Growing Beautiful and Fragrant Lilacs

Hello again,


Good gardening friend Paul Parent of the Paul Parent Garden Club sends out a great newsletter every week with pertinent gardening topics. I encourage you to go to his website to sign up for his newsletter. Paul can also be heard every Sunday morning from 6 AM to 10 AM at his website or at WBACH (104.7 FM) every Sunday morning from 6 AM to 9 AM. Paul recently sent this article out called "Growing Beautiful and Fragrant Lilacs" (I occasionally add a few comments in italics) and here it is:

Fragrant, Fragrant Lilacs!

"If you ask a gardener what the most fragrant plant in their garden is, the answer would most likely be the lilac plant. The lilac is a longtime favorite for most gardeners and it was even grown in the gardens of George Washington and Thomas Jefferson. Be sure to see some of the original lilac in their gardens when you visit their homes when the season is right for them to bloom. Lilacs are unique plants; if cared for properly and planted in the right spot, they will live for hundreds of years. Lilacs date back to the mid 1700s and were planted in our first botanical gardens and arboretums across the colonies.


Growing up in New England, I can always remember the lilacs at the Arnold Arboretum in Boston/ Brookline. These gardens are part of Harvard University, and the oldest public arboretum in North America. When the lilacs come into bloom the fragrance of the hundreds of lilacs in the garden is carried through the entire garden...

If you want to grow lilacs, select a location in your yard with full sun all day, though there are some varieties that will also tolerate a bit of shade. These varieties will have smaller and fewer flowers on the plants due to the shade. Sunshine is the number one reason your lilacs may not be flowering. Next to sunshine, ask what is the type of soil on your property and how it can affect the development of flowers? Lilacs prefer a rich soil that is well drained and never has standing water around it at any time of the year. One last piece to the puzzle is the pH or acidity level in your soils; lilacs do much better in a sweet soil than an acidic soil.

All soils can be changed by adding soil conditioners to them like peat moss, compost, animal manure, and even sand. If you can open up the soil and improve the texture of the soil, your plant will thrive. Sand will break apart the clay in your soils, allowing better air movement; peat moss will help hold moisture in a sandy soil that typically dries out during the heat of summer. Compost and animal manure will do both, plus help to make poor soil healthier and better able to hold nourishment and water.

If the soil around the lilacs contains clay, treat the area with a soil conditioner like Garden Gypsum from Soil Logic. In just a few weeks, your soil will expand and drainage will be greatly improved. For acidic soil, add lime stone, wood ashes or Magic-Cal from Jonathan Green to sweeten the soil and free up the phosphorus in your soil. Look at the ground in the area where you want to plant a new lilac. If you see moss growing, it is a signal that the soil is acidic and you will have to add soil sweeteners to help the lilac grow and flower. If you have an established plant that is not flowering very well and moss is growing in the area, apply soil sweeteners in the spring and fall until the plant begins to flower.

Lilacs will also grow better if you can remove the grass growing around the plant and create a mulch bed 2 to 3 feet in diameter at the base of the plant. Grass and weeds will rob the plant of moisture during the summer and nutrition during the growing season; this completion will limit the plant's ability to make new shoots at the base of the plant. A layer of bark mulch 2 to 3 inches thick will go a long way toward helping your plants prosper. (Consider using a good compost for this task!)

When the plants are young, it is very important to remove faded flowers from the plant. This cleaning prevents the plant from using its energy to make useless seed pods, and that energy will be used to make additional foliage on the plant. Pruning is also very important on both young and established plants, as it will stimulate new growth on the plant.

The best time to prune your lilac is when the plant has finished flowering or, in the case of no flowers on your plant, when the lilacs in the neighborhood are in bloom. Do not be scared to prune, as pruning will stimulate new growth and that is where the flower buds will develop during the summer. Say to your lilac, "I am doing this for your own good." Begin by removing any dead or damaged branches from the plant. You should remove 1/3 of the foliage on the taller growing branches. If some branches are very tall, cut them to your waist and leave this tall stump in the clump. Strong plants will develop new growth in the shape of a broom from this stump, and in just a couple of years these new shoots will be in bloom. You can also cut the branch to a foot from the ground and shoots will develop on it also.

