Which is best to plant this time of the year?
Perrenials or annuals this time of year? I'm a very good indoor plant grower, but recently purchased a house with LOTS of garden space. I'm not sure which plants would give my house good curb appeal right now, but are also easy for beginners.
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depending on your zone, I would look at the home and garden centers for what they are currently stocking. For my area, there are large amounts of pansies. There are seeds to start indoors. Later in April, I will go and see what garden centers are offering, once I know there is no chance of snow - especially here in ANYTHING-CAN-HAPPEN-PENNSYLVANIA
You need to plant by zone and use plants that are accustomed to growing in the zone if you put them in the ground. Take a look at this site for some guidance: http://planthardiness.ars.usda.gov/PHZMWeb/. I personally like perennials for in the ground and annuals for my pots. Most perennials will come up year after year with little maintenance. If your garden centre already has them out, then you're likely OK to put them in, but I agree with Elizabeth that you should check with your garden centre.
Here in western Canada, we're not planting anything outside until late May when the risk of frost has past (in fact, it's snowing here again today
). Pots that can be brought indoors if it freezes may be able to be planted out sooner, but our garden centres generally don't even have plants until early to mid May. Makes for a short growing season!
Planting time depends on your regions planting zone and related frost times. You might want to check with your local cooperative extension -the master gardeners have local events plant clinics plant sales and seminars that might be helpful for beginners— I know my area does.
Additionally your cooperative extension agents are iready and waiting to answer all your questions —be sure to take advantage of this great resource.
These offices are manned by a wonderful team of master gardeners that know your local situation quite well. There's also email ( submit a photo) Q&A resources that have helped my concerns and questions many times. Consider googling up your local extensions office.
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