Not really a botanically-correct statement, but you know what I mean. John Porter’s previous blog post did a great job of explaining cucurbit reproduction (loved the Pucchini). Though I was surprised to learn “not getting any fruit” is actually a problem. Can’t say I’ve had an issue with that, ever. We have a really vibrant bee population and they’ve been super busy.
I love growing squash of all sorts, despite not being a terribly gifted vegetable garder. Past Garden Professors posts have addressed this issue. One might ask, why on earth would a two-person household need a 60-foot-long row of zucchini? Because we can! Though if I recall, I intended to go back and thin the row. Whoops.
The zucchini hedge. And those aren’t weeds, they’re *biodiversity*.
By late summer, we usually end up with gummy stem blight, powder mildew or squash stem borer No sign yet, though any of these goodies could show up next week. The plants are all healthy and ridiculously enormous. It’s been very warm and dry, but we have a nice drip irrigation system in place.
So guess what happened when we got too busy to check on them for three days? Many more were still on the plants when I snapped this pic. I’ve worked zucchini in some form into every meal except breakfast. Joel’s still being a good sport. Next step is anonymous *gift* bags to folks at the office. Though I think I’m getting a reputation.
Normal-sized zucchini at top of photo for reference. Aargh.
Not all zucchini taste alike, as true fans know. The pale hybrid Bossa Nova, right, has very creamy and tender flesh with seeds that are really only noticeable when it gets, er, hefty. Bossa Nova is a recent All-America Selection and perfect for use with those spiralizer thingies. The ribbed/striped variety is Costata Romensco – an heirloom variety with really wonderful flavor. Humongous plants though, probably not the best choice for square foot gardening fans. Tigress is the white-flecked green selection, allegedly more disease resistant than most. Bright and sunny Gold Rush, an old-school AAS selection, adds some color and is a bit sturdier/keeps longer than yellow summer squash.
I won’t be trying to save seeds – as John noted, can be very tricky/futile when there are other cucurbits about. Plus it’s too much fun to pick out next year’s selections from the winter seed catalogs, when the prospect of bountiful zucchini stacked like firewood actually sounds appealing.
The Garden Professors, led by our warrior princess Dr. Linda Chalker-Scott, continue to ferret out bad advice, bogus information, and worthless products foisted upon the unsuspecting gardener.
I’m assisting in the hunt as well. See my survey link below. Looking specifically for :
1) Gardening-related blogs and vlogs (video blogs) that are out there – could be anywhere on the spectrum of misinformation: spewing pseudoscience or just plain malarkey. Or some of the content is o.k., but veers off occasionally into the land of the absurd.
2) PRODUCTS! I’m especially interested in this. There have been some hilariously useless things brought to our attention over the years, but new gardening products are constantly coming on the market to fill this or that perceived niche. The Amazonification of garden retail is exacerbating the problem. A brief example is a $94 compost “tumbler” that two heads of old cabbage would fill. Now roll around daily and wait… So let us know of any gardening product that you or a friend have purchased and it just didn’t work as promised (or failed in epic fashion).
All responses to my survey are confidential with no names used in the input or output, so feel free to include rants along with links. Will share what we gather in a future post (or two). Survey closes June 20, so don’t tarry. Thank you, and garden on!
(posted by Holly Scoggins)
The Perennial Plant Association (PPA) is a unique group of folks – comprised of plant breeders, educators, propagators, promoters, garden writers, growers, retailers, gardeners, and landscape designers – all under one umbrella. The PPA is probably one of the most vertically-integrated plant organizations out there. If it has anything to do with a perennial plant, there’s a good chance one of our members is involved.
The marvelous/legendary PPA Symposium has been held in all parts of the country. This year’s perennial-fest is in Raleigh NC. This goes back to my particular roots with the organization – my first PPA experience was in 1997 symposium, also in Raleigh, while I was grad student at NC State. Helped out in a few capacities, including tour bus wrangler (on the surprisingly rowdy bus, no less).
