Spring is an ideal time of year to add new pollinator-attracting plants to your landscape! The Garden Center is full of plants with flowers of all shapes, sizes, and colors, allowing for a wide array of combinations to suit various bed shapes and design styles. 

1.  Know Your Planting Location: Before choosing plants, be sure you know key characteristics about the area in which you are planting. Many plants for butterflies, bees, and hummingbirds love sunshine. So, siting your butterfly garden in an area that receives a minimum of 6+ hours of sunlight will likely be ideal. Also, most pollinator-friendly plants will appreciate soil that is well-drained (i.e. not soggy). Of course, there are exceptions to these guidelines for sunlight and soil moisture. If you are working in an area of the yard that has more shade or moisture, our Nursery Professionals can also assist you in choosing plants that will work for those conditions as well.

2. Choose the Right Plants: Generally, nectar-rich flowers are key. And, including an assortment of bloom shapes will encourage a variety of pollinators to visit. It is also important to consider bloom season so that flowers are present early spring through fall.

​Have space to go bigger? Pollinators also love these flowering shrubs and trees:

3. Get Your Soil Ready: We highly recommend amending the soil in your planting area with Brownswood Premium Planting Mix as well as a starter fertilizer such as Espoma Organic Bio-tone® Starter Plus to give your new plants their best start. You can find our Planting Guide at the link below. It provides planting instructions and helpful information about watering and getting new plants established.​

4. Plant: Planting different varieties of plants in groupings of three or more will result in more blooms of any given flower type being available at once. Do keep in mind mature heights and widths of each plant for best spacing and arrangement. For example, if arranging in tiers, situate taller plants in the back of the bed and work forward. It may be helpful to sketch a layout of your planting area with rough measurements beforehand to ensure proper spacing. Water regularly as new plantings are getting established and provide a balanced fertilizer in spring and fall.

5. Enjoy! Butterflies, bees, and hummingbirds are a delight for all ages to observe, adding a sense of wonder and excitement to the landscape. It may take a little while for pollinators to find newly planted flowers, so be patient... they will come!

Although our Winters are usually mild here in Charleston, we do occasionally experience a hard freeze that can damage or even kill landscape plants. We've put together a few tips for avoiding plant damage and caring for plants after a freeze event.

The first and best way to guard against cold damage is to select plants that are appropriate for our growing region. Nearly all of the varieties we grow and stock at our Nursery fall into this category. If temperatures are expected to be at or below freezing for an extended period - one or more hours - precautions taken to protect hardy landscape plants will lessen the likelihood of wilted or brown leaves and damaged flower buds. Prior to the arrival of freezing temperatures, add mulch to cover plant roots, water if there's been a lack of rainfall (be careful to water the root zone, not the foliage), and cover plants with a "frost cloth." Frost cloth can be purchased or fashioned from a bed sheet or thick black plastic. Be sure to cover plants to the ground and secure to prevent plants from being exposed to cold air/wind.

Of course, it's hard to deny the beauty of certain colorful tropicals such as the Tropical Hibiscus. Tender plant varieties are often treated as annual container plantings throughout the warm season with the expectation that they may not survive a cold Winter. However, these and other annual flowers can be protected from freezing temperatures by bringing them into a covered area such as a garage. If containerized plants are too heavy to move, water them in place and cover with a frost cloth. Note: Containerized plants left outside may not survive hours of cold exposure even if watered in and covered.

​After a cold snap has passed, allow ice or snow to melt away naturally. It can take days or longer for cold damage to become visible. Freeze damage will likely present itself as wilted or brown leaves, browned and/or fallen flower buds, or splitting/cracks in the bark of shrubs and trees. 

Clean up cold damage on hardy perennial plants by removing any mushy, wilted foliage immediately. You may also strip crispy, brown foliage from deciduous woody ornamentals and trees at this time if desired.

Resist pruning damaged shrubs and trees right away. Instead, wait until warmer weather arrives and temperatures have stabilized to prune away dead wood. This will prevent stimulating the plants to produce new growth too soon.