The Colchicum Report ’24

Sep25

Some people say less is more, and I can see their point in just about everything… except for plants. ‘More is more’ is what I say, and even if it gets to the point of ‘too much’ that’s still ok because at that point you’re doing it for the people who don’t grow too many plants, and I’m sure that’s what they would want you to do. Please don’t try to follow this logic too closely because I’m sure there are quite a few holes in the argument, but long story short: I still don’t have too many colchicums and even if I did that’s still good because I’m more likely to share a few without risking a cold sweat as they leave my greedy little fist.

Colchicum x byzantinum has grown here for years and it always puts on a lengthy, floriferous show.

So in case I’m being too subtle: this post will contain too many colchicums

Colchicum ‘Nancy Lindsay’ looking more violet than normal in the evening light.

Before I go off the deep end let me take a minute to provide some slightly useful colchicum information for those who aren’t familiar with the plants (yet). Generally they’re a bulb -more accurately corm- which puts up lush foliage in the spring, dies down by the summer, and then sends up crocus-like flowers in the fall. Naked ladies or autumn crocus are two common names and they’re a nice fresh surprise of color when the garden is tending towards tired. Decent soil, decent drainage, and some full-sun for the leaves in spring and they’re fairly easy to grow… unless they aren’t… which is sometimes the case, and if it happens to you it’s not you, it’s the plant. Sometimes they’re jerks.

More ‘Nancy Lindsay’. They’re tucked here and there in a blue fescue border and I like the look.

I have a few colchicums which have been jerks, but some like ‘Nancy Lindsay’ have multiplied from single corms to hundreds and that’s an excellent thing. I will just enjoy that they like my garden and not dwell on the ones which have faded away, and I suggest you do the same if it happens.

Maybe Colchicum speciosum bornmuelleri group. I say maybe because a reference book I reference states the “real” thing has brown pollen and these do not, but I’m not quite ready to throw out the name on this one.

Other than the occasional form which insists on dying, the other thing with colchicum is their actual ID. For some reason colchicum are a little muddled in the bulb trade and even from a decent source there’s a good chance some bulbs are going under the wrong name. Not a big deal, because most are nice, but if you’re at the point where you already have a bunch of ‘nice’ ones then the confusion can be a little irritating and the quest to get the “real” this or that can turn into a lengthy pursuit.

More maybe bornmuelleri group. These came from Brent and Becky’s and their description is accurate and the plant is a beauty even if the latest authority describes the form differently.

Only a real nut would take up the mis-labeled challenge and start ordering second and third bulbs from different sources just to see if one looks more “real” than the other, but that’s getting a little too deep so I shall move on without making any guilty confessions.

A nice vigorous (and somewhat floppy) Colchicum speciosum which looks very much like ‘Giant’ but is probably not. Just so you don’t do the same let me point out this clump was about three times the size until the winter when construction runoff kept this spot too wet. Avoid that.

Other more interesting observations on colchicum are that they will flower even if not planted. I showed a bag of stored bulbs coming into bloom in the last post, but a more intentional look would be a bulb or two in a bowl on a windowsill. It might possibly stress the bulb but not that much, so if you have a couple extra give it a try. Or if you want, try a few picked blooms in a vase, and oddly enough maybe even try a few in a vase without water. Fresh flowers will last several days without water, the reason for which I have no idea, but they will and if you’re the type who is a little unsettled by zombie flowers well then put some water in of course.

The box of blooming corms has been planted and seems none the worse for wear. I dug them from this spot in June but couldn’t come up with a better spot so back they went and now I’ll be stuck mowing around them since this became part of the lawn in the meantime.

The final thing about colchicums is where to plant them. They flower at a time of year when just about everything else is floppy and overgrown and it’s hard to spot a low flowering bulb which should be showing off front and center. Some gardeners have nicely mulched beds under shrubs where they show off well, but that’s in short supply here (and might already be dedicated to snowdrops) so into the front edges of the beds they go. Lawns too, although it takes until early June for the foliage to die back and not everyone can turn a blind eye to unmown lawn for that long.

The meadow has become more shaded than I’d like as the aspens continue to grow, but the colchicums are still doing ok even if the bloom is beginning to thin and the individual flowers look like they’re stretching.

It’s a struggle to leave big empty spots in the borders here, so either by design or chance the colchicums are forced to share. To be honest most of it is by chance… I am absolutely the kind of gardener who often wanders around with a small pot in had, wondering where it could possibly fit in, and in July when the colchicum foliage is missing and the spot looks available… in goes a new plant!

Some of the better colchicum companions are creeping sedums and thyme. Colchicum x aggripinum is very accommodating anyway with his low, dwarf foliage, and much easier to work with compared to the leafy mounds of some of his colchicum cousins.

Iv’e had luck planting them amongst creeping thymes and sedums, low fescues, sundrops… anything which isn’t too tall or has overly dense roots… but eventually one reaches a point where one might have more colchicums than groundcovers to cover their feet. That’s when this gardener decided to go all in and just dedicate a whole bed to colchicums. There really was little other choice since clumps needed moving and dividing and one can only walk around for so long with a handful of bulbs before realizing the answer is right there in front of you. The lawn in the side yard is so unnecessary, and wouldn’t a four foot wide grass path be just as effective as a six foot wide path?

The colchicum bed one year on from planting. I’m hoping by next year the newest plantings will fill in some, and also that the gardener will resist the urge to sneak in too many other goodies.

The new colchicum bed is nice, but the soil is not. It’s dry and compacted, and probably doesn’t have all the organic goodness which it should, but a few of the new plantings seem very happy… and a few seem underwhelmed. I’ll give it a year and maybe then I need to consider a second bed? One with better soil would be nice but of course those spots are in high demand.

I think this is ‘Faberge’s Silver’ but without a label I’m second guessing myself, even if last year when it was planted I was absolutely sure I’d know it when it comes up. Maybe the gourd doesn’t fit in this bed, but I’ve never been able to deny a volunteer squash of any kind, they’re always fun to grow.

It’s typical that new ground has barely been planted and the gardener is already talking about more, but that’s about par for the course. This new bed could almost be called a collection. I am still insisting it’s not.

What an oddity, colchicum ‘Harlekijn’ has plenty of “interesting” to deserve a spot in this garden. Normally there’s a bit more pink, but maybe the drought and heat of this spot discourages more color.

