Notes from Norm's: What's Happening in September

Connor Evers

Sep 7

3 min read

Hello there!

Thanks for joining our monthly (or so) Notes from Norm’s- a quick overview of our month with photos of the greenhouse and nursery, an occasional garden project update, farmer’s market visit, a plant we want to rave on, conference details, or a new garden design tidbit.

We’ve been growing the best of the old and new varieties since 1971. We continue to operate our Aurora, SD retail location May through November with helpful team members to assist with your garden project needs-spring, summer, and fall. Our plants are in good shape for the fall season, we’ve been caring for and growing a great variety of trees, evergreens, shrubs, and perennials.

Our roots in growing and retail plant sales have expanded over the years to include services in tree planting, naturalistic garden installation, management, consulting, and garden design.

We’d love to see you at the nursery soon-we’ve refreshed displays, brought out new potted trees and shrubs, and continue to plant a few fall perennial crops. Our newsletter this month goes deeper into some of those displays, and lays out some tree planting recommendations with photos from our customer’s properties and our nursery. If you’d like help selecting trees for your planting location, our team at the nursery would love to assist during business hours- you can bring along photos and soil examples if you’d like. We can also assist with an on-site consultation if you’re looking for a boots on the ground approach to better understand your unique site conditions.

Colin & Connor Evers

Norm’s Greenhouse & Nursery Team

Here we go again...

At the risk of building a reputation for sending out a monthly stump-speech: watering in drought conditions like we’ve experienced this summer are essential.

In order to avoid winter damage, or early dormancy, new plantings (within the last 2 years) require weekly watering to establish, and this is often necessary monthly for even established trees, shrubs, and perennials. For the most accurate gauge for your specific soils and landscape, our recommendation remains: check the soil moisture levels surrounding your plantings 2-3” below the soil surface with your finger or a shovel. It will require 1-2” rains per week to alleviate the current drought stress the plants in our gardens are experiencing.

In densely planted landscape beds with trees competing for moisture, the underplanting and beds 20-30 feet from large trees are affected by the moisture competition from mature shade trees. Saturating understory plantings can be very beneficial in extended drought periods.

Signs to look for

Yellow foliage on the interior leaves, scorch on the leaf margins (edges), and premature fall color are signs of drought stress. Overwatering is highly unlikely, but still possible-always check soil conditions before beginning watering.

A walk through Norm's in August

Trees We're Recommending this Fall

‘Triumph’ elm

Fast growing
Drought tolerant
Clay & soil adaptive
Dutch Elm disease resistant (hybrid elm)

‘Fall Fiesta’ sugar maple

A fantastic orange/red fall color feature plant
Tolerates periods of drought, but requires a well-drained organic soil
Large shade canopy

‘Decaf’ Kentucky coffeetree

Selected variety without seedpods- seedless!
Unique compound leaves with bright yellow fall color
Drought tolerant, clay and soil adaptive

‘Tannenbaum’ mugo pine

Deep green, evergreen foliage
Selected at SDSU under direction of Norm Evers’ evaluation of mugo pine seedlings
Unique compact, pyramidal form
Tannenbaum (“Christmas Tree”) shape

‘Autumn Brilliance’ serviceberry

Native plant
Multi-stem (shrub) or single-stem forms grown in nursery
Limited native small trees/large shrubs with spring flowers, tasty summer fruit, and fantastic fall color