Frugal gardening: Think perennial

In gardening, as with anything else, it pays to think long term. Perennial plants cost a little more than annuals, but they will come back year after year.

2005 was my first full year as a homeowner, and I went a little overboard on the annuals. Annuals are plants that do not live through the winter, which means you have to buy and plant more of them each year. They're hard to resist because most of the time they are already blooming when you buy them, so you have instant color in your yard. Popular annuals in the Northeast include pansies, geraniums, snapdragons, and impatients.

This year I'm determined to resist all those gorgeous flats of flowers outside the grocery store. Here are some tips for building a healthy, long-lasting collection of perennial plants.

* Plant bulbs. They take virtually no maintenance, multiply over time, and many will bloom early in the season. Having crocuses, daffodils, and tulips already blooming in your yard will help you resist the temptation to buy annuals.

* Try to work it so you have something blooming all the time. Bulb and seed packages usually give a range of months in which they're expected to bloom.



* Unless you're trying to cover a lot of ground, be wary of plants that tend to spread like crazy. Plant them in an out-of-the-way patch so they don't take over your whole yard. These include hostas, mint, irises, ivy, bamboo, morning glories, and others. I even have a strain of aggressive chamomile that keeps cropping up in my lawn.

* Get more bang for your buck by planting small flowering bushes. Bleeding hearts do well in the shade. Larger bushes like lilacs and rose of sharon will also give you some nice color. Bushes tend to be expensive, but if you're willing to take a bigger risk that they won't survive, you can buy them quite small and wait for them to get bigger. They're usuall priced according to the size of the pot they come in. Four-inch pots are cheapest but hold very young plants. Gallon pots hold more mature plants, but cost more.

* If there's a certain flower you can't resist buying at the flower stand, see if it will grow in your area. Even if you have to re-plant it annually, it will be cheaper than buying the flowers by the dozen.

* Gardening is a great way to get to know your neighbors, and you can save a lot of money by being friendly. Want an expensive leaf shredder? See if some neighbors want to go in on the cost and share it. Covet Mrs. So-and-so's iris patch? See if she's planning to thin it any time soon to keep the patch healthy. You can plant some of her cast-off bulbs. Want to plant some tomatoes, but can't buy the seeds in small enough quantity? See if someone wants to share seeds.



* What can you grow that's edible? Many herbs like basil, oregano, cilantro and parsley are very easy to grow in the ground or even in indoor containers. Lavender is a perennial in the Northeast, and rosemary should be too (although my rosemary bush didn't make it this year). If you have space and sun, try growing some staple vegetables like tomatoes or beans.

* Plant groundcover to keep weeds down. You can get varieties of sage and thyme that are low to the ground, can withstand small amounts of foot-traffic, and smell wonderful.

* If you don't have enough ground cover, mulch to keep in moisture. Make sure you use compost or shredded leaves instead of wood bark mulch. Wood bark mulch leeches nitrogen from your soil, and often breeds fungus, whose shooting spores stain the siding on your house. Read all about it here.