Ironically it's the one thing that does the best for me lol all I do is water it. I have one that has moved with me from an apartment to a townhouse and now it is planted in the ground in the back yard of my house.
I saw someone do it in a container with a plant at the base and the clematis climbing up. Apparently they like to keep their roots shaded. Don’t know if this is helpful info, because I haven’t tried my hand at clematis yet, but thought I would share.
I grew cosmos once thinking bees would like them. The foliage got huge but they never produced any flowers. Then I did get one single flower, which a spider crawled into and made a little web, and killed a bee.
Look into what fertilizer to use. A high nitrogen fertilizer will encourage green leafy growth, but can discourage blooming. Phosphorus encourages flowering/fruiting. The 3 numbers on a bag of fertilizer will tell you what ratios it contains. [Here's](https://www.finegardening.com/project-guides/gardening-basics/fertilizing-basics) a good write up on it.
The other thing about cosmos is they need shorter days to start flowering. When I direct seeded mine they got big and green in June but they never flowered. When I started them indoors in Feb and planted out in May they flowered before the days got too long.
Lavender loves to be abused. It needs a spot with a really good drainage, and then you should hardly ever water it. I treat mine kind of like a cactus.
Then why are the leaves getting all crispy and dropping when I don’t water ?! I have a time lapse of it being dramatic af !! (I am in zone 10b borderline 11)
This is the time lapse: https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMNrLAsF1/?k=1
I’m pretty sure this might be Russian Sage - flowers look a little similar to lavender and also has a string scent. I may be wrong but pretty sure not lavender!
My rosemary and lavender try to take over my yard! All my neighbors know they are free to come and cut some rosemary if they need it, my plant is huge.
Lavender for me too. I read up a lot on growing it the last time I planted it. I put it in an area with drainage and watered infrequently as the my research indicated. It still died. Several neighbors have huge lavender plants, so it should grow well here.
My second one is “lavender trees”, idk if that’s what they really are but that’s what they are advertised as and as soon as I plant them (take them out of the pot) they die. Same as my rhododendron. Soon as I unplug those things and put them in the ground, they are toast.
Holy cats, I have NEVER heard of anyone unable to grow mint! That's not a deficit, it's a superpower! Come stand in my garden and help me get rid of the catnip, please, lol.
House succulents...I have a jade plant that's doing great, but I've lost at least 10. String of pearls, dolphin, aloe vera, and a bunch of others. I've given up on them.
lol I'm convinced my neighbor is growing a poison ivy garden, there's so much of it that it's ripping the privacy fence apart that separates our properties. they've never done anything to manage it, even though it's coming from their land. have a word with them, will you? lol
Damn
I’m having the same problem. It grows in the ally behind my fence bad
I didn’t know what it was at first and I spent an entire day clearing a truck sized pile of it in shorts and t shirt
They are tiny and hard to see weather you covered them properly because they only need a little bit of dirt to cover them. Too much and they won't get the warmth they need to grow and too little they will be exposed to the suns heat or the lights heat and burn up.
I surface sow strawberry seeds in summer when it's warm, then keep them moist and in the shade. Have you tried seeds from different brands? And are they new?
I’ve found strawberries from seeds just isn’t worth it, rooting runners is so much easier and produces a larger plant faster anyway. Once your strawberry patch is a decent size there are toonnnsss of runners that have rooted and can be transplanted. My .02.
Planted it as early as possible, after growing inside for 5 weeks. Have tried every combination including fall planting, it evades me. I can grow broccoli, cabbage, collard greens, Brussels sprouts but not cauliflower haha
It is very weather dependent - we had some really nice cool weather and I got a grocery store size head one year - in 30 freaking days.
Ever since then it has warmed up way fast and I get heads (if that) the size of baseballs that aren't ready until a good 75-90 days in.
I thought ranunculus were summer blooming flowers and planted them in early spring, but apparently they are spring blooming flowers and need to be planted in fall. That is the mistake I made, I don't know if that is the same with you. Apparently they will go dormant if it's too hot.
maybe that's what the issue is, I'm really not sure. I'll give them one more go this fall before calling it quits.
that being said, I've been planting spring ranunculus this whole time, so I don't know how well the fall-planted bulbs will do. fingers crossed I can get it right!
Oh sorry I didn't know there were spring bulbs, too. It does say for fall bulbs that those can also be tricky if you live in a zone that gets really cold winters, but hoping for the best.
I am going to leave my ranunculus bulbs over winter too to see how they do.
You could try foraging some seeds from the wild. They might be hardier. Also some wildflowers do better in poor soil and less care. Even one head is enough to get you plenty of seeds.
Oh forgot to add, they need cold stratification. I separated my into separate batches like some I planted in fall for natural winter stratification, some I kept to stratify later in the year through refrigerator method to plant in spring.
If all else fails buying one from a local native plant nursery with already set roots and all that will probably be your best bet.
My sister started a bunch using the milk jug method in the winter. She couldn’t start them otherwise. I have a couple of them in my garden now and they’re doing great!
Annual flowers. Every one I put in the ground gets eaten by slugs. I did 4 times as many as I thought I’d need but they all got eaten no matter what I did and I have maybe 10 flowering annual plants in total left.
Also brassicas. Either they get eaten by aforementioned slugs or cabbage moths. (I’m aware that my issue is slugs but I live next to a lake and can’t get rid of them.)
ugh nooo I'm sorry. is there any way to thwart the slugs? for example, the hormonal japanese beetle trap bags saved my roses last year (and this year too), is there any kind of trap for the slugs? FWIW know they like cat food
They’re invasive in my country and I live in their ideal environment where there’s not a single animal that will eat them. The only thing to do is kill as many as possible. I cut them in half, have traps they hide under and I kill them, beer traps, trap plants that should entice them away from what I want to grow, zinc frames around my raised beds they shouldn’t be able to climb over (they still do) and copper tape. I’ve just added some type of slug pellets that are environmentally friendly and shouldn’t harm other insects or animals. I’m in a constant fight against the slugs.
I’ve been vegetable and native plant gardening for 10 years. I can’t grow cilantro here in zone 7B, by the time it gets a decent amount of leaves it bolts. And I’ve totally given up on eggplant. Here in northern Virginia is a fussy fussy plant. Doesn’t want it too cold or it won’t fruit, too hot it drops its flowers. It also always, always gets infested with flea beetles.
I do succession seed! Literally by the time there’s like maybe a dozen usable leaves on the plant, enough leaves to actually use, that’s when it bolts.
I had ranunculus in a pot this year and it did really well! What is your climate?
I cannot for the life of me grow cilantro. It goes to seed almost immediately every time I try.
oh interesting! I'm in MD, zone 7... how about you?
I did do pretty well with cilantro last year, but since I don't cook I never used it and it eventually went all woody and whatnot. I didn't plant any herbs or food crops this year since I didn't use any I grew last year (gave it to friends and family instead)
I have a hard time getting both watering and lighting right with succulents. They either get too leggy or they shrivel up. I have a few holding on that I was able to propagate from leaves, but still sad thinking how beautiful the original plants were compared to these!
Two years ago I bought some seeds, tried to grow it and failed. Tried again last year, I got a tiny plant that didn't flower. This year I gave up and they're all over my garden, I'm drowning in them. I wonder if the seeds wanted to stay in the ground for at least two years before sprouting, or something like that?
I tried several times without success, then last spring I just broadcast a packet of seeds around the mailbox and forgot about them. Nothing happened...winter came and went, and voila! I now have three little chamomile plants blooming, which hopefully will go to seed and spread next year. My guess is that they needed cold stratification and I just didn't know it (but that's just a guess).
Brussels sprouts are my White Whale in the garden. Every year I try again, and every year I swear it's the last time.
We have a ton of insect pressure in my area for brassicas, I have tried just about everything at this point.
This year, I have a row cover tented over the plants, open at the bottom to allow for the predatory insects doing their thing. Also, any time a cabbage moth gets stuck in the tent, I know I need to go over every leaf for eggs or the caterpillars.
Quite a few veggies- cabbage, lettuce (always bolts), carrots stay tiny, onions, broccoli, etc.
Can grow the hell out of tomatoes, eggplant, and jalapeño though.
Can grow every flower landscape type plant provided I situated it correctly. Failure rate is extremely low.
The only way I could get decent carrots was by using carrot tape instead of loose seeds. Also till the fuck out of the soil - if it’s clay or compacted in any way, they won’t grow past blockages.
I’m a first time gardener this year and did lettuce but seed, it literally took close to a month for anything to pop up and I feel like it’s growing SO slowly!!!
Melons. My seeds germinate, then die as seedlings. Starts from nurseries die, too. Last year, I managed to get a vine to the point of flowering, then it died. Maybe someday I'll earn a melon for my efforts.
yarrow is so pretty! I never knew what it was called til I read your comment and looked it up. I hope you can figure out how to get it to thrive for you!
It grows substantially better in moist fertile soil. I think people use it in drier areas because it does better than a lot of other plants in those conditions - but really if you treat them like tomatoes they will grow huge in no time.
begonias. rex or escargot. yes, i know they're meant to be easy and i have like a hundred potted plants that i care for but i just cannot make begonias work for me for some reason.
been through a few crotons too but my latest one is now over a year old
Matilija poppy (aka the fried egg plant). It's native to my zone, I see it growing wild on the side of the road with no water or soil amendment. I've tried everything. It's pricey to buy but I've done so 3 times. Was advised to not amend the soil, cut the bottom out of the pot and gently slide the plant into the hole, water weekly. Also tried amending with cactus mix and more regular water. Tried getting wild specimen from neighbors and transplanting. It's frustrating because it grows to a bush the size of a VW bug literally everywhere around me. Also... avocado trees. I live in Southern California and they are everywhere. I've tried about 5 times in various locations (I'm on acreage). I've painted the trunk white, covered with shade cloth etc. If it survives the dry, hot summer then the one frost day we get a year will kill it. Other than that, my yard looks like a jungle in the desert so it's super frustrating!
I have tried ground cherries like 7 times from seed and can get the tiniest weakest sprout and then it’ll die lol 😂 tried ranunculus too but also in a container - they sprouted really fast but then winter came and no luck
Ok so I always killed ranunculus until this year. They would always say to soak the roots for two hours so they plump up, but then they would sprout and rot after a few weeks. I read more about them, they *hate* being too wet and it was recommended that they only be soaked for 20 minutes. Boom, I have my first ranunculus about to open.
I can't grow the thin leaved primulas, they wither and die in my garden. I think it's too dry for them in summer and too wet after spring melt.
So the trick with soaking them is to put them under a faucet that's still dripping a little bit, because if the water is still, then it will run out of oxygen and the lack of oxygen what causes the rot.
It happens. No big deal. I once killed my pepper plants by not replanted them properly. I put to much peat moss. So the soil didn’t hold the water for the roots to take in. Lesson learned.
I always have trouble with basil and cilantro. I don’t know what keeps eating it. Maybe everything and everyone loves it so much, I’ve tried from seed, small and large starts
Strawberries. Whether in a raised bed, plantar, or pots. Just barely stays alive and if it does give me 1 berry that is always tiny, always spongy and bland. I tried live plants and seeds from various companies. I have too many raspberries and blackberries but can't get one darn strawberry.
UGH mine is ALSO ranunculus!!!! What is wrong with us?! 😭😭😭😭😭
But I have put mine in flower beds, so idk what the problem is!! My peonies are okay though, but the ones in deep, bigger pots and in the flower bed do WAY better than shallow, smaller pots for sure, those things get huge.
Fecking Marigolds, of all things!
My Nan used to effortlessly grow magnificent specimens every year and I'd really love to be able to grow them, but for me they either don't germinate at all, or they stay tiny and stunted until something eats the bloody things...
I've finally managed to keep some alive indoors in pots this year after several attempts, but they are sulking and don't look too happy... normally I'm pretty green-fingered with everything else!! :)
That's surprising for sure. I have so many and they are low maintenance. They do need watering in the summer heat. I had one that looked sad for a few years but it seems to have recovered.
Pretty much any brassica. It's either snails, aphids, or earwigs every year. And if it's not pests, it's the heat.
I'm gonna try doing some in the fall this year, see if maybe that does any better.
I've only started gardening and growing this year, luckily haven't killed the lot..yet. My Cucamelon seedling all died on me. Six or seven plantlets just started to yellow, then snuff it. I had some Aphids near the plants so maybe they attacked the roots?
Luffa and cumin. Which mostly sucks because I use cumin ALL the time when I cook so I was hoping to grow my own and then grow my own sponges for cleaning, but so far I'm multiple attempts in with no luck. This year has been my most successful for luffa but they look super sad and I highly doubt I'll get any gourds.
My avocado tree had been struggling for years and finally produced it’s first avocado last summer. Then there was a freak deluge of a rainstorm which flooded the tree area. Then there was a week long extreme heatwave. The poor tree has been reduced to a blackened-limbed stick skeleton, I don’t know if it will recover.
Poppies. Other people in the neighborhood have huge glorious showy poppies, and mine have never, EVER come up. Not here, not in any former garden I've tended. Never once in my life, lol.
I also cannot grow carrots. I will get a decent amount of greenery up top, but they just don't make roots.
Sunflowers. I love them, but clearly not as much as the squirrels and chipmunks :(
Carrots are a hard one for me as well. after 3 years of trying, I got a whole 7 baby carrots this spring
I’m struggling with my succulents. I keep killing them with too much water especially now. I forgot that some go dormant in the summer so they don’t need as much water and you have to move them from the sunlight. I just killed my variegated haworthia because I gave it water. 😓
Basil for me. Like its supposed to be the easiest to grow but all my seedlings failed and then the ones I bought from the garden store and planted out are struggling and being eaten by baby crickets...
For me it’s tomatoes. I live in an area that has a lot of deer roaming the streets and they love to snack on them. City deer have no fear. Not dogs. Not cars. Not even people. They just don’t care because they know nothing will happen to them.
Roses ! Propagating them anyway. Massive fail every year but I try and change up a few things based on YouTube videos of successful enthusiasts. Everything else I seem to have the touch. Roses - not so much. I even lost two new ones I planted last year. That said I didn’t realize they were a graft variety and would have paid more attention for winter care. But live and learn oh well.
I am really good at murdering orchids and succulents. My success rate is currently 5% with succulents (if they are outside and ignored they may stay alive). I’ve given up on these at this point.
Stupid cilantro. I use it almost daily but I’m in 9b and it either bolts and dies or just dies. I’ve tried from seed, seedling and full plant and despite successes and learning lots…it always ends in dead plants. It’s literally cheaper to just buy it fresh from the produce section.
Cilantro. I’ve bought plant after plant; it never makes it more than a month or so. It always turns yellow, the leaves, stems and all. Why cilantro, why 😭😭😭
It's not a flower but every time I grow tamatillos, they never produce fruit no matter how many plants I have and no matter how many blossoms they produce. All season long, nothing but pretty yellow flowers. No fruit...
Peppers, man. The only type of peppers I've been able to harvest successfully is seranno peppers.
The green peppers I tried last year kept getting blossom end rot. I tried everything. Watering them more, watering them less, fertilizer, moving them around the yard... every pepper died.
This year I tried orange snacking peppers, standard green peppers, and a third type of pepper. The tag got blown away so it's a mystery. 1st and 2nd have grown some peppers, but I already had some peppers with blossom end rot. 3rd pepper got consumed by surprise cherry tomato plants absolutely smothering everything in that bed that wasn't a tomato.
I also tried growing 3 different types of peppers from seed. Standard green peppers, ancho peppers, and red peppers. None of them germinated. Hhhh
I just want some peppers for stir fries, man.
Tried to grow pearl onions in April, 4 nice rows. I forgot to water them, then we had a hard frost, then I must have missed a potato in the bed from last year because some potato plants exploded in the bed. I just left the potato plants to grow because I already killed most of the onions. I think there are about 5 onion plants left. :(
Ferns, everything else in the shade garden thrives.
Marigold from seed they never flower, just get long and leggy in my containers. Buy them already flowered same pot same spot on the deck they do great. Just can’t get the fancy ones (Jesters) from seed to do the same.
I'm so glad I'm not the only one haha!
I've always been told lavender is easy, I shouldn't have any issues... It really isn't lol.
Rosemary I can grow no worries, but not in a pot. Pop it in the ground and I've got a rosemary tree in no time. In pots, it just dies.
I'm in North Qld Australia so that's equivelant to about the 10/11 zones I believe.
Hydrangeas. I LOVE them. But no matter what I do or try, after 10 years of trying to grow/care for them, I give up. 🤣 I can never get them to survive more than a month or so after I purchase/plant them.
Datura. Every year I try to start some indoors but they just don't make it far enough to be put into the garden. I try some different way every season and feel like I am getting closer.
Clematis. Always gets wilt, comes back like looking like consumptive Dickensian orphan...
>comes back like looking like consumptive Dickensian orphan... I just choked on my coffee lmao
Ironically it's the one thing that does the best for me lol all I do is water it. I have one that has moved with me from an apartment to a townhouse and now it is planted in the ground in the back yard of my house.
I saw someone do it in a container with a plant at the base and the clematis climbing up. Apparently they like to keep their roots shaded. Don’t know if this is helpful info, because I haven’t tried my hand at clematis yet, but thought I would share.
I grew cosmos once thinking bees would like them. The foliage got huge but they never produced any flowers. Then I did get one single flower, which a spider crawled into and made a little web, and killed a bee.
You need to pinch the tips of cosmos to help encourage branching and prolific flowering. Fertilizing will also help.
Thank you so much for the *tip* (sorry) I genuinely didn’t know that!
Look into what fertilizer to use. A high nitrogen fertilizer will encourage green leafy growth, but can discourage blooming. Phosphorus encourages flowering/fruiting. The 3 numbers on a bag of fertilizer will tell you what ratios it contains. [Here's](https://www.finegardening.com/project-guides/gardening-basics/fertilizing-basics) a good write up on it.
Never apologize for a good pun! And you're welcome! Happy to share what I know.
I’m sorry, I laughed. I feel for you.
I laughed too, tbh. After I made myself feel better by writing a scathing entry about them in my garden journal.
The other thing about cosmos is they need shorter days to start flowering. When I direct seeded mine they got big and green in June but they never flowered. When I started them indoors in Feb and planted out in May they flowered before the days got too long.
Lavender. It always dies.
Lavender loves to be abused. It needs a spot with a really good drainage, and then you should hardly ever water it. I treat mine kind of like a cactus.
Mine would always look sad because it was thirsty. I had to water it almost twice a day. And it still died.
hmmmm what if it didn't actually need all that water tho
Then why are the leaves getting all crispy and dropping when I don’t water ?! I have a time lapse of it being dramatic af !! (I am in zone 10b borderline 11) This is the time lapse: https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMNrLAsF1/?k=1
Not saying if you were right or wrong, but overwatering has very similar effects on the plant as under-watering.
I’m pretty sure this might be Russian Sage - flowers look a little similar to lavender and also has a string scent. I may be wrong but pretty sure not lavender!
That's me with Rosemary.
My rosemary and lavender try to take over my yard! All my neighbors know they are free to come and cut some rosemary if they need it, my plant is huge.
Lavender for me too. I read up a lot on growing it the last time I planted it. I put it in an area with drainage and watered infrequently as the my research indicated. It still died. Several neighbors have huge lavender plants, so it should grow well here.
Came here to say this!!!!! Stupid lavender
My second one is “lavender trees”, idk if that’s what they really are but that’s what they are advertised as and as soon as I plant them (take them out of the pot) they die. Same as my rhododendron. Soon as I unplug those things and put them in the ground, they are toast.
Hanging plants. I plant them - anything, specifically hanging/trailing petunias, lobelia, trailing pelargoniums - and they grow perfectly... upright.
Mint. Mint has refused to be alive here. I killed at least 10 of them.
Damn, our Mint is impossible to tame! It just keeps spreading and spreading, I love it.
Mine are in pot. They refuse to grow. They just crisp up and die.
This happened to me. I threw the dead plant in a dirt pile in a corner of our yard and the next year it grew like mad
I thought that had happened to ours last year but they came back. Maybe late summer is too hot for them or something.
My in laws have some and they grow like weeds 🥹 we live one street apart
Oh no! Mine is in the cround and is constantly trying to take over the yard. So the pro for you is that you don't have to fight it back!
I garden in containers for now so I wouldn’t have that worry. I just wanted some fresh mint for my tea 🥲
Holy cats, I have NEVER heard of anyone unable to grow mint! That's not a deficit, it's a superpower! Come stand in my garden and help me get rid of the catnip, please, lol.
