Rubicon

August 26:

• "Deer are not fond of peppermint. The strong scent overwhelms their senses, making it an effective deterrent."

The deer at the greenhouse finally did it. They crossed the Rubicon and sampled all three peppermint pots. I posted the following "Lies from the Internet" June 28 and have been adding to it ever since. The lies are that certain plants are resistant to deer, and peppermint always is at the top of the "resistant" list. I have two other peppermint plants at the house a mile from the greenhouse. The local deer have not sampled those. They are a bit darker green than the three shown below, and they are flowering. Whether the scent is more intense and they avoid them for that reason, or whether the local deer just have different taste, I do not know.

The greenhouse deer took another nip in the past couple of days at the Monarda, chives, Vermillionaire, salvias, zinnias and marigolds, all of which also are on the list. At the house, they tried but mostly failed to push through a cage to get at the Astilbe, apparently unaware that "The smell, texture, and bitter taste of astilbe flowers are distasteful to deer."

My list of truly deer resistant plants includes Plectranthus 'Velveteen Aromatic' (incorrectly known as Cuban Oregano), Garden Sage, Russian Sage, Rosemary, Greek Oregano (not Italian), Thyme, Agastache, Lavendar, and most succulents including Sempervivums and Echeverias (not Delosperma and Aloe). That's it, that's the list.

August 19:

• Actually I can't call this one a lie because the internet hedges: "Basil is considered moderately deer resistant. Deer generally dislike its strong aroma and essential oils, but it is not completely deer-proof."

I got home from a week away today and the greenhouse deer decimated the two basil plants that were outside. (They also chewed the flowers off all of the deer-resistant marigolds. And they destroyed the zinnias for the hundredth time. I got NO zinnia flowers this year.) The deer at the house a mile away have not touched three basil plants that are outside. I'll probably secure the largest one just in case their cousins from down the road turn them on to basil.

August 8:

• Today's lie is about phlox. "Looking to add a pop of color that butterflies love but deer won’t touch? Meet phlox—your new favorite flowering perennial."

We have two plants next to the house that have been there for six years but have never flowered because the deer keep chewing on them. I identified them today with 68% certainty that they are phlox. I put cages around them a month or so ago and they have been growing well, so we will see if we get anything this year. August 24: The deer bent the cage and chewed through the wire to take out one side of the one of the plants. Phlox isn't just a target of opportunity; they were working to get at it.

July 27:

• "Delosperma (hardy ice plant) is considered exceptionally deer resistant. Deer typically pass on these vibrant mat-forming succulents."

WRONG!!! I put one of my Delosperma outside the greenhouse to get it some more sun, hoping it would finally flower. The deer knocked over the pot in their haste to chomp on it. It got a good pruning but will survive...inside.

• "Nasturtiums are generally considered deer-resistant because of their spicy scent, peppery taste, and pungent oils."

WRONG!!! The nasturtiums growing in my greenhouse window box were consumed by deer in the past 24 hours.

Also today, the deer confirmed that they will eat Coleus (see below). My two larger Coleus 'Wicked Witch' pots have not been touched at the house, but the deer around the greenhouse ate the two smaller ones I had there, following up on an incident a month ago. One or both might bounce back eventually. I'm still waiting for the supposed toxicity of Coleus to kick in and take out some of the herd, but that may be wishful thinking. There may be a difference in acquired taste in the two deer herds a mile apart, but in light of recent events at the greenhouse I feel compelled to cage the two big 'Wicked Witch' at the house. August 24: I left one of the 'Wicked Witch' on the patio without a cage. It was surrounded by stinky plants like peppermint and oregano, but that was no deterrent. It will recover eventually. I moved the pristine one into Witness Protection inside the greenhouse for the remainder of the summer.

There were five deer around the lodge today, three adults and two fawns. I would walk toward them making threatening moves, and they would just stare at me. If I got too close, they would jog about 20 yards and look back at me. Truly town deer.

This just in: The deer at the house lopped the top off of our Stevia plant. But to be fair, Stevia is not considered deer resistant.

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June 28 original post:

• "Borage is highly deer-resistant. Its sprawling foliage and stems are covered in rough, bristly hairs that deer and rabbits tend to avoid."

