Just Because....

Just because this is so pretty. Hibiscus 'The Path'.

"Dis-buds" for You.

Guess what time of year it is again? Yep, it's BUD time. No, not time to grab a cold one and sit back with the ball game on, it is the time to disbud for the upcoming show which is now 8 weeks away!

If you are grooming many plants for a show it's sometimes hard to look up each and every plant to determine if it's a single or a double. So, to make things relatively simple, you disbud all standard plants at eight weeks. Doubles could be done at 8 weeks and single-bloom plants at 6 weeks, but that can get confusing not to mention time consuming.

It's also a good time to look at the leaf placement and the overall grooming of the plant. You could gently re-align leaves at this time so that they will be in the optimal position by Oct. Seeing that the plant is in good shape and clean now will prevent accidentally knocking off blooms or leaves closer to the show too.

Any questions about getting plants ready for a show???? Contact the blog at nsavctc@gmail.com and experts will be happy to answer your questions and lend a guiding hand for anyone that would like some advice.

It's The Great State Fair!

Time again for the 12 biggest days of summer!!!! Food, fun and FLOWERS!!!

The horticulture building is featuring the African violet show starting today, Thursday August 23, 2007. Lots of violets, gesneriads and design. The AVSM is hosting the show with additional affiliate club tables all featuring lots of beautiful plants!!!

Get on down to the Fair and grab something on a stick before you go and check it out. Bring your camera too!

Everyone Needs One of These!!!

You might be like me and you've definitely noticed that there aren't a lot of books, publications or decent printed materials about growing gesneriads. I might hazard a guess and say that one of the last inclusive books about a good variety of gesneriads was published about thirty years ago in the 1970's. This brand new book looks like it will be a wonderful guide to growing gesneriads and if you read about the offer, they are practically giving them away. What a great deal! Their publication chair has this to say:

The Gesneriad Society is proud to announce the pending publication of
its manual "How to Know and Grow Gesneriads". Publication date is
September 1, 2007. The cover price of "How to Know and Grow
Gesneriads" will be US$10. Quantity discounts will be available.

Thanks to a generous donation from the Frelinghuysen Arboretum
Gesneriad Society, all Gesneriad Society members will receive a copy
in the mail with their 4th Quarter 2007 issue of Gesneriads, to be
mailed in October.

We are offering a special pre-publication price of US$5 until
September 1. That means only the next 10 days. So of you aren't a
Society member, or if you are curious and can't wait until
October/November, or if you want to buy copies for friends, here's
your chance. Go to http://gesneriadsociety.org/Shop/knowandgrow.htm
for more information.

--Peter Shalit, Publications Chair, The Gesneriad Society

Art to A-Maze

The Minnesota Landscape Arboretum is one of the BEST ways to enjoy a summer day for plant lovers - and also for those who haven't discovered that they are plant lovers yet. (After seeing the Arboretum they will be!)

This year's special feature is an art installation called Art to A-Maze! The Arboretum says, "Explore the relationship between people and the natural world on the Art to A-Maze Walk, featuring a juried collection of 15 installations of environmental art and sculpture. The art walk leads visitors from the Oswald Visitor Center to the new permanent Maze Garden."


This is the permanent knot garden viewed from above in the herb display.



The mazes were just one of the wonderful parts about spending the day there. Besides seeing all the brilliant flowers, there is something to learn in each display. The collections show you all the various choices if you are thinking about choosing some plant materials for your own yard.

The annual displays highlight the newest, the most vigorous and the unusual while the tram tour gives you a great chance to preview all the places that you'll want to visit on your own so that you can spend some time really seeing all that there is to see.



The hosta collection/glade has over 300 different hostas spread out under the canopy of mature maples, all labeled for the viewer.







The formal hybrid rose gardens have hundreds of roses... tree roses, miniatures, floribunda and more.





The gold fish must have had an excellent year so far if the number of tiny fish is an indication. It's Koi heaven.






And sometimes you just need a little whimsy to make the journey complete. It might be a warthog, but then again....

Shipping the Right Way...

