Syringa vulgaris, or the common lilac

The glory of our region, the lilacs, are at their finest. Their heady fragrance is the hallmark of mid-to-late spring, and there is no finer activity than gathering armloads of these lovely ladies for vases and containers around the home.

Lilacs require a minimum of six hours of sunlight to perform their best. If you are growing them against the garage near a north facing wall, or in the shadows, you just aren’t going to get many blooms.

It is a myth that lilacs will do good in poor or heavy soil. Yes, they will grow in clay, but only if it drains well.Lilacs area at their best in a soil that is slightly alkaline or neutral and high in organic matter. They benefit frommulching and do appreciate a fertilizer higher in phosphorus. The time to prune is when lilacs stop blooming. Remove faded blooms will promote good flower buds for next year.

May To-Do’s

• Remove spent blooms from spring flowering bulbs. This will keep the bulbs from expending energy producing seed. Don’t pull the foliage or trim it back. You can roll it down and rubber-band the foliage to make your beds look tidier. This allows the bulb to make and store food for next year’s flowering.
• Yes! It’s time to plant all those green goodies. Try to do this on a cloudy, windless day.
• Don’t count on rainfall for your watering! It is crucial that newly planted nursery stock get an inch or two of water a week. Supplement Nature with deep watering. Fertilize roses, flower

We who live in zone 5 of the country have an edge over our southern breathren because Peonies require a prolonged winter chill. That is one of the reason why people who live in zones 8 and higher cannot grow Peonies. So, the queen of the May garden would have to be the homey and lovely peony.

Why we love them:

Peonies are long-lived, but slow-growing at first. Garden peonies will usually begin blooming within three years after planting. They must be planted shallow. Peonies can live for up to a hundred years. Incredible!!

It’s so fitting that we honor our mothers during spring and May is truly spring at its best. Everything is alive with promise: Trees, shrubs, and many flowers are all putting on a show. Even the air seems fresher as it”s softly scented with the smell of flowers and freshly mown grass. Granted, there are still some chilly evenings and cold rains, but warm days are overwhelmingly here, and the full force of the season is upon us.

“What potent blood hath modest May.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

Butterfly gardens are one of natures simplest pleasures for your own enjoyment, photo opportunities, or an outlet for artistic talent. These gardens can also be extended to interest youth in nature, by providing a small window of native inhabitants of the local environment.

Different species of butterflies have different preferences of nectar, in both colors and tastes. A wide variety of food plants will give the greatest diversity of visitors. Try staggering wild and cultivated plants, as well as blooming times of the day and year. Groups of the same plants will be easier for butterflies to see than singly planted flowers.

Overripe fruit, allowed to sit for a few days is a very attractive substance (to them!) as well. All insects are cold-blooded and cannot internally regulate their body temperature. Butterflies will readily bask in the sun when it is warm out, but few are seen on cloudy days. It is a good idea to leave open areas in a yard for butterflies to sun themselves, as well as partly shady areas like trees or shrubs, so they can hide when it’s cloudy or cool off if it is very hot.

Butterflies also like puddles. Males of several species congregate at small rain pools, forming puddle clubs. Permanent puddles are very easy to make by burying a bucket to the rim, filling it with gravel or sand, and then pouring in liquids such as stale beer, sweet drinks or water.

Some varieties of flowers which are easy to find and grow in Illinois, and will be attractive to many species of butterflies include:

• Rudbeckia (July-Aug)
• Aster (sep-oct)
• Lilac (May)
• Goldenrod (Sept-Oct)
• Lavender (June-Sept)
• Daylilies (June-Sept)
• Echinacea (July)
• Marigolds (all summer)

Hoy Landscaping Inc. is pleased to announce the launch of a new website in partnership with Headstand Media, a Chicago web design company. The new site uses current open source best practices and includes a blog for posting news and updates. It also follows best practices for search engine optimization so that our customers and prospects can find us easier using the search engines.

We hope that you will look through our site and subscribe to our RSS feed to receive timely updates about our business growth, landscape design services, and related topics of information.

Contact Hoy Landscaping Services for all your landscape design project and maintenance needs.

We are happy to announce that Hoy Landscaping Services has moved to a larger and more efficient location in Melrose Park, Illinois.

Our new address and contact information is:

Hoy Landscaping Inc.
3000 Lake Street
Melrose Park IL 60160
T E L : 708.356.1066
F A X : 708.356.1067
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Can you believe how quickly all the leaves came down over the last week? I would rake my leaves one day and you wouldn’t know it a few hours later as the ground would be covered again. Can’t complain though as Fall is a beautiful time of year. The beautiful chrysanthemums and other colors just give that last tinge of warmth as nature warns of things to come.

Here are some things for your to-do list:

1. Get your spring flowering bulbs installed. It’s not too late!
2. Christmas is around the corner and approaching quickly. Put some evergreen boughs and colorful branches and pine cones in your planters. It will give you a beautiful look when the snow tops it off.
3. Cut back any unsightly dormant perennials. You can leave the grasses and other perennials that will add winter interest… just be sure to cut them back early enough in Spring so that the old growth doesn’t interfere with the new growth.

Happy gardening!

When old man winter is right around the corner, don’t think your gardening is done. As your plantings begin to go dormant, they are taking in precious fluids to store until next year. Keep them moist even during the Fall so they will wake up happy in the Spring!

Have you noticed leaves dropping earlier than usual? Remnants of a summer drought can affect leaves dropping earlier than usual. When this happens also don’t expect to see Fall colors as normal. Most of the leaves are weakened by the drought to go through the color change process. They just simply drop off instead.

In our HoyBlog you will find bits and pieces of knowledge and experience about how we run a landscaping services business. We will link to portfolio photos and descriptions of our most recent projects, as well as information to keep you informed of the latest in Hoy Landscaping developments. Subscribe to our RSS feed in the upper right corner of our site to get the latest new information delivered directly to your news reader software.