Tuesday, July 6, 2010

Giant Allium Seedpods


How unearthly does that look! The “Giant Allium” does not only produce the well known beautiful purple globes, but after the flowers fade, it turns into this unbelievable spaceship seed. Don’t get overexcited though, the allium is done blooming mid June, and the seedpods don’t last long enough to provide winter interest. Another downer is that the flowers are either sterile or new plants are not coming true from seed. That being said, though, it is a must in the perennial garden. The giant alliums come out faithfully year after year and if the conditions are good (at least part-sun and plenty of water), they will spread. You can dig them out and divide them in the fall to get more of these beautiful plats in your garden. They are completely care free, once you planted them and gave them a little bit of food, they will not need anything else. They are not disease prone and will not crowd your other plants. After the seeds are ripened, the plant dies back and will come back next spring.
This perennial grows up to 2 feet in height and about a foot wide and will provide food for the birds, bees and butterflies. Alliums are not scented, but the huge flower balls up to 8 inches in diameter are spectacular. Another plus is that squirrels don’t seem to have an appetite for the bulbs, so if you plant them in the fall, you’ll see them the following spring.
If you decide to try your luck and propagate the plant from seed, just let the seeds dry on the plant and store them in a brown paper bag in a place where they will not be susceptible to mold.
Come spring, plant in peat moss under a plastic or glass cover to contain the moisture. Good luck. If nothing else, you’ll satisfy your curiosity with respect to what can come out of those seeds. If you really, really want more of these beautiful plants, divide the bulbs.
Posted by all-year-garden at 3:45 PM

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the art of waiting

You walk along the garden path one morning, look around and wonder where did it all come from. Naturally, you planted them all, or nearly all, with a few pleasant surprises here and there of self-sown perennials that sprung out from under annual growies before you got to notice them. Otherwise, though, the tall, stately beauties surrounding you are always taking you by surprise, because the first lesson in humility that is served to obstinate gardeners is the unwillingness of living things to develop according to your plans. They have their own internal clocks, their own environmental sensitivities and a completely different relationship with time than you. So, those lupines that you planted and thought dead sprung up on you two years later, after you planted cosmos over the following year, which self-seeded, and now both plants are gracefully mixing together in a fluff of stringy and palmed leaves, taking over an entire portion of your garden that you were intending for a completely different purpose this year. Or the snapdragons whose seeds you spread evenly over an area, but they decided to all come out bundled together to the left of the patch, leaving the rest of the dirt barren. Or the lily-of-the-valley that you tried to start from roots in the same spot for three years in a row, and now it decided to come out all at the same time and completely take over. Maybe you were planning, but your garden begs to differ. And when the garden and the gardener have different opinions, the garden usually wins. The struggling plant that you moved because you needed the space and didn't feel like throwing away now thrives in its new location with a vigor beyond expectations. Sun loving plants keep blooming in the shade behind the house, in a place that, of course, is not a showy feature of your garden. After a while, the oddities and surprises of your garden become familiar and dear to you, like an old friend's little idiosyncrasies warm up your heart after you haven't seen her in a while. A sense of peace descends upon the wiser gardener, a sense of acceptance that in this dialogue with nature, nature has something to say back to you. If those plants that you failed to recognize when you transferred them outdoors and planted them at the front of the flower bed turned out to be tomatoes, or if the sun garden you neatly organized according to height and flowering season exploded into a jumbled jungle of healthy growth, or if the miniature zinnias developed into four foot tall tree-like structures, or if all those tens of berries you saw on your strawberry plants were gone the second they turned slightly ripe because squirrels and rabbits believed in sharing, enjoy it, allow it, embrace it. If gardening only taught me one thing it would be the art of waiting. If you have enough patience and time, things kinda turn out the way you planned, sort of, eventually.

your private outdoors

Sitting at the table under the tree canopy, a book in one hand, the other hand mindlessly rubbing your temples, you lose track of time. The splotches of light filtered through the branches above move slowly opposite the sun path, while the day merges into evening. The light becomes gentler, more tired, almost horizontal. Around you two full walls, one half wall, a tree for a roof, and a balcony: your private outdoors. Noises come and go, the chirping of birds, the passing cars, people chatting while walking their dogs, the syncopated rhythm of joggers, the soft rubbery noise of bicycle wheels. The words on the page start fading as the evening shadow descends into the night, the contours are less precise, the contrast becomes nonexistent. Your cat comes around rubbing against your leg to remind you of dinner. The kids go in and out of the house abruptly, slamming doors, running down stairs and giggling plenty. Night flowering plants release their fragrance in the warmth of the day's end, and as light becomes more scarce, the sounds and scents intensify. The cat settles down in your lap, purring. Eerie little blue solar powered garden lights dot the darkened contours of the plant masses, and you discern more than you see the familiar garden path, the lilac bush, the archway above the gate. White flowers look like reversed shadows in the headlights of passing cars. The heavy summer night air, thick with humid fragrance, slowly cools down into a breeze.