February 25, 2020 - almost spring

 Hi Gardeners

We had a wonderful weekend here, sunny and temperatures got to 51 here on Sunday. But today winter is on its way back. A good snowstorm is predicted for tonight and tomorrow. Yesterday I found several snowdrops in bloom and I could see all the other bulbs peeking up from the ground. Soon they will all be covered again.

February’s almost over and this has been one of the mildest February’s I can remember. (I hope the next couple days don’t change my opinion.) It’s now daylight until 7:30 pm and daylight savings time is just around the corner. You can feel the sun is stronger as it climbs higher in the sky. The trees are coming out of slumber, I notice several people around me are tapping for maple sugar.

I have a dilemma that only other gardeners would understand. We need a new roof badly and hubby wanted to get it started this spring. I don’t want my gardens ruined by falling debris. My gardens are all around the house and it’s going to be difficult to protect them. I guess if it gets done soon maybe things won’t be too impacted.  

As people are coming to give estimates, I ask them how they could protect my plants.  Most look at me kind of funny. A long time ago I let roofers replace my shingles in July. They promised to protect the plants around that house with plywood “slides”. Let’s just say it was a disaster and the garden was ruined for the summer. So, I am rightfully afraid.

It may be possible to hold off on the roof until fall, but then which month should I choose? The garden is beautiful through October. I keep going out and trying to decide where a dumpster for the torn off shingles and wood could be placed, and I don’t see a good option close to the house. Here’s an example where I didn’t think about fixing the roof when I planned the gardens. But then roof replacements are usually decades apart and I have good reasons for having my gardens where they are. Wish me luck.

“Winter” seed sowing

Sowing seed in the fall and winter, or in very early spring is a practice that has been around a very long time. It’s being talked about on garden sites online as if it is some newly discovered miraculous idea, but many older gardeners have been doing it for years. Technically February is still winter.

Peas

Grass seed can be sown when snow is still on the ground. In late winter simply sprinkle it over melting snow. You’ll lose some to birds and run off so seed heavily. Peas can be planted as soon as you can push the seed into the ground in the spring. They are often planted on St. Patrick’s Day. But that’s not where the interest is.

The modern trend of winter sowing generally has a gardener sowing seeds in something like a milk jug. In earlier times the seeds were simply sown in the ground or in a cold frame. You can sow certain seeds in the fall right in the ground. Almost any plant that will self-seed in the garden can be done this way. Make sure to mark where you plant the seeds. They will germinate when conditions are right in the spring. It may take longer for seeds sown this way to bloom than plants started inside.

Experience has taught me that sowing seeds in the fall or very early spring out in the garden - at about the time the snow melts- has some disadvantages. Chickens are very adept at finding every tiny seed when other resources are scare. So are wild birds and mice.  So, the idea of protecting the seeds in some way is helpful. It also keeps you from forgetting where the seeds were planted.

Unless you want only a few plants however, I suggest gardeners use a cold frame, rather than milk jugs or other small containers. Those small containers can work if you are lucky, but they are much more prone to wide temperature fluctuations and they don’t give plants much room to grow.

A cold frame is simply a box on the ground with a clear lid, and sometimes a clear side. You can also use hoops or tunnels to promote early seed starting. A gardener can simply construct a wooden box with a Plexiglass or glass lid or make a lid covered with heavy clear plastic film. Old windows can make good cold frame tops. The box should be at least eighteen inches deep to allow plants to grow. The walls should be thick or well insulated. You can add a floor or simply have them sit on the ground.

Purchased cold frames may be made of wood or plastic. They often have hinged lids that are connected to a device that opens the lid when a certain temperature is reached. You can also buy those devices for homemade cold frames. They may also have heat cables on the floor and fans to circulate air. You can add those things to homemade cold frames too.

Set the cold frame up several days before you sow seeds or set plants in it.  Cold frames should receive full sun all day. You could set the box up in the fall, but you don’t want to put seed in it until it’s quite cold outside. You don’t want the seed to germinate early and then the seedlings perish from cold nights. Also, a warm spell in winter may start seeds germinating and then a cold snap will kill them.

If you want to put seeds in the cold frame in winter I would cover the top with something to keep out light and crack the top a bit. This would prevent seeds from germinating too early. As spring approaches take off the covering and adjust the top for the weather as described below.

Some people add soil and plant directly in the box, but plants transplant better if started in pots. Square pots use less space. Don’t start seeds or plants in a cold frame too early in the spring. The weather should be ready for them to be planted in the garden when they outgrow the frame and night temperatures should not fall much below freezing. Planting in a cold frame can usually begin six- eight weeks before your last expected frost.

The most important thing to remember about cold frames is that even though it is in the upper thirties outside on a sunny day, it will be much warmer inside the box with the lid closed. If temperatures get too hot the plants will die just as quickly as if they got too cold. On sunny days the lid must be raised at least a little. That’s where those devices that will raise the lid when the temperature gets to a certain point inside and lower it when it drops are handy. They can be purchased in garden supply stores.

Cold frame
wikipedia

If you do not use a thermostatically controlled opener you must be diligent in raising and lowering the lid depending on weather conditions. If extremely cold weather threatens after seeds sprout the whole cold frame can be covered with a blanket.

My grandfather used this trick with cold frames. Just before he put flats of seeds inside them, he added a big shovel of cow manure from a relative’s farm. He put a layer of newspaper over that and then his flats of seeds. The composting manure gave off heat even at night. I used to paint 2-liter pop bottles black and fill them with water and place them around the sides of the cold frame (inside). They collected heat from the sun during the day and released it at night.

Tunnels and hoops

Tunnels are usually tall enough that you can walk under them and hoops are shorter and must be removed before caring for plants, although the terms are often interchanged. Home gardeners are more likely to use hoops. They are generally covered with plastic or a spun polyester-like fabric. Unlike a greenhouse hoops can be placed right in the garden where plants are grown or put away for storage in warm months.

Both tunnels and hoops are used over crops planted right in the ground or over potted plants. They can protect crops from frost and raise the temperature in the daytime to promote growth. Hoops will give you about a month’s head start over the same plants planted in the ground. Crops like melons and peppers can be transplanted to the garden early and benefit from draft protection and the warmer daytime temperatures a hoop provides early in the season. Hoops are great to protect crops at the end of the season when an early frost threatens too.

