SSG--sorry to hear about your Electric Lime! :-( I hope it recovers okay. The reddish shade sounds nice for the winter. I planted mine in a shady spot with another heuchera and columbine.
I have been wondering about the hosta virus now every time I see an interesting one. How would I know if a plant is potentially infected?
MidAt plant shopping June 2013 ...
Catmint, I meant to say bright yellow and not bright green in the summer. This spring, the edges were very badly burned and almost turned black. It recovered slowly when moved to partial sun and hopefully will recover completely when in full shade. Last year it was in full shade and did much better, and winter coloring is very interesting indeed.
My Gold Standard had Hosta Virus X. Apparently Gold Standard is known to be highly susceptible. It had very noticeable color bleeding in the veins and looked a lot like this:
http://eppserver.ag.utk.edu/hosta%20virus%20x.jpg
I cleaned my tools like crazy after removing it and haven't seen it in any of my other hostas.
thanks, SSG. I think my hostas are okay, but I guess time will tell!!
I ended up getting a Rising Sun redbud. That 50% off coupon came in handy!
I need to figure out how close the fence line I can plant it...
oh very pretty! sounds much nicer than my redbud, which is just plain green most of the year. :-)
Lol SS I knew it! Good for you. What's a garden for if we can't grow the plants that call our names? Even if we have to relocate them a few times before they fit in to the scheme of things for a few years! Still thinking about a Hardy Palm?
I've resisted the Forest Pansy Redbuds at HD but if they go on further clearance, I'm afraid one will come home with me!
Evidently Red Buds can benefit from some pruning early on for shaping and removal of branches at a bad angle to trunk to avoid splitting way down the line. I think if soil and site is good that you could put it as near to the fence as needed to be somewhat 'in line' with other plantiings the and just concern your self with how it looks for you, not your neighbor! The branches are kind of wimpy for a while and thet grow pretty fast, so soon enough it will spread its wings above the fence.
Oh that's good to know, coleup. The one that I got has been limbed up already and looks very healthy. I can't wait for those early spring pink blooms!
I think they have to be of a certain age to bloom?
In case you're needing a new hosta but don't know which one-
http://www.americanhostasociety.org/PopularityPoll.html
thanks, Sally--I do have a few of those! :-)
I stopped at the nursery again while Katie was at her volleyball game (they won--yay!) and picked up a couple interesting plants on sale, one of which is Amsonia hubrechtii Blue Star http://www.missouribotanicalgarden.org/gardens-gardening/your-garden/plant-finder/plant-details/kc/w810/amsonia-hubrichtii.aspx.
I also picked up a very large shrubby plant with red stems and bright orangey-red leaves. The tag said it was a Hibiscus Fireball. However, when I look online I can't find anything about Fireball having red twigs and bark and bright orange-red leaves. Any ideas? Is it a Fireball or something else?
Here are a couple more including a close-up of one of the leaves.
Cat--
I can tell you that the lone seed pod in your 1st picture is definitely a Hibuscus
seed pot. I have looked at hundreds of these....as I have 2 perennial Hibiscus.
The leaves sure are different from a hibiscus....but then, there are a zillion
varieties I have never seen. G.
Catmint, I found a similar picture on this post: http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/load/peren/con1018515716071.html
The second picture on that post shows its fall color. It looks just like yours!
Gita, I agree about the one seed pod--it definitely looks like a hibiscus. SSG, thanks for the link! That does look like the plant I got so maybe it really is a Fireball. It's just that most of the photos I've seen online show green foliage and stems. But maybe it has autumn colors that have not received much attention! Sure hope so--I love the color!! I lived in CT for 25 years, and I still miss the autumn colors and try to purchase plants that will provide a little of that... The Amsonia hubrechtii turns a bright gold in the autumn, so I'm looking forward to that, too.
Catmint, I'm seriously considering getting rid of some of my floppy miscanthus and replacing them with amsonia hubrechtii. I love that fall color!
cat--
break off that ONE seed pod and take out the seeds....
Just be aware that most Hibiscus seeds haave a problem with the Hibiscus weevil
which grows inside the seeds and later crawls out after chewinf a hole in the
seed.
You can read more on this on this Thread I started. I have been dealing with
these for years! So sick of it!!! G.
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/1331873/
Gita, I'll break off the seed pod in the morning and take a look inside!
SSG, I saw the Amsonia hubrechtii at Brookside Gardens recently and it was beautiful! Such a lovely golden color and *so soft* to the touch. The nursery near my daughter's volleyball game had a total of 6 of them.
