Indholdsfortegnelse for January/February 2020 i Horticulture

As has been the case for a number of years now, this Horticulture issue, the first of the year, celebrates public gardens. I always enjoy working on the content of our public-gardens issue because it’s a reminder of the important, varied roles that these institutions play. In this issue’s features, we take virtual visits to three diverse sites: Green Spring Gardens, a historic estate turned public park in Virginia (page 30); Lan Su Chinese Garden, a relatively small botanic garden in a downtown Pacific Northwest setting (page 22); and Le Jardin Secret, an imaginative space hidden behind high walls in the midst of bustling Marrakesh, Morocco (page 46). Though these gardens are far apart in locations and styles, they all play the deeper roles for which we turn to such…

Sow. I sow seeds for globe artichokes under my grow lights in mid-February. It’s not a typical crop in my northern region, but short-season varieties like ‘Imperial Star’ and ‘Colorado Star’ provide a good yield of plump artichokes from mid-July through autumn. Early sowing gives the seedlings plenty of time to size up by May, when I can plant them in the garden. Sow more. I use my grow lights and a sunny windowsill in winter to grow healthful shoots and microgreens, and I also grow sprouts in jars on my kitchen counter. For a continual supply, I start new jars of sprouts every week or two, and sow seeds for shoots and microgreens every two to three weeks. My favorites include sunflower and broccoli shoots, arugula microgreens and alfalfa…

1. Use what you have. You may love that full-sun perennial, but if all you can offer is shade, you’d better skip it. You can bend some rules, but putting the right plants in the right place holds hard and fast. 2. Keep a journal. Record the dates that you plant, divide and harvest. Write down problems and the solutions that you find. You’ll see that over time success can be achieved by reading over what happened in the past. 3. Cultivate friends. One of the most rewarding parts of gardening is the social aspect. Share your plants. Get involved with a garden club to swap divisions and advice. 4. Mulch. Top-dressing with good mulch improves gardens; it’s a fact. Mulched soils stay cooler in summer and maintain a more…

When designing new flowerbeds, don’t shy away from gracefully curvaceous lines. Curving bed lines are so much more attractive than angular lines in all but the most modern landscapes. But beware: Beds that are too curvy can be impossible to mow near. That little un-mowed patch inside of a curve has to be trimmed with a string-trimmer or left wild and hairy. It’s so frustrating! Here’s a way to avoid the frustration. You’ve probably heard of the trick of using a hose to temporarily delineate the edges of a new bed before actually digging it out. Once you’ve adjusted the hose to shape the bed to your satisfaction, do this extra step: Bring out your lawn mower and, without running it, push it along the curves of the hose to…

Lan Su Chinese Garden 239 NW Everett Street Portland OR 97209 The garden is open year-round except on major holidays. For complete details visit http://www.lansugarden.org While you’re in the area, consider adding these other Portland public gardens to your itinerary: • Portland Japanese Garden, within Washington Park at 611 SW Kingston Avenue • International Rose Test Garden, within Washington Park at 400 SW Kingston Avenue • The Hoyt Arboretum, within Washington Park at 4000 SW Fairview Boulevard • Crystal Springs Rhododendron Garden, 5801 SE 28th Avenue…

Stash these plants in a dry, dark place each winter, and wake them up for a role in the garden when spring returns. 1 Cacti and succulents I don’t water any of my tender succulents in the winter, from my aloes to agaves to cacti. I scatter them around the house, often in dark corners where they’ll look pretty, and then I just ignore them. Kept bone dry, they stop growing completely but keep looking good. Come spring, they move back out to serve as low-maintenance container plantings or unexpected in-ground plantings. 2 Begonias Rex begonias, the ones with the huge, brilliantly colored leaves, naturally want to go dormant in the winter. I used to kill them by watering them too much in the winter, which leads to…

I’M JUST FINE with a bit of excess. “Even moderation in moderation,” I often repeat to my wife and kids. It would seem that the muscles responsible for rolling eyes would eventually wear out, but I don’t think that they do. So, if some is good, is more better? Well, sure. Sometimes. You can’t have too many gardens, and, in gardens, I would suggest you can’t have too many flowers. Someone once asked, “Can I plant more trees in my yard than the books recommend?” I said, “Have you ever been to a forest?” But while a pancake dinner once in a while will make a dude happy, a pancake dinner every night will, sadly, make a dude need a defibrillator. For me, a few drinks can help me enjoy…

LAMAR BUMBAUGH knew where the ginseng grew—but he wasn’t telling. This portly herbalist, rare bookseller and pure Pennsylvania Dutchman was known locally as Mountain Bummy. His antiquarian store on the main street in Kutztown was a trove of Pennsylvania German culture. The Pennsylvania Dutch aren’t Dutch—they’re Deutsch, the German name for Germans. Most originally emigrated from Swabia in southwest Germany, near Munich. So no wooden shoes or windmills, but plenty of southern German accent. If you visit the Pennsylvania Dutch country today, you can still see folks driving horses and buggies and hear old-timers speaking that same German dialect—nearly 300 years after their forebears came here. The Dutch don’t change much. It took me several years of begging, promising that I’d never tell a soul and befriending him before Bummy…