Many types of tunnels and hoop frames are sold, as is the fabric or clear plastic to cover frames you build yourself. Some of the plastic material has slots for ventilation. Gardeners can fashion a hoop frame with wire fencing or pvc pipe, hula hoops or other things and cover it themselves. You will need some sort of pegs or weights to keep hoops from being blown off.

Ventilated garden hoop
Garden Supply Company

Care must be taken to lift hoops on a sunny day, especially plastic covered ones. Ventilated plastic may be fine when temperatures are below 50 degrees but keep a close check on plant conditions. Thin spun fabric covers let some air through but even those can become too hot. When temperatures regularly rise above 70 degrees all covers may need to be removed for the season.

Using a cold frame or garden hoops gives you all the advantages of an unheated greenhouse, with less expense and taking up less space. It can allow you to sow seeds that need a cold period to germinate and still know exactly where those seeds will pop up, while protecting them from hungry animals.  If your window space is inadequate for seed starting inside or you don’t want the expense of grow lights, you can use coldframes and hoops to start seeds early.  That’s all there is to “winter” sowing.

How old can seeds be and still germinate?

In 1803, the Dutch merchant ship Henriette stopped at Capetown South Africa on its way back from the Orient. On board was a man named Jan Teerlink. On the layover he explored the Dutch East India Company’s garden, established in 1652 to help provision Dutch ships who stopped there. While exploring Teerlink collected seeds.  He stored them in paper packets labeled with what information he knew about them. The packets were placed between the pages of his notebook, which was bound in red leather.

No one knows why Teerlink collected the seeds.  He himself did not own land and wasn’t known to be interested in gardening. But Amsterdam had plenty of people obsessed with finding new and unusual plants so maybe he meant to sell or give them to someone he knew.

Unfortunately for Teerlink his ship was attacked by pirates on the way back to Amsterdam. The British allowed certain “pirates” to raid ships and take what they wanted, with the loot shared with the Crown. No one knows what happened to Teerlink but the pirates gave his notebook to British authorities.

Teerlinks notebook, with seed packets still inside, was first stored in the Tower of London and later transferred to a drawer in the U.K. archives.  One day, some 200 years later, a visiting professor discovered it and found the seeds inside. The seeds were brought to nearby Kew gardens where scientists tried to germinate them. Of the 40 packets of seeds only 3 yielded seeds that were able to germinate. These were packets labeled ‘Liparia villosa’, ‘Protea conocarpa’ and an ‘unknown Mimosa’. 

The protea seed was actually identified by botanists as a Leucospermum, officially Leucospermum conocarpodendron subsp. conocarpodendron. It and the mimosa survived to maturity, the Liparia did not. The common name for Leucospermum is tree pincushion. The plant grown from the ancient seed and other species of Leucospermum can be seen in the Temperate House in Kew Gardens.

 

Protea flowers

If you think that those seeds were ancient, there’s news this month that date palm seeds from the time of King Herod, some 2000 years ago, have been germinated and grown into trees. The dates were found in an excavation of caves in Israel. Out of 34 seeds they found that were soaked and then planted, 6 grew into plants. 

Sarah Sallon, an ethnobotanist at the Hadassah Medical Center and her colleagues reported in Scientific Advances that the ancient dates were about 30% larger than dates growing now. They believe they were one of several varieties of dates cultivated by Mideastern farmers some 2000 years ago.  They hope to cross the dates with modern dates to make the modern fruit larger.

Dates from the same area were found a couple decades ago and planted, resulting in one mature male date palm. This tree resides in a fenced area at the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies at Kibbutz Ketura in Israel. The tree has been named Methuselah.

Another very ancient seed, actually 3 seeds, that germinated are sacred lotus seeds found in a Manchurian dry lakebed.  They were carbon dated to be around 1,288 years old.  Researcher Jane Shen-Miller of UCLA said the seeds germinated in just 4 days, which is typical of modern lotus seeds. In 1996 when the plants were carbon dated, it actually killed them. Now we have more advanced ways to carbon date plants that keeps them alive.

A gourd rattle buried for 600 years in Argentina still had seeds inside that were removed and planted and grew several plants. Another case of plants growing from ancient seeds involves Persian silk tree (Albizia julibrissin) seeds collected 147 years earlier. They were stored in a British Museum that caught fire in 1940. The water used to put out the fire soaked the seeds and to everyone’s surprise they began to germinate. I don’t know what happened to the plants.

If you look up oldest seeds germinated, you may find mention of some Silene stenophylla (narrow-leafed campion) seeds that were recovered from rodent burrows in Siberia and thought to be around 3100 years old. The seeds were damaged, but embryos were extracted and grown by tissue culture into plants. However recently it was found that the seeds were actually much younger than 3100 years old, maybe even just a few decades old. They fell into rodent burrows and were contaminated for carbon dating by older materials in the burrows.

There’s also a story told about the development of a type of wheat called Kamut. Legend says a soldier in WWII found the seeds in a stone box in an ancient Egyptian tomb. The seeds were sent to a friend’s father in the US, who planted them and from which an unusual strain of wheat that is still being grown was developed.

Researchers say that while this type of wheat was unknown in the US, it was a type of wheat grown in the Mideast by small farmers, passed along as an heirloom. This is called a landrace, a variety of plant developed for a small region by local growers. The original seeds were not that old when they were first planted, a farmer had probably stored them in the stone box for safekeeping during the war.

What about the seeds in your cupboard?

This time of year, gardeners are thinking about planting seeds and they may dig out some seed packets they had left over from last year. Are those seeds going to germinate or should you buy new ones?  The answer is- it depends.

Every type of seed has a different time length in which it stays viable, or able to sprout.  As you can see from the article above, some seeds will sprout after a very long time in storage. But few seeds will make it through that length of time, and they would have to be stored in just the right conditions. A seed is a living thing, a tiny embryo packed with a food supply. It must breathe, and carry on other life processes, although in a very “slow motion” sense.

If the seed gets too hot, too cold, too dried out, too wet or damaged in storage it will die. Even in the ideal storage conditions for that seed each year that passes will make it less likely to germinate and grow. Some types of seed have the ability to germinate after many years in dormancy, there are weed seeds that can lie dormant in the ground for a decade or longer.  And there are seeds that should be planted almost as soon as they ripen on the plant if they are to germinate well.