Even if it’s not a collection, there are some newer finds which even a non-collector would be compelled to add. ‘Early Rose’ is into year two here and is again a favorite, with beautiful form and color, good vigor, and multiple flowers for a longer bloom season.

Colchicum ‘Early Rose’ first coming up and coloring up. It has a nice upright form.

‘Early Rose’ a week later, still upright and still looking great. There’s even a nice bit of checkering in the bloom, something I always like to see.

And here are some other beauties which are beginning to settle in and clump up.

‘Spartacus’ is a clear pink, dwarf form which is really pretty excellent. He’s got a long season and a color which stands out. I wouldn’t mind if he multiplied more quickly…

‘Glory of Heemstede’ has a nice strong color and puts on a nice show mid season. Also fairly vigorous with a longer season.

I didn’t buy it as such, but I’ve been told this is ‘Pink Star’ and she is putting on a nice show this year.

Not the best picture but the double white flowers of ‘alboplenum’ are another one of my favorites, even when I’m trying to pretend I’m too refined for double flowers. I still wouldn’t mind a bunch more of these even though there are already a few nice patches here and there.

And that’s probably enough colchicums for this year. You were spared photos of every last one thanks to my summer’s-end laziness and apathy and as you can see there were still probably more than enough. I hope for your sake the apathy rolls around again next year as well because my hope is they multiply and spread over the next year and there is even more to go on about next season 🙂

Oh, and I may have added a few new ones as well. PHS Daffodils put out a one time list longer than any I’ve seen in the States and I’d be a fool to pass on them, even if it means looking like I’m some kind of collector -which I’m not. Here is one last photo to prove there are still some other fall blooming things around.

The hardy cyclamen (C. hederifolium) are coming on strong as the summer fades. Soon this whole area will be covered by their foliage.

Enjoy your week and I hope September has brought plenty of nice things to your garden as well.

Somewhat Autumnal

Sep22

Second post. Must get done….

Actually it’s only been about a week and a half since this post was started, so I guess that’s an improvement. As usual I have no excuse, I’m just easily distracted -and a bit on the lazy side- so any structured use of time almost always falls to the wayside. Fortunately it’s not April and I can get away with letting things go a bit, and trust me I have.

This was the new tulip bed along the boxwood hedge, and once they came out it became home for all the excess coleus cuttings and unplanted canna tubers. I think it looks great for September.

The steady rains all August have kept the lawn from dying and made the tropicals very happy. Even though they were all planted kind of late, the gardener was fairly responsible about feeding them here and there and keeping the weeds at bay. One of the biggest successes was the banana which was still small enough to sit next to the light all last winter, and didn’t shrivel up to nearly nothing once the weather got warmer. Instead it came outside at a reasonable time, sank its roots down, and put out leaf after leaf, each bigger than the last. Laugh if you want (since I’ve seen much larger in other Pennsylvania gardens), but until I can overwinter a hardier sort in the ground for more than a winter or two, this is a plant that has made me proud and one which I greet personally on each and every garden walk.

The stem on this beast is at least six feet tall and the leaves rise another four or five. I shall try to dig and store it, but won’t get my hopes up just yet.

The kids keep asking when the bananas will be ripe, but I don’t have the heart to tell them maybe never. I think it’s actually an edible type but yeah, the chances it survives with any decent amount of vigor for the next growing season are pretty slim given my lack of a 15 foot high, heated greenhouse that isn’t already filled. Perhaps some advice from a friend can help. He gifted me a good sized offset this spring which had been overwintered in excellent shape, but under my care from March to April it grew smaller and smaller before it was finally planted outside again and began to recover. On a good note though, it now sports a healthy double stalk and being in a decent sized pot, it should be somewhat easy to drag inside and overwinter.

Another tropical, the bulbs of tuberose are blooming now and fill the evening garden with scent. It’s a real treat, I love it.

It’s too early to mention taking things in for the winter so I’ll only do it once, but if we drift into a cooler spell of weather again I guess it will be time to get more serious. Coleus cuttings will be first as well as any lantana and geranium cuttings. They both seem to root better if taken from plants which haven’t yet experienced too many nippy nights.

The dichondra baskets have been neglected this summer and nearly dried out more times than I’ll admit, but they suffer through it quite well, and they will likely return next year. These will stay out for another month at least, they don’t mind some frost.

Besides the tropical parade, the rest of the late season annuals and lingering perennials are still trying to look fresh in spite of a turn to dry.

The potager is weedy and seedy but at least the rain has kept it green, if not full of flowers and fruit. The geranium pots have been great though, there’s a reason your grandparents grew them.

As any good gardener will be, I’m not happy enough to take the warm and sunny autumn on its own merits but instead I’m already beginning to wonder how the approaching winter will be. Our mildest winter ever was a strong El Nino winter, and going forward that’s over and we will see what a ‘normal’ winter is like these days. August was still the hottest August ever, but September? October? February? Time will tell.

A stray Begonia sutherlandii tubercle found a home here next to the porch foundation and has overwintered twice without any help from me. Returning a third year in a row might have me claiming it’s hardy-ish here.

Tropicals and semi-hardy perennials are a thing of course, but absolutely hardy things are a much less-work kind of thing. Colchicums are hardy things and it’s their season. Here’s the start of it and I think there will be more to come in the next post…. whenever that might be….

Sun? Shade? Dirt? Colchicum don’t care. The corms will begin to grow regardless of if they’re planted yet or not. I almost forgot I had this batch dug and stored in the garage, but fortunately discovered them just in time!

So hopefully this blog will feature a full batch of colchicums in the next post. They are at their absolute peak and in spite of this dry spell which keeps getting longer and longer, and this heat which seems uncomfortably out of season, the colchicum are a bright and fresh smear of color in a garden which is looking slightly tired.

One of the first to ring in the colchicum season, ‘Disraeli’ offers a rich color, large flowers, curious checkering, and a long season of bloom. It is an absolute favorite.

Last summer many of the colchicums were divided and moved to the beds alongside the house and it was a little concerning to see how many my ‘here a bulb there a bulb’ process has resulted in. Someone who likes to throw labels around wouldn’t be all that wrong if they referred to the bed as a collection but I’m going to hold off on that. I bravely stated this fall that I might give away a variety or two which aren’t my favorites, and that’s not the talk of a collector.

