Dandelions and Friends

Taraxacum pseudoroseum

Taraxacum faeroense (T. rubrifolium)

T. faeroense group

T. faeroense

Taraxacum sp. grey leaf

Taraxacum albidum

Cicerbita (Lactuca) plumieri

C. plumieri

I've written before about dandelions, and there are lots of well behaved, picky even, members of this genus for discriminating gardeners to play with.  Taraxacum pseudoroseum is becoming better established in cultivation thanks to the NARGS seedlist here in the USA and the seedlists of the AGS and SRGS in the UK.  Its the only pink, or at least pinkish, dandelion I have come across so far.  It is nearly impossible to distinguish from T. officinale, the ubiquitous lawn weed, in foliage so one has to remember where it is planted so it does not get weeded out.  T. albidum is a bit more course growing, especially if not in full sun, but it is also remarkably similar to its weedy cousin, save for the white flowers. Both T. pseudoroseum and T. albidum produce plentiful seed, but neither self sows very strongly in my gardens.  If you need more plants, they are easy to start from seeds in pots to be planted outdoors in spring.  T. faeroense, also known as T. rubrifolium, comes from the Faeroe Islands and may be endemic to there from what I have been able to find out.  My seed came from Plant World Seeds in the UK, and I really love the adpressed rosettes of dark purple foliage which stay purple even in warm weather. The foliage provides a nice foil for the bright yellow early spring flowers, and this plant could never become a weed as it is so small and does not make numerous seedheads.  I think it would look better against white gravel as opposed to dark soil, this would show the leaves better.  T. sp grey leaf is something I got from one of the Czech seed collectors, I think it comes from Turkey and it is a very shy bloomer.  The distinctive grey leaves appear very early and may die off in late summer and the flowers, when they do appear, are light yellow.  It is a rather finicky plant, disliking competition and needing a well drained sunny site.
Cicerbita plumieri also came from Plant World Seeds as Lactuca plumieri.  It is native to Europe and is basically a blue flowering tall perennial lettuce.  One plant has bloomed so far, and it is self fertile, already yielding many more seeds than what I received in the original packet.  It looks like it will bloom for several more weeks as new buds mature.  I rather like it, and I understand that it can get taller still than my three to four foot plants in the slope garden at school in unamended rocky soil. 

More South Africans in June

Diascia rigescens

Diascia rigescens

Diascia fetcaniensis "African Queen"

Diascia anastrepta

Senecio polyodon

Senecio polyodon

Senecio macrocephalus

Senecio macrocephalus

Gerbera ambigua

Gerbera ambigua

Helichrysum splendidum

Helichrysum splendidum

Berkheya purpurea

Berkheya purpurea

Kniphofia northiae

 

Berkheya macrocephala amid the poppies

It has been an outstanding season thus far for the school garden, by now the endless days of May rains have stopped and become more normal in frequency.  The flowers above are all blooming in June, except for Gerbera ambigua, which bloomed in May.  This is the white form of the species, I collected both white and yellow forms many years ago in SA, and forgot to dig up the 2 plants of I had in the garden last fall. They both survived but only one bloomed, so no fresh seed for this year since gerberas are self infertile.  In my home garden I had excellent winter survival of all three hybrid  gerberas I planted, though I admit covering each of them with a large pot filled with soil when temps dropped into the teens for the coldest part of the winter.  The G. ambigua enjoyed no such protection, and came though just fine, though I would not expect them to be hardy through our worst winters without protection of some sort.
This has also been a stellar year for diascias, D. rigescens is absolutely spectacular right now.  Even though it makes a perfectly good annual from seeds started early indoors, it is even better after it survives a winter. The plants are so laden with flowers that they have bent down from the weight, but the flower spikes continue to grow upwards anyway. D. fetacaniensis "African Queen" is a more subtle plant, the plants grown last year from seed from Chilterns have formed nice mats of tiny leaves with loads of delicate flowers hovering just above the foliage.  D. anastrepta from Silverhill is similar, but with glossier leaves and a distinctive yellow spot in the flower.  I do hope they offer seed of it again sometime, as I have only one plant and it will not set seed on its own (though perhaps it might hybridize with the others, the results could be quite interesting).
Senecios are wonderful daisies, and South Africa has several nice purple flowered ones in addition to the expected yellow sorts. S. polyodon is reliable even in harsh winter years, and produces myriads of small purple flowers well above the rosettes of foliage.  Individual plants live a few years, but it is always good to have some coming along from seed (they will self sow in favorable conditions) because they don't last forever.  Senecio macrocephalus is a shorter plant with much broader leaves in tight rosettes.  The individual flowers are much larger than S. polyodon and it starts blooming earlier.  Many seeds are produced by this plant and it will self sow and germinate the same season if rainfall is sufficient.
Helichrysum splendidum has nice linear grey foliage, and is a vigorous plant.  It sprawls so it needs to occupy some space, and in good years where winter dieback is not severe it produces many clusters of small yellow strawflowers.  I am expecting good seed set this year as several different clones of it are blooming right now.
Berkheya is a cool genus utterly unlike anything in the northern hemisphere that I am aware of, I call them thistle daisies.  An apt description as they are often prickly but bear large daisy type flowers. Most are yellow, but B. purpurea is an unusual shade of blue purple.  It is recently becoming established in cultivation in the US (and in the UK) and is proving winter hardy.  My small colony of them is increasing from self sown seeds that came up this spring from what seeds I missed harvesting last year.  It will bloom the first year if started early, but will do so much earlier in the season once it has gone through a winter.  B. macrocephala is a more typical yellow flowered sort, but is not as prickly as its breathern.  One of about 4 plants is blooming for the first time this June, it is hard to see the white felted leaf bottoms of the plant as its flowers rise up to mingle with the numerous corn poppies in bloom at the same time.
Kniphofia northiae is worth growing for it foliage alone, but this year three plants have flowered, all at different times with no overlap.  The first one that flowered was one of the ones by the wall, I am now harvesting the numerous seeds it produced. The second one flowered when we were having the rainy spell, it did not set seed.  This third plant, which like the second is in the unprotected slope garden, is about to bloom so it should go into July.  This species is easy from seed and I have enjoyed watching the enormous starfish like rosettes get bigger and bolder each year, and now am finally enjoying their flowers as well.