Most common garden vegetables and flowers have a storage time of between 1 and 4 years when stored in good conditions. Every year that passes fewer seeds will germinate in a stored packet. And sometimes seeds will germinate from older stored seeds, but they will not grow well.

Anthurium, Asparagus species, Clivia, perennial Delphinium, Geranium (Pelargonium) Gerbera, Ginkgo, Impatiens, Kochia, Philodendron, Magnolia, Passiflora, Potentilla, Salvia splendens, Tanecetum coccinium (or Pyrethrum) seeds should be planted as soon as collected or purchased.

Onion, leek, parsley and parsnip seed doesn’t store too well and should be used the first year you get them. Peppers and sweet corn should be used up by the second year. Most other garden vegetables will still have good germination for up to 4 years if stored properly. Most common garden annual flowers such as zinnias, marigolds and cosmos should be used within 3 years.

If you find an open packet of seeds that got left in the shed from last spring those seeds may not have a good germination rate. Seeds should be stored in a cool, dark place, protected from moisture and extreme heat. Left over seed should be put in containers with tight seals, not left in paper packets.

To find out whether seed is still going to germinate you can take a small amount of it and put it between sheets of moistened paper towel inside a plastic bag. Place the bag in a warm spot and see what happens.  If most of the seed germinates you can plant the rest in the ground or inside in pots or flats.

Remember some plant species need certain conditions to be met before their seeds will germinate, regardless of whether they are fresh or older seeds. Most often this is a period of cold stratification, a period of cold moist conditions, such as when seeds fall to the ground in fall and spend winter in the ground. Some seeds need light to germinate, others dark. Some seeds need to be soaked or nicked to break a hard seed coat.

For lists of special germination needs for common garden seeds you can go to my page on seeds at

https://gardeninggrannysgardenpages.blogspot.com/p/seeds-germination.html

It is probably a good idea to discard seed you find that hasn’t been stored well and buy new. Even though some of the seeds may germinate the seedlings may never be as vigorous as those started from fresh seed. Seed from many plants that is stored correctly can be used for several years if you are a thrifty gardener, although your germination rate may be reduced.

Advantages of buying bareroot plants- and when not to…

This is prime season for the shipment of bareroot nursery plants. Some gardeners are hesitant to buy plants in this way but there are many advantages. When you buy a bare root plant you will receive a dormant plant whose roots are without soil. The roots may be in damp peat moss, paper or wood shavings but won’t be in a pot. Not all plants can be shipped bare root. But strategies developed over centuries have allowed people to send plants great distances without the weight, disease and pest potential that potting soil carries.

Shipping plants without potting medium allows one to get a larger sized plant for the same price as a smaller potted one, as the shipping costs will be less.  And when you get a bareroot plant you can see the root system without having to wash the soil off it. If it’s inadequate, damaged, or circling you can see it and ask for a refund or do some corrective pruning.

There is less risk of plants carrying pests like fungus gnats, snails and slugs and some other pests if they are shipped bareroot.  And since bareroot plants are generally dormant, they don’t have foliage to hide pests either.

Plants that are shipped bare root are almost always deciduous, and most frequently perennial, woody type plants.  Some very small evergreen seedlings can be sent bare root because enough moisture can be supplied to the roots for a short period by wrappings, but larger evergreens cannot.  Herbaceous plants with fleshy, tuberous roots can sometimes be shipped bare root, hosta, iris, daylilies for example, and a few other herbaceous plants. Strawberries and onions can be sent as bareroot plants. But some plants will only survive well if potted during shipping, even if they are dormant. Plant sellers are usually pretty good at choosing the right method of shipping.

 

Bare root plants often survive shipping better than potted plants especially when the weather is cold, or shipments get delayed. But bare root plants can only be sold when the weather is cool, generally in the spring, because warmth may bring them out of dormancy.

There is a time not to buy bareroot plants. If you are shopping in a garden store and see boxed perennials or bagged roses don’t choose the ones with long shoots. Don’t mistake the boxes and bags as the same thing as pots, they have no potting medium in them.

When I worked in retail garden stores plant inspectors would make us remove the shoots from bagged roses. The inspectors were concerned about plant diseases and also the fact that plants producing shoots without soil are weakened. Too many roses with long shoots could get the whole lot condemned.

Plants with shoots may seem appealingly more alive than the ones without growth but they are already compromised. Tiny buds are ok, but long shoots with leaves are not. Retail stores get these boxed and bagged plants far too early and the growth that occurs in the bags and boxes as they sit in a warm bright store weakens them. Some stores with uninformed personnel even go so far as to water the plants when they begin growing. This does not make healthy plants; it further weakens them.

If the last frost hasn’t occurred in your area planting these sprouted plants outside shouldn’t be done. They will not be conditioned to the cold and the growth will be killed. This further weakens plants already compromised by sprouting without soil. You could pot them and hold them inside if you have the room. But these plants frequently do not perform as well as those that did not have much growth before they were planted.

If you are going to buy bareroot plants from retail stores buy them as soon as the stores get them and store them in a cool dim place until you can plant them outside. Most dormant perennial plants and trees can be planted outside as soon as the soil can be dug.

I know many gardeners like to rescue plants, but the boxed and bagged plants in big box stores that have already sprouted are not a good bargain, especially if its late spring or summer. Stores will rarely mark these down until late in the season because they do not understand that the plants are damaged. It’s better to buy a healthy dormant plant online or buy potted plants than waste your money on these.

"Late February, and the air's so balmy snowdrops and crocuses might be fooled into early blooming. Then, the inevitable blizzard will come, blighting our harbingers of spring, and the numbed yards will go back undercover.  In Florida, it's strawberry season— shortcake, waffles, berries and cream will be penciled on the coffeeshop menus."

-  Gail Mazur, The Idea of Florida During a Winter Thaw

Kim Willis

All parts of this blog are copyrighted and may not be used without permission.

And So On….

Find Michigan garden events/classes here:

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Newsletter/blog information

If you have a comment or opinion you’d like to share, send it to me or you can comment directly on the blog. Please state that you want to have the item published in my weekly blog if you email me. You must give your full name and what you say must be polite and not attack any individual. I am very open to ideas and opinions that don’t match mine, but I do reserve the right to publish what I want. Contact me at KimWillis151@gmail.com

February 18, 2020 Birds, begonias and bad advice busted

Hi Gardeners

It’s a wet, sloppy gray day here but we did have two days of sun before today. We got about 2 inches of very wet snow last night. If you step on it turns to water type of snow, very messy. Many farmers say snow is fertilizer and it actually does contain some nitrogen. But I am ready to be done with snow.

