Sanhedrin Nursery – Garden Blog

• Mother’s Day is the perfect time to give a gift of a living plant. Rhododendrons, lilacs, hanging fuchsias and ivy geraniums are sure to please her.

• Plant an herb garden in a container near the kitchen door for convenient fresh spices like basil, oregano, parsley and thyme.

• Rhododendrons, azaleas and camellias provide lots of beautiful flowers for the shady spring garden. Choose now.

• Mulch blueberry plants with aged sawdust and feed with cottonseed meal or an acid fertilizer.

• Flowering dogwood trees are blooming now to help you choose a beautiful small tree for a focal point in your garden.

What’s New in Roses?

The 2013 AARS Winner, Francis Meilland, will be the last in a long line of famous roses. After this year, the All-America Rose Selection (AARS) program will be discontinued.

The Francis Meilland rose is named to commemorate the 100th birthday of Francis Meilland the breeder of the historic Peace rose. When Meilland foresaw the German invasion of France he sent cuttings to friends in Italy, Turkey, Germany, and the United States to protect the new rose. It took on different names in each country, but in the U.S. it became known as the Peace rose. The name was publicly announced on April 29, 1945, the very day that Berlin fell, considered the end of the Second World War in Europe.

The Francis Meilland rose has large, 5-inch, high-centered blooms of soft, shell pink that emit a wonderful fragrance that everyone identifies with a ‘real rose’. Though it will be white in the heat of the summer, the strong, fruity and citrussy fragrance will perfume the air. Francis Meilland is the first hybrid tea rose to win under no-spray conditions, so its dark green foliage should look good all summer.

Ch-Ching! is a beautiful golden yellow rose with an occasional kiss of ruby-red. A true grandiflora, Ch-Ching! provides clusters of elegant high-centered blooms against dark green foliage and deep red new growth. Vigorous plants grow 3-6′ tall with a spread of 3-4′ and have outstanding natural disease resistance. The strong fragrance is spicy and fruity.

The new novelty rose, Ketchup & Mustard, is a conspicuous red and yellow bicolor, with red on the upper side of the petals and yellow on the backside. The floriferous, rounded plants filled with extremely glossy green foliage bloom in flushes throughout the season. It will be a conversation piece in any garden.

The long lovely pointed buds of We Salute You open slowly to tones of glowing orange, then turn to warm pink, giving two distinct colors in each lovely bloom – orangey on the inside and pinky on the outside. The big open blossoms are carried on long stems clothed with very deep green highly-glossed leaves. Warm weather brings out the best flower colors. 

Purple Splash climbing rose bears large clusters of wine-purple blooms streaked with white and accented with sunny yellow centers. It flowers repeatedly from midsummer into fall, with the aroma of sweet apples. Climbing to 10-14 ft., it does best in full sun.

Spice up your garden with a fragrant new rose and enjoy its lovely blossoms all summer.

• Petunias can be planted now. Their bright flowers will bloom all summer in hot, sunny locations and they will take a light frost.

• It’s time to put out oriole feeders. You can also attract them with fresh orange halves.

• Flower seeds can be sown directly in the garden now. Cosmos, marigolds and zinnias will give you beautiful flowers all summer.

• Feed roses to encourage a beautiful display of color later this month. Treat plants to prevent insect and disease problems.

• Plant the vegetable garden this month, but remember that late frosts can still nip tender young plants.

Helping the Good Bugs

Not all bugs are bad bugs. In fact there are many bugs that don’t eat plants at all, they feed on other insects. By encouraging these beneficial insects, you can maintain a natural balance in your garden and reduce damage done by insect pests with a minimum of pesticide sprays.

Insects that feed on other insects are divided into two types, the predators and the parasites. Predators move around looking for plant feeders such as aphids, mites and caterpillars. Lacewing larvae and ladybug larvae and adults aggressively devour aphid populations. Ground beetles prey on a variety of ground-dwelling pests like cutworms, root maggots and slug eggs. Predatory mites attack spider mites and two-spotted mites feed on many plants and can be a real problem in hot dry weather. Beneficial nematodes attack root pests like cutworms, weevils and grubs.

Parasites are insects that develop in the bodies of other “host” insects. Most parasites are tiny wasps or flies whose larvae eat other insects from within. Tiny parasitoid wasps are aggressive beyond their size when it comes to pursuing aphids and caterpillars. They provide a very effective means of insect control.

