Flowering this week: Gloriosa superba

Summer glory in Gloriosa superba

Commonly called the glory lily, flame lily or climbing lily, this plant should be recognised by all ex-pat Zimbabweans and some Indians. Oddly enough, it originates in both areas and is the national flower of Zimbabwe and also accorded special status in the state of Tamil Nadu in India. It is only a very distant relative of the lily, being a member of the colchicum family and because it is full of the chemical colchicine, all parts of the plant are poisonous. Colchicine is used to double the chromosomes in plant cells and is highly toxic in concentrated form. Not that I have ever seen anybody want to eat gloriosas.

The plants grow from V shaped tubers which will survive in very dry, sandy conditions so we use them in the narrow dry house border facing north where very little else but succulents will grow. They are winter dormant and never get watered, even in summer. The tubers find their own required depths and can end up quite some distance below ground.

Gloriosa is a good cut flower, lasting well in a vase though the pollen can stain. But look at the flower shape. It opens conventionally enough but then the petals reflex entirely (in other words they all bend backwards) leaving the anthers and stamens completely exposed. Sometimes the petals can be so recurved that it looks like a full crown with fringe. The colours are always in the yellow/orange/red spectrum and the most desirable forms tend to be those with the sharpest yellow and dark red contrast. It is not particularly rare in this country, so you should be able to find gloriosas if you want them and they are an ideal plant for sandy, coastal gardens.

In the garden this week January 15, 2010

  • Mark is keeping an eagle eye out for the nasty potato and tomato psyllid which has made an unwelcome arrival in this country. A call from a Central Taranaki gardener describing psyllid-like symptoms had him searching the internet for additional information. The psyllid is a bit like a white fly but it will destroy crops if left untreated. It injects a bacteria into the plant in the process of sucking the sap and that bacteria weakens the host. Alas it has been found already in Taranaki. If your potatoes or tomatoes have symptoms which don’t look quite right for standard blight, seek out additional advice. All garden centres have apparently been circulated with information on this pest from Crop and Food. It appears that the psyllid may be easier to control than whitefly and can be treated with a pyrethrum but early action is essential. Plants can grow out of it if you get onto it early enough.
  • It is time to get a summer copper spray onto citrus trees. Whilst mostly easy care, the occasional preventative spray on these can pay dividends in avoiding premature fruit drop.
  • Winter firewood needs to be felled without delay if it is to dry in time. This is by way of motivating you to get out and prune your cherry trees now. Cherry wood burns well.
  • Now is also a good time to get out and carry out summer pruning and limbing up on evergreen trees and shrubs. Cleaning out the accumulated debris from dense conifers can reduce the habitat for slugs and snails and keep the plant in a healthier state with better air movement.
  • • Do not let your vegetable garden dry out. Most vegetables put on a great deal of rapid growth and adequate moisture is essential to sustain that.
  • Keep mounding up the earth around potatoes. This protects the tubers from the sun which is what turns them green and there is a school of thought that says it leads to a heavier crop but we have not seen proof of this.
  • Continue planting successional salad vegetables, green leafy veg, corn, beetroot and dwarf beans.
  • The article on the food pages on Tuesday listing edible flowers missed out courgette flowers (divine stuffed with a ricotta mixture – pumpkin flowers can also be used) and day lilies. If you don’t mid sacrificing the flowers, day lily buds are surprising tasty and can be a good addition to salads.

Flowering this week: Hydrangea Immaculata

Perfection in pristine white - Hydrangea Immaculata

The most perfect floral display in our garden this week has been Hydrangea Immaculata – such an appropriate, if somewhat Roman Catholic name. A smaller growing, compact variety, being about a metre high and a metre wide, its moptop flower heads are pristine white. It is best grown in the shade where it will light up a dark area because it tends to burn in our intense summer sun. Beyond that, there is nothing fussy or difficult about this summer perfection. It is just one of the common macrophylla types and as the flowers age, they often develop a pretty rose pink tinge. Cuttings are easy to strike, even for the novice gardener.

Hydrangeas are a wonderful source of colour in summer and ideal in verdant Taranaki with our combination of high sunshine hours and summer rain. Because our soils are acid, most are blue though as you drive northwards through the Pio Pio and Te Kuiti area, you may notice that their hydrangeas tend to pink which indicates alkaline soils in their limestone country.