Well, this is certainly the time of year that a person might start to see that the "summer" collection is looking a little worn and "tired". It just might be time to think of ordering something new or trading some plant material with a friend.

The gesneriphiles list recently had a very thorough discussion about the best ways to get slips and cuttings transported or mailed to their destination in the freshest and best shape possible. There was a fairly consistent consensus that "dry shipping" was definitely preferable to sending the material wet, or with moisture around the base of the stem. For those that are not already on the gesneriphiles@lists.ibiblio.org I suggest that you sign up. They have a wealth of information and very helpful ideas for the gesneriad/AV enthusiast. Some of the comments from the list tell the story themselves....

K. C. said "I had mixed results with the cuttings/leaves I purchased or received at convention. It appears those that were just placed in their baggies without anything wet around them faired much better than those that did. I even removed some of the wetter paper towels that were on some while still at convention, but the damage was already done. I have also found that some plants (Chirita, Petrocosmea) actually do better it the stems have had time to dry off before potting them up."

J. R. had this to say "I agree that wilt is better than rot. I've had a number of things sent to me over the years that looked like they were too dried out to try to save, and almost always they'd root and grow. And not just succulent material.

J. B. says "I would concur with the "pack dry" ideas being set forth. I received several cuttings from this year's convention, courtesy of J. and her sharp eyes on the lookout for a few things, and the courtesy of several fellow growers responding to one of my earlier posts. One was dry, nothing but the plant, and it has now been stuck into some perlite and is ready to root, no wilting involved. But another that she picked up for me was a cutting of Drymonia variegata - as most of you know somewhat hard to come by. Sad to say, not only had the leaves dissolved into mush but the entire stem right down to the kleenex (?) wrapped end was a thin tube of soggy fluid and barely contained mush, no chance of rescue.

And S. G. said "One thing I have found personally helpful in preserving plant specimens, especially cuttings and leaves which I won't have an opportunity to put down right away (eg. at Convention) is to have a small supply of the New Zealand Sphagnum moss pellets on hand. One pellet can be reconstituted in a larger plastic baggie. The excess water can be squeezed out and the moss fluffed. I then use a small amount of this slightly dampened moss to surround just the tip of some thin-leaved leaf or delicate stem cuttings or humidity-loving small plants which might not be fleshy enough to survive in just a baggie until I arrive home. I also wonder if this moss might have some of the anti-fungal properties of the milled moss sometimes sold under the name of "no damp off". Once plant material begins to decay, the process can be pretty rapid. The process releases hormones and gases which can accelerate the decay of the remaining material. If one immedidiately gets rid of any dead or decaying leaves and stems and rinses off the remaining good material, sometimes the process can be slowed down. Also opening the baggie periodically to release the gas build up will also help. I have noticed that certain material has a tendency to decay at a faster rate in a plastic bag while other material can live without decaying for some time. Certain columnea and nematanthus cuttings can lose leaves very quickly in sealed plastic bags. Sometimes just leaving the plastic bags open a bit can release these gases which accelerate the decaying process. Temperature also accelerates the decay process so keeping plants at cooler room temperatures is better."

And finally, here is yet another way to prepare the cuttings A. B. wrote "I purchased a number of leaves and cuttings that Marcia Belisle (commercial vendor) brought to the sale. They made it home in perfect condition. Here is how she prepared them:

She planted the leaf or cutting in a small plastic bag (about 1.5 by 2 inches) filled with soilless mix. I suppose you could use vermiculite or 1:1 vermiculite:perlite, too. The bag had a small cut in the bottom to allow water to drain. Then the smaller bag + its leaf or cutting was placed into a larger zip bag. This was about 3 by 4 or 5 inches (the sizes that are available at craft stores such as Michael's or Hobby Lobby by the 100). This larger bag had an address label printed with the full description from her catalog.

Marcia told B. that she and J. prepared the bags well ahead, placed them upright in trays, and kept them moist. Every leaf or cutting had roots when I unpacked them from their little plastic 'pots' and were in perfect condition. And, I had much more information on the label than fits on a stake. Other unrooted items I purchased prepared in other ways were not so lucky!"

