Apologies for commandeering the famed Duke Ellington line, but it seems appropriate for the new Colocasia ‘Waikiki’. When we first met Hawaii’s John Cho in 2003, we knew some special elephant ears would be the result of our collaboration, but it was hard to imagine something like the seriously tricked-out Colocasia ‘Waikiki’. Almost every year,
It ain’t worth a thing if it ain’t got that bling! Read More »
Since we are limited in the number of hardy century plant species, our only option for more agave diversity in the garden is to create it by crossing existing hardy species together. Here are a few of our recent successes. Agave x amourifolia is a Plant Delights/JLBG creation from a cross we made in 2016
Sex for the Centuries Read More »
Outside of the nerdy members of the International Oak Society, few gardeners have ever heard of Quercus x vilmoriniana. This spectacular oak is a hybrid between the Asian Quercus dentata and the European Quercus petraea. Quercus x vilmoriniana has been known in European gardens since 1894, but is rarely seen in US gardens. The hybrid
Over the last few years, we’ve been growing more and more aspidistra (cast iron plants) from seed in the garden. Here are a few of our more interesting seedlings. The first is from our search for a narrow-leaf selection of the common Aspidistra elatior, which has been christened A. ‘Thin Man’. The second is a
As a plant breeder, one of the cool things we get to do is observe the diversity that arises from a single cross. In some cases, the diversity shows up in the first generation (F1), while in other cases, the first set of offspring need to have sex with each other for the diversity in
This summer, two of our spiking clumps of Agave ovatifolia became dislodged from the ground during a violent thunderstorm. We wondered if they would still set viable seed despite being without roots, since the energy built up from 15 years of growth was still in the foliage. We made several crosses without having to set
I’ve fallen and I can’t get up Read More »
We have a rather large collections of crinum lilies at JLBG and occasionally take time to make a few crosses. One of our recent selections is one we’ve named Crinum ