Beginner's Garden #2

The Beginner's Garden, Phase 2

You'll accomplish three things: thinking, shopping, and planting. Next month we'll discuss the excellent qualities of the plants you purchased, and you'll tell me how they're doing. (Canadians and mountain people should wait until mid-May to plant.)

1. Thinking

Figure out whether your garden sits in full sun or shade. Full sun means that your planting bed is in the sun from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. While you're considering this, lean down and clean up the bed again. (What, again? Yes, because your initial cultivation stirred up some weed seeds that were waiting to be exposed to light and by now have sprouted. Plus, if your garden is in a city, your plot has probably collected chewing gum wrappers, cigarette butts, a couple of plastic bags, and a beer can.) A shady plot has dappled sunlight. In general, it's better to expose shade-loving plants to a little extra sun than sun-loving plants to a little extra shade.

2. Shopping

It's best to go to stores early in the morning for a few reasons. The parking lot is less crowded, the nursery staff will have time to answer your questions, and the plants won't have lost water in the heat of the day.

Here's your list. You're beginning with three each of three kinds of tall perennials. Then there are additional, shorter plants to go in front of these perennials, and a choice of annual plants to mix in as you will. You should buy mature plants in plastic containers that are at least three inches deep. You may want to save the annuals for another day if you're running out of money, energy, or space in the car.

Tall perennials for full sun

Echinacea (three): Also known as coneflower, the most common colors for this plant are purple and white. But there is also a newly bred yellow and a very trendy orange. (Don't get the dwarf one, though.)

Achillea (three): The common name for this one is yarrow. It comes in lemon yellow (labeled "Moonshine") and golden yellow ("Coronation Gold"). It's also available in pink and a paprika red. The golden yellow is a hard color to work with. Almost nothing blends with it except a strong blue.

Rudbeckia (three): This is the familiar black-eyed Susan.

Short perennials for full sun

For the plants to go in front of the nine mainstays, the choice is yours. It will depend on what's available at your nursery, what you want to spend, and, most important, what appeals to you. You should also decide whether to buy three or one of each kind (note, though, that designers advise repeating one kind of plant to unify the plant bed.) You should get at least three and no more than nine.

Nepeta: Its common name is catmint. Lavender flowers grow over mounds of soft gray-green foliage.

Coreopsis verticillata: Common name, tickseed. This one has threadlike foliage with small flowers that are lemon yellow, red, or pink.

Geranium: Buy the kind called cranesbill. This is not the red or pink geranium you see in a pot by the front door, but rather a more meadowy looking plant. Colors range from magenta and light pink to blue and white. A favorite of mine is "Rozanne," a periwinkle blue.

Annuals for full sun

You'll want as many as 12 of each of these.

Verbena bonariensis: These plants are tall and skinny (in contrast to the common low verbena), so you can spread them throughout your garden.

Nicotiana: As the name implies, these are flowering tobacco. They come in red, pink, white, or even green.

Callibrachoa or petunia: These will be your lowest-growing plants. Callibrachoa looks like a tiny petunia and blooms like crazy. Petunias are petunias.

Oregano: Find the one labeled either Greek or Italian. For spaghetti sauce, or sauce for chicken with lemon and garlic, and, when it flowers, for the bees.

Perennials for shade

Astilbe (three): This is ferny foliage with red, pink, or white flowers.

Hosta (three): These are large-leaved, almost tropical-looking, plants. Ask the nursery people to steer you to the ones that will get big. (At the moment, a hosta may be a few tiny leaves in a pot.) You can choose bright green, blue-green, gray-blue, or variegated. There's one called "Sum and Substance" that gets wonderfully enormous.

Ferns (three): You want the family called Athyrium, or lady ferns. You can choose straight (so to speak) lady fern (felix-femina), Japanese painted fern, ghost, or Branford rambler.

Short perennials for full shade

As explained for the sun people, above, choose no fewer than three and no more than nine of these. Buy a lot of one plant or mix, as you wish.

Heuchera: Also known as coral bells. You're looking for interesting leaves here; the flowers are not thrilling. "Frosted Violet" is purple with white veins. "Lime Rickey" is chartreuse.

Liriope: Also known as lily turf. This is a grassy tuft that's very hard to kill, with a small spike of flowers.

Lamium: Somehow has the unappealing name dead nettle. This is low-growing, with yellow or pink flowers.

Annuals for full shade

As many as 12 of each. Look for the six-packs with small plants.

Impatiens: Pink, white, lavender, orange.

Nicotiana: This flowering tobacco will bloom in part-shade as well as sun.

Browallia: A sweet small blue flower with a white center.

Spearmint: You may want to put this in a clay pot and pop the pot right into the soil. Mint spreads like crazy. This is for mint julep, and, when it flowers, for bees (like the oregano in the sun garden).

For both sun and shade

One trowel (hand shovel), if you don't have one already.

One bag of mulch, preferably shredded cedar. You have artistic freedom in choosing leaf and flower colors. And you are free to purchase gnomes, flamingos, or a gazing ball. However, you may not buy the red-dyed mulch. This would ruin the whole deal.

3. Planting

Do this right away, even though you're tired. There's nothing sadder than letting plants sit around and dry up. I also planted right away when I worked for the New York City Parks Department because anything left in a pot would get stolen.

Set your plants out, still in their containers, with the nine taller plants (the Big Three) in back. The design is up to you. Most experienced gardeners prefer to avoid planting in rows. Think about family groupings rather than military lines.

Your planting bed will be crowded—all the better for crowding out the weeds. Space the Big Three plants at least a foot apart. The smaller perennials and annuals should go in front, about six inches apart from each other. We're not worrying too much about design. If anyone asks, say it's a cottage garden. Our goal is to plant an array that will probably not die.

Now comes the one step that takes some care: getting the plant out of the pot and into the soil. Dig your hole and test if it's the right size by putting the plant, still in the pot, into it. Don't plant it yet; you've got to release it from bondage. Hold the pot in both hands. Put one hand on the soil at the top of the pot and flip the pot over with the other. The plant should slide out easily. If it doesn't, whack the bottom of the pot with the trowel. It's tempting to just pull on the leaves, or on the crown (the point where the leaves meet the roots). Don't. You don't want to rip the leaves, and the crown is the most vulnerable part of the plant.

Put your plant just deep enough into the ground so that it's set at the same depth as it was in the pot. Once all your plants are in the ground, try to avoid stepping on the bed. The weight of a human foot compacts the soil, and your plants' roots need air as well as water.

The next to last step is to spread mulch on the soil, taking care not to push it right up against the stems of your plants. Don't water until you've got everything in place. Then water a lot—think quagmire. (But soak, don't blast).

Finally, admire what you have done. Save your plants' labels, to remember what's what. Don't stick them in the ground next to the plants, though (that's tacky). Congratulate yourself on being far ahead of all those beginning gardeners who fail to take the plants out of the pots.

Soak your garden again in four or five days. Then keep an eye on things. For the first month you'll want to water about once a week. (More if it's very hot or very windy.) God does not water enough.

Queries happily fielded at gardening@slate.com.