Ladybugs, Tricho-Gramma wasps, predatory mites and beneficial nematodes can be purchased to put in your garden or greenhouse.

These various beneficial insects consume large numbers of pest insects, but their diets are not limited to other insects. In fact, many of the beneficial species have periods in their life cycles when they survive only on nectar and pollen. So by planting a variety of insect-attracting plants you can keep beneficial insects going strong.

There are two plant groups that are particularly attractive to beneficial insects. They are the parsley or carrot family and the daisy or sunflower family. Most beneficial insects have short mouthparts and cannot reach far into a flower for nectar and pollen. The small flowers on these plants put pollen and nectar within reach of these tiny insects.

The carrot family includes many herbs such as anise, dill, fennel, and cilantro and vegetables such as carrots, parsley and celery. The flowers of these plants are arranged in clusters called umbels which are shaped like an umbrella. They produce large amounts of nectar as well as shelter for insect-feeding insects, another critical requirement. To take advantage of their nectar, you just let a few of your carrot, parsley and celery plants go to seed.

The sunflower family is the largest family of flowers on the planet. These “flowers” are actually made up of dozens or hundreds of tiny flowers clustered together. This family includes yarrows, marigolds, zinnias, asters, calendulas, chrysanthemums, cosmos and many more. While these plants have less nectar than those of the parsley family, the flowers last a long time, and with planning, you can have some in bloom throughout the growing season.

Alyssum, borage, statice, various clovers and yarrows also attract parasitoid and predatory insects. Low-growing plants, such as thyme, rosemary, or mint, provide shelter for ground beetles and other beneficial insects.

Get to know what the good bugs look like and lure them to your garden by growing these attractive flowers. In a few years, you may find that you just don’t need insecticides any more.

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

• Prepare for planting season! Turn in cover crops and do a soil test if your garden had trouble last year.

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

• 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.

• Asparagus, artichokes and rhubarb are perennial vegetables that can be planted now.

Azaleas for Spring

Some of our loveliest spring flowers bloom on compact plants called azaleas. These garden gems are evergreen and easy to grow given the right conditions. They bloom reliably every spring and live for many years in gardens or in containers.

Azaleas are attractive shrubs for areas that receive partial shade, or filtered shade all day. They cover themselves with beautiful flowers each spring and are good-looking all year as a small border shrub. Plant them with rhododendrons, Lily of the Valley shrub (Pieris japonica), Japanese Snowball bush (Viburnum plicatum) or Japanese maples for a harmonious garden design.

Azaleas are fairly hardy plants, however they have a reputation for being difficult to grow. Most azalea deaths occur from faulty planting. In their native habitats they are found growing in loose, porous soils. So it is best to plant azaleas in a well-drained site with cool, moist, acidic soil.

The planting hole should be 18 to 24 inches wide but only as deep as the root ball. Use peat moss, planting mix, or ground bark to amend the soil up to 50%. Plant the azalea higher than the surrounding ground level and build up to the sides with the soil mixture. One of the quickest ways to kill an azalea is to bury the plant by putting soil on top of the root ball. The surface of the root ball should still be showing when you are done planting.

Too much fertilizer will also kill an azalea. These plants have tender fibrous roots which are easily burned by high-nitrogen fertilizers. Use a non- burning organic fertilizer like cottonseed meal or a chemical fertilizer labeled for azaleas once a month in April, May and June. Then switch to a 0-10-10 fertilizer for the months of July, August and September.

Azaleas are often the victims of overwatering. Water the plants as you would any other plant to get them established, and then check the soil to keep it moist but not soggy wet. If kept too wet, or grown in poorly drained soils, azaleas can be killed by root rot fungi. The leaves will wilt and then dry up on the plant.

Not all azaleas are hardy to the cold temperatures in our area, but there are varieties that can take temperatures down to 5°F. Look for names like Kurume and Satsuki to be sure you are buying a cold-hardy plant. Belgian Indicas and Southern Indicas will grow where temperatures don’t fall below 20°F. Below that the bark will split and the plants will die.

Kurume azaleas have very dense foliage and small flowers that completely cover the plants in spring. They come in all shades of red, pink, lavender, purple and white. Satsuki azaleas have a looser form and large flowers in white, pink or red that are sometimes striped or have multiple colors on one plant.

With a carefully chosen plant and proper planting and care, azaleas will live for many years, in the landscape or in containers, showing off their colorful flowers each spring.