I participated in the Great Backyard Bird Count this weekend. In my 2 hours of observing my feeders I saw 15 species of birds. They were mostly the common feeder birds that frequent my feeder in winter. In summer the number of species that are on my farm probably doubles or triples. I’ve noticed a huge increase in what is called the house finch, the sparrow sized birds with purple red chests. They seem to have replaced English sparrows, I saw none of those this year and no starlings either.

The bird count takes place all over the world. Thousands of people submit lists of birds they see on selected weekends. The counts help researchers study birds and tell what species are declining or expanding their range. If you want to see the results of the count and learn some fascinating things about birds you can go to this site https://www.allaboutbirds.org/

This time of the year I get a lot of little surprise plants sprouting in my pots of indoor plants. My plants vacation outside in summer and seeds fall into them. Some are weeds, like the ground ivy coming up in a couple pots, others are from flowers like the woodland nicotiana and cleome seedlings popping up. I’ve even had petunias and impatiens come up in pots.

I usually leave the seedlings; ground ivy actually makes a pretty trailing houseplant. When it’s time to move the plants out again I either transplant the seedlings to the garden or pull them out. Right now, I have some pretty large woodland nicotiana seedlings and I’m thinking of putting them into their own pots and maybe moving them under the grow lights.  It would be amazing if I could get them to bloom inside- although the plants get huge. They will be ready to bloom much sooner than usual when I move them outside anyway.

I’ve got some seed and nursery plant orders coming soon- hopefully.  I was able to find a white bat flower bulb this year before they sold out. At least I’m hoping I won’t get the dreaded out of stock message. I don’t like it when companies ship to customers in warmer zones first, using up their stock even though customers in colder zones may have ordered the plants long before the customers in the warmer zones. 

If you say it’s in stock when I order, then you should reserve that plant for me until it can be shipped. Some companies don’t do that. I understand why they may want to move plants out quickly rather than continue to care for them but it’s not fair to customers in colder zones. If it happens to me more than once I tend to stop ordering from that company.

What not to use to start seeds

Gardeners are itching to get their hands back in the soil. I know some of you are already starting seeds, although it may be too early for most types of common garden plants to be started in planting zones 7 and lower. If you want to know the right time to start seeds consult the seed package. Most will tell you how many weeks before you plant outside to start the seeds.

But regardless of when you sow them, there are things you should not use to start those seeds. Many clickbait garden sites online have cute suggestions for containers to start seeds and there are lots of social media posts promoting these without ever trying them or thinking about what might be wrong with the idea.

One of the oldest of these is using eggshells for starting seeds. Egg shells do not have enough room for root development of seedlings. They don’t provide any drainage and are hard to balance in an upright position. And you cannot plant the shell and all in the garden, even if you crack it a bit. It takes years for eggshell to naturally break down in soil and plant roots are rarely able to break through it in time for the plant to have a productive growth season. Do not use eggshells for starting seedlings, put them in your compost pile.

Ice cream cones are one of the silliest things I have ever seen recommended for starting seeds. When you get them wet they turn to mush. They will mold and smell. They will attract bugs and mice. If you managed to get them to stay together long enough to plant them in the garden animals would dig them up to eat, destroying your seedlings. Don’t use ice cream cones to start seeds.

For the same reasons why you shouldn’t use ice cream cones to start seeds, don’t use hollowed out orange halves, lemons, grapefruits or any fruits. Put those things in the compost pile.

Glass jars and ceramic coffee cups and bowls are not good for starting seeds unless you can put drainage holes in the bottom in some way. By the way the cute pictures of little houseplants in coffee mugs are also a recipe for disaster because they have no drainage. Plastic bags are also not good to plant in, although you can surround a container with a bag to make a mini greenhouse.

Things that can be recycled to start seeds

There are many good things you can recycle for seed starting, such as foam coffee cups, paper cups, deli trays, (the ones with clear domes make great little greenhouses) cottage cheese cartons, milk cartons, cardboard tubes and so on. Egg cartons can be used although they don’t provide much space for roots. Just make sure recycled items all have holes poked in them for drainage and that they have been washed in hot soapy water before use.

You can recycle nursery pots and cell packs if they are washed before use.  You can also make pots from cardboard and newspaper. For how to make pots from paper products and more seed starting advice see this page.

https://gardeninggrannysgardenpages.blogspot.com/p/seeds-germination.html

No, you can’t get corona virus from potting medium (soil)

A rumor or maybe it should be called false information, has been circulating on social media that potting soil from China might infect you with corona virus. This is not true of course, as most people who stop to think about it should know. 

First, very little if any, potting soil comes from China. It would have to be transported by ship and the freight charge would make the cost prohibitive.  It would also be a long trip, and including time sitting on docks waiting to be loaded and unloaded would take far longer than the 14-day incubation period of corona virus. Then there’s exposure to the elements, heat, cold and so on. The virus would be long dead.

China does sell potting soil, and some of it has the same brand names as potting mix sold here. But the potting mix made in China is sold in China and maybe some surrounding countries. I see that Alibaba sells potting mixes and ingredients to make them to the US, but you have to purchase them by the metric ton. This is bulk material, not bagged product. Since North America has an abundance of materials to make potting medium I doubt many companies would source anything from China.

Most potting medium is produced regionally because of the cost to ship it any distance. Different manufacturing regions may source different ingredients to make the mix, even for the same brand name, but they tend to get them locally. Since we do not have a current outbreak of corona virus potting soil will not be a source of the virus. Even if we do have a widespread epidemic at some point, you would be very unlikely to contract corona virus from potting medium.

So no, you aren’t going to get corona virus from potting medium from China, because that product is unlikely to even be here in the States. And if it was, it probably wouldn’t be able to pass the virus to you. Now if you are reading this in China and going to use some potting medium you bought in a store in China, then you might have a tiny chance of getting corona virus.

Potting soil can carry some diseases, primarily of bacterial origin. I have written about this before. You can read the article about that in this blog;

 https://gardeninggrannysgardenpages.blogspot.com/2019/01/january-22-2019-kims-weekly-garden-blog.html

Fuchsia Begonia Begonia fuchsioides-

Fuchsia Begonia
Photo Select Seeds

Last week I wrote about two other types of begonias, this week I would like to mention two other unusual begonias you may want to try growing this year. The first, Fuchsia begonia, has been in cultivation since Victorian times, yet few modern gardeners know of it. It makes an excellent houseplant for winter and a showy garden plant in warmer times of the year.