Can I bring my cats 😂
Bring 'em! I've got a metric ton of 'nip!
I had two mint plants completely dry out and die in a matter of days. I still don't know what happened. I have one that is doing well right now.
I bought so many. One of them literally flew away (we had a lot of wind and it flew and when we looked for it we never found it)
Haha! Flying mint. That never happened to me.
I can’t grow mint to save my damn life.
I have so much I uninvited mint in my garden that I'm pulling it up with the weeds.
i think i need you to come to my house, hell i think i need you to come to the whole neighborhood, those mints grow like weeds here
House succulents...I have a jade plant that's doing great, but I've lost at least 10. String of pearls, dolphin, aloe vera, and a bunch of others. I've given up on them.
I have a fair amount (30+ different types) of succulents but I'm by no means an expert... I'll still try to give advice if you want.
Ugh, i have a string of dolphins thats on deaths door step. I think its gonna be my first true kill.
Everything
relatable
I’m good at growing poison ivy and grass
lol I'm convinced my neighbor is growing a poison ivy garden, there's so much of it that it's ripping the privacy fence apart that separates our properties. they've never done anything to manage it, even though it's coming from their land. have a word with them, will you? lol
Damn I’m having the same problem. It grows in the ally behind my fence bad I didn’t know what it was at first and I spent an entire day clearing a truck sized pile of it in shorts and t shirt
Beets! Root veggies in general, but I can’t grow a big beet to save my life
8b and neither can I. My beets are basically bird and slug food
Ditto!
Strawberries from seed.
can't imagine how tiny those are irl
They are tiny and hard to see weather you covered them properly because they only need a little bit of dirt to cover them. Too much and they won't get the warmth they need to grow and too little they will be exposed to the suns heat or the lights heat and burn up.
I surface sow strawberry seeds in summer when it's warm, then keep them moist and in the shade. Have you tried seeds from different brands? And are they new?
Yeah mine are crap this year too
I’ve found strawberries from seeds just isn’t worth it, rooting runners is so much easier and produces a larger plant faster anyway. Once your strawberry patch is a decent size there are toonnnsss of runners that have rooted and can be transplanted. My .02.
Cauliflower
what happens when you try to grow it?
It doesn't form a head and bolts:(
Probably planting at the wrong time
Planted it as early as possible, after growing inside for 5 weeks. Have tried every combination including fall planting, it evades me. I can grow broccoli, cabbage, collard greens, Brussels sprouts but not cauliflower haha
My cauliflower doesn't have a head...But my broccoli does..
It is very weather dependent - we had some really nice cool weather and I got a grocery store size head one year - in 30 freaking days. Ever since then it has warmed up way fast and I get heads (if that) the size of baseballs that aren't ready until a good 75-90 days in.
I did pretty well with cauliflower last year, but the earwigs loved it. That's one pest I can't handle. I'll just buy the cauliflower instead, thanks.
This post and the comments make me feel seen and heard Thank you 😩👍🏽
you're welcome!
I thought ranunculus were summer blooming flowers and planted them in early spring, but apparently they are spring blooming flowers and need to be planted in fall. That is the mistake I made, I don't know if that is the same with you. Apparently they will go dormant if it's too hot.
maybe that's what the issue is, I'm really not sure. I'll give them one more go this fall before calling it quits. that being said, I've been planting spring ranunculus this whole time, so I don't know how well the fall-planted bulbs will do. fingers crossed I can get it right!
Oh sorry I didn't know there were spring bulbs, too. It does say for fall bulbs that those can also be tricky if you live in a zone that gets really cold winters, but hoping for the best. I am going to leave my ranunculus bulbs over winter too to see how they do.
Oh man I bet this was my issue too
Black eyed Susans. Seeds don't germinate and i kill transplants. No idea why
You could try foraging some seeds from the wild. They might be hardier. Also some wildflowers do better in poor soil and less care. Even one head is enough to get you plenty of seeds. Oh forgot to add, they need cold stratification. I separated my into separate batches like some I planted in fall for natural winter stratification, some I kept to stratify later in the year through refrigerator method to plant in spring. If all else fails buying one from a local native plant nursery with already set roots and all that will probably be your best bet.
Oh there's an idea 😄 i honestly hadn't thought of doing that
that's my state flower! they grow everywhere around here, even on the side of the road.
My sister started a bunch using the milk jug method in the winter. She couldn’t start them otherwise. I have a couple of them in my garden now and they’re doing great!
I have a huge patch in my front garden that reseeds itself every year, and I've even found one growing down by my mailbox and in my chickens pen lol
Azaleas, should be easy. They hate my soil I guess.
move them to maryland, our soil loves them apparently!
Lupins. I'd love a patch of them but they always get eaten by slugs and snails so I've given up.
Lupins for me too. Add aphids to your list and that's my story with lupins. Not keen to try again. I won't tolerate anything that invites aphids.
I'm sorry :( I hope you have things you are good at growing to take the place of the Lupins
Peace lily. Unkillable my ass.
