Thursday, March 28, 2013

Pruning the Overgrown: Dappled Willow


(Perspective makes it appear as if the dappled willow is half the size of my hobbit home. Not the case, it is a mere five feet by five feet in this picture. In the location in my garden, a more manageable 3 1/2' by 3 1/2' feet is more to my liking.)



I've yet to see a mass planting of dappled willows. I rarely see them in botanical gardens, either. However, for about 2-3 months of each year, visitors to my yard are bowled over upon viewing mine. Even my neighbor, Dr. Darrel Apps (who should know better!), has succumbed to the allure of the dappled willow, planting a rooted cutting of mine in his front yard.

I attempt to keep mine "in check", meaning it seems like I am checking/pruning it all the time.

I'll also be the first to admit that at times I've let my dappled willow get to be too much of a good thing. Like the commercial when the grade-schooler attempts to define less and more, we gardeners tend to always want more. A word of advice, more in the case of the dappled willow rapidly becomes unruly and overgrown.

This constant gardener thing is probably why botanical gardens fail to plant this lovely. It needs a one on one relationship with a pruner.

At this point I would love to have some cohesive pictures of the pruning of a dappled willow. I do not. Photojournalist have not applied to document this aspect of my on-going pruning war. (Come back in late July, maybe I'll take the time to document in pictures then.)

I will admit, like the gardener with the hedgers locked under glass, preferring to hand-prune, I have broken out the hedger. This approach is a bit like using a wrecking ball to kill a housefly, and not recommended. I've used this approach a couple times. The result is much less than satisfactory, with frayed cuts when nice clean ones are preferred. Willows, because of their stringy bark which does endear them to basket makers, and hedgers are not simpaticos.

Once you have established the best size for your willow and regularly cut it to that height, over time it becomes an easier and easier task to see where you need to make your cuts. The new growth will be thin pencil-straight and the hard-pruned areas of your shrub will take on a branching appearance. Often by the time pruning time comes around your willow will put on 10" to 18" of new growth. It is this new growth, after the color changes from the white to pink and into the green of chlorophyll producing foliage, which needs to be removed to keep your willow looking its best. For me, here in central Wisconsin this tends to be in the beginning of July. Additional pruning for size and shape can be done up until about eight weeks before your frost date in fall. You want to allow sufficient time for any new growth to harden off. I have found I prefer a ovid shape (like an egg laying on its side), and given the location of my shrub, this works very well for me. This is not the shape I recommend for the pruning of box or privet (or even dare you prune them, conifers).


Last year this color change for my dappled willow came about eight weeks into one of the hottest, blistering droughts I have ever seen in central Wisconsin. One cool evening, as I was starting my pruning process, I noticed that typically where there are lots of leaves to provide sugars to the roots growing in the branched areas of my shrub, this year there were none. For those of you not aware, willows need/love moisture. There is a reason for the iconic image of the graceful weeping willow draped over the shoreline of a creek or pond. They are wetland lovers. Once established, willows have no problem sourcing their moisture needs as their fibrous roots will travel far and wide to obtain the moisture they need (Do not plant these beauties near septic, or sewer lines!) Even in my well-watered and mulched garden, my willow was having a hard time of it. (I believe due to the heat. Its chlorophyll production was totally being produced by the new growth. Prune this off all at once, I would run the risk of pushing this plant beyond its levels of endurance, even as well-established as mine appeared to be.

I devised a plan to remove the new growth in stages, approximately a 1/8-section of the plant down to the branching area at two-week intervals. This I felt would encourage growth on the inner branching areas of the shrub where the mature branches would produce primarily green foliage.

I took this picture today and it shows this structure more clearly.




(The above picture is from the same perspective as the second picture in this post.)

Only the foliage growth on new wood seems to have the intense coloration for which I grow this shrub. I also increased the watering of this shrub throughout the rest of the summer. For any of you thinking of taking your 8' to 10' willow down to a 3' to 4' more manageable size; this might be a good plan for you as well.

Part of your pruning program should also allow for the entire shrub to be cut to the ground every 3-5 years. Choose a couple of the oldest branches and cut them off at ground level each year.




Snow Report- Comparison




Last year on this day my PJM rhododendron was in full bloom. This year, I can't find it under the snow bank.

However, the 4" deep "lake" that covered my parking space in my yard suddenly disappeared, meaning the ground has finally unfrozen in at least one spot in my yard!