South Africans In June

Kniphofia caulescens

Senecio macrospermus

Senecio macrospermus

Pelargonium luridum

Pelargonium leucophyllum

Berkheya radula

Hebenstretia sp

Hebenstretia sp

Freesia laxa

Geranium schlechteri

       This June so many things are blooming in my school garden.  It is the talk of the faculty, not a day goes by without someone complementing my garden.  My colleagues enjoy the brightly colored poppies and other colorful flowers which boldly proclaim their presence at this time of year.  But if they were to look closer, as the occasional horticultually informed visitors I bring to my garden do, they would notice that there are lots of plants that they have never seen before.  In fact I am certain some of these plants are not to be found elsewhere in New York, at least not yet.  This holds especially true for the numerous South African species I favor, and after last years mild winter, so many of them came through the winter with extra vigor.  Marginal things were greatly favored, and reliable things got an earlier start than usual. 
        Just some of the South African taxa I grow that have or are blooming are shown above, there are many other South African species in various stages of development in the garden.  Kniphofia caulescens is one of two kniphofia species to bloom thus far.  It makes an impressive clump, with multiple shoots and spikes.  Two plants bloomed from seed I got from Silverhill, and though one is smaller, I am hoping that they are cross pollinating so I can get more seed.  Earlier I had K. northiae, a wider leaved species, in bloom, and one of them seems to have self pollinated since I see seed pods forming.
       Three plants of Senecio macrospermus are in the garden, but only one is blooming thus far.  The grey foliage is interesting all by itself, and this species can get quite tall.  I know that Ellen Hornig grew superb specimens of this in her former Oswego NY garden.  I imagine one plant will be unlikely to set fertile seed, as self incompatibility is common in the Asteraceae, but if this is the case I will probably have better luck next year when the other two plants are likely to be large enough to bloom.  This yellow senecio reminds me of the ones I saw last summer in the mountains around Denver, but no Rocky Mountain species grows as tall as S. macrospermus does. 
         Pelargonium luridum continues to return yearly in its sheltered spot at the base of the wall, and this spring it is joined by several other pelargonium species.  These other species (and one hybrid) survived unprotected in the slope garden.  They include P. sidoides, pulverentulum, leucophyllum, and a hybrid I made between ionidiflorum and odoratissimum.  P. leucophyllum was given to me on my last visit to South Africa by the late Charles Craib.  He collected it on the Adriesberg in the Eastern Cape at high altitude, and was not sure of its identity.  I have identified it from descriptions in the Pelargoniums of Southern Africa series by JJA Van der Walt and P. Vorster. They illustrate and describe P. hypoleucum, a species with a more western Cape distribution, and in their discussion write about a plant of similar appearance that it found on the highest peaks in the Eastern Cape near the Lesotho border, and refer to it as P. leucophyllum.  Whatever my plant is, it is hardy so long as at least some foliage makes it through the winter, even if it is tattered come spring.  The foliage is richly scented, and the small lavender and white flowers appear on a spreading plant during spring and early summer. This species should be protected during bad winters, but this year no such protection was needed.
           Berkheya radula is not one of the really high altitude berkheyas, from what I can find out, thus I dug the plants in past years and overwintered them in my classroom.  This winter I left most of them outside, where they have done so much better and are now coming into full bloom.  It is self incompatible so to get good seed I need to have both of my 2 older plants blooming at the same time.  They are doing so now, and some of their offspring from preceding seasons will soon join them.  Should Silverhill offer more seed of it in the future I will order some more so as to widen the genetic pool so seed can be set more easily.   I like the soft yellow flowers intermingled with the bright red Shirley poppies, which themselves are doing splendidly this year from self sown seeds.
           Hebenstretia species is a cool little plant I grew from seeds sent to me by Panayoti from his first South African collecting expedition.  Some day I will find the data on this plant, but it grows easily from seed as an annual, but in years with mild winters it makes an even better perennial.  It looks like nothing one would find in the northern hemisphere floras, it has that Gondwanan look for sure.  The delicate foliage reminds me of some kind of conifer, but it is too soft in appearance and texture to be a  actually be taken for a conifer, and the crowded spikes of tiny white flowers with their bold bright orange markings do catch one's notice. It will flower off and on throughout the growing season.       
          Freesia (formerly Anamotheca) laxa comes in three basic colors; red, white, or blue.  The blue form is an obligate winter grower from the Cape, but the red and white forms are found in summer rainfall regions in South Africa, and are reputed to grow well in our southern states.  Against the wall they do well, perhaps when I get more I will try them in less protected locations to see just how much cold they can take.  They will sometimes die back in summer and try to grow again in fall, only to get cut down, but they reappear as soon as the weather gets warm again.
           The last plant pictured, Geranium schlecteri, also came to me from Charles Craib years ago, this time as seed labelled as G.wakkerstroomianum.  The latter species has more deeply notched petals than what I am growing, so I suspect it really is G. schlecteri.  After all plants in nature don't come with labels, and natural variation within a species is often more than one might imagine if one only sees the same plant as it is represented in gardens.  Actually this geranium is quite rare in cultivation anyway.  It  is a gently sprawling plant with single or paired flowers of a soft lavender.  The flowers appear through early summer and it will set copious seed, though it is a modest self sower thus far. 