Also, for those mailing plant material, padded paper envelopes worked much better than the plastic padded ones. What do YOU think about this???? Leave comments.

What's Your Opinion???

Here's a challenge for everyone! Look at the photos and think about what's going on with these plants. Contact the blog with your ideas. ALL IDEAS ARE HELPFUL .... to start conversations, generate solutions to this and other problems, and to help others that might be having the same things happen to their plants. Simply reply to the blog. For HELP commenting, click on link.

What causes the center leaves of a recently potted plant to die off? Forget pests, this has nothing to do with them. I can repot 30 plants and after a couple weeks will notice that on two or three the center leaves have turned brown and died off. Now keep in mind that the leaves do start to grow then turn mushy brown from the tip to the stem.

More often than not the entire center will be lost. The plant itself is still healthy, but with no center, it will form multiple crowns or produce suckers. Okay, you still have a plant with which to start over from leaves or suckers. But it would have been much nicer to have the original plant that is already a good size in the first place.

I think Yukako has a chance of making it. Ma’s Winter Moon is very iffy. Sora's Munchie and Lyon’s Fortune Teller look very pathetic. It can be with any color foliage, variegated or not. Plus the plant keeps right on blooming if it has any possibility of producing leaves before the center dries up completely. By the way, there was no evidence of “orange crud” on the plant.

So, does this have to do with transplant shock? Is it because it was planted too deep? What?

Many thanks to Barb W. for the article and the great shots of the plants! Remember, send in comments!

Extremely Cool!

Ok, these have to be the best thing I've seen in a plant collection ever! The Como Conservatory's new feature just outside of the Tropical Encounters exhibit have "giant Victoria water platters, just like they had at Como Park in the 1920's!!! These water lilies from South America can grow leaf pads up to 6 feet across! The pads have an interesting texture that looks almost like plastic on the top with harsh, substantial spines on the bottom. They can hold more than hundred pounds if the weight is distributed evenly over the surface of the pad.



























The flowers are fascinating too. They apparently open for just two nights. The first night they are white, while the second night they're scarlet red. They are from the family of Nymphaeaceae, genus Victoria, USDA zone 10a to 11. The top photo shows other water plantings and some more rather typically sized lily pads for comparison. This is a display well worth seeing. I can't wait to take better photos the next time I'm there!

Oh, the waiting!

Harry Potter: three hours and nine minutes!!!!

They're not just for breakfast anymore!

Ever decide that you're just plain bored with your usual salad? Can't think of a way to dress up the roast? Well, you might have to look into EDIBLE FLOWERS!


Disclaimer first!!!! Do not eat anything that you have not PERSONALLY RESEARCHED and determined to be safe for you and your particular dietary requirements. Not all flowers are edible and some people are allergic to various things, just like with any other foods. We bear no responsibility for what you may or may not try!!!

Recently, there have been articles and recipes using edible flowers in the news and in popular magazines. Flowers can add color and some complex tastes to what may be ordinary fare. Midwest Home magazine ran an an article in last month's issue called "Beauty and the Feast" in their Savvy Host section that not only had recipes with delicious looking pictures, but they listed various local restaurants that feature flowers in the dishes on their menu.


This is a photo taken from the Midwest Home magazine shot by photographer Maki Strunc.

I went out into the garden and found some of the edible flowers that I had. After I took their pictures, I ate them. I will have to admit (as an editorial comment) that some things seemed like I was I was tasting lawn clippings. But, to be fair, some of them were actually pretty good. I am going to try serving up some of the more tasty ones to the family in a salad.

Use web resources to find lists of different flowers and specific information on them that may be useful to know before you try them. Type in "edible flowers" in to a search engine like Google and you will get plenty of information.

The flowers pictured in the composite photographs are in order - #1 Bachelor Button, Borage, Celery, Cilantro. #2 Dandilion, Fuchsia, Hibiscus, Impatiens. #3 Monarda, Nasturtium, Pansy, Rose. #4 Snapdragon, Strawberry, Tulip, Viola.

Once again, this is meant for fun and interest. Do NOT eat anything that you are not SURE of! Be sure to look at Midwest Home's website (click on the link) and check out the recipes!