Sanhedrin Nursery – Garden Blog

• Bulbs, bulbs, bulbs! It’s time to plant tulips, daffodils, hyacinths, crocus and many other flower bulbs for beautiful blooms next spring.

• Chrysanthemums can be planted in pots or flower beds for bright and cheerful flowers to enjoy this fall.

• Look for rich, bright colors in the foliage of deciduous trees and shrubs. Japanese maples, fothergilla, snowball bush and maple trees are beautiful right now.

• Ornamental cabbage makes a dramatic planting in flower beds over the winter.

• Crimson clover, fava beans and rye grass will fortify your garden soil over the winter. Seed these crops as you compost your summer vegetables.

Smiling Pansies

“If a man has two pennies he should buy a loaf of bread with one, which will sustain his life, and a flower with the other, which will give him a reason to live….. Chinese Proverb

The happy faces of pansies have appealed to gardeners for centuries. Developed from three wild species, the modern pansies have large flowers, beautifully marked “faces” and a wide color range. They add color to the winter and spring garden over a long season.

Pansies are low-growing flowers that are nice for borders and look very pretty in containers of all kinds. Their heart-shaped, shiny green leaves cover the ground and the flowers rise above them on six-inch stems.

Pansy flowers can be up to three inches across and come in a wide variety of colors: violet, purple, blue, pink, red, orange, yellow, white and many new bicolors. The Matrix series is impressive with a wide color range and a no-stretch habit. Ultima Radiance Pink Pansy features beautiful pink flowers with white faces, yellow eyes and deep purple streaks. Not all pansies have faces. Delta Pure hybrids have solid colored flowers in bright yellow, red, blue, white and other colors.

Significant breeding improvements in recent years have produced hybrids that bloom longer, show better heat resistance and cold tolerance, and display a wonderful range of colors and patterns. Pansies have become more popular as gardeners have seen how well they preform through wet, wintery weather. Pansies are unaffected by a covering of snow, and pop right back when the snow melts.

They are good companions for spring-flowering bulbs. By choosing colors that compliment the bulbs you can create some very pretty living bouquets. Blooming over a longer season than the bulbs, they will fill in and provide color as the bulbs are finishing their cycle.

By planting pansies now, you get to enjoy their big, beautiful blooms all fall, often throughout the entire winter, and then again from early spring until the summer heat sets in. Ideally, plant your pansies where they’ll get some shade in the summer, but lots of sun when the trees soon lose their leaves and the weather cools. Then they’ll get the benefit of that cooling shade when the trees leaf out again in spring and the weather warms up. Remember, pansies love sun, but don’t like heat. 

Violas, which are the smaller cousins of pansies, also have some interesting new hybrids. The Sorbet series includes Lemon Chiffon, in soft yellow and white, Orange Duet with charming violet and orange flowers, and Peach Melba, with peach and yellow petals tipped with red. They are dense and neat, spreading to 12 inches across.

The flowers of all pansies and their cousins, violets, violas and Johnny jump-ups, are wonderfully edible. Use them to decorate your salads and cakes, and those tasty flowers will add color and a mild wintergreen flavor to your creations.

The “old fashioned” pansy has many new varieties to bring color to your pots and flower beds this fall and winter.

• King Alfred daffodils, those big, showy, golden, trumpet-flowered daffodils, can be planted now from bulbs for glorious spring flowers.

• Transplant shrubs that need to be moved this month. It’s also a good time to transplant natives.

• Broadcast wildflower seeds and annual ryegrass on hillsides to stop erosion and give you lots of flowers next spring.

• Compost falling leaves to make excellent garden mulch by next season.

• Cut asparagus down to about two inches above the ground once all of the foliage has died. Mulch asparagus beds with three inches of well-rotted manure.

Camellias for Fall Flowers

Camellias are well-known for their large, perfect-looking flowers that bloom in the springtime. These are Camellia japonica and are indeed magnificent shrubs. But they have a lesser known cousin, Camellia sasanqua which is a fine shrub with stunning fall and winter color displays. They vary from tall, bushy shrubs to low, spreading ones making a wonderful hedge plant, a superior container plant, or even an effective ground cover.

The flowers are smaller and less showy than the common camellia, but they make up for it with a profusion of bloom. By planting both types of camellias, you get a very long season of bloom, extending from November through May.

Camellia sasanquas are generally rather open and informal. Some varieties have a loose, open habit and pliable stems with a graceful form. They can easily be espaliered on a fence or trellis for a dramatic effect. Many varieties grow only 2-5 feet tall and wide, while others, like the December-blooming ‘Yuletide,’ are quite compact and upright.

