Posted on by tonytomeo · 12 Comments

Coreopsis

80718It is a common theme. Coreopsis was a much simpler group of only a few specie and cultivars in the 1980s. There are now too many hybrids and cultivars to keep track of. They have been bred so extensively that they do not produce viable seed like the old fashioned types that can self sow so nicely, and were more closely related to the unimproved specie that would be found in the wild.

Breeding did more than expand the range of floral color and form. It combined the more impressive flowers with the resiliency of the toughest of perennial specie. Because they are sterile, some of the modern hybrids may not need to be deadheaded like more traditional types. Although tougher modern hybrids can capitalize on the sustainability fad, they can not proliferate and naturalize.

Coreopsis blooms in summer and autumn. The small daisy like flowers can bloom yellow, orange, red or pink, but traditional bright yellow is still the favorite color. Most cultivars are less than two feet tall and wide. A few can get nearly twice as tall. The most compact cultivars are only about half a foot tall. Coreopsis wants good sun exposure, and will bloom less and likely mildew if shaded.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 12 Comments

Saving Seed For Next Season

80718thumbThe gardens with the most flowers need the most deadheading. This involves the removal of deteriorating flowers and any developing fruiting structures and seed associated with them so that they do not divert resources from subsequent bloom or vegetative growth. Old flowers that do not produce seed because they are sterile or lack pollinators might get deadheaded too if unsightly.

Deadheading is not for everyone though. Flowers up in trees, big shrubbery or large vines are obviously out of reach. Many annuals, like alyssum and nasturtium, produce far too many flowers to be deadheaded. Most plants bloom and disperse seed without bothering anyone, or even getting noticed. Bougainvillea blooms too flamboyantly to miss, but then sheds neatly without any help.

Bougainvillea does not set seed anyway. The insects that naturally pollinate it within its native range in the Amazon River Basin probably do not live here. Yuccas that live far from their native range likewise lack the specific yucca moth that they rely on for pollination, although some get pollinated by accident. Big yucca stalks get deadheaded just because they are not appealing after bloom.

What is more fun than what gets deadhead is what does not get deadhead. The alyssum and nasturtium mentioned earlier naturally naturalize where they get watered. They toss so many seed around that they can replace themselves as readily as the old plants die out. California poppy, cosmos, calendula, campion, and many other annuals as well as a few perennials, can do the same.

Besides that, there are all sorts of seed that can be collected from old flowers for the following season. Each variety of flower finishes in its own season. Each variety likewise gets sown in its own season. It is not necessary to leave all fading flowers if only a few can provide enough seed for later. It is important to remember that hybridized and some overly bred cultivars do not produce viable seed, and that subsequent generations of the fancier varieties will revert to be more similar to their simpler ancestral parents.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 16 Comments

Palm Treevia

P80708

This is a quick trivia question.

Which of these three states has the most native genera of palm?

1. California

2. Hawaii

3. Oklahoma

4. None of the above

P80708+

This is not a trick question. Notice that it asks about genera rather than species.

1. California is home to many exotic specie and genera of palm; but only ONE is native. The California fan palm, Washingtonia filifera, which is also known as the desert fan palm, lives in isolated groves out in the Mojave Desert. https://tonytomeo.wordpress.com/2018/06/30/oasis/ Because it prefers hot and arid desert climates, and does not like to be watered too generously through summer, it is now a very unpopular palm for landscapes.

2. Hawaii, is populated by many more exotic species and genera of palm than California is, but only species of the ONE genera of Pritchardia are native. Many of the exotic genera were imported by ancient Polynesians to produce food. Others were imported later for landscaping.

3. Oklahoma is the sort of place where only a few of the toughest of exotic palms can survive outside. Yet, McCurtain County, in the very southeastern corner of Oklahoma, is home to ONE very rare but nonetheless native variety of dwarf palmetto, Sabal minor.

4. ‘None of the above’ is the correct answer to the question because none of the other choices above have any more native genera than any of the others.

So, although Hawaii really does have more native species of palm, it has no more native genera than California or even Oklahoma. Each of these three states has exactly ONE native genus of palm.

