i would be more afraid.. with this late a delivery .... that they would be fried to a crisp ... in my MI .. let alone your z8? .. before they could get the root system settled and working .. of course my MI is different than say.. the PNW ... long story short.. tell us where you are.. it might matter ...

all that said ... with less than prime mail orders.. yes.. i would pot them up.. grow a root mass .... and hold them over for fall planting ...

ken

ps: this of course.. is why i used to have a hundred pots for fall planting.. lol .. you gotta buy.. when you find when you want.. but that doesnt mean it should be planted ...

Thanks ken_adrian, that is what my gardening instinct tells me to do. And you are right. Mornings and nights are cool here in Seattle area but afternoon sun is already pretty hot for transplants. Good sized plants transplanted earlier in the spring still need a watchful eye for water. Guess I will get busy today!

I'd pot them up. While I do not do much, if any, mail order, I do often get very small starts of some plants that will definitely benefit from being potted up for the season before being direct planted to the garden. And it really has nothing to do with the weather - PNW springs/early summers are very amenable to plant establishment and I routinely plant all through the growing season. Even in midafternoon, it is not hot enough here until late July or August to have transplanting concerns. It is more a case of the small starts being overwhelmed or swallowed up by the rapid growth of more established plants. Except for annuals, I make sure all plants fill at least a gallon sized container wrt root development and generally wait until even larger for trees and shrubs.

I'd probably also vote for potting them up in larger pots, but not for the entire season. I'm guessing that these plants were raised in a greenhouse so they will need hardening off, aka small, and then increasing, hours outdoors; indoors part of the time. I would think that if they do well, they could go out into the ground permanently in another month.

It will take longer than a month for a small mail order start to have a root system that will fill a 1G pot. And that is exactly what is needed if one hopes to plant anything in July and have it survive.....even here in the cool summer PNW!! It is far more advantageous to wait until the cooler temps of fall before planting out. Far less issues with transplant shock and the need for constant watering.

Thanks for replys. Even June is sometimes too hot for successful planting where I live. The vagaries of site, soil, etc. I garden on almost sand and even after 30+ years of adding compost and whatever else I could get my hands on, I still battle soil that is not very water retentive. I am already doing significant watering of beds. I very much wish we had laid out a drip system before planting but that ship sailed a long time ago. I have started to replace some plants with more drought tolerant plants but even that is not easy as we in the PNW have to contend with wet feet in the fall, winter and spring. No complaints though, spedigrees, at least we don’t have snow in April!

So today I am potting all those tiny plants and will hold until fall.

I pot up mine unless it's a sensitive kind of plant that resents root disturbance. When I plant really small plants, then I usually put some kind of protection over the plant such as a cage. I had a few plants in pots over the Winter because I got lazy last Fall. I waited too long and the soil was too wet to dig in. Fortunately, everything in pots lived because it was such a mild Winter.

Most things will live in pots over winter here ;-) Because I now rent, virtually my entire garden (all the plants of value) are in containers. From small 1G's on up!! But I have always grown a lot of plants in containers, if nothing more than for just the decorative effect.

FWIW, only the smaller containers are really at any risk from winter cold damage. And depending on the plant, most of those breeze through just fine as well.

I guess much depends on climate in a particular area, as you've mentioned Cercis. Here the winters are very long and overwintering plants in pots is problematic. I start many plants from seed, some in tiny pots, and the health of all improve dramatically when they are planted directly in the ground. By first frost in September, perennial plants have usually developed a good root system to carry them through the winter. In a warmer climate, hot sun is probably as detrimental to a young plant as freezing temperatures, and the winter is not the 7 or 8 month affair that it is here, so overwintering probably has a different meaning altogether.

Here's hoping that your plants do well in their new pots.

I always just plant mine and keep watered well and shade if necessary ....never lost any. They will still need to be watered well in pots so I prefer to plant and get them established ASAP.

Hello gardengal48. I am located on the south of Whidbey. My problem is not the temperature per se but the temperature combined with my sandy soil. I also believe that the rapid changes in temperature which seem to have increased in frequency over the years has a detrimental effect on new plantings. If I can get things planted in May, the chances of success and decrease in daily attention are greatly augmented. Of course, that pretty much limits what is available as well as as the distinct possibility that it may be too wet to move around in my beds. Always a balancing act, isn't it? I continue to plant gallon pots with good root growth into June most years but have to be vigilant on watering and temporary shading. The little guys with fragile root growth would never make it.

I do keep pots for transplant for early fall planting but really have to "dunk" a few times a week which can be a pain if we want to take a few days away from the house. If we do go away they get "super dunked" and moved to the shadiest, coolest spot we have on the property.

It is very interesting to me how these micro climates influence our gardens and how we learn by trial and error. The west side of Whidbey is notorious for gardening chaos, not for the heat but for the wind. Coupeville, 30 minutes up the road, is drier and warmer than our place. Driving south down our highway, the pavement can be perfectly dry but as soon as I turn onto our road, the pavement is wet (I think we must be directly under a convergence zone!).

I potted up my tiny Echinacea pallida yesterday. I don't have much luck with any Echinacea but have always loved the look of these and so will give it a go.

Sandy soil can certainly do a number on late spring transplants!! Less of a concern about heat than it is a lack of water. Mulching well with a good organic mulch should help with that.

I live on Bainbridge, a block up from the Sound. It is very mild here year round.....never too cold in winter (only experienced a couple of rather light frosts this past year) but never very warm in summer. The maritime effect :-) And for some reason we get much less rain than Seattle.

