Looking for help. I am putting my cannas to bed for the winter. Do I cut all the small roots off or leave them? Is it better to leave them in clumps or divide them? Thanks April
Canna's
Your answer plus a *bit* more ;) This article looked good in its' entirety.
Horticulture, The Art of American Gardening, August-Sept 1997 v94 n7 p40(6)
Cannas catch fire: these old favorites have blazed back into fashion. (Cover Story) Wayne Winterrowd.
Abstract: Cannas have finally shed their image as 'garbage can plants' and are now fashionable for modish gardeners. There are hundreds of canna hybrids, but it is the species or species-like canna that tend to attract the attention of gardeners.
Full Text: COPYRIGHT 1997 PRIMEDIA Special Interest Publications
As I remember it, most of my childhood - at least in summer - was spent roaming the back alleys of Shreveport, Louisiana. Both sets of my grandparents lived in older sections of the town, and my brothers and I became adept, even when quite small, at riding the trolley to visit them. It was boring to ride the trolley, however, and so (though we were forbidden to do it) we would generally get off early and thread our way through the labyrinth of alleys. In a sprawling and then-thriving southern city, these narrow passages were forgotten places, rather like country lanes, where chickens of indeterminate breed scratched in the dirt, guinea fowl scolded us with their raucous warning cries, and rabbits in hutches could be fed with a handful of weeds or grass. Rows of galvanized garbage cans stood at every back gate, graced - if such a word applies - by plantings of rank foliage and flowers, cannas mostly, taller by far than we were, or barren bananas, all luxuriant leaf with small, inedible fingers, and occasionally a fig tree, so abundant with fruit that small boys could take it without reproach.
The plants that I chiefly remember are the cannas. They were rather coarse plants, perhaps six or more feet tall, with great, elliptical, blue-green or bronze leaves, surmounted by rather smallish flowers of burnt orange, vibrant red, or orange-speckled yellow. They throve in the sour, old soils of the back alleys. None of the good gardeners I knew then - grandparents and many gardening aunts and uncles - would ever have thought of bringing them into the garden. They were simply the "garbage can plants," and no one knew how they had got there.
They may be there still, for a canna, where it is hardy, is an incredibly tough thing. But it has been 50 years since I threaded my way through Shreveport's back alleys, which may themselves now exist only in the cartography of my childhood memory. Fortunately for modish gardeners, cannas are, at the moment, very fashionable plants. Happy (or at least rather smug) then are we who have grown them all along, apologetically and embarrassedly in out-of-the-way places or in pots, and now can plant them in the border with panache.
'Panache' is, coincidentally, the name of one of the most stylish cannas at present. It is hard to say exactly what its parentage is, though clearly it bears traces of the elegant, gray-green-leaved Canna glauca, a species that has contributed its blood to some of the finest cannas now available. 'Panache' is larger than the species, however, attaining a height of five or six feet, with cool green leaves two feet long, topped by scapes of thin-petaled, spidery, four-inch flowers in a beautiful blend of cream and salmon. An "orchid-flowered" type, it is as far from the flashy, wadded, park-bedding cannas ("gladiolus flowering") as one can get. My original plant was given to me by Chris Rosmini, a noted Los Angeles gardener (who does not like cannas all that much), with the admonition that I should not be too nice to it, as its vigor could easily get out of hand. She need not worry, for in cold Vermont, no plant derived from tropical herbs native to Central and South America is likely to run rampant. Still, in the five years I have had it, it has grown well enough (in a large pot) that I have been able to share pieces with other gardeners.
Though cannas exist in hundreds of hybrid forms (often listed, because of their mixed parentage, under the catch-all label of C. xgeneralis, or, in older references, C. xhybridus), it is the species or specieslike cannas that are most likely to win favor with gardeners newly interested in them. Among species, C. glauca is certainly one of the loveliest. Native to the West Indies, it reaches a height of about four feet, bearing slender, pointed, concave leaves about one and a half feet long, of a beautiful celadon, and produces slender, pale yellow flowers of great delicacy. Though all cannas relish dampish, rich soils, C. glauca prefers to be aquatic, and grows lustily even with several inches of water above its rhizomes. It is thus suited for planting at the verges of ponds, or in pots submerged in a pool, where its leaves form a handsome contrast to dwarf cattails, banded bulrushes, or the irislike foliage of Acorus calamus 'Variegatus'.
