Thrifty Gardening Tip Follow Up: Buying and Saving Discount Plants

Previously in my new series of posts about how to garden on a budget, Thrifty Gardening Tips, I wrote about finding and saving discount plants. After writing that post, I had an urge to go out and look to see what I could find. It was the Thursday before the Fourth of July holiday and I had this feeling that there might be some deals out there waiting to be discovered. I used buying mulch as an excuse and drove out to the store. When I got to the garden center I was shocked to find that every, yes every, discount plant was on sale for $1 each! I picked up 12 plants total! They were all in pretty good shape, they just hadn’t been sold and the store was making room for more seasonal stock. At $1 per plant they were guaranteed to get sold.

Here’s what I found and where they’re going:

Japanese Painted Fern (Athyrium niponicum ‘Pictum’)
This fern will replace one of the ferns that the rabbits destroyed in my corner shade garden.

Two Mugo Pines (Pinus mugo)
When our patio is built these will be planted around it with a Japanese maple. Until then I may need to pot them into some larger pots. They will be in the ground by fall. (Which means an upcoming patio building project!)


Three Coral Bells (Heuchera x villosa ‘Mocha’ -Left and Right, Heuchera ‘Melting Fire’ – center)
These will go into the corner shade garden with the other heucheras. I hope eventually to divide several of these varieties and start a new shade garden in the back of our property as they seem to be relatively rabbit resistant.

Clematis (Unknown)
These didn’t have any labels on them so I will have to wait until they bloom again to identify them. The plants looked good but the blooms were spent. I planted one of them against our lamp post in the front yard. The other clematis I am going to give to my mom who loves clematis (don’t tell her yet she doesn’t know and she’s out of town!)

Two Autumn Coral Azaleas (Azalea x ‘Conled’ PP#10568)
This is one of the encore azaleas that bloom from spring through autumn. It has coral pink blooms and grows up to two and a half feet tall by three feet wide. I haven’t determined where these two azaleas will go yet but I’m considering planting them near our hemlock privacy screen.

Two to Four ‘Mystic Spires’ Salvia (Salvia longispicata x farinacea)
I put two to four since the nursery that planted them actually put three in each gallon pot. Two of which were still strong and viable in each pot. Instead of 2 for a dollar I picked up four. Two of them I planted near our Yoshino Cherry tree, one I put in the birdbath garden after I expanded it, and one I put in our front porch garden.