Fall is upon us and not only is it a great time to plant and add a few of those newest offerings just hitting the market, but it’s also the perfect time to get new garden beds and ideas set up for the spring!

The summer heat is waning, the veggie garden is slowing down, and plants are getting ready for the winter. But now is not the time to kick back!

So what’s new on the horizon for your landscape this year? Here are a few new ideas for you to employ and wow the neighbors, friends, and family!

The Incredible Shrinking Front Lawn

Sure it looks good, and has become the ‘standard’ for what the front of your home should look like, but is a money/water/time/energy trap, not to mention a waste of space that requires chemicals and work to keep it looking its best.

Removing the lawn entirely, or piece by piece, gives you more room for flowers and fewer irrigation curb appeal methods! As property sizes shrink and space gets tight, fewer folks are worried about the water-hungry front lawn of days gone by. With so many new groundcovers, flowers, shrubs, and trees available, many gardeners are turning their sights on replacing that grass with a new planting bed, vegetable garden, or outdoor living space!

With just as much curb appeal as the turf, a tidy front garden with seating, a focal point shade tree, and wrapped in flowering shrubs or sheared evergreens for privacy, is quickly becoming a better option. Especially when combined with planting natives, xeric gardens, and places where birds and pollinators can also feel welcome!

Using plants that pull double duty in the landscape - by either providing shade for money-saving cooling in the increasingly hot summers, broadening food sustainability and access, or just finding room for all the cool new plants that keep coming out each year!

Some hot new plants to make room for this fall include - 

• French Manicure Hydrangea
• Butterfly Candy Butterfly Bushes
• Ice Breaker™ Korean Fir
• Baby Kim® Lilac
• Prairie Splendor™ Coneflower
• Boom Chocolatta Hardy Geranium

Another way to get rid of water-hogging lawns and turf is by creating pathways of native lawn turf like Buffalo Grass, or pavers down the middle of a swath of native tall and short grasses mixed with prairie flowers and wildflowers! Simultaneously creating a butterfly and bee haven as well as a Xeric and drought-tolerant area that won’t need constant fuss or watering once established.

• Blue False Indigo
• Asters
• Purple Coneflowers
• Milkweed
• Goldenrod
• Cup Plant
• Bee Balm
• Indian Grass
• Big & Little Bluestems
• Culvers Root
• Coreopsis
• Liatris

The Mini-Farmstead/Homestead

Healthy food sources, wider choices in crop type and diversity, plus food sustainability continue to be a top priority for many. Whether it is turning the backyard into a vegetable garden and orchard to raise chickens and rabbits or just expanding the Victory garden that you started during Covid. The desire to turn part of your landscape, rooftop, or balcony gardens, into an edible landscape and personal grocery store has increased exponentially!

With the help of high-density planting, edible landscaping, and the many new dwarf fruiting bushes and space-saving vertical garden options, growing more food in less space has become so easy! Plus many small-scale homesteaders like to sell their produce at farmers' markets or share with neighbors! After all, homegrown goodness is always best!

• Grow your own Mushrooms!
• Golden Raspberries
• Pink Blueberries like Pink Lemonade Blueberry Bush
• Gooseberry Bush
• Honeyberry/Sweetberry/Haskap Plants
• Persimmons
• Fig Trees
• Pomegranates
• Heirloom/Specialty Fruit Trees

Growing Your Own Superfruits & Healthy Organic Eating!

The ability to get access to nutrient-dense superfruits for fresh eating organically, and making your own smoothies, juice, and snacks is easy!

These are also highly unusual plants, easy to grow, and serve double duty in the front and back landscape with some careful planning. We’re sure the neighbors will be clamoring to see what it is you have growing now!

• Goji Berry
• Aronia Bushes
• Consort Black Currant
• Elderberry Bushes
• Tropical Fruit Trees

Restful & Healthy Environments

Gardening is already great exercise and good for your mental and spiritual well-being. Creating outdoor spaces that refresh the mind, body, and spirit by relaxing you, chasing away stress, reducing cortisol, and improving sleep and air quality, are very much needed in this polluted, increasingly urban day and age! We all need less stress and ways to unplug and there’s nothing like spending some quality time getting some sun, breathing fresh air, and finding a quiet place to meditate.

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  A water feature with an outdoor rug and floor pillows to meditate. Surround yourself with lavender, and peonies, Roses, Jasmine vines, and scented flowering shrubs like Gardenia and Mock Orange.
• A yoga or Tai Chi area surrounded by swishy ornamental grasses or calming evergreens
• A hammock surrounded by dense flowering shrubs, Ferns, Hosta, and a big shade tree
• A small pond with a garden bench, water garden plants, and a gazing ball
• Create a morning coffee nook with a bistro set, surrounded by fragrant Roses

A healthy-for-you garden includes making it more sinus friendly! 

