Sanhedrin Nursery – Garden Blog

• Begonias bulbs can be started indoors now and set out after danger of frost. You’ll enjoy their beautiful flowers this summer.

• Plant lawns now from seed. Reseed established lawns to fill in bare patches.

• Azaleas, rhododendrons and camellias provide lots of beautiful flowers for the shady spring garden. Choose them now.

• Fertilize established roses now and begin spraying them for insect and disease problems. Neem oil is a very effective, less toxic spray that works against both insects and diseases.

• Enjoy the bright yellow colors of goldfinches outside your window by putting up thistle feeders for them.

What’s New?

“It’s Spring again, and birds on the wing, again…” Spring is finally here and we’re all looking for something new and unusual to brighten up the yard.

Daisies are always fun and offer their bright flower faces up to the sun. The ‘Margarita Bronze Bicolor’ Osteospermum dairy is a most unusual color. This bronze African Daisy has long, ridged, daisy-like petals of a rosy-bronze with a halo of pastel yellow surrounding the dark eye. It is really striking and a perfect addition to your flower arrangements. It’s sister plant, ‘Margarita Pink Flare,’ has rich, pink flowers with a white center that “flares” out from the dark blue eye. Growing 12-15 inches high, they will look nice planted with white alyssum.

A new group of Nemesias are called Sunsatia® and their ‘Raspberry’ is a rich, warm color. Nemesias are related to snapdragons and grow in part sun, with abundant raspberry-pink flowers all through the spring season. Growing 12-18 inches tall, they can be used in flower beds or as fillers in combination pots.

For a really big splash, try the new Sunbather® Gazanias. This new generation from Australia have a dense growth habit and large brightly-colored flowers. ‘Sunbather’s Sunset’ offers amber-orange double flowers that stay open day and night. It grows 18 inches tall and wide, and loves the full, hot sun.

Now, for something really different, you’ll have to see the new Supertunia® ‘Pretty Much Picasso’®. Its unique flowers are rose pink edged in lime green with a dark purple eye. The vigorous plants are great for mixing in combination pots. They will grow 8 inches tall and 12 inches wide. Try them with Lysimachia, an evergreen groundcover with rounded, yellow-green leaves, and white alyssum.

Another great new petunia is ‘Double Cascade Blue.’ Floriferous and cascading, the dark purple-blue double flowers cover the large, vigorous plants. Mix them with double ‘White Sonata’ or single pinks for a showy combination.

New varieties are always coming out in Impatiens. As part of the new Dazzler™ series, we now have ‘Lilac Splash’ and ‘Blue Pearl.’ Dazzlers™ put on a big show of 1.5-in. blooms over rich, green foliage all summer long. The flowers of ‘Lilac Splash’ are a deep lavender-pink with a red eye, and ‘Blue Pearl’ is more of a light magenta with a purple eye. Both will brighten up your shady flower beds and pots.

Don’t overlook snapdragons for taller plants in the flower border. A new series called ‘Freesong’ grows up to 18 inches high. The well-branched plants make excellent cut flowers in cherry, crimson, pink, scarlet, white, yellow and orange.

Spring is here and it’s time to get planting!

• Hang up Codling moth traps now to reduce the number of wormy apples in your harvest this year.

• Attract birds to your yard with bird feeders. Delightful gold finches will be happy to visit your thistle feeders, and rufous-sided tohees will visit seed feeders.

• Gladiolus bulbs come in every color of the rainbow. Plant them this month for summer flowers.

• Turn in cover crops now and you will be ready to plant your summer garden in two or three weeks.

• Plant sunflowers now from seed or plants. Choose either the multi-stemmed kinds for cut flowers or the giants for edible seeds.

New Books for the Gardener

“The Sunset Western Garden Book” has been the “bible” of Western gardeners and nursery folks for over 80 years. With its unique climate zone maps for just the Western states and a special understanding of Western growing conditions, the Sunset Book is THE reference book for most California gardeners.

Newly released is the 9th Edition of “The New Sunset Western Garden Book,” complete with more than 2,000 full-color photographs. This is the first edition that includes a color photograph for every plant in its encyclopedia. And the red type for each plant name really stands out on the page. Over 9,000 plants are described in its pages.

There is an extensive “Plant Finder” section that lists Plants for Slopes, Deer-Resistant Plants, Plants for Shade, and Trees and Shrubs for Containers. It also lists Plants for Waterwise Gardens and Plants for Damp Areas as well as Plants that Attract Bees and Butterflies.