Older plants can be rejuvenated by removing 1/3 of the branches each year for three years and allowing the new shoots that develop at the base to take over the plant. Those new shoots that develop at the base should be thinned by 1/3. You should remove the small, weak looking ones, keeping the thick and strong looking shoots to replace the older branches.

New lilac plants should be planted with compost and mycorrhizae to help the plant get established quickly before the heat of summer arrives. (An excellent source of mycorrhizae for this job is Flower Tone or Tree Tone by Espoma.) Water 2 times a week until the fall and fertilize the plant in September with mycorrhizae again.

The only problem lilacs have is powdery mildew on the foliage, and that can be prevented with 2 or 3 applications of Serenade organic fungicide beginning in mid-June and repeated every two weeks. Good air circulation around the plant and keeping plants away from irrigation systems that splash water on the foliage will prevent this problem.

If you like lilacs, look for a new hybrid variety just introduced this spring called 'Bloomerang.' (sold right here at Skillin's!) This new variety will give you months of flowers, not just weeks, as it is a repeat bloomer. It will flower in the spring for several weeks and, if you can remove the faded flowers, it will re-bloom in the mid-summer until frost. The beautiful fragrant flowers are lavender, and are great for cutting also. The plant will grow five feet tall and just as wide, very similar to the 'Miss Kim' hybrid; the flowers and foliage look similar also. This is a wonderful plant to have near a deck or patio where you spend time outside during the summer."

Thanks Paul!


Mike Skillin
Skillin's Greenhouses
May 22, 2011

October Garden Talks 2010

The purpose of this post is to relay a few "quick hit" garden tips to you through the month of October. Some of these tips will be garden tasks I am doing myself, some of these tips will be quick pieces of advice we are giving to customers, some will be quick links to good gardening advice we encounter on the internet.

                                                     (photo found at http://www.dannylipford.com/)

Check back to this post often as we will update it often as we roll through October 2010!

Here are our September Garden Talks 2010 .

October 18--Sorry folks meant to do some posting over the last couple of days but work duties have kept me from the keyboard! Let's review--Skillin's Country received about 3.5" of rain on Friday. Hopefully not too many lost power. This rain has really soaked our gardens and lawn areas and that is a good thing!

It will be VERY COLD tonight in all parts of Skillin's Country. I still have some container plantings I want to keep going so I am going to haul the frost blanket out. I will also spray some plants later tonight with water and then again early tomorrow AM. This may hold off (or in the case of the morning showering blow off) those nasty frost particles!

I talked with many customers yesterday about planting bulbs. We still have a great selection of bulbs here. One KEY is to plant those bulbs DEEP--usually 2 or 3 inches deeper than normal directions. Try going about 4 times as deep as the bulb is wide.

Deeper planting of bulbs is better for several reasons: 1) to better insulate bulbs from roller coaster soil temps. The deeper the bulb the more even the temperatures are.  Bulbs like it cool. 2) A deeper depth makes it more difficult for above ground rodents to tamper with the bulbs 3) A good depth also makes it easier to plant annual plantings "on top" of the bulbs in the Spring.

October 14--Here is a recent email question we received from customer Donna:

From customer Donna: Is fall the best time to prune lilacs? My bush isn't producing very well.

Answer: Lilacs can be pruned in the fall but it is not the best time to prune them. By now the lilacs have set much of the growth that will produce flowers for next year. SO, by pruning now you would probably not have any flowering this coming Spring.


The BEST time to prune lilacs is in early to mid June right after their normal flowering time of late May.

One suggestion would be to give your lilacs a good feeding of Plant Tone by Espoma right now and some handfuls of a good calcium based lime like Mira Cal by Jonathan Green. Both products will work slowly to improve the soil around the lilacs and this should help the lilacs produce better. I usually recommend two feedings of Plant Tone and one of Mira Cal yearly.

Also, we had a very dry summer—we have had some good rains lately but make sure your lilacs get a good deep watering weekly between now and when the ground freezes.

Finally, lilacs thrive in the sun. Are they in an area where it is shady? Perhaps that is the issue as well.

October 13--Gardening friend Margaret from http://www.awaytogarden.com/ checks in with some great garden tips quite often. Her web site is worth a visit. This garden tip from her "October Chores" caught my eye: "AS VEGETABLE PLANTS (and annual flowers) fade, pull them to get a start on garden cleanup. Before composting the remains, cut them up a bit with a pruning shears or shred, to speed decomposition. I sometimes just run piles of dry things over with the mower (nothing too woody or you’ll wreck your blade, of course)."