A special feature THIS year in Raleigh will be a one-day plant-geek-fest, open to the public as a separate registration item (of course any perennial freaks are absolutely welcome to attend the entire week of symposium events as well!).
Many/most of you are not located in the Mid-Atlantic/Southeastern region of the U.S. So why I am I touting this here? Because some of my biggest Ah-Ha! moments regarding growing and gardening have happened in places far from my comfort/hardiness zone. And the plants…oh the plants. In searching through my older GP posts, I’ve mentioned the PPA at least 9 times.
Recent examples: In 2016, the PPA symposium was in Minnesota… really opened my eyes, heart, and wallet to some lesser-known prairie species and design concepts. I probably have one of the larger Silphium collections in Southwest Virginia now. Whoops.
Last year’s symposium in Denver, Colorado brought with it awesome alpines and steppe plants – many of which I could grow here, with a bit of assistance from enhanced drainage. Of course there were also examples galore of rock gardening techniques to help make that “enhanced drainage” thing happen. Beyond the plants and gardens, another highlight is the opportunity to meet the area’s botanical movers and shakers that I wouldn’t have had otherwise. So much positive, fun energy – helps to remind me why I do this thing!
Joseph Tychonievich experiencing Perennial Overload Syndrome at the 2017 Perennial Plant Association Symposium last year in Denver. Triage included some deep breathing and a Sprite. Plant: Dalea candida. Place: Chatfield Farms, Denver Botanic Garden. Photo: H. Scoggins.
So…trust me when I say driving for 6-8-10 hours or hopping on a plane to the handy-dandy RDU airport will be WORTH IT. Especially if you stick around for core symposium including fab tours to private and public gardens, independent garden centers, behind-the-scenes at wholesale nurseries, and (wait for it) dinner and garden wandering/shopping opportunities at Plant Delights Nursery.
Back to the “Spend the Day with Perennial Plants” opportunity on Monday, July 30 – Check out this lineup for the plant talk day – and note the geographic diversity of the speakers – again, this isn’t just a “Southeast” thing!
– Patrick McMillan is an Emmy Award-winning host, co-creator, and writer of the popular nature program, Expeditions with Patrick McMillan . He’ll highlight Carolina native perennials for the garden in a morning talk. Later that afternoon, he’ll cover Southwestern plants we can use in the Southeast to cope with drought.
– George Coombs manages the horticultural research program at the Mt. Cuba Center in Hockessin, Delaware. This renowned botanical garden focuses on native plants, and their plant evaluations are making a big splash in the industry. Get a peek at the top-performing selections and find out what it takes to stand out in their trials.
– Christian Kress owns a specialty nursery in Austria that focuses on rare perennials from around the world. He’s traveled extensively, authored books, and introduced several beloved perennials to the market. He’ll bring the knowledge on flocks of Phlox (!) and introduce us to the amazing selections coming out of Russia.
– Judith Jones owns Fancy Frond Nursery in Gold Bar, Washington. She’ll open the world of ferns and inspire a new appreciation for their role in the landscape. [Am hopeful that frond puns will abound.]
Other presentations include iris breeder Kevin Vaughn; John Kartesz on native plant inventory software that generates customizable maps and databases; Larry Mellichamp on the world of unusual, surprising and bizarre plants; and Lauri Lawson on medicinal plants.
ALL THIS IN ONE DAY, PEOPLE.
The whole shebang takes place at the Hilton North Raleigh/Midtown. Advanced registration is required and early bird pricing ends June 1. See the program description and get registration information on the PPA Raleigh website. Be sure to check out the glorious e-Brochure just posted on the symposium home page. Hit me below with any questions – and would LOVE to see you there!
Enjoying our first day above 55 F in quite a while here in mountains of Southwest Virginia. We’ve had far-below-average temperature and three significant snow events over the past four weeks.
