Welcome to The Impatient Gardener Garden Awards, where, using no specific criteria at all and having no judges other than myself, I pick the best of the best that grew in my garden in 2022.
:01 Intro
:46 Best vegetable: Asian Delite eggplant
2:46 Best annual from seed: Snapdragon Madame Butterfly
4:53 Best potted annual: Salvia Unplugged So Blue
6:38 Best perennial: Salvia Crystal Blue
7:42 Best perennial newcomer: Persicaria ‘Orange Field’
9:11 Best shrub: Hydrangea Tiny Tuff Stuff
9:59 Best dahlia: Milena Fleur
11:36 Best grass: Purple love grass
13:02 Best container: The big urn
13:55 Best garden visitors: The fox family
14:42 Plant of the year: Red Abyssinian banana
#gardenawards
My name is Erin and I love sharing inspiration and information with real-life gardeners. I live and garden in southeastern Wisconsin, zone 5b.
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41 Comments
Happy New Year, Erin! Love your channel and all your garden wisdom 😊
Happy New Year Erin! I love watching your videos, see you next year ❤
Erin, thanks for the recap! My favourite plant this year was panicum virgatum ‘northwind’. I found out after I bought it that it’s a Roy Diblik introduction named after his nursery. It provides great all season vertical interest in mid to back of a border and has finely textured blooms that give movement to the garden in the slightest breeze. Tough as nails too. It was knocked to the ground with a heavy snow and after the snow melted it just popped right back up. I am also loving the salvias, ‘Caradonna’ was my favourite this year. Happy New Year 🎉
I grew an annual variety of salvia which was beautiful, if only I can find the empty seed package to reorder. Also my favorite is any variety of cosmos. Happy New Year 🌼🐝🥳
I planted a coralberry proud berry bush and it did great in my zone 5 garden. It was about 8 inches when I got it and ended up being about 15inches and even had a few berries by the end of summer.
Milena Fleur gets my vote for best dahlia too, it was so prolific and vase life was great. My choice for annual was Zinna Queen Lime with Blush, but will add the snap dragon to my seed list this year. Thanks for great 'award' video!
What area are u in. I’m no 9. Would I love to try a few them🎉
Lantana wish I could post you a picture of my wheelbarrow. It was a small tiny plant so I planted 5 lol and found out in a few weeks that I Only need one
That was a great video, so fun. The plant that blew me away was Salvia "Wendy's Wish". I bought 2 to flank the bottom of a rose. Needless to say, I never saw the rose last year. The Salvia just took over the whole area. Each one was 3' x 3' x 3' tall. So much bigger than I expected. Beautiful plant, would recommend to a friend for ease of growing. 🌻
You r so much fun!
Best Dahlia: 'Diva'; Best Annual grown from Seed: Ageratum Blue Dondo, Best container: The one with 4 different coleus shoved in at the end of the spring planting with a lysimachia and a lime sweet potato; best veggie: Clancy potato and a dark ribbed Italian zucchini; I definitely love salvias, but was surprised by the growth habit of obedient plant 'Crystal Peaks'– a perennial I grew from seed the year before that it bloomed June through September.
What are the round peachy flowers in the bouquet in the snapdragon segment? Btw I love these recaps videos of how things performed
Thanks Erin for all the entertainment, education and fun you gave me this year. You inspired me to grow my first ever dahlia this year which was a huge purple puppy! 2023 will be my year for adding many more to the garden. I left mine outdoors in hopes that it will overwinter, 🤞 Wishing you a very happy new year and happy gardening.
Thank you for a great year of garden education, motivation, and laughs!
Love your favorite picks. And the Abyssinian banana is definitely the bomb! I’m trying to figure out where I could plant one next year.
Congratulations Banana Plant on the overall win…. I couldn't agree more…. it was spectacular!!! And the foxes…. easy winner!!! I don't have much of a garden right now but I plan on fixing that this year!!
These plants took the Cake in the Best Plants of the year for me:
Best Vine(and edible plant) is Asian pigeonwings(SO MUCH TO HARVEST from this plant, would grow a wall of them in my family's farm, the flowers with the calyxes taste sweet when eaten straight from the vine)
Best in flavor(and reseeding) would be Sweet Thai Basil(the seedlings are EVERYWHERE)
Best cut flower annual would be Sulphur Cosmos(sad to see them go with their orange and yellow blooms)
Best landscape/container annual would be my French Marigolds(they Love to be divided, so I can preserve them as much as I can, but my petunias are a close second)
Best shrub is Hawaiian Hibiscus (which stands at about 8 ft tall and 6 feet wide) (the mop head hydrangea would be a close second for loving the consistent rainy days)
Most vigorous rose is that yellow miniflora rose I bought in the local market(IDK what variety)
Best rose(s) are the 2 striped roses I have(one climber(Still finding out what it is) and one miniflora(variety is Claire Rayner, this one has RMD, but it's THRIVING like it doesn't have it)
Perennial of the year(because it's a tropical rainforest here, no frost will kill it) is lobularia. The constant white blooms and scent are just DIVINE!