The flowers of sasanquas are about 2-3 inches across and may be single, semidouble, or double, usually with a central burst of bright yellow stamens. They cover themselves with blossoms that just keep coming for weeks. Their delicate rounded and often frilled petals range from pale shell pink, rich rose, and vibrant white, to fiery red. Individual flowers last but a short time, but as they fall they are replaced by many more. Many have sweetly-scented flowers as a bonus. They stand out through the winter against glossy, dark green foliage.

Camellia sasanqua can be planted in sun or shade, but avoid intense heat and reflected light. It makes a fine container plant, and some varieties can be used as ground cover shrubs.

All camellias need careful planting. Most failures occur from planting too deep. Dig a hole twice as wide as the root ball and 1 inch shallower. Mix in one part compost to every 3 parts of native soil, and fill in around the root ball. After planting, the root ball will stick up 1 inch. Fill in around the sides of the root ball with the soil mixture, making a watering basin, but do not put soil on top of the root ball. Add mulch to cover the root ball and surrounding soil. This method insures that the plant will have good drainage, and the roots will be able to breathe.

Their cultural needs are similar to rhododendrons and azaleas as they prefer a rich organic and acidic soil and filtered shade. But Camellia sasanquas will also will take considerable sun if kept moist through the summer.

Look for beautiful, fall-blooming camellias now. They make a nice addition to the winter landscape.

• Holland flower bulbs are now available for fall planting. These lovely gems will bloom for you next spring.

• Naked lady amaryllis have lovely, fragrant pink flowers that bloom in late summer with little or no care. Plant the bulbs, available at local nurseries, now.

• Wildflower seed broadcasted with the first rains will take root over the winter and burst into flower next spring.

• Divide artichoke plants which have been in the ground for three or four years. Mulch established plants with steer manure.

• Protect the pond from the worst of the leaf fall with a fine-mesh net over the surface of the pond.

Growing Great Garlic

Garlic is a staple in the kitchen, turning ordinary food into gourmet delights. And it should be a staple in the garden as well. Homemade garlic oil spray makes an effective deterrent for many garden pests. And garlic, when interplanted with other crops, will help repel some insect pests.

Garlic grows best in deep, rich well-drained soil, and full sun. Bulbs will not develop to their full size if it is shady. It should be planted in the fall as close to the autumnal equinox as possible. This gives the bulbs time to develop some roots before winter. Garlic likes cool weather, so it is a good winter crop. It will be ready to harvest around the summer solstice.

A garlic bulb is separated into cloves and each clove is planted 4-6 inches apart and 1-2 inches deep. Weeds are garlic’s biggest enemy so weed the bed regularly. Gophers love garlic so protect your crop with gopher wire or traps. Newly planted garlic should be watered twice a week until the rains start.

One pound of garlic plants a 25-foot row or a bed 4 by 6 feet at 4-inch spacing. For most garlics, you can harvest 10 pounds for every pound you plant.

In the early spring, encourage vigorous leaf growth by fertilizing the bed. Use fish emulsion, blood meal or a high-nitrogen fertilizer every two weeks. Foliar application is especially helpful once the leaves get bigger. Stop fertilizing as soon as you see the base begin to swell as the plant begins to form a bulb.

Keep the plants well watered during the last few weeks when the bulbs are forming. The extra water and fertilizer will result in large bulbs. Sometimes flower stalks will start to grow. It is important to cut or break them off as soon as you see them or they will reduce the size of your crop.

Garlic is harvested in late June or July. The leaves will turn yellow and then brown when the garlic is ready to harvest. Let it dry on the ground for a day or two. You can braid the dried stalks and hang them on a wall where they will be decorative and handy.

There are hundreds of kinds of garlic grown throughout the world. They can be divided into two groups: hard-necked garlic and soft-necked ones.

The most common here is California Early White, which is grown commercially around Gilroy, California. It is vigorous, productive and has a pungent flavor. It is the easiest to grow and seems to be less fussy about growing conditions than the others. It is a softneck variety.

Late Pink garlic has smooth bulbs and pinkish cloves with a fairly strong flavor. It has a soft pliable neck that lends itself to braiding and stores for 6 to 8 months in proper conditions. It matures late and is usually the last garlic to come out of the ground.

Spanish Roja is an heirloom garlic with rich, spicy flavor. This large hardneck variety has a blushed pink-red color with bulbs usually over 2 1/2 inches in diameter. The bulbs have thin bulb wrappers and 7-10 easy-to-peel cloves per bulb.

Elephant garlic is a very large, easy-to-peel garlic with a mild flavor. It is a good keeper and full-sized bulbs weigh up to 1 pound. Plant the cloves 3 to 4 inches below the soil surface and space them from 8 to 10 inches apart in the row.

October is the best time to plant garlic, so grow yourself some great garlic this year.