What's a "Pack Trial?" Glad you asked!

If you've never heard the term "pack trial," no problem. The veteran plant experts and Tagawa Gardens know all about them, and they use that knowledge every spring to help make your Colorado garden the best it can be. Pack trials are special displays of thousands of new and improved plants... mostly annuals, but some perennials. The pack trials that are of the greatest interest to Tagawa's are held every spring in California. And what a show it is! This event is officially called the Spring Trials by the gardening association that organizes it. This year's trials have just wrapped up. Kris and Jere, Tagawa's Annuals and Production Managers, are now back in Colorado... their heads spinning with the names and images of "must have" plants for Tagawa's customers. More than forty plant breeders and growers hosted fellow members of the green industry this year. Jere and Kris picked the crem de la crem to visit during their week-long stay to see which new plants and planting ideas showed the most promise for Colorado gardens. Here are some things to look for, either this growing season or next. Both of our experts were impressed with a new tomato called "Tomaccio." Kris says it's a sweet raisin tomato with an intense sugary flavor. It can be picked fresh or left to dry on the vine. Wow! Even if the plants aren't available for this summer's garden, Kris hopes to have some samples of the fruit for "show and tell" during Tagawa's "Tomatopalooza" in late summer. I can't wait! Also impressive: a new pink poinsettia. "Big deal" you say? Well listen to this. The grower offering this poinsettia is hoping to see these pretty pink plants used at baby showers, wedding showers and in mixed containers. Stay tuned! Both Jere and Kris give a "hats off" to Proven Winners, an on-going favorite of Tagawa customers. Proven Winners is working on some new colors for their Callibrachoa Superbells, including a plant called "Cherry Star." The flowers are a dark cherry-pink with yellow stars at their center. And more Callie Superbells with names like "Sweet Tart" and "Tequila Sunrise" are in the works. A product you'll definitely be seeing at Tagawa's this spring is called "Wooly Pockets." It's vertical or up-right gardening as you've never seen it before. Wooly Pockets won the "Best of Show" award at last year's Independent Garden Center convention. Tagawa's staff will be happy to show you Wooly Pockets, then it's up to you to let your imagination run wild! Tagawa Gardens works closely with Ball Horticulture, one of the most innovative plant breeders in the country. Ball is always a favorite stop for our crew on their Spring Trials visit. Kris and Jere were both grabbing for their cameras when they saw Ball's garden bed of Osteospermum "3-D." Kris says these African Daisies do, indeed, look three-dimensional! They come in lilac, white and blue, and have large centers with double petals that don't close at night or on cloudy days. These will definitely be a "must have" for African daisy fans. Also this season or next, watch for a new Echinacea or coneflower called "Double Scoop Raspberry." They should be a perennial in Zone 5, which covers much of the front range. The list of great new plants on display at the Spring Trials goes on and on.. a bush-type portulaca or moss rose called "Happy Hour," a new gazania that is a perfect Bronco orange, a large begonia called "The Big Whopper," and a new petunia called "Pink Lemonade." Some of these plants may be available this season. For others, we'll have to wait 'til next year. But rest assured: Jere and Kris and many more plant experts at Tagawa's are always "out there," doing their homework, to make sure our customers can choose from the best and brightest ideas in the world sof gardening.

Container Gardens and Instant Gratification

Nothing but nothing dresses up a porch, patio or deck better than a big pot of flowers, spilling out in a beautiful jumble of color. A push towards smaller homes and simpler lifestyles has helped make container gardening the rage. Planting flowers in all sorts of pots and containers (almost anything with a drainage hole) is alll about instant gratification, and we at Tagawa's say "hooray" for that! We're here to help.

It's easier than you might think to plant your own containers and have pots
that look like they were done by a pro. All it takes is a few very basic design tips that will help guide you as you choose from the thousands of annuals that fill the benches at Tagawa's to over-flowing during the spring and summer months.