For special effects you can look through sections that list Flowering Trees and Shrubs, Fall Foliage, Plants for Fragrance and even Plants for Moon Gardens!

Flip to the back of the book for down-to-earth gardening information. You’ll learn about soils, how to plant a tree, growing in containers, how to grow herbs and how to design with perennials. There’s a lot of information on choosing and planting trees, “the backbone of the garden.”

There is information on choosing and growing vines, wildflowers, and how to create a wildlife habitat. Watering and fertilizing are covered in detail as well as how to protect your plants from frost, hot sun and midnight marauders.

It has a section on vegetable gardening, which tells you when to plant each kind of vegetable in your climate zone. There is also some information on when to harvest different crops.

If you are primarily interested in fruits and vegetables, Sunset has a new book called the “Western Garden Book of Edibles.” With complete instructions for growing over 190 vegetables, herbs, berries, fruits and nuts it is a very valuable reference book.

In the back of the book are detailed plans and design ideas for kitchen gardens of all sizes. It also has easy-to-follow guidelines for composting and building raised beds, arbors and trellises and garden paths.

The Practical Guide tells you about soil amendments, planting cover crops, starting from seed and using mulches. It also has color photos of many of the most common plant pests and diseases and a few of beneficial insects.

Both books will be fun to sit down with and discover some new plants and gardening tips and they will be nice additions to your gardening library.

• Tomatoes can be set out with protection. “Season Starter” will protect them down to 20°F and will give them a warm environment during the day.

• Summer flower bulbs can be planted now. Choose from gladiolus, dahlias, begonias, lilies and more.

• Flowering magnolias, or tulip trees can be grown in full sun or partial shade, as a lovely accent plant in any garden.

• Put up hummingbird feeders this month and enjoy these colorful and entertaining birds.

• Plant artichokes now. Fill a hole with one part humus and two parts soil and set out plants in full or part sun.

Versatile Potatoes

America’s most popular vegetable, the potato, can be boiled, baked, fried, microwaved, steamed, or roasted, with or without their peels. Combined with butter, sour cream, or oil they are rich and addictive, but left to themselves they’re quite low in calories and loaded with nutrients.

Potatoes with a high starch content, like russets, bake well and yield light and fluffy mashed potatoes.  Those with a low starch content, like red-skinned potatoes, hold their shape after cooking, and are great for making potato salads and scalloped potatoes.  Medium starch potatoes are called all-purpose potatoes, and they’ll work in most potato dishes. 

Baking potatoes are high in starch with a coarse, cork-like skin. For baked potatoes, Russet Burbank is the standard. But newer varieties like Rio Grande Russet and Norkotah Russet may give you higher yields. You can also have fine baked potatoes with Sangre 11, a red potato with white flesh, Mountain Rose, a red potato with red flesh, and Yellow Finn, a popular yellow potato. California White is also good baked.

Boiling potatoes are waxy and low in starch. They have a thin, smooth skin and are high in moisture and sugar, but low in starch. Many red potatoes are delicious boiled. Red La Soda is a classic boiler with sweet white flesh, and Sangre 11 is excellent for boiling and ranks high in taste tests. Red Gold has delicate yellow flesh and unique flavor. Modoc has bright red skin and is early maturing. Red Chieftain has dark red skin and white flesh and is slow to turn green in storage. Yellow Finn and Yukon Gold are also good boilers.

For mashed potatoes, look to Russets, of course, or Yukon Gold. Or try some of the reds like Mountain Rose, Red Pontiac or Red La Soda.

Salad potatoes need to hold up to boiling, so you can use Yellow Finn, Red Norland, and Red La Soda for salads. Colorado Rose, a red potato with white flesh, is also good for salads. All Blue, a blue potato with blue flesh, will add color and interest to your summer salads.

“All-purpose” potatoes are moister than baking potatoes and will hold together in boiling water. They are particularly well-suited to roasting, pan frying, and using in soups, stews, and gratins. They can be baked, mashed, and fried, but will not produce the same results as the bakers. Yukon Gold, Red Pontiac, California White and French Fingerlings fall into this category. Carola is a new yellow skinned potato with yellow flesh that is becoming very popular for its versatility and flavor.

Fingerling potatoes are gourmet potatoes that are more widely available now. There are many varieties of these small, finger-shaped potatoes, but they all tend to be low in starch, and great for roasting or making potato salads. Look for French Fingerlings, Russian Banana and Rose Finn Apple.

Try some new varieties and enjoy the many flavors of the versatile potato.