The pinkish flush on the freshly opened blooms of x byzantinum ‘Innocence’ fades quickly to pure white. This good doer is another beauty and also a long bloomer as fresh flowers continue to come up as the earliest fade.

Even though it’s not a collection, maybe I did relabel every clump in the last few days. I kept mixing up ‘Ordu’ and ‘Orla’ so with a bright new label that’s no longer a problem, and now there’s one less embarrassing moment as I lead tours through the plantings.

Hope your plantings are also doing well and have a great week.

Day After Day

Sep8

Greetings. It’s been a while and the last post here probably says the same if I could remember that far back, but it’s time to put an effort in and I guess we’ll start with baby steps. Step 1: It’s fall. Even back a week or two to when these photos were taken there was a tint of russet in the view.

Back in late August when things were looking decent but still a little tired from the heat. Fortunately we had enough rain to keep the Hydrangea paniculata looking awesome, and can you see that neat border of somewhat fresh mulch?

Step 2: This post has been sitting on my to-do list longer than I’d like to admit so I guess getting that guilty confession out is another step. No reason, I’ve just been enjoying other things and have sadly neglected both blog and blogging friends.

A late rebloom in the daylily farm. ‘Carved Gold’ which is quite nice in my opinion.

Step 3: Reassure anyone reading that even though it’s messy and may look neglected, things are still interesting to me and there are wonderful spots, and although I tend to the woe-is-me style of writing I don’t want to give the impression I’m fishing for any ego boosts here… although I’m always pleased to hear them!

You may notice the ‘Limelight’ planted in the potager has not yet moved and likely never will in spite of the fact I don’t always think this is a good spot. But it looks great here in August and if I get another post up in September you’ll see it doesn’t look too bad then either!

Step 4: Get through this and post. I’m not particularly busy so that’s not the reason, it’s just so nice out this morning I’d like to fill another cup of coffee and use that excuse to sit around longer 😉

The other side of the ‘Limelight’ (Hydrangea paniculata) border with the new annual plantings where the tulips grew this spring. There’s a boxwood hedge in there as well, but right now it’s all about the cannas and coleus!

Step 5: Tell you how excited I am about the pumpkin patch aka former waste area maybe still waste area in the back of the yard.

The pumpkin patch three weeks ago. Pumpkins were just starting to form and I can now safely say a few of the smaller ones should ripen in time.

Step 6: It was a really nice although hot summer. It flew by. I feel like it was my shortest summer ever, with many missed opportunities -and that’s nothing to be proud of, but there are always enough highlights which is great.

The shade garden area. Plenty of the red spires of Lobelia cardinalis in this August photo, and a good amount is still in bloom today.

Step 7: Just wrap it up. Keep the babbling at a minimum so as not to tie up your visit, and one last photo from the summer garden.

A nice random vine for those of you who like random vines, Codonopsis lanceolata is a late summer treat which has edible and medicinal uses but isn’t going to overwhelm your garden tour visitors. Sometimes I even miss the blooms, but they are cool little things.

Step 8: Thanks for visiting and hope you have a great week. In my head I’m thinking ‘sure I’ll get another post up in a couple of days, colchicums are awesome, annuals are nice, fall feels good’, but my track record speaks otherwise. We will see!

Pineapple Season

Aug9

It’s pineapple season here at Sorta Suburbia, and that would be the bloom season of sorta-pineapples, aka pineapple lilies, aka Eucomis in case you were wondering. Eucomis are an easy to grow South African bulb which I’ve recently discovered are hardier than you’d think.

eucomis oakhurst sparkling burgundy seedling

‘Oakhurst’ is a form of Eucomis comosa which comes up with dark purple foliage and and stems. This seedling comes up dark but fades a bit in the heat and dry of July, but I suspect its named parent would do the same here.

The first bulbs which I risked leaving in the ground year round were a bunch of ‘Sparkling Burgundy’ seedlings which just came out of nowhere one year. Actually I sowed the seed two years before so it was entirely my fault they were here and I had more than I needed, but from my experiences they sprout easily from seed. Mine were sprinkled into a pot one January, covered with a thin layer of grit and thrown out onto the sidewalk next to the garage to sit until the freezing weather until spring when they sprouted. Simple enough, right? I’m sure you have your own methods but sometimes I feel people are too impressed when I say something was grown from seed, so let me just say don’t be. Plants do it all the time, and I find the biggest struggle is getting the gardener to actually get them in the dirt.

Seedlings of Eucomis ‘Sparkling Burgundy’ planted in too much shade near the house foundation. They would likely be darker and less-floppy in more sun.

Once you have the plants going there’s not much else to do. Mine are in full sun to part shade, decent soil, ok drainage… they’re not difficult. Since this is not always a well-cared for garden I can say with authority they don’t particularly like really poor soil or a real hot and dry location, but a little attention to watering and feeding in your own garden would fix that.

Eucomis bicolor after its first winter in the ground. The speckling on this plant is a nice touch.

The first experimental plantings of the E. comosa seedlings is now pushing probably eight years with no fussing on my part and not a single plant has been lost. Our winters can dip below zero (-18C) as a winter low and the ground freezes deeper than the bulbs are, so I’d say they’re pretty hardy. Silly me to not think that any of their pineapple lily cousins would also be hardy, but it took a friend showing a photo of his plantings online for me to get that message. I left my E. bicolor bulbs out last winter and they were also fine. Our winter was extremely mild so I can’t personally say these are also exceptionally hardy, but word is they can be.

The flower details on the blooms of Eucomis bicolor are always cool. Maybe a few more seedlings and a bigger patch of this could be justified.

I’ve also been told there’s a really good chance my dearest pet of a Eucomis could also be perfectly hardy. ‘Freckles’ is smaller growing hybrid of E. vandermerwei that has been enjoying the potted life here for at least ten years. Pot goes out in the spring, pot goes into the garage in the fall, and sits in the dry dark for six months until the process repeats. It’s a no-brain process, but some would suggest I have too many plants in pots, so perhaps this will also break free of the potted life either this summer or next spring.

Eucomis ‘Freckles’ is a lower growing plant which shows the cool purple mottling of the species E. vandermerwei. It’s a late summer bloomer and is just starting to send up its little ‘pineapples’.

Two weeks ago the gardener here was looking for empty terra cotta pots and there was nothing to be found, so he decided he was bored with his last Eucomis, E. autumnalis, so he tossed it onto the compost pile. So much for that. After all these new thoughts on hardiness he has gone through the compost, found the roots, and given it a spot in one of the beds. Autumnalis looks a little worse for wear for its ‘adventure’ but in this garden that barely stands out.

Eucomis ‘Freckles’ from a prior year. Quite an adorable little thing in or out of bloom.

So that’s it for my pineapple lily sales pitch. One disclaimer is that the bloom stalks often flop after a couple weeks, but you’ll have to see for yourself if that bothers you or is worth staking for… and you can guess what my opinion on that is… and the final fun fact is that Eucomis can be somewhat easily propagated via leaf cuttings. If you’ve never done it give leaf cuttings a try, to me it’s one of those odd things which shouldn’t work but it does. Chop a leaf into two inch sections, stick them right side up into some potting soil and wait. Small roots and eventually bulbs will form and there you go. Snake plants (Sansevieria) will also work this way, so if you’re out of pineapple lilies try a snakeplant for now.

All the best for an excellent weekend. We are weathering the downpours of tropical storm Debby today which will be followed by cooler, dryer weather and I’m not sure how I feel about the cooler part. Low 80’s is entirely seasonal but after a stretch of 90’s it sounds almost chilly and makes me think of what lies in store. Hopefully a few days of sunshine which doesn’t make you melt can make up for that. Enjoy!

Less Work

Aug6

Every August there comes a point when I realize the garden is a lot of work, and as I stand there with itchy bug bites, sweat running into my eyes, and dirt all over (with a little blood here and there too) I realize it’s not always fun either. To that end I told the boy that on second thought he’s got to take out a bigger loan for college, and I was going to go ahead and use that budget line to buy some mulch after all. Mulch is a labor-saver, it looks neat, saves on watering, and keeps the weeds down and would be an excellent way out… until it was dumped in the driveway and someone had to spread it. More work, and the boy was oddly standoffish when I suggested he help.

Agapanthus ‘Blue Yonder’ has survived transplanting and division, and I was even able to split a bit off for a friend… although deep down I still wanted to keep it all to myself since it’s such a cool plant!

So for the last week there’s been more sweat and blood given for the garden, and again I’m wondering why I’m allowed to make these decisions without any real adult supervision. It’s obviously my own fault, but in the meantime there’s been more rain (and a relentless blanket of heat and humidity) and even with additional purges for the mulch to go down the garden does look pretty good and at least now the suffering isn’t all a wasted effort.

Holy color! My latest crape myrtle addition (Lagerstroemia ‘Tuscarora’) has burst into bloom and I think it’s the greatest thing. Southerners will yawn but I’m quite pleased. Fingers crossed it can overwinter decently enough to bloom again.

Besides making my life easier by having a well-mulched garden, I’ve also continued on my quest to add an increasing number of border-line hardy plants which will need more coddling than usual in order to do well, and obviously this goes against any less-work initiatives. “Zone Pushing” is what some people call it, but I’m going to go all silly on you and claim it’s just me getting a jump on global warming. Argue any point you’d like but when each ski season is worse than the last I would suggest the zones are creeping North and sooner or later will match my horticultural hopes. Agapanthus have been doing well for a number of years (hardy deciduous forms, not the evergreen types), hardier forms of Crinum lilies have had no problem overwintering for three years, and now I’m trying Crape myrtle again. The ones I planted years ago at my parents’ house on Long Island used to freeze back regularly but are now taking on tree proportions, so I think I can at least get away with them being root-hardy if not top-hardy. The two dwarf ‘Barista’ series shrubs I planted last summer are back this year and full of buds, so there’s hope.

Our hot and dry stretch has singed most of the lawns, but for a sunflower in a crack at the end of the driveway? No problem. I’m stupid for not just growing a yard full of sunflowers.

Something which seems like it should be a lot of trouble and work, but really is not… and is also absolutely hardy as well… are the Cyclamen purpurascens which are coming into bloom now. Unlike the other species of winter-growing hardy cyclamen, these tend to be evergreen and will bloom in August over a nice cover of patterned foliage. I’m tempted to go on and on about them but I’ll spare you the rambling and just say give them a try, and if they’re not happy try them somewhere else since these took a while to find their happy place. The best patches are under the carpenter ant infested cherry tree where it appears the ants have tossed the seeds they collect after they’ve eaten off the sweet coating at the nest, and the seeds happily germinate and grow in what would seem like a terrible spot.

Cyclamen purpurascens coming into bloom in the shade of a weeping cherry. They should continue flowering for several weeks, regardless of drought or heat or humidity.

So that wasn’t bad. I was barely distracted by the first cyclamen coming into bloom, and I also didn’t even mention that I’ve been digging and examining and dividing clumps of snowdrops as I mulch my way through the garden… but I will mention the waste space instead. The weeds were neatly mown for June’s graduation party and then mown again… and again, alongside the rest of the lawn since I guess that’s what one does when you’re trying to keep things neat, but of course that’s boring. And work, and it being work isn’t a deal breaker, but when it’s also boring and pointless as well, then I must object. Better to pickaxe a shallow hole in the horribly poor soil and throw in a few pumpkin seeds. Or ‘maybe-pumpkin’ seeds since they’re seeds which have been sitting in cups on a garage shelf for years and I can’t remember which amazing pumpkin or squash or gourds contributed the seeds several autumns past.

The waste space is now a pumpkin patch. If the rains and heat keep up there might still be enough time for some kind of late season squash to ripen, and if not… squash are always fun to watch grow.

Starting a pumpkin patch wasn’t much work at all but then when the anonymous seed actually started to grow, I felt guilty that the soil was so bad. When it dried out, any attempts to water would just run off, so maybe a mulch of free municipal compost could help. Then another two runs for compost happened because there’s no sense in being skimpy with free compost… and might as well scratch in a little 10-10-10 since this is all just construction fill and even maybe-pumpkins need some help to not look anemic… and then when you’re not mowing the weeds they grow tall and might shade the maybe-pumpkins, so better pull a few… and here we are. I don’t suggest you reduce your workload by starting a pumpkin patch.

