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I had just about decided to sell my car and other vehicles. Since they all have birthdates starting with 19 and lots of miles to boot, it wasn't for the money.

My logic was that without the vehicles I would stay home and solve at least two problems. I would have more time to fight weeds in present and planned gardens and I would no longer see the occasional garden atrocity that happens out there.

Two weeks ago I railed at the excessive use of the garden hose. Ironically, a non-competing weekly ran a story about a woman, much younger than I, who had glorious gardens. She offered a half dozen or so pointers defining her success. One was use water and fertilizer sparingly. Amen!

Speaking of weeds, we seem to be getting just the right weather to make them abundant and happy. However, I am still convinced that regular pulling, not cultivation, an inch or two of mulch, no close source of uncontrolled weeds and an occasional visit with a jug of round-up (if that is to your liking) will win the weed battle in time.

Be patient, I am getting to this week's garden sin. I will keep my vehicles. The logic of my plan was shattered when someone came in and requested an evergreen shrub that he could take the hedge sheers to. My suggestion, after several questions about what he wanted for final results, was to buy something that would grow like that naturally. The person took my suggestion, but I fear that plant is in for a troubling life.

I said it before. I'll say it now, and I will say it in the future. Hedge sheers are maybe the worst invention ever made. I'll back off just a little and say the most miss -used invention.

The hedge sheers, I guess, were invented to form hedges or maybe creating topiaries. The first thing to think about is the selection of the plant. There are a few plants that will tolerate that level of trimming (abuse). Sorry. Make sure your hedge is one of them.

Second, don't forget about light. The top of the hedge should be narrower than the bottom. If the top is wider it will shade, and eventually kill, the bottom. Once that has occurred, it is difficult, if not impossible, to restore the bottom.

You guessed it. On recent ventures off the farm I saw trimmers in action. The first was a hedge being sheered into a perfect V. Correctly, the V should have been upside down.

The results of previous attacks were already visible. What I saw was a collection of sticks with a few leaves wearing a matted crown of green leaves.

Even worse, on public property a day or so later, I saw the hedge trimmers attacking a lilac bush. Remember, this was late July and the victim was a spring blooming shrub. The result was that next years flowers were being removed.

One of the best trial gardens for flowering annuals is right in our back yard. Penn State Extension, industry groups and the Master Gardeners of Lancaster and Dauphin Counties run it. Located at the Penn State Research Farm near Landisville, it's free and open every day during the growing season.

Last week they held an open house and plant evaluation for commercial growers. I spotted a pretty good number of local growers in attendance. We're all looking for that perfect plant to add to our sales offerings next year. More realistically, we get to see the plants of many breeders growing under similar conditions.

One can ooh and aah over 'Diamond Frost' Euphorbia, which has been a standout since 2004 or 2005 or 'Bonfire' Begonia that unquestionably was last year's best introduction. Or, one can go bleary-eyed walking through several hundred yards of competing petunias or geraniums.

This year the plant appearance was about as good as I have ever seen. The director had an explanation that caught me off guard. He said, "We have had perfect weather, it hasn't rained recently." The obvious quickly struck me. Rainfall is necessary for the plants, but can quickly wreck havoc on flowers. They water their plants with a drip system which does not put water on the flower or foliage. That's something else for those of you who like to wield the water hose to think about.

If you think I'm stalling with the names of the best new plants for 2008 you are correct. Much of what I saw was small tweaks and improvements in existing plants.

My daughter, who has worked in the breeding field, described it well. In her search for a yellow impatiens, the first target was the color. The next goal was a smaller plant. Then the goal was that the flowers were more visible above the foliage.

That's not all she said but you can get the picture of how the process works. The long-standing claim still holds. Eighty per cent of the annuals you will find in the greenhouse next year were not available five years ago. The first time I heard that I was ready to argue, but quickly realized that it is true.

The best plant group I spotted for next year was a five or seven color series of regal, also called Martha Washington, geraniums. If you have been interested in plants maybe half as long as I have been your nose turned up and a frown appeared at the very thought of regal geraniums.Going back 20 years or so they had wonderful early spring flowers but the blooms disappeared at the first hint of warm weather. Bud set occurred at about 45 degrees and that's tough to pull that off during our summers.Last Thursday, I mopped my brow several times from sweat, if not amazement, as I looked at regals that were covered with flowers and buds. That's what I mean by incremental changes.

I would encourage you to visit the trials some day or evening if you like flowers. It would be a real treat. If you don't know enough about that area to follow the signs from Auction Road call the extension service at 394-6851 for directions.

If you spot something unusual, look for it next year at your favorite greenhouse. If you fall in love with a particular petunia you may be disappointed because it is almost easier to pick them by throwing darts at a list of the hundreds of possibilities than it is to compare the multitude of plants that look a lot alike.

Photo courtesy of PS Extenstion

So far this season I have been quite tolerant of those of you who like to torture your plants with too much water, but sometimes you see something that forces you to speak up. Let me paint a picture I recently observed.

The villain was a well-rounded gentleman of undetermined age who was barefoot and shirtless. The weapon was an open-ended garden hose with no breaker in sight. The time was noon last Tuesday. The place was the side porch of a house in a town near you.

The victim: well you know how we used to water fight by putting a finger or two over the end of the garden hose, were the plants at the other end of the stream 20 or 30 feet away. My guess is that his wife told him to water the garden and he was doing it.

