After the snowdrops, after the crocuses, after the daffodils, there is just about nothing blooming in the front of the house until the June show of peonies, irises, and poppies. I have not been the first person to notice this bloom gap, not by a long shot, and the traditional recommendation is to plant tulips to bridge this gap.

Tulips As Annuals?

The only thing is, tulips don’t thrive in my clay soil and it’s taken me a while to get used to the idea of planting them as annuals. I have nothing against annuals–when they’re grown in someone else’s garden. In my garden it seems profligate to spend so much money on plants that won’t come back. I used to grow a lot of annuals from seed, but discovered they need the most babysitting (watering, potting on, etc.) right about when I need to spend the absolute most amount of time outside weeding, mulching, and generally asserting a modicum of control. So I tend to grow the kind of annuals that self-sow, which tulips are not.

This spring I finally got it through my thick head that species tulips tend to be more perennial than a lot of the more “woo-woo look at me” sorts of tulips. Here I’d been growing Tulipa bakeri ‘Lilac Wonder’ for over ten years in the Crocus Bank, and it took me this long to realize I could grow it elsewhere. I did realize that the Crocus Bank was not the best place for it. In order for the crocuses to come back every year, we have to let the foliage grow to its full extent and go dormant. And while we are waiting for that to happen, the grass is growing longer, too. Consequently, by the time the ‘Lilac Wonder’ tulips are blooming, they get kind of lost in the grass.

The petite 'Lilac Wonder' tulips got lost in the high grass.

But on the other side of the driveway is the peony bed, which is looking for some action while the peonies get up to speed. A whole mess of ‘Lilac Wonder’ tulips would not get lost with some peony shoots as a backdrop. I had learned from planting the crocus bed that guessing how many bulbs one would need to plant a given area does not always work well. So the first order of business was to measure the length of the bed.

I needed to know the length of the bed in order to order the appropriate quantity of bulbs.

Shopping for Tulip Bulbs

Then it was time to go shopping. Brent & Becky’s Bulbs has the most information packed site. When I checked their information for Tulipa bakeri ‘Lilac Wonder’, it told me I should plant 10 to 15 bulbs per square foot. Figuring 10 bulbs per square foot along a 15-foot length, I could have ordered 150 bulbs of ‘Lilac Wonder’. But I decided to buy 50 bulbs of ‘Little Beauty’, another species-type tulip, and the remaining hundred ‘Lilac Wonder.’ I thought the darker color of ‘Little Beauty,’ mixed in randomly, would add a little zing to the ‘Lilac Wonder,’ and I also hoped the inner color of ‘Little Beauty’ would match the outer petals of ‘Lilac Wonder.’ I’ll let you know next spring.

Here are the tulip bulbs straight out of the box.

I am cited as a “winter survival pro” at Seasonal Wisdom. Check it out, and add your own tips in the comments. I know a lot of my readers are winter survival pros.

Remember this?

Cypripedium acaule, commonly known as Pink Lady-slipper

Seed pods of pink lady-slipper, Cypripedium acaule

Lady Slipper Seed Germination

As related by William Cullina in The New England Wild Flower Society Guide to Growing and Propagating Wildflowers (affiliate link):

• “The typical lady-slipper seedpod contains between 10,000 and 20,00 seeds!”
• The reason they have so many seeds is because the seeds lack endosperm
• Without endosperm, the seeds are very light and are spread by the wind
• “Without endosperm, orchid seeds cannot germinate unless they become infected by certain soil fungi [Rhizoctonia mycorrhizae], which the seedlings partially digest to obtain the sugars and nutrients necessary for growth.”
• “Once a seedling has chlorophyll-containing leaves and a few roots, it . . . becomes less and less dependent on the fungus for survival.”
• “At least some species of Rhizoctonia are pathogenic or disease-causing when they infect nonorchidaceous species, such as members of the Mustard family.”

