George's Current Ramblings and Readlings

Spring Derailed… but It’s Coming

March 27th, 2018

   I’ll try not to rub it in when I admit that I was enjoying 70-degree days in the sunny Deep South when everyone here was dealing with the record-setting, first-day-of-spring snowstorm.

Last week’s snow was more insult than injury.

See my photo gallery on gardens of New Orleans and the Deep South

   Though most of the snow was gone in a few days, the melting and resulting wet soil will set us back a bit on the start of the growing season. We were running a little slow even before that.

   I don’t think we’ll see much serious or long-term damage. The spring snow was more insult than injury.

   The two main issues were limbs that came down and evergreens that sagged from the weight of the snow.

   If you had some branch breakage, eliminate ragged stubs by making sharp pruning cuts to just outside the little rings where branches attach to trunks or larger branches.

   Don’t get up on a ladder to fix high damage. Call an insured professional to handle hangers-on and limit your cutting to what you can reach from the ground.

   Evergreens that sagged should spring back to form as temperatures warm. If they don’t by April, use soft ties (old nylons are good) to pull branches back together. Tie them inside the foliage rather than around the perimeter so you don’t see this botanical straitjacketing.

   Most perennial flowers are just getting started or still dormant. They should get back on track shortly – at worst with some browned leaves that can be pruned off as new ones grow.

   Early planted vegetables such as peas, cabbage, onions, broccoli, spinach, and lettuce are very cold-hardy and won’t be fazed by the snow, other than a slight delay in development while they were under snow.

   The buds of spring-blooming trees and shrubs also will continue on their way since they’re more sensitive to unusually cold temperatures than a temporary covering of snow. While a foot of snow is unusual for later March, temperatures in the upper 20s and low 30s are not.

   As we drift back into the 40s, flower buds should open and bloom nicely, albeit a little later than some years.

   Don’t worry about bulbs such as daffodils, hyacinths, crocuses, and tulips. Those are cold-hardier than most people think – especially the leaves.

   The worst that should happen with those is that bulbs whose flowers opened and were pulled over from the weight of the heavy snow will finish their bloom drooping rather than looking up and out. Even that won’t cause any lasting damage.

See George’s video on not worrying about bulbs poking up early

12 Low-Care Plants You Probably Won’t Kill

March 20th, 2018

   The first qualification on my new-plant list is that it’s not likely to die.

Hydrangea Pinky Winky

   A dead plant isn’t a good plant in my mind – no matter how cool it looked in the garden-center pot or what kind of kudos it got in print.

   If living is something you value in plants, too, here are 12 shrubs, evergreens and perennials I like that give really good survival odds, even under assorted forms of abuse.

   1.) Panicle hydrangeas (Hydrangea paniculata). Superb new varieties are available in this type of cold-hardy, summer-blooming shrub with the white-to-pink cone-shaped flowers. Options range from 4- to 5-foot dwarf types such as Little Lime®, Bobo® and Little Quick Fire® to 7- to 8-footers such as ‘Limelight,’ Pinky Winky® and Quick Fire®. (Sun or part shade.)

   2.) Spirea ‘Ogon’ (Mellow Yellow®) (Spirea thunbergii). This spring-flowering shrub looks more like a 5-foot, golden willow than a typical ball-shaped spirea. The leaves are narrow and finely textured and turn coppery in fall. Dainty, snow-white flowers cover the plant in early spring. (Sun or part shade.)

   3.) Shrub roses. The 4-foot Knock Out® series is best known, but other types such as the lower-growing Drift®, Oso Easy®, Kolorscape® and Flower Carpet® series give a long bloom time in multiple color options with little care other than an annual or twice-a-year cutback. (Sun or light shade.)

Theme of the 2019 Philadelphia Flower Show… and Highlights from 2018

March 11th, 2018

   A lot of people are eager to know next year’s Philadelphia Flower Show theme even before the current show is over.

   Here you go: “Flower Power.”

I’m guessing next year’s Flower-Power-themed Philadelphia Flower Show will feature at least one floral vehicle, like this one that Jane and Larry Shull have in their Perry County backyard.

   Part of it will be a celebration of the 50^th anniversary of Woodstock, so expect peace signs, hippie accoutrements, and I’d imagine at least one VW bus with flowers painted on it.

   But the bigger tie-in is that the main entrance will feature the official competition for the 2019 FTD World Cup of Flowers.

