Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day March 2015

Can it be bloom day again already?  Time is sure flying.  I want it to slow down now so that we can savor every minute of spring and summer!  Thanks to Carol at May Dreams Gardens for hosting GBBD on the 15th of every month.  Garden bloggers from all over the world share what's blooming in their gardens at this time of the year.  Click here to see more!

We've had a mild winter and a rather warm stretch of weather so some things are blooming a bit earlier this year than last.

 Camellia japonica 

Here's the giant camellia I inherited with the garden.  Joining it in bloom this month is the also inherited magnolia. 

Lots of hellebores blooming.  Here are three - 'Anna's Red'

'Cotton Candy'

 'Onyx Odyssey'

A few last crocus.

Some crocus planted by the gardening squirrels.  I find bulbs  coming up in the strangest places.

Ribes sanguineum planted by a bird years ago.

Akebia quinata 'Shirobana'.  The scent of the flowers is gorgeous and reminds me a bit of fragrant stock.

 Kerria japonica 'Pleniflora' 

Tête-à-tête daffodils and that poor Rheum palmatum atrosanguineum that looks like it really wants to be divided into four plants.  Maybe next weekend...

One of the two magic Abutilon megapotamicum which have bloomed all winter this year!  Gotta love a plant that blooms constantly!

Stachyurus praecox.

Double flowered Primula vulgaris.

 Daffodils and very fragrant Skimmia japonica.

Pieris japonica

One lone Anemone blanda from a small group planted many years ago soldiers on year after year.  I rather like it's common name Grecian Windflower.  Perhaps next autumn I'll give it some companions.

Pulmonaria popping up to say hello.

Ceanothus 

Viburnum bodnantense 'Dawn'

Forgot to take pictures of the Grevellia and Lonicera fragrantissima, still blooming. 

Meanwhile, inside the greenhouse- our old friend, Impatiens congolensis.

Agapetes

Couldn't resist throwing a poinsettia or two out there for extra color after the holidays were over.

I'll compost them  when the colored bracts fall.

 Clivia.

Jasminum  officinale perfuming the air.

Grevillea 'Ned Kelly' just starting to show color.

 Begonia 'Gene Daniels' continues to bloom and grow.  What a great plant!

Happy GBBD!

All Good Things Must Come To An End; Saturday in Portland, The Final Installment

Our last nursery visit on Saturday was Portland Nursery on Division.  While both Portland Nurseries are owned by the same folks, they are very different places and must both be visited! While I would have loved to visit even more nurseries on Saturday, the day was coming to a close and for some reason, nurseries aren't open twenty four hours a day.  (Really, how cool would that be?)

Spring has also arrived at Portland Nursery on Division!

I was surprised to see these in bloom already as mine are barely emerging from the ground.  However, I just got a report on Tuesday that they're blooming in some gardens here in Tacoma!  Wonderful warm spring!

These two seem oblivious to the blooms all around them.  Must b quite a chess game!

Both in the concrete jungle

and countryside, spring has arrived!

Love the frills on these florist cyclamen but resisted.

Even this picotee!

I admire the deep saturation of Pericallis but they're fairly short lived for me.  If you can't go without water for a while, you won't make it in my garden!

This tropical pitcher plant proved too great a temptation.  Hope I can keep it alive!

 Portland Nursery on Division has a large and well stocked indoor plant section through which are scattered interesting indoor gardens like this one.

This Begonia sp. would have come home with me if I didn't already have one!

Their Solandra maxima was blooming.  I understand that they smell like piña colada but the flower was about 3 feet above my head.  The blooms are awsome and seeing this one growing so well in a greenhouse gives me an idea...

Happy Friday the thirteenth and have a great weekend!

A Peek Inside The Greenhouse

Having a greenhouse is a wonderful thing and I'm delighted with mine.  However, I've been playing in there so much that the garden is screaming at me to do some outdoor gardening.  Here's a glimpse inside the greenhouse.  Please ignore the potting soil on everything!

You may remember this corner and my comment about the insulation.  Jean (Dotty Plants Greenhouse Journal) stated the obvious and advised me to cover it up and made a list of possible materials.  I had been so focused on either leaving it or using wall board that I'd not though any further.

The suggestion I liked best (because I already had some lying around) was bamboo or reed screen.  Looks a hundred times better and only took a few minutes with a pair of scissors and a staple gun.  Bless your heart Jean!