I am sorry that I have no good pictures of any of these palms. All three of these pictures were obtained online. I have experience with neither the dwarf palmetto of Oklahoma, nor any of the species of Pritchardia of Hawaii. However, the California fan palm happens to be my all time favorite palm, even though it is not very happy here. It is such a stately palm, and those grown from the same seed batches are uniform enough for formal plantings. They are the palms that flank the famous Palm Driveway of the Winchester House in San Jose, as they were popular for flanking driveways and roadways in California and Arizona during the Victorian period. I did happen to see California fan palm in the wild outside of Palm Springs while in school in the late 1980s and can tell you that they are spectacular in their native habitat.

P80708++

Note: The elderly and deteriorating California fan palms that flanked the Palm Drive of the Winchester House have been replaced with palms that are hybrids of California fan palm, Washingtonia filifera, and Mexican fan palm, Washingtonia robusta. They are more tolerant to the irrigation of the landscape around them.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 1 Comment

More Spontaneous Limb Failure

P80707KP80707K+(This was copied and modified from the Facebook page of Felton League.)

Warm and humid weather is an uncomfortable change for an otherwise mild summer. It also causes spontaneous limb failure among trees, particular those in riparian areas or irrigated landscapes. What sounded like muffled firecrackers was the (slow but steady) fracturing of another cottonwood limb in Felton Covered Bridge Park. (Another incident of spontaneous limb failure was mentioned a few days ago.) (https://tonytomeo.wordpress.com/2018/07/01/spontaneous-limb-failure/) This one was over the picnic area adjacent to the playground. The fallen portion of the limb was less than a foot in diameter, although it was slighter wider than a foot wide where the fracture originated. It fell onto the middle of a group of picnic tables, with the fractured proximal end remaining suspended and attached to the originating tree. Because it remained attached and fractured slowly, the limb did not fall with enough inertia to damage the picnic tables. It was removed very efficiently.P80707K++(continued)

Cottonwood, sweetgum, coast live oak, valley oak, Chinese elm, California bay, California sycamore, willow and various eucalypti are particularly susceptible to spontaneous limb failure. The oaks and eucalypti are particularly dangerous. Oak limbs are extremely heavy, and tend to break away cleanly and suddenly rather than fall slowly while still attached. Eucalypti limbs likewise break away cleanly, and then fall from great heights without many lower limbs to slow them down. As they start to fracture, Chinese elm and willow limbs might stay attached to the main trunks or the larger limbs from which they originate, which might slow them down somewhat.

Sadly, spontaneous limb failure does more than damage whatever the falling limbs land on. It can also disfigure the affected trees so severely that they must be removed rather than salvaged.P80707K+++

Posted on by tonytomeo · 23 Comments

Six on Saturday: Finally Flowers

 

After posting so many inter pictures of soil, stone, road signs, plumbing, empty wine barrels and mockery of French culture, I suppose I should share some pictures of actual flowers for a change. I mean, this is about gardening after all. Unfortunately though, I do not work with many flowers. The landscapes are designed to be compatible with the surrounding forests, so flowers are minimal. I already shared pictures of most of the best. Some of these are from gardens that I do not work with. I just thought that they were pretty.

1. Avens finished blooming more than a week ago. I just really liked this picture because it is such a nice swirly orange color. Until I found these, I had not seen avens in many years, and did not expect to see it anytime soon. Since featuring it in the gardening column, I have found that others in other regions are quite familiar with it, and this it more popular than I would have guessed. http://www.canyon-news.com/ph-has-ups-and-downs/80473P80707
2. Lobelia is one of the more common warm season annuals. This is not from one of the landscapes that I work with, but looked good enough in a planter box in town for me to get a picture of it. I do not know what variety it is. There are many varieties nowadays that I am not familiar with anyway. Back in the 1980s, bright blue lobelia was popular alternated with white alyssum. I thought it looked rather silly at the time, but would not mind seeing it now. It was such an 80s look.P80707+
3. Pelargonium was in the same planter box as the lobelia. I know neither the species nor the cultivar. Again, it was just too pretty to pass up without getting a picture. It is more diminutive than the sorts of pelargoniums that I am familiar with. The plants are very compact. The variegated leaves and flowers are quite small.P80707++
4. Zonal Geranium happens to be one of my favorite perennials because it was one of my first. Although I grew my first for only a short while when I was very young, I still grow one that I found in a trash pile when I was in junior high school, and another that I found naturalized in a creek near San Martin shortly after I graduated from college. I bring pieces of them everywhere I go. Both are the big and weedy types that are probably very closely related to the straight species. The first one is the very common bright pink with leaves that lack halos. The second is the very common bright orange red with only slight halos on the leaves. Getting back to this remarkably bright red zonal geranium; it is not one of mine. The leaves have only very light halos. The growth seems to be almost as vigorous and weedy as my bright orange red one, but not quite. It is more tame, and more prolific with bloom. The bright red color is prettier too.P80707+++
5. Lithodora looks prettier close up that it really looks in the landscape. It was planted into one of the newer small landscapes, but is not growing very well. I found the name to be amusing because it seems to mean that it smells like a rock. However, someone recently explained to me that the name means that it adores rocks, since it naturally grows in soil that is too rocky for other plants.P80707++++
6. White Hydrangea is a nonconformist among all the hydrangeas that I fertilized to be either pink or blue. So far, the pink ones are still pink, and the blue ones are still blue. The few white ones are always white. http://www.canyon-news.com/ph-has-ups-and-downs/80473P80707+++++
This is the link for Six on Saturday, for anyone else who would like to participate:

