Emailed Wednesday,
August 09, 2006. To subscribe, click here.
To reprint any of this material, simply credit www.oldhousegardens.com. © 2006
Friends of Old Bulbs Gazette
Old House Gardens, 536 Third St., Ann Arbor, MI 48103, (734) 995-1486
"We have descended into the garden
and caught three hundred slugs. How I love the mixture of the beautiful and the squalid in gardening. It makes it so lifelike."
Evelyn Underhill, 1875-1941, English theologian
and author
Cold Dutch Winter Reduces Bulb Harvest
Though it wasn't bitter, this past winter in the Netherlands stayed cold longer than usual and spring arrived late. As a result the bulb harvest this summer has been smaller than expected, and a couple of our growers have already told us they won't be able to deliver as many bulbs as they'd promised. So we're sold out of 'Argent' daffodil, the tulips 'Blue Flag', 'Insulinde', 'Prince of Austria', and 'Zomerschoon', and several of our web-only rarities. Others are sure to follow much too soon, and although ordering early may not be a fool-proof way to avoid disappointment, we highly recommend it.
Expert Surprised: Heirloom Tulip Thrives in Steamy Mobile
Bill Finch, Mobile's garden guru and environmental
editor of the Press-Register, reported recently:
I had given up on any form of tulips for Mobile,
until Scott beat me over the head with Old House Gardens' selection of the old-fashioned 'candy-striped'
species tulip, Tulipa
clusiana. I'd tried various strains of this tulip before, without much success, and so gratuitously threw a few of Scott's candy-stripers into some poor dry soil at the corner of my yard. I figured maybe my wife would get a brief kick out of them. Now I'm kicking myself that I didn't start planting candy-stripe tulips years ago. They've come bursting out of the ground three springs in a row, each year better than the last.
In an email to us, Bill added:
"Yes, I really do think your clusianas are pretty solid for sharply drained, humus-poor, sandy soil in at least upper zone 9A south. And they really have had a trial by fire here: much warmer than normal winters, hot springs, and (until this year) wetter than normal summers. In the past, I believe I must have trialed one or more of
the chrysantha types, perhaps 'Cynthia'. [Ed. note: These are clusiana cousins with yellow or cream and red blooms.] I don't believe I ever had one survive the second summer, and lost most the first.
Bill goes on to report good results with our antique Freesia alba (which we usually recommend for dry-summer/Mediterranean-climate gardens only), Byzantine gladiolus, Spanish bluebells, and the Narcissus he calls our "Gulf Coast All-Stars." To read his whole article, click
here or go to http://www.al.com/search/index.ssf?/base/living/115350213282340.xml?mobileregister?lhg&coll=3.
Gladiolus Bonus: Hummingbirds
"A glad lover for over 50 years," our good customer Margaret Kwitek of Maribel, Wisconsin, says if you don't have glads blooming in your garden this summer, you're
missing more than flowers:
"Oh my goodness, your pictures of glads are wonderful! As for any 'glad haters,' all they have to do is put a comfy chair in the garden when the glads are in their glory. Sit quietly and enjoy the show of hummingbirds. They seem to know when you relax and feel quite comfortable coming in to those lovely flowers. I've even had them come to flowers I had cut and was bringing into the house. I'm never disappointed when I need a lift. I ALWAYS have glads if for no other reason. Who would fail to be delighted?"
David and Goliath in the Garden
A recent report says that 70% of all lawn and garden sales are rung up by Home Depot, Lowe's, Wal-Mart, and K-Mart. We shop the big-box stores, too, but imagine this: If that percentage ever reaches 100%, how will that affect your gardening?
More than ever, thanks for spending some of your garden dollars with us!
Top Five Perennial Hyacinths (and Deer-Resistant, Too!)
