Time Flies, Peonies Rise

Good gravy, I've been puttering along through Spring, thinking that I have been keeping up pretty well with the garden chores.  I've pruned shrubs and burnt prairie grass, planted onions and potatoes, divided perennials, and even sprayed the apple trees for cedar rust, but I almost missed an important chore.  Gardener's, please don't forget that your peonies need your support!

I've got approximately 40 different peonies (when did that happen?), which constitutes a full crapload of peonies (as opposed to a half crapload).  I don't provide supports for all my peonies, just the taller ones standing alone as specimens in their borders, or the larger ones prone to topple.  Paeonia tenuifolia, low-growing and already in bloom, doesn't need support.  And many of my peonies are confined in a defined area (the "peony bed," what else?) where they can mostly lean on each other.   But, in total, I counted 21 commercial support hoops hanging in my garage this weekend when they should have already been in place hovering over the peonies.  Over the peonies?  Around the peonies would be a better description. Those babies have really shot up over the past two weeks, with many beginning full bud and topping better than 2 feet!

 

So I rushed around yesterday and got the supports in place.  Thank God that I've purchased a number of those commercial hoops that have a hook-catch so you can place them around already established clumps, such as the one shown above.  Other peonies, not quite so tall, are lagging and so they got the "unsnapable" supports that they can grow up through like the one at the right.  And a few peonies are just going to have to do without this year because I used some of the smaller supports for a few "front-and-center" sedums that have a tendency to flop around and look flat in late summer when they should be standing tall and proudly the center of attention. 

It's like a country song.  "Mamas, don't let your peonies grow up to be flop-mops.  Don't feed'em to much or shade them too much, Let'em be beauties and cut flowers and such." (Apologies to Waylon).  

Easter Surprise

As Easter, 2011 finally arrives here in this slow-starting Spring, I've been given a present in the garden to watch over.   A white sport appeared on my 'Sensation' Lilac this year amidst all the deep purple, white-edged blossoms. This year, the Equinox Gods must be rewarding my earlier offerings to the start of Spring.

I appreciate the gift, but I would feel more special about it if a quick search didn't reveal that white sports from 'Sensation' are not especially rare.  There are several pictures of these sports on the Internet, and indeed, a webpage about plant sports by Professor Janna Beckerman from Purdue University's Plant Diagnostic Lab included a white 'Sensation' sport as a common example.

'Sensation' Lilac

'Sensation', for those gardeners who aren't familiar with it, is a popular lilac in commerce and in gardens because of the unique purple and white look to the blossoms that is commonly described as a "picotee."  Picotee is derived from the word "picot," which is a series of small embroidered loops forming an ornamental edging on some ribbon and lace, and the word "picotee" actually is defined as a carnation with pale petals bordered by a darker color.  'Sensation' then, I suppose, should be more accurately described as a reverse picotee.   'Sensation' also has nice heart-shaped foliage, but it is a rather stiff bush, growing 8-10 feet tall and wide, with strong, hearty branches that tend to be a little more sparse than most lilacs. To my amusement, 'Sensation' is labeled at many online nurseries as a "new" introduction, but it is actually an old lilac, introduced in 1938 by Eveleens Maarse.  According to Jennifer Bennett in her 2002 book Lilacs for the Garden, it was a genetic mutant of lavender-colored 'Hugo de Vries' that occurred when the Maarse greenhouse in Holland was forcing lilacs for Christmas. John Fiala, in Lilacs: A Gardener's Encyclopedia, lists it in a section with lilacs of "special and unique color classifications," and describes it as "outstandingly effective and unique."  Alongside the white sports, 'Sensation' has also been known to revert to the plain purple form resembling 'Hugo de Vries'.

For the scientifically-minded, the proper term for the mutation that led to 'Sensation' is a "periclinal chimera," which is a plant composed of cells of two distinct genotypes separated into distinctive zones.  Periclinal chimeras, as opposed to the other categories of chimera (mericlinal, and sectorial chimeras), are important because the mutations are stable and can be vegetatively propagated.  Thornless blackberries are perhaps the best known result from the formation of a periclinal chimera.  In the case of my white 'Sensation' sport then, the white flower genotype tissues have separated to give me a present.

Knowing all that, however, makes my own 'Sensation' sport no less of a miracle to me.  I'm going to watch it, and if it doesn't go through an ugly brown phase as so many white lilacs do when they fade, I'm going to try to propagate it.  Maybe someday I can have a part in releasing a lilac that will be named 'Easter Sensation.'

Buck Mania

Yesterday was what I consider a very good gardening day.  To start off, we got approximately an inch of much-needed rain here in Manhattan last night.  But even better, just before the rain, I received and planted a box of bands from Heirloom, primarily composed of Griffith Buck cultivars:

For those who are used to Grade 1 potted roses, the bands that you receive from most heirloom specialty growers could be perceived as a disappointment, but let us try and remember that what we are buying is primarily the genetic material.  Bands most often come, as you can see below in small pots and are barely rooted cuttings, but the advantages of having your roses grown on their own roots, ungrafted, makes up all the difference.  As rosarians, we can make the growth happen on our own with enough patience, but we can't manufacture 'Ferdinand Pichard' out of 'Easy Does It' or 'Carefree Spirit'.  Expect for them to take a couple of years for these to make a large bush, but with a little protection, they will get there in time and they certainly have a better chance than a BigBox "bagged rose" with its paraffined canes and clipped roots.  Yuck!

In this shipment, I received a number of mostly Griffith Buck cultivars, all planted into the same bed, including 'El Catala', 'Folksinger', Iowa Belle', 'Queen Bee', and 'Bright Melody'.  I'm particularly interested in growing the latter two bright red or reddish-orange cultivars as I've never seen them in person.  I am also received a 'Wonderstripe' from the Heirloom Roses breeding program, a 'Crested Moss' to add to an OGR bed, and I'm going to give 'Ferdinand Pichard' one more chance.  I've purchased and killed that gentleman before, but I'm such a sucker for striped roses that I certainly think he deserves a second chance.  Or is it a third?