In other on-going snow news, the snow-loading of my yard by a neighbor has me more and more concerned. THIS shoving of his snow away from his garage (and into my spruce) so the melt would not run into his garage was not "okay." (How is it I can spot non-gardeners by observing their other actions?) I can see already there may be damage. Just in case he can not "remember" all his snow pushed up on my trees and shrubs and cannot imagine how all those branches got broken and shrubs scraped off and up-rooted...











...a little chat will be forthcoming once the snow melts. I want to be VERY clear. Not "okay."


POSTSCRIPT: My dappled willow seems to have its own fan club. I wanted to publish some recent pictures of my shrub which is now over ten years and has almost died once after a drought, but is in all its glory at the moment, June, 9, 2016.


Currently about 3' tall by 4' wide


Wednesday, March 27, 2013

(Except for WAY too Much Snow) It Feels Like March


(Some salvia 'Black and Blue' cuttings, laurentia seedlings, and some cuttings that like it drier for dish gardens.)

This morning is the first morning I walked my boxer and it actually felt like a Spring day. It is sunny. The sky is blue.

There's still about 18" of snow most places and high banks pushed up along the roadsides. (Latest on the "snow watch".)

Maybe this is a good day to finish up that pruning! I think the maple sap might be running!

Tuesday, March 26, 2013

Signs of Spring


(Flowers from my mother, to celebrate the occasion.)

My handsome Son bought me an extremely nice, ergonomic pruner for my March birthday. Many time he buys me mulch, quoting my "Mulch is always the perfect gift" saying and demurring that there is just too much snow for mulch this year. I still have over a foot most places in my garden and snowbanks in places of 8' to 10'. Yes, FEET! (Thanks to my neighbors feeling it's "okay" to pile their snow in my yard...)

We have a lot more light. This alone, I think is responsible for buds swelling on my lilacs and viburnum. The quantity of light is also bringing the impatiens, gerbera, fuschia, and nicotiana saved for cuttings and left to languish in my south-facing windows back into bloom.

On sunny days, although still cold (barely 30 degrees, typically) I feel more like getting out to the garden to finish up my winter pruning. Pruning made nicer by the gift of the pruners.

What I have not done is prune back the grapes. Typically, here, it is done the last weekend in March. I can't even see the bottom section of my grapes, let alone enough of them to prune! We have so much snow.

Also I have been running the risk of parking on my street overnight. We have a ban from November 1 through April 1 on on-street parking. Unfortunately, my parking space is a sheet of ice over a pond in my drive as the ground is frozen. Even though I can't see around the piles of snow at the curb and at corners in the village, technically I can't be ticketed after Monday.

Even if winter holds on-- no risk of tickets! Yay! (Unless the Village Board declares a Snow Emergency on April 3rd...)

Monday, March 25, 2013

A Jungle Under the Lights



Winter may continue to fiercely hug the landscape here in central Wisconsin; but indoors, in my grow room I have a tiny jungle. Impatiens, gerbera, and nicotiana are blooming. The brightly-colored coleus are growing cheerily. The transplants for the family garden are germinating and will soon demand their own space.



From this picture of my cleome seedlings you can see the uneven germination and growth rate that makes them problematic for commercial growers. This is a problem with cleome started from seed, and nicotiana and petunia, too. Probably why so much of this stuff is actually a single clone. And we wonder why a fungus can threaten to wipe out an entire crop like impatiens.








So, Spring, whenever you decide to make you way here, I'm ready for you!

Tuesday, March 19, 2013

(Realistic?) Expectations When Visiting a Public Botanical Garden


Allen Centennial Gardens, August 2012

I suppose for a lot of arm chair gardeners our area botanical gardens are their gardens. For actual gardeners, these botanical gardens are a resource and a respite from the labors and tribulations in our own small plots. A recent response from the Director of Allen Centennial Gardens on a blog posting I did after a visit to the Allen has pointed out possibly the only hot spot in Wisconsin this spring-- the area under the collar of its director, Mr. Ed Lyon. All of which has gotten me thinking about what our expectations should be when visiting any botanical garden.

So I pose the question, "In this age of arm chair gardening and virtual tourism, what should be our expectations when we actually put feet to gravel and smear on the sunscreen?"

I have read there is a whole new level of garden visitation going on-- a garden tourism craze. It has gone a long way to revitalizing tourism for broad areas, if you doubt the trend you need only read a few blogposts of one of the driving forces behind the nationally acclaimed Buffalo/Niagara garden walks.

