What's Blooming. Roses

Ning bought a new camera. Here are some of the results. Who says that you need chemicals to grow beautiful roses?

Tamara. This has long been my favorite. See below for Tranquility, which is giving Tamara a run for it's money. A David Austin "English Rose". Very, very fragrant.

Scepter'd Isle. Also a David Austin "English Rose:. Nice and fragrant.

Red Masterpiece. Sold as a hybrid tea, and has a hybrid tea scent. Very vigorous. More of a 'grandiflora' habit - big, many blossoms per bunch. A few years ago, I threw some prunings behing a new retaining wall. They were buried in fill soil. The prunings grew up through the soil, and became big bushes that are also blooming nicely.

Rustled Rose. This is a very fragrant purple rose that was 'rustled' by taking a cutting. It looked abandoned, growing by a telephone pole on a Portland street. The original bush is gone now. Not too vigorous, and susceptible to blac spot, but VERY fragrant. Fruity, berry fragrance.

Scentimental. Prolific.

Yellow "rustled rose". This was grown as a cutting from a bouquet of flowers that was brought into work by a coworker. It took about 4 years to reach good blooming size, and still isn't large. Looks like a hybrid tea type, and has mild hybrid tea fragrance. Looking in rose books, it might be "Graceland" but there are so many similar roses, it's hard to say.

Tranquility. From cutting-grown plant bough from Heritage Roses in St. Paul Oregon. I have not seen another rose exactly this color. Very fragrant and prolific. It was slow to reach blooming size, but is not very vigorous and prolific. No black spot so far.

Figs Progress Notes

So far this year the fig trees have had a difficult time. Early warm spell in late winter, then a hard freeze, then cold and wet, another warm spell, and the latest freeze in recorded record here. After a slow start, they lost the first leaves. Finally, there seems to be some growth and potential for late figs. At least they survived, and only one branch on one fig failed to grow.

Hardy Chicago. I'm not sure what caused the spots on the first leaves. The newer leaves don't have them. A couple of branches are at the 6-leaf stage, so I nipped out the terminal bud to encourage formation of figs. If the first leaves are very small, I didn't count them. If about 1/2 size, I did.

Lattarula. Very late start, None of the branches are at the 5-6 leaf stage yet, and many of the leaves are small. This tree suffered the most from the leaf drop.

Vancouver. This tree was the fastest to grow. About 1/3 of the branches are at the 5-6 leaf stage. The leaves are starting to grow out normal sized as well. There is one breba. This is the only tree with a remaining breba. That's not too much of a loss, since brebas have not been very successful anyway.

Petite negri. This tree had a number of brebas but they all fell off. Only a few branches are at the 6 leaf stage.

Desert King sapling, planted this winter. It is surrounded by bean plants, about the same size. Each branch is about 6 inches long, with multiple leaves, about 1/2 the size that I expect ultimately.

Bathroom project. Status report.

Framing and pocket door installation finished. None of this was as bad as I worried. The pocket door part was actually fairly easy. Here it is, 1/2 way open. I used the level about a zillion times to make sure that it was plumb.

Now the wall has wallboard. I waited for the inspector's OK (verbal) for this. I was tired of the bedroom feeling like a construction site. Not completely done (wait for the NEXT inspection) but now feels like a bedroom again. Actually makes the room feel bigger, for some reason.

The pocket door actually works. Amazing. Also amazing, I actually remembered to get 1 1/8" drywall screws, and they didnt go through the pocket door frame. All-in-all, this part worked out nicely.
The photo is a bit distorted - the posts are actually parallel and vertical. The city had sent me a threatening letter, stating get it inspected or get a big fine. So I got it inspected. The inspecter said that he couldn't renew the permit unless I did a couple more things, mainly improve the joist strength. I had installed 1 2X10; he said that I needed to pair them. So here it is. You cant see in the photo, but the 2X10 at the top is paired, and the posts are bolded into the concrete floor. Also, nat as difficult as I had worried, and I didn't crack or damage the floor. This basement room is looking strange now, but it want from ugly-finished to just ugly over the past few years. Someday, when everything else is done, maybe it will be another bedroom and these posts will be part of a clost door frame....

It's strange. For the other bathroom, the inspector signed off on the framing before I got wiring and plumbing installed. This one says I have to get wiring and plumbing first. Plus, the other one renewed the permit for me. This one says that I have to call the city (atually, in their letter, I think tha tthe the city said that the inspecter could do it - but now I cant find the letter).