Cullina states

In my experience, adequate sunlight; moisture; and a well-aerated, good organic soil with adequate fertility is all adult lady-slippers need to grow well. In fact, even small seedlings that we have received in sterile bags (growing without mycorrhizae) grow on very well in a sterile, hydroponic mix. It seems clear that once the seedlings have passed out of the critical germination stage, they can grow well in cultivated conditions without mycorrhizae.

However, Cullina says that the pink lady-slipper I have does “not adapt well to cultivation.” I plan to leave them right where they are, and I’m not messing with the seed pods. But I learned a few things tonight and thought I’d share them with you.

For years now, we’ve enjoyed the crocus display along one side of our driveway. This spring I decided it should be even bigger, and over the last two days I planted a hundred more, bringing the total to over nine hundred. The “soil” is compacted clay, making the corms somewhat difficult to plant, but, happily, also difficult for the voles to get at. Thought I’d show you how I do it:

The Crocus Bank chronicles my problem driveway bank and provides all the details as to what varieties I planted to solve this design challenge. I started planting in 1994, and developed my method of planting lots of small bulbs in compacted soil through trial and error. I didn’t want to dig up the slope because it would create erosion problems, but I did need to streamline the process as much as I could.

You can’t be too rich, too thin, or have too many crocus.

What do you plant en masse in your own garden?

It is a family tradition to walk up the hill and into the woods this time of year to seek out the witch hazel (Hamamelis virginiana) blossoms. This is a native shrub or small tree that prefers moist, acidic soil–which we have in abundance.

In some years, the witch hazel doesn't drop its leaves, making it more difficult to see the flowers.

This year we found many trees with the leaves already gone.

The flower-filled branches are enchanting

The first autumn we lived here, my husband took me up in these woods. He was obviously looking for something, but I couldn’t figure out what. Finally, he stopped and said, “Look up.” There before us was a rather large witch hazel completely spangled with the feathery blossoms. I was enchanted. It looked like stars had fallen and gotten caught in the branches.

It’s been a long time in coming, but I think we finally have a witch hazel year equal to that memorable, almost mythic one. Honey, are you up for a walk?

Last night it snowed. That, in itself, is not unusual for the second half of October. But normally we get flurries mixed with rain, and no accumulation. Yesterday a weather record for snow accumulation was broken. The official new record is 1.2 inches accumulation. The old record was “trace.” And unofficial reports coming in tell of as much as twice that accumulation.

The view from the porch around 7:30am. (Click to enlarge)

The hillside was past peak color two days ago, but still looked pretty.

Of course, this is all child’s play compared to Buffalo’s October 2006 snowstorm, so I’m trying hard to keep things in perspective. I generally figure there will be one mild day the first week in November to get the final clean up done, and they are predicting temperatures in the sixties next week, so I’m hoping I will still get to plant the box of a hundred crocuses I bought. So I’m trying hard not to panic. But it is disconcerting.

You might think after a 26F freeze there would be nothing left blooming in the garden, but you would be wrong. The colchicums continue to shoot up new blossoms. Pictured above is Colchicum autumnale ‘Album’.

A vigorous but nondescript colchicum lines the shrubbery and looks fine from the house.

These are the mongrel colchicums. They grow well in grass and make a good show from a distance.

Colchicum speciosum 'Album' peeks out from hosta leaves.

'Lilac Wonder' colchicum blooms in a mass of catmint leaves.

Colchicum autumnale 'Alboplenum' looks like a carpet of stars.

My one and only chrysanthemum, an unnamed passalong.

Mysterious Blue Flower Hanging Out with the Vegetables

Mysterious blue flower showed up in the vegetable garden. (Click to enlarge)

The Johnny-jump-ups are thriving in the cooler weather. The tall border phlox, especially the white one that came with the house, has just enough bloom that I hesitate to cut it down. The frost ruined the opened blooms of black-eyed Susans, dianthus, and flowering tobacco, but new blossoms have opened since then. I appreciate the stubborn hangers-on, the ones who are willing to give it one last shot. But I know the party’s over. Time to clean up.