Native to South America this begonia looks like a small shrub, about 2 feet high. It has clumps of slender but sturdy, gently arching stems that are covered with small oval glossy green leaves about an inch long. The plant is attractive even when not in bloom, but it is usually blooming.

Fuchsia begonia blooms look like wax begonia flowers, but they occur in dangling clusters at the tips of the stems. From a distance the plant looks much like a fuchsia plant, hence the name. Flowers range in color from pale to rosy pink, with white centers. With the right light the plant will bloom all summer and in bursts all winter inside.

This plant is a tender perennial, you can treat it as an annual if you wish, planting it outside after all danger of frost has passed and letting it die at first frost. But fuchsia begonia can also be moved inside before frost and will continue to bloom for you. You can then enjoy it for many years. In zone 9 and higher the plant will survive outside all year.

You can start this begonia from seed, but seed is very hard to find. Most gardeners will want to start with a small plant. Plants are easily started from stem cuttings. Plants can be a bit hard to source too, but there are some links below the article to buy them. They are relatively inexpensive. Once you have a plant flowering seed pods may form. Let them dry on the plant and then you can collect the seeds to start new plants.

Outside the fuchsia begonia likes light shade or partial shade. Indoors it needs bright light to continue to bloom well. They prefer rich, organic type soil that is kept evenly moist, but pots should be well drained. Monthly fertilization will keep the blooms abundant.

To keep the plant full and compact pinch back the tips in early spring. Outside the plants have few insect pests. In humid wet climates they may suffer from stem rot. Make sure plants have good airflow around them. If the plants get chilled, they may drop their leaves but will recover if kept in warmer places. They prefer night temperatures above 60 degrees so bring them in early if you are keeping them as a houseplant.

You could use fuchsia begonia as a potted plant on shady porches, as color for shady places in the garden and as a blooming houseplant. In Victorian times they were often placed on pillars in shady areas of the garden. If you like the unusual or heirloom plants the fuchsia begonia may be the plant for you.

https://selectseeds.com  (plants, not seed)

 https://plantlust.com/

Polka dot begonia Begonia maculata

The second begonia I want to bring to more gardeners’ attention is the Polka Dot begonia. Like the begonia above this tender perennial also makes a great garden or houseplant. It’s beautiful and showy, both in and out of bloom. This plant is also known and sold as Begonia ‘Wightii’.

Polka Dot Begonia is native to Central and South America and Africa. It is hardy outside only in zones 10 and higher. It can be put outside after all danger of frost has passed in spring and brought in before the first fall frost and will give you many years of enjoyment. Gardeners will want to start with plants.

 

Polka dot begonia foliage
Photo White Flower Farm

Polka dot begonia has long irregular blade shaped leaves similar to the familiar angel wing begonias. However, the leaves are green on top with silver white dots all over them and the reverse side of the leaf is red. Leaf edges are ruffled. It has a cluster of cane like stems that can get 30 inches tall and 18 inches wide in well grown specimens. Canes may also have a reddish color.

The Polka Dot plant will flower all year if kept warm and in the right light.  The flowers are in dangling clusters of white or pale pink.  They look quite attractive in shady spots and could be part of a moon garden with both the leaves and flowers showing up well in the dusk.

Outside the polka dot begonia should be in light or dappled shade, the north side of buildings or on covered porches and decks. Leaves will scorch in too much sun. The area or container must be well drained, and they prefer rich soil. Because they are prone to powdery mildew outside, don’t crowd plants, make sure there is good airflow around them.

Polka dot begonias can be a little fussy as houseplants, but a well grown plant is worth the fuss. They like a bright sunny spot inside, south windows in winter or east windows in summer. They can be grown under grow lights also. They should be kept above 60 degrees F.

Root rot is the biggest problem with polka dot begonias indoors. Use a coarse, well-draining potting mix, you may want to add a little extra perlite to regular potting soil. The pot must drain well. Clay pots work well for polka dot begonias. The pot should not be too large for the plant. Polka dot begonias like to be a little pot bound and smaller pots mean the soil dries out faster.

Water the plants only when the top of the soil feels dry, but don’t let them wilt either. Yellowing leaves usually mean you are overwatering. As mentioned above, these plants are subject to root rot if overwatered. You must pay attention to watering with this plant.

Humidity is also important when growing polka dot begonia indoors. Low humidity will cause crispy leaf edges. However, they should not be misted as wet leaves may get powdery mildew. Instead use a humidifier in the growing area, place them in humid areas of the home or set them over water filled trays. Do not let the bottom of the pot sit in water however, or the soil will remain too wet.

Polka dot begonia flowers
Photo Select seed

To keep new foliage and flowers coming fertilize outside containers and indoor potted polka dot begonias with granular slow release fertilizers or use water soluble fertilizers twice a month according to label directions.

Polka dot begonias should be periodically pinched/cut back to encourage a full, compact look. Cut back canes to just above a stem joint, taking a third or less of the length off. Old straggly, beginning to look woody canes can be cut off at soil level. Don’t let the plants get too lanky before cutting back and you will develop a nice, beautifully full plant.

All those pieces you cut off can be rooted to start new plants. This begonia can also be rooted by laying a leaf on soil, slitting the veins and weighing or pinning the leaf to the soil like one does with rex begonias. It can be started from seed too, if one can find the seeds.

If you like plants that do double duty, inside and out, or you like beautiful foliage plants the polka dot begonia may be for you.  You may have to search a bit for plants, but some sources are below.

https://www.logees.com/

https://www.whiteflowerfarm.com/

https://www.selectseeds.com/

Buying imperfect food- is it a good idea or marketing scam?

You’ve probably heard that about 1/3 of the food we buy gets wasted, thrown away instead of eaten. You may also have heard that a lot of that food is thrown away before it gets to the customer, because it looks bad, has passed an expiration date, or is too ripe or green.

The media has been promoting the ugly food movement, encouraging people to buy those normally discarded fruits and vegetables and make good use of them. It’s become the socially conscious trend of the year. But has it also become a scam? There are those out there always ready to capitalize on people’s desire to do the right thing or to keep up with popular movements.

