Editor’s Note: This morning we have local garden enthusiast Kendra Quince discovering the treasures within her new garden and giving us a helping hand with identifying unknown plants and flowers. Here she is:

Well, I have to admit, I’m not sure where to start. This new garden is throwing me off. Suddenly my yard is twice as large and full of beautifully landscaped and abundantly growing plants. The problem? I have no idea what anything is!

Sure, I know my rosemary and my lilac bush. I know the yellow eyed susans and roses (because they had flowers when I moved in). But the vast majority of plants - Nope, I don’t know them. And I like to know my plants, but when the season is over and plants are losing leaves (without flowers, or simply dead) it is very difficult to decide what is what.

If I don’t know what I’m looking at, I don’t know what to do with them. Should I prune, divide, dig up or leave be? Who knows! So we set out to discover exactly what we have here.

With kids in the garden, it became a game. First, we went to the library and got a large stack of books. Reference material is always handy. Especially if you can find detailed books that relate to our area and ones with pictures of the plant in more than one season.

Then we played peek-a-boo in the garden. We wanted to see what we could discover and running around was really fun. We found some cascading bushes full of red berries (bird berries I always say, at least until I know for sure), and some beautiful orange flowers in full bloom amidst the rain. Fall flowers are always welcome when the days become dreary.

This late in the season, our best hint to identify the plant we are looking at is what is left – usually the seed head. If we examine the seeds, we can often get an idea of what the flower looked like. You can almost see the flower in the seeds shape. If there are many small flowers then there are usually many seeds. Large dramatic flowers usually have similarly large seeds.

So, the tiger lily was easy to recognize because of its long leaves and tall stalks with heads that resemble the shape of a closed tiger lily about to bloom.

 We also want to note the leaves (if there are any left), as well as the bark or stalk. Of course if there are flowers then those will be easier to identify. If it is a flowering plant, most information corresponds to the flowers.

While outside, we also collected samples of leaves, seeds, petals and twigs to bring indoors. The only challenge here was stopping – we could have taken the whole garden inside if it fit! Then we carefully pressed our leaves and delved into the books for some information.

We found basics - like what different seed heads are called (pod, capsule, samara, drupe or berry) and how to identify leaf and flower shapes. For flowers, this included cup, bell, umbel, cyme, funnel, trumpet and many more.

Lucky for us we also had a book that was divided into flowering season and color, so an orange bloom in November only had so many choices. After sorting the seeds and the flowers we had collected into piles and labeled, we moved onto our leaves.

For leaves not only were the shapes listed (linear, ovate, sagittate, hastate, etc.), but also compound leaves, arrangements, margins, bases and tips. Wow, I didn’t know you could break them down into so many parts, or that there were so many variations. But, it did help narrow down which plants we were looking for. For good measure we decided to make some leaf rubs as well, so we pulled out the paper and crayons and collaged the leaves we had pressed.

We now had an assortment of seeds, leaves and flowers all properly labeled by to shape and composition, but not telling us much about the plants they were from. To really discover what a plant is we would ideally have seeds, flowers and leaves from each. But, once again, it is late in the season, and unless I want to wait until spring to see what pops up, I’ll have to do with the few clues I have left!

This part really is just research. So far we’ve spent a few afternoons hunting through sources, cross referencing and trying to find some of the trickier ones. The kids enjoy leafing through books. I will say, “Okay, find me a little red flower” and they’re off – flip, flip, flip…

Some of these plants I know and when I finally confirm their name, I will say – “Ah ha, I knew that!” But some of these I have never seen. Like one especially leathery plant with big umbrellas of purple flowers that are still blooming! I can’t seem to find anything that resembles it anywhere - but I suppose that keeps me going as well.

One step at a time as we come to know our new plants and our new home.