Begonia Grandis

ベゴニア/Begonia grandis by nobuflickr

This past weekend TheGardenLady visited a lovely garden in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. The owner wanted to show me what she had in bloom. Under the trees in the shade and growing in the pachysandra were her hardy begonias – begonia grandis. She especially wanted to show off these plants that were now in flower because she had learned about Carolyn’s Shade garden from the TheGardenLady’s recommendation. This is where she bought these begonias as well as all her other healthy shade plants. And these hardy begonias were not only hardy because they overwintered but because when they are happy and they were so happy in her garden that they are popping up all over. And the flower display was so lovely – flowers with the bonus of a light fragrance.

TheGardenLady had always loved begonias and was familiar with annual begonias, Rex begonias and tuberous begonias but it was only a few years ago that I learned that there was a hardy begonia that would overwinter in zone 6. This was when a friend gave me a baby begonia grandis plant. This plant grew in my garden for a few years but this year’s drought killed it. I am so sad and plan on getting another next year.

Begonia grandis originated in East Asia – China and Japan and is the most cold hardy of all the begonias. It grows as a perennial in temperature zones 6 through 9. In zone 5 it is considered a tender perennial which means that it might survive with a good covering of mulch but you would be safest to take it indoors for the winter. Hardy begonias bloom in late summer and autumn and will propagate itself by seed and bulbils formed in the leaf axils. The plant grows about 2 feet tall and likes part to full shade – it does not really want afternoon sun. It tolerates morning sun and this allows you to see the red veins in the leaves. Begonia grandis seems to tolerate all soil types but likes woodland soil best and tolerates all pH levels though it prefers neutral to slightly acid soil with good drainage and average watering. It can be used as a ground covering.

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Aster Amellus ‘King George’

This photo of Aster amellus “King George” is from GardensandPlants.com

TheGardenLady received this question from Doug.

I am particularly interested in the “perennial Aster amellus ‘King George.’”. As I was informed by my grandmother that her father had cultivated this or a similar plant. Please could you provide me with any information you have on the subject. (her maiden name was “White” from “Crayfoots Haven” in Kent)

There are many perennial Asters. Aster amellus ‘King George” is an Italian aster, a reliable old cultivar that has prolific lovely large violet/blue-purple daisylike flowers that grow in clumps blooming in August, September and perhaps October. I believe this is the aster that has the common name Michaelmas Daisy.

King George aster is a very popular variety in the United Kingdom.  The Royal Horticultural Society had given it the Award of Garden Merit (AGM) and it seems to be sold all over the UK, but whether they ship outside the UK is the question – some of the sites said they no longer sold them outside the European Community. See here. TheGardenLady has not found “King George” for sale on line in the US, perhaps because of its being an older variety.

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Lou Manfredini’s Advice about How to Make a Raised Garden Bed

Our Suburban Garden by SteveSJ76

TheGardenLady has invited people with horticultural interests and expertise to contribute posts to this blog. The following post is about how to build a raised garden bed and was submitted by Lou Manfredini.  Lou is Ace Hardware’s Home Expert.  He is a nationally recognized DIY expert, hosting his own home improvement call-in radio show on WGN Radio in Chicago and a nationally syndicated home show, HouseSmarts. Lou is also the official home improvement expert for NBC’s TODAY Show. To learn about more tips and projects from Lou visit here.

Raised garden beds provide great advantages over traditional gardening areas. For instance, they provide more flexibility to grow flowers or vegetables in spots where the soil or ground is not ideal. With a raised bed, you can control your soil conditions and pick what type is best for what you’re growing, and by keeping your garden off the ground you can keep out pests and wildlife that might see your garden as a delicious lunch.

Ready-made garden beds and containers are available at hardware and home improvement stores, but if you don’t want to spend the money it’s simple to build your own!

First select a location for your garden. You’ll want to pick an area in your yard or deck that gets at least 5-6 hours of sunlight a day for ideal growth of your plants. Use painter’s tape to define and mark off your area. You can choose to make your raised garden bed as long or wide as you like, but make sure you can reach all plants.

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Coleus Plants at Atlock Farm

Smallwood’s Driveway by eskinola

Yesterday was a gloriously beautiful day, so TheGardenLady and her friends decided to visit Atlock Farm, an outstanding nursery at 545 Weston Canal Road in Somerset, NJ.  If you see a house surrounded by topiaried or sculpted trees, you know you are next door to this wonderful nursery.