That episode left me searching for a simple watering guideline. What I came up with is that if your grass is green, there is no established plant in the landscape that needs watering. When it comes to water consumption, turf is the biggest drinker. If it is happy everything else is too.

Of course I need to define established plant. Any annual or perennial that has been in the ground for at least two weeks is established to my thinking. For shrubs it is a bit longer and for trees at least a full season. The larger the tree or shrub the longer the establishment period will be.

If you are fortunate enough to be getting the rainfall I am, the garden water hose should be napping full time in the shed. I have not mentioned containers because that is an entirely different game.

When I add a plant to the garden, I water thoroughly. The biggest reason is to firmly establish contact between the plant and the soil of it's new home. I would then water every three to five days until it has seen several natural rainfalls. After that I wouldn't think about watering until after the turf has browned.

When it comes to watering in the garden, reduce the effort. Don't waste water. Don't listen to your spouse and don't read the first five words of this sentence.

The steep slopes surrounding my house mandate a two-step mini-deck to reach my kitchen door. Nearly every time I exit and peer over the deck rail I feel compelled to recalculate my plant IQ.

My problem or my exceptionally wise action was to plant two identical unusual lace cap hydrangeas in the sight line just beside the deck. They are planted close enough together that they could hold hands with little effort if they wanted to.

Right know I'm feeling half smart as one is rather eye catching with large pinkish flowers that quickly fade to an interesting light purple. The other's flowers are scarce but I hold out faint hope that there are still more lurking in the terminals of its branches.

At the end of the winter and after the unusual April freeze I felt pretty dumb. They were killed to the ground. The only growth was from ground level. Any blooms on most hydrangeas after that level of kill would produce a wait to next year scenario.

Hydrangea! To me they are a love-hate affair. Do their problems outweigh their value in the garden? The common complaint is that they do not bloom. Many hydrangeas set buds on new wood during the summer of the year before they bloom. In theory, winter injury of branch tips exceeding several inches will eliminate bloom. There are also significant differences in winter hardiness among varieties. I still have a lot to learn on that issue.Improper pruning is also a good way to eliminate bloom. The rules are: do not tip; prune immediately after flowering.

Recently there has been a lot of press about a variety that blooms all summer. As is often the case, people who market and would be lost in the garden, write much of the garden news. I'm not challenging their claim, I just need to add that there is now a collection of hydrangeas that share this characteristic and always has been.

I would be remiss not to include a paragraph or so on color change that occurs in many pink or blue hydrangeas. To get blue you need very acid soil. That can be a chore in this area unless you have a naturally wooded lot. Or you can add alminium sulfate. Pink is the opposite and occurs here with no effort.

The good news is that the array of colors available is greatly expanding. I even saw one at Mt. Cuba (a du Pont garden in Delaware) that offers different color flowers on the same bush. It may be an issue of aging but there were white, pink and red ones. The foliage on that one also was a bit different with a reddish hint.

Yes, I am itching to add a lot more hydrangeas to my garden. My problem is deciding just where. I am looking for a spot with well-drained soil that never gets too dry. It must be sheltered from the afternoon sun and the winds of winter. Perhaps establishing an evergreen screen should be my first move.

How does one begin an article that is really page two of what you wrote last week? Now that I have answered that question I will continue with my list and brief description of plants named Plant of the Year by the Perennial Plant Association.

1998: Echinacea 'Magnus'. Despite the recent explosion of new coneflowers, Magnus remains the standard with good vigor and bright purple flowers.

1997: Salvia 'Mainacht'. That one was 'May Night' before the plant namers decided that the official name was the one assigned in the country of origination, which in this case is Germany. It gives a slightly different look in perennial salvias with compact habit and deep purple flowers.

1996: Penstemon 'Husker Red'. A knee-high plant with excellent deep red foliage and small white or pink flowers. I've seen both depending on the origin of the plant. It is more hardy and will tolerate more moisture than most penstemons which are native prairie plants.

1995: Perovskia atriplicifolia. That's Russian sage. It has fine gray leaves topped with an airy blue-purple flower during the summer. Will reach several feet tall. I would not cut this one back until spring. That is the only iffy I've seen. This is one of my daughter's favorites. She thinks it looks great with purple coneflowers planted in front or as a stand-alone.

1994: Astilbe 'Sprite'. This is a short, late blooming light pink one. I don't have any idea why they singled out this cultivar, but they did. There are lots of good astilbe in a wide range of color and bloom times. This is one of the few perennials I might (emphasis on might) drag a water hose to during a drought.

1993: Veronica 'Sunny Border Blue'. A taller veronica with deep green leaves and near blue flowers. I have seen it occasionally get rather tall and gangly but it is a very good plant. In my yard now, it is stunning.

1992: Coreopsis 'Moonbeam'. In my mind, it is still the standard in the fine-leaf coreopsis. It has plentiful yellow flowers and one of the longest bloom periods of any perennial I know.

1991: Heuchera 'Purple Palace' There has been a great number of coral-bells introduced over the years, but Purple Palace is still hard to beat. It is grown for it's purple foliage rather than the flower. It has exceptional site versatility and garden durability. It also should be priced at a fraction of the fancy new ones.

1990: Phlox stolonifera. There are a number of cultivars of this groundcover phlox, which is recommended for shade or part shade. Colors generally are pink and blue-purple. I haven't had the success with it that I've seen at Longwood Gardens mixed with tiarella.