Begonias

Nothing to say right now, just a few photos of my begonias.  These are all hybrid seedlings from my breeding program, rapidly outgrowing their space under the lights indoors and needing to go out in the garden very soon.  I really like a couple of them, but will any of them prove to be hardy?  Only time will tell!  Click on the photos to go to zoomable originals in Flickr.

Quick and easy begonia propagation

One reason begonias are so popular is because they're ridiculously easy to propagate.  When I was a kid, I was introduced to begonias when my mother brought home a leaf that a woman in her bridge club had given her.  I already knew how to propagate african violets from leaf cuttings, and this woman told my mother that begonias could be propagated the same way.  It worked, and I was hooked.  I've since discovered that most begonias can be propagated from leaf cuttings.  About the only ones that can't are cane or "angelwing" begonias, which have to be propagated by division or stem cuttings.

Winter doldrums

Edgeworthia chrysantha, blooming in January

I've been taking a break from blogging, originally because of the usual holiday craziness, but then because I just can't seem to motivate myself to write or even think about gardening.  The days are far too short, and the garden far too brown.  The last two winters wiped out much of my garden, and I'm just not looking forward to another one.  I shouldn't complain because after our two coldest winters in 20 years, we're now experiencing one of our warmest.  Although we had a few light frosts in November and December, DC didn't experience its first hard freeze until early January and we've only recently seen a few scarce flakes of snow.  Daffodils and crocuses are popping up all over my garden, and the silver-haired buds on Edgeworthia chrysantha (above), which normally blooms sometime in March, are swelling and opening.  (I should note that I took the photos in this blog post with my new 6s iPhone; the photos may not be publication quality, but I'm pretty impressed with its camera function.)


Edgeworthia chrysantha in a friend's garden, showing the silver-haired clusters of buds

On the bright side (quite literally), days are getting longer and spring doesn't seem quite as far off.  Indoors, seedlings are beginning to demand my attention.  I made several begonias crosses last year, including a couple that I think are going to produce some very cool (and almost certainly hardy) hybrids.  I spent today sowing the last few batches of seeds, and potting up some of the seedlings that have already gotten too crowded in their pots.  Some of them are already hinting at the colors and patterns I can expect from them.  Once the seedlings have their second set of true leaves they really take off, so I guess it's time to get off my butt, stop feeling sorry for myself, and get back to gardening.


Begonia seedlings

Testing the limits... and finding them: 2014-2015 losers

August 2015: no more windmill palms

I've always been interested in testing the limits of marginally hardy plants, plants that are new to cultivation, and plants whose hardiness is otherwise unknown.  For better or for worse, my last two winters have been very good ones for testing hardiness!  The low temperature in my back yard in Washington, DC (zone 7a) during both winters was about 5 degrees (-15° C), my area's coldest temperatures in 20 years.  Despite the similar low temperatures, the two winters were very different in terms of wind, snow cover, and timing and duration of the cold.  Several plants that survived the first of the two winters didn't make it through the second; in some cases I think they were weakened going into the second winter, but I also think the ground froze more deeply, doing more damage to otherwise healthy plants.

Big Begonia grandis

Begonia grandis in a private garden near Baltimore, Maryland

I'm just back from attending the Perennial Plant Association (PPA) national symposium in Baltimore, Maryland.  I've only recently joined this organization, having been talked into it by my friend Janet Draper.  And I'm so glad she did!  I just spent an amazing, exhausting, energizing 5 days of talks, garden tours, trade show, and best of all, spending time with several hundred fellow plant geeks, including at least a dozen people I already knew from Facebook but had never before met in person.  I took over 500 photos, and it's going to take a while to get them processed and uploaded to my Flickr account.  For now I'll just quickly share some photos of the first plant (of many!) that blew me away: Begonia grandis, a.k.a. "hardy begonia".

Begonia update

Begonia hybrid seedlings

Begonias have been a sorely-needed bright spot in an otherwise bad gardening year.  Two cold winters in a row, combined with more than my usual degree of neglect, have taken a hard toll and I've had many losses.  But those losses have opened up some opportunities, bringing more sun into what was an increasingly overgrown garden, and opening up some space to try new plants.  And among the losses, I've had a few pleasant surprises.