WRONG!!! They ate a borage plant and half of a strawberry plant in a caged grow bag in the yard. Fortunately, I was already planning to remove that borage so a strawberry runner from an adjacent grow bag could root there. The other bag had a slightly taller cage and escaped unscathed. The strawberry plant might bounce back. I put a netting over the top of both cages and still should be able to root the runner there. Growing borage with strawberries is supposed to have a number of benefits which I'm not going to go into. Here is an image of a borage (with strawberry plants at its feet) inside the greenhouse where the deer can't get it. Note the plastic bars set up to keep them from poking their heads in if I leave the window open. Looks like I have to add a couple more bars near the top.

• "Black-Eyed Susans (Rudbeckia) are considered deer-resistant. Deer generally avoid them because of their rough, hairy texture and strong taste."

WRONG!!! They dove down into the two-foot cage and lopped off the top. It might come back. I will put netting over the top of the cage.

• "Yes, aloe vera is generally deer-resistant. Deer typically avoid it because of its thick, spiky leaves and bitter sap."

WRONG WRONG WRONG!!! Surrounded by acres of lush early-summer vegetation, deer at the greenhouse have sampled aloe vera on two different occasions. I'm leaving some aloe vera outside the greenhouse as an act of defiance, and in hopes that the reported toxicity will kick in and take care of the problem. Deer at the house (a mile away) have not sampled the aloe vera. July 1 update: The deer at the greenhouse chewed on both of the 'Tiger Tooth' aloes. As mentioned, they have their choice of lush vegetation the area, but they decided to sample plants with sharp spines. It would be like chewing on razor blades. This is ridiculous. At the house, a deer was seen sniffing an aloe vera on the back deck, so now all aloe at both locations are inside. The six at the greenhouse are lined up at the back of the bench because they are big, and to stay out of direct light. I noticed that all six have chunks missing. The two at the house made it inside sniffed but unscathed.

• "Yes, Monarda (commonly known as Bee Balm or Bergamot) is widely considered reliably deer-resistant. Deer typically avoid it due to its strong, medicinal, mint-like fragrance and slightly fuzzy leaf texture."

WRONG!!! They sampled a Monarda I bought and planted at the corner of our house. It will bounce back eventually, but that set it back significantly. I'm planning on planting next to the shed the two Monardas I have nurtured from seed since late winter, killing millions of aphids to get to this point. Right now they are aphid free and more than a foot tall. But I was waiting to plant until I got more fencing material, which I now have. We also have a landscaping project coming up and it includes three Monardas. (Update: They have been caged.) The deer at the greenhouse have not chewed on the purchased Monarda that is the centerpiece of the outside barrel. They prefer aloe vera 'Tiger Tooth' aloe.

• "Yes, Salvia (sage) is widely considered an exceptionally deer-resistant plant. Deer typically avoid it because of its strong, aromatic fragrance and slightly fuzzy, textured leaves, which they find highly unappealing."

• "Vermillionaire® (Cuphea hybrid), also known as the Large Firecracker Plant, is highly deer-resistant. Its tubular flowers have an unappealing texture and a strong, unpalatable scent that grazing deer typically avoid."

WRONG!!! I planted a salvia and a Vermillionaire together in a grow bag and the deer couldn't wait to take the tops off of them that night. The salvia recovered sooner than the Vermillionaire, but neither is near its original height.

• "Yes, coleus are generally considered deer-resistant. Their textured leaves, strong natural scents, and the plant's mild toxicity make them unappealing to browsing deer."

WRONG!!! The greenhouse deer chewed on two coleus which I had outside. Fortunately they didn't completely destroy them and they have regrown from the stubs.

• "Oregano is highly deer-resistant."

MAYBE!!! I'm not 100% sure, but I think they sampled my new Italian Oregano plant. I won't even let them have a chance at the marjoram, which is milder. They have left the more robust Greek Oregano alone.

• "Yes, marigolds are generally considered deer resistant. Deer typically avoid them due to their pungent, medicinal odor and bitter-tasting foliage."

• "Yes, chives are highly deer resistant. Because they belong to the Allium (onion) family, they have a strong smell and pungent taste that deer instinctively avoid."

WRONG??? If they yank marigolds or chives out of the pot but don't actually eat them, does that mean they are deer resistant? Last year they pulled the marigolds out of the window boxes and spit them out. They were intact enough to replant. A couple months later, they did it again. It was too late in the year to bother replanting them. This year I planted the nastiest marigolds I could find, and they have left them alone. Also this year, they yanked a chive plant out of its pot and spit it out. I replanted it and it probably will be OK. August 25: I'm updating this from "WRONG???" to "WRONG!!!" They are definitely searching out the marigolds to eat the flower buds, and they are clipping the chives like grass.