And with a pumpkin patch to distract, and maybe even a few more spur of the moment crape myrtles ordered and in need of planting, you can see how well the mulch is reducing my workload this summer. Tomorrow marks one week of it sitting in the driveway and all I did yesterday was buy another bromeliad, and all I did today was repot a begonia. I guess I’ll have to get back at it tomorrow. Or not. There are just a few more snowdrops to attend to before I can mulch, and snowdrops can’t be rushed. It will all be worth it though, no more weeding and I’ll finally be on easy street… right?

Oh those lazy days of summer. I hope you’re enjoying them as well!

Love and Hate

Jul25

We went on a little trip a few days ago and were gone for barely two days and the garden fell apart. It was mostly the fault of the weather as temperatures sat in the mid 90’s each day (35C) but it didn’t reflect well on my plantings and I was generally disgusted to see them all go to pieces in such a short time. This post would have had a much more one-sided title had I put it together that next day, but fortunately things move slowly here and I’ve had a few days to reflect and recover before putting things into words (and pictures). Plus it rained. A summer rain storm can change everything, and between that and some directed culling and chopping and fertilizing, there’s a slight air of positive vibes drifting through the yard again.

Pots of succulents can withstand quite some abuse, so are perfect for the roadtripping gardener. Tools scattered about can also make things look busier than they really are… until someone asks when the last time they were used was…

As usual much of the problem is the gardener’s fault. Normally drip lines on a timer nurse nearly all the potted plantings throughout the summer, but “I think I’ll just rip them all out since I should probably re-think the layout” happened when the deck was worked on, and re-thinking doesn’t really get water to plants as well as a drip line does. So once the gardener chose to continue gardening for the year, the first thing on the list was watering containers. It should have been repair the drip lines, but it wasn’t, and it also wasn’t the second thing. The second thing was to either cleanup, repot, or toss any of the succulents which weren’t already out on the summering wall. I’d been holding quite a few back because they weren’t quite display-ready, but after seeing how they were the only things not complaining about summer I decided to reward them with a little attention. It worked, and things look better, and best of all anything which looked sad or filled with complaints was tossed. My theory on the last succulent pots was the same as what normal people apply to their wardrobe. Anything you don’t use or love or haven’t worn yet this season goes on to the ‘goodwill pile’ and gets recycled as compost 🙂

The sloppy little stone wall is again topped with various potted succulents and somehow I’m short on pots again. That could be an easy fix but the gardener is not allowed to visit the terracotta isle any more.

Purging the pots was a relief, and then trimming the box hedge and mowing the lawn were also excellent jobs for improving the gardener’s outlook. The lawn doesn’t really need mowing, but the weeds in it do, and trimmed up they look so much better.

Then I looked at the flower beds and purged them as well. Mid summer should be a lush highlight for the garden, but the heat has taken a toll and in the mood I was in there was no room for tired plants. So now I have empty spots and need mulch, but who doesn’t like spreading mulch in the middle of summer? Fortunately that same day we also opened the envelope containing the bill for the boy’s first year of college, and seeing that ‘realigned’ how much of the budget was going into mulch purchases!

Tulips (and plenty of weeds) finally came out of this bed early in the month and all the leftover cuttings and roots and tubers from the garage went in. There is a new crape myrtle, and it’s so full of buds I don’t even care if it’s hardy or not!

Summary so far: Most of the garden has been composted, but at least it looks neat. A good rain has helped.

A few of the ‘toothy’ daylily seedlings which have been added to the garden. They’re interesting and I think I like them, but I’m more of a craftsman style, and less Louis XVI.

The gardener should stop complaining. Flowers abound, the pool is perfect, the agapanthus are starting, and nearly every evening is filled with fireflies.

A few seeds were collected off the hardy agapanthus a few weeks before they were bulldozed into oblivion and now two years later we again have blooms. I’m quite happy with them.

Maybe now we will finally get to the stupid drip irrigation. It’s not hard at all to set up, but the gardener hates crouching under the deck to run the lines, and he knows he has to do a nice job this time since everything else looks halfway decent and a bunch of lines thrown around would not show well.

Have a great week and I hope your summer garden is doing well. If not I suggest a purge, a little mulch, and maybe a new succulent and things may improve immeasurably 🙂

The Daylily Farm

Jul7

Summer is going swimmingly, and although it’s been hot we’ve been fairly lucky with rain so the plants are holding up well and the gardener is glad he doesn’t have to drag a hose around any more than he has to. Not that he would, since our gardener tends more towards lazy than to ‘an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure’, but he does feel guilty every now and then when the same plant cries out for help each time he passes and he has to mumble a “sorry, I know this wasn’t part of the deal when I brought you home”…

The daylily farm

One plant which does seem to take all the neglect in stride is the daylily (Hemerocallis). Like dahlias and cannas, they’re not everyone’s cup of tea, but since the gardener is a coffee drinker anyway, it was just a matter of time until problems developed. A visit to a real daylily farm two years ago triggered the problem and of course with no friends willing to step in and squash it, things escalated. Actually friends suggested more visits, friends dropped daylilies off, friends invited the gardener over to ‘dig a few’…

Some goodies in the beds of the daylily farm

A few friends shook their heads and recommended counseling, or more finishing up of home improvement projects, but the gardener enjoyed visiting these daylily farms and with new plants rolling in left and right it seemed only logical to start his own. Sensible people pointed out there’s no room for a farm. The gardener laughed.

A friend gave me ‘Hawkwoman’ and she’s a star. A heavy bloomer with flowers nearly a foot across!

So now I have a daylily farm. A friend implied madness when confronted with several beds of daylilies filled with dozens of varieties in a garden which recently held only three, and I had to somewhat agree although he’s not one to talk with his house full of thrift store finds. Mine is clearly a business venture, so it’s ok. Small businesses are ok and so are entrepreneurs, and although the flow of daylilies is still only a one way stream into the garden I’m sure it will be turning a profit in no time. Think of how many farmers you know buzzing around in expensive sports cars and sipping lattes all summer. That could easily be me.

‘Nona’s Garnet Spider’ in one of the production (not sales) beds.

