Early Early Blooms

With a recent return to warmer temperatures, I took a nice walking tour of the entire gardens this morning. While it's still sloppy out there, the "feel" reminds me of late March / early April. With that in mind, I had a couple goals with my walk. First and foremost, I needed to stretch out of my increasingly "hunched over the computer" posture. I have more back problems in winter for just sitting at my desk. I also wanted to check for deer damage and make sure our deer protection efforts were still in place. I didn't notice too much damage but can see evidence of deer checking things out (note the deer poop shot further below). I also had a gut feeling that I would find some things blooming or preparing to bloom. I had only made it to the woodland walk garden when I saw snowdrops (Galanthus nivalis) in bloom (top picture). This was one of the few clumps actually blooming yet but most snowdrops seem to be poised. Normally I would show a picture like this in mid to late March. My first blog posting of snowdrops last year was March 8th. The picture directly above shows the blooms of a 'Cinnamon Snow' hellebore (Helleborus) getting ready to open. Hellebores bud like this for a long time before they open early for a couple weeks. Again, I normally wouldn't see this for at least five more weeks. To the right is another hellebore (Helleborus niger) budding out in the color rooms garden. Also called the Christmas rose, this specific species (and specimen) is the first hellebore we see open up in March. To the left are the emerging buds of the spring adonis (Adonis amurensis 'Fukujakai') in the gazebo garden. Note the hint of yellow as these will all be beautiful flowers (daisy shape) in the near future and this is one of the top 10 earliest plants to bloom out in the gardens in spring.

It was nice to get thru the gardens and I've already compiled some additional duties that we'll have to address in terms of spring clean-up. We also will have some projects occuring in March that will be very welcome. This includes the re-roofing of the gazebo and observation pier structure and hopefully some major repainting of the arched bridge and many other garden elements if the weather cooperates. I can't help but worry that we'll be "paying" for all this warm weather with a severe end of spring! We'll see. To the right are the buds of the bearsfoot hellebore (Helleborus foetidus) in the gazebo garden. The arched bridge (below) never fails to be scenic at any time of the year.We had a nice turnout of volunteers today and we were a regular "paint shop" today (as seen above). Dr. Gredler can be seen in the upper left working on his orange obelisks. In the foreground are Gena (left) and Myrt (right) converting our lime obelisks to a nice, dark lavender. Dick W. is at the bottom of the photo and he worked on applying primer to all the deer and sleigh cutouts that he and Del have been working on recently. In the upper right are Urban and Rose working on the slanted blue pyramid. See further below and to the right to see Urban's interior work on the second pyramid. He and Rose are making quick work of those gardens structures. Urban and I also made time for a tour of the woodland walk to discuss some pruning "targets" and initiatives. To the right is one of the many "evidence piles" that the deer are leaving for us. Nice shot to the left in the Japanese garden today.

Marianne came in to process six more seed orders and she's done a nice job keeping the seeds grouped and organized as she processes them. Next week we'll start preparing labels for these varieties. Note the picture below of the Takii seed box. This is one of the many companies for which we trial seed varieties out in the gardens. We currently have over 70 seed varieties that we're trialing and will also receive vegetative cuttings for some other varieties as well. Most of our trial varieties aren't commercially available yet. It is always fun to try new plants out in the gardens and share them (visually!) with our visitors. Marianne is also helping prepare handouts for the looming WPT Garden Expo (www.wigardenexpo.com/) that is coming up on February 10th, 11th and 12th. Big John and I will haul up all our stuff and set-up the RBG booth on that Friday morning. Gary was over to clean up the laser engraver which should improve the quality of the labels being produced. We'll see Luis tomorrow and he'll keep up with our labeling momentum. We also saw Janice, Big John, Dick H., Glenn E., Kris K. and others today. At the bottom is our pile of clippings, trimmings and brush from all the recent pruning and removals. Much of our larger debris is chipped up for use as mulch out in the gardens. This pile will only be getting bigger as we continue pruning efforts out in the gardens. The progress has been quite amazing. By the end of this week, I will have posted my 1000th RBG Hort Blog and am on the start of my fourth year doing it. I hope readers, who find it of value, will spread the word and help promote RBG.

Photo Contest Materializing...