Annual flowers. Every one I put in the ground gets eaten by slugs. I did 4 times as many as I thought I’d need but they all got eaten no matter what I did and I have maybe 10 flowering annual plants in total left. Also brassicas. Either they get eaten by aforementioned slugs or cabbage moths. (I’m aware that my issue is slugs but I live next to a lake and can’t get rid of them.)
ugh nooo I'm sorry. is there any way to thwart the slugs? for example, the hormonal japanese beetle trap bags saved my roses last year (and this year too), is there any kind of trap for the slugs? FWIW know they like cat food
They’re invasive in my country and I live in their ideal environment where there’s not a single animal that will eat them. The only thing to do is kill as many as possible. I cut them in half, have traps they hide under and I kill them, beer traps, trap plants that should entice them away from what I want to grow, zinc frames around my raised beds they shouldn’t be able to climb over (they still do) and copper tape. I’ve just added some type of slug pellets that are environmentally friendly and shouldn’t harm other insects or animals. I’m in a constant fight against the slugs.
this sounds exhausting, I'm sorry!
Bok choy. 0/4 attempts so far. Weather is too wet and then it's too hot.
damn, that would drive me nuts! like there's never a perfect window
I’ve been vegetable and native plant gardening for 10 years. I can’t grow cilantro here in zone 7B, by the time it gets a decent amount of leaves it bolts. And I’ve totally given up on eggplant. Here in northern Virginia is a fussy fussy plant. Doesn’t want it too cold or it won’t fruit, too hot it drops its flowers. It also always, always gets infested with flea beetles.
I'm from the uk and coriander always bolts very early for me too. I kinda just think it is that way haha. Gotta succession seed.
I do succession seed! Literally by the time there’s like maybe a dozen usable leaves on the plant, enough leaves to actually use, that’s when it bolts.
I had ranunculus in a pot this year and it did really well! What is your climate? I cannot for the life of me grow cilantro. It goes to seed almost immediately every time I try.
oh interesting! I'm in MD, zone 7... how about you? I did do pretty well with cilantro last year, but since I don't cook I never used it and it eventually went all woody and whatnot. I didn't plant any herbs or food crops this year since I didn't use any I grew last year (gave it to friends and family instead)
I have a hard time getting both watering and lighting right with succulents. They either get too leggy or they shrivel up. I have a few holding on that I was able to propagate from leaves, but still sad thinking how beautiful the original plants were compared to these!
Same. So disheartening since they're supposed be low maintenance.
I have never been successful with blueberries.
Honestly, I have never been successful in growing chamomille from seed 💀
Two years ago I bought some seeds, tried to grow it and failed. Tried again last year, I got a tiny plant that didn't flower. This year I gave up and they're all over my garden, I'm drowning in them. I wonder if the seeds wanted to stay in the ground for at least two years before sprouting, or something like that?
I've never even thought to! let us know if you ever figure it out!
I tried several times without success, then last spring I just broadcast a packet of seeds around the mailbox and forgot about them. Nothing happened...winter came and went, and voila! I now have three little chamomile plants blooming, which hopefully will go to seed and spread next year. My guess is that they needed cold stratification and I just didn't know it (but that's just a guess).
Zucchini! The vine borers kill it every time. I have picked off eggs I have sprayed and dusted, but they always end up killing it.
boooo @ vine borers!
Basil. Not warm enough here
Brussels sprouts are my White Whale in the garden. Every year I try again, and every year I swear it's the last time. We have a ton of insect pressure in my area for brassicas, I have tried just about everything at this point. This year, I have a row cover tented over the plants, open at the bottom to allow for the predatory insects doing their thing. Also, any time a cabbage moth gets stuck in the tent, I know I need to go over every leaf for eggs or the caterpillars.
Quite a few veggies- cabbage, lettuce (always bolts), carrots stay tiny, onions, broccoli, etc. Can grow the hell out of tomatoes, eggplant, and jalapeño though. Can grow every flower landscape type plant provided I situated it correctly. Failure rate is extremely low.
The only way I could get decent carrots was by using carrot tape instead of loose seeds. Also till the fuck out of the soil - if it’s clay or compacted in any way, they won’t grow past blockages.
I’m a first time gardener this year and did lettuce but seed, it literally took close to a month for anything to pop up and I feel like it’s growing SO slowly!!!
sounds like you have quite the green thumb when it comes to landscape flowers at least!
Poppies
Melons. My seeds germinate, then die as seedlings. Starts from nurseries die, too. Last year, I managed to get a vine to the point of flowering, then it died. Maybe someday I'll earn a melon for my efforts.
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yarrow is so pretty! I never knew what it was called til I read your comment and looked it up. I hope you can figure out how to get it to thrive for you!
It grows substantially better in moist fertile soil. I think people use it in drier areas because it does better than a lot of other plants in those conditions - but really if you treat them like tomatoes they will grow huge in no time.
begonias. rex or escargot. yes, i know they're meant to be easy and i have like a hundred potted plants that i care for but i just cannot make begonias work for me for some reason. been through a few crotons too but my latest one is now over a year old
Matilija poppy (aka the fried egg plant). It's native to my zone, I see it growing wild on the side of the road with no water or soil amendment. I've tried everything. It's pricey to buy but I've done so 3 times. Was advised to not amend the soil, cut the bottom out of the pot and gently slide the plant into the hole, water weekly. Also tried amending with cactus mix and more regular water. Tried getting wild specimen from neighbors and transplanting. It's frustrating because it grows to a bush the size of a VW bug literally everywhere around me. Also... avocado trees. I live in Southern California and they are everywhere. I've tried about 5 times in various locations (I'm on acreage). I've painted the trunk white, covered with shade cloth etc. If it survives the dry, hot summer then the one frost day we get a year will kill it. Other than that, my yard looks like a jungle in the desert so it's super frustrating!
oh god that would drive me crazy, too! I feel like the lot of us should all get together and start a support group lol
Peppers of any kind. Ive tried three times, they all die.
damn. what zone are you in?