But until I decide to sell something the ‘sales beds’ are still just an excuse to line out daylilies in big blocks just because it’s cool as well as the other big plus. Having a daylily farm in your very own yard also keeps the gardener in the garden, since apparently it’s frowned upon for him to be off visiting other daylily farms every weekend in July.

‘Cosmic Struggle’ is another reliable, heavy bloomer who reblooms later in the season.

Maybe I will have a sale day this summer. Even after just two years they’re multiplying and maybe I don’t love every one as much as the next or I don’t need a row of ten plants of the same variety. It would be nice to have visitors at least since they do look nice this year and I think other plant nuts would enjoy it. In the meantime here are some more pictures of the madness. Not to single anyone out, but a blogger in Germany who might be named Cathy may have said they would welcome photos of daylilies a bit more than snowdrops and I didn’t know how to take that. How can you compare the diversity of shapes and colors and inherent grace of the snowdrop to that of the daylily? I don’t get it but here are a few more daylily photos with a little less babbling.

From a local breeder, ‘Brookside Mystery Date’ is a good growing, shorter plant with deliciously colored and textured blooms. I begged a friend to stop by the grower on their last open weekend to grab it for me since I was tortured by regret over not buying it earlier in the year.

Also from a local breeder, one of the unnamed Brookside Beauties which the farm offers. They’re seedlings they chose to leave unnamed, but couldn’t bear to toss out onto the compost pile.

For local people, the Brookside hybrids are the work of June and Dick Lambertson of Lambertson’s Daylilies. They were the farm which (unknown to them) started this all, and as they move into full retirement, Joann and Brad Lamberton (a coincidentally similar name but not related to the Lambertsons) of Garrett Hill Daylilies are picking up the legacy. And just to support my main supplier and dealer, I’m glad Garrett Hill has taken this on. They are building a beautiful spot and although I’m sure they question jumping in with both feet like this (on top of their day jobs!), a visit to their farm outside Honesdale Pa is a treat worth the trip.

Unnamed daylily seedlings purchased mailorder from Petal Pusher Daylilies in Fort Wayne Indiana. Some really cool forms came in my mixed box!

Green throated flowers are always interesting. Also an unnamed Petal Pusher seedling.

And “blue”? I’m not sure how I feel about this type since the color varies so much depending on the weather, but on this morning I was a fan!

One last unnamed seedling, possibly my favorite from Petal Pushers.

I could go on but I shall not. Just two final daylily confessions, the first being the Facebook page which was created to pollute the internet with even more daylily photos straight out of the farm here, and the second being the fact I’ve grown a few of my own seedlings here just to see if I could. You’re more than welcome to ‘like’ the Facebook page but the seedlings thing is a shady endeavor. With just a small patch of seedlings in bloom I realize I lack the vision and passion to produce anything which amazes anyone but myself, and of course I’m pleased with them, but they’re nothing special. Good news for the farm I guess, since it lacks the room for rows of seedlings, but on the down side it doesn’t stop me. I have dozens of new seedlings which need planting out this summer and I’m already eyeing pods forming on this year’s stalks 😉

One of the Sorta Suburbia seedlings

Gosh did I go on this morning, and still the house is quiet and breakfast has not been served so here’s the rest of the garden:

The potager is looking inviting and even a little under control. Vegetable plantings are sparse this summer, but you know something is always brewing 😉

The entry arch has clematis ‘Sweet Summer Love’ in full bloom. I was lukewarm the first year, but now that it’s hit its stride I’m a fan

I’ve finally managed to get a few nigella (aka love in a mist) seedling going, I don’t know why it took so long but I’m liking the airy look and the interesting seed pods which follow the bloom. It should be an easy reseeder now.

Blue hydrangeas are in bloom everywhere this year, since the non-winter failed to kill them back and a lack of late frosts spared the flower buds, This is hydrangea ‘Tuff Stuff’ which claims hardiness but has never bloomed like this before. I wouldn’t mind if this happened again some time.

The meadow garden is too shady now that the Aspen suckers have grown, but the rudbeckia is having a good year regardless. This area will be mown in August and kept cut until the fall.

I’ve been dabbling in red hot pokers and finally have a few which bloom reliably and for more than a week or two. Kniphofia ‘High Roller’ is just starting with several later buds still to come for an extended show.

The oxeye daisy season is getting a little messy and floppy, so out they come. The mower will take care of this mess, and hopefully the lawn can overwhelm the seedlings which this mess shall produce.

Still no sounds in this house, so I’ll end with just one more photo. The gardener added a few concrete blocks to the deck supply delivery and now it looks like there will be no new raised beds, rather a set of steps leading up the berm. That of course will involve more blocks, more leveling, more digging, and far more work than the gardener will consider on a day of rest but it’s going to sit in the back of his mind as a new source of guilt over an unfinished project which wasn’t even a project the week before. I’m sure it will be an excellent way to reach the top of the hill for weed control purposes.

That hill isn’t even safe. You almost broke your ankle last time you were strimming it.

So that’s pretty much the update from here. I shall now make some noise so someone feeds me and then spend the rest of the day either immersed in cooling water, hidden in the shade, or comfortable in the embrace of an air conditioning vent. Summer is pretty good and I wish it didn’t race by.

Enjoy your week!

Bring it on

Jun25

So if you see this post and think it’s been a while you’re right. Two months of silence is an unprecedented void on this blog, and I’m a little annoyed with myself that this winter the blog review will go straight from early spring bulbs right into summer… but that’s something to worry about in January. Today we’re just past the summer solstice and it’s midday with the thermometer at 95F (35C) and apparently that’s just what it took to get me inside and in front of the computer again.

One of the opium poppies (Papaver somniferum), probably a ‘Laurens Grape’ seedling, is looking exceptional in spite of the heat. The opium poppies are safe, but the Shirley poppies (Papaver rhoeas) became rabbit food once the bunnies developed a taste. They were looking so promising…

So where was I? Here of course. Partially busy, partially lazy, going to work, and then off to Iowa for a week at the end of May (also for work). Things were transplanted, things were weeded, regular rains helped everything immeasurably, and then a load of mulch helped me immeasurably in keeping the weeds from returning… once it was spread of course. I think the garden looks nice, and if you can remember one of the reasons I wanted it to look visitor-nice was for a high school graduation party that would take place here. It did take place. Last weekend when the weather was cooler and excellent we had food and fun and about 70 people over to celebrate. Last minute projects went until the last minute of course, but overall the scars and construction of the last few years have been erased and the garden is finally back.