The photo above, while obviously not taken today, was taken on a day with very similar temperatures in April! The high today was 55 degrees F which isn't too unlike our April weather where you would see this redbud (Cercis canadensis) blooming near the observation pier (note the arched bridge in the distance). The photo above was also one that was included in one of our past RBG calendars. We've done RBG calendars for three years in the past and they continue to become more popular and are a nice item to sell in our Cottage Garden Gifts (gift shop) at the Parker Education Center. I've supplied the bulk of the photos for our calendars in the past but we're now formulating final details for an amateur photography contest that will be offered very soon that will allow participants to submit their favorite RBG photos for inclusion in the 2013 RBG calendar. I'm really excited about this and thank our committee (Tina, Kris, Bill, Lisa and Sue) for finalizing details (which will be announced in about three weeks). The warm weather brought in all sorts of volunteers today including Jumbo Jim to the left who was selecting donated seed (thanks Ferry Morse and Doreen!) for the Rock County Farm. Jim also facilitates the RECAPPER efforts at the gardens and is actively involved in myriad gardening projects. To the right is "Sawdust Larry" who has been running the chainsaw for two solid days to deal with some target removals. He, Dick W. and Bill O. were out hauling back debris from these removals and our winter brush pile is getting larger by the hour.

Urban was out in the gardens pruning in the woodland walk garden this morning. Maury was in to put another coat on his yellow pvc pipe planters (left) and only has three left to paint (green). Dr. Gredler continued his obelisk painting and we had some nice help from Rose (and later Urban) with painting our big blue pyramids a lighter shade of blue. The bottom blog photo shows Larry and Bill bringing one of the three pyramids in this morning. To the lower right is Rose inside one of the pyramids with the start of the conversion. We offered to pass her bread and water in her confinement but also told her she couldn't leave until she was done with the inside of that one! Dick H. was in working on some vehicles and other projects. Today we were happy to find a buyer for our older pick-up truck. We also saw Gary, Mary W., Kay F. and others today. Janice was in for a good portion of the morning working on the information sheets for our plant sale offerings. I'm down to finding a couple bell pepper (Capsicum annuum) varieties and selecting herbs and our plant sale orders will then be complete. The seed orders are arriving daily with five deliveries just today! I also worked on some spreadsheets, small projects and had a nice lunch with Kelli (recent RBG Exec. Director), who is enjoying her new job at Blackhawk Technical College. Tomorrow I'm going out in the gardens to look for winter aconites (Eranthis hyemalis) and snowdrops (Galanthus nivalis) blooming as I think we may be getting close for these early bulbs that we don't normally see until mid-March.

Great Teamwork!

We has another great turnout of volunteers today and the weather was nice enough for some guys to get out in the gardens as well. There was lots of activity going on at the Horticulture Center as evidenced in the photo above. Can you spot the five Grumpies!? Del to the lower right continued to work on reindeer with Dick W., who can be seen in the distance wearing the ball cap. To the far left is Maury continuing to paint our pvc planters. Bob A. in the center is priming and repainting the recently repaired garbage and recycling bins. In the far distance is Dave T. (bending over) who, along with Jim D. (not in above photo, probably napping), continued repairing more of those same bins. Dr. Gredler was also in continuing to repaint our next batch of obelisks (red becoming orange). To the right is evidence of some wildlife out in the gardens. Hopefully there is still enough available foraging material and the bunnies aren't girdling any of our trees or shrubs!

I spent the morning catching up on bills, paperwork and some other odds and ends. I also put some time in to my "Eat Your Landscape" talk that I'll give at the WPT Garden Expo at 12 noon on Saturday, February 11th. I'll also give this talk at the Chicago Flower Show on March 15th. I've done this topic a couple times in the past but wanted to create a new presentation as I've amassed lots of photos over the past year that are perfect for an improved discussion. I'll certainly be including plants like the 'Magenta Sunset' Swiss chard (Beta vulgaris) to the left and the red-ribbed, dandelion-leaved chicory (Cichorium intybus 'Red Ribbed') to the right. Both have very nutritious greens that will regenerate after numerous cuttings. The chicory (photo from Ron & Bev's garden) sure looks like a dandelion but it's important to mention that dandelion greens are hightly nutritious as well. The intent of this program (in my mind) is to get people motivated about growing their own produce in ways that don't require a large garden space. I'll emphasize smaller stature, ornamental options that can be incorporated in to garden beds, borders, containers, etc. The photo directly below shows the 'Soldier' beet (Beta vulgaris) that we incorporated throughout our reception garden last year. The maroon foliage worked well in our pink scheme and we had lots of questions on this ornamental edible that has not only the "beets" but nutritious foliage.Urban and Pat were out pruning in the arboretum today and helped clean-up some significant debris that Larry created with some chainsaw removals. Dick W. also helped with some of this clean-up and will be back tomorrow as well. Marv and Terry hauled over our oak leaf cutouts to the Parker Education Center as they will be available starting this Wednesday (February 1) for artists/sponsors to pick-up ($40 materials/registration fee). Check out our website at www.rotarybotanicalgardens.org for more information on this program (and many others). The guys also helped haul debris from Larry's targeted removals. Dick H. was in working on one of our trucks too. Marianne (to the right) was in to process our biggest seed order and we talked about starting to sort these and label them next week. Marianne also worked on organizing some drawings and other projects. Luis was in to continue data entry for our woody plant label production with the new engraver. We also saw Bradford, Karen B., Bill O. and many others. Today was also the first meeting of the year for our Horticulture Therapy committee (Darcie, Janice, Mike M., Art, Dawn).

