Tag Archives: Abbie Jury

Plant Collector: Hydrangea Libelle

Hydrangea Libelle

Hydrangea Libelle

Were we to host garden weddings here (which we will not), I would be targeting white hydrangeas for easy care summer display in semi shaded areas. The compact white moptop Immaculata is very, very good but perhaps just a little clichéd in a bridal sense. Hydrangea macrophylla ‘Libelle’ is looking equally good this week.

Libelle is a large grower. This plant is well over two metres even though I prune it every winter and it is growing in competition with an adjacent tall hedge. Its flower heads are appropriately large and abundant. It is a lacecap which means it has a flat head. The true flowers are the small blue clusters in the centre. The outer rim of large, white individual flowers are sterile (which means they do not set seed) and technically they are sepals. The blue and white contrast is a very clean and attractive combination. Later in the season, the white will turn to pink tones in that olde-fashioned antique colour range that hydrangeas do so well.

Hydrangeas are a wonderfully obliging plant family that is often taken for granted. But after the unrelenting rains of last week, when pretty much every other bloom was sodden and disintegrating, the hydrangea flower heads just serenely continued as if nothing would bother them. They can last for a long time on the bush and make a splendid cut flower as well.

First published in the Waikato Times and reproduced here with their permission.

In the Garden: January 5, 2012

A fortnightly series first published in the Weekend Gardener and reproduced here with their permission.

I am very selective about container plants these days

I am very selective about container plants these days

As summer takes hold, I am grateful that I have dramatically reduced the number of plants I grow in containers. I am not particularly reliable at hand watering and there is nothing worse than feature plants in pots, troughs or containers that stand out because they are gasping for water, drooping and defoliating badly. It is also very difficult to get water into potting mixes which have dried out completely because the water just flows straight through. A squirt of detergent can act as a surfactant and help water absorption. Because I only grow bulbs, the odd large bonsai or choice shrubs in pots, I never add water retention crystals. With our high rainfall, these products keep the potting mix too wet, rotting out the roots and the bulbs. This is particularly so in winter when plants don’t want to live with their roots sogging in cold, wet conditions. The only time I have used water retention crystals was in my hanging basket phase (it passed quickly) and when I tried seasonal pots of annuals – which also passed quickly. We went on holiday leaving lovely big pots of blooming pink petunias and blue ageratum and came back to pots of withered, dead plants. The water retention crystals were not enough. I decided then and there that I preferred a more permanent and sustainable style of gardening.

In issue 323 of the Weekend Gardener, I wrote about plunging pots to reduce watering requirements while still keeping individual plants featured. It only works if the pots are porous (I keep to terracotta) and they still need the occasional water but they are much easier to maintain over summer. I have found I need to keep an eye out for slug infestations around the plunged pots. They like the damp, dark conditions and can take up residence on the outside surfaces of the pots. I found an entire slug convention on one pot recently but at least it encourages them into one area for easy eradication.

The peaceful, neverending task of hoicking out flat weeds

The peaceful, neverending task of hoicking out flat weeds

Top tasks:
1) Weeding is never ending. At this time of year, some of it can be done quickly by push hoe. If any weeds get away on us and set seed heads, we try and remove them from the area but the aim is always to get them before that stage so they can be left to wither and die in the summer sun.
2) The autumn bulbs will be starting to move very soon, putting out fresh roots. I need to thin the Cyclamen hederafolium, Colchicum autumnale (the autumn crocus) and check over the clumps of nerines (mostly sarniensis hybrids) before they are growing.
3) When I feel the need to do something quiet and mindless, I head out with the lawn tool to dig out flat weeds in the grassy areas of our park. It is a bit like King Canute holding back the sea but it makes me feel more virtuous than spraying and it is a soothing summer occupation.

Tikorangi Notes: Friday 30 December, 2011

Latest posts:
1) Finally found it – the proper Jacobean lily (though neither Jacobean nor a lily): Sprekelia formosissima
2) A touch of mea culpa on a very public spelling error – and a continuation of discussion on pohutukawa and other members of metrosideros family.
3) Grow It Yourself – or maybe not in the case of pizza counting as a vegetable in American school lunches.

Wet pigeons, awaiting the erection of the wedding marquees on the front lawn this morning

Wet pigeons, awaiting the erection of the wedding marquees on the front lawn this morning

Tikorangi Notes:
The rain it raineth, unrelentingly alas. Mark’s pidgies are looking sad on the front lawn. I am merely contemplating the arrival of the marquee company, due any minute. On the bright side, at least the wedding party tomorrow did plan on two marquees and not trust to fine weather. And we have wonderful drainage so the grassed areas don’t get boggy and mucky. Add to that, we own a fair number of umbrellas. And it is not the wedding of one of one our own – though it is the daughter’s best friend. Maybe the rain will stop as the day progresses. Maybe the weather gods will smile and the forecasters have the timings wrong. Weather prediction in this country is a notoriously difficult activity, given that we are long, thin islands in the midst of vast oceans with competing tropical and polar air masses. But wait, do I detect a lightening in the sky to the north?

I am privy to all sorts of information about the wedding but my lips are sealed. All I can say is watch this space… The orange toilet brushes, dropped in yesterday by the bride’s father, rather caught my attention.

It would be so nice if the rains would stop. We will battle on otherwise – this is an unstoppable event – but it would be more fun if we were not making dashes around under umbrellas.