Inspired by the words of Elizabeth Lawrence, “We can have flowers nearly every month of the year,” Carol of May Dreams Gardens started Garden Bloggers Bloom Day. On the 15th of every month, garden bloggers from all over the world publish what is currently blooming in their gardens, and leave a link in Mr. Linky and the comments of May Dreams Gardens.

Yikes! Snow predicted for Friday! This is happening too fast for me. Just had first hard frost (26F) last night.

Last night the National Weather Service issued a frost advisory for our area, and we did indeed get a frost. They are issuing a freeze warning for tonight. What’s the difference?

I contacted a member of the local weather station staff. He told me that

Both [the frost advisory and the freeze warning] are only issued during the growing season. A Frost Advisory is issued when the predicted temperature is expected to fall to 36 degrees or lower in the next 3 to 30 hours during the growing season. So temperatures 35 to 40 range would also dictate a frost advisory. A Freeze Warning is issued when there is an 80% or greater chance that the temperatures are expected to fall to 32 degrees (F) or lower in the next 3 to 30 hours during the growing season. If the temperature is expected to fall below 28 degrees (F) this is considered a Hard Freeze.

Radiational Cooling

Another way to look at it is that a frost is caused by radiational cooling, that is, the earth loses enough heat that temperatures drop below the freezing point at ground level. Sometimes when there is a very light frost, the freezing temperature occurs just a bit above ground level. Our first frost this year was a very light one, where the tops of the basil plants got damaged, but the plants themselves survived.

Advective Cooling

A freeze, on the other hand, is caused by advective cooling, where a mass of cold air comes into the area from somewhere else (like the Arctic). This usually signals the end of the growing season for all but the hardiest plants. When the weather service issues a freeze advisory, they are telling you the party’s over. It’s time to get serious about fall clean up and winter preparation.

Time to Get Serious with the Chores

I need to empty and wash the bird bath and bring it in. Oh, and I better make sure the rain gauge is empty. What’s on your must-do list?

Many gardeners complain that it is difficult to place colchicums in the garden because of their unusual growing cycle, in which their leaves grow in the spring, die down in the summer, and then the flowers emerge in the fall. The colchicum bed at Montrose Gardens in Hillsborough, North Carolina, pictured above, contained many colchicum design ideas that could be implemented in any garden.

Approaching the bed from this direction, we are actually leaving the house and gardens proper and moving toward the entrance gate.

Colchicums star in this bed, but the other plants were carefully chosen to work with them. (Click on the photo to enlarge)

Different hues of pink and green play off each other.

The black grass makes the white flowers stand out.

Colchicum autumnale var. alboplenum stands out in a bed of dark ajuga

The hellebores are background plants now, but were in their glory when the colchicums were leafing out.

Colchicums are hard to love when they're going dormant.

Even I, the self-appointed colchicum evangelist, must concede that they are not at their best at this stage. What you may not have noticed in the Montrose photos above, but which I could see at the time, was the presence of hardy geranium foliage. Hardy geraniums are making lovely mounds of greenery, spangled with blooms, just when the colchicums are at their worst. Depending on which hardy geraniums you plant, you can easily camouflage the waning colchicum leaves with some lusty geraniums. And the geraniums are usually due for a cutback shortly before the colchicums bloom. It’s a win-win situation that I first read about in an essay by Brian Bixley in Essays on Gardening in a Cold Climate. (Catchy title, yes?)

I was very happy to find these colchicums blooming at Montrose Gardens. Since so many of these southern plants were unfamiliar, stumbling across these flowering bulbs was sort of like meeting up with your next door neighbor when traveling abroad. I was pleased to see that the same siting and planting techniques that I have used to incorporate colchicums in my garden were also used at Montrose Gardens, though with a southern plant palette.

Colchicums: isn’t it time you planted some?