Now in my household little food is wasted. Between dogs, cats, cage birds, chickens and wildlife little food waste from my house goes uneaten. I have always looked for food bargains in the grocery, buying outdated greens and fruit for my birds, overripe bananas to mash and freeze for baking, wrinkled oranges to set out for the orioles. I even pick out stale bakery goods that are marked down to feed the chickens. 

My grocery puts outdated canned and packaged goods in a corner of the store marked down for quick sale and I will go through the items and buy some if I have use for them. I also buy marked down meat and freeze it. I consider myself thrifty.

What I will not do however, is pay more for old, ugly, overripe or otherwise less desirable produce and other food. And that’s what’s happening right now in many places. People with a knack for making a buck are packaging up old and ugly produce and other items and actually charging more than what a customer would pay for fresh, more presentable produce and other foods, sometimes a lot more. And people are buying it, I guess as a misguided effort to save the world.

When that old, or ugly produce has to be shipped to you it isn’t helping the environment. Good or bad produce being shipped has the same effect on the environment. If that food was already shipped to your grocer, and then it came to a choice of you buying it or it being thrown out, then maybe you are helping the environment when you buy it. If you are buying imperfect produce at the farmers market for a reduced price, good for you.

I remember working at food pantries where farmers and stores donated that ugly produce and other surplus items to be given out to those in need. And poor people often search for items they can get reduced at the grocery to stretch their food budget. I wonder how much of those former donations and price reductions have decreased so that well to do people can buy boxes of imperfect food at jacked up prices to show they care about the environment.

I also wonder how much of that imperfect food actually gets used by the customer too. In many of these company “plans” you get a box of whatever is plentiful at the time. How many people actually cook a big bunch of fresh beets or use up those apples with big soft spots? How many people give up trying to wash and peel crooked twisted carrots and just toss them?

I’m also seeing “imperfect” eggs, cheese and other dairy products being offered. I don’t know if I would want to buy those things, at least until I inspected them. And I’m thinking some of those things are actually normal products, being added to the mix for variety and having the prices jacked up to boot.

Many people also believe that the imperfect food is organically grown. That’s not always true, in fact conventionally grown food is just as likely to have ugly or unwanted items as that which is organically grown. Some places advertise their ugly produce as organic, but that is very hard to prove unless you have expensive testing done. And if you pay more for organic imperfect food than perfect organic food you are only fooling yourself.

If you really want to be a good environmentalist, and be thrifty, buy your food locally and seasonably. Do buy damaged, ugly and outdated items if you source them locally and you know you will use them. Use up the food, perfect or imperfect, that you do buy before it becomes too spoiled to use. Plan carefully before buying fresh produce, so you know the amount you will need and when you will use it. And donate food that’s still useable to food pantries if you know you won’t use it.  

But don’t buy “ugly or imperfect” produce if it costs more than “average or good” produce, especially if it has to be shipped from a distance. It may make you feel good, but it’s only encouraging people to take advantage of environmental causes. Looking at photos on company sites I’m thinking they bought some of the stuff that would be offered in any grocery and just marked up the price and called it ugly.

Don’t buy foods you can’t chose and may not want to eat when they arrive as surprise boxes. There are things that you actually shouldn’t eat, like green potatoes or melons and things you don’t know how to cook or don’t like in those boxes. If it doesn’t get used, it doesn’t matter if you rescued it. If that ugly food you pay more for causes perfectly good food to not be purchased at the grocery and that food is discarded, what did you actually accomplish?

If you want to reduce food waste and help the environment convince your local stores and farm markets to reduce and sell ugly produce and outdated items at a discount and then buy them when you can. And take the money you save from buying overpriced imperfect foods from sly profiteers and donate it to a good cause.

 “There is always in February some one day, at least, when one smells the yet distant, but surely coming, summer.”

Gertrude Jekyll

Kim Willis

All parts of this blog are copyrighted and may not be used without permission.

And So On….

Find Michigan garden events/classes here:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/118847598146598/

(This is the Lapeer County Gardeners facebook page)

Newsletter/blog information

If you have a comment or opinion you’d like to share, send it to me or you can comment directly on the blog. Please state that you want to have the item published in my weekly blog if you email me. You must give your full name and what you say must be polite and not attack any individual. I am very open to ideas and opinions that don’t match mine, but I do reserve the right to publish what I want. Contact me at KimWillis151@gmail.com

February 11, 2020 full snow moon

Hi Gardeners

Rex Begonia leaves

We are getting some sun in bits and pieces today and it is most welcome.  And while it has been partially obscured by clouds the Full Snow moon has made the night much brighter the last few nights. I love looking out at snow covered areas on a moonlit night. The light reflected off the snow makes spotting night creatures much easier. Deer, possums, coyotes, rabbits playing, coons scurrying and owls waiting for mice can be seen from a window.

When I was younger that kind of moonlit night would draw me outside for a quiet, peaceful walk. The hooting of an owl or howling of coyotes and the scrunch of deer hooves on snow let you know where to look. Now my old joints protest the cold too much and walking through the snow is too much, but I do remember.

My little snowdrops are now snow covered. The colder weather and snow will delay the progression out of dormancy for our garden plants and trees, which is probably a good thing. If you want some early spring blooms you can cut branches of forsythia, witch hazel, Amelanchier (or serviceberry), Cornelian cherry, flowering quince, any fruit trees, red maple, birch, poplar, pussy willows and clove currant, and put them in a vase of water in a warm room. They should bloom in 1-3 weeks inside.

Valentines Day is Friday.  Want to learn about some plants that promote love -or lust?  Try this article.

https://gardeninggrannysgardenpages.blogspot.com/p/plants-that-promise-passion-valentines.html

Potatoes inside?

About this time of year many of you will find potatoes starting to sprout in your cupboard. If you are itching to garden, you might want to have a little fun and plant some of those sprouting potatoes. With luck you can produce a tasty meal or two in a couple months.

If you have a sunny location in your home or grow lights you aren’t using potatoes will grow inside. Of course, it would be difficult to grow any quantity of tubers, but it’s a fun project for kids or the bored gardener.

First take a sprouting potato and cut it in chunks, with each chunk having a sprout or two – or eyes. (Little small potatoes, like tiny red potatoes or fingerling types can be used whole.) Let the chunks sit for two or three days in a sunny window or under a grow light. Putting an apple near them will make the sprouts develop faster as apples give off ethylene gas, which promotes sprouting. The cut parts of the potato should dry and form a “skin” before planting. You can leave the potato pieces on the windowsill until sprouts are an inch or so long without harm.

