Haunted by last year’s garden fails? Here are common mistakes with shade, soil and plant selection to avoid this spring

Look for disease- and pest-resistant plants. Powdery mildew is a common disease on phlox — ‘David’ is a phlox cultivar that is resistant to powdery mildew. Go to the Chicago Botanic Garden’s website, chicagobotanic.org, to access Plant Evaluation Notes, which are reports on the performance of cultivars of various plant genera, such as Phlox, to find the cultivars that grew best at the Garden.