Although the species needs no improvement, several beautiful forms (or possibly hybrids) of it were selected at Longwood Gardens some years ago, of which the best are 'Erebus', with clear coral flowers, and 'Ra', with flowers of daffodil yellow. Both may be grown as pond plants, but will also flourish in perennial borders, if they are well watered. Canna glauca and its offspring should be very useful to weekend gardeners as terrace plants, as they may be grown in tubs of rich earth and topped up with water, to flourish from weekend to weekend without supplementary irrigation.
Among species cannas with attractive foliage and beautiful (though relatively understated) flowers, several others are very much worth seeking out. Canna indica, for example, produces bronze-flushed leaves on stout stalks to five feet, and stiffly erect, narrow racemes of flowers colored a rich red, nicely set off by burnished, dull red stems. Its common name (extended now to all cannas) is "Indian shot" - a reference to its seed, which is about the size of a large pea and so solid that it was used by South American hunters as ammunition. Such a use was one way, perhaps, that it became so widely disseminated, leaving the actual origin of the plant in doubt. But it also floats, and so has traveled over fresh water and salt, to become naturalized throughout Central and South America and into the West Indies, and from there even to the back alleys of Shreveport.
Probably through the pre-Civil War connections maintained by the Deep South with the Caribbean Islands (in products human and otherwise), another beautiful species canna, C. edulis, became widely naturalized in the warmer sections of our country. Called "achira" in Queensland and "tous-les-mois" in Haiti, it is the only member of its genus that is cultivated for food. The starchy rhizomes are ground into an easily digestible pablum for infants, and used to thicken puddings, soups, and stews. Though it can grow to 10 feet when well established, in gardens C. edulis 'rarely attains more than five, and though it possesses the luxuriance typical of all cannas, it has a curious look of delicacy (for a canna). Its two-foot leaves, bronzy red beneath and grass-green on top, have a fine, thin margin of red along the edges. It is grown mostly as a foliage plant, yet its scarlet flowers are stunning, two-inch funnels of thin petals packed along the flowering stems. There are forms with flowers tending to orange and even yellow, but the red is nicest.
Admired even by those who do not like cannas is another species, C. iridiflora. Clausen and Ekstrom (in Perennials for American Gardens, Random House, 1989) call it the "most graceful of all the species," and Graham Stuart Thomas calls it "this nonpareil." Nonpareil it certainly is, with vast, blue-green, banana-like leaves on stems that quickly reach 10 or 12 feet in height; its grace is not there, however, but in its down-hanging racemes of flowers, tinted gray on the stems and abundantly furnished with five-inch-wide, broad-petaled blossoms of a deep, old-rose pink. For all its beauty, it is not an easy plant to place in any garden except a tropical one - its boldness of leaf and vividness of flower causing it to look a little odd and embarrassed among the gentle shapes of geraniums, campanulas, phlox, and the like. Perhaps in most temperate gardens it should be used more as a shrub than as a perennial, placed by itself at the corner of a garage or barn, or planted (as is done at Wave Hill in the Bronx) as a backdrop to other plants bold of leaf and tropical in feeling, such as the giant elephant ear (Colocasia esculenta), the four-foot-tall, round-leaved native American Darmera peltata, or the improbably vast leaves of the Japanese butterbur, Petasites japonicus var. giganteus. It also forms a splendid contrast with the fine architecture of larger ornamental grasses (Miscanthus species and Stipa gigantea). And, like other cannas, it makes a superb large, tubbed specimen.
