George's Current Ramblings and Readlings

2022 Garden Trips: Hoping for “Normal” Again

February 15th, 2022

   Will this be the year when we can finally get back to traveling again without worrying about omicron variants, antigen tests, quarantines, and last-minute cancellations?

Some of the bulb beds at the Netherlands’ Keukenhof garden… one of our trip stops this year.

   I’m hoping. And assuming the best, Lowee’s Group Tours, Collette Vacations, and I have put the finishing touches on our 2022 lineup of garden-themed trips.

   Things have been so uncertain for two years now that it’s almost hard to remember the “good old days” when we could just go.

   It’s been an adventure even getting this far with the new planned trips. We normally have details ready on the whole lineup the fall before, but this year, Jo and Chrissie at Lowee’s have been pounding their heads trying to get confirmations and prices on everything.

   Although things still could change, we’re as ready as we can be with a 2022 series that will include a pair of European trips, another round of popular home-garden tours, five day trips to the 2022 Philadelphia Flower Show (outdoors again in June), and multi-day trips to see gardens of New York’s Hudson Valley, gardens of the Midwest (St. Louis, Nashville, Louisville), and a Christmas-time visit to North Carolina’s Biltmore and Tennessee’s Smoky Mountain National Park, Gatlinburg, and Pigeon Forge.

   I’ll be doing a free, online PowerPoint presentation with photos, details, and pricing tomorrow, Wed., Feb. 16, at 6:30 p.m. You’re invited to join. You just have to register in advance to get the log-in address and instructions.

   If you’re interested, click here to get the PowerPoint Zoom link from Lowee’s.

   I’ve also posted details on my Talks and Trips page.

   Or you can go directly to Lowee’s Garden Series website page, where you can see the itineraries and even book trips directly online.

   Or you can go the old-fashioned route and just call Lowee’s Group Tours at 717-657-9658 (or toll-free 1-888-345-6933) or email CKelly@Lowees.com.

   Here’s a quick rundown on where we’re planning to go and when:

   Netherlands and Belgium River Cruise, April 18-April 29, 2022

   We’ll see the stunning Dutch bulb fields, the amazing Keukenhof bulb gardens, and the once-every-10-years Floriade horticulture expo in this 12-day tour of the Netherlands and Belgium, which includes a seven-day river cruise. We’ll visit the Dutch towns of Arnhem and Middelburg, the Belgian cities of Bruges, Ghent, and Antwerp, and tour the Dutch windmill village of Kinderdijk, the huge Aalsmeer Flower Market, Amsterdam’s botanic garden, and a working bulb farm. Prices start at $4,999 per person double, including airfare, the cruise, hotels, admissions, and 26 meals.

No Winter “Wow,” but the 2022 Philadelphia Flower Show Will Happen

February 8th, 2022

   Cabin-fevered gardeners normally would be gearing up by now to visit the world’s biggest and oldest indoor flower show, which usually takes place in early March just two hours down the turnpike from Harrisburg.

This artist rendering shows the planned entrance to the 2022 Philadelphia Flower Show.
Credit: Pa. Horticultural Society

   But in case you’re wondering why you’re not hearing much about it, the Philadelphia Flower Show for the second straight year is taking place outside in June.

   To be specific, the 2022 show is scheduled for June 11 through 19 in the same place it was held last June – over 15 acres in south Philadelphia’s FDR Park.

   Lowee’s Group Tours and I will be offering five daily trips to the show June 13-17. Two of them will be show-only offerings, while three of them will include morning tours of three different Philadelphia-area public gardens before heading over to the Flower Show (Fairmount Park/Shofuso Japanese Garden, Morris Arboretum, and Chanticleer). See details on all of the trips here.

Read George’s PennLive.com report, with photos, from the 2021 first-time-outside Philadelphia Flower Show

   A lot of people (me included) were hoping the show would go back to its good, old, indoor, end-of-winter self after a year when COVID forced it outside for the first time in its 193-year history.

   But as people continued to get infected with COVID, the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society’s show planners eventually had to make a decision. The continuing uncertainty carried the day.

   “The whole driving force is COVID and the unknowns from it,” Sam Lemheney, PHS’s chief of shows and events, told me when the show pulled the plug on the return-to-inside idea late last September. “We have to decide so far in advance to have everything ready and have plants growing in the greenhouses. There are still way too many unknowns and potential complexities with going back inside the Convention Center. We did it last year outside and figure we can do it again… and hopefully make it better.”