I have a lot of PNW marginally hardy plants do very well here. Mirror plant (Coprosma) and cuphea overwinter reliably, as do pittosporums. But outside of plain old Echinacea purpurea, coneflowers are duds!! I think you have an advantage there with sandy soil :-) Mine is not, even this close to the beach ( I actually live in the woods!)

I'm with Garden-Ho. They plant so easily when small, and I really like the fact that their roots establish naturally in place instead of in the pot. It does take pampering and watering, though, which I am glad to do. Pots require more watering, it seems. Just what I like. Gardengal has so much more experience than me, so I would give her advice more weight.

With all the wild weather fluctuations here, its easier to just plant the things. The ground is going to retain more moisture and buffer temperature changes for me better than a container.

My only reason for suggesting a temporary re-potting was to be able to harden off the plants with both indoor and outdoor time before plunking them in the ground permanently, so as to avoid shocking them any more than they already had been. However, to be honest, I, myself, would be more apt to directly plant them outside and hope for the best.

On edit, I think that echinacea like sandy soil, cercis, so probably they will do well in your garden (eventually). That is the reason I've had no luck growing them here, because of the lack of sandy soil on my property.

Just a report back. After repotting the tiny plants, they are looking great. Much bigger and healthier. I am glad that I waited to plant outside as we have had some heavy rain this last week that pummeled even some established plants (in the convergence zone drawback).

Thanks for all the feedback.

So like what plants did you get through the mail? I'm guilty of ordering a lot of plants through the mail this year but it is super fun for me to get packages that say LIVE PLANTS :). How are your Brugs doing? This year was the first year I'm doing Brugs in Coupeville dang they're slow. They are growing but slower than a snail's pace.

I think the problem is this is the first year I really am gardening in the PNW, especially on Whidbey and since I've gotten a LOT of new perennials, they all have to establish themselves and here it takes so long. Plus my penchant for marginal plants makes it that much more difficult. Oh well my zucchini, cosmos, borage, and nasturtiums from seed are about to bloom so I should be grateful for the little successes.

Z

I have a Santa Rosa buffet arriving tomorrow, FedEx willing. Yeah, pot farm will be growing. I will look at each plant deciding if it needs potting up at this point. Likely most will. I'll be holding out for cooler, rainier weather to plant and also like GG said, because established plants would wallow all over new plants right now.

Small, new plants have a much smaller rootball and can dry out pretty fast planted out in the garden. They need more frequent watering in than the established plants in the garden and are liable to be overlooked. Small plants that are not much more than rooted cuttings are safer in pots where they can be watched more closely than plants out in the landscape.

Invest in good soil that is rich in organic matter and can hold moisture well. Depending on the type of plant I also suggest keeping it in partial shade for a few weeks until the roots have a chance to get established in the new container. You don't want the small plant drying out.

I am sad to report that only one of the three echinacea plants made it. The Perle d’Or clematis also died. It was tiny and crushed in the packing. I didn’t hold out much hope for it at the time.

This was the 3rd time I have received very small plants from this vendor and won’t order from there again. Plants received from other vendors at the same time were gorgeous.

I am happy to report my good experiences but don’t want to malign a small nursery by name. The small nursery business is hard enough....

z man, my brugs are looking good but if this weather continues, I don’t think they will bloom this summer, or maybe not until fall. Not enough heat....

Too dark now to take a photo but will do later today.

My Santa Rosa plants look great, but for safety I think they'll spend another few months in pots (till weather gets cooler/wetter). We had blissful rain last three days (not a whole lot..but cooler/cloudier) which helped the plants through acclimation.

My Santa Rosa plants should be here Thursday. They are all warm season grasses but Ill hold off on planting until early september. I bought some little bluestems a few weeks ago, pulled them out of the pots, divided them, planted them straight in the garden bed, and have been watering with a watering can at the crack of dawn everyday it doesnt rain, and it is enough work. The new plants can live on the deck with my seed grown perennials until the rain does more of the work.

It is actually preferable to plant warm season grasses sooner rather than later :-) The roots start to go dormant in late summer...about the time they would normally produce seed heads.......and planting when that has or is about to occur can prevent their establishment in colder winter climates.

Hmm, zone 7 is hardly a colder winter climate though :)

It is not even recommended to plant warm season OG's here in fall!! They just do not establish well with a late season planting and most OG sources or specialty nurseries will confirm this.

Well it is mostly their dormant season and they don't establish or grow roots, but a potted specimen should settle in fine with care.

There is a very good reason late season planting is not recommended.....the plants are unlikely to settle in well and often will simply die off over winter. Otherwise, why would virtually every single OG authority and resource advise against it??

Thanks for chiming in gg, maybe i will rig up more drip lines for this year, or leave them in pots and put them in the cellar for the winter, then plant next year.

The nearby nursery where I got the other grasses said they lost a lot of switchgrass when it randomly hit -6F a few nights, even with the plants in their greenhouses.

skip, that would be my suggestion. Either plant them soon and provide the extra water needed this season or hold them over until spring.

Overwintering in pots would be more problematical than late planting (to me).

Cercis,

I have four new brugs this year and the cool weather is not helping them. However, I did get one B. vulcanicola and B. arborea, both of which belong to the "cold" brugramsnia types, as opposed to the regular or "warm" brugmansia types. These "cold" types come from higher up in the Andes. I am giving those a try and am optimistic.

Z