October

Oct7

September flew by and now it’s October. Autumn, and for maybe the first time in forever I’m glad to be done with summer. Maybe.

Colchicum ‘Lilac Beauty’ coming into full bloom against the blue of leadwort(Ceratostigma plumbaginoides). I think I show this scene every year, I like it.

It’s been chilly and gray and rainy and within 5 days I had my fill of autumn and started thinking about snowdrops and even colder weather. Cold I don’t really mind, it’s these depressing dark days which wear me down and I can’t imagine “living” somewhere with endlessly gloomy weather.

A colchicum speciosum which came as ‘bornmuellerii’ but might not be. The yellow next to it is a Sternbergia lutea, a fall blooming crocus look-alike which I need more of.

The gloom and rain also makes the lawn explode into growth and I’ve mowed it more times in the last month than all summer, and between that and the endless construction, and cleaning out the house next door, and making room for another person’s everything, and work, and lawyer talk, and explaining geometry and biology every night to a 14 year old, well I guess I know why September flew by. Good thing for colchicums and all those other autumn goodies, they sure make up for a less than complete daylily farm!

Colchicums by the driveway and a few 40% off goodies which I of course don’t need, but at least won’t need cramming into an already overfilled basement.

So it’s busy here and a new normal is setting in and a change of seasons might not be the worst thing to keep everyone moving along. The colchicums kicked off autumn and now hardy cyclamen and autumn flowering crocus and chrysanthemums are making it into a party.

Most of this would be fine in the open garden, but I do like having the most special of things all in one single protected space. Maybe next year I’ll evict the camellia seedlings and give them a try in the open garden.

Besides the miracle of copious rain, and its explosive effect on the lawn, the rain also performed a little miracle in the potager. It’s nothing to impress a Southerner, but having any kind of red spider lily in bloom this far north is something I did not expect to ever actually have happen but it did. Maybe there’s hope for it establishing. I wouldn’t complain if it settled in here, but knowing that the second bulb was also doing well up until it rotted last summer is giving me a few serious doubts.

Lycoris radiata, the red spider lily. Winter foliage will grow in another few weeks and then look miserable all winter as it wishes it were still south of the Mason-Dixon line.

Elsewhere in the garden the colors are all autumn and the vibe is all seedy.

Along the street the ‘Sunnyside Up’ pokeweed (Phytolacca americana) is as lovely and promiscuous as ever. Unlike everything else here it didn’t even seem to mind the heat and drought this summer.

Even after a summer of neglect and weeks of triage watering there were still plenty of things which bounced back. The front border looks full and the potager is an overgrown mess. It might not be as tusnami-of-chlorophyl as previous years but I can deal with it.

I didn’t expect Geranium ‘Rozanne’ to endure the drought like it has, but it looks great and seems to have been reborn this October.

Maybe the thousands of dollars spent watering were worth it here in the potager… things limped through the heat and then made for one last hurrah now that it’s cool and wet.

For the last two or three weeks you can’t even tell the cannas and dahlias spent all June and July in misery. Stunted plants aren’t the worst thing for a gardener who never got around to staking.

Progress on the daylily farm hasn’t been as swift as I had hoped for. My sole employee gets a list each weekend, but then when Sunday afternoon rolls around it’s like he didn’t even have a list, since it’s been mostly ignored for two days and nothing was done. Last weekend he made a good point about taking a few cuttings and carrying in a few pots instead but he really could have done a little more in the digging department on top of that. Perhaps this weekend I’ll take him out back and give him a serious talking to. Hopefully he’ll see the light, and hopefully back there no one will see me mumbling to myself again.

Ok, I distinctly remember my mother in law saying ‘I don’t care, as long as it looks nice you can plant whatever you want’ a couple months ago when I asked about planting some coleus in her planter. Maybe I took that out of context, but so far there have been zero comments about a daylily farm going in on the side of her house.

So maybe the daylily farm will be ready by next spring, and maybe it will not. Whatever happens I’m sure it will mostly complement the tropical bed which has also somewhat revived from the rain… and is also just across the property line, in my mother in law’s yard…

Not a whole lot of tropicals in the tropical bed this year, but even the tropics have their run-down, abandoned-farm kind of areas. Thankfully there’s more yellow pokeweed here weeding around and complementing the red roses and purple verbena.

While the stunted cannas here bring me down a bit, it’s my Queen of the Prairie statue which brings on the only commentary about this bed. The statue has been called creepy, and it’s been questioned as to why it faces her kitchen window but that’s just coincidence and I think she looks pensively thoughtful and pleasant.

Although no one insisted the Queen remain in our living room I don’t think anyone expected her to be evicted to the back lawn once we bought the house. Personally I think she’s enjoying her trip back to the earth.

Something else who’s days are numbered are the tropical pots. Time to start thinking about who is freezing, who is becoming a pot of cuttings, and who is getting hauled back in for the winter garden. It shouldn’t surprise anyone that things have multiplied and been added to.

Obviously this begonia needs to come inside. What soul-less heathen would let frost touch it while it’s flowering its head off?

The new angel’s trumpet in a (heavy)20 inch pot looked much less alarming as a little free cutting last fall, and a couple elephant ear divisions were never expected to fill one entire half of the garage but then it happened. Better safe than sorry is what I always like to think, so of course they’re all going to get safe winter homes.