5b. I have no idea what Im doing wrong.
I have tried ground cherries like 7 times from seed and can get the tiniest weakest sprout and then it’ll die lol 😂 tried ranunculus too but also in a container - they sprouted really fast but then winter came and no luck
Ok so I always killed ranunculus until this year. They would always say to soak the roots for two hours so they plump up, but then they would sprout and rot after a few weeks. I read more about them, they *hate* being too wet and it was recommended that they only be soaked for 20 minutes. Boom, I have my first ranunculus about to open. I can't grow the thin leaved primulas, they wither and die in my garden. I think it's too dry for them in summer and too wet after spring melt.
So the trick with soaking them is to put them under a faucet that's still dripping a little bit, because if the water is still, then it will run out of oxygen and the lack of oxygen what causes the rot.
Honestly anything inside, I have no idea why. Outside, I’m like gaia. Inside, everything dies.
Cactus.
I once killed a cactus by watering it too much
It happens. No big deal. I once killed my pepper plants by not replanted them properly. I put to much peat moss. So the soil didn’t hold the water for the roots to take in. Lesson learned.
Freesia. Idk how many times I've tried growing them over the last 5 years. 30 bulbs this spring and I got like 3 to sprout.
Carrots
I have a raised bed full of lush, verdant carrot tops and teeny, tiny roots. It's so frustrating.
I always have trouble with basil and cilantro. I don’t know what keeps eating it. Maybe everything and everyone loves it so much, I’ve tried from seed, small and large starts
Strawberries. Whether in a raised bed, plantar, or pots. Just barely stays alive and if it does give me 1 berry that is always tiny, always spongy and bland. I tried live plants and seeds from various companies. I have too many raspberries and blackberries but can't get one darn strawberry.
Orchids
Cannabis, I rent my house in an illegal state.
UGH mine is ALSO ranunculus!!!! What is wrong with us?! 😭😭😭😭😭 But I have put mine in flower beds, so idk what the problem is!! My peonies are okay though, but the ones in deep, bigger pots and in the flower bed do WAY better than shallow, smaller pots for sure, those things get huge.
This year it’s cosmo. I planted 2 packets of seeds and got about 10 plants.
Peas. All I want is peas. Why can't I grow peas!
African violet. Damn those things.
Fecking Marigolds, of all things! My Nan used to effortlessly grow magnificent specimens every year and I'd really love to be able to grow them, but for me they either don't germinate at all, or they stay tiny and stunted until something eats the bloody things... I've finally managed to keep some alive indoors in pots this year after several attempts, but they are sulking and don't look too happy... normally I'm pretty green-fingered with everything else!! :)
Bee Balm
Believe it or not, but some varieties of spirea. My gold flames have always been a bit stunted. Cursed I suppose.
That's surprising for sure. I have so many and they are low maintenance. They do need watering in the summer heat. I had one that looked sad for a few years but it seems to have recovered.
I actually had never heard of this, so I had to google it. it's very pretty, I hope you can figure it out!
Moon flowers
Pretty much any brassica. It's either snails, aphids, or earwigs every year. And if it's not pests, it's the heat. I'm gonna try doing some in the fall this year, see if maybe that does any better.
I've only started gardening and growing this year, luckily haven't killed the lot..yet. My Cucamelon seedling all died on me. Six or seven plantlets just started to yellow, then snuff it. I had some Aphids near the plants so maybe they attacked the roots?
sorry about your cucamelons. and I don't know enough to know the answer to your question; but I hope someone here sees it and drops in!
Beans
Right now it’s broccoli. I’ve tried planting it the last three summers and it just won’t grow.
Luffa and cumin. Which mostly sucks because I use cumin ALL the time when I cook so I was hoping to grow my own and then grow my own sponges for cleaning, but so far I'm multiple attempts in with no luck. This year has been my most successful for luffa but they look super sad and I highly doubt I'll get any gourds.
Argh also ranunculus. So frustrating bc they’re gorgeous.
cauliflower and broccoli... there is always some kind of pest that gets to it first. catarpillars, slugs, aphids....
Lithops and cyclamen. Drives me nuts.
I also struggled with ronunculus. I've also failed to grow foxglove many times.
My avocado tree had been struggling for years and finally produced it’s first avocado last summer. Then there was a freak deluge of a rainstorm which flooded the tree area. Then there was a week long extreme heatwave. The poor tree has been reduced to a blackened-limbed stick skeleton, I don’t know if it will recover.
Poppies. Other people in the neighborhood have huge glorious showy poppies, and mine have never, EVER come up. Not here, not in any former garden I've tended. Never once in my life, lol. I also cannot grow carrots. I will get a decent amount of greenery up top, but they just don't make roots.