All the rain was a blessing for the lawn, with newly seeded areas sprouting well, and zero-topsoil areas growing as if their roots actually had something healthy to live on. This is the side of the house where two years of concrete trucks and work vehicles had been accessing the addition. I now call it the daylily walk.

To be honest the garden has been here throughout, but there was a lot more ‘interesting’ than anyone but myself would appreciate. Buggy borders filled with weeds and waste spaces overflowing with seediness are the first things I’d check each morning, but others would likely hold a different opinion. The fact that there were little to no complaints about the mess and in particular the lack of steps down from the deck for several years is quite amazing now that I think on it. I should really do some before and after posts.

Currently the beds on the side of the house are overfilled with the common oxeye daisy. It’s a weed but it’s a weed which I’d take over empty mulch beds any day, and until better things get planted… or the heat wipes them out… I’ll take it.

A before and after would be great for one of the big surprises this summer. Little seeds sprout and grow and suddenly one afternoon you’re amazed by a huge flower on your baby Southern Magnolia (M. grandiflora). Yes, trees have been growing from seeds for eons, but when it’s by your own hand that’s something else. I would have to check, but I suspect the tree is somewhere around ten years old.

The first of five flowers which this Magnolia grandiflora has set. This and one other seedling have flower buds, the third still has some growing to do.

Perhaps the mild winter helped the Magnolias along, since they’re borderline hardy in this zone, but I’ll take it regardless. Another thing I’ll take is the nearly 100% overwintering of all the purple Verbena bonariensis which has come up just in time for the party. There are seedlings (still too small to flower) as well, but for the party a few big patches of purple really make things look much better than they are!

The path sloping down to the backyard and potager.

In between small talk and second helpings a few people noticed the garden. “Wow, that’s a lot of plants”, “it looks nice”, and “that must be a lot of work” were some of the comments and they were all quite nice to hear but I kept shooting myself in the foot by pointing out how many of the plants were actual weeds. For the oxeye daisies I kept telling people to look alongside the highway later and notice the same exact flowers, and for the verbena I pointed out that they’re all self-sown seedlings, and for the milkweeds I just highlighted the ‘weed’ part of the name. I do like the milkweeds though. They are a weed, but an interesting one and not as unattractive as many of my other “interesting” plants.

Alongside the driveway the showy milkweed (Asclepias speciosa) is flowering for the first time. It struggled to get started but apparently all the growth was underground since it’s sprouting everywhere this year!

Right now it’s the showy and the common milkweed which are putting on the best show. They’re somewhat similar but the common is much taller, especially this year with all the rain. Once they finish blooming I’ll wack em back since a six foot tall clump of m’weed by the front door is not the curb appeal our mailperson needs to see every day.

Common milkweed (Asclepias syrica) pops up throughout the garden because its roots go everywhere. In okay spots it will be cut down to about three feet after bloom, in not-okay spots I pull them out, and usually they break off neatly at the root and I can ignore what must be a massive root system.

So as usual I started this post with high hopes, but now it’s six days later and still not done. Let me try and get moving. A short summary (which is what I should have started this all with) is party was good, garden was decent, massive projects were finished enough, and summer is off to an excellent (although slightly exhausting) start.

No one complimented the Japanese iris but I thought they were nice. Please note the brick piles which still remain. I can’t do everything!

So in the week since the party I’m less focused on plumbing and deck reconstruction and more focused on finishing up on the garden to-do list. I’ll hopefully get another post up one of these days because the daylilies have started, the tulips have been dug, the annuals planted, and things look even better, especially since the heat broke yesterday and we had a nice downpour to water things.

The weedy end of the potager. More milkweed and still a few beds of bulbs to dig, but a mown lawn goes a long way in making any corner of the yard tolerable.

The cooler weather has been a nice break from the smothering heat and humidity, and yesterday I was able to work outside without the waterfall of sweat and overall homeless in Florida look which has been the rule for the last two weeks.

Part of last year’s ‘waste area’ became a firepit. It looks so much more purposeful than a patch of weeds but with the hot nights there have been no demands to give it a try.

When I said the garden looked good enough I wasn’t kidding. We were focused on other things, and other things always end up taking longer than expected and you don’t always get around to yanking out the dried up tulip stems. Weeds can wait when it’s a couple hours before the party and you’re setting pavers at the base of the new deck stairs while someone else is asking if she could powerwash the stairs so that she could set up tables and chairs since she thought that would be an important thing to do as well. She was right. It all came together and no one openly questioned the plethora of exceptionally healthy no-doubts-they’re-real-weeds and the embarrassingly undug tulip beds.

Someone with more sense might have focused on this bed in the very center of the yard, but…

Let me reassure you that in the days after the party the tulips have been (mostly) all dug and some of the biggest weeds are gone. There’s hope, and in another week or so I won’t need the distractions of food, beer and lawn games to keep people from looking too closely since hopefully there will be far fewer ‘ouch’ parts of the garden!

This driveway loudly announces ‘projects not done’, and no one said a word about it. I guess we have some decent friends, or at least friends who know better than to get me started on some long sand moving explanation.

So summer 2024 is off to an excellent yet tiring start. There shall be droughts and bugs and deer attacks but with any amount of luck there will also be garden harvests, bird-filled mornings, flowers, fragrance, and fun… and daylilies. I’m still kind of into the daylily thing, and with them opening up new blooms every day I have to make a decision on the daylily farm plans. It started as a joke, people were enthusiastic, and now I fear they were just joking along with me! We will see.

Thanks for reading and it’s good to be back!

A Weekend in Spring

Apr15

So I guess it’s officially spring in my neck of the woods. People were cutting grass, washing cars, and of course I was even busier than ever wandering around checking on the same plants again and again. Sunday was warm and between the first tour in the am and the last tour in the pm things had moved ahead more than you would think. Fortunately I was there to keep an eye on things 😉

Narcissus ‘Pistachio’ is one of my favorites with its glowingly pale yellow blooms on short, wind-steady stalks.