Cat--
You won't see anything inside--just seeds....not until December or January...
Right now--I am guessing--they are just developing from eggs laid in the developing seeds...
Please read all the stuff in the link I posted above. Very educational!
I put most of them in the freezer for 4 days--as Dr.O (John) suggested.
Kept a small amount out to see if these bugs will hatch and get a real close photo of one...
Then toss the seeds...
Gita
SSG (or anyone else), would you like me to pick up one of the Amsonia Blue Stars for you next weekend when we are up that way again? They were $10 for a gallon pot. I think they are not commonly found.
http://www.missouribotanicalgarden.org/gardens-gardening/your-garden/plant-finder/plant-details/kc/w810/amsonia-hubrichtii.aspx
Images from Google Search:
https://www.google.com/search?
q=Amsonia+hubrichtii+blue+star&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=kxZAUpDvEfiv4APl1ICYCg&ved=0CC8QsAQ&biw=1092&bih=508&dpr=1
Catmint, I've seen them at Behnkes and Meadows, but I've been waiting for them to go on sale.
I got two teeny ones from Santa Rosa a couple of years ago, but they didn't do that well.
I'd forgotten my struggling Amsonia-- wonder if I can find anything of it now.
Ssg and Sally-- any lessons learned you can share with me??
Ssg can you tell me more about Meadows and Behnke? Are they local?
This message was edited Sep 23, 2013 8:03 AM
My poor Amsonia was given a raw deal in the garden, so I don't have any advice, so sorry! I crammed it in, and it got surrounded by to much vigorous stuff.
My general advice would be- use care with swapped things, they can be more tender than pot grown things. Esp if they were recently dug before swap. Some are dug early and do have time to grow into their pots.
Sorry that was NO help with Amsonia. I got it from Foxnfirefly who hasn't posted much lately.
Catmint, Behnke's is right by the Costco/Ikea in Beltsville. There's a Potomac location which isn't convenient for me so I've never been there.
Meadows' Farms has a lot of locations, but I've only been to the one in Burtonsville.
Behnke's has regular sales and coupons, and a very good selection of perennials and trees. They've been around forever and the workers there are pretty knowledgeable. Oh and a fantastic houseplants section.
Meadow's prices are generally cheaper, but they have a more limited selection. It seems like they sell higher volumes of more popular plants. They have the best price on pine bark fines, which is what I use to make my potting mix. The Beltsville Behnkes is probably 3 times the size of Meadow's in Burtonsville.
The amsonia I got was in a tiny pot, with just one little shoot. I don't think it was worth the price, even at the steep Santa Rosa discount. Maybe some grasses don't have a good chance of survival when they have such teeny roots to support them.
Granted, I completely ignored it and didn't do anything to it, but that's how I care for most of my plants and they seem to do ok. I want to give it another chance with a more established plant.
My only advice is to plant in full sun. Mine did not thrive or survive in part shade. If yours is one of the new hybrids, it may have some vigor to it. I'd also site it for best placement for fall color and not blue flower viewing as my recollection is of not a very long bloom season.
Here is a link to one of my goto sites for plant info and evaluation, Plant Delights.
http://www.plantdelights.com/Amsonia/products/50/
Just a quick note here. Many of the perennials I have had occasion to unpot and examine recently have been very poorly grown indeed! No wonder the don't survive in our gardens!
Quality can vary from grower to grower and from year to year and from retailer to retailer.
Lots has changed in the last few years in the plant producing industry, from tissue culture overtaking seed, division, cutting or other means of propagation, to much production ocurring off-shore and shipped in for 'finishing' with heavy emphasis on chemical enhancers and growth regulaters to bring a consistent product to market on a tight timetable in automated greenhouses,
etc. Bottom line, maximum sales/profit and lots of hype.
Just my observations. Please do not c/p my comments. They are my comments for our ears, not for growers or retailers out there, those I make in context and in person. Thanks.
SSG--thanks for the info on Behnke's and Meadows. I will have to check them out! I've mostly gone to American Plant (on the beltway) simply because I knew about it and it is relatively convenient since it is right off the beltway--plus I love their plant selections, although pricey.
I've enjoyed going to Seasons in Gaithersburg--it's nice to see a different selection than they have at American Plant, and the prices are lower, too! :-) But I can see that many other nurseries are out there for me to explore--LOL!
I totally get what you mean about the single tiny shoot in the small pot with overly-small roots. I have a Japanese Fern and Indian Pink like that right now that have been struggling to survive in my shade garden; I think they're going to make it, but it's been touch and go...