Besides selling really excellent and unusual plants, Atlock Farm also has one of the largest displays of topiary trained plants that are for sale. Among all the plants, they sell a lot of coleus (see photo above), one of the easiest to care for and most decorative plants to add to your garden or your container garden. Coleus need little maintenance besides watering and has few pest problems. This plant can be raised easily from seed, though most people prefer to buy the plants so that they can choose from the amazing variety of leaf coloration and decorative leaf shapes. Coleus is an annual but you can take snips of leaves and root them in water and when they root can keep them over winter in a container to plant outdoors the following spring. Atlock Farm has many coleus to choose from and they even make topiary out of coleus.  See here.  Besides the plants for sale, Atlock Farm has a small show garden and this year they have lots of vegetables, all which seem to be heirloom vegetables, growing in their show garden. They sell these vegetables plus some wonderful gifts for plant people.

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Pennisetum – An Ornamental Millet

Pennisetum glaucum ‘Purple Majesty’by SS&SS

TheGardenLady received this question from Patti.

I was at my local home store yesterday and saw a beautiful ornamenatal grass in a pot. Of course ‘no one’ who worked there knew what it was! They had tag on for the container, nothing about the contents.

The plant to me looked like several mini corn stalks. They were a deep burgandy color. The heads on the plant looked like cattail heads. PLEASE can you give me an idea what this was so maybe I can get some for my house. I have been searching pictures on line and seen nothing like it yet.

It always helps for identification purposes if a reader would email a good, clear photo or photos of a plant or whatever needs identification. I am sure the store wouldn’t mind your taking a picture of the plant. Send the photo/s with your question. The more information TheGardenLady gets, the better she can answer your question/s.

Without a photo, the first plant that jumps into this Garden Lady’s mind is an ornamental millet – Pennisetum. There are a number of different ornamental millets, so my first guess is that the one that interests you is Pennisetum glaucum ‘Purple Majesty’. For good photos of this plant check out this website.

Pennisetum glaucum can be bought as seed and planted.  See here.  But it might be too late to plant it outdoors in your area this year. If you buy the plant you can save the seeds to plant next year. People love to add this plant to gardens or pots for the color of the leaves and texture of the seeds.  See here.

Of course, it could be Pennisetum setaceum ‘Rubrum’ commonly called Red Fountain Grass.  See here.  But this Pennisetum did not quite fit your description.

Please let TheGardenLady know if Pennisetum glaucum ‘Purple Majesty’ is the plant that you like.

Shrubs that Grow in Little Sun

Aucuba japonica by heathervhogg

TheGardenLady received this question from Kelly.

I live in Georgia where it can get really hot and dry at times. I have a space in back against my house which gets little or no sun during the day. I would like a shrub or two which may live in these conditions. Can you help?

This is a good but difficult question because most plants want some sun and some water. But I think gardeners will be looking for more plants that will thrive in this heat and drought.

One suggestion is Japanese Aucuba – Aucuba Japonica which does best in little sun and will live in semi-arid conditions.  See here.  This plant NEEDS shade in the south. There are a few different Aucuba japonica plants to choose from including a Variegata form that would really brighten a shady area.  See here.

Rhodotypos scandens flower by tmoertel

Another shrub that seems to be able to thrive under any condition, (it is considered an invasive in many states) is the Black Jetbead shrub Rhodotypos scandens.

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Biodegradable Flower Pots

An encouraging sign… by Green Wellies

TheGardenLady readers may already know about biodegradable flower pots, but I just saw them for the first time in a charming local garden  store.  The concept is fantastic and so is the look. Since those of you who take your plants outdoors for the summer will soon be bringing them in, you might want to consider replanting them in these attractive pots that are good for the environment.  Of course, these pots are for anyone  looking for neat pots for your plants.

These biodegradable pots are manufactured in China. The pots are made of materials such as maize straw, corncob, straw, wheat skeleton, bamboo fibers and rice hulls.  Because they are 100% biodegradable, one doesn’t have to worry about recycling them when you want to get rid of them. You can use them outdoors, but they last longer if used indoors. The colors may fade if kept a long time, but the pots will last. They come in various sizes and colors. You can easily make a hole in the bottom of the pot to prepare these pots for drainage so that you can directly plant your plant or you can leave it as is and use it as a cache pot to put a pot in. (I was also told that they make neat votive candle holders because the pot is translucent.) They would make a great fund raiser if you can get them wholesale.  See here.  If you just want the biodegradable pots  for yourself, there are retail websites that sell them if you can’t find them in a local store. See here.

Sunchokes

Jerusalem Artichoke by mightyjoepye

TheGardenLady received this question from Pecki.