https://thepropagatorblog.wordpress.com/2017/09/18/six-on-saturday-a-participant-guide/

Posted on by tonytomeo · 3 Comments

‘Mystic Spires Blue’ Salvia

70705Once it gets started in late spring, ‘Mystic Spires Blue’ salvia has potential to bloom until autumn. It only needs older floral spikes pruned away as they fade (deadheading) to stimulate new bloom. If it gets overworked and lanky without deadheading, it can be cut back in the middle of summer to start a new bloom cycle all over. It can get more than three feet tall and almost three feet broad.

Butterflies and hummingbirds really dig the small rich purplish blue flowers that are tightly packed into the upper foot or so of the floral spikes. These floral spikes tend to lean away from the center of the plant, with the tallest on top leaning collectively in one direction or another. They look like they would be good cut flowers, but they might start to drop their older flowers after only a few days.

The deep green foliage is technically evergreen, but it does not matter. All growth should be cut back to just a few inches above the ground in winter. ‘Mystic Spires Blue’ salvia likes richer soil and a bit more water than what drought tolerant salvias want. Yet, like most salvias, it grows more efficiently as #1 (1 gallon) plants planted as winter ends, than #5. Warm and sunny exposure is best.

 

Posted on by tonytomeo · 7 Comments

Things Heat Up In Summer

70705thumbThis does not seem like such a mild climate when it is difficult to distinguish between the time and the temperature on a local bank clock tower. You know; when punctuation is the only difference between four minutes past one, and one hundred four degrees. Fortunately, like mild frost in winter, hot weather does not happen too often, which is why this climate really is milder than most.

Most of us know what to do for the garden when the weather gets warmer. Obviously, many plants want more water. What we do not often consider is that there a few things that we should ‘not’ do. Unlike us, the plants in the garden can not find shade when the weather gets warm. Those that are exposed find creative ways to provide their own shade. We really do not want to mess with that.

By this time of year, outer foliage of exposed plants is mature enough to tolerate heat. Only foliage of plants that prefer to be partly shaded is likely to be damaged. However, inner foliage of even the toughest plants is not as resilient as outer foliage is. Simply shearing a hedge exposes inner foliage that can be scorched by overexposure. Sunlight enhances the effects of heat and aridity.

If possible, it is best to delay such pruning and shearing until after unusually hot weather. No one wants to be out working in the garden on a hot day anyway. More typical seasonable weather may not seem to be much cooler, but a few degrees can be a big difference to plants. Once exposed, inner foliage should adapt, and hopefully be resilient to heat before the weather gets hot again.

While young and thin, formerly shaded bark that suddenly becomes exposed can be damaged by sun scald. (Deciduous trees do not get scalded while defoliated in winter because the intensity of sunlight is diminished at that time of year.) Sun scald of bark is much more serious than foliar scorch because it kills bark, leaving open wounds on main limbs and trunks. Decay within these wounds compromises structural integrity, and can ruin otherwise healthy trees.

Although rare, spontaneous limb failure can occur in some trees during warm weather, particularly if humidity increases and breezes remain minimal. It sounds silly, but warmth accelerates vascular activity, possibly until foliage becomes too heavy for the limbs that support it. If limbs break, they can cause major disfigurement, and detrimentally expose bark of inner limbs and trunks.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 4 Comments

Horridculture – Mutants


P80704Mutants are the source of many of our favorite cultivars of otherwise simpler specie. Many cultivars of plants with compact, pendulous or fastigiate (strictly vertical) growth, or variegated, bronzed, golden or otherwise abnormally colored foliage, were derived from ‘sports’, which are mutant stems that appear on otherwise normal plants. Thornless blackberries were sports of thorny cultivars. Fruitless mulberry is a sport of white mulberry. There is no shortage of mutants.

https://tonytomeo.wordpress.com/2018/05/07/cultivars-are-the-real-cloned-mutants/

https://tonytomeo.wordpress.com/2018/05/06/sport/

By nature, mutants are genetically unstable. A few can easily mutate back to their original and more genetically stable characteristics. Variegated plants are notorious for developing simple green unvariegated foliage. Because it has more chlorophyll, the unvariegated foliage grows faster, and has the potential to eventually overwhelm and replace the variegated foliage. That is why green sports should get pruned out of variegated plants.

‘President Roosevelt’ is the most popular of the few variegated rhododendrons. In nursery production, it gets pruned somewhat regularly to remove green sports. Variegated specimens are rare in landscapes because almost all revert to unvariegated foliage within only a few years.

‘Yellow Wave’ is a cultivar of New Zealand flax with pendulous yellow striped foliage. It can be seen in front of the upright greener foliage in the background. These are not two separate plants stuck together. The more vigorous green foliage is a reverting sport that should have been removed by the ‘gardener’ who is supposed to be ‘maintaining’ this landscape. The green sport is now so developed that it can not be removed without damaging the rest of the ‘Yellow Wave’ growth. It will undoubtedly be left to overwhelm and replace it. Fortunately, the upright green foliage is about as appealing as the ‘Yellow Wave’, so no one will notice the inadequacy of the maintenance. No one ever does.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 12 Comments

Hydrangea

80711There are so many more of the fancier cultivars of hydrangea, Hydrangea macrophylla, than there were as recently as the 1990s. Many of the pink and blue hydrangeas were interchangeable years ago. They would bloom blue if the soil was acidic. They would bloom pink if the soil was alkaline. Their color changed accordingly when planted from potting media into soil of another pH.

Most of the modern cultivars nowadays are better at one color or the other. Those that want to be rich pink or almost red might turn lavender or purple in acidic soil. Those that want to be rich blue might do the same in alkaline soil. That makes for many hues of pink, blue, lavender and purple. Most of those that bloom white always bloom white, and their foliage might be a little lighter green.

There is also much more variety in floral form than ever before, although all bloom in summer or autumn with big rounded or nearly spherical trusses of many small flowers. The deciduous leaves are about six inches long, and pleasantly lush and glossy. Modern compact cultivars stay low and dense. Larger cultivars get about six feet high and wide, with somewhat open branch structure.

Posted on by tonytomeo

pH Has Ups And Downs

80711thumbEnvironment is what determines what plants grow where. It may sound simple enough, but environment is a combination of many different factors, including but not limited to climate, soil quality and exposure. Each of these factors is a complicated combination of other factors. For example, climate includes temperature, humidity, rainfall, frost dates, winter chill duration, wind and so on.

Home gardening, like the production of horticultural and agricultural commodities, is obviously limited by environment. Plants that want rich soil with good moisture retention are not happy in clay or inert sandy soils. Annual vegetable and flower plants that do not tolerate frost are grown after the last frost, and finish before the first frost. Annual plants that survive frost are grown in between.

Environmental modifications, such as irrigation, fertilizers and other soil amendments, make it possible to grow what would not normally grow in particular environments. However, environmental modifications are not always practical. For example, if the cost of irrigation of a particular commodity might exceed the projected revenue of that crop, an alternative crop must be grown instead.

pH (the ‘power of hydrogen’) is another one of the many limiting environmental factors. It is what makes the soil acidic or alkaline. Some plants prefer the soil to be slightly acidic with low pH. Some are more tolerant of slight alkalinity with high pH. What we choose to grow in our gardens should be adaptable to the pH of the endemic soil, whether it is acidic, alkaline or close to neutral.

There are all sorts of fertilizers and soil amendments that can modify the pH somewhat if necessary. Such amendments make it possible to grow rhododendrons and azaleas and other plants that prefer slightly acidic soil where the soil is naturally slightly alkaline. The problem is that the adjustments of pH are not permanent, so must be maintained. In many situation, major modification of pH is impractical. It is generally more practical to select plants that will be happy with the natural endemic pH.