º£½Ç´óÉñ

My least-favorite garden chore

I hate to dust! But I don't mind ironing. I know that has nothing to do with gardening (except that I often escape to the garden to avoid dusting). But it does point to a truism: When it comes to household tasks, it's not necessarily those that are the hardest or most time-consuming that we dislike the most.

After all, dusting isn't difficult. And it doesn't have to take a long time, even to do the best job possible (and my dusting is at least a notch or two below that standard). But I'll do almost anything to avoid it.

My outdoor equivalent of dusting is g. It's a mindless chore, completely routine. And deadheading does produce a couple of to thank a gardener for pinching off the old, spent blossoms -- a neater, better-looking plant that produces more flowers.

So I realize that it isn't logical to want to avoid deadheading. But, logic or not, I don't want to deadhead. I want all flowers to be like (Madagasar periwinkle) and be "self-cleaning" (that means the old flowers fall off the plants by themselves).

Unfortunately, most flowers aren't like that. So I spend more time than I'd like each summer pinching off the spent blooms from big pots of , cutting back old flower stalks from daylilies and hostas, and shearing coreopsis.

But where I draw the line is petunias. I never buy petunias for my garden. They produce so many flowers, all of which . And if you don't do it regularly (like twice a week), you have to pay attention to make sure you aren't cutting off future flowers instead of incipient seed pods.

The funny thing is, though, even though I never buy petunias, I almost always have them in my garden. Every year one plant company or another sends me at least one six-pack of petunias to trial. This year it was from Ball Horticultural Co.

In the beginning, I had my doubts about the color -- I wondered whether the [definitely darker than this photo] would clash with my other flowers. (Most of my urban "garden" is in huge pots.) But it didn't. The flowers are attractive, and it's been a prolific bloomer – even in June, when Boston had only four rain-free days.

So, if I were a fan of petunias, I'd definitely buy Easy Wave Petunia Burgundy Star in the future. It's a winner. But why can't someone invent a "self-cleaning" petunia?

What's your least-favorite garden chore?  And which petunias are your faves?

More Monitor gardening: The main Monitor gardening page. Our . Our .

You may also want to visit . If you join the group (it's free), you can upload your garden photos (and possibly win a prize). Join and get answers to your gardening questions.

And finally, you can now .