In addition to female-only perennials, trees and shrubs, and sterile forms of plants, you can create a sneeze-free environment (at least outside your own doors)! Keeping weeds down naturally, limiting pesticides and spraying, and deadheading/shearing at specific times of the flowering cycle, will all help you create a hypoallergenic environment outdoors. Go outside after rain and on cooler mornings/days, wear a mask if needed on hot days and when the pollen count is high, and always shower/change clothing immediately after working/spending lots of time outdoors.

• Azaleas/Rhododendrons
• Boxwood
• Clematis
• Dahlias
• Dogwood Tree/Shrub
• Evergreens & Privet (sheared)
• Iris
• Garden Phlox
• Hydrangea
• Magnolia
• Perennial & Tropical Hibiscus
• Palm Trees
• Peony
• Rose of Sharon
• Sea Thrifts
• Spring Flowering Bulbs
• Verbena
• Vinca (Periwinkle)
• Viburnum Shrubs

Making Bouquets and Dried Décor From What You Grow!

Filling your home with scented bouquets for relaxing and elaborate table arrangements when entertaining, or be generous and give the gift of cheer! Create dried décor with what you can pretty up your home, dry herbs and flowers for Wreaths to enjoy all winter, and fresh or dried floral arrangements

Growing a cut flower garden not only enhances your home indoors but also adds curb appeal outside too! Many brides are even growing their wedding decorations, and bridal bouquets, and growing their reception gifts too!

Choose plants that are long-blooming, reblooming, and flowering throughout all parts of the spring, summer, and fall for something new in your arrangements all year round!

• Ornamental Grasses like Pampas with showy seed heads
• Spring flowering bulbs & Ephemerals
• Late Spring flowering perennials like Peony, Daisies & Columbines
• Foliage plants for greenery like Ferns, Hosta, Coral Bells, Artemisia & Evergreens
• Summer and Late Summer blooming plants - Daylily, Roses & Coneflower
• Fall blooming and fall reblooming perennials - Hydrangea, Sedum, Rudbeckia & Asters
• Herb plants for drying and crafts
• Filler plants like Baby’s Breath, Clematis, Russian Sage, Yarrow, and Astilbe
• Great flowers for drying - Roses, Hydrangeas, Yarrow, Lavender, Globe Thistle & Statice

Create Bonsai, Tree-Form, Topiary, or Espalier Plants

Want to try your hand at something completely different this fall? Grow and train your trees and vines into either trim little Bonsai, train vines into tree forms, or create a truly unique Espalier! These are the ultimate hobby gardening achievements! There are so many benefits that both these space-saving forms of pruning and training methods can have on your home, mood, your mental state (it's meditative!), and are surefire conversation pieces!

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  Train vines like Grapes, Clematis, Climbing Roses, and Trumpet Vines can be trained into crisscrossing grids, in spirals up supports or poles, or into stand-alone weeping tree forms like Wisteria vines are trained into trees!
• Fruit trees and flowering trees can both be trained into flat, tiered Espalier forms. There are many forms of Espalier and all look so unique that you’ll be able to find one best for your experience level, for the plant you’re working with, and the way you are using your Espalier!

• Many shrubs, especially broad-leaved evergreens, or conifers can be trained and pruned into pompom or spiral topiary forms, sheared into shapes that are only limited by your imagination!

• Almost any tree or large shrub can be trained into a Bonsai by limiting its root growth and moisture needs, compacting its root system, and trimming and wiring it a certain way to mimic the look of a plant dwarf and contorted by harsh environments on mountains and tenuously clinging to rocks and cliffs! Start with a smaller-sized tree about 1-3 years of age and begin training it this fall. Please note that most of these plants will still need their winter dormancy unless you try your hand at Bonsai with a houseplant that stays indoors or on the porch. So once you start training your tree or shrub, you’ll have all winter to wait to see your new growth in the spring.

Start small and try an easy Kokedama for your home!

Kick Start Your Autumn!

Everything you do for your landscape this fall means less you’ll need to do in the spring, and will have your winter garden ready for the chilly next few months! Plus with some careful fall planning, you’ll have a better view (and a better stocked pantry) that winter! Set in motion your plans for 2024 this autumn with the help of Nature Hills Nursery!

Check out the premade Autumn Wreaths for easy decorating this fall, saving you more time to set your lofty new plans in motion!

Happy Planting!