New begonias, off to a late start

Begonia seedlings, about to be planted outdoors

I should have done this 6 weeks ago, but this morning I finally got some of my begonia seedlings outdoors and in the ground.  These are hybrid seedlings from a cross I made last summer, and they've been growing under fluorescent lights since germinating during the winter.  They got off to a slow start because begonia seedlings don't like the cool temperatures and low humidity of winter, but they grow explosively in the spring.  If I wait too long, as I did this year, they get a bit too crowded.  Summer also brings heat they don't appreciate and I know from past experience that they'll begin to decline indoors, succumbing to pests and diseases.  The south-facing sun porch where I grow them is the hottest room in the house, and even with air conditioning gets a bit too warm for comfort in July and August.  They do quite well in the ground, and are best planted out in early May but this year I held off, waiting to see what might come back from last year after a very cold winter put my plants to the ultimate test.  Many plants didn't make it, but I did have a few surprises.

Spring waits for no man

Herbaceous peony (unknown cultivar)

A couple of weeks ago I wrote about the three days of glory (rarely four, often two, sometimes as little as one) my tree peony gives me.  It's always one of the first plants to bloom in my garden, in fact one of the first to stir at all, showing new growth long before the threat of frost is past (although oddly enough, the flowers have never been nipped by a late frost).  Tree peonies aren't really trees; they are hybrids derived from Paeonia suffruticosa (whose Latin name means "kinda shrubby") and related species with persistent woody stems that might grow a few feet tall at most.  Now it's time for the more familiar herbaceous peonies, the perennial kind that dies to the ground every winter, and tend to bloom a bit later.

Three days of glory

After a long, cold winter and a late, chilly spring--followed by a week in Buffalo--I finally enjoyed a perfect spring weekend, feeling a bit guilty about not working in the garden but happy to just enjoy the warm weather and appreciate the flowers.  Stealing the show today is my tree peony, an unknown cultivar that is one of the very few plants I've kept from the previous owner.

No-name begonias

Begonia 'Helen Teupel', sold unlabeled

In an online begonia group that I frequent, not a day goes by that somebody doesn't post one or more photos of begonias they got from a friend, or purchased without any label, asking "what is it?"  These are often rex hybrids, one of the groups I most often see offered without any names in garden centers.  There's something about rex begonias that seduces people into buying them, but there's apparently also something about them that makes people lose their names.

Spring forward?

Crocus carnage: Bird?  Squirrel?  Gremlins?

Spring is never a straightforward season and March is especially unpredictable.  I had 77 degrees (25° C) two days ago, and a frost last night.  I guess I shouldn't complain too much because it snowed in Buffalo yesterday!  But complain I will, because when I came home from work last night I discovered that, just as they were about to open, some critter had nipped off nearly every bud on my 'Ruby Giant' crocus.  @$%&#!

Hope springs eternal - or - another good winter for testing hardiness

New begonias

I came back from Behnke Nurseries, a great local garden center just outside DC, with a few new plants in the back seat today.  How could I pass up these beautiful rex begonias from Foliera?  Especially at 20% off!  Call me an optimist, because I'm pretty sure I'll have room to put these new begonias somewhere in my garden this spring.

A new hardy begonia?

Unnamed begonia hybrid (August 2014)

I'm leading with a photo from last summer because that's what this blog post is ultimately about.  And hoo-boy, could I use some warm weather right now!  This has been a slow winter for me, with MANTS being an isolated bright spot of horticulture in the middle of January (see Beating the winter blahs at MANTS).  This hasn't been a bad winter for Washington, DC but I'm just back from an extended visit to Buffalo to help out with my dad, who is in a nursing home following a major stroke and was in the hospital for the last 6 days of my latest visit.  This was an exhausting visit, and to add insult to injury the weather was awful but for once it worked in my favor: there was a weather advisory on the day of my scheduled departure and I was able to extend my stay for an extra 3 days without any additional fee.

Garden bloggers bloom day: November 2014

Despite a few evening clouds, it was cold and clear last night in Washington, DC and we finally got our first good freeze of the season.  I've had a couple of very light frosts already, when overnight lows were in the 30's, but without any damage to my plants.  Last night was the first time it went down to the freezing point, 32 degrees F (0 C), or perhaps slightly lower.  When I went out this morning to survey the damage the first thing I noticed was the sickly sweet smell of frostbitten vegetation.  That's the part I always forget.

