If you're a new or newish gardener, spring cleanup can seem not only overwhelming but also baffling. What do you cut back, and just how, exactly? One of our "How To" articles will come to the rescue: check out #7 Spring Cleaning in the Perennial Garden. This gets into a good deal of detail about different growth patterns and how specific perennials should be cut back to the ground, cut back only partly [such as Russian Sage, pictured above] or not cut back at all in some cases.

If you are indeed feeling overwhelmed with garden cleanup, here are some tricks I have learned over the years.

• cut back the messy stuff first, especially ornamental grasses and large, bushy perennials such as Baptisia or Hibiscus. Clear away this debris before you attempt to rake the lawn or adjacent paths. No sense in having to rake twice!
• in borders, clean up first around spring-flowering bulbs, early shrubs such as Forsythia and early perennials like Helleborus. They will look so much better without the clutter of dead stems around them. Move on later to other parts of the garden where the perennials are still dormant.
• clear dead leaves and debris away from paths, patios, sidewalks and driveways. Sort of like vacuuming the living room, it somehow tricks the eye into thinking the garden is cleaner than it truly is, and it gives you immediate satisfaction for minimal energy!

Hope these tricks can help to reduce your spring cleanup stress!

We are in the "green age" now for many different consumer products, and especially so for fertilizers. The choice is completely yours to make so far as whether you want to use a chemical fertilizer or an organic product. The only opinion I will throw into the debate is this: so far as the plants are concerned, the major three components of fertilizer — N (nitrogen), P (phosphorous), K (potassium) — all become readily available to plant roots for absorption when they break down in the soil. The actual source of these nutrients is not of much importance to a plant in your garden. However, if the impact on the environment in the processing and manufacturing of a fertilizer is of high importance to you, then that will likely affect your buying decision. Fortunately, organic products have really come a long way in recent years in selection, price and value.

I prefer to keep it as simple as possible, when gardeners ask about selecting fertilizers. You just simply don't need a whole bunch of different formulations to feed the average perennial garden. One product ought to be sufficient for everything. The most important thing to know is to NOT use turf or lawn fertilizer on the perennial garden. Turf products have a high amount of nitrogen which is ideal for grass but with flowering plants will cause luxurious foliage at the expense of blooms. High nitrogen fertilizer may cause your plants to get very tall and become too floppy.

What I find myself most often recommending for perennials is an all-purpose vegetable garden food. It all comes down to value: if you own a great Dane, you don't buy tiny little tins of poodle food! You get the big, honkin' bag of dry kibble instead. Same with fertilizers. Nearly always a larger package offers better value, and if you have a large garden then that is the route to go. Try to find a granular product with at least a portion of slow release food included, since the product will then last longer into the season instead of feeding with a big burst all at once.

Vegetable garden fertilizers tend to be highest in the middle number (phosphorous) which promotes flower bud development and sturdy stems. Vegetable food is typically a formulation something like 5-10-5 but this does vary a lot in different regions. Ask your garden centre staff to recommend a good all-purpose vegetable food.

Follow the rate on the bag for vegetables, and use a kitchen scale and small container to weigh out the proper amount to cover a square yard or square meter. Mark this line on inside of the container with pencil or pen. Then it's just a matter of scooping and sprinkling the product around.

Avoid dumping fertilizer directly on the crowns of emerging perennials: aim to sprinkle it AROUND each clump if possible. If the plants have already leafed out, use a rake or similar tool to gently brush the granules off the sensitive foliage to prevent burning. Some gardeners broadcast the fertilizer and let it be, others prefer to work it into the soil a few inches. One tool that does a good job of this is the Garden Claw®.

Fertilizing a perennial garden just once a year in the spring is usually sufficient. Most perennials will fend very nicely for themselves even without yearly fertilizing if your soil is reasonably rich to begin with. A few perennials do benefit from a second feeding, particularly heavy feeders like Delphiniums, Astilbe and Summer Phlox. Give these ones another sprinkle of food around the time flower buds begin to form.

While many gardeners swear by soluble fertilizers (the kind you mix with water) for their containers and bedding annuals, this is a real time commitment for the entire season and truly is way too much food for most perennials. Regular bi-weekly soluble fertilizing will cause enormous amounts of growth on perennials, resulting in tall plants that need staking or, even worse, break under their own weight.

One last note: while bagged, composted manure products are an excellent source of organic matter and easy to use, the nutrient levels listed on the bags is extremely low, little more than a trace. Don't count on these to provide a kick start if your garden is in need of a feed. Apply these as a top dressing in spring and just let the soil critters do the job of working them down into the soil over time. They certainly are beneficial for improving soil texture and water retention ability. And it doesn't really matter if it's from a sheep or a cow.

