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.

• Spring vegetables can be planted now.  Start your garden with broccoli, cabbage, lettuce spinach and chard.  It pays to grow your own!

• Clematis that bloomed last summer can be pruned now.  Wait on spring-blooming varieties until after they bloom.

• Plant peas in well-drained soil for a spring crop.  Protect from birds with bird netting or lightweight row cover.

• Asparagus will provide you with delicious, low-priced spears for years to come if you plant them now from dormant crowns.  

• Pansies and violas will fill your spring flower beds with their bright faces in many shades of blue, yellow, red, pink and purple.

Roses Galore!

Many of us look forward each year to seeing the new roses. This year we have a beautiful yellow floribunda rose, and a lovely pale pink hybrid tea rose. And there are others, just a year or two old that you may not be familiar with.

The sweetly pink hybrid tea, Francis Meilland, edged out the competition to earn the All-America Rose Selections award for 2013. Statuesque form, fragrant flowers and disease resistance helped it earn the sought-after honor. Her name honors the 100th birthday of the breeder of the famous Peace rose.

AARS Winners are grown in test gardens for two years where they are judged on color, fragrance, flower production and disease-resistance. Only the most successful roses become Winners each year. This year there was only one rose given this honor.

Sparkle & Shine™ is a “bloomin’ fool” of a rose with large clusters of ruffled yellow blossoms. The long-lasting yellow color, dark red new growth, and improved disease resistance make this an excellent landscaping rose. It can be used as an easy care flowering hedge. 

For an old-fashioned rose-pink rose, the new Grande Dameâ„¢ is hard to beat. The intense old rose fragrance invites you to bury your nose in its large, glamorous blossoms. These lovely, nodding flowers grow on a vigorous, shrubby bush with fewer thorns than most rose bushes. A nice cutting rose, this is a modern antique that grows well in all climates.

You’ll find a unique rose in Ketchup & Mustard™. “Slap a layer of the brightest red onto a backside of darkest yellow and set it atop the greenest glossiest leaves” and you have this stunning red and yellow floribunda. The medium-sized flowers hold their color well and repeat bloom all summer. 

Red roses are considered the most romantic and In The Moodâ„¢ is a lovely way to say it with flowers. Its large, double, classic hybrid tea flowers hold their brilliant red color well. And the bushy, prolific plant will give you lots of long-stemmed roses for cutting.

A most unusual rose is Koko Loko™. Opening up with perfect hybrid tea form, its petals are the color of a creamy caffe latte. But as the flower matures, it turns into a round, ruffled lavender that lasts a long time either on the plant or in the vase. 

Purple Splash™ offers a new color combination in a climbing rose: wine purple striped with white. The pyramid-shaped clusters bloom profusely over a long season. It has light green foliage on a vigorous plant with climbing canes 10 to 14 feet long. The flowers have only 5-10 petals each but they carry a sweet spice and rose fragrance. 

Dress up your garden with some glamorous new roses.

• Living Christmas trees make a fine tradition. Slow-growing Colorado spruce trees can be used for 3 to 5 years before they need to be planted. Water them every other day while indoors.

• Check your nursery for stocking stuffers: kids’ gloves, watering cans, bonsai figurines, seeds and bulbs.

• Spray for peach leaf curl with copper sulfate. Peach and nectarine trees may suffer from this fungus disease without a protective spray.

• Water living Christmas trees frequently while they are indoors, and put them outside after a week or ten days.

•Feed the birds this winter and enjoy the pleasure of their company. Bird feeders come in many styles and make wonderful gifts.

Living Gifts

Head to the nursery this month for plants that can be enjoyed long after the holidays. Evergreen shrubs like Daphne, Camellias and Rhododendrons are lovely gifts that will be enjoyed even more when they come into bloom in the spring.

The sweet fragrance of Daphne is one of the pleasures of springtime. The small, evergreen shrubs have handsome foliage and a profusion of pinkish-white flowers that bloom in February. One stem will scent an entire room.

The beautifully shaped flowers of Camellias cover the glossy, evergreen leaves throughout a long season. The early flowering ones begin blooming now with dainty, single flowers and those that bloom in April and May have perfectly formed double flowers. They are lovely in a partially shaded area and do well in containers on the patio or deck.

Rhododendrons also have spectacular flowers in large clusters in the spring. They are generally deer-resistant, like partial shade, and will grow for many years in a large container.

Roses are available this month at the best prices of the year. For best selection, look for bare-root roses this month. If you want roses for cutting, choose hybrid teas, like ‘Fragrant Plum’. For small spaces or containers, choose varieties that stay compact, such as ‘Sunsprite’, and to add a focal point to any landscape, choose a tree rose, like ‘Betty Boop’.

The interior landscape will welcome a fresh, new houseplant. From hanging ferns and spider plants to tall palms and dracaenas, there’s a plant for every situation. They add life and color to the area and clean the air at the same time. Or create a dish garden with a combination of small plants in an attractive container, for a unique gift.

Bonsai plants and succulents also make nice gifts, and a bag full of Daffodil bulbs will be happily received by almost any gardener.

Trees of all kinds will grow into beautiful specimens that will outlive us all. From fruit trees to dogwoods, Japanese maples, and flowering magnolias, trees become an important part of any piece of property. Beauty, shade, fruit, and a greener planet are all good reasons to plant a tree this season.

Give a gift that will continue to grow and remind them of your thoughtfulness for a long time to come.