Beyond Begonia grandis: new hardy begonias

Begonia grandis, white-flowered form

Many gardeners are familiar with Begonia grandis (a.k.a. B. discolor, B. evansiana, B. sinensis), a tuberous species from China commonly known as the "hardy begonia".  The name is well-earned: this truly is the hardiest species in a huge but mostly tropical and subtropical genus, going dormant in the winter and able to survive freezing temperatures into zone 6.  But for a very long time, the most exciting news about hardy begonias was that they came in white as well as pink.  In a genus with so many flashy plants, neither the foliage nor the flowers of B. grandis are terribly exciting.  The leaves are handsome enough, and the pink or white flowers are nice coming so late in the season... and darn it, it's a hardy begonia.  But hardiness is mostly what it has going for it, and is offset by the thing being downright weedy.  It produces little aerial bulbils that act like seeds, dropping all over to produce a steadily-growing colony that will eventually crowd out smaller and slower-growing plants.

Begonias and temperature

Begonia sizemoreae (female flowers)

With temperatures dropping and the growing season coming to an end, I was going through some old photos for a blog post I'm putting together and came across some photos of a plant I no longer grow, Begonia sizemoreae.  This recently described species from northern Vietnam is closely related to B. rex (and according to some botanists the two belong to the same species).  I picked up this plant on a whim at a local begonia society show and grew it for a few years; while it didn't turn out to be the least bit hardy, it did give me some interesting hybrids that survived a couple of warm winters in the ground and encouraged me to attempt more crosses.

A year of blogging

Garden one year ago

Today marks one year since I started this blog and published my first post.  The most immediate reason for blogging was the shutdown of the federal government last year: being stuck at home for an indefinite period of time, I decided to use my time productively rather than watch TV and surf the web!  I had been thinking about blogging for a while, and in fact had tried my hand at blogging once before (I was particularly proud of Transitional Species in Insect Evolution, about the evolution of termites from social, wood-eating cockroaches); but before I get too self-congratulatory I should also note that my previous attempt at blogging lasted just over a year!  Finally, after years of posting commentary and photos on several plant and gardening-related websites and discussion lists, I realized that in a very real sense I was already blogging; I might as well pull it all together on one site, attached to my own name.  Plants and gardening have always been a passion for me, and I hoped to direct and focus that passion.

Garden Bloggers Bloom Day: September 2014

Seemannia hybrid

Bit by bit, the garden is recovering from a brutal winter.  It may not look like much from above: there are a couple of empty spaces where palms used to grow, the hardy banana (Musa basjoo) hasn't grown nearly as big as it did last year (see Everybody loves my big banana), and the figs were killed to the ground and are coming back from the roots, but hidden underneath all that foliage are some plants that are just now hitting their peak.


View of the garden from our roof deck

Raleigh, part 2: Plant Delights Nursery and JC Raulston Arboretum

Crinum and Yucca

[Part 1 here: Southeastern Palm Society summer meeting.]

I spent a pleasant and only moderately wet morning taking photos at Plant Delights Nursery and chatting with Tony Avent.  In retrospect (especially considering the afternoon rain that made photography nearly impossible later in the day) I probably spent too much time with the begonias, but that's one of my current interests and it's what I wanted to see.  Tony is very interested in begonias (although I've yet to find a plant group he's not interested in) and has acquired quite a collection of species and hybrids at the nursery to test for hardiness and commercial potential.  We compared notes at length on hardy begonias, not just B. grandis but several other species and hybrids that are proving to be fairly hardy, as well as my own efforts to breed hardy begonia hybrids.

A midsummer miscellany

Cardoon (Cynara cardunculus), National Museum of Natural History gardens

I don't normally do a lot of walking in mid-summer, but we've had such uncharacteristically pleasant summer weather for the past several weeks that I can't use my usual excuse of heat and humidity to avoid a bit of exercise.  So come with me on a Friday evening as I walk from work in downtown Washington, DC to join my husband for dinner at a restaurant on 14th Street near Logan Circle.  This month marks 23 years since we moved here from a small town in upstate New York, so forgive me if I wax a bit nostalgic along the way!