In May I almost let spider mites kill this. “pinch off all the leaves, soap it down, and fertilize and water the sh!t out of it and it will be fine” was the excellent advice I received. It would look even better if i didn’t forget to fertilize the last few weeks and missed a few waterings…

Other things are also finding their way in for the winter. If it’s an early freeze things might be easier, but if it’s a late freeze I’ll have way too much time to soften up and say what’s the harm in one more?

I hope this red mandevilla can survive the winter with me. Previous attempts have failed but how can I not try?

There’s always room for one more and it’s good to have all these things going on to carry us through the next month. Each month has it’s own surprises, and even if I didn’t need the surprise water heater replacement yesterday, having hot water again is almost as nice as a house packed full of somewhat appreciative houseplants and a garage full of sleeping bulbs and tubers.

Hmmm. I didn’t even think about digging things yet. That might be a November, as the snow flies, kind of project and I’ll wait until then to worry about it. One month at a time, right?

Heading into the Holidays

Nov23

If pushed I think some people would consider it to be early winter around here, but with my newfound ‘fondness’ for the autumn season I’m going to consider it late fall. Normally even a hard frost is enough to declare the onset of winter, but as of 5:45 pm today I’m still thinking fall is an ok season and not the usual dark, wallowing in self pity, miserable, death to all growing things, slightly depressing time of year that it normal goes by.

The wild enthusiasm of the potager has once again been tamed by cold, and a good portion of the shredded leaves have gone to mulching the cleared out beds.

Even with a good number of chilly mornings and cold nights, there’s still been a lot of gardening going on… well a lot considering how short the days are and how often an employer expects you to be at work each week… the potager took quite some time to rip up tree-like annuals, dig forgotten potatoes, and do all the put-away stuff that growing vegetables requires. We all know that the amount of vegetables here really isn’t an excuse to make a full workload, but I did plant half a bed of garlic this fall and finally put the diseased, frozen tomato vines out of their misery so that’s kind of legitimate. Less legitimate are how many beds were then planted with tulips. They did well last year and I thought I threw away a good amount of smaller bulbs, but I also know I have a weak spot for tulips so if it looked big enough to bloom who am I to deny a plant its destiny?

Only a few tulips were purchased but apparently a few daffodils were purchased as well. As far as I can recall they were not purchased by myself, so I’m not sure how they got here, but they’re here now so I suppose I should plant them.

I gave away a bunch of daffodils two summers ago, so based on that and the promise to give away even more this summer, I allowed a few new ones to be purchased. Only about a dozen, and I swear they were interesting things which sell by the single bulb and never (or only a few times) did I ask for multiple bulbs. Surely you can imagine my disgust when months later a heavy box shows up, filled with bags of three or more bulbs each plus multiple bags of free bulbs. Unconscionable. Then a second box shows up. Ugh. Those bulbs were so big I was downright intimidated, and of course I never cleared out the spots where these new goodies were supposed to go. Nearly 100 new bulbs to plant when I was figuring only maybe two dozen, and then inspiration struck. A sand bed where you only put summer pots can easily take in a few spring bulbs, and they’ll practically disappear by July especially if you plant them along the far edge. It’s brilliant if you ask me and it almost makes me regret not ordering more. What if I really did dig up the overcrowded ones? I shudder to think about the potential gaps in the spring bulb garden which may have been.

The fall blooming Galanthus elwesii ‘Barnes’ seems to be doing well in spite of the beating its foliage takes once winter settles in. Two years ago it was moved around to the East side of the house and he appears to like the spot.

Ok so there’s a snowdrop photo. To be honest I’m not always as thrilled to see snowdrops in the fall as I am in spring, so on a scale of 1 to 10 this might only register an 8.5, but considering the historical average of November hovers in the 2 range that’s pretty friggin exciting. Maybe I need to compliment these fall drops with some late cyclamen, that would probably boost the thrill-meter to 9.0, or come up with another road trip idea. Word is Nancy Goodwin is opening Montrose Gardens this Sunday for tours of her nearly famous fall snowdrop walk, and the idea of seeing rivers of thousands of snowdrops in full bloom is enough to have me mapping the eight hour drive South to Hillsborough North Carolina. That’s crazy though. I’d have to turn off my cell phone tracking and lie about my destination and I suspect that’s a bad sign when you start lying about your plant addictions. Definitely bad, so no. And I’m not even considering it any more…. Not at all…

So look at that, I just cancelled a 986 mile round trip drive to go look at snowdrops, and to distract myself from actually taking the trip anyway I’m going to calculate fuel costs. Giddy-up I just saved $144, plus at least another 20 dollars in tolls and suddenly I have $164 that I can spend elsewhere. Genius, and when I spend it at a small business that happens to sell snowdrops, I’m also supporting the local economy and am practically a social engineer.

Amazing. I hope your week is starting off just as productively 😉

A Roadtrip

Nov18

Obviously with a million things to do in the garden, a roadtrip to see other gardens and meet with other gardeners and talk about gardening does not get anything done in my own garden, but who cares, it’s a lot more fun!

Unplanted daffodils and yet to be stored dahlias be darned because last Saturday a few obsessive fall-snowdroppers made plans to meet up at Edgewood gardens to talk snowdrops and of course “pick up a few things”while we’re at it. Some picked up more things than others and that happens. Actually it’s harder to not have that happen when faced with the hundreds of hardy cyclamen in perfect fall foliage, and pot after pot of full-bloom autumn snowdrops.

Autumn blooming snowdrops on the greenhouse benches of John Lonsdale’s Edgewood Gardens.