October 13--Here is a recent email question we received from customer Nancy. I thought I would pass the discussion along:


From customer Nancy: I have a question about soil. I have gardened for years and have always had great luck with vegetables. This summer, for some reason, I used Miracle Gro organic potting soil for tomatoes on my deck and Miracle Gro garden soil mixed with the soil in my garden for vegetables in the yard. Now, this was great for my flowers - I have never had so many healthy blossoms - but the plants didn't set much fruit at all. The only thing that grew well was beans. Was I missing some key element for the plants to set fruit?


Answer: For container plantings we recommend the all organic Bar Harbor Blend potting soil by Coast of Maine Organics (we sell this Maine based product right here at Skillin’s—good pricing!). This is a very well composted soil. We then recommend weekly or every other weekly liquid feedings with all natural Fish and Seaweed Fertilizer by Neptune’s Harvest. Yum Yum! This gives your veggie plants a good balance of nutrients with a great shot of calcium that is great for vegetable fruit.

October 12--Gardening friend Margaret from http://www.awaytogarden.com/ checks in with some great garden tips quite often. Her web site is worth a visit. This garden tip from her "October Chores" caught my eye: BE EXTRA-VIGILANT cleaning up under fruit trees, as fallen fruit and foliage allowed to overwinter invites added troubles next season. So will mummies (shriveled fruit hanging on the trees). Best to pick and remove (though I confess to leaving mine hanging for the birds, who adore it).

October 10--We survived the frost of last night pretty well along the coast but I have an idea deeper in Skillin's Country the cold was very likely more severe.

We received a couple of email gardening questions at skillins@maine.rr.com and I thought I would pass the discussion along. Feel free to email us your gardening questions!

From customer Marty: "You recommended composting perennial beds this fall. Have lots of daffodil bulbs in them. Do I need to put on bulb fertilizer too or will the compost do for all especially when the bulbs are mixed in so much with the later plantings?"


Answer: I would put some scatter some Bulb Tone by Espoma all natural fertilizer (or its cousin Plant Tone) on top of the soil before I laid down the compost.


This fertilizer will be available in the Spring to help give those daffs a nice PUSH in the Spring.

From customer Lori: "I bought a passionflower vine this summer, and I'm wondering if it will winter over okay, or if I should try to bring it in? If I can leave it outside, is there anything I can do to protect it?"

Answer: I would definitely bring the plant indoors this winter. It will not overwinter out of doors.

When you bring it in, give it as much light as possible. It may well need a good haircut sometime over the winter to set it up for as nice shape as possible this coming Spring.

October 7--Well that rain we received overnight was great. About 1.5" of rain fell in Skillin's Country and our plants will use it well!

October 6--As the weather turns cooler and cooler in Skillin's Country we are at a point where it is good to cut back almost to the ground any perennials whose foliage has become unsightly. The seedheads and dried foliage of some perennials add interest during the winter months, while others just look messy. As the weather continues to cool more and more perennial foliage will turn less and less attractive so keep those pruners sharp and ready! This weekend looks to be a good time to get out in the garden for tasks like this. The eminent garden writer KCB posted a terrific article on putting garden Beds to Rest. Check it out!


October 1--Good gardening friend Hammon Buck of Plants Unlimited in Rockport ME recently sent out a great gardening email. One piece of advice focused on using Winter Rye as a cover crop and I liked what Hammon wrote. If you do rototill your garden in the Spring, we recommend winter rye as a winter cover crop or what the "old timers" like me call "green manure". Here is what Hammon wrote:

"Cover crops are grown to protect and/or enrich the soil rather than for short term economic gain. When turned into the soil, a cover crop is called a green manure, so the terms are reasonably interchangeable. Cover crops are an important part of a crop rotation plan to maintain soil health and reduce insect, weed, and disease pressure.


Cover crops protect the soil from wind and water erosion, and they can help alleviate compaction. With the exception of legumes, which fix nitrogen from the atmosphere, cover crops don’t actually create nutrients, but they can conserve nutrients which may otherwise be lost through leaching. Some deep rooted crops can obtain nutrients from below the root zone of most vegetables. When these cover crops are turned under, the nutrients will be released to the upper zone of soil. Fast-growing cover crops are well-suited to suppressing weeds, by “smothering” them and starving them for light. Use high seeding rates if cover crops are grown for weed suppression.