• "Zinnias are considered moderately deer resistant. While deer generally avoid the coarse texture and strong scent of mature zinnia plants, they will happily eat tender young seedlings or the flowers if their preferred food sources are scarce."

Right (mostly)!!! What I disagree with here is other food sources are not scarce! They took out two of my six zinnia seedlings that were about four inches high in the window boxes, ignoring acres of lush vegetation surrounding them. August 26: I have about five zinnia sprouts in the window boxes that haven't gotten taller than four inches all summer. Any time one develops a flower bud, they eat it.

Usually these internet statements are accompanied by a disclaimer that deer will eat just about anything if that's all they have or if there is a drought. For the record, both my house and the greenhouse are surrounded by lush fields of vegetation that have received adequate rainfall this spring and early summer. They have no excuse. They are 150-lb. rodents.

So far the plants the deer have not touched are Agastache, Basil, Lavender, Greek Oregano, Rosemary, Sage, Russian Sage, Peppermint, Sempervivums, Thyme, and Plectranthus 'Velveteen Aromatic'™. I have 20 fuzzy, aromatic 'Velveteen' plants scattered around outside and they don't touch them. They also haven't touched my petunias...but they are in baskets eight feet in the air.

On a more positive note, it appears two of the four potato stalks are in the process of dying. They have leaned over quite a bit just since yesterday. That might mean the harvest is not too far away. We are just about at the 90-day mark, so apparently we are on track. They have not flowered, but flowering is not a required step to get a harvest. I'm excited, not just for the potatoes, but for getting that big grow bag out of the greenhouse where the plants overshadow their neighbors.

I don't plan on growing potatoes inside the greenhouse next year, but I might put the big grow bag in our yard next to our new trees, and the question is whether I have to fence it. "Yes, potato plants are generally considered deer resistant. Deer typically avoid grazing on them because the leaves are part of the nightshade family and contain bitter toxins (glycoalkaloids) that are unappealing." I like the part about the toxins, but I probably will fence them at least initially. Red Lodge deer have made a liar of the internet too many times for me to lower my guard.

Ladybug

At times this spring I wondered if I should buy some predators such as ladybugs or lacewings to go after the aphids that were infesting the peppers, sunflowers and others. Internet research indicates they are most effective in closed systems such as commercial greenhouses, but maybe not so much in a small private greenhouse that has the windows open. The beneficials can just fly away after you release them.

But they will come around on their own if they find something to eat. They aren't in the huge numbers than if you release them, but the natural method is more sustainable. And cheaper. I saw this one on one of the sunflowers in the grow bag.

Two days later: The sunflower head in the above image looks spent. All of the heads on the three Teddy Bear plants in the grow bag looked that way, and most of the leaves looked diseased. I didn't see a path forward to better blooms so I chopped the plants in the bed, leaving just a few green onions that have been living in the shadows for months. The Teddy Bears in the planting bed look much better and I'm harvesting blooms from them. The one Teddy Bear plant outside at the house also doesn't look great, somewhere in between the two groups at the greenhouse. There is one conventional sunflower at the house that is about to bloom its one bloom.

The results are in

Almost a month ago, I planted an expendable coleus in the ground next to the north side of the house just to see what would happen. I kept a cage over it for a while, and even though it had some bug damage it was growing and producing flowers. The cage did not have a top but the deer did not dip in to take a bite. Here it is yesterday morning just after I took the cage off.

Less than four hours later, this is what it looked like.

I saw a guilty-looking fawn fleeing the scene. I have to conclude that it would be foolish to plant coleus in the ground next year unless they are well caged. I have my ColorBlaze 'Wicked Witch' on the west side of the house in pots and am careful to have them caged or surrounded by lots of other plants.

The deer herds at the house and a mile away at the greenhouse have different tastes. I knew the greenhouse deer would eat coleus, but I was hoping the house deer would not pick up the habit. Oh well.

Teddy Bear

The Teddy Bear Sunflowers have been blooming in the big plastic pot in the greenhouse for a while, and I thought the next to bloom would be the one outside the shed at the house. But finally the row of Teddy Bears in the greenhouse southeast bed put on a growth spurt. The ones in the big pot are sort of crowded, so this one in the bed is currently the best bloom we have.