Saturday, April 7, 2018 at our farm (Newport, VA). Not making me want to garden.
For much of the Mid-Atlantic, Northeast, and Midwest, spring has been very slow to arrive. The jet stream has been riding mighty low, and is taking another dive next week. For gardeners, this is frustrating (see above), though here in USDA Hardiness Zone 6b, we’re still well within the “last freeze” window.
For ornamental plant nurseries, greenhouses, and retailers/garden centers in these regions, this is darn close to devastating (the South has fared much better). For growers and retailers, spring is the busiest time of the year – many see 70-80% of their annual sales between March and early June. Of that amount, at least 50% of retail garden center sales will happen over the weekends. IF it is nice. Folks stay away in droves when the weather stinks. And this has repercussions down the supply chain.
Chris Beytes, the editor of GrowerTalks and GreenProfit (two highly subscribed-to publications within the greenhouse and garden center sector), has been keeping track of spring sales for years.
Growers and garden centers self-report a weekend rating on a scale of 1 (dreadful) to 10 (can’t keep product on the shelf, happily exhausted, planning vacation in Tahiti). Not all states end up represented – either they’re too busy selling (Florida!) or too depressed to report (possibly Ohio!).
Closer to home: I took my Ornamental Plant Production and Marketing students on a field trip last Friday. We toodled up I-81 to visit a container nursery (woody plants) and a wholesale greenhouse focused on quality bedding plants and baskets for the independent garden center (IGC) market.
The greenhouse was absolutely packed to the gills with market-ready annuals, herbs, veggie transplants, and hanging baskets.
And it was eerily quiet.
A Friday afternoon in April, and the only folks in a wholesale greenhouse…were the owners. THIS IS NOT NORMAL. There should be workers, carts, trucks, beeping, yelling, transplanters cranking, etc.
Weather over the previous weekend and early week had been spectacularly crappy. Because the garden centers across the region had not moved enough product to restock, there was no shipping. Because there was no shipping, there was no space freed up to put anything else. Because there was no space, no transplanting could occur, and seedlings/liners were still in their trays. Calls were probably being placed to the propagation greenhouses that grow the plugs/liners, asking them to hold off on shipping until the finishing grower could clear out the backlog of plug trays. Plus perfect plants stay perfect only so long. Pesky things tend to grow/flop/get pests and pathogens.
I love for students to see the real-world hustle/bustle/insanity of spring that growers face each year. The act of growing plants is what sparks the interests of the students – but understanding the supply chain and market behavior is just as important. We did get great tour – along with a lot of fodder for class discussions.
Hopefully things will warm up; garden centers across the regions will be jam-packed, and all will be well. If this paralysis continues much longer, the window of opportunity will start closing. It gets warm/hot, schools let out, folks go on vacation…and lose that got-to-garden feeling.
You can help repair this logjam (yes you can!). Regardless of the weather this weekend (because you’re a tough cookie/Garden Professors reader), get thee to your favorite garden center or retail greenhouse this weekend. And buy! Buy! Buyyyyy!
Greetings all, and good to be back in the saddle for the Garden Professors. It’s been a while since I’ve filled you in on my own personal gardening struggles (lots) and triumphs (few) as well as topics I think you’d be interested in. I’ve always appreciated the kind comments and good questions our readers pose, in response to my off-kilter posts and horrific punctuation.
I’m sure there is one BURNING question that long-time readers have:
I’m sure many readers have been at the receiving end of a cactus spine or Agave poke; the genus Puya makes Agaves look like stuffed animals. Fish hooks line the margins of each leaf, and cascade over the side of the pot. Therein lies the problem…
Still alive, and doing pretty well, but Pootie the Puya really needs re-potting to realize her full potential (the blooms are outrageous, and the point of all this, as I mention here: http://gardenprofessors.com/the-eternal-gardening-optimist/)
I’ve attempted to “go in” a couple of times, but even leather grilling gloves get snagged. Need really strong tongs (two sets?). I’m probably going to have to just bust the pot. She didn’t make it out to the deck this summer due to the awkward pot situation. Suggestions welcome, especially from anyone who has wrestled with one of these (and lived)!
We have about 3000 sq ft of mixed border surrounding (in multiple layers) our 1500 sq ft home. We take care of everything ourselves, in our spare time (ha!!). Thus, our maintenance schedule BARELY includes cutting back perennials and ornamental grasses Feb-March, plus any pruning needed for woodies…then some fits of weeding throughout the growing season.
Most of this stuff has been in the ground for five to eight years, and we have a high tolerance for nature taking its course. We’re surrounded by deciduous forest, so of course trees pop up where they’re not supposed to, especially oaks and the occasional hickory, which I dearly love and hate to remove. But I do. Because seedling trees are about impossible to just yank out like a weed – a whip just a few feet tall will have a taproot as long. With our stringent maintenance regime, they’re usually tall enough to poke up over the Panicum or loom over the Leucanthemum by the time I notice, so then digging becomes the only option.
Or, wait, maybe just cut it back really hard, like below the soil line. That’ll kill it, right? Nope? Back again? Chop, chop, hack, hack. Most saplings will give up after a few years. Except this one:
Ailanthus altissima a.k.a. “Tree of Heaven.”
Most of you know this is a totally invasive doody-head of a tree. Google for details if not familiar. I thankfully have not had much experience with it, until the past few years – there must be a mature one in the area. It would pop up here and there in our borders and blueberry field, but I didn’t think much of it. Grab the loppers, cut it back. BIG mistake.
Behold, the most ridiculous root:shoot ratio ever:
Bunny, our pensive 40 lb whippet, for scale.
I had lopped this individual back three years in a row. All I could see were the pale, unbranched shoots, not very imposing at all, so chop, chop. But finally, after a heroic effort last evening, it was successfully ripped from the heart of our main perennial border. Joel had to use our John Deere 950 tractor with a brush grabber chain to get this out of the ground, even after 20 minutes of his digging around the root to get the chain attached.
Like some kind of sea monster, my repeated attempts to kill it apparently just made it angry. And stronger.
It’s still out there, on our burn pile.
A dog barks in the night.
0_o.
Ornamental onions are hot patooties. From big, bold, purple globes to small pink half-moons, there is no end to ornamental onion-y goodness out there with 30+ species and cultivars in the trade. There’s no substitute for ornamental onions in regards to architectural drama – the perfect geometric foil to wispy grasses, floral spikes, and umpteen daisy-thingies. The seed heads from the sturdier species will persist and add interest to autumn and winter perennialscapes (not sure if that’s a word).
Not one but TWO cultivars of Allium on the cover of the fabulous new Chanticleer book…
All are members of the Allium genus, just like those onions sprouting in your kitchen counter veg basket – hence the deer- and small mammal- resistance factor. However…there are some issues.
Can be short-lived. I have first-hand experience with this – plant, enjoy for a year or two, then…where did they go?
Bloom time is rather vaguely defined. Most catalogs list “early summer” or “late spring” for most cultivars. But if you want continuous purple orbs, what’s the order of bloom?
Can be expensive. Bulbs for some of the mammoth “softball” sizes will set you back $5-$7 each (the bulbs themselves are huge). This is of particular concern due to the first item.
Foliage failure. For some of the largest species and cultivars, the foliage starts to die back around (or even before) bloom time. Not a lot of time to put the necessary energy back into that big honkin’ bulb.
We already have a multi-year lily perennialization trial going in conjunction with Cornell and some other institutions. I thought I might try the same thing with Allium.
Student worker Lauren, after a long day of taking data on a gazillion lilies.
Unfortunately, I had this bright idea in November – well into the bulb-ordering season. I tried to compile as complete an inventory as I could, ordering from several vendors. Ended up with 28 species and cultivars – as much as the space prepared (check out that nice soil!) could hold, at our urban horticulture center near campus (Virginia Tech is in Blacksburg, USDA Zone 6, about 2000′). We put five or seven bulbs (depending on size) in each plot, and replicated the whole thing three times.
Ready to plant!
We’ll take data over the next three years on time of emergence, bloom time and duration, foliage duration (have a nifty chlorophyll meter that can help quantify that), some growth measurements, and perennial tendencies (or not). My hope is to end up with a really specific chronology of bloom times plus life expectancy. Yes, this was just a patented Holly wild hair; luckily I had some general funds to cover it. But I do think our little onion project will be of interest to more than a few folks, whether professional landscape designers or home gardeners. I know I’m excited to see the results ($30 for five bulbs – yeek)!
A dibber, also called a dibbler (the garden tool, not the small nocturnal marsupial), has many uses in the garden and greenhouse. It also offers the opportunity to announce your intentions of dibbing (or dibbling). I’m a huge fan.
For example: just planted the last of my fall bulb purchases. One of packs remaining was Allium unifolium, left over from installing our Allium field trials. (28 species and cultivars – woo! Beats doing research on soybeans or something.) These little bulbs are about the size of nickel – even the smallest hand spade is overkill. I think I’ll just grab the dibber!
For the uninitiated, a dibber or dibbler is simply a very sturdy, pokey thing, with a nice ergonomic handle. To use, simply scatter bulbs (never, ever in rows)… Poke and plop. Went about 5″ to 6″ deep for these wee bulbs. Goes really fast once you’ve honed your dibbing skills.
As a bulb-planting strategy, I like to leave them all uncovered until I’ve got the whole batch situated. Then make like a squirrel and cover the bulbs!
Voila. Done in 60 seconds! Though I’ll probably forget where I planted them within 60 minutes (which does make for a pleasant surprise come spring time – “Oh look! Alliums!”)
You’ve probably heard certain plants dismissed as “trashy” – but what does that mean? We have a delightful Magnolia macrophyla in our campus garden – with huge foliage, creamy blooms, the native factor, etc., it draws all kind of attention. So I’d hesitate to call it trashy. But the autumn leaf drop clutters the ground with leaves the size of a sheet of legal paper. They aren’t rake-able, or really mow-able, have to gather by hand into “sheaves”. And there’s a LOT of them.
Here’s another example:
We plopped a 3-gallon Koelreuteria bipinnata (many common names, such as Chinese Flame Tree, Bougainvillea Golden Rain Tree, etc). into one of our home perennial borders a few years ago. As Dirr notes, it started out “beanpole-like in youth” but has grown into a nice vase shape. It hit puberty last year, with a smattering of flowers and fruit. This year has been a different story – I swear it doubled in size; and judge for yourself its full-on adulthood:
Late August and early September brought huge panicles of yellow flowers – eye-popping for us, and a late-season bounty of pollen and nectar for our honey bees (and every other bee and wasp in the area). You could hear the canopy “buzzing” from several yards away.
The yellow petals then fell away, carpeting the grass and part of our deck. It their place developed shrimp-pink, papery capsules.
I cut one of the capsule-filled branches off; and a month later everything is still pink and intact in a vase of water. I also noted each of three capsule sections bears one dark round glossy seed. Uh-oh. That’s a lot of seeds.
With our first freeze, the leaves fell – in big chunks consisting of a tough foot-long petiole and a bunch of leaflets. My mower didn’t do a good job chopping them up – ended up having to rake and move to compost pile. What the mower DID do was fling the papery capsules far into other beds.
Flashy? Yes.
Trashy? Yes.
Invasive? Not sure yet. Will report back if seedlings appear!
Comments welcome – tell us about your favorite “trashy treasure”!
The zucchini hedge. And those aren’t weeds, they’re *biodiversity*.
Normal-sized zucchini at top of photo for reference. Aargh.