I planted these sunchokes in the Spring and now the stalks are almost 5 feet tall. Do I remember that they eventually have a yellow flower or do I just wait and dig them up in November?

Jerusalem artichokes, Helianthus tuberosus, otherwise known as sunchokes, bloom late in the summer and into the fall. They are a native of North America related to the sunflower. They are not related to Jerusalem or an artichoke. The story about how the plant got its name starts when French explorer Samuel de Champlain got them from the North American natives and thought they tasted like artichokes. He sent the them to Europe to grow. The Italians called them girasole articiocco, meaning “sunflower artichoke”because of the taste. Americans thought girasole sounded like “Jerusalem,” so this name became one of the common names of the plant.

Jerusalem Artichokes (Helianthus tuberosus), also called the sunroot or sunchoke or earth apple or topinambur by Ian A Kirk

Jerusalem artichokes or sunchokes are very easy to grow in zones 3 through 9 in almost any loose, moderately well drained soil in sun or partial shade. They spread easily and can become invasive, so some people consider them a weed. They like regular watering but can tolerate some drought. They grow up to 8 feet tall so plant them in the back of the garden. Butterflies and songbirds enjoy the flower. And the tubers are good eating either raw or cooked, low in calories and good for people with diabetes. Use a brush to scrub off the dirt. If you cook the chokes, you can prepare them as you would any potato recipe.

Sunchokes by Laurel Fan

In the fall, at least 2 weeks after the flowers have faded you can start harvesting the tubers but it is best to wait as late as possible before the ground freezes too hard that digging is a chore. This is the best time to start digging up your tuber harvest; it is best to wait till at least after the first hard freeze or two, because–as with many root crops– the flavor of sunchokes is improved by a freeze or two, plus they do most of their growing in late autumn. Alternatively, you can just leave the tubers in the ground right through the winter, then dig them up as soon as the ground unfreezes enough in spring: some suggest that the tubers taste even better after fully overwintering.

Don’t let the flower go into seed. Cut off the flower just before that happens.  See here.

Bedbugs: How to Deal with this Problem

bed bug close up by David P James

One of the major problems that we are experiencing these days is the reemergence of bedbugs. This is a grave problem that is growing everywhere in the world.  The good news is that bed bugs are not supposed to carry any diseases. And the sort of good news is that not everyone seems to be allergic to the bites. But I don’t believe human beings enjoy living with insects and bedbugs breed so rapidly that one can have an infestation quite rapidly (see here). The US government has numerous papers on bed bugs.  (See here)

More and more articles are appearing about places infected by bedbugs – this includes libraries, movie theaters, etc. So if you are planning on traveling in North America, a good website to check out is this.  On this registry, you can also report locations you know about that are infested.

An entomologist who seems to be very knowledgeable about bed bugs and owns a pest control business is Richard Cooper of Cooper Pest
Solutions
and extermination service. He has a bed bug website where he sells bed bug products and has some of the most up to date information about how to protect yourself from this scourge.  See here.

There are some products you can use to help eliminate some of the bed bug problems.  According to Penn State facts,

Three classes of insecticides are reviewed: (1) Botanical insecticides containing natural pyrethrins will repel insects and can “knock down” bed bugs for a period of time, but natural pyrethrins quickly deteriorate and do not provide the necessary residual action of some other materials. Finishes on furniture and other wood items may be damaged from the petroleum carriers contained in aerosol pyrethrins. (2) Inorganic materials such as silica gel, boric acid, and diatomaceous earth will provide long-term control, provided they are used in an environment with low humidity. These inorganic materials have very low repellency, a long residual life, and can provide good control if thoroughly applied to cracks and crevices. However, they are typically white in color and may leave the surface of items with an undesirable film unless they are carefully applied. (3) Synthetic pyrethroids such as deltamethrin, lambda-cyhalothrin and others can provide good control if they are carefully and thoroughly applied to suspected bed bug areas.

If you have an infestation of bed bugs in your home, it is best to contact a reputable exterminating company. Call your local Master Gardener office or  your agricultural extension to ask if they have new information on dealing with bedbug problems or have a list of reputable exterminating companies.

Bardini Gardens in Florence (Photos)

TheGardenLady loves Italy, the art, the cities and countryside and the gardens. I have visited many Italian gardens but the Bardini gardens in Florence (see here) is not a garden that I had ever known about until recently. I have visited Florence a number of times over the years and wondered how I could possibly have missed this garden. The reason is that the Bardini gardens had been restored and just recently reopened. Perhaps this garden is an excuse for me to re-visit Florence 🙂

The following photos are from the Bardini gardens, including the cafe within. Many are views of the Cathedral.