This is the Teddy Bear behind the shed in a grow bag, surrounded by dill. This one should burst forth in a few days. Teddy Bears put out multiple blooms. There also is a regular sunflower with just one bloom in an adjacent grow bag, and it seems to be a week or so away.

August 19: This may be the most full Teddy Bear yet. This is handheld focus stack of six images.

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In other news, the cucumber harvest has begun with three cut so far, the strawberry plants put out a berry on occasion, and I'm doing my best to clone petunias. The three tomato plants outside at the house are doing well, but the four greenhouse plants are very vigorous and I pruned some of them today so they wouldn't grow through the ceiling. But tomatoes from only one plant (outside) have ripened yet. So far, one pepper has developed almost to usable size on our eight plants, and most of the plants look fine and seem to be threatening to put out more fruit. In a few months we might have peppers. But our growing season ends in mid-September, at which time (if healthy) the three tomatoes and two peppers that are outside the house in grow bags (along with two strawberry baskets) will go to the greenhouse and I will turn on the heat. It is going to be crowded in the greenhouse from mid-September to the middle of November. Season extension, donchaknow.

Season extension:

• Tomatoes (four in beds, three in grow bags).
• Peppers (six in beds, two in grow bags).
• Cucumbers (two hanging baskets, one grow bag).
• Strawberries (east planting bed, four hanging baskets, three grow bags).
• Cilantro (west planting bed).
• Sunflowers (southeast planting bed, big plastic pot, and maybe the two grow bags currently behind the shed).
• Petunia plants.
• Geranium plants.

While I am making lists, here are a few more:

Overwinter, greenhouse. I'll probably keep the temperature at about 50 until mid-November, then set it to 10 from then until April. In theory, that is Zone 7b instead of our actual Zone 5a.

• Hardy succulents (Sempervivums, Sedum, Delosperma), need to prepare the southeast planting bed.
• Hardy herbs (Greek Oregano, Italian Oregano, English Thyme, Lemon Thyme, Sage, throw a couple Rosemary in there to see if they survive).
• Allium bulbs.
• Strawberry plants.
• Grow-bag perennials (I have to figure out which ones).
• Chives, the most worry-free plant of all.
• Mums. Maybe. The two from last year have shown no signs of flowering yet and I'm not going to keep them alive if they don't flower. That's a threat; I can use the pots for something else.

Overwinter, house (60-70 degrees) and garage (50-55 degrees).

• Tender Succulents.
• Petunia plants and cuttings, I will have to take the plants out of their baskets/big pots and put them in smaller pots. I can envision ending up with 16 or so 6-inch pots of petunias. What I can't envision is where they will all go. I am moving all of my grow lights from the greenhouse back to the garage.
• Geranium plant. Maybe just one pot, not bother with cuttings. The two hanging baskets have a winter home elsewhere.
• Coleus plants and cuttings.
• Basil, Peppermint (need to cull), Marjoram, main Rosemary plant.
• Plectranthus 'Velveteen Aromatic'™ (currently have 20 potted, NEED to cull).

Seed starting, garage, March-April. I should have enough Epic 6-cells (13) but space allocation will be a challenge.

• Tomatoes (12 to get eight plants).
• Peppers (12 to get eight plants).
• Coleus (6-12). I also plan on getting three new Proven Winners ColorBlaze plants. 2027 will be The Year of the Coleus.
• Coneflowers (6 each, two kinds, destined for outside at the house).
• Coreopsis (6, destined for outside at the house).
• Shasta Daisies (6, destined for outside at the house).
• Marigolds (12).
• Bachelor Buttons (6).
• Sunflowers (6 Jiffy pots).

Things which will get direct seeded May-June.

• Alyssum, greenhouse inside and outside.
• Nasturtiums, greenhouse inside and outside.
• Zinnias, greenhouse outside.
• Onions, greenhouse inside.
• Borage, greenhouse inside.
• Dill, in a grow bag with something.

Things I'm not going to seed start next year because I'm sick of them.

• Broccoli, beets, carrots (they never mature, probably not enough light where I put them).
• Greens (aphids eventually breech the cover cloth).
• Peas, potato, radishes (not enough production for the effort).

Herb Garden

I have four greenhouse planting beds, one each on the east and west ends, and two on the south side. The east bed has strawberries, and the west bed has tomatoes and peppers. I do not plan to change those two allocations.