MEADOW BLAZING STAR LIATRIS LIGULISTYLIS Monarchs, swallowtails, painted ladies, sulphurs, red admirals, hairstreaks, fritillaries, hummingbirds and other pollinators flock to this tall, narrow perennial for nectar in late summer. Abundant seeds fluff out later in the season to draw goldfinches and other birds. Flowering persists for several weeks in late summer, adding color and vertical interest when many other perennials are past their prime. Its narrow leaves minimize moisture loss, making it drought tolerant. A GreatPlants Perennial of the Year (2017). HABIT: Meadow blazing star grows three to five feet tall and one foot wide. ORIGIN: Rocky woods, slopes and streambanks, moist meadows and dry prairies of the central United States and Canada. HOW TO GROW IT: Site in full to part sun and average soil. Rich soil can result…

A BIG PART OF THE FUN of growing my own food is trying new varieties every year. I look for those that have more disease resistance, larger yields, excellent flavor or other outstanding characteristics. Here are four vegetables you should grow in 2020. ‘Picolino’ cucumber, a disease-resistant hybrid, was a knockout in my 2019 raised beds and polytunnel, producing a heavy crop of crisp cocktail-size cucumbers. The skin is smooth and thin—no need to peel it. For best quality, harvest the fruits at four to five inches long. As a year-round vegetable gardener I’m always on the lookout for delicious crops that can be harvested into late fall and winter. I have a new favorite cold-season kale with the introduction of ‘Mars Landing’. This beautiful variety has glossy purple-bronze foliage…

1. ‘ARNOLD PROMISE’ WITCHHAZEL Hamamelis ×intermedia ‘Arnold Promise’. Fragrant, clear yellow, spider-like flowers appear on the bare branches of this architectural shrub in late winter. It typically flowers from mid-February into March, and its foliage turns bright colors in fall. Full sun. USDA Zones 5–8. 2. LENTEN ROSE Helleborus orientalis, H. ×hybridus. These shade-loving perennials have evergreen foliage and they generally bloom from March to April, with large, nodding flowers in shades of white, pink, rose and purple. They enjoy moist, well-drained soil that is high in organic matter. Part shade to shade. Zones 4–9. 3. ‘MOUNT AIRY’ BOTTLEBRUSH Fothergilla בMount Airy’. The shape and texture of this deciduous shrub’s spring flowers give it its colloquial name. Rounded foliage provides a nice foil for perennial companions through summer, and then…

1. ANGELONIA Angelonia angustifolia. This summer annual can’t be beat for flower power and heat tolerance. High temperatures don’t phase it one bit. It just keeps blooming from spring right up until the first hard frost. Giant types like ‘Archangel’ boast two-foot flower spikes. Full sun. Annual. 2. BLUESTAR Amsonia hubrichtii. This perennial gets its common name from the pale flowers that speckle it in early spring. Its soft foliage makes a feathery three-foot backdrop to lower-growing plants through the summer and then turns fiery orange in fall. Bluestar thrives in heat. Full sun to part shade. USDA Zones 5–8. 3. BUR OAK Quercus macrocarpa. A towering height and uniquely gnarled branches make this native tree the king of the Midwest’s forests. It provides shade, food and habitat for hundreds…

Despite its location in the midst of one of the busiest downtown areas of Portland, Ore., the Lan Su Chinese Garden is a hidden treasure of tranquility, tradition and beauty. Because it occupies no more than a standard city block and it is surrounded by a high wall, you could miss the garden if you didn’t know it was there. You might even doubt that much could be inside such a small space, but what lies beyond the entryway is bound to impress. THE CREATION OF A GARDEN Although it can’t rival the famous district of San Francisco, Portland’s Chinatown has long held a vibrant and strong presence at the northwest corner of the heart of the city. When Portland and Suzhou, China, joined as sister cities in the 1980s,…

GREATPLANTS GreatPlants for the Great Plains, a joint program of the Nebraska Statewide Arboretum and the Nebraska Nursery & Landscape Association, promotes species that are tough, adaptable and beneficial to the environment around them. Many of 2020’s choices are natives that have adapted, along with the wildlife and pollinators they support and rely on, to the changing regional climate and conditions where they evolved. 1 CATALPA  Catalpa speciosa. Tree of the Year. This beautiful tree has showstopper blossoms from May into June, plus large and dramatic leaves and seedpods. White orchid-like flowers look individually painted with dark purple dots and golden yellow smudges leading pollinators to the nectar within. These flowers occur in clusters up to two feet long. The leaves are equally impressive at about a foot long, as…

NATURE INTO ART by Thomas Christopher Photographs by Ngoc Minh Ngo (Timber Press, 2019) Take a deep dive into Wave Hill, the world-renowned public garden in the Bronx, N.Y., with Nature into Art. Thomas Christopher provides a compelling history of the property and its 1960s development into a public garden, with a focus on the experimental approach of founding Director of Horticulture Marco Polo Stufano and his original team, who eschewed plans on paper and catering to the typical expectations for a public garden. Preserving the incredible views from this Palisades-side property and celebrating the sheer beauty of plants drove many decisions, rather than convention. The tradition of “plants first” is continued today by current head Louis Bauer, who also places much stock in Wave Hill’s roster of gardeners, giving…