I don’t mean to sound holier than thou, but I was actually less excited about the amazing plants than I was about meeting up with friends. It’s been a while and this die-hard group hasn’t been gathering as much as it should, so hopefully I didn’t come across as too needy or desperate when I grilled people on secret soil mixes, perfect winter microclimates, and how does your Galanthus bursanus tolerate sudden lows below 10F… Somehow these questions only seem possible amongst this group 😉

An amazing range of potted hardy cyclamen (Cyclamen hederifolium). John may not have a sand plunge (like I do btw) but he does well enough growing these in cold frames and the open garden.

It was excellent, even if the time does fly by when we’re there.

Hardy camellias in full bloom on the shaded hillside. Even in November there’s plenty to see outside.

There would have been more time, but I foolishly tried to wedge in a side trip on the way down. Ott’s Exotic Plants of Schwenksville, PA has been on my bucket list for a few years and for some reason this trip was the time when it became “on the way”, so I finally stopped in.

Otts exotic plants. Multiple greenhouses filled with… exotic plants! This centerpiece conservatory was big enough to house a waterfall, observation bridge, and 40 year old fiddleleaf fig, which reached for the sky and has a trunk wider than I could ever hug!

I was 100% happy with the stop. I found the multiple greenhouses to be amazing, and the lush, mature tropical plants were cool, but the thought of heating them all was a little scary. Many of the greenhouses were filled with sales benches, but some were just filled with plants, and it felt more like visiting a botanical garden rather than some tropical plant clearinghouse.

A little late in the season for the famous mums-mountain, but you can still get a sense for the fall extravaganza which likely takes place here each autumn weekend. Even on a gloomy, drizzly Saturday in November there were still plenty of people out and about.

One excellent thing about this stop were the free plants. Since it felt like a botanical garden I didn’t think a $25 admission fee was out of the question, but rather than pay it, I put it towards a plant purchase and ended up paying nothing for the aloe and African violet which followed me out. Wow, do I have a flair for accounting!

Let’s just not mention the other stop. Even with an admission voucher, I still went a bit over. Obviously it’s not my fault, but who would ever suspect I’d need to take home an entire flat of hardy cyclamen in addition to the other stuff? It was Edgewood Garden’s first and only (hopefully) ‘a tree fell on my greenhouse’ cyclamen clearance sale, and there are still flats left if you’re interested.

Obviously nothing was planted Sunday… or since… oh well, it happens, and just like I’m still having a good week I hope you are as well.

The Fall of Autumn

Nov11

Supposedly autumn began weeks ago and summer is a distant memory, and in theory I understand that, but with shorts weather popping in here and there and with a sweaty lawn mowing afternoon it was easy to pretend we’re closer to July than we are to Christmas. That is until the last week and a half. Frosts have arrived and even a good freeze on a few nights, and it’s become hard to keep thinking autumn will be here forever and winter’s not creeping up on the horizon. Usually that in itself will spin me into despair over the loss of summer and the slow decay of annual life and the death of almost everything green… but I’m still kind of ok this year. The chrysanthemums were rained out but the snowdrops are starting, the fall foliage was kind of drab but the tulips are going in, and between houseplants under lights and amaryllis bulbs filled with promise it’s only the occasional dreary day which gives me the blahs.

I picked the last of the glass gem corn as the potager beds begin to clear out. The surprise of unhusking is something I never tire of and for next year I wonder if planting only pink or green or lavender seed would be a thing to try.

Trust me we’ve had a good share of dreary days, but sun as well, and if the sun can just keep trying for a few more weeks I think I’ll be able to get the bulbs in and the garden put to bed before the snow starts flying…. Assuming that happens… Lately winters have become North Carolina mild and I’m already planning things like pruning in December and mulching in January rather than shoveling snow.

A freshly pruned Scotch Pine (Pinus sylvestris, probably ‘nana on a high graft) looking neater, if not better, than it did before.

As the post-Covid schedule revs back up weekends are becoming more gymnastics and basketball and less sit in the garden all day thinking about what kind-of really-should ought-to-be done, rather than what comes first. Of course I know what I should do, and of course I don’t always do it. Case in point is the overly shaded, kind of overgrown, dwarf Scotch Pine along the porch. It’s been that way for years and could be pruned pretty much anytime other than last Sunday, but after finishing a coffee and looking at it for one minute too long I started with that. 45 minuted spent crawling around underneath pruning out dead-wood and sawing down stubs and making the tree look arguably neater was probably not even on a to-do list but now it’s done. Tulips are not planted, but this tree that I don’t even like all that much looks neater which is also probably good.

Other things did happen last weekend. A bunch of frozen mess was pruned down and thrown onto the lawn. The it was all mowed up. I think it looks very well kept and there’s also a nice pile of mulch which will be used elsewhere.

I often get into the mood where nothing’s good enough and everything’s an overgrown mess. Sunday that happened again and now there’s one less clump of variegated maiden grass (Miscanthus ‘Dixieland’) in the garden. I loved it but two wet years had it spending October and November as a floppy mess and instead of pruning the top I just pruned the roots instead. Maybe it will be missed… but to be honest I’ve already got a few other things planted around it which could use more room so there’s a good chance whatever hole is left is already filled. Such is the curse of the shoehorn/wedge-it-in planter.

A five foot tall, five foot wide, white and green grass is missing. I don’t even think anyone noticed.

In case you’re wondering, all the pots are accounted for and all the last tender tropicals are safely under cover for the winter, and for one of the first times ever this gardener didn’t have to jump up out of bed when he realized a freezing forecast was coming and there were still pots to drag in. He can now think about all the cannas in need of digging and daffodils in need of a new home. I guess that at least keeps him out of the bars.

A fall snowdrop. Galanthus reginae-olgae always blooms in the autumn as we head for winter and the new snowdrop season begins. You could maybe say I’m excited about that…

So there it is. The first snowdrop photo of the 2021/22 season and before anyone complains I want to add they’ve been blooming for weeks and I haven’t even mentioned them more than once or twice. That will change of course, so fair warning 😉

I finally ripped out those disgusting dahlias. Good riddance. Tulips (probably way too many for a vegetable garden) are going in and a good mulch from the front lawn with chopped annuals and frosted perennials included is going on top.

I think snowdrops in bloom are a big part of my rehabilitated views on autumn. The fall season still doesn’t break into the top three of the favorite seasons list, but with colchicums and then chrysanthemums, and asters and cyclamen, and now snowdrops, things are much less gloomy and gray than they used to be.

Hope your autumn is more snowdrops and less gloomy as well, have a great week!

Down to 48

Oct25

The ten day forecast looks miserable. All I see is rain and clouds and more rain, and at the moment rain predictions are between three and four inches for the week. But… this weekend was supposed to be a washout, and it kinda was but there was enough dry in between to get a few fall jobs done… if not entirely the ones I should have done 😉

I stumbled across some 50% off ‘Green Giants’ and now the backbone of my berm plantings is mostly complete. Over the last three years I’ve planted about 30 and I don’t think I’ve spent more than $300 which I think compares well to the $550 each Norway spruces the Industrial park planted. We will see what happens as things grow…

One thing which I did need to get done was the planting of the ‘Green Giant’ arbovitaes which followed me home. They were an excellent deal at about $15 a piece and I think they’ll just take off along the berm. Maybe in a few years they’ll completely cover the bare lower branches of the crappy spruce which are there now, and hopefully I won’t even know there’s an industrial park back there anymore… assuming I also lose my sense of hearing and miss the endless vroom… crash… beep… beep… beep… which goes on all day.

Most of the caladiums were thrown into the garage to finish dying back and drying off. New containers from elsewhere in the yard have taken their places. A rough count left me at 48 more pots which still need attention…

For some reason I love ‘Green Giants’. I love arborvitaes in general, but the common and I’m sure soon to be overplanted ‘Green Giant’ is just perfect in my opinion. They’re fast growing and the ‘giant’ part of their name should raise alarms, but just about everything I plant is part of some poorly thought out, regret it later, “plan”, so at least I have friends with chainsaws is all I’ll add.

A second bank of lights is up and running in the winter garden, and a third will be tomorrow. I of course went ahead and made more cuttings, hence the third light, and my wish that you realize this is already the ‘before’ photo.

I probably could have pulled a bunch more containers into winter storage, and cleared myself of any threat of dragging the last stuff in the night before a big freeze, but… suddenly I was convinced I needed to make my coldframe into a sand plunge. The “cold frame” is really just an old shower door set onto a wood frame, and making it into a sand plunge was really just filling it with sand and taking mostly hardy things and sinking their pots into the sand, but they’re cool things. Things which would probably be just fine in the open garden but just wouldn’t be as easy to fuss over. I’m thrilled with the change. They’re so much nicer to fuss over now and I can sit on the edge and just pick leaves out and turn the pots around slightly, just so they look even more special. Obviously it was super important that I got this done today.

Hardy cyclamen, hardy camellias, hardy agaves, and my most recent treasure, a pot full of hopefully-hardy dwarf palmetto palm seedlings (Sabal minor ‘McCurtain’).

So my sand plunge is filled with things which would probably do just as well planted out and just covered or mulched a little. The cyclamen for sure do just fine planted out, but I really like my sand plunge. Maybe next year I can repot everything into the same sized pot and have it all neat and super organized like some garden that pays gardeners to be all neat and super organized. As usual I’m sure that would be the most necessary thing this garden needs. That and a lawn mowing. Who has time to cut grass when there are sand plunges to build?

Hardy cyclamen doing just fine without sand or any kind of cold frame protection. I love seeing the new foliage sprouting up as the temps drop 🙂

So anyway… this long, stretched out autumn is obviously getting me into trouble. Too many cuttings, too much time to drag things in, too many shenanigans in general and on top of all that I bought tulips in a clear violation of my ‘no-new-tulips-this-year’ rule. Just forty. That’s nothing considering a couple hundred are sitting in the garage awaiting replanting, but it was a clearance sale. I’m sure I saved at least five dollars and knowing I won’t be starved for tulips in May is practically priceless.

Have a great week.

A Taste of Autumn

Oct17

Yesterday was forecast to be a gloomy day of rain, with strong winds and a good chance of thundershowers, but the morning surprised me with scattered sun and a breeze almost strong enough to blow away the swarms of blackflies and keep the mosquitos grounded. It was nice. It was warm. I took some pictures and actually did a few things rather than sit inside, and then when the rain and wind did finally come through it happily matched afternoon break time, so win-win!

Thinking the weekend would be lost to rain and cold, the lawn was mowed and even edged Friday afternoon. What a guilt-free way to greet Saturday morning.

Now I’m not going to promise I did anything important or essential, but I did do a few things which have been haunting me like moving Lycoris bulbs and repotting some plants for winter. Now if that gets you thinking this is a good time for moving Lycoris bulbs, think twice. It’s probably not, and summer dormancy is probably better, but they’re moved now and that’s something which didn’t happen in August.

I still love the pumpkins and finally found a use for the peppers which have been sitting on the side of the house all summer. The coleus also look perfect, but that will change quickly as nighttime temperatures begin to drop.

Beyond that I just spent the morning enjoying the autumn garden.

Some lingering annuals and autumn colors on the hydrangea.

The breeze from the approaching cold front must have been carrying a few Monarch stragglers, since every now and then I would disturb a bunch hidden amongst the flowers. They were all hungry and focused on feeding, not like the lazy floating through the air which the earlier crew was doing a few weeks ago.

I’m glad I deadheaded the buddleia a few weeks ago since it’s brought on one last flush of flowers for these late Monarchs.

I think there were enough flowers for a little rest-stop but with the clock ticking all the Monarchs were gone by early afternoon, riding the winds in front of the approaching rain. Safe travels!

It’s chrysanthemum time, and I love all of them except maybe this buff “peach?” colored one. Is it the brown grass behind or the hot pink in front, I don’t know, but something is off with these colors.

On another note, a few years ago a box or two of Minnesota-hardy mums came to this garden and did exceptionally well in spite of neglect and poor planting locations. During dry summers their seedlings would spread freely and this gardener was quite pleased with some of the results. Only about four of the original plants survive but only about two of the lost ones are missed, so in spite of the money spent this gardener feels like he made out better than he usually does.

Maybe not the nicest color, but I do like the more unusual flower forms of many of the seedlings.

I guess this is where I say mums make nice porch pots and I’ve bought my share of tight pots of perfectly budded plants, and then enjoyed them completely until they dried out one time too many. If they’re hardy enough they will also do well in the garden, making a nice lump of color for a few weeks anywhere between August and October depending on the cultivar.

This orange and gold seedling is nice enough to keep for another year… maybe the pink as well, but I already have a few others which are similar.

My confession is I find them kind of boring. They’re very neat and uniform, but I like flowers that sway in the wind. I like to see the bees working through them and plants which keep putting up more buds with larger flowers and unusual petal types. Once again the dream of a perfect garden with ribbons and pools of fall color falls to the wayside in favor of ‘interesting’. Oh well 🙂

‘Cheerleader’ is the last of the hardy football mums. I might have to try one more time to get some more which will tolerate my on again off again plant care program because this one is friggin awesome!

Let me just add that ‘interesting’ isn’t always as beautiful as the perfect pots from the nursery.

One of my favorite colors are the white with a pale yellow centered ones. Awesome color, but don’t look too closely at the foliage.

I transplanted all of these in June and chopped them back to sticks and worried a little that they would recover. They did, but then the endless rains of August brought on overly lush growth which ended up nurturing disease and killing off much of the foliage and blooms. A note for the better gardener is that chrysanthemums appreciate good air circulation and full sun, and dislike a crowded bed with overhanging sunflowers and milkweed.

By now some of the plants are completely leafless. Some are fine. A real ‘breeder’ would probably yank all the defective ones…

Of course there’s little chance I’ll address the disease problems. I’m more of a thoughts and prayers kind of gardener, not one who acts on these things, so maybe next year will be better. On the other hand I will rip out a few of the ones which don’t thrill me, since new seedlings are much more fun than seeing all the same ones returning next year 😉

In another bed this ‘cafe au lait’ color is something I like. Hopefully this one proves hardy.

Here’s just one more which I like.

Pink with interesting petals, but possibly weak stems? I’ll see today how it fared through yesterday’s rain and wind.

Hopefully no one is overly impressed with my seed-growing adventures. To put it in perspective there are often seedlings which just show up on their own, and are often much nicer than anything I nurture.

Just like that a seedling appears. Of course I’ll keep it, but maybe move it to a spot which isn’t soaking wet all winter…

…and don’t think I’m too good for buying and saving a few potted mums and seeing if they survive to bloom another year…

Hmmm. Has the leftover sand been sitting in the driveway since August? Someone better move it before that same someone accidentally tries to run a snowblower through it in December.

Speaking of surviving for another year, the pots are starting to migrate closer to the garage and their winter housing. The new bed on the side of the garage has been perfect for keeping things off the driveway… sort of… as I realize there are half a dozen fairly large pots sitting alongside the sand pile…

I suspect this cold front will push all the caladiums into dormancy. They’ll probably go into the garage first so they can stay out of the rain as they die down.

So that’s the mid October update. Chrysanthemums and the wait for the first frost pretty much sum it up and given the ten day forecast both will be around until at least the end of the month. I’m fine with that and I won’t even mention those other things which are starting to preoccupy my every other plant thought. The first ones are starting to sprout and of course new bulbs have been planted.

Have a great week 🙂

179

Sep26

179 isn’t the default setting for blog titles, it’s the harsh reality of autumn. Saturday afternoon I made a tour of the grounds and counted up 179 pots scattered about. All of these will require some kind of attention before autumn winds down and winter settles in, and all of them seem to have appeared out of nowhere this year. Another frightening statistic is that I didn’t even count any pots smaller than six inches, and I also didn’t count the dozen stewartia seedling which were potted up Saturday evening… just in case, you know? Stewartia are special little things, and now if I need a dozen potted seedlings next year, it’s reassuring to know I’m prepared.

The early autumn show of Heterotheca(aka Chrysopsis) villosa ‘Ruth Baumgardner’. I love it more each year.

But I wish I was mentally prepared to deal with these pots. Maybe buying a box of 100 drip emitters and more tubing for the watering system was not as good an idea as it seemed, but for the moment I’m trying to move on and I’ve started grouping some of the stuff which will get the same treatment.

You turn your back once and suddenly a dozen amaryllis (Hippeastrum) show up. I probably don’t need a dozen, but better safe than sorry is what I said some cold December afternoon…

I’m sure it’s just the caladiums which are making things look bad. They make up around forty of the pots, and yesterday I shut off their water to give them a couple of weeks to dry out and come to terms with the cooler nights. Soon they’ll collapse and go dormant and I can toss them in the furnace room, but instead of things shutting down, lets talk Colchicums!

Some kind of Colchicum speciosum. I don’t know if it’s a cultivar or not, but it’s a favorite regardless.

We are into the middle of Colchicum season now. I’m loving it.

colchicum aggripinum duncecap orostachys iwarenge

A late Colchicum xaggripinum surrounded by the flower stalks of Orostachys iwarenge. The Orystachys really appreciated the mild winter and has never looked like it actually wanted to live let alone thrive like this.

Plenty of other colchicum are popping up here and there. I shouldn’t want more, but I kind of do, if only for mental health reasons as they carry me through to the fall snowdrop season 😉

Another unknown Colchicum speciosum, actually this was my very first one… also not true to the name it was purchased under…

My new colchicum book describes ‘Harlekijn’ as having “little appeal except to those keen to amass a full collection of cultivars”. Oops. I was hoping that wasn’t the direction I was going.

Colchicum ‘The Giant’. Big, robust, floppy, and a scene stealer.

Colchicum speciosum ‘Atrorubens’ on the left, and ‘Album’ on the right. Two of my current favorites.

This one came to me as white… but most will agree it’s not, and eventually the company where I purchased it from also agreed and sent me a refund. I believe it is Colchicum ‘Pink Star’.

‘Lilac Wonder’ has been swamped by the yellow woodland salvia, Salvia Koyamae. Normally the salvia is half dead by the time it blooms since whoever planted it put it in a dry, full sun location, not the the moist woodland which this plant wants.

So autumn, pots, and colchicums. Not a bad week at all. To top it off I’ll wax poetically about the beauty in death of my beloved cardoon plants. The seedheads are ripe, and now they’re opening up to scatter their children across the landscape.

Cardoon seed heads. The bottom of the stalk is quite ugly, but if you focus on the top…

Ugly dead thistles might be one poetic interpretation but I prefer to ignore the possibility of a cardoon superspreader event and think that some goldfinch might fly over and find these to be the motherload of tasty thistle seed. Thats the hope at least, but for now I haven’t seen them give it a try. They’re still focused on the sunflowers so maybe they’re saving these?

I suspect that’s a lot of Cardoon seedlings…

No matter. Cardoons sprouting all over might be just what my garden needed, and as long as they don’t crowd out the snowdrops I’m willing to give it a try!

Enjoy the last days of September 🙂

A First Day of Autumn Tour

Sep22

Who says you can’t change your ways? I know a guy who’s been passionately anti-autumn for decades, and has actually been know to get hostile and crabby, short-tempered and moody as the day length shortens and a cool crispness taints the summertime air. That person is changing. He might even have said “Fall isn’t all that bad”, and smiled at a dewy morning lawn and a river valley full of mist as he sat on the back deck and had already sipped through at least half his morning coffee. Prior to the coffee he was still kind of luke-warm about the change in season, but at least he was out there enjoying it rather than mumbling about the frigid ten day forecast.

Ripe berries and a touch of autumn colors on the dogwood

“Maybe it will kill some of the mosquitoes” was the delusional hope

The front border is looking exceptionally neat and well-groomed

No, the mosquitoes aren’t going anywhere, but fortunately they weren’t completely rabid the weekend before last when the local garden club, the Backmountain Bloomers, paid a visit to the Sorta Suburbia gardens.

‘Bengal Tiger’ cannas with the yellow daisies of Heterotheca villosa ‘Ruth Baumgardner’. I like this plant more and more every year.

I was absolutely thrilled that the club came by, and even more thrilled that a few more showed up than I had expected. A muggy, buggy, September afternoon isn’t exactly prime garden visiting season so even a group of four felt-bad-for-you-so-we-came visitors would have been something special. There were more visitors than that, so I hope I didn’t come across as too desperately excited 🙂 (I don’t often get visitors you know)

Purple hyacinth bean (Dolichos lablab) seedpods in the front border. I threw a few seedlings in amongst the fennel forest, and I think they looked nice enough.

So that was the big excitement. It was a nice balance to the insane cursing and swatting I experience every other day as I try to beat back the bugs and not catch West Nile while everyone else is getting Covid. That would be just about right, I’m never any good at following the trends.

Colchicum cilicicum and some Colchicum ‘Disraeli’ coming up nicely through a few floppy chrysanthemums

With all that said, the garden does look nice. There’s been enough (actually way more than enough) rain and I really gave the garden a once over of weeding and trimming. Plus now there are more fall-bloomers than ever, and it’s really given me something to look forward to as everything else crumbles and dies prior to winter’s kiss of death… -ok i said I didn’t hate fall as much as I used to, I never went as far as to say I actually liked it-

Colchicum ‘Autumn Herald’ coming up through the creeping thyme.

Colchicums are a big part of what’s become good about fall. The earliest ones help distract me from the earlier and earlier sunsets, and then I have the mid and late season ones to look forward to. Right now the Mid season ones are just hitting their stride.

Colchicum ‘Glory of Heemstede’ according to my label… love the darker color and checkering!

Let me just share a couple pictures and talk less 😉

Colchicum ‘Jochem Hof’ is the name I have for this one. For some reason colchicum names and IDs are notoriously muddled, and even a good source may give you a misnamed bulb.

‘Faberge Silver’ is a newer variety with a nice blend of white and pink

‘Nancy Lindsay’ is a favorite and also a great grower here. I have a few bigger patches of it and still feel like I could use more 🙂

‘World’s Champion Cup’ has large goblets of bloom, often with a white highlight.

Colchicums aside (for just a minute), the backyard was also looking decent in its late summer colors.

The edge of the tropical bed always looks good with a few cannas, but for the most part it’s been neglected this year. What a shame considering how lush it could have been with all the rain (as demonstrated by the lush green of the lawn)

The potager was also looking nice, even if it was mostly out of control. Ten foot tall Kiss-me-over-the-garden-gate (Persicaria orientalis) has a way of demanding attention, and although no one asked for seeds, I guess in MY garden they liked it.

The pergola has almost disappeared under the vines and overgrowth of September

I of course liked showing off the castor beans and complaining about my dumpy seed-grown dahlias. The black eyed susan vine was also something to be admired, but maybe my visitors know there are cooler colors out there, so plain old orange wasn’t so impressive.

My hiding spot in the now mosquito-infested potager. Hopefully with long sleeve weather approaching I can safely hang out here again without losing a pint of blood.

Thankfully no one asked the awkward question of why there weren’t more vegetables.

The Japanese morning glory Ipomea nil ‘Fuji no Murasaki’ has reseeded mildly enough that it doesn’t scare me like regular morning glories. Let’s hope it stays that way.

One last part of the garden which I was proud to show off was the nearly completed sand path which now runs around the back side of the house. I think my visitors might have appreciated it more if it weren’t so overgrown, but if they only knew what a muddy mess this path was just three weeks ago I think they would have been more appreciative of this solid and dry passage.

The finished path. There’s still plans afoot for this end so we will see…

My friend Lisa asked about the sand, and in the nicest way I think she was trying to figure out what if any thought process there was behind this decision. Sand is nice at the beach, but anyone who has slogged a couple hundred feet through it knows there might be better path options out there, so let me point out this is the crushed sand usually used as a paver base, and it actually packs down fairly well as a path. When I went to check out the ‘crusher run’ which is a rougher mix often used for paths, I saw this and thought it might be worth a try. So far so good I think. It has a nice clean look and is mostly crushed Pennsylvania bluestone so I like the mellow color as well.

Recycled retaining wall blocks on the right, recycled composite decking as an edging on the left.

Even with a bit of a slope there were no washouts after our six inches in two days rain event.

You can see some of the slope here. The grass looks crappier than usual because I had to raise the lawn about four inches to meet the edge. I’ve been filling in this part of the yard for years to bring it up.

Actually there was more erosion in the caladium sand bed than there was in the sloped walkway. I suspect there was just an extreme amount of runoff from the concrete, so hopefully that’s a one time deal.

It’s still ‘Year of the Caladium’ along this side of the house

Here’s yet another gratuitous caladium picture. They haven’t liked the cold spell we had, and then all the rain didn’t help, but they’re still awesome 🙂

Mixed caladiums in need of a winter home.

Cooler weather had me thinking about what to do with the caladiums and also where to go with all the other pots which have accumulated around the garden. I started to hear an echo in my head of ‘Oh, that just goes into the garage over winter’ because I think I said it dozens of times as an answer to wintering over questions. It started to make me wonder…

‘Alice DuPont’ still looks great. In general most of the deck still looks decent, and I really don’t need fall to come by.

So will it really all fit into the garage? A quick count of pots quickly went over 100, and that wasn’t even counting anything under six inches or anything on the deck. That’s a lot of overwintering, and that’s almost even stressful, and when I deal with stress I take cuttings. So on Sunday I added another two flats full of little potted cuttings to bring in. Maybe they won’t all make it. Maybe I’ll find some kind of other space… doubtful… but with a suspicious box on the porch this afternoon and vague memories of bulb orders, I think a few pots of caladium tubers are the least of my worries.

Have a great week 😉

Yay. Fall.

Sep4

The colchicum are coming and that could mean that fall is approaching. I say ‘could’ because these “autumn crocus” also come in forms which bloom in the winter and early spring, but most normal people are satisfied with the fall bloomers, and most of the named hybrids with the largest blooms come up at this time of year. I of course am quite the normal person so shouldn’t have been surprised to come across the first clump of Colchicum x byzantinum shrugging off all the rain and coming into full bloom yesterday afternoon. It was inspiring. Instead of sitting on the porch all afternoon thinking about things which should be done, I found a garden fork and started lifting and dividing colchicum clumps.

Colchicum byzantinum coming up through the foliage of a floppy clump of little bluestem

Less-normal people might listen to experts who know better, and divide their colchicum in early summer after the foliage dies down, but those experts clearly need more tulips to dig and caladiums to transplant because they obviously have too much time on their hands in July. I do it now and even if the bulbs (corms actually) have begun to send out roots it’s not the end of the world to disturb them and get them into the spots which are not yet planted up with colchicum. Actually, as long as I’m confessing faults I might as well admit I’m downright careless with the process and don’t even water in moved bulbs… even if it’s bone dry and fresh roots are sprouting… they don’t seem to mind at all. I wish more plants were as forgiving.

