Use few remaining warm days wisely
Warm fall days are great for installing Christmas lights. It is much easier to wrap branches with strings of lights on warm days in mid- to late October than on cold days in late November or early December.
Use LED lights to save on power and be able to use more strings on a circuit. Buy warm-color white LED lights if you want to match the color of the commonly used white incandescent lights. Cool-color LED white lights have a blue cast to them.
Wrap branches of your trees with strings of lights to accent the tree's form. Chicago Botanic Garden staff starts installing strings of lights in early October.
• If you are planting bulbs for next spring, keep in mind that daffodils are among the hardiest, most adaptable and most pest-resistant bulbs for Chicago-area gardeners. They naturalize beautifully and are available in many sizes and bloom times.
Proper selection of varieties will give three to five weeks of constant bloom. Deer, squirrels, chipmunks and rabbits do not eat them.
Ornamental onions also will not be eaten by animals. Tulips are a deer and rabbit favorite.
In my garden, squirrels and chipmunks have left winter aconite and snowdrops alone while eating all of the crocus.
• Proper placement is important for success with spring-flowering bulbs. They prefer to be moist in early spring and fall and to be dry in the summer when they are dormant. They do not like wet sites or heavy clay soil.
If your garden soil has a lot of clay, plant the bulbs higher than normally recommended. In general, plant bulbs at three times the diameter of the bulb. It is best to avoid working with the soil when it is very wet.
• Crocuses are ideal bulbs for naturalizing, for rock gardens or for underplanting beneath tall trees.
They may be scattered in lawns, but their grasslike foliage must remain intact for at least six weeks before being mowed to a short height for best results long term.
Crocuses, which are planted shallowly, are easy targets for rabbits and squirrels and might require repellent products or light chicken wire screen placed directly over them at planting time. Blood meal sprinkled on the ground after planting may help repel squirrels and chipmunks.
• Tim Johnson is director of horticulture at Chicago Botanic Garden, chicagobotanic.org.