I was looking at our patch of Bletilla ‘Brigantes’…a hardy orchid hybrid between Bletilla striata and Bletilla ochracea and wondering what its offspring would look like. I recalled that the late plantsman Don Jacobs grew bletillas from seed in his window sill, so I figured we’d give it a try. If you’ve never handled orchid
Hardy Orchids from seed Read More »
I had the wonderful opportunity recently to spend the day with NC State plant breeder, Dr. Dennis Werner in his extensive redbud breeding plots. So far, four redbuds have been named and released, including Cercis ‘Ruby Falls’ (weeping purple leaf), Cercis ‘Whitewater’ (weeping variegated leaf), and Cercis ‘Merlot’ (upright purple leaf with better color retention),
We hope you’ll be able to visit during our final open weekend for summer, Saturday July 15 (8-5) and Sunday July 16 (1-5). The gardens are looking quite fabulous, especially our new crevice garden. The greenhouses are also quite full of an assortment of perennial treasures!
Final Summer Open Nursery and Garden Weekend Read More »
Here’s another new elephant ear we’re thinking about introducing, but we’d love to hear your thoughts. Mature height is 3-4′ and it does spread among other plants. We are calling it Colocasia ‘Smiley Face’. This is an unidentified species, probably from North Vietnam, that has been hardy for us for over a decade. Thoughts?
Another possibly new elephant ear Read More »
Here’s a new image of Colocasia ‘Aloha’ growing in our garden. This 2017 introduction from the breeding work of Dr. John Cho is truly amazing and so unique. This plant is 8 weeks in the ground from a 1 quart pot.
We posted this a few weeks ago as our Agave ‘Mountain Man’ (A. gentryi x montana) prepared to open. We’ll, the big moment is here…below are a few shot from today. The seed were wild-collected in Mexico in the late 1990s by our friends at Yucca Do, and our seedling was planted in May 2000,
Agave Mountain Man – the big moment Read More »
From the flora side of the garden, the lovely sacred lily, Rohdea japonica is flowering today. Our bet is that many folks have never slowed down long enough to actually see a rohdea flower, but if you look close, you’ll see the pollen is ready for hybridizing. Representing the garden fauna, we are loaded to
Reproduction in the Garden today Read More »
In a matter of two days, most of our region went from abnormally dry to saturated, when an unusual weather system tracked across our area. Not to worry…we’ve loaded two each of every plant on the green arc for safe keeping. We tallied 5.5″ of rain at the nursery, while areas a few miles away
Ark, Ark…is that rain we hear? Read More »
Look what showed up in the garden. Our specimen of Agave ‘Mountain Man’…a hybrid of Agave montana and Agave gentryi decidied to flower for our spring open nursery and garden. This unusual hybrid starts its flower spike in the fall, which stops for the coldest part of winter, then starts growing again in spring. The
A View from the top – Agave flowering soon Read More »
We began growing sacred lilies back in the 1970s, when few people in the US, outside of a handful of fanatic collectors were growing them. The only large scale grower of the green species, Rohdea japonica, was our friends, the late Sam and Carleen Jones of Georgia’s Piccadilly Farms. Despite being very easy to grow,
New, Hard-to-Find Sacred Lilies (rohdea) available Read More »
