Winter nursery trip reveals treasures
While everyone else was home watching the Super Bowl on Sunday,
I hit the garden centers and nurseries to see
– without a crowd – what is new, interesting and plant-able
right now.
My goodness, what a treat!
Winter nursery trip reveals treasures
While everyone else was home watching the Super Bowl on Sunday, I hit the garden centers and nurseries to see – without a crowd – what is new, interesting and plant-able right now.
My goodness, what a treat!
The garden outlets are filled to overflow with wonderful flowering plants, dozens of bareroot candidates, seasonal shrubs such as camellias, azaleas and rhododenrons, plus winter bedding plants, annual ornamental grasses, early blooming perennials and ready-to-flower daffodils and tulips in pots.
It’s obvious from these dazzling displays that, despite the recent freezing temperatures, there is more than enough to fill in, fill out or totally redesign our own gardens.
Among the things that caught my eye was Double Decker tree roses. This year’s newbie from Jackson and Perkins is the double-decker tree roses. The two-layer creation features J&P’s weeping tree roses for a lush topiary look, and the promise of all these flowers is beyond tempting. . The top rose and the bottom rose are the same varieties including a creamy yellow named Yellow Ribbons, coral pink Electric Blanket and a cranberry shade called Roseberry Blanket. The ones I saw were, of course, dormant, but they are not bare root. These layered roses are sold in 5-gallon pots, and can be grown in containers or in the ground.
If you can’t find them at your local garden center, Double Deckers are in the J&P catalog (1 Rose Lane, Medford, Ore. 97501, and on the J&P Website (www.jacksonandperkins.com).
The catalog price is $49.95 and the price may be a little more or a little less at garden centers.
The word Double Decker is now a registered trademark of J&P.
Another is the self-pollinating Bing cherry tree. Wow, did that grab my attention? I have lost three Bing trees, one to old age, one to missing pollinator, and one to tip die-back. The tasty Bings need a cross pollinator such as Stella or Tartarian to produce fruit. . So, what is this mysterious self-pollinating Bing doing among the other bare-root fruit trees on the nursery rack?
Read the fine print. It’s not really a Bing. The ultra dwarf self-fertilizing Bing cherry tree is actually the Lapin cherry. The fruit tastes just like Bing, according to the label, but it’s not the real deal. Still, it needs only 600 chill hours and produces in late June, just like the other Bing.
Does this feel a bit like false advertising? Maybe. But the lesson to be learned from Bing-Lapin is to carefully read the labels to be sure you know what you are buying. Nontheless, I’m adding this fruit tree to my backyard orchard. We’ll see if it lives up to the promise.
Among bare-root vegetables, an excellent supply of artichoke and asparagus roots are good bets for plantings now. I was caught by the packaged root of Green Glove Artichoke. This vegetable is also good for landscaping and that’s what prompted me to buy one for $4.99. Artichoke plants with their big droopy fountain-like stalks can add an interesting highlight to an edible landscape. You can pick the artichokes to eat, and also let a few go to flower stage. The purple flowers – dried or fresh – are dashing in floral arrangements. In fact, some floral arrangers grow artichokes merely for the flowers.
Although artichokes are famous for growing in cool coastal summer weather, they will do just fine in San Benito County gardens. The trick is to dig a deep hole with a small amount of compost.
E-mail Joan Jackson at [email protected].