The Best New Trees and Shrubs of 2022

February 1st, 2022

   Five hydrangeas with new twists, a compact new native Virginia sweetspire, and a “baby brother” to the popular ‘Green Giant’ arborvitae are among the best new trees and shrubs hitting the market for the 2022 growing season.

Hydrangea Let’s Dance Can Do!
Credit: Proven Winners

   Growers, local garden centers, and other plant experts picked the following dozen woody plants for the four-part, best-new-plants series I compile each year.

   Today’s best new trees and shrubs of 2022 is the final installment of this year’s series.

   Part one on best new edibles of 2022 appeared on Jan. 11, part two on best new annual flowers of 2022 appeared on Jan. 18, and part three on best new perennial flowers of 2022 posted last Tuesday, Jan. 25.

   Some of the following new tree and shrub varieties are available online and in some plant catalogs. Most also will be available in local garden centers beginning in April.

   The details:

Hydrangea Let’s Dance Can Do!

   Of all the many new hydrangeas introduced in the last few years, Proven Winners’ Natalie Carmolli says this one really stands out for its gobs of baseball-sized flowers that keep coming and coming – right to the end of the season.

   “It’s a reblooming machine,” she says. “We knew this plant was special when we released it, but it keeps surprising us with its outstanding ability to rebloom.”

   Carmolli says Can Do’s “secret” is that it sets flower buds along the entire length of each stem, not just at the tips.

   Although Let’s Dance Can Do looks like a common big-leaf hydrangea with rounded blue-violet or pink flowers (depending on soil acidity), it’s actually a type of mountain hydrangea. Mountain hydrangeas have winter-hardier flower buds than most big-leaf types, meaning less chance that winter will kill flower buds (a key answer to the question, “Why didn’t my hydrangeas flower?”)

   Let’s Dance Can Do plants grow three to four feet tall and almost as wide, its leaves turn a purplish shade in fall, and an ideal site is one with morning sun and afternoon shade.

Oakleaf hydrangea ‘Snowcicle’
Credit: Plants Nouveau

Oakleaf hydrangea ‘Snowcicle’

   Another new twist in hydrangeas is ‘Snowcicle,’ which is a native oakleaf type that’s unusual because it has double-flowering blooms.

   Angela Treadwell-Palmer, founder and co-owner of Alabama-based Plants Nouveau, picks this as her favorite new-for-2022 woody plant for its “incredibly long, double-flowered panicles and strong stems that set it apart from all of its predecessors.”

   ‘Snowcicle’s’ summer-long blooms are 12 to 14 inches long and age from creamy-white to a showy combination of rose-red, olive-green, and cream. The strong stems eliminate flopping, which is common on most oakleaf hydrangea varieties.

   ‘Snowcicle’ plants grow four to six feet tall in full sun to part shade and develop a fall foliage color that ranges from deep wine to burnt orange.

The Best New Perennial Flowers of 2022

January 25th, 2022

   Compact versions of two popular native plants, three new ornamental grasses with golden blades, and two new dark-leafed flowers top the list of interesting new perennials debuting in the 2022 growing season.

Amsonia ‘String Theory’
Credit: Walters Gardens

   Growers, local garden centers, and other plant experts picked the following 14 perennial-flower choices for the annual four-part, best-new-plants series I compile at the beginning of each year.

   The article on best new edibles of 2022 appeared Tuesday, Jan. 11, while the rundown on best new annual flowers posted last Tuesday, Jan. 18. The series ends next Tuesday, Feb. 1, with a look at the best new trees and shrubs of 2022.

   The following new perennial flowers are available online and in some plant catalogs and will start showing up in local garden centers in April.

   The details:

Amsonia ‘String Theory’

   Amsonia hubrichtii, commonly called “bluestar,” is an under-used native perennial with blue spring flowers and showy fine-textured foliage that turns gold in fall. The main rap against it is that some people think it gets a little tall and floppy with its three-foot height.

   New for 2022 is ‘String Theory,’ a compact version that knocks a foot off of amsonia’s usual height.

   “It’s more compact than the species, plus the leaves don’t turn chlorotic (yellowish) in summer,” says Chris Ruger, a grower for the wholesale Quality Greenhouses near Dillsburg who picks ‘String Theory’ as his favorite new perennial of 2022.

   The variety blooms a little later in spring than the species but still retains the periwinkle-blue flower color as well as the brilliant golden fall-foliage color.