Winter Rye is a common winter cover crop, sown after cash crops are harvested in the fall. It is very hardy, adapted to a wide range of conditions, and seed is inexpensive. The latest-sown cover crop, it produces a lot of biomass in the spring. This adds organic matter to the soil but may be difficult to incorporate prior to crop planting. Sow 60-120 lb/acre if drilled, 90-160 lb/acre if broadcast, from late summer to mid-October in most areas. Incorporate rye in early spring before it gets too rank for your equipment to handle."

Garden Talks May 19

Hello again,

Gardening is happening in Skillin's Country where we are all about teaching you to Grow A Greener Garden!

One of the prettiest plants in my yard is the Brunnera Macrophylla Alkanet a shade tolerant perennial with beautiful blue flowers right now. I borrowed the picture above from the ubcbotanicalgarden.com site found through Google images. The plant is a beautiful medium green shade with some gorgeous contrasting blue flowers. We sell it here at Skillin's and I highly recommend it for shady spots.

Yesterday morning I finally installed my Mole Mover tubes to protect my vegetables and flowers. These tubes are the best battle I know of against pesky and voracious woodchucks. Those big woodchucks get hungry and they love tender vegetable, annual and perennial plants. Come see us for the BEST protection. The Mole Mover tubes work great. They run on C batteries (in the new models the C batteries can last 18 months, a big improvement over the old models, and this is a little better for the environment). The tubes need to be plunged into the ground within 30 feet of the woodchucks holes--not necessarily in or near the garden. Once battery powered and in the ground the tubes emit a consistent annoying sound every 25 to 30 seconds. This sound can be heard underground only (and in the woodchuck's den) and it slowly but surely drives the woodchuck beserk until he and the family leave the area. Once plunged into the ground give the tubes a week or two and then the woodchucks will be gone. A few years back now I had some fat woodchucks that almost drove me away from gardening . They ate nearly all my perennials, annuals and vegetables. I tried fencing, hot pepper wax, throwing rocks, gasoline rags in the holes, filling the holes, fake owls, motion activated water throwers, rotenone garden dust, coyote urine, fox urine, fencing again and praying and finally the praying led me to the Mole Mover tubes! They worked and now I garden happily! We sell them here at Skillin's!

I had a question today about pruning lilacs--it is fine to cut the flowers now and enjoy them indoors. Lilacs can be pruned freely for up to about 2 or 3 weeks after they are finished flowering and then should not be pruned after that so as not to disturb next year's wood that they will flower on. So enjoy those lilacs now and prune soon!

Planting tomatoes? Plant with Tomato Tone by Espoma or Tomato Maker. During the garden season water feed your tomatoes with Fish & Seaweed fertilizer by Neptune's Harvest; these natural fertilizers contain good doses of calcium which help to strengthen your tomato plants and fruit. This helps to alleviate Blossom End Rot a common problem for tomatoes in our cool and often wet climate.

Also, give your tomatoes plenty of SPACE. Most problems I see with tomatoes (leaf blights, lack of fruit) happens because not enough light and air circulation can get to the tomato plants. And last but not least tomato plants love monthly applications of Messenger--if you do nothing at all give your Tomatoes Messenger!!! (we talk about Messenger in some detail in the posts of May 18 and May 15).

Mike Skillin

Skillin's Greenhouses

May 19, 2009

Sensation Lilac!

Sheliah from high atop North Raymond is back with a great picture of one of my absolute favorite lilacs, the Sensation Lilac. The white bordered flower is one of the prettiest ones ever. And the Sensation Lilac grows so well here in Maine.

Sheliah does her gardening high atop the hills of Raymond ME and if you can grow a green garden there you can grow one anywhere!

Here is Sheliah:

"I LOVE lilac's! I have three favorites. Monge, Beauty of Moscow, and this one that is pictured the Sensation. I wrote about the dark, dark purple Monge a while back. (Click The Monge Lilac for a great article about the Monge lilac and general lilac care). The Beauty of Moscow has pink buds and opens into a double white. It smells as good as the Old Fashion Lilacs which do smell the best. The draw back of the Sensation is that it does not have much of a smell - I can look past that because - look how beautiful it is!!!"

Sheliah for Skillin's

High Atop Raymond ME

March 27, 2009