Fire and Ice(plants)

Delosperma sp. "Firespinner"

Delosperma sp. Firespinner

 

Delosperma sp "Tiffendell"

Delosperma sp "Firespinner" and Delosperma sp "Tiffendell"

Delosperma sp "congestum"

Delosperma sp "White Nugget"

Delosperma dyeri

Delosperma dyeri

 The Aizoaceae family, also known as ice plants, mesembs, and, in South Africa, vygies, contains hundreds if not thousands of species.  When I saw them blooming in habitat in the Klein Karoo in South Africa, I was impressed with their incredible diversity and the sheer brilliance of their flowers. In the bright African sunshine it almost hurt to look at the flowers of some of the more colorful species. Luckily for South African plant enthusiasts who live in cold winter areas, there are quite a few of these plants which can take cold winter weather in stride.  No one has been more instrumental in bringing many of these hardy ice plants into cultivation than Panayoti Kelaidis of the Denver Botanic Garden.  When I visited Denver last summer I saw how well these plants grew in that harsh continental climate.  In fact most will do better in Denver with its colder minimum winter temperatures than here in southern New York, because these are plants that relish sunshine and dislike excessive rain, humidity, and heat in that combination.  Many also dislike winter wet and cold at the same time as well.  Nonetheless with careful  species selection and siting (well drained sandy soils in elevated beds) and some luck they can do very well in this area.  Our recent mild winter and warm sunny start to spring greatly favored these plants, so the displays this spring were spectacular. 
One of the new kids on the block this year in nurseries everywhere is Delosperma sp. "Firespinner".  This is an undescribed species from a high altitude area of the eastern Cape in South Africa, and from what I heard it refuses to bloom at Kirstenbosch Botanic Garden.  Apparently it does not get cold enough during the winter in the Cape Town area to trigger flowering. It has no such problems in Denver nor here in my NY garden.  Brilliant orange flowers with magenta pink centers are produced en masse in mid spring on a very compact plant.  My plant was received as a test plant from Panayoti, and it has weathered two very different winters in its slightly raised bed.  This plant should do well over much of the US and is sure to be a winner in those areas where it proves easy to grow. 
Equally brilliant and faster growing is Delosperma sp. "Tiffendell".  This is sometimes listed as a form of  cooperi, but it is lower growing and more cold resistant than the commonly cultivated form of cooperi seems to be.  Another Panayoti introduction, this is a favorite of mine, it was a sheet of screaming magenta for weeks in my garden this spring. I like loud plants, and this is a superstar among them. 
For reliability where ice plants tend to rot out during wet and cold winters, look no further than Delosperma sp. "congestum".  Now this easy to grow plant is a bit of an enigma.  It has been passed around as congestum, basuticum, and who knows what else. In fact it is an undescribed species, and may not even be a delosperma at all.  Its larger seed capsules and tight habit suggest that it may be a Rabiea instead.  Regardless of its true taxonomic affinities, it is a treasure in the garden.  The white centered bright yellow flowers appear in early spring, and sometimes later on as well. This plant does like summer water, but still should be growing in a well drained situation.  Mine are in a raised bed with hardy opuntias.  A variant of this species which appeared among plants in cultivation goes by the cultivar name of "White Nugget".  This is essentially an alba form of the species.  I grow it with the yellow form and hope they are crossing with each other, if so it will be interesting to see what kind of variation might result in the seedlings.
Oh how I wish I had planted some Delosperma dyeri in my garden last year.  I've tried it before, but with the mild winter we had, those who had it in a good spot last had a great spring show this year.  And one of those lucky places was the New York Botanic Garden, where the brightly flowered specimens shown above strutted their stuff in the rock garden on a fine day in May.  I don't know whether these are the asexually propogated clone "Red Mountain" or if they are seed grown.  I have heard that the species does show some variation in flower color. 
I have acquired seed of many hardy ice plants from the various plant society seed lists and from my visit to Denver last summer.  I started many of these this spring, and look forward to planting them out later this season.  I may soon be acquiring a new house with a large terraced back yard that would be ideal for growing those plants, so I look forward to more adventures with these South African floral gems.

