It’s beginning to look, feel and smell a lot like fall
Fall has arrived in Oklahoma. It feels like fall and is beginning to smell and look like autumn as we see the first leaves turning yellow on poplars and get to watch the walnuts and pecans start falling from the trees.
The monarchs and other butterflies are active and moving south in big numbers.
Fall decorating has expanded dramatically in recent years as more folks use pumpkins and gourds to dress up their front porches, patios and container gardens. We have more growers across the state growing these seasonal crops to meet the demand for fall decoration, jack-o’-lanterns and pies!
Many folks also use bales of straw and cornstalks for fall decoration. The straw can be used after the decorating season to spread on top of your flower beds as good insulating mulch for winter protection and to add organic content to your soils.
Besides these harvested crops that work good as decorations, there are many living and flowering crops that can add zing and zip to your fall and even winter gardens.
Hardy mums are looking great at nurseries, greenhouses and garden centers across the state and are ready for you to buy and add to your yard for instant fall color. You can buy them in smaller 6-inch or 1-gallon containers or already planted in large decorative containers.
Hardy mums are different varieties than those grown as pot mums. They are perennials and will come back year after year if planted in the ground and watered periodically throughout the winter. They bloom naturally with short days and the flowers will be showy for several weeks until a hard freeze knocks them back or freezes them to the ground.
If you are hosting a fall party, family gathering or just want to enjoy the color and spirit of autumn, hardy mums are the quickest way to dress up for fall. You also can use tropicals like crotons with their yellow, orange, red and green foliage to create fall color, but you will want to bring those in before even a frost as they are tropical plants. Flowering asters are another crop that gives nice fall color until the first killing freeze.
Select and plant ornamental or flowering kale and cabbage to add color and excitement to your fall and early winter flower beds and container gardens. They will survive and look good through early frosts and light freezes but will eventually succumb to hard freezes as we get deeper into winter. It is their colorful foliage that we enjoy.
Dusty Miller has silver gray foliage we can enjoy year round but works great as a part of fall plantings. Snapdragons, sweet alyssum, violas and dianthus also provide fall color and can tolerate some light freezes before dying in some of our harsher, hard winter freezes.
Pansies are the star of the winter bedding plants in Oklahoma. Their cute flower faces can be very charming and make me want to smile each time I look at them. As long as you water them periodically through the winter so they don’t dehydrate, they will bloom even when there is snow on the ground. The old timers always have recommended putting a little Blood Meal fertilizer or a general bedding plant fertilizer in the ground and around the pansies as you plant them. They will grow quickest in the cool fall weather and then bloom through the winter in a sunny area until the warm, even hot days of spring sap them of their energy and end their cool display of pansy face flowers.
This is prime time to plant cool-season grass seed like tall fescue or annual or perennial rye grass to establish a soil cover or to achieve a green winter lawn.
Enjoy the pleasant fall weather in your garden and the final month of spring and summer flowers as you plant for fall and winter color.
Rodd Moesel serves on the State Board of Oklahoma Farm Bureau and was recently inducted into the Oklahoma Agriculture Hall of Fame. Email garden and landscape questions to rmoesel@ americanplant.com.