Seattle Chinese Garden's 1st Peony Festival

I'm kind of bummed that I won't be here to help celebrate China's most famous flowering plant at the Seattle Chinese Garden this Saturday.



Our horticulture committee has endured a few challenges lately, yet we're moving forward in hosting our first even horticultural event by showcasing the genus Paeonia

Peonies have long been popular garden plants, but it never seems popular enough in the Puget Sound Area to garner its own exhibition. Perhaps it's because of the busy time of year when you're competing with plant sales, garden opens, etc. etc., but in Chinese culture, the peony is much celebrated and we thought that we'd begin a tradition of acknowledging this beautiful flower each year so the Seattle Chinese Garden becomes a destination for folks to come visit what we hope to be the largest collection of tree and herbaceous peonies in Western Washington that's open to the public.

For our first attempt at this, Swanson's Nursery kindly lent us 3 plants for the festivities this Saturday. Here they are being delivered. Oh, driving around with these blossoms and their scent was heavenly!!

This first year is really a trial run using the handful of tree peonies we have in our nursery holding area that haven't received the best of care, but are still quite remarkable. They'll be showcased in glazed ceramic Chinese pots

There will be a flower arranging demonstration, a running slideshow of a Peony festival in China and photos of many cultivars available in the trade. There will also be information about care and culture of peonies and potted herbaceous peonies for sale.

The event will also offer an opportunity to see the new "Knowing the Spring Courtyard" and the early stages of future construction.

I hope you'll come and support our humble horticulture committee and see some wonderful tree peonies in bloom and see the brand new courtyard!


WHAT: Seattle Chinese Garden's 1st Annual Peony Festival

WHERE: 6000 16th Ave. SW, Seattle WA 98106

WHEN: Saturday, May 21st. 12PM-5:30PM

COST: FREE!!!!

For more information visit the Seattle Chinese Garden website!


ALSO:IF YOU'VE GOT A PEONY BLOOMING IN YOUR GARDEN, DO CUT ONE OR A FEW TO SHARE AND SHOWCASE!!

I hope to share my peony pride and joy in future years with my precious:

This new plant's called....domino...DOMINO!!!

My young division of this Epimedium 'Domino' is getting established in a container and it decided to flower a few weeks ago.



Still not as readily available as other cultivars as this one set me back around $30.00 plus shipping, but it has gotten so many raves from fellow plantsmen and collectors I had to get it!

It is incredibly prolific in bloom with wonderful mottled foliage when developing and its overall vigor and habit are superb!

And now, the song/music video that reminds me of this plant!

5 Days to go.....planting like crazy!

With so many things sitting in pots, I've been trying to get things in the ground before I leave. The past few days, it's been dahlias!

I purchased a few dahlias from the Seattle Dahlia Society a few weeks ago and even with our almost non-existent spring temperatures, I figured that it'd be safe to plant them out right about now.

After all these years, I'm continually amazed at such a large plant and extravagant flowers come from a simple little tuber.

While it's getting kind of late to get tubers, dahlia plants become available at local nurseries later in the summer. However, they're often more expensive and the variety is usually poor.

So each spring I always look out for tubers, young plants, or pot roots.

TUBERS: These often come as a cluster of small, thin tubers packaged in sawdust or peat or a single plump tuber with at least one "eye" like the foreground of the photo above.

PLANTS: In late winter, dahlia growers force a few tubers indoors, underlights, to generate what are called "basal shoots" from the tubers. These young, tender shoots are allowed to develop until they're 3-4 inches tall and carefully cut off to create a little cutting, in which they place in media so it can root!! These basal cuttings bloom this summer and form tubers like all the other dahlias! Some varieties respond very well to this treatment and it's a great way of getting more plants as the tubers used to generate this cuttings can also be planted out and will also grow and flower!

POT ROOTS: A somewhat newer method of offering dahlias. These are basically cuttings that have been kept in containers all of last year (or cuttings taken in late summer) so you have this "block" of tubers you can plant out.

Now that they're all in, I need to make sure they're marked so I know where they are and I can place a taller and stronger stake if they need it without fear of spearing the tubers.

Just gotta get the slug bait out as those tender shoots coming up are tasty to slugs and snails.


This is one of my favorites called 'Pooh'

Flamingoes back in fashion?

Yes, I often question my design aesthetic. Client had them around so, whatevs

Needs to go....Needs to go!!!

SOAFB!!!!!!! Evil EVIL!!!! Grrrrrrrrrrrrr

Hyacinthoides hispanica aka Scilla hispanica

I truly HATE when this happens. Those fucking bulbs go down so deep, they're so difficult to eradicate and by pulling off just the stems and foliage, I've actually aided their spread even further becoming more of a bitch next season!!

"Yes, you can be pretty in early spring drifts of color, but, bitch, you spread way too much and I WANT YOU OUT OF MY LIFE!!!"

The Countdown Starts...10 days until London

Is it the excitement of it all or the gazillion things I feel like i have to do before I leave that's keeping me up late? Next week, I'm off to London to fulfill a dream I've had since I was 12 years old and my main agenda:

The Chelsea Flower Show!



Regarded as the world's greatest flower show, I taped a PBS special of the BBC coverage of the 1997 show and I had fantasies and wild aspirations about being the youngest ever exhibitor at Chelsea. Though I'm no longer able to fulfill that lofty goal, I'm approaching this tremendous opportunity to visit London as something I personally wanted and needed to do at this point in my life.

So much of gardening has all been about work and trying to make a living doing what I love to do, but often times the joy and exhilaration of flowers that captivates me tends to be forgotten and I want to be able to just soak it all in: sniff every flower, snap endless photos, talk with other plant enthusiasts from all over the world and just wear a smile on my face the entire time as if to say "This is where I belong"!



Such high expectations for a trip, eh? Barring any potential illness, injury, natural disaster, family emergency and the like, I should have a decent time.



Follow me through my thoughts and and observations leading up to my voyage to the UK and I'll be sure to try and post regular updates!


Cheerio!!


R

Impulse Buy: A fragrant sausage....vine.....yup yup

Needing some slug bait and twine, I went to a local nursery and ran into horticulturist, Joe Abken, who informed me of a new shipment of vines from Monrovia.

It was part of the Dan Hinkley collection of new introductions and it happened to be an unusual evergreen vine called Holboellia coriacea 'Cathedral Gem'. Collected in China, this seldom grown plant is dubbed the "Sausage Vine" because of it's bizarre fruit, but the FLOWERS ARE SO FREAKIN' FRAGRANT, I cursed at Joe for corrupting me once again on a absolutely stunning plant that I had to try.



The scent is very reminiscent of orange blossoms and when Tina came by, it reminded her of Sampaguita (Jasminum sambac) as well.

Supposed to be hardy down to Zone 6 and it gets its name because this plant was found growing at Winchester Cathedral in the UK. It blooms in late winter to early spring they say and requires part shade and consistent moisture in rich, but well draining soil. The straight species can grow up to 20 to 20 feet when mature, we'll see how I do with this one!

We need more interesting and reliable evergreen vines to replace crap like ivy and Clematis armandii, which can be nice, but a maintenance nightmare! If this sausage vine can get dense, flower reliably when its suppose to and the foliage holds up well all year, then we'll be happy campers.

Don't worry, Dan, this photo wasn't taken from your garden!


R