One other species canna should be sought, and that is C. warscewiczii. Native to Costa Rica, it is lower in stature than C. iridiflora, at about five feet, with leaves a foot and a half long and half as-broad. Though predominantly olive green, the whole plant is suffused with a dull purplish or brown-purple tint, against which the flowers, scarlet with a pronounced bluish cast, are handsomely set off. Like other species cannas, each individual blossom is small, in this case not more than three inches long; but they are borne abundantly, and are followed by very attractive, dull red, bristly seed capsules. Once any canna has finished its leaf growth and produced a flowering stem, it can continue to produce three or even four racemes of flowers from the same stem, and for that reason, when scapes are done flowering they are generally cut away at the point where they join the terminal stem. With C. warscewiczii, however, it is nice to leave the spent scape alone in order to enjoy the handsome seed capsules.
All cannas, it appears, cross freely among themselves. And so, once one leaves the realm of true species to enter that of their hybrids, there are hundreds of forms to choose from, in heights ranging from hardly more than a foot to 16 feet, with leaves that may be bright or dull green, bronze, red, or even yellow striped, flowers both fatly clustered in cobs or thin and elegantly articulated along the stem, in colors that can range from almost white through pale and deep pink to rose, red, scarlet, orange, or yellow, sometimes with one color freck-led over another.
Since their first vogue among gardeners in the mid-19th century, there have been progressive waves of hybridization, intensifying when cannas were in favor and diminishing when they were not. With the present renewed interest in cannas, new breeding programs have occurred, though usually they have taken a different direction from that of Victorian breeders, emphasizing softer colors of peach and cream and palest yellow, and exploiting the elegance of the small-flowered species. But with a gene pool almost as vast as that of modern daylilies or bearded irises, almost anything except true blue can be produced in a canna.
And one can, if one is minded to, spend almost any amount of money on them - $100 or more for a rhizome of the finest, newest forms. But many of the older hybrids, tried in gardens and retaining their admirers through the thick and thin of canna fashion, offer the best value. Among the boldest is the old hybrid 'Le Roi Humbert', a name sufficiently difficult to say in French that the gardeners at Wave Hill have shortened it simply to "Leeroy." (Officially, it should be known as 'Roi Humbert'.) It is a vast plant that can easily reach nine feet, with huge, red-bronze leaves and scarlet flowers. A red-spotted yellow form, appropriately named 'Yellow Humbert', also exists. Shorter in stature, at five feet, is 'Wyoming', bronze-leaved also, with orange flowers; and shorter still, at three feet, is 'Black Knight', with brooding, burgundy leaves and deep red flowers. Among green-leaved cannas with red flowers, 'President' is a standard, at three feet, and it may also be had in a rose-pink form (called 'Pink President', which, if not precisely an oxymoron, is at least a hilarious conjunction of adjective and noun). 'Rosamond Coles', though a little taller, at four feet, has a similar fresh conjunction of light green leaves and red flowers, and among the Pfitzer strain (bred in Germany chiefly for park bed-cling), 'Pfitzer Crimson Beauty', at hardly a foot and a half, is a serviceable plant.
Though many people who love cannas want a red canna, figuring perhaps that one might as well go all or nothing, softer oranges, pinks, and yellows are often more beautiful in the garden, especially the foggy New England garden, where brasher colors can be discordant. Among yellows, the favorite is 'Richard Wallace', four feet tall, with green leaves and soft yellow flowers. 'Primrose Yellow' is a stronger color, and, like all the Pfitzers, never more than two feet tall. In that strain as well there is a fine warm pink, called 'Salmon', and a deeper pink, almost to red, 'Chinese Coral'. The softest, tenderest pink of all, however, at least among the older hybrids, is 'Cupid', which also grows to about two feet. Recent breeding efforts (as with daylilies) have concentrated on white to near-white forms, and for a price, some very beautiful ones are becoming available. But 'Eureka', the first approximation of white among cannas, is affordable, and very much worth searching out. Finally, for a real splash, one can grow C. 'Striata', a gilded lily if ever there was one, with large, pale green leaves liberally striped with yellow, surmounted by burning orange flowers. One plant of it in a pot might be enough, or a huge drift somewhere, perhaps along a garage wall, but nothing in between; for, like many plants of very pronounced character, one wants either a dash or a gob.
