Gardenias flower with bright, warm days and cool nights.
Home landscapes require large-scale landscaping plans with attention to space, light, drainage and growing zone. While some homeowners prefer the greenery of grass and trees, others enjoy the bright blooms and scents of flowering shrubs and plants like gardenias and lilies of the Nile. If you want to plant your own landscape with these bright tropical plants, choose the right time and sites and get started. Does this Spark an idea?
Instructions
1. Start your planting in mid-spring when the frost lifts. Choose gardenias and miniature lilies of the Nile, or agapanthus, if you live in warm U.S. Department of Agriculture Plant Hardiness Zones 9 through 11. These are tropical and subtropical plants and don't do well with freezing temperatures in winter.
2. Set out your landscape plan. Put gardenias in large sites with full to filtered sun, adequate drainage, air movement and at at least 2 to 6 feet of space, depending on cultivar. Plant miniature lilies of the Nile in white, blue, purple and periwinkle for effect, at the bases of the gardenias, in borders or in beds of their own, with full sunshine and good drainage. Keep the two plants separate for easier fertilizer applications, as gardenias enjoy more acidic soil than lilies of the Nile.
3. Amend all the soil at the same time to give the plants rich, quick-draining foundations. Turn 6 inches of organic compost into the top 12 inches of soil in all of the beds and planting sites and mix well to produce crumbly, loamy soil. Both plants rot in standing water or thick, tight soil.
4. Plant gardenias in their chosen sites with their crowns at soil level. Plant miniature lily of the Nile bulbs in their chosen sites at depths of 2 to 3 inches and spacing of 12 inches. These plants grow in somewhat crowded situations but do better with adequate room for air and sun.
5. Water all of the plants with 2 to 3 inches of water and put them on schedules of 2 inches of water weekly. Lay mulch on the soil around the plants to keep it moist and warm.
Tags: lilies Nile, chosen sites, inches water, miniature lilies, miniature lilies Nile, Plant miniature