I cannot for the life of me seem to keep ferns alive! This spring I bought two Christmas Ferns to plant on my hillside. The hill is East facing, but gets a lot of shade from the woods and also from the bushes and trees on the hill. The only time it gets some direct sun is for a couple of hours as the sun is passing between the bushes and the roof of the house.

I live in north Mississippi, so of course it's blazing hot and dry in the summer. But I've tried watering a lot, watering very little, and somewhere in between.....and no matter what I do my ferns just don't seem to be thriving. The ferns didn't look all that great when I bought them from the nursery, but it was the only place that I could find the Christmas fern variety. I thought they would bounce back after I got them in the ground. They seemed to do ok for awhile, but as the summer went on, and now that it's coming to a close, I'm afraid they might be a lost cause. The soil on the hill is heavy clay.....I didn't really amend much of the soil before planting, so I'm not sure if that has part to do with it. But I think my watering schedule might be a big factor.....I've killed ferns before because I watered them too much......but with these I can't seem to find a happy medium. Here are some pictures.