I did not wash the car in case you’re wondering, but in between garden wandering, I did have to endure track meets, ferry the child to some parties and then endure a Sunday morning college visit. Fortunately the visit was local and just a twenty minute drive, but between hearing tuition payment options and filing the taxes the night before it was a good thing the weather turned nice so I could escape to the garden…. until we had an April thunderstorm roll through… more rain was not what we needed.

‘Vulcan’ is a bright daffodil, even brighter with the cool temperatures of the previous week.

So I guess this post is bound to be as aimless as my weekend wanderings but with the weather turning warm the garden will move ahead rapidly, and these pictures from Friday evening will be stale old news if I dawdle any longer so here’s a post. I’m hoping I’m not the only one who falls behind this time of year?

The new colchicum bed is already nearly overwhelmed with colchicums and other things. I was a good boy for dividing and replanting, but now do I possibly have too many?

If you remember, last year things in this garden were focused on earth moving, and this year it’s the second step of the process, mainly making it look nice. The garden doesn’t always look nice, and often veers into the messy lane, and for this year that won’t fly. There is a girl turning sixteen and a boy graduating High School and both parties are planned to happen this summer and in this garden.

The last raw scars of earthmoving are beginning to fade with a new planting bed and new lawn coming up. I have until mid June to clean up the edges and pretty up the plantings.

I knew this was coming, so now with the date picked I have to focus on having something nice in the yard for the party days. Right now I’m envisioning yellowing and dying tulip and daffodil foliage, alongside weedy oxeye daisies and an overgrown meadow garden, and although that might be interesting I’m quite sure I shouldn’t mention it to the bosses. Somehow I have to dig all the tulips and get something nice into the beds all within a couple weeks, and no one seemed the tiniest bit flexible when I said that August would be a nicer time for a graduation party or maybe a sweet sixteen plus two months party.

The tulips are coming on fast, but this bed is showing a lot of the fungal infection called ‘tulip fire’ (spotty leaves and twisted growth). They are the same bulbs which are planted elsewhere but in this bed they’re suffering and I think I need to give the soil a break from tulips.

If worse comes to worse I’ll just chop the tulips and plant coleus everywhere. There’s always a backup plan but I’d be lost in August without a bunch of trays filled with curing tulip bulbs so hopefully the weather and work schedule can make it happen. Tulips are worth it. If you thought snowdrops were bad, prepare for tulips, but fortunately during tulip season there are a billion other things to do so this blogger can’t really go on like he does in March.

Mixed Darwin tulips in yet another ‘new’ bed. They were opening up by the end of Sunday and I’m anticipating a dazzling display by the end of the week.

Things may turn stressful. I’ve got a party to plant for and here I am questioning if I have too many colchicums or tulips or snowdrops and where would I grow more tulips if I clear them out of the potager to give the soil a rest, and why don’t I have too many or even enough daffodils and I wonder if I could grow those in the potager beds and dig them for summer and….

I think it’s just that time of year. There are so many plans and for a little while they haven’t been screwed up yet, and for at least another two or three more weeks I can imagine that it’s going to be a perfect season. Even if it isn’t though it’s still better than January, right?

Corydalis Solida

Apr2

There was a time when spring blooming bulb lists and catalogs wouldn’t show up until late summer. The obsessed would have orders in the mail before heading out to the beach again, but the more sensible would dillydally with other distractions until that first chilly afternoon got them thinking about planting up for the next season. It was a logical model. Most spring blooming bulbs are dug in the summer and who has the time to count bulbs, set prices, and send out a catalog when you have acres of tulips to dig? But times change, and these days the bulb merchants are perhaps willing to take a bit of a gamble on prices and harvests, and know gardeners are at their weakest now when the cold of winter is still fresh in our minds and a hillside of daffodils sounds like a good idea. It is a good idea! With things sprouting everywhere the gardener doesn’t even think twice about last November and all the mumbling about planting bulbs before the ground freezes and another daffodil hillside would be brilliant 😉

Not daffodils, but a range of Corydalis solida seedlings coming up in the front street border.

Maybe there’s no daffodil hill in your future, but don’t give up because of that. Take a browse through the ‘minor bulb’ section, or the ‘miscellaneous bulbs’ tab and realize that tiny bulbs are barely any work to plant and can sometimes make just as big a display. Corydalis solida comes to mind and this year they’re quite an excellent show as the cool (somewhat gloomy) weather is keeping them in flower and keeping their colors nearly as bright as the day they opened.

Corydalis solida squeezing in where they can amongst the snowdrop and winter aconite foliage. This bed is a free for all until the next thing sprouts up and takes over.

Back in the day this blogger made a better effort at providing somewhat useful information, but that day is not today so let me suggest this post from 2016 when I was still just dabbling in the corydalis world. The best moment for me in my 2016 flashback was my wonder at seeing the first seedlings and how they differed from the mother plants. Good times. I believe nearly everything in the garden now is a seedling, and the originals are all gone, so if you adhere to a strict color palette and mauve in your melon offends your vision I’d say skip corydalis.

A visit to 2016 also reminded me that there were just two pink and one white hyacinths in this patch, and just a single bunch of pink corydalis solida. Old me was much neater.

Since we wandered into the recent past I guess some more lessons learned are that other minor bulbs also spread freely. I’m thinking the blue Scilla siberica in the last photo, and I’m wondering if I should evict it from other parts of the garden before it really mounts an invasion. Grape hyacinths (Muscari) can also spread more than you might like but are easier to deadhead… until you miss a batch…

Corydalis solida in one of the snowdrops beds. Obviously I just walk past this section when I’m wandering the garden with a homeless new plant in my hand, there’s not a single spot left for new things.

Well this post appears to be wandering off track as usual. I hope everyone enjoyed a nice Easter weekend and didn’t spend too much time looking at bulb catalogs whenever there was a lull in the family time, and I almost made it through this post without mentioning the weather or snowdrops.

One of the latest to bloom, Galanthus ‘Peardrop’ would be a keeper even if she flowered in the thick of the season, before all the others had faded and she’s the only drop left standing.

Oh weather. We’re about two or three weeks ahead of a normal season and there’s two or three inches of rain forecast for the next few days. Ugh. It better straighten out before all the daffs and tulips open is all I’ll add.

Have a great week 🙂

sorta like suburbia

more than you ever wanted to know about my garden