To the left is one of Marv's new gloves which he thought was blog worthy. I'll let you decide. At least his baby soft hands will be protected. To the lower right is Maury working on the pipe painting. I did mention that if he would set the cup of coffee down, he could paint twice as fast.....No luck. Those pipes can also be seen in the bottom photo. We're really making great progress with our winter projects and the pace has been record-setting thus far with the Holiday Lights Show (HLS) take down allowing more time for these traditional projects. We continue to check our deer protection out in the gardens and surprisingly have not only seen very little nibbling but not a lot of tracks either....Unfortunately, February has always been the "Severe Browsing Month" for us in the past so we'll keep attentive. I should be done ordering seeds yet this week as we locate the last of our plant sale varieties and focus on finalizing our collections.

Persian Shield

One of my all time favorite annuals for foliage is pictured throughout this blog. I took all of these photos over the years at many different gardens. We've grown Persian shield (Strobilanthes dyerianus) every year that I've been at RBG and I wouldn't be without it. The foliage is truly amazing and quite hard to describe verbally. This is a perfect example of how a picture is worth a thousand words. I thought the Missouri Botanic Garden website had the best description by saying that "the foliage is an iridescent purple flushed with silver, with a dark purple underlayment broken up by dark green veination." Perfect. This plant is native to Burma and does not enjoy full sun. Ideally, position this plant where it receives afternoon shade. We purchase about 50 of these in 4" pots each spring and they end up around 24" or so by the end of the season. Persian shield does like rich soils that are moist but well-drained. We also fertilize ours every two weeks. As seen in many of these photos, this plant is a great candidate for not only the partly shaded border but the container too.

Moss Rose Collection Ordered

Today was very productive for me with more seed ordering accomplished and lots of odds and ends taken care of this morning. I'm pretty sure I'm done ordering all the seed varieties for our moss rose (Portulaca) collection. The moss rose (Portulaca grandiflora 'Fairytales Cinderella') above is one of the many vegetative varieties out on the market. I've included some of these in the collection but have currently focused primarily on seed varieties. I've found 67 varieties thus far and we'll probably add another 20 of the vegetative-type varieties as well. Some of my seed order today can be seen to the right. I also spent some time on our Home Garden Tour (July 21st, 2012) as preparations have to start early so we can get the details confirmed and tickets produced before Mother's Day. We have seven wonderful home gardens this year with the majority being in neighboring Milton, WI. I also worked on some presentations and finalized the listings for two more garden areas that are in need of our new woody plant labels. Luis will be in on Monday for data entry and production. The stacks of labels below are just some of what Gary and Luis have prepared. There are another 4,000 blank ones on the way! Marianne has been preparing the labels for these (double-sided industrial tape) but we also need to come up with a good system for creating concrete anchors for these (just the woodies). I've been thru too many gardens where labels have been pulled out, knocked over, moved or are missing. We'd like to really secure these out in the gardens and will come up with a plan of attack soon. Maury was in for a good portion of the day and started painting the first four of ten pvc pipe planters (see to the lower left). These four will be painted blue while the others will be either orange (3) or lime (3). These will be quite conspicuous out in the gardens and we're not shy about some vivid colors out there, whether with plants or other garden elements. Dr. Gredler was in all day continuing to paint obelisks. He came up with a nice way of putting on the second coat of lime on the 9' obelisks (see to the lower right). Doc then started converting some red obelisks to orange. He asked my why not paint them red again. My response, much to his chagrin, was "Red is so last year, orange is back in." Bev and Deb stopped by to talk about the leaf art project for 2012 and some Garden Festival (August 25) details. Next Wednesday, February 1st, interested artists/sponsors can pick up an oak leaf (primed plywood) cutout from the Parker Education Center for a $40 registration/materials fee. There will be only 40 pieces offered and they go fast! Details regarding this project can be found on our website (www.rotarybotanicalgardens.org). It will be nice to see the creative results displayed out in the gardens. Dave G. and Dean stopped by today and we also saw Bill O. briefly. Directly below are Tom and Nancy working on sorting/sifting/organizing the contents of our flat file system yesterday. We're really making sure our historical records, plans, etc. are organized and safe. I've even made multiple copies of all my photos, computer files and presentations from the past seven years or so. At the bottom is our weeping Jack pine (Pinus banksiana 'Uncle Fogy') specimen in front of the Parker Education Center. I think we'll move this specimen up higher so it can cascade down. The close proximity of this specimen to the curbline (bottom of photo) has caused some problems with "pruning by snow plow."