We just happen to have an international expert living in our midst here. Glyn Church at Woodleigh Nursery and Garden near Oakura is probably better known overseas than here (ain’t that just the way?) but locals at least have the chance to go and see his garden in person. Mark was there a few days ago and can vouch that it is full of summer colour and looking great with some gorgeous hydrangeas. Bloody Marvellous was a showstopper in purple. Glyn is working towards being accredited as holding the national collection of hydrangeas in New Zealand which means he has a wide range. He has targetted the summer garden and the floral display goes well beyond hydrangeas. His garden is open by appointment.

In the garden 08/01/2010

  • In the nursery, our rule of thumb has always been that cuttings of deciduous plants should be in by now but you have perhaps another week up your sleeve. If you have a controlled propagation set-up of some form (a heated mat, hot box or similar), you can get more difficult cuttings to root. Easy plants like hydrangeas, some viburnums and grape vines are not so time sensitive, but now is optimal. The general rule for most cuttings is to pick fresh season’s growth which is still green but firm, not floppy or brittle.
  • Don’t even think about major re-organisation in ornamental gardens or planting trees and shrubs. Full summer is not the time to do this at all. It is, however, ideal for lifting and dividing bulbs. The spring flowering ones are dormant now while the autumn flowering ones are just going into growth so do them first. When bulbs get too congested, they don’t flower as well or as long. When replanting, remember that they always need good drainage as they can rot out, especially when dormant. Most also do better in full sun.
  • Learn from our schools and the current generation of children. Be sun smart. Work in the shade or move a sun umbrella around the garden where you are working during the heat of the day. It is quite pleasant sitting out digging and dividing bulbs under a sun umbrella.
  • If your container plants are so dry that water just runs straight through, you will need to take action. Adding a squirt of detergent or surfactant to the water can help as can plunging the entire pot in water, if you can. A little water often is more likely to soak into container plants so water dry plants twice a day.
  • In the vegetable garden it is the very last chance to get main crop potatoes in. You can still get a late tomato crop through if you plant strong plants. Corn can continue to be sown until the end of the month with a reasonable expectation of success.
  • While some of us are still waiting for summer to make its full statement as opposed to the teasers so far, vegetable gardening is such that one is always looking ahead, in this case to winter (ssshh). If you are really keen, you can be sowing Brussell sprout seed now. February is the month to start swinging into planting most winter veg.
  • We are currently harvesting raspberries, loquats, a few strawberries when we beat the birds who have built a secret tunnel into the cloche, rhubarb, tangelos, early season plums (the red Phillips plum), pawpaws, the never ending oranges and avocados. Alas the vegetable repertoire is a little more limited but Mark promises to try harder.

Flowering this week: The San Pedro cactus or echinopsis pachanoi (syn. Trichocereus pachanoi)

The San Pedro cactus or echinopsis pachanoi (syn. Trichocereus pachanoi)

The San Pedro cactus or echinopsis pachanoi (syn. Trichocereus pachanoi)

During summer this amazing plant flushes over several months, sprouting a profusion of sweetly scented, large and exotic flowers. Each bloom lasts a couple of days, after which it shrivels up and falls to the ground where it then resembles something unsavoury left by a visiting dog.

This South American cactus is best not planted where visible to passers-by lest horticulturally enabled young people with extremely strong stomachs, no taste buds and a thrill seeking disposition raid your plant. In a sunny position with excellent drainage, it stands bold and tall and distinctly phallic in a spiky sort of way. Like most cacti, San Pedro is easy to propagate. Cut a short length from the end, leave it to dry for a few days and then stick in a pot or the ground. The trick is keeping it upright because it is top heavy and may rot if you plant it too deeply. If you use a length cut at both ends, it will sprout two new shoots and resemble rabbits’ ears but it tends to be weak at the point of the fresh growth.

Left to its own devices, it will tower and sway to around 4 metres, putting out side growths and clumping from the base over time. Should you happen to have a problem with tinea in the hooves of your cattle or goats, the San Pedro cactus is a traditional medicine for dealing to this affliction – just add alum and lye.

For the botanically precise, there is a bit of a question mark over the finer differences between echinopsis pachanoi (syn. trichocereus pachanoi) also referred to as the San Pedro cactus and echinopsis peruviana or the Peruvian torch cactus. The differentiation is not helped by the possibilities of plants being hybrids between the two closely related forms. We tend to call ours the Carlos Castaneda trichocereus for reasons which will be understood by readers who have encountered the works of Castaneda or indeed Aldous Huxley.