   Plants grow just under two feet tall, ideally in full sun. Amsonia is also heat-tolerant and not a favorite of deer.

Pennisetum ‘Yellow Ribbons’
Credit: Penn State Trial Gardens

Golden/yellow fountain grasses

   This must be the year of the golden fountain grass, which is a compact, deer-resistant type of ornamental grass. Three different experts picked three different new gold-bladed fountain grasses as their favorite perennials of 2022.

   Bucks County author, speaker, and “Perennial Diva” Stephanie Cohen likes the new Lumen Gold variety for both its growing habit and rich golden color.

   “It’s short, fine-textured, grows in a clump, and looks good all season long,” she says. “I’m growing it, and I love it.”

   Lumen Gold’s brightest golden foliage color comes in spring. Plants then soften to lemon in early summer, then more to lime-green the rest of the year with a touch of orange in fall.

   Sinclair Adam, director of Penn State’s Trial Gardens in Lancaster County, likes the new ‘Yellow Ribbons’ fountain grass.

   “It starts out with yellow foliage in early season, then turns greener in midsummer, and in fall the yellow comes back,” Adam says, adding that it has “spotless foliage” and a uniform habit when several are grown in a group.

   Both Lumen Gold and ‘Yellow Ribbons’ grow about two feet tall with a slightly wider spread.

   And one that Walters Gardens’ Laura Robles likes is Prairie Winds ‘Lemon Squeeze.’

   Robles says ‘Lemon Squeeze’ has chartreuse-gold leaves and is “one of the best for vigor that we’ve seen in gold-leafed (fountain grasses) with absolutely no burning in the sun.”

   This one grows a bit larger at about three  tall and wide.

   All three of the above varieties produce tan plumes in mid to late summer in addition to the golden foliage and grow best in full sun and good drainage.

The Best New Annual Flowers of 2022

January 18th, 2022

   A new heavy-blooming petunia with petite white flowers, two new flowers you’ve probably never seen before, and the world’s first trailing salvia are among a banner slate of interesting new annual flowers debuting in the 2022 growing season.

Texas primrose Ladybird Sunglow
Credit: Proven Winners

   Growers, local garden centers, and other plant experts picked those and more for the four-part, best-new-plants series I compile each January – a good month for gardeners to plan what to plant in the coming season.

   The article on best new edibles of 2022 appeared last Tuesday, Jan. 11. The best new perennial flowers of 2022 will post next Tuesday, Jan. 25, and the best new trees and shrubs of 2022 is scheduled for Feb. 1.

   Some of the following new annual flowers are available in seeds or plants online and in some plant catalogs. Most also will show up in plant form in local garden centers beginning in late April to early May.

   The details:

Texas primrose Ladybird Sunglow

   Looking for something different? This new variety of a not-so-well-known, heat-tough, Texas-native flower is the favorite new-for-2022 annual of Chris Wallen, a grower at the wholesale Quality Greenhouses near Dillsburg.

   Known botanically as Calylophus, Ladybird Sunglow has bright yellow flowers that resemble evening primrose.

   “It flowered in my home garden non-stop since May and survived that first 23-degree hard (fall) freeze,” Wallen said. “Deer ignored it while eating plants all around it.”

   Ladybird Sunglow grows four to six inches tall, has a mounding habit, is attractive to pollinators, and has no known pest or disease problems.

   “This seems nearly bulletproof,” Wallen says.

   Plants do best in full sun.

Jamesbrittenia Safari Dawn
Credit: Proven Winners

Jamesbrittenia Safari Dawn

   Another new and different annual debuting in 2022 is this bicolor little rosy-pink and yellow bloomer from Proven Winners that looks a bit like sutera (a.k.a. bacopa).

   Wallen says Safari Dawn is a “gigantic improvement over Jamesbrittenia of 15 years ago. It has beautiful bicolor blooms, a nice full habit, and it’s tough and easy to grow. Plants at my house and at the (Penn State) Landisville trial gardens bloomed all summer. My plants also survived that 23-degree hard freeze.”

   Sometimes known as South African phlox, this new Jamesbrittenia grows six to 12 inches tall in a mounding habit and does well in full sun to part shade. Deer don’t like it.

   Fellow Quality Greenhouses growers Andrew Pierozak and Jason Smith also rate Safari Dawn as a 2022 favorite.

   Proven Winners says that “this heat-tolerant South African native has seemingly been on the cusp of greatness for years but has never quite broken through with the right combination of plant performance and beauty. We have finally cracked the code.”