Seed catalogs start arriving in my mailbox before I am ready for them. How can I find time to think about next year's garden when I have barely finished cleaning up from Thanksgiving dinner!
For all you home gardeners, I suggest starting a folder to stock pile all those seed catalogs away until a cold January day. Looking at seed and plant catalogs hopefully gives gardeners (beginners to the experienced) inspiration and hope for the new spring season. Maybe this spring is the year to start a small garden with your kids. Or is 2012 the year that you are finally going to grow morning glories on your fence.
Browsing through a seed catalog, even if you never sow one seed, might just give you the confidence and knowledge to make better plant choices when visiting your local nursery this spring. Read how shade impatiens come in many colors, not just the same white, red, or pink. Some perennials bloom all summer while others only bloom a few weeks. There is so much to be learned by reading about some of these plants that are offered for sale in a catalog.
The fun part about seed catalogs is that I find inspiration not only in the vast amount of plant material that is available, but in the combinations of plants certain catalogs show growing together in photos. Would you like to plant a few flowers in the vegetable garden to give your garden a little bit of color. Open up a Burpee catalog. They do an excellent job describing all of their colorful annuals.
If you need ideas on how to make your containers a bit more interesting, then look at White Flower Farm's spring catalog. There are so many different photos of containers in that catalog, you will see something that catches your eye and would be easy to duplicate.
Would you like to try to grow a few different heirloom veggies this spring? Two of my favorite vegetable catalogs are Johnny's Seeds and Territorial Seed. They have a great selection of vegetables and many of the seeds are organic.
Here are just a few seed companies that have interesting selections each year:
TERRITORIAL SEED COMPANY - great catalog for veggies
SELECT SEEDS - this is a great catalog for old-fashion and heirloom flowers
SUMMER HILL SEEDS - great source for rare and unusual flowers
JOHNNY'S SEEDS - great source for organic vegetable seeds
If you're trying to go paperless, don't worry. Most seed companies today have informative websites to review and research plants. Even though I appreciate those websites, there is still something nice about sitting down in the evening with a cup of tea and turning the pages of a really informative seed catalog.
Happy Searching!
Marie Meiklejohn, owner of Marie's Garden in Skippack, Pennsylvania has been gardening for over 25 years. The last 16 years at her property in Skippack where Marie's Garden is located. Many of her gardens showcase what she grows and sells each year.
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