Cannas are among the easiest of all tender perennial plants to grow. General garden references list them as hardy only to the warmer parts of North America, usually USDA Zones 9 and But they are probably hardier than that, particularly if (as with many marginal plants) they are carefully sited, next to the wall of a heated building, and given the protection of a thick mulch of shredded bark or dried leaves. Canna glauca and its selections, if planted at the edge of a large pond, should particularly gain hardiness from the warming effects of a body of water. But for most of North America, cannas should be planted out annually as young, vigorous plants after all danger of frost has passed, and be lifted and stored when the first autumn frosts have blackened the leaves.
In the garden, cannas are very greedy feeders, as would be expected from a plant of such quick and lush growth. So, at setting-out time the garden earth should be well dug, liberally enriched with peat, compost, or well-rotted manure, and after the plants are established and growing well, a generous sprinkling of vegetable garden fertilizer to complete their nourishment. Beyond that, one need only be sure that they have the water they need, which is plenty, but never, except in the case of Canna glauca, so much as to make the soil waterlogged.
Growing cannas well is hardly beyond the skill of most gardeners. using them effectively in the garden is another matter, however, requiring a bit of finesse. Though Gertrude Jekyll depended on the foliage of cannas for substance at the back of her borders, and Lawrence Johnson used 'Roi Humbert' as one of the main structural elements of his famous red border at Hidcote, gardeners with less courage than they might well hesitate before plopping them all about. For the trouble with a canna is that generally, among the usual perennial plants, there is not an intermediate form between their tropical lushness and the finer, more meadowy texture of most border plants. So, when one attempts a rhythmic placement of them, they are hard to blend, and the effect is rather regimented and unsettling - in short, bad border design (as in "Here's one . . . and here's another . . . and here's another still"). So perhaps cannas are best used as surprises, at the turning of the path, at the corner of an outbuilding, in a seemingly naturalized drift beside a stone wall . . . or next to the garbage can. They should perhaps be planted the way the late Henry Mitchell liked his marigolds, "used sparingly, like ultimatums," for any single canna still goes a long way.
But, as Mark Twain once observed about egg nog, "a little whiskey is nice, but too much is just enough." Like many other plants of bold or emphatic character, cannas seem to look very well in mass, or with other plants of similar form - ornamental bananas, hedychiums, and colocasias. So you could, if you went canna wild, do what Christopher Lloyd has done with the old rose garden at Great Dixter, a venerable planting designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens. Walled on three sides by yew hedges and enclosed on the fourth by an old cow shed, for years it had been a showcase for shrub roses and hybrid teas. No more, for all the old bushes have been grubbed out, and now, improbably, those fine walls enclose a mad exposition of cannas, bananas, and other tropical herbs, all laced together by massed plantings of four-foot tall, magenta-flowered Verbena bonariensis. It is all improbable stuff, surprising to find as a planting near a 15 century English manor house. Indeed, as a friend of mine in Connecticut complained to me, "I don't know what he is up to. I just don't see the point." What he is up to - as Mr. Lloyd would gleefully tell my friend - is the avoidance of boredom. And one can say for the bigger, bolder cannas, at least, that they are never boring.
RELATED ARTICLE: STORING THE ROOTS
Storing canna roots can be a little tricky, because if they are kept too moist they will rot, and If too warm, they may either desiccate or sprout prematurely. The plants should be cut down, leaving about four inches of old stem. They should be dug as entire "stools," the gardener's word for a connected mass of roots or rhizomes. Though loose soil may be shaken or teased away, the stools should not be washed, and certainly not separated, as that will create tissue that will not cure sufficiently to prevent rot. Stools should be set in a warm, dry place for a few days, until the dirt that surrounds them is moderately dry. They should then be placed in large pots or plastic nursery tails and covered with barely moist peat, to sleep out winter. Sand is sometimes recommended, though it often remains too damp And unless you have just the right kind of moist root cellar, with temperatures hovering around 40 degrees Fahrenheit, ignore the advice to put the roots in paper bags and forget them for come spring, you will find little more than withered, woody lumps, long since dead. Cannas store best at temperatures cold enough to prevent new growth, but never so cold as to freeze the roots. Temperatures between 40 and 50 degrees are ideal, and the peat should be checked from time to time, and lightly moistened if it is dry. - W.W.