You’ll need a good-sized container for every 2 pieces of potato or small whole potato. A five-gallon bucket or 12-14-inch-wide, deep pot, will do.  I have used small Styrofoam coolers, the cheap kind, with good results. Grow bags would work well. The container must have good drainage. Drill or melt holes in the bottom if needed.

Fill the bottom 3 inches of the container with a good lightweight potting mix. If it doesn’t come with fertilizer mixed in, add a granular slow release fertilizer for vegetables according to label directions and mix it in well. Put the potato pieces on the potting mix and lightly cover them. When the potato shoots are 3 inches above the mix, add more potting mix until just the top set of leaves is sticking out. Repeat this as the shoots grow until you have filled the container to an inch or two from the top. Do not add fertilizer every time, however.

Your potato container needs to be in strong light (south window) in temperatures between 45 degrees and 80 degrees F., 72 degrees is ideal. If using artificial light give them 14 hours of light. Natural daylight should be supplemented with lights in the evening for a total of 14 hours of light for best growth. Potatoes need regular watering, so the potting mix is always moist but never soggy or waterlogged.

Potato flowers

Your potatoes should grow rapidly and bloom in about 6-8 weeks. Tubers will begin forming when blooming stops. It is natural for stems and leaves to begin to yellow a few weeks after bloom. A month or so after the potatoes bloomed you should have small potatoes. They should have formed all along the buried potato stems. Dump the pot out to find them. Harvest and eat potatoes grown inside before they get too large for best results.

If the potatoes seem to have completely died back sometime after blooming dump the pots to see if you have any tubers. Potatoes naturally die back as tubers get larger.

If you start now you could have some new, small potatoes by late May, just after potatoes would be planted in the garden outside.

Should everyone plant trees?

Should everyone around the world be planting trees anywhere there’s an open spot? That seems to be a very popular thing for people to advocate for, to help with global warming. Even the president talks about planting trees and he doesn’t believe in the science of global warming. But while planting a tree or trees on your property probably is a good thing, researchers say planting trees isn’t always a good idea for some places on earth.

As the northern and southern pole areas get warmer, vegetation is beginning to grow where there once was little. While that seems like a good thing, it does have a downside. Snow covered areas reflect light, which cools the earth, the darker colors of vegetation and exposed earth absorb the suns heat, leading to more warming. Over time the tree line will probably shift north, but scientists don’t think we should encourage it.

The other time when planting trees may do more harm than good is in areas that are getting drier. Everyone who owns a farm pond knows that trees around it will drop the water level in the pond when they are actively growing and taking up water. Trees invade wet areas in the process of succession, first to come are tree species that tolerate wet roots, then more upland species until what was once a marsh becomes a forest. The trees dry up the ground by holding water within them and by moving it from the soil to the air.

A research study done by Cambridge University on 43 areas of the world and published in the journal Global Change Biology, found that trees reduce the amount of water that flows into and through rivers.  Five years after planting trees in watershed areas or near rivers the water flow was reduced.  After 25 years the flow was decreased 40% as an average and some rivers were dried up completely. In some places small rivers and streams were dried up in 10 years.

When rainfall is regular and abundant trees moving water out of surface water areas and from the ground water fuels the water cycle, keeping rain more frequent and abundant. Everyone has enough water. But when it gets hotter the air gets drier, and suddenly the amount of water being taken up by trees can’t put enough moisture back into the air to promote rainfall. Lakes, rivers and ponds dry up, and wells begin going dry.

The chemical reactions of photosynthesis require water to produce food for the tree and since photosynthesis shuts down at high temperatures, trees also need water for evaporative cooling. When its hotter trees require more water to keep cool, the water evaporates off the leaf surfaces.

Think of a tree as a huge column of water moving from the roots to leaf surfaces where water escapes as a gas through leaf pores. Every large tree holds thousands and thousands of gallons of water and on a hot day the tree is pumping that water into the air continuously. A large mature forest ties up astounding amounts of water within it and moves water into the air at phenomenal rates.

The water never leaves the earth’s atmosphere of course. It just goes on the wind somewhere else, until the air gathers enough moisture to create droplets of rain or snow. We know that as the earth warms patterns of rainfall and storms are changing.  With these changes some areas, generally those that were on the border of previously drier areas, and those that tend to have seasonal rain with long dry areas between are going to see less rain.

When we plant trees on those drier areas, they may actually speed up the process of drought, eliminating smaller ponds, lakes and wetlands, diminishing the flow of rivers and streams and lowering the water table. The water the trees pulled from those sources goes into air too hot and dry to promote rain and moves away from the area on the wind.

When the hot, drier air meets cooler, more humid air, the water in the drier air melds into it, saturating the air enough so that rain or snow form.  Some areas of the country are going to get wetter in the process, sometimes catastrophically so, and more humid. The wetter areas are where planting more trees is going to be very helpful.

We’ve also observed that where trees are removed in the tropics the areas get hotter and drier and that promotes less rain. It’s a tricky balance, some areas need more trees and some areas don’t. When you remove trees from some areas, you cause drought. But when you plant trees in other areas you also promote a water shortage.

For most Americans planting trees on your property is still a good thing and to be encouraged. Trees cool the air around homes, and they cool the entire region down too, if there is good tree coverage. Trees are important producers of oxygen and absorbers of carbon dioxide. Tree cover does have the ability to modify the climate in a small way. Just make sure to plant species of trees that are right for your conditions.

But there are areas of the country that are getting drier and hotter where planting trees may not be a good idea. First, if trees must be watered on a regular basis to survive after the first year or two of establishment, they probably shouldn’t be planted. Use plants more suited for dry areas.

If you depend on surface water for drinking, irrigation or other uses in drier areas, planting trees close to a river, stream or pond and in the area that drains into those waters, may reduce that water source, and often permanently. In areas with water tables close to the surface (shallow wells) trees can also rob that water.

If you want a marsh or swamp for wildlife habitat planting trees in and near it and allowing trees to seed into it and grow may not be wise. Planting trees around prairie “pot holes” or small ponds where trees could dry up the water source is also not a good idea. Usually ponds are either catch the runoff of surface water or are where ground water is close to the surface or small springs bubble up. These ponds will be more likely to dry up if trees grow around them.