Certainly the internet has changed our expectations. Pinterest, I feel, is making its mark. Pinterest worried me even before I read Nancy Ondra's post about hunting her photos "pinned" without thought to photo copyright infringement.





These two photos of mine have had thousands of re-pins since I first posted them in a blogpost critiquing the 2011 Outagamie Master Gardeners' Garden Walk. (These are not the only popular photos of mine floating around out there.) I wonder if the homeowners have come across these pictures from their yards and what were their thoughts?

Certainly, Instagram, FaceBook, and cameras within the reach of our cell phones should put firmly in mind the idea that everything is posted to internet these days, too. The internet is certainly an image-driven medium, but there is certainly plenty of room out there for words to go along with our pictures.

It shouldn't be beyond anyone's expectations that pictures will be accompanied with words, sometimes questioning, "What is really going on here!"







Above are more pictures from my August 2012 Allen Centennial Garden visit.

Different botanical gardens have differing missions. Some have extensive educational facilities connected with their displays. Others have herbariums; some hold living collections of rare and unusual plants. Arboretums, although low-key, grow group plantings of many cultivars and species of a genus of herbaceous, woody perennials. Some do testing of perennials, roses, and annuals. Needless to say, an expectation of being able to visit an interesting collection of growing plants should be pretty much a given.

The plants are the entre for garden. They should be well-labeled, well-grown, and well-displayed. Many an interesting plant has entered my garden as a single specimen after seeing it massed in a botanical garden.

If any experimental growing methods are being used, placards to educate can be present. I really liked those used in 2011 by the Chicago Botanical Gardens in their edible gardens.



I really like how most botanical gardens are broken into smaller rooms. Many of my favorite ideas have been inspired by deconstructions of how these "rooms" are composed. These ideas are transplantable to my own yard, too.

So, plants, nice views(interesting landscaping), ideas, education, maybe even a sense of serenity should be expected take-aways from any visit to a botanical garden.

What are your expectations from your botanical garden visits?




Thursday, March 14, 2013

Locked in Ice: The Garden


There are cracks appearing.











I can't remember a winter hanging around so late into March. I'm sure this too in its perverse way is a sign of global warming.

Just for contrast, last year on this day:

Tuesday, March 12, 2013

Can Plants Actually Talk and Listen?



Okay. So. My blog is Talking-to-Plants. I named it that because I do spend a lot of time muttering to myself, "talking to plants". And it often seems I can hear them. I can tell they are stressed or dying. Or happy.

There is nothing happier than plants after a gentle rain or being misted by a watering system, regardless of what Geico commercials will tell you.

But now scientist think plants might actually be able to communicate.

I've had my supposition about this for years. When I come near with my pruning shears, I sense a collective gasp. When I sit in my grow room and run my fingers over the tops of fat little seedlings, the feeling is not unlike rubbing my dogs ears.

And then there is that serious talk about apples or gone I had with my Honeycrisp one spring. And, the 44 beautiful perfect apples I had that fall.

I guess I will be doing a bit more coaching in the fruit tree department.

Okay, you, cherry, apricot, and plum! Listen up! I'm talking to you!

Sunday, March 10, 2013

Under the Lights


Coleus, from cuttings.


Gerbera, repotted.

Today, as promised I am posting pictures from my grow room. This grow room is an unused space under the eaves in my loft bedroom. Originally, it was planned as a possible half or three-quarter bath, time, money, energy, and easy way to plumb it eluding me. Electricity, it's got. Someday when I have a greenhouse and a viable plan (I have a stack of unfeasible ones...), it'll happen. Until then? Lemonade.


Impatiens and fuschia, from cuttings.


White 4 o'clocks and agrostemma, from seed.


Cleomes, from seed.


Fuschia, from cuttings, blooming already.


Lime green nicotiana and variegated Swedish ivy, both repotted.

Laurentia, from seed, and the poorest germinator of all the seed so far, about 50%. (Pink and blue.)


Blue ageratum, from seed.


Most exciting germination so far, cobaea scandens alba, from seed. (Look right in the center, it's coming!)It's a white cup and saucer. Again st my brown fence and arbors I think this will be a gorgeous climber!


That perennial seed mix growing strong!

Another picture of the mirablis jalapa alba.


And lastly, nasturtium 'Vesuvius'.