STARTING CANNAS INDOORS: Cannas should be started into growth about six to eight weeks before the last anticipated spring frost. It is better to be tardy than to rush, since they are plants of such rapid growth in warm weather that they will quickly make up for a week or two of starting late. Each stool should be lifted from its peaty bed and freed of the remaining earth so divisions can be made. The strongest plants will result from one or more ivory-colored shoots attached to as much brown, woody tissue as possible. Each division should then be potted up in a container just large enough to hold it comfortably, in fast-draining soil, preferably made of half soilless potting mix and half coarse builder's sand. Newly potted rhizomes quicken best at about 70 degrees, and bottom heat is a help. Because they will not need light until they are well sprouted, the top of the furnace, if it is comfortably warm but not too hot (place your hand on it when it is operating to see), is a good place to start up. Keep the soil only moderately moist - never soaking - until strong shoots appear, when they can then be watered abundantly, and of course, moved to bright, sunny conditions. When growth is well advanced, soluble fertilizer, at half the strength recommended on the package but twice as often, is an encouragement to strong growth. - W.W.
Wayne Winterrowd is the author of Annuals for Connoisseurs (Prentice Hall, 1992) and coauthor of A Year At North Hill (Henry Holt, 1996).
Mag.Coll.: 90G3337
Article A19896294
Article courtesy of MJPL Infotrac
This message was edited Nov 5, 2005 1:24 PM
Thank you for the interesting info. Great stuff.
Cheers
April
Pam
Thanks for the info and now I know I've goofed!
I washed my root balls off and then dried them and stored them in peat in my neighbors basement, it is not heated very well and is dark. So maybe partly correct will still work.
I will let you know how it works. I was also amazed at how big the roots have become after one season as they were just one small sprout when i started them last year. They sure could become a problem if they wanted too.
I am so lucky to have such a great neighbor who is happy to help with storage!
Ann
Glad to help and crossing fingers and toes for all of us to have success with our beauties!
For those of us that don't have success (or want to expand our collection ;).....one of our Canadian members is CannaAskForMore and he is the owner of Guildwood Cannas & Tropicals: http://www.guildwoodcannas.com/ He has the most extensive collection of Cannas I've seen available on this side of the border. I noticed tonight he's been eyeing new ones on the Tropical Forum so I imagine even more exciting new varieties will be available on his site soon. :)
Thanks for the link Lilypon, they have great stuff. When I overwinter my cannas, I dig them up, separate them (that way it is easier to wash all dirt), I allow them to dry, sprinkle them with rotenone powder and cover them with wood chips or peat moss until the next spring. Some people say it is better to separate them in spring before sowing; I had no problem so far with my way of doing things.
It's sure seems to one of those things the rest of us will have to experiment with until we can discover just the right amount of barely damp to keep them from rotting &/or desicating. Thank you for mentioning rotenone powder ( I picked some up for sprinkling my EE's with).
I know one greenhouse in the Battleford's kept their Cannas in the ground for a couple of years. They were dug in deep next to his house, mulched and had good snowcover (we also had a number of very mild winters then). The first *cold* winter that came along wiped out his collection. It isn't something I'd try but it did work for a while.
Well I guess I arrived at the party a little late. I normally leave the rhizomes whole and store them with some of the original soil they were planted in. However, experience is the best indicator of success. Threre are about 3-4 common methods used to overwinter cannas but not all of them will work for everyone as everyone has slightly different conditions to deal with. The common element with all these methods (besides storing them at cooler temps) seems to be using some type of media (soil, leaves, peat, etc) to regulate the moisture loss while at the same time allowing the rhizomes to transpire. If you want to find out a little more about cannas I attached a link to the website of Ian Cooke who wrote a very informative book about cannas.
http://www.cookecannas.co.uk/
I love Dave's Garden. Everyone is always helpful. Thanks to all.
cheers