If you have an area that is flooding more frequently than it used to, planting thirsty trees like willows and poplars could actually help. There are numerous tree species that can be planted on flood plains. They take up some of that water and hold it and their roots stabilize soil that might get washed away. They reduce the amount of water that gets into rivers and streams, which may stop flood damage.

The bottom line, most of you should plant trees if you have the space to do so. Trees are a big help to the environment. But there are some gardeners, landowners and project managers who should think carefully before planting trees. Trees are not always right for every situation.

More reading

www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/01/200120113407.htm

Daffodil Begonia -Begonia narcissiflora

You may have seen this begonia in some bulb catalogs this spring, I have just ordered some.  For a long time, this rare begonia was only available from Golden State Bulb Growers, the only nursery keeping it in production. It was discovered in 1898 so it’s not new but little breeding or propagation was done with it. I don’t know what changed but several bulb catalogs are featuring the plants this year.

I have seen salmon and white colors offered, I ordered salmon. In the Netherlands there is a pale yellow-pink variety, but I haven’t seen it offered here. Different catalogs show the salmon as different shades, so it will be a surprise when the ones I ordered bloom, I guess.

The center tepals of this begonia’s male flower form a cone or trumpet shape and the flower looks a lot like a daffodil flower. Descriptions say the male flowers are 4 inches long. Tepals are a kind of sepal-petal mixture that many types of flowers have. Begonias have two types of flowers on one plant, male and female. The female flower in begonias is smaller and less conspicuous.

Daffodil begonia
Photo from Springhill nursery

These daffodil type begonias are a tuberous begonia and the care should be similar to other tuberous begonias. They would be good for baskets and containers in light or partial shade. They are supposed to bloom from early summer until frost. Like all tuberous begonias they could be treated like annuals or the bulbs can be allowed to go dormant and then stored over the winter.

Daffodil begonias are a novelty, whether they offer an improvement over the numerous other colors and forms of tuberous begonias remain to be seen. I love tuberous begonias, so I am going to give these a try.  You may want to try them also.

Some places to buy them;

https://www.dutchbulbs.com

https://www.springhillnursery.com

https://www.michiganbulb.com

Focus on Rex Begonias

Rex begonias are a great plant to brighten up the winter. As a houseplant their interesting foliage will add color to the windowsill. And they can be moved outside in summer to bring color to shady containers and baskets.

Rex begonias have large leaves, generally pointed, although rounded and other shaped leaves are not uncommon. The leaves are thick and wrinkled looking and come in a variety of stunning colors and patterns. Some plants can reach a foot high and some plants have been bred that stay quite small.

Rex begonias are great collector’s plants because there are hundreds of varieties for sale. You’ll have a hard time picking just one plant to grow.

Rex begonia

Growing conditions

Rex begonias are relatively easy to grow except for one requirement. They need humid conditions to keep leaves from getting crispy edges and eventually falling off. If you have a well-lit bathroom, rex begonias may thrive there. They may also do well over the kitchen sink. Plants can be used in terrariums too.

If you don’t use a humidifier in the house in the winter, you can place the rex begonia in a shallow tray of water with stones or marbles in the bottom to keep the pot bottom above the water line. Grouping rex begonias with other plants also helps with humidity. Misting the plants isn’t recommended as rex begonias will get spots on the leaves from water sitting on them.

Rex begonias like bright light but not direct sunlight. An east or north windowsill will generally work or place them about a foot away from a south or west window. Good, strong light brings out the best leaf color. In the summer outside they need partial shade. Rex begonias can also be grown under artificial light.

Plant the rex begonia in good, light potting soil or use an African violet soil.  Keep the soil moist but don’t let the pot get waterlogged. While rex begonias like moisture and humidity their roots also need some air.

Fertilize lightly beginning in March through September, maybe once a month. Don’t over fertilize, as foliage plants, rex begonias don’t need much fertilizer. Keep dead leaves picked off. Plants may go through a period of adjustment when moved, especially from a humid greenhouse or from outdoors into a drier indoor location. Some plants will even go dormant.

If the rex begonia does seem to drop all its leaves and die down to soil level all may not be lost. Let the pot dry out until it’s barely moist. Put the pot in a clear plastic bag and set it out of direct light for a few weeks. Check from time to time to see how moist the soil is and add a little water if it is very dry. After a month or so- or sooner if you notice new growth, take the plant out into bright light and resume watering.

Like most begonias, rex begonias flower.  However, this species of begonia does not have very showy flowers and you will probably want to clip out the flower stems that peek out from the center so the plant concentrates on producing its showy leaves. I am a lazy person when it comes to trimming flowers however and I still have nice plants.

Rex Begonia propagation

Rex begonias are one of the few plants that propagate readily through the leaves. You can remove a young leaf and stem and insert the stem into a moist pot of planting medium. Place the pot in a clear plastic bag in bright indirect light and keep moist. Wait for a new plant to form at the leaf base.

You can get many plants from one rex begonia leaf using this method. Find a wide container that a large leaf can lay flat on. Flip a rex begonia leaf over and make small cuts across several of the large veins. Don’t cut all the way through the leaf. With a cotton swab rub some rooting powder- found in houseplant supplies- on each cut. 

Fill the container with moist potting medium.  Place the leaf on it cut side down and weigh down the leaf with small pebbles, metal washers or some other small item so that the cut vein contacts the soil. Place in a clear plastic bag in bright indirect light and wait for new plants to form at the leaf surface by each cut.

 

Rex begonia cut along leaf veins

These wonderful plants are a great way to share plants between several plant lovers. Each gardener can buy a different variety and start new plants to trade with other gardeners. But even if you don’t want to propagate and share a rex begonia or two can add some color to your life.

Have a fun Valentines Day- Remember chocolate is good for the heart-

Kim Willis

All parts of this blog are copyrighted and may not be used without permission.

And So On….

Find Michigan garden events/classes here:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/118847598146598/

(This is the Lapeer County Gardeners facebook page)

Newsletter/blog information

If you have a comment or opinion you’d like to share, send it to me or you can comment directly on the blog. Please state that you want to have the item published in my weekly blog if you email me. You must give your full name and what you say must be polite and not attack any individual. I am very open to ideas and opinions that don’t match mine, but I do reserve the right to publish what I want. Contact me at KimWillis151@gmail.com