Kids love the unusual, especially white pumpkins, giant sunflowers, yard long beans, and birdhouse gourds. Use acid fertilizer on azaleas, gardenias, and rhododendrons as soon as they are finished flowering. When daffodils and other spring bulbs finish blooming, give them a shot of fertilizer for next year's flowers. Feed blue hydrangeas with aluminum sulfate to keep them blue. Bait or handpick slugs and snails.
Blast aphids off plants with a jet of water from a hose.
That's right, a strong spray will dislodge and drown pests such as aphids, those nuisance white flies, and mites. Don't forget to spray the undersides of leaves. If infestations are heavy, try using an insecticidal soap. Remember not all bugs are bad bugs, so know the difference before you get out that chemical spray. Growing herbs, alyssum, and cosmos will attract beneficial insects such as ladybugs, hover flies, parasitic wasps and lacewings.