Sally and Coleup--good advice about the full sun and the visible placement. I think I'm going to have to dig a well-placed hole in my sunny back lawn for it! I'm working on creating more full sun garden bed space but we're not there yet, so a-digging I must go! :-)
Coleup that is a good observation about being careful to examine our plants carefully that we purchase. Before I knew to do this, I planted a few plants that were *extremely* root-bound and didn't understand why they didn't do well! Then when I decided to transplant them--out they came as though they were still in the pot, with heavy pot-ridges on the bottom, and roots growing all up the sides! :-o
Gita, I got 15 seeds out of the pod from the Hibiscus Fireball. I'll be happy to share these! :-) Just hope there aren't any weevils...
Those darn evil weevils. I think a trip to the freezer would take care of that concern, or refrigerator?
Terp, thanks for the reminder--safely in the freezer and even marked--LOL. I can already hear my daughter, 'Mom, what is *this*??' ;-)
Cat--
Did you read the link I sent you re the Weevils in my Hibiscus seeds?
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/1331873/
Dr.O (John) said that if my freezer was at 0*--tree days would be enough--
or the seeds could get permanently damaged.
My freezer is a bit above-0*--so i did 4 days. We will see! This is an experiment....
He also suggested I freeze them in a paper envelope--NOT plastic baggie.
I appreciate your offer on sharing your seeds--but, No thanks...
I have enough seeds to populate the eat Coast!
ALSO---
Give your Japanese (painted???) ferns some sun. They can take it!
Mine grew wonderfully in bright, filtered sun.
Not all ferns nees shade!!! Most of them appreciate some filtered sun.
I got 12- 4" pots of half-dead Japanese Painted ferns this spring at Lowes--
for 50 cents a pot. Cleaned them up and watered them...
I think they were over-watered and had not had enough light. YES!
Maybe they had them in the Plant House (inside) with not enough light.
Knowing how beautiful these ferns are--I went and bought them all.
I kept 3--Shared some others with certain DG'ers--before I posted any in my "haves'...
Within a couple weeks--they were growing by leaps and bounds--and, totally gorgeous.
1--This is what they looked like a few days after i got them.
2--A week later....
hi, Gita. I remember the thread in the Pests forum with Dr O and 'Trackin' as to whether they were weevils or beetles. :-) I guess I'll find out with mine! I put them in an envelope and put the envelope in a plastic baggie because of the dampness in the freezer. Hope it works. I'll plan to take them out Thursday evening.
It is a Japanese Shield Fern Dryopteris erythrosora. My shade garden gets some morning sun through the neighbor's Rose of Sharon on the east side and then some very late afternoon sun (the long slanting rays in the last hour before dusk) that sneaks past the holly tree planted on the west side of the shade garden. (The area is shaded by trees on 3 sides and my shed on one side). I decided it was actually getting too much sun--especially when it was only the size of my little finger and rather battered looking to start with-- so I planted my new hosta green fountain (from the swap) in front of it to filter some of the late afternoon rays, and it looks a little better now. This reminds me to go check on it tomorrow--but I did notice it was looking better after I sheltered it some more with the hosta. Fingers crossed.
Your Japanese painted ferns are beautiful--how they thrived after you took them home and gave them the care they needed! I often stumble a bit through trial and error before I find the right location for a plant--and a few of them just never seem to thrive! I think it will help a lot once my additional full-sun garden space is expanded and ready to use. I feel like I have a ton of part sun/part shade, only a little full shade, limited morning sun, and never enough full sun. Add moisture variations in and it does become a challenge at times finding the right spot for every plant...
Catmint, last summer my Japanese painted fern looked just awful and I didn't think they'd make it, but they're looking much better this year! I think the problem with mine was that they were too dry. I moved them to wetter shade and they're doing better.
I've actually never been to American Plant! I knew they were in Bethesda but just assumed they were too expensive because of their location. I'll have to check them out. :)
thanks for the encouragement, SSG! I'll keep my fingers crossed for more growth in the spring. My shade garden area is not as wet as I'd like it--the trees shield some of the rain--so I do have to give it extra water.
American Plant is interesting. It is on the pricey side, but they also have some interesting plants there (I go to the one on the beltway, which I think has a larger selection than the one in downtown area). Of course right now their stock is dwindling with the end of the season. They have lots of brand new or less common plants--e.g., the Begonia Kaylen I got there.