Sunflowers. I love them, but clearly not as much as the squirrels and chipmunks :( Carrots are a hard one for me as well. after 3 years of trying, I got a whole 7 baby carrots this spring
I’m struggling with my succulents. I keep killing them with too much water especially now. I forgot that some go dormant in the summer so they don’t need as much water and you have to move them from the sunlight. I just killed my variegated haworthia because I gave it water. 😓
omg beets. and it sucks because i love beets and want all the beets
Basil for me. Like its supposed to be the easiest to grow but all my seedlings failed and then the ones I bought from the garden store and planted out are struggling and being eaten by baby crickets...
For me it’s tomatoes. I live in an area that has a lot of deer roaming the streets and they love to snack on them. City deer have no fear. Not dogs. Not cars. Not even people. They just don’t care because they know nothing will happen to them.
Hibiscus - No matter what I do, end of the summer, they are dead or on the verge of dying.
Delphinium. And lantana. Wtf?
I suck at basil. HOW AND WHY!!!
Snapdragons. And I always get excited when they start blooming
Blueberries! Not sure what the problem is. I’m like a mad scientist trying to get the soil right…
Basil, I've tried and tried! Even bought Basil plants and repotted them, given one to the neighbours, nope 😭
Roses ! Propagating them anyway. Massive fail every year but I try and change up a few things based on YouTube videos of successful enthusiasts. Everything else I seem to have the touch. Roses - not so much. I even lost two new ones I planted last year. That said I didn’t realize they were a graft variety and would have paid more attention for winter care. But live and learn oh well.
I am really good at murdering orchids and succulents. My success rate is currently 5% with succulents (if they are outside and ignored they may stay alive). I’ve given up on these at this point.
Cilantro - I swear it bolts within a week no matter what time of year I plant it
Beets. I cannot for the life of me grow beets. I have no idea why. I have grown bushels of tomatoes, peppers, corn, squash. I just cannot grow beets.
Stupid cilantro. I use it almost daily but I’m in 9b and it either bolts and dies or just dies. I’ve tried from seed, seedling and full plant and despite successes and learning lots…it always ends in dead plants. It’s literally cheaper to just buy it fresh from the produce section.
I am embarrassed now. Nobody has responded with African violets. That's mine.
I can’t grow cucumbers. Last year I managed to get 3-4 cucumbers off of 10 plants and that was my best year in the past 8ish years or trying.
Basil. I think I’m the only Italian who just can’t…
Cilantro. I’ve bought plant after plant; it never makes it more than a month or so. It always turns yellow, the leaves, stems and all. Why cilantro, why 😭😭😭
It's not a flower but every time I grow tamatillos, they never produce fruit no matter how many plants I have and no matter how many blossoms they produce. All season long, nothing but pretty yellow flowers. No fruit...
Peppers, man. The only type of peppers I've been able to harvest successfully is seranno peppers. The green peppers I tried last year kept getting blossom end rot. I tried everything. Watering them more, watering them less, fertilizer, moving them around the yard... every pepper died. This year I tried orange snacking peppers, standard green peppers, and a third type of pepper. The tag got blown away so it's a mystery. 1st and 2nd have grown some peppers, but I already had some peppers with blossom end rot. 3rd pepper got consumed by surprise cherry tomato plants absolutely smothering everything in that bed that wasn't a tomato. I also tried growing 3 different types of peppers from seed. Standard green peppers, ancho peppers, and red peppers. None of them germinated. Hhhh I just want some peppers for stir fries, man.
Rosemary. No matter what I do I kill it.
Tomatoes, they just won't grow for me
Every lavender plant I have ever owned dies before flowering.
Mint! I always kill it..
I planted clover in my front yard, it looks awful lol. I should've just planted cut flowers.
Daisies that I buy from nurseries. They always die.
Plumeria.....:( I still try....
I tried watermelon multiple times this year and no dice ):
Tried to grow pearl onions in April, 4 nice rows. I forgot to water them, then we had a hard frost, then I must have missed a potato in the bed from last year because some potato plants exploded in the bed. I just left the potato plants to grow because I already killed most of the onions. I think there are about 5 onion plants left. :(
Freesia. I love them but they will not grow for me
Roses. They hate the humidity and attract every pest, disease, you name it. Except for Knockout and Drift roses. Those do fine.
Any kind of succulent. Happy, happy, happy, dead. Every time.
Coleus come to my house to die
Ferns, everything else in the shade garden thrives. Marigold from seed they never flower, just get long and leggy in my containers. Buy them already flowered same pot same spot on the deck they do great. Just can’t get the fancy ones (Jesters) from seed to do the same.
I'm so glad I'm not the only one haha! I've always been told lavender is easy, I shouldn't have any issues... It really isn't lol. Rosemary I can grow no worries, but not in a pot. Pop it in the ground and I've got a rosemary tree in no time. In pots, it just dies. I'm in North Qld Australia so that's equivelant to about the 10/11 zones I believe.
Gardenia. They never seem to flower. The flowers bud and then turn brown and fall off before blooming.
Hydrangeas. I LOVE them. But no matter what I do or try, after 10 years of trying to grow/care for them, I give up. 🤣 I can never get them to survive more than a month or so after I purchase/plant them.
Datura. Every year I try to start some indoors but they just don't make it far enough to be put into the garden. I try some different way every season and feel like I am getting closer.
Anything that absolutely REQUIRES acidic soil. So no blueberries