Anyway, a bit of progress.

Ancient Palm Still Growing

Here is a link to the ancient Judean Date Palm that was grown from a 2000 year old seed. I can't post a photo becuse it is copyrighted.

Nice to see it is growing. Even if male, maybe it could be used as a pollen parent for new hybrids with modern varieties. Of course, what it most wanted is for it to be female. The it could be cloned and the actual dates would be Judean Dates, probably almost the same as the ancient varieties. My question now - if they can do DNA testing as noted in the article, then why don't they knoe if it is female? I understand gender in plant is different from animals, but still, it seems like DNA testing sould give an answer.

According to a wikipedia article, 2000 years ago there were thick forests of these palms along the Jordan River. The current date palms in Israel were imported from California, and originated in Iraq.

Brugmansia "status report"

This no-name brugmansia was taken out of the garage, cleaned up, and repotted 10 weeks ago. Not too promising then. I'll post again when it starts to bloom.

Click on the "brugmansia" tag below, to see what it looked like 10 weeks ago.

This brugmansia was a cutting, and I thought it might not survive the cheap+lazy method of drying out in the garage, so I kept in in a sunny window. It doubled in size during the winter. Now it's repotted and on the deck. The yellow leaves are a response to too much sun on the older leaves, but they'll soon be replaced by the newer, greener leaves.

Overwintered and other Geranium (Pelargonium)

Here are some of the overwintered geraniums (Pelargonium). The most successful and easiest approach was to have them in containers and just leave the containers dry out in the garage for the winter. This is the "cheap+lazy" method since it really doesnt entail much effort, and results in nice good-sized plants by early summer.

The variegated pelargonium was overwintered. It is just coming back into its own. The finely cut leaf pelargonium was just added. It is scented, citrus. The smaller flowers are sweet alyssum, probably coming up from seeds from ones that bloomed in the container last year.

So tell me, please - why do I need a peppermint scented pelargonium when I have peppermint-scented peppermint growing all over the place? Anyway, it does smell, strongly, like peppermint. This one is new, so is not an overwinter example.

This wals also overwintered as above. This one is pine scented and it smells very much like pine. The scent is stong. Cool. Each time that I walk past it, I pinch off some more and smell it. The dark purple leaves are part of a Tradescantia pallida. This did well in other containers, using the dry-for-the-winter system. I was also surprised to see one poking up in the strawberry border, surviving the winter in ground. That is probably a fluke, this is really a tender tropical plant.

This is another scented one. I forget the variety. It did not survive the totally dry method 2 winters ago - this was kept as a cutting over that winter. So this winter I kept it almost-dry in a cool sunny room. Also took a cutting, using the lazy-gardener's method of cut off a piece and stick into some potting soil and water like any other house plant. That worked too. I cleaned it up a bit, and stuck some cuttings in the ground or with other plants. If they grow, that's good. If not, nothing lost.

Just regular run-of-the-mill geraniums. The prior over-winter entries show how they looked coming out of the garage. 6 weeks ago the leaves were dry and crispy, and the stems didnt look much better. All that I did was clean them up and set them in a semi sunny location. Again, the lazy gardener's method of overwintering, and the cheap gardener's method of having some large geraniums for the deck. They'll be blooming soon.

Magnolia sieboldii

This bush is now 7 years old. I bought it mail order from Wayside Nursery. This is the first year that it has bloomed. It has about 6 flowers, smaller than the usual magnolia. The advantage of this tree was that the flowers were described as fragrant. I cant smell them at all. Also that it blooms later in the Spring than other magnolias, so that the flowers are less likely to be touched by frost. I think that is true.

I'm not sure that it was worth it. Maybe next year it will have more flowers. Novelty is worth something. I've never seen one before, except in the catalog.

Addendum: I went back out and stuck my nose into a flower. It IS sweetly, but faintly, scented. Well, I'll give it a chance for another year. Many shrubs and trees improve with age, including color and scent. The wisteria didnt bloom for about 6 years, and it was worth the wait.