Here's a view  of this area a couple of months ago.  Jean advised thinking vertically so I stood up.  Seriously, though, I'd been thinking about attaching shelves to the wall. 

Lots of options but I decided to go with more chrome shelves because they're relatively inexpensive, allow good airflow, can be easily put together, taken apart, and reconfigured.  I love the extra space!  Because the plants require a lot of space, all of the shelves weren't needed so I used them on top of some of the chimney liners that used to have planks on top of them. 

 There are four folding banquet tables in the middle.  I'm thinking of getting a couple more shelves and getting rid of a couple of the tables.  There are some really tall plants that will want a lot of headroom so two tables will stay but the shelves are half the width of the tables so there'd be even more space.  I may want to live out here this summer.

Scadoxis puniceus purchased from Rare Plant Research at the Portland Yard, Garden, and Patio Show is pushing up a flower bud or maybe even two!  How exciting is that?

That poor Agave striata sitting under the glass table is still waiting to be transplanted (since October!)

The work space decreases as various junk gets deposited upon it!

The Jasmine (Jasminum polyanthum)  is still blooming around the back of the tables.  I never seem to get back there to take pictures - more tables, pots of dirt, cuttings, and the begonia experiment are back there. And more agaves that need to be potted up.

Here's how I feel when I'm in the greenhouse pottering. (Interestingly, this is exactly how I look with no hair.)  Hopefully there will be no great fall!

Meanwhile, Back to that Saturday in Portland...Garden Fever Nursery

Garden Fever is another cool Portland neighborhood  nursery.  Loved this twig wreath hanging outside.

Tillandsia fever is alive and well here!  The inside of the shop is a treasure trove of fun, funky, and beautiful garden and home decor, plants, seeds, bulbs, etc. Because they prefer that photos not be taken inside, I can't show you more but believe me, it's definitely worth a visit!

The outside areas are divided nicely which makes the nursery seem huge.

One has to admire the velvety richness of anemones blooming so early in the year!

Libertia ixioides 'Taupo Sunset' was a new variety to me.  How great is that?  It looks like a miniature phormium.  

Magnolia stellata is a favorite this time of year.

Metal planters and bugs.  

I was delighted to find Camellia 'Black Opal' grown by Gossler Farms here and also bought some purple and chartreuse glass chunks.  I'm already looking forward to my next visit to Garden Fever!

My Begonia Experiment

A century or so ago, in my misspent youth, there was a gardener in my hometown in Alaska, Mrs. Bierly, who loved delphiniums and tuberous begonias.  On one visit to her garden, she showed me the largest, most beautiful tuberous begonia I'd ever seen.  She'd gotten the tuber from White Flower Farm and it had been produced by the famous English begonia growers Blackmore and Langdon's.  I also love tuberous begonias and dreamed of someday ordering from Blackmore and Langdon's.  (I'm fond of delphiniums as well and they grew beautifully for me in Alaska;  here I've had mixed results.)

After forgetting to order year after year, I finally did it this winter.  Look what arrived in the mail last week!

Oh the suspense and the excellent packing!

Blackmore and Langdon's has quite a reputation in the world of tuberous begonias and the price of their tubers reflects that.

Hyacinth Bucket (pronounced bouquet!) from the BBC series "Keeping Up Appearances" would be delighted by the royal insignia on the invoice!

There are several grades of begonias, named varieties, exhibition quality, greenhouse quality, and bedding quality are a few of them.  I got one named variety, a "super selected" variety and a collection of greenhouse quality tubers.

So, what's the experiment already, you may be asking.

I decided to see the difference in performance between the Blackmore and Langdon tubers and some bought at a local grocery store.  I also ordered a few from Breck's Bulbs in Indiana at the same time as I ordered from B&L but they haven't yet arrived.

Size isn't necessarily an indication of performance (I know what you're thinking and you should be ashamed.)  but here are  a couple of side by side comparisons.  Fred Meyer on the left, B&L on the right.

 Again F.M. on the left, B&L on the right.  

Tom is now calling the greenhouse the laboratory (with 5 syllables in a horror movie accent.)  So here they are all potted up and labeled.  Let's see if Blackmore and Langdon tubers are worth the price!  Do you have experience in growing B&L begonias and if so, what is your opinion?

I must say how nice it is to have a greenhouse to start plants in.  In previous years, the large pots of  begonias brought up from the basement would be taking up every square inch of counter space in the kitchen.