Honorable mentions: from the roses would be Frau Karl Druschki for having a unique bloom form and high tolerance for frequent transplanting
Erin, you are AMAZING, would love to see and hear more from you! ♥️
Happy New Year Erin to you and your loved ones. Great video as always. My favourite plant this year is the Canadian rose Chinook Sunset with a runner up of Heavy metal grass. Loved your fox family but I really loved your sail under the Bridge this year. ❤
I learned about Carex toffee twist from you. I had to go on a bit of a mission to find it—nurseries in my area are awful. When I did I bought a ridiculous amount. I put it in all my fall planters. It looked great with the fall colors. We had a crazy freeze here last week and it still looks amazing. Think I’ll put them in my dry river bed. Thanks so much.
Thanks Erin! Happy New Year – my plant of the year was Vinca – never bought from the garden center before but the one container beat all the heat, humidity and bloomed non-stop until the first significant frost – I even divided that plant into different containers and they kept blooming without skipping a beat~
Salvias always give so much to the garden. They flower until early nov here. Or until there’s a heavy frost. Last year it flowered all winter because we had a mild one.
Prince of orange phlox has been wonderful for 4 yrs in a row now.
It’s tall, it doesn’t flop. Only stake it if there’s gonna be a harsh wind storm.
It blooms longer than any other phlox in my garden and I do have a few varieties as they’re a favourite of mine.
Shrubs- I’d say Daphne, especially the new everlasting ones that flower on and off throughout the entire year.
Love the look of the deschampia golden tau. I guess it’ll be my next mission.
Oh Erin, I needed this. We moved into our house 20 years ago this coming February. We were thrilled to discover in the spring that our neighbors were gardeners (and also the kindest people ever). We have enjoyed many years of sharing plants, sharing bulb orders, and enjoying each other's gardens. Don died of a heart attack in September at only 77 years old, and Janice was moved to memory care two days ago. We are experiencing so much grief right now, and I have been planning the bouquets I will take when I visit her this summer. I will definitely add the snapdragons to my seed orders. Thank you for your videos. You are inspirational and almost always give me a laugh, and I love seeing your animals. Plus, listening to you talk takes me home to Madison. Happy New Year!
The Fox family…..adorable! Your award shows are so helpful. We have had such rainy summers (2 years now), I'm over managing the dinnerplate dahlias. Ordered both of your award winners and looking forward to growing smaller ones this summer.
Hi Erin! What an awesome tribute to the plants who give so much to us. It’s really hard to pick a fav as a plant mom. However, if I must, it’s got to be my Encore Azaleas. Happy New Year!
Happy new year Erin . Love your garden , that banana plant was crazy !
Hit up the handle 👆. Best plug for Psychedelics and alot more…
👆 👆 👆 Psycheds, MDMA, Edibles…….
This was an awesome way to wrap up 2022, just when we all need a gardening lift! Last night I ordered 2 persicaria “Golden Arrow” from Digging Dog, so was interested to see a different variety from DD make your list. I grew Milena Fleur dahlia as well and loved it, no staking, gorgeous, excellent production. That banana is so cool! I may have to see if I can find one to grow here in central Ohio this coming year. Thanks for inspiring all of us in your gardening world, and happy 2023!
Hi Erin, marigolds and zinnias performed very well for my garden in MD. Loved your award show. Thanks
Love this, Erin! So much fun to look back at your year in the garden. And those little foxes – swoon! ❤
Thank you so much for sharing your gardening with us. I don't know how you do it all ("regular" job, household, gardening and videos)! Always great advice and inspiration.
Love this video! Your best container winner was gorgeous! My biggest success this year had to be Thomas Edison dahlia. First time growing it and wintered over the tubers. Can’t wait for this year! Happy New Year!!
'top Banana!' lol
Good list, Thank you 👍
For me…
Annual: Verbena bonariensis
Perennial: shade – Diane Claire Lungwort. Sun – Rudbeckia American Gold Rush/Veronica Waterperry blue.
Grass: (still) Calamagrostis Karl Foerster/ Hakonechloa All Gold is a close second
Grass-like: Carex Ever gold, Everest, etc.
Shrub: (still) Hyd Little Quick Fire./Prague Viburnum close 2nd
Tree: Nyssa sylvatica
Question… Salvia Wesewa, does that have a longer bloom for you than other perennial salvias? I remember hearing that it would send up blooms after the initial flush was in decline. I was not able to track that in the places I have it this year so wondered what you might have seen??
Thanks again. Happy seed time
I was a first time seed starter last spring and had pretty good success EXCEPT snapdragons. I did try Madame butterfly without success. I am going to try again because I think they are gorgeous. HELP! I will watch your seed starting video again to see if I missed something. Thanks!
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Peach Drift roses were unbelievably prolific in a horrible, hot and dry summer in Austin, TX.
I’m 5b too so very much appreciate this Erin! Also, my garden is only year 2 on hydrophobic soil AND I bought 4 yards last year I’m certain was contaiminated. Had SO much failure…especially dahlias. I’d love some planning “clumps”…like. Plant this with this…2 of these with 3 of these…” etc. thanks sister…love your work!
Loved this video!! Happy New Year and happy 2023 garden planning!
I agree, your banana plant was a showstopper!
You turned me on to dahlias, so I ended up with several which bloomed very late in the season and were BEAUTIFUL! Thank you!!!!
Of course that banana is so deserving of the trophy!! 😊
I’m watching everything dahlia as I’m a newby! Growing my first purple cactus dahlia this past season. I did stake it however I’m not sure it needed that. The stems were short and strong! It was the most beautiful flower I’d ever grown 😊 Im now lover of dahlia! 💜