My current plan is to convert the southeast bed to succulents, and the southwest bed to herbs. Most of the plants will be hardy and hopefully will survive the winter, although there also will be some summer visitors. I figure I have to take more than half the soil out of the succulent bed and replace it with pumice and coco coir, ending up with about 40% garden soil, 40% pumice, and 20% coir. The herb bed doesn't need such a drastic change, although I may mix in a bag of pumice.

The herb bed currently is planted in onions, with a tomato and pepper at one end next to the others of their kind in the west bed. I have cleared away enough onions to christen the herb garden with its first plant, a Greek Oregano cutting that happens to be flowering. It has some little branches on the bottom, and I probably should prune off the top to encourage bushiness. I also have an English Thyme plant that is ready to go in, and eventually will have permanent plantings of Italian Oregano, Lemon Thyme, sage and chives. Rosemary and Marjoram are not hardy enough to survive the winter unless I provide some heat, and even then I may have to switch to more hardy varieties. Basil, cilantro, peppermint, dill and others will be part-time residents.

Some interweb sources say oregano is invasive. It is related to mint, after all. Better Homes and Gardens says oregano is not invasive... but don't let it go to seed.

The outside barrel also is an herb garden of sorts. The centerpiece is a Monarda/Bee Balm which can be used for tea, although I am not planning on it. I planted some thyme, and also have removable pots of chives, rosemary and peppermint. As an outside planter, deer resistance guides what goes in there. For a front border I planted some alyssum, of which the internet says, "Alyssum is considered deer resistant because deer generally dislike its strong fragrance and mustard-like taste." The deer routinely trim it back.

The succulent bed was supposed to be a flower bed this summer, although the main thing that is flowering now is alyssum. The nasturtiums put on a show for a few months but were starting to look ratty, so I took out the last of them a few days ago. The alyssum and nasturtiums were supposed to be support players along with marigolds, not the main event. The sunflowers and zinnias were supposed to be the headliners. The sunflowers have barely gotten to a foot in height but finally might be on the verge of blooming. The zinnias never grew. The marigolds provide some blooms, but I have dug a few out and put them in pots to give the sunflowers some room. I put a few Bachelor Buttons in place of the zinnias and have plants, but no flowers yet. I have mixed in a few coleus where there is room, both in the dirt and in pots, and a couple have gotten bigger than anything else in that bed.

The sunflowers in the giant (16-inch) plastic pot on the north wall are much more successful than the ones in the bed. The zinnias have grown in the outside window boxes but haven't flowered yet, in part because the deer don't know that the internet says they are not supposed to like to eat them. I have planted a few coneflowers but too late in the season to do anything but get established for next year. Most of the flowers I have gotten this year such as petunias and geraniums are in pots or baskets. I'm still going to try to grow a lot of flowering plants, both annual and perennial, but will not have an inside greenhouse bed allocated for that purpose.

Caged

My 2025 petunias, which at this time last year were scraggly little stems in baskets, are mounding like crazy. Less than a month ago I gave the pots a severe trim, and they have bounced back with great vigor. Petunias are tender perennials, so they will survive the winter if kept in a warm place, like our garage which is heated to 50 degrees. After I got the greenhouse a year ago, I transferred the petunias from the baskets to a pot in the greenhouse, moved it to the garage in November, and this is the eventual result.

I have another pot identical to this one, and a mixed pot with geraniums and more of these petunias. I still do not recall what variety these are, but I probably got them at Home Depot in Spring 2025 and I suspect they may be Waves or some other named variety instead of just generics. I'm sure they are hybrids, but are not sterile because I've had a few volunteers with flowers that are pink, not purple. The oldest image I can find of the purple petunias is from October 18 after they had been in the greenhouse for about six weeks. This is a healthy group (at least three plants, maybe more), but nothing like what we have today. Over the winter I did get a some clones going (see below) and that's how I ended up with 2.5 pots of purple petunias this year.

The other thing to notice about the top image of the big mound of petunias is it is caged. Maybe I have have mentioned this before (a few hundred times), but deer eat everything here. I saw this morning that the deer topped off the Rudbeckia (Black-Eyed Susan) in the front yard AGAIN. It was in a two-foot cage, but there was no top and they bent the cage as they dove in. I gave it a taller cage today, and maybe that will allow the plant to flower this year. And as a reminder, may I quote the internet:

"Rudbeckia plants are generally considered deer resistant, with top varieties like 'Goldsturm', 'American Gold Rush', and Brown-Eyed Susan frequently skipped by hungry wildlife. Deer usually avoid them because of the coarse, fuzzy hair on the leaves and stems along with a bitter taste."