You can ask a perennial gardening question of your own by clicking the "Ask an Expert" link on the top of this newsletter. Due to time constraints, please — no questions on flowering shrubs, trees, evergreens, lawns, hydrangeas, roses, etc.

QUESTION: "When do I dig and divide a large clump of zebra grass, and what is the best way?" Dan — Lima, New York

ANSWER: [NOTE: unfortunately, my reply to Dan bounced back. When asking questions please ensure you type in your correct e-mail address!] A really mature clump of Zebra grass (or any other selection of Miscanthus sinensis) has extremely thick and woody roots and it's not going to be an easy task. You may well end up using an axe to chop the roots into big chunks, or a pick to dig around and undercut the rootball and help to pry it from the ground. A saw may be useful to split the rootball first into two then into quarters or smaller pieces. So long as each chunk has roots and eyes for new top growth, most of the pieces should settle back in and grow. A mature clump can easily give 20 or more divisions.

The best timing is spring division, for ALL of the tall fall flowering ornamental grasses — including others such as Saccharum, Panicum, and Pennisetum. You can divide them now or you can wait a bit until the first signs of growth, which in your region will likely be about mid May.

If it's just a matter of wanting more plants, you might find it's easier to sneak divisions from around the outside of the clump where the roots are not quite as woody, and to leave the mother plant in place.

Sometimes mature clumps of grasses develop a dead zone in the middle, which we call the "doughnut effect". At that point the plant could be divided but I've heard of another approach to consider: use a long, narrow spade to scoop out the centre of the clump that is bare and dead. Refresh this with new topsoil, then sneak a few wedges from around the outside of the clump to replant in the middle. By flowering time in the autumn the clump should once again be full and beautiful. It's worth a try and much easier on the back!

• Plant Select® (based in Colorado) for the Rocky Mountain and Plains States. Yearly lists include many interesting plants that have been developed or discovered at the Denver Botanic Gardens.
• Gardeners on the Canadian prairies will want to peruse the listings from the Alberta Perennial Trials. The latest 2005 - 2007 evaluations are only available in hard copy: try the Calgary Zoo gift shop.
• Great Plant Picks for the Pacific Northwest. This is a very extensive plant listing from the Elizabeth C. Miller Botanical Garden near Seattle, Washington. Great suggestions for Washington, Oregon and coastal British Columbia gardens.
• Chicagoland Grows® has helped to market and develop a number of new plants, many of them coming from the Chicago Botanic Garden. Be sure to check out their interesting new Baptisia hybrids, including Starlite Prairieblues™, pictured above! Midwest conditions extend well up into southern Canada so this information is great for gardeners over a wide area.
• Keep an eye on this program, launching in 2009: Beautiful Gardens™: Grow With Confidence is based in Virginia, testing and developing plants for the Mid-Atlantic regions.
• The Santa Barbara Botanic Garden has a plant introduction with many interesting things for coastal mid California, but some of them are suitable for other regions, particularly the "Canyon" series of hybrid Coral Bells.
• Georgia Gold Medal Plants has been testing and promoting a wide range of plants back into the mid 1990s, including annuals, perennials, shrubs and others. Excellent listings with lots of great photos for you Southern gardeners.
• Speaking of the South, we sometimes don't know which plants to recommend for Texas, but Plants for Texas® will come to the rescue!

Unlike tender greenhouse-grown annuals, most perennials have a fair bit of internal antifreeze and can tolerate more cold weather than you might think. Even if tender new foliage gets hit by a hard frost, perennials are usually capable of surviving this by making fresh leaves again from the roots. However, if the temperature suddenly dips to below about -5 C (roughly 25 deg Fahrenheit) then some action is needed. Use old towels or blankets to give extra protection; these give much better insulating value than plastic sheets.

You certainly can purchase perennials early and leave them in the containers for a few weeks before planting. Leave them outside in a bright spot as much as possible, and do remember to water them two to three times a week or more, if they show signs of wilting. If a sudden frost threatens, just take them to the protection of a garage or shed, or even into the house. Remember to get them back outside again; they really prefer the cooler temperatures of outdoors and the brighter light.

Our best-selling book, the Perennial Gardening Guide (4th edition, March 2003) is a handy reference used by gardeners across North America — written by John Valleau, horticulturist for Heritage Perennials®. Available at your local Heritage Perennials® Dealer.