Grow it Yourself (or not, in the case of American school lunch pizza)

Yes! Pizza. In honour of one of life’s bizarre rulings of 2011, that pizza counts as a vegetable serving. Here I was thinking that by definition, vegetables are edible plants that one grows but apparently not. Mass produced pizza with a smidgeon of a red substance which once, some time and distance past, had a debt to a tomato, can now officially count as a vegetable. One might not have been quite so surprised had the good gnomes of Brussels made a formal decree. It was the European Community, after all, that passed regulations on how bent a banana was permitted to be and they also addressed the perplexing issue of cucumbers. I can’t recall the details of that but I think it was probably on how far a cucumber was permitted to bend from a straight line. But it was the United States Congress, that fine law making body, which bowed to the pressures of the frozen food industry and reclassified pizza to enable it to remain as a healthy option (ie: counting as a serving of vegetable) on the menu of school lunches for American children.

Our diets in New Zealand may be far from perfect and we have a growing issue with obesity, but I think we have far too much respect for the Heart Foundation and the healthy tick to consider mass produced pizza as a healthy food choice. If you are worried about your weight, just ponder for a moment how many obese vegetarians you have met. I failed to come up with any. Certainly it is not common and while giving up eating meat may be a step too far for many (including me), doubling the fresh vegetable intake might be a good New Year’s resolution to make, along with trying to grow at least some at home.

First published in the Waikato Times and reprinted here with their permission.

Oh Christmas tree, oh Christmas tree…

The pohutukawa - often called the NZ Christmas tree

The pohutukawa - often called the NZ Christmas tree

Ah, the Christmas tree. I was a little amused by a comment on Twitter from somebody that their potted pohutukawa had arrived but was considerably smaller than they had expected so their decorations were now placed beside it. Somebody else posted a photo of their potted karaka tree festooned in gold tinsel, Christmas balls and lights. It looked odd, but logic says it is no odder than adorning a pine tree in similar fashion.

Some brand the pohutukawa as the New Zealand Christmas tree. Living near the coast as I do, pohutukawa feature very strongly in the landscape. They obligingly flower at Christmas, lighting up the landscape. But of course there are large parts of New Zealand where they don’t grow or aren’t needed and residents there may well question the seasonal accolades bestowed upon it. When I say they don’t grow, the problem is that this special tree is not overly hardy. Indeed it is distinctly frost tender when juvenile. If you look at the distribution, it is largely coastal because disturbed air flows from the sea prevent frosts. Head just five or more kilometres inland and it can be too cold for them.

The other aspect of pohutukawa is that they are a wonderfully obliging and resilient coastal tree, putting up with salt laden wind and making enormous buttress roots to hold back the ravages of coastal erosion. They will grow where most other trees struggle badly, defoliate and die. Our coastal areas would be barren wastelands without them. Once you move to more sheltered areas inland, you have a much larger palette of trees to choose from so the tough pohutukawa might not be the tree of first choice. So for those of us who live in coastal areas from about the lower middle of the North Island upwards, the pohutukawa is our New Zealand Christmas tree but there will be New Zealanders who have never seen one in flower.

Did some not make the grade in years past? A commercial grower's roadside field. Spot the two that have never been clipped

Did some not make the grade in years past? A commercial grower's roadside field. Spot the two that have never been clipped

For others, it has to be said the common old pine tree is more likely to deserve the award. Many people do not realise it is in fact native to California – it grows wild in a limited area of the Monterey Peninsula. But I think we could probably crown this country as the Pinus radiata capital of the world and certainly other countries don’t tend to use the humble pine as a Christmas tree. The handsome abies family are the favoured tree in Europe, particularly A. procera and A. nordmanniana, and these are so much slower growing that there are good grounds for raising eyebrows at the environmental vandalism of severing them to become temporary frames for Christmas lights. At least Pinus radiata grows so quickly in this country that it is more or less disposable. It also clips very well and if you buy a cut tree from a commercial grower, you should get a well shaped specimen with shorter needles. We were always into gathering wildlings, though the children would have liked better shaped specimens when they were young. They used to bewail the unbalanced shapes, the scruffy branches and the extra bits tied in to pad out particularly sparse areas.

Should you contemplate a growing Christmas tree in a pot as a last minute green alternative, you need to factor in three aspects. A large tree has a correspondingly large root system and is damned heavy. Don’t expect a living tree of two metres plus unless you have a small fork lift. It then takes a fair amount of skill to keep large plants healthy for an entire year so thinking you can keep your living Christmas tree and reuse it in future years may not be entirely practical. You are far more likely to have a moth eaten looking specimen with dead patches, badly root bound and hungry come next December. Thirdly, should you have purchased a living tree with a view to planting it out in the New Year, make sure you harden it off slowly to the bright sunlight when you bring it outdoors, saturate the root ball before planting and keep watering the poor thing all summer. But above all, choose the site carefully. Most living Christmas trees are forest giants in their infancy. They are not generally suitable candidates for suburban gardens, even less so if you are planting one a year.

The grapevine version

The grapevine version

If you are still determined to try a live option for the future, take a look at our native matai and start clipping and training it early.

If the live Christmas tree is an ethical option based on concerns about the abject waste of severing a tree in its prime to adorn your house for two short weeks, it would probably be kinder to the environment to stick to the disposable pine tree or go for the reusable option. As a family which shuns the horrors of the tinsel Christmas tree, I am hoping my efforts with the woven grapevine pyramid will be greeted by the returning adult children today as an acceptable alternative.

Merry Christmas everyone and best wishes for a safe and happy festive season.

First published in the Waikato Times and reproduced here with their permission.