April Flowers, Without Showers

Lunaria "Corfu Blue"

Miniature Bearded Iris from SIGNA seeds

Aquilegia flabellata from NARGS seeds

Rosa foetida

In concert with our very mild winter, March though most of April featured unusually warm and dry weather, perfect by my standards.  Why move to California when if I live long enough Cali may come to me here in New York, courtesy of global climate change?  I actually had to water my school and home gardens once during this period, which is not typical for this time of year.  Since the end of April Nature seems to be making up for lost time with almost daily showers,so now we have too much rain, though I hope it will abate sometime soon. 
The Lunaria "Corfu Blue" is flowering from small seedlings I started the previous year.  The seed came from Derry Watkin's "Special Plants" seed list.  As is so often the case with new plant introductions, the UK folks are ahead of the Americans, so a careful perusal of  UK seed lists from often reveals new gems worth trying on this side of the pond.  I like this plant, it makes a mound of blue violet flowers in early spring, followed by the characteristic "coins" (flattened oval seed pods) later on.  It must be a new species, as it does not look like L. annua to me, and Derry states in her excellent seed list that it behaves as a perennial at times.  She also states that it reaches 36 inches, but my plants are half that, perhaps because they were not large when I planted them out the year before.  Should they prove to be perennial (unlike L annua, a true biennial) I will be able to find out next year if they can in fact reach 3 feet tall. 
The miniature bearded iris shown above were grown from mixed hybrid seeds I got from SIGNA, the Species Iris Group of North America.  Specialist groups like this cost a pittance to join, provide very informative publications to the members (in the case of SIGNA now in electronic form for those who don't need more paper in their house) and have excellent lists of seeds donated by members.  Many of these seeds are difficult to find or simply unavailable elsewhere.  And they are available at a very nominal cost as well.  It is possible to get some wonderful miniature bearded cultivars from any of several excellent online iris nurseries, but I find great joy in growing my own from seed.  The element of surprise is an essential part of gardening for me, and growing iris from seed will produce all manner of interesting variations to keep one excited about the potential beauty of  next flower to open. 
From the North American Rock Garden Society (NARGS) seed lists, so many treasures can be grown.  If you are also a member of one of the local chapters, as I am (Hudson Valley Chapter) in some years seeds left over from the annual winter distribution are available to members of these chapters as surplus seeds which are divided up and sent out to the local chapters to dispose of as they wish.  One year I got quite a few seeds, actually they were going to end up in the trash so I felt obliged to take as many as I could.  It also was an opportunity to try things I might not have selected when I put in my seed list order to the national society, since there was no quota and no reason not to expand my horticultural preference boundaries a bit. In fact, whenever I get an opportunity like this I often, just for the hell of it, will take the very few unlabelled packets that would otherwise surely be thrown away, and I have gotten some nice things from those mystery packets.  I pull a few packets from my seed stash out from the fridge to start each year, and one of them was labelled Aquilegia saximontana x jonesii, a cross of two very desirable and sometimes difficult to grow western American species. What I got is not that, but instead the much more common and easily grown A. flabellata nana.  But I am not complaining, not at all, how could I when viewing those exquisite blue flowers on such a compact plant?  In my school garden they grow among moss phloxes and other low growing plants, and I look forward to them seeding around as A. flabellata is want to do. 
I also grew the yellow Rosa foetida from seeds. I lost the label ages ago, so I was pleasantly surprised when two plants bloomed this spring.  This is a tough species rose that flowers on smalls young plants only about three years old.  It does bloom only in spring, so the flowers are to be enjoyed only once each year, but they are quite lovely and way ahead of other roses.