Benkhe's is a really great plant store, I love going there. Hate their prices, but sometimes you just have to pony up to get the exact variety you want. I don't know if I think the quality of the plants are better than anywhere else including the big boxes, but they have a better selection. If there's something you want and you just can't find it, I live mere minutes away from the distributor for many of these places called The Perennial Farm: they have retail hours on Saturday. They literally have everything that your retailer has, and then some. But if you are like me and think that Benkhe's is overpriced, you are going to be blown away by The Perennial Farm's prices.... Sedum spectabile for $9.99? Are you kidding me? The employee told me that they never have sales: b/c they just keep their product for next year. But The Perennial Farm is worth a field trip just to see the place.
I have one of Gita's JPFs and can testify that it doesn't mind some sun. It gets the last hour of full sun in the evening and it's happy as can be. My problem is not so much moisture or sun/shade, but hot and cold spots in my yard. I have a baking hot zone in front of a south facing brick wall. And since my yard slopes downward in an eastward direction, there's a cold well on the other side of the yard there. The cold zone is not such a big deal in summer, but you can really see the difference in the way the bulbs come up later and get bud blast in the spring. I'm trying to see if my Black and Blue Salvia survives winter better in front of the brick wall. So far it has tolerated the heat fairly well this summer. An easy way to gauge the temperatures in your landscape is to observe how the snow melts. The first places to melt are the warmest, last to melt are the coldest, except for areas where the snow doesn't fall b/c of dense evergreen coverage.
Good observation on the snow melt, ditto that. You could easily have a two zone difference there, typwc. I would go at least zone 8 in your hot spot.
Karen--
my B&B Salvia survived last winter. I had been told oit was aa tender perennial,
so I put a small circle of the plastic fencing around it and filled it with leaves.
Around mid-spring, I thought I better remove some of the leaves so that
any new growth would not rot.
To my surprise, there was bunches of new growth under all the leaves.
So--I removed them all...
WHERE is this "Perennial Farm" you say is minutes from your house?
I have never heard of it....
My JPF has sat in different levels of sun and done OK. I think the colors
are more vibrant if it gets some sun.
I am waiting until I "ake apart" my front bed so i can plant my two on either
side of the rocks. There it will get full AM sun for a few hours.
Gita
Gita, It's on Glen Arm Rd. http://goo.gl/maps/tePOb
http://www.perennialfarm.com/
They only have retail hours on Saturdays. It's such a big place that you can drive through the nursery. Surprised that you of all people have never heard of it. You seem to know where all the good places are. Take a close look at the labels that you have for some of your plants, often different nurseries have the same exact labels, which say they are from The Perennial Farm. I see their truck trundling down I-95 sometimes early in the morning. I have seen plants grown by them at Benkhe's in Beltsville, Valley View in Timonium, Poor Boy's in Parkville, and as far north as Brown's Orchard and Farm Market in PA.
The Dazzleberry Sedum that several of you now how have came from Poor Boy's via The Perennial Farm.
ssg: There is an American Plant right at River Road and the Beltway -- it would be easy for you to get to if you swing around the Beltway. I go there often, but I don't buy much anymore because it is a bit pricey. I love Behnke's but haven't been there in a few years. Both have very good selections.
Catmint: Meadows Farms' selection isn't as big as American Plant, but it is still pretty good -- much better than the selection a box store. And they have great sales, plus a selection of shrubs and beat-up plants that are marked way down. And at the end of the season they mark all their remaining perennials down to 50% and then 75% off. That is what I am waiting for. I got some fantastic bargains last fall.
Amsonia: Amsonias take several years to fill in so you need to be patient - don't give up on them just because they are still spindly. Wait a few years. I bought literally a dozen or more A. hubrichtii from Santa Rosa last year for my awful front hill and they are doing fine -- I don't think I lost any -- but they are still small. They do need full sun to do well. In a few years they become bushy in size. (Same thing goes for Baptisia.)
This site has some wonderful photos of Amsonia hubrichtii: http://hayefield.com/2011/03/11/one-plant-three-seasons-amsonia-hubrichtii/ I hadn't looked at the site before, but on quick perusal it is very appealing.
Typ, I am definitely a sucker for the nurseries with great selection--I love seeing the unusual, the lesser-known, and the newly-released cultivars. Perennial Farms sounds like it would make a great field trip someday, even though I probably wouldn't buy much with those prices!! :-) Still, it's always fun to look and make a few notes about possible future purchases...
Lovely photos of the Amsonia, Happy. Thanks for sharing the link.
Well, I went out and checked on my Japanese Shield Fern this morning--and it has about tripled in size and is now bigger than my fist! :-) I'm glad to see the healthy growth--it looks much better. It also has some pretty bronze coloring now.