The design concept of "thrillers, fillers and spillers" is fun and easy to follow, and can help you envision your finished container even before you check out at Tagawa's. Here's how it works.

The "thriller" piece of the design puzzle refers to something dramatic for the center of your container garden.... a bold and up-right eye-catching plant to help "anchor" the whole arrangment. Thrillers are often the tallest plant in the pot, but a big, intensely-colored annual can work well, too.

Ornamental grasses make terrific thrillers. Tagawa's brings in dozens of different kinds of grasses every year that thrive in containers. Remember that the grasses may not be at their full-grown height when you plant them, but should grow quickly into their leading role.

"Fillers" come next. They're the plants you choose to surround the thriller... plants that will help give your container garden so much of its form and personality. Tried and true plants like geraniums can make great fillers. Or you may want to try something new, like "Diamond Frost" euphorbia. These airy plants have a non-stop show of tiny white flowers that fill the pot with small points of light. It's not the effect of each individual flower that gives Diamond Frost its well-earned reputation as a "must have." It's the appeal of so many tiny white flowers creating a kind of cloud effect that has won people over. For a pink-tinted effect, go with Diamond Frost's cousin, "Breathless Blush," and wait for the "oohs" and "ahs" that will follow.

The fillers can be two or three of the same plant, or a variety of plants. Just be sure you're selecting plants that will all "play well" together.... plants that share common needs for sun or shade. If you put plants with drastically different needs into the same pot, somebody's not going to be happy.

"Spillers," as you might have guessed, are the wonderful plants that we put against the ouside edge of the pot, so they can spill and tumble out. I'm inclined to think the spillers are often the most important players in a potted garden. They give a fluid sense of elegance... a healthy over-flow
that can make a container garden look lush and full. To me, plants without spillers look incomplete..... a bit as if an important guest missed the party.

The list of plants that make good spillers goes on and on. Cascading petunias are a classic form of a spiller. But there are hundreds of other choices that can make your pots look bold, impressive and professionally-done. Consider the "callies," the challibrachoas. They look like minature petunias, but come in wonderful shades of pink and purple.... red and salmon..... orange and yellow. The callies have a lot of devoted fans, and deserve every one of them.

If you're goal is a "mixed" planting.... a container with several different types of plants... besure to use a variety of foliage and flower shapes and textures. The results will have a lot more eye appeal. Don't forget to include plants with bi-colored or variegated leaves that are grown specifically for their foliage, and may not even have flowers during our short growing season. These variegated accents are another one of those "professional" touches that can make a big difference in the finished look of your container

And don't dismiss the beauty and simplicity of a big pot of a single type of plant.... maybe a few of the wonderful sun coleus varieties and nothing else. Coleus as a mass planting make a big statement.

A large tub of "Bubblegum" petunias can have a lot of punch, too. They're as pink as their name implies, and aside from regular watering, require little maintenance. Last summer, our neighborhood deer herd gave my Bubblegums a crew cut. A few days later, I couldn't tell they'd been munched. My kind o' plant!

The more plants you use in your container garden, the more frequently it's going to need to be watered over the summer. A nice, round number might be perhaps five to seven large plants (about a four-inch pot) in a 16" to 18" container, along with a few small fillers and spillers if you have the room.

Water your containers when the top few inches of soil dries out. Be sure to water thoroughly every time, until you see water begin to drain out at the bottom of the pot. Never leave a container garden (or any plant, other than bog plants) in standing water. The containers should always drain freely.

One last word to help make your containers a success. A lot of plants that are marked "full sun" on the label will struggle in full afternoon sun in Colorado, if they're also getting a lot of reflected heat off of a fence or wall. I think of Colorado sun as "sun-and-a-half." Reflected heat can be a challenge even when a plant is well-watered. If the plants' roots are baking, all the water in the world may not help.

Please bring your gardening wish-list to Tagawa's, and let us help guide you toward the best container gardens your decks and patios have ever had!