New NOVA gardner - Need help and advice! (Alexandria, Vienna: sales, townhome)

[shoboo75]

Hi,

My husband and I will be moving in to our new townhome at the end of April. I am hoping to start a small garden right away, even if it means crowding our deck with pots and crates!

As someone new to gardening, I am wondering which store would be more helpful to guide me in getting started? Is Lowes or Home Depot the best place to go?? Is one better than the other?

Or should I go to one of the garden/nurseries that I see on Route 50?

Also, please share recommendations on specific flowers/plants that grow well in this NOVA area.

Thanks!

[Nancy in Nokomis]

Home Depot type stores have a limited selection but are cheap - garden centers have much more variety and are more expensive but the people there will help you more and have more knowledge than the sales clerk at Home Depot.
Well for annuals you can plant some pansies right now but they will burn up when summer heats up. Then you can plant some marigolds, petunias and impatients. Start with easy flowers and plants.
I would go to a garden center and ask for some advice for the perennials (flowers/plants that come back every year) and shrubs.
A lot of the soil around here is not so good - clay - you need to make a good soil mixture and use plenty of mulch on top because it will be scorching hot in summer and you want those plants to have some protection from the heat.
Stick with plants that do good in heat and drought. Last year it was veyr hot and did not rain for weeks and weeks

[OldCrow15]

Hi shoboo, you don't say exactly where you live in NoVa so I don't know how convenient either of these might be but you might be interested to tour Green Spring Gardens in Alexandria or Meadowlark Gardens in Vienna. Both are county garden parks that should be in prime springtime glory by the time you're looking to start planting. Either should offer an interesting experience in getting an idea of what grows well around here. Green Spring is free and Meadowlark used to charge a fee but I'm not sure if that's still the case. Green Spring has a reference library and frequent plant sales featuring native plants.

[normie]

Here are a few tips from when I lived in Nova:

1. If you are planting annuals or anything that is tender, you should wait until May. Usually they recommend waiting until Mother's Day. A trip to a local garden, such as Meadowlark Gardens, will show you what can be planted right now.

OTOH, if you are simply putting pots on a deck you might be able to get started before that. You could always bring your plants inside if cold night temperatures are predicted.

2. It is worth it to spend a little more to buy topsoil and mulch from Merrifield Garden Center. Merrifield is also the best place to go for advice. They have an extremely helpful staff. They also have free classes every Saturday and a great little tv show.

3. If you want a showpiece plant, I recommend going to Merrifield. They are pricey, however, and generally I did better at two places that had better prices: a little nursery on Maries Lane (near Cascades Pkwy and Nokes) as well as the WalMart in Sterling (near Nokes Blvd--this Walmart deals with local nurseries and the plants I bought here often did very well.)

Another place I (sometimes) liked was Krops Crops on Georgetown Pike. Some plants I bought there thrived--but some died immediately.

I have had terrible luck with Meadows Farms, Home Depot, and Lowes. A lot of my neighbors loved Meadows Farms, so maybe I just had a few bad experiences. Meadows Farms does have a nice selection of crape myrtles. They occasionally run a 2 for 1 deal and that is a great time to buy crape myrtles from them.

Avoid buying azaleas from roadside stands in shopping center parking lots. One of my neighbors had a terrible experience with plants from such a stand spreading disease in his garden.

4. The best place to get mulch is from the local community mulch pile. There are several around Nova. Help yourself to as much as you want for free. Do not buy topsoil or mulch from Home Depot, Lowes, or WalMart--the quality is terrible. It looks horrible, it doesn't nourish your garden and we had a real problem with crabgrass and weeds after using top soil from those stores.

[claremarie]

I second the nomination of Merrifield. Home Depot is great for mass annuals, and their quality has greatly improved over the last five years or so, but you will get zippy advice from their staff. (You will often get good advice from your fellow shoppers, but it's very hit or miss). Because you're starting with containers and small quantities, the price premium you'll pay at Merrifield won't be so bad. They have some very nice container displays, and if you visit when it's not too crowded, you can get some excellent and free assistance from their very knowledgeable staff.
The best potting soil I've found is the "Mr. Mulch" brand sold at Merrified. I've also had good luck with the name brand potting soils sold at Home Depot.

The best advice I can give is to start with a few larger containers, rather than a bunch of smaller ones. Containers dry out very quickly in the summer, and you won't need to water larger containers as often. You can experiment with two or three different plants in each container, which is more interesting than single plants in small pots. And it makes your deck look less cluttered.

You can go ahead and plant pansies, snapdragons, and several other "cool-weather" annuals right now.

Have fun!

[shoboo75]

Oldcrow, we will be living in the Town of Aldie near South Riding come April.

My 'starter' gaden may have to be containers kept on the deck or the small back yard area we have.

Will Merrifield sell these containers as well?

Thanks all for your advice and support!

[claremarie]

Merrifield and other gardening specialty stores will have the most extensive container selection -- again, they will also cost more. Home Depot has some nice, lightweight composite containers, so you might shop there first to get an idea of what is available. I have seen some giant, very inexpensive containers at Costco, but their selection is very hit or miss.

You can do a LOT with containers, and get some great ideas online or in books before you go shopping.

[normie]

If you have the patience, containers and other gardening supplies are great things to get at moving sales and estate sales in Nova.

[irisheyes13]

We have been very happy with both Merrifield's and Cravens as we have started on your town home yard. Both are excellent resources with knowledgeable staff.