Lies, lies, lies. Our deer do not have access to the internet so they don't know they aren't supposed to eat Black-Eyed Susans and Shasta Daisies. I have Shasta 'Daisy May' in a barrel next to our new trees. I have a cage on it, and it will remain for at least the next year.

August 7: I put the petunias on the patio and had a thin metal pole under the pot holding the cage down. Two problems, the cage is only three feet tall, and the basket is not anchored and can slide. The deer took advantage of both of those, decimating one pot by diving on it, and trimming the other pot by sliding the cage. The second plant will bounce back in a few weeks, the one pictured probably will not recover before I have to bring it inside. Both cages are now anchored in the border around our house, and have netting over the top.

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An alternative to caging is to use baskets. (Another alternative is an 8-foot fence, but the HOA is not cooperative.) This is probably as good as the Really Red/Latte basket has looked this summer.

Even though it is summer, overwintering is always on my mind. I have been trying to clone the nine Supertunias [for personal use] since I got them in April, and have had occasional success. The 2025 purples were a challenge to clone from cuttings. My first attempt failed completely. I had a little better success after I started using rooting hormone. I think my main problem is overwatering followed by underwatering, which means appropriate attention every few days rather than drowning them and then forgetting about them for a week. This is my first successful clone, image taken January 8 after taking a cutting in mid-November. This clone and at least one other one are the basis for one of the big mounded pots we have today, the source for the other pot being the original plants.

I haven't kept meticulous records of the petunia cloning success rate, but I'm guessing it is maybe 25%. With Plectranthus 'Velveteen Aromatic'™ and Coleus, the success rate this year is 100%. Persistence is a virtue with the tunias. There are two Supertunia Jazzberry cuttings in the garage right now that look very promising, and that is the variety that I most want to have success with. I've gotten something from most of the others, with Latte being the biggest challenge so far for some reason. Even Priscilla, which (to be frank) sucks in the big basket at the house with Hoopla gave me a good clone that I have in a small basket by itself in the greenhouse.

One year

A year ago today I took delivery of the greenhouse.

At first, all I had to put into the planters was a pot of basil.

I planted what I could in August and kept a few things going until November. I turned the heater off Nov. 30, but I still visited every few days to get ready for the spring awakening. The allium bulbs started coming up Feb. 5. I turned the heat back on April 4 and started planting.

Our last frost date is not until a week into June, and petunias have to grow in the greenhouse until then. This image is from May 13.

And this is what it looks like now.

I'm growing strawberries

Nasturtiums and borage would take over the strawberry bed if I let them. I cleared all of the nasturtiums out of the strawberry bed, left just one borage, and put down some more straw mulch. I took the last nasturtium out of that bed a few days ago. In the adjacent flower bed, I removed all but two nasturtiums. In both beds, I thinned out the alyssum just a bit so it wouldn't stray too far from the edge. This should give the strawberries and sunflowers some more room to grow. This image also shows the two cucumber baskets hanging from the rafters. The cucs have been hanging outside on the west side of the greenhouse for about a month, but the foliage is on the verge of hanging low enough for the deer to eat. The interweb says, "Cucumbers are generally considered deer resistant. Deer typically avoid them because of their prickly leaves and fuzzy vines." Red Lodge deer do not have access to the interweb, so they eat all sorts of things they are not supposed to like.

On the other side, I chopped down all the underperforming broccoli and seeded that area (to the right of the tomatoes) with cilatro/coriander. Also in this image at lower left, I dug up a marigold that was being overshadowed by the tomatoes and gave it its own pot. The basil plant in the left corner and another basil that is obscured by the tomatoes will get the same treatment in a few days.

Here is the west side of the greenhouse where the cucs used to be. I hung the Priscilla and Bubblegum tunia baskets there just for the photo, then they went back inside. I might put them there on occasion, but not all the time. Down below are 12 'Velveteens,' two peppermint, a Greek Oregano cutting, and one lonely coleus that I wanted to transition from inside. As I was getting ready to leave, the coleus looked sad and wilted from being outside in the wind, so I stuck it back in the greenhouse. "Hardening off" is a thing.