Which hyacinths return and rebloom best? Dr. Bill Miller of Cornell University tested dozens of varieties in zone-5 Ithaca, NY, on zone 6-7 Long Island, NY, and
in zone-7 Clemson, SC. At each test-site, twenty bulbs of each variety were planted in full sun, fertilized, and watered once. After that they received NO supplemental watering (hyacinths like dry summers) and only routine weeding.
After three years, these were the top-five performers, with their date of introduction and the total number of bloom-stalks followed by sub-totals for Ithaca, Long Island, and Clemson in parentheses.
1. 'Atlantic', 1986 = 90 (35, 30, 25)
2. 'Fondant, 1983 = 83 (28, 36, 19)
3. 'City of Haarlem', 1893 = 72 (32, 19, 21)
4. 'Gipsy Queen', 1927 = 70 (26, 17, 27)
5. 'Carnegie', 1935 = 66 (22, 25, 19)
Coming in seventh was 'Lady Derby' of 1875 with 63 bloom-stalks (the top performer in Clemson), and all the rest of the top ten dated to the 1940s and 50s. Heirlooms rule!
Hyacinths are also resistant to deer browsing, Dr.
Miller adds, "and this is a key benefit that should be recognized." So now you know!
Little Beeswings: Cute Dahlia, Great Song
Most gardens are rich with significance that eludes the uninitiated. Here's an unusual example from our good customer Debra Knapke of Columbus, Ohio:
"Just had to write and tell how much I am enjoying Little Beeswings" dahlia. It gets a 9.5 on the cuteness scale. But I really bought it because 'Beeswing' is the name of one of my favorite songs by Richard Thompson."
When we admitted that we didn't
know who Thompson was, Deb obliged us with a link to both his "Beesweb" website at
http://www.richardthompson-music.com/bio.asp and the "Beeswing" lyrics at http://www.richardthompson-music.com/song_o_matic.asp?id=207. "His voice is very distinct," Deb says, "and the song is a haunting ode about a free spirit and a doomed relationship.
Heavy!"
Coming Soon: More Web-Only Treasures
As the smaller-than-predicted Dutch bulb harvest continues (see above), we're waiting with fingers crossed to hear what other extra-rare daffodils and tulips we can offer you as web-only specials. Stay tuned, check out the ones we've already listed, and thanks for your patience!
Your Garden Memories: Mr. Boylan and His Iris
Our good friend Joyce Cook of Austin, Texas,
writes:
Thanks for your invitation to describe one of my early garden memories. One can't just accost someone on the street and say, 'Hey,
wait till you hear how lovely this garden was that I used to know.' So it's nice to be asked.
"In the Ozark town of Batesville, Arkansas, where I grew up, there was a neighbor across the back alley, Mr. Gene Boylan, who grew bearded iris. And I mean, he grew them! He must have had 15 rows, with about 15 plants in each, all spaced with their own hills and plenty of room to walk between.
"I was a child, not even a teenager at first, and was allowed to open his gate and walk down every row, pausing at every single plant to first smell it, then look inside it to the soft, radiant mixture of colors inside each blossom. The subtle blend and gradation of colors was wonderful to me, the way one color bloomed from the previous one, with no recognizable dividing line. I never cared for Disney-like, all-one-color shapes, but rather hungered for complexity and subtlety of design.
"I was a lucky kid to have this beauty in my own block. I now have a garden with a bearded iris section, and I frequently recall Mr. Boylan's blooms with joy. I now know why he spent so much time out there."
Burpee Outlines Encouraging Plans for Heronswood
For a sunnier view of Heronswood's future, here's a link to a long letter detailing Burpee's vision for it: http://www.heronswood.com/. We've got our fingers crossed and wish them all the best.
Did You Miss Our Last Newsletter? Read It Online!
Last month's articles included our web-only rarities, what's to blame when bi-color dahlias aren't, heirlooms at historic sites, a great new book about heirloom gardening, and more. You can read all 52 of our back-issues at http://oldhousegardens.com/newsArchive.asp.
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