Colchicum byzantinum ‘Innocence’ just starting into growth with no roots present yet.

Honestly I far prefer moving them now. It’s instant gratification and you can see how the flowers work with the neighbors, and most importantly you know they’re in a spot where you can see the blooms. A lot can happen between July and September and usually it involves other plants covering the spot where you thought the colchicums would look perfect.

‘Innocence’ with a little more room to spread out. Better gardeners would add a short groundcover of sedum to better show off the blooms, but one thing at a time please.

The colchicum bulbs looked great btw so I’m hoping for a good show this fall. Fair warning: you might have to come with me to look at them all in bloom, since a quick review of last year’s posts show less than ten colchicum photos. Unacceptable! I need to refocus on my blog’s tagline of “more than you ever wanted to know about my garden”.

Speaking of ‘more than you wanted to know’, last Christmas I did get the new book on colchicums (titled ‘Colchicum: The Complete Guide’, just in case you’re struggling) and after going through it once last winter, I may now take a refresher weekend to brush up on a few things. I say this to prepare you for all the smart-sounding observations I’ll be peppering my colchicum posts with over the next few weeks, things like why is it ‘x byzantinum’ and not just Colchicum byzantinum… well it’s because the plant is believed to be a hybrid (hence the x) and not a true species, as writing C. byzantinum would indicate. Wow. You’re welcome, and please feel free to correct me as I overconfidently bumble my way through botany.

Hope you have a great weekend!

Out With The Old

Dec5

Let me start with getting one thing off my chest. The daffodils are still unplanted. There, that was easy.

The weather was beautiful last weekend so we decorated for Christmas, we hung a ridiculous number of lights, and we (and I’m leaning more towards the less plural I on this one) cleaned up most of the basement of all the nonsense and clutter that kids can accumulate. Then in the midst of a pandemic we drove to Longwood to enjoy the Christmas display. Of course there will be judgements on safety but for now we’re all still healthy and it’s the weather which has taken a turn towards the worse. On a miserable afternoon I’d rather rush out and capture a few last joys of the 2020 garden season rather than actually do something productive. Maybe tomorrow will be different…

‘Ashton’s Supreme’ is growing in a pot and has already moved into the garage for the next few nights. It may be hardy, and someday I may put it to the test, but for now I’d rather he avoid the frosts and snow.

I’m excited to see my only fall blooming camellia opening up a few flowers before it gets too cold. It’s one thing enjoying them for a few hours in another garden, but to have one of your own to really drown in for as long as you want… and then to make excuses to go out and see every few hours… well that’s a whole different story. Currently the plan has ‘Ashton’s Supreme’ spending the coldest months in the winter garden, staying potted, and then some day moving to the open garden when either (1)he gets too big or (2)global warming shifts me just one more zone South. Obviously there’s also a good chance that (3)the gardener kills Ashton, but for just $30 from Camellia Forest Nursery I’m already thrilled with how far I’ve come.

The question of the bog garden. Shelter in place or quarantine elsewhere?

I’m also somewhat thrilled over how the bog garden’s pitcher plants have recovered from some questionable overwinering techniques from last year. Someone just picked up an old saucepan from the sandbox, lifted the pitchers from the bog and put them in the pan, and then placed the whole embarrassment next to the compost pile under a few sheltering branches. They lived, but this year I’m not sure if I shouldn’t try something different. Or just do nothing. Nothing is pretty easy, and it’s been working for the daffodils so far.

The sword beans (Canavalia gladiata) have been picked and brought into the garage to hopefully ripen the seeds. Maybe I’ll get lucky, but maybe I won’t since they’re still mighty green.

Last year seemed much more full of November projects and plenty which bridged over into December, but this year I’m quite fine with calling a time, nailing a lid on 2020, and announcing the start of the 2021 gardening season. Hello snowdrops is what I’m going to say next, and of course I’m excited!

Galanthus elwesii var. monostictus ‘Hiemalis Group’ ex. Montrose. An appropriately big name for what is commonly referred to as the giant snowdrop (in this case a fall blooming version).

Mani over at the Miserable Gardener has observed that the guy he lives with takes an inordinate amount of pleasure in rattling off the name of this first snowdrop of my new year. I’ve begun to enjoy it now as well, and although I may still need to tweek quotes and capitalizations to be completely proper I’m not going to let ignorance stand in my way. Ignorance seems to be very ‘in’ these days so I might as well call it what I want, right? -who am I kidding… I can’t stand ignorance, so please correct me if you can.

Galanthus ‘Three Ships’ is leaving port earlier than ever and holding the possibility of an open bloom by Christmas. That would be a first, and of course I would be thrilled.

Let me close by saying this last photo has me most excited. I keep thinking this snowdrop phase will pass but as of yet not luck. Once in the summer of 2019 there was a point when I almost said I wasn’t thinking about snowdrops, and then just a few months ago I turned down the offer of a bulb or two because “I had too many other plants needing attention”, but now I’m back to obsessed. ‘Three Ships’ looks healthier than ever and honestly for a flower which blooms here in January, anything better than dead is quite an achievement in my opinion.

Let the season begin!

sorta like suburbia

more than you ever wanted to know about my garden

Category Archives: fall