The Teddy Bear Sunflowers are starting to bloom, and they are crawling with ants. I wondered why that was since I hadn't seen aphid infestations on the leaves for quite a while. (Ants raise aphids like milk cattle.) I didn't have the answer until I took some macro images and saw them in the flowers. The interweb says, "active aphid populations begin to die off when temperatures consistently exceed 90°F," and I have not seen aphids on the pepper plants since it got really warm. But apparently the sunflower aphids are more hardy or are better protected inside the flower.

Expendable

I followed through on yesterday's post and planted one of the green coleus on the north side of the house. We have small rocks surrounding the house, so I cleared a spot and punched through the landscape fabric to dig the hole. The soil under the fabric is greasy clay. With some of the other plants I have put in, I amended the soil with coco coir to make it looser, but did not do that this time. It is planted in clay under the rocks.

I decided to cage it to give it a chance to get established before I throw it to the wolves, uh, deer. I really want to see if the deer will eat an established coleus, so will take the cage off in a few weeks. With average first frost around Sept. 12, this plant is doomed in perhaps seven weeks, so I want to see how big it gets planted in the ground...if it survives. This will help me decide what to do next year.

Meanwhile, at the greenhouse, the tomato plants on the west side are getting huge and I removed one of the marigolds that was getting shaded out. I potted it and put it outside. I might even have to move one of the pepper plants to a pot or a new location in the bed. There are three basil plants mixed in with the tomatoes that also will benefit from being moved eventually.

Behind the tomatoes, there are four broccoli plants. Two of them have finally produced heads 140 days after I started them from seed. That is almost two months longer than it should take, and the heads are very loose. I now believe that the location I have used for broccoli both last fall and this spring just does not get enough light. It is in the northwest corner, so it gets little morning light, and now the plants are being shaded by the tomatoes. I should just harvest what little there is and plant some cilantro back there.

If I was trying to grow nasturtiums and borage as primary crops, the east side of the greenhouse would be a roaring success. But I have to remind myself that I am trying to raise strawberries and sunflowers, not borage and nasturtiums. There are still a couple of nasturtiums in the southeast bed with the sunflowers and in the outside window boxes with the flowers, but I took the last one out of the east strawberry bed today. I have decided I will take some good pictures of the borage plants in the east bed tomorrow, then remove them, except maybe one. When I started removing nasturtiums, the alyssum got thick along the edge. I will keep some of it, but not all. The alyssum outside in the barrel has not grown quickly but it is alive. I might try to transplant some from inside, but it might not work according to the interweb.

Tower of flower

I am not going to overwinter all of the coleus, and the ones that are mostly green are the first ones on the chopping block. The usual advice for coleus is not to let them flower, but I decided to let this one go to see what would happen. This is the one with green frilled leaves that was mangled by deer just a month ago. I planted it in the greenhouse planting bed a few weeks ago and the flower stalks are now at least three feet high. It's actually rather impressive and I'm reconsidering its status for the upcoming cull.

To the right, over by the window is another coleus raised from seed. It probably will make the cut. Back in the corner is one of the ColorBlaze 'Wicked Witch' clones and it is a shoo-in. All of my coleus came from a Burpee variety seed pack, except 'Wicked Witch' which was Proven Winners Direct purchase.

I look this image on the 17th. It is one that I put in the planting bed, which implies that I wasn't planning on saving it. This is another one that is getting reconsidered. It isn't very tall but was producing a stalk with little purple flowers, so I nipped that in the bud.

So far the bushiest coleus, besides the original pot of 'Wicked Witch,' are a couple of mostly-green plants that I have at the house. I've been thinking about planting them on the north side of the house since, to be realistic, they are expendable. Unlike 'Wicked Witch,' these seed-raised plants don't seem to do well in full sun, so the north side probably would be an optimal location. The questions I want answered are (1) will the deer eat them and (2) how big will they get in the two months before they freeze.

Coleus foliage is considered mildly toxic to deer (Yay!), but that didn't prevent them from mangling the one shown in the top image. But that was at the greenhouse. The deer a mile away at the house have not bothered the coleus that are on the back patio. Those plants are either surrounded by stinky herbs or are close to an active part of the house. If I planted them on the north side, they would be on their own. I have found depressions in the stones on the north side which lead me to believe the deer nap there once in a while. Time for an experiment.