from what I’ve found. I might try once more but most flower farms buy plugs. Like you, we had a very cold spring and then all of the sudden it was full on summer here in Oregon near Salem, zone 8b. Onions never bulbed up, tomatoes and peppers dropped flowers and I had cabbage worms and never have had cucumber beetles until this year. The beetles not only destroyed the cucumbers but also destroyed most of my dahlias. It was a blessing to have a friend gift me with tomatoes they grew and I canned up sauces, and crushed tomatoes from them.
How did you fertilize your sugar snap peas? I planted them in early fall and they grew vigorously but didn't produce any peas before the frost came. I think I added too much granular fertilizer in the soil before planting.
Hi Roxanne, what works for me regarding hummingbirds food, (Google recipe) I prepare the sugar water and whatever is left, I place it on the refrigerator.. I use as I see needed.. I also purchased more hummingbirds feeders.. yes, it's a little work but the reward is amazing for you and your garden! 😊 😃 😀 😄 😁
Dahlias- suggest you check out RU-vid-Impatient Gardner Dahlias She is zone 5b and extremely helpful and improved my dahlia growing this season tremendously.