I looked around google for more information about this Magnolia. It is also called "Oyama magnolia" for the mountain where it is native in Japan. It also grows in Northern Manchuria and Korea. (Ning grew up in Manchuria and states that he's never seen one before). The Japanese and Korean varieties may have lighter coloration of the stamens, with the Manchurian varieties having darker red stamens. This information from "The World of Magnolias". This variety seems to be in the darker stamen group, although not as dark as in the original catalog picture. Apparently it is better suited for shade, and this one is in a more sunny spot - maybe that's why it dried out 2 years ago during the summer. Last year I watered it more frequently, compared to the other shrubs, and it did not lose leaves that summer. According to multiple sources, it blooms over a several-week cycle, and then sporadically through the Summer.

Peach Tragedy

With the warmer sunnier weather, the Peach Leaf Curl seems to have stopped infecting the newest leaf sprouts. However, so much damage was done that many of the branches are dead. I pruned off everything that I thought was dead, and then a few strategic shaping cuts, and pruned back to new growth where I could. Most of the prunings were dry and crunchy.

This is "Honey babe". It was the hardest hit. I still dont know if it will survive. I gave it a good dose of fish emulsion.

This is "Garden Gold". It seems to be starting a recovery. I hope so. It also got a dose of fish emulsion.

Fish emulsion is stinky, and probably for that reason the dogs love it. They follow closely and lick the watering can when I set it down.

The newly planted peaches were completely untouched by the leaf curl. As bare root trees, I suspect that they were stored indoors, in a climate controlled barn (I saw that at Raintree Nurseries). That supports the idea that preventing rain from washing spores into the buds might help prevent the disease. I had worried that covering them would make overheat, due to solar energy, or make them dry out, because the rain would be diverted. However, this is far worse. It's also proof that neem oil is not a panacea. Of course, nothing is a panacea, and I knew that. My plan this fall will be to build a 'barn' to cover each tree. Since they are miniature trees, it should not be too difficult.

Kitchen Garden

We have been eating lots of cilantro. This was sown by crushing old flower heads from last year's cilantro, letting the seeds scatter on the mulch. The flower heads were saved by leaving them in the garden shed over the winter, unprotected. The cilantro is flavorful and tender. This method fits into the "cheap+lazy" gardening philosophy. I putter around far too much to be considered lazy, but "virtually no effort" takes up too much room in the labels.

The strawberries hold a lot of promise. The most blooms, ever.

The Inchelium garlic looks like corn plants. No scapes yet.

Several of the tomatoes have flower buds, even though they are only about 9 inches to a foot tall. I've started pinching out the lower branches, to maintain a cordon shape. One grouping had pale leaves - uncelar why, but this area did not get as much chicken compost. I added fish emulsion and added some epson salts for good measure (Mg and sulfur) and the leaves ARE greener today.

I hate to say it, but I planted some 'orphan' tomato plants in an area that is frequented by the cat for her litter box. These ARE larger and greener than the others. I guess this is OK - they are fruits, so the food part is not near the cat's 'products'.

We've been eating lots of scallions, both of the 'potato onion' type (my favorite) and the "Egyptian walking onion' type. And some of the 'I don't know what they are' type, that just happened to be left in the ground from previous years. These are perfect for the "cheap+lazy" gardener, since each onion produces sets for next year, at the top of the plant. These can be planted in the fall for early scallions, at zero cost and little effort. If you ignore them, they'll fall over and plant themselves, which is esentially zero effort for the gardener.

Today I planted another set of Ning's beans. In addition, I planted bush zucchinis. Something ate the prior seedlings. I planted new cucumber seeds, for the same reason.

Ginkgos

The is the largest of 3 ginkgo seedlings in the yard. Ning started it about 8 years ago in a flowerpot, from seeds that my Dad collected in Quincy Illinois. The parent tree was in the yard of Herman Deege, who taught me about the ancient heritage of the ginkgo trees, and told me that they were deciduois but more closely related to conifers, and taught me that they came in 2 sexes. I was 10 years old at the time. When it looked like this tree might not flourish in the flower pot, I planted it in the ground. It has the advantage of lots of nutrients, since it is in the area that the dogs use for their bodily functions. It is also watered during the summer, for the same reasons.

This tree is the same age, but was planted in the ground one or two years after the first, for the same reason. This year I fed it with fish emulsion and compost. The cat was using the compost mulch for her litter box, so I mulched it with thistles, which seems to have corrected that behavior quite nicely. It has grown about 9 inches so far this year.

I am somewhat of a ginkgoholic. There are 3 seed-grown young trees planted in the yard, with intent to grow into full sized trees, and multiple seedlings in flower pots. I don't know what I will do with those.