   This is the global competition for floral designers. It’s where the world’s best designers try to outdo each other to win what’s essentially the gold medal in a flower-arranging Olympics.

   The competition will kick off during the 2019 Philadelphia Flower Show’s preview day on Fri., March 1, 2019. Winners will be announced at a gala event on Sun., March 3, 2019.

   All competitors will create four floral designs, and the top 10 semifinalists will create an additional design. The top five finalists will create one final design prior to the winner being announced.

   The competition will be the 2019 “Flower Power” show’s central feature.

   If you’re interested, the 2019 show takes place March 2-10, 2019. Lowee’s Group Tours and I once again plan to run bus trips there each show weekday: March 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8. Details and bookings will start this fall. Check my Talks and Trips page for when the 2019 trips are ready.

   Meanwhile, the 2018 “Wonders of Water” show just ended after being disrupted for the third year in a row by a midweek snow.

   See 25 photos I took at the 2018 Philadelphia Flower Show.

The World’s Biggest Tulip Give-Away

March 6th, 2018

   If you’re growing tulips in your yard, odds are the bulbs originated in the Netherlands, that tiny European country that supplies the world with about 1.7 billion tulip bulbs every year.

People pick out their free tulips on Dam Square during Amsterdam’s 2018 National Tulip Day.

   One of the world’s most impressive horticultural sights is in spring in the Dutch rural tulip-growing regions, where carpet-like rows of blooming tulips roll out for acres and acres like we grow corn and soybeans.

   I’ve been there twice in that time frame and can tell you that tulip fields are a lot more eye-grabbing than soybean fields.

   Even more impressive is the Dutch public garden called Keukenhof, which is 79 gorgeous acres filled with 7 million spring-flowering bulbs. It’s only open during spring, so the whole place is packed with bulbs for maximum impact in those few months.

See a photo gallery of the Keukenhof gardens and Dutch bulb fields from George’s 2012 group tour to the Netherlands.

I’m at the Philadelphia Flower Show this week… read my PennLive post on some of the coolest things to see.

   This year, while visiting my new granddaughter in Amsterdam, I happened to be there on the third Saturday of January, which is the day of an annual Dutch occasion called “Nationale Tulpendag,” or National Tulip Day.

   The highlight is when Dutch bulb-growers join forces to plant a “picking garden” of 200,000 tulips in Dam Square in the heart of Amsterdam.

   These are tulips forced into bloom in greenhouses and set out in wide blocks of trays. They’re not planted in soil but packed tightly together with the bulbs intact and roots intertwined. In other words, they’re live plants, and suitable for planting.

   The best part is that people get to come in and pick a bag of 15 free tulips.

   And pick they do. Some 15,000 people line up to take advantage of the offer, which is an excellent way to brighten a typically cloudy, chilly Dutch January day.

   We waited in line for 45 minutes to pick our share of blooming tulips, which I planted in my daughter’s postage-stamp Amsterdam backyard for instant color.

Check Out New “Gardening Complete” Book

February 27th, 2018

   My fifth gardening book is done and out – a 376-page, $30 hardcover on 19 of the most important and timely gardening topics.

The cover of “Gardening Complete.”

   It’s titled, “Gardening Complete: How to Best Grow Vegetables, Flowers, and Other Outdoor Plants,” and it’s a Cool Springs Press collaboration with seven other authors, each of whom contributed two or three of the book’s chapters.

   I wrote chapters on “Botany for Gardeners” (plant names, plant types and other important basics), “Designing Your Gardens” (deciding on goals, pairing plants, laying out gardens, etc.), and “The All-Season Garden” (plants and tips for making the yard look good in all four seasons).

   Other authors did chapters on soil and compost; pollinator gardens; container gardening; raised-bed gardening; watering, fertilizing and pruning; native plants; growing fruits and vegetables, and weed and pest control.

   See a video that describes the book

   The other seven authors are Katie Elzer-Peters, Rhonda Fleming Hayes, Charlie Nardozzi, Tara Nolan, Dr. Jacqueline A. Soule, Lynn Steiner, and Jessica Walliser.

   Altogether, it’s a comprehensive look at what I think are the most timely and most important topics that gardeners care about.

   The book is a hardcover retailing for $30 and is available in bookstores as well as through online booksellers such as Amazon and Barnes and Noble.

   I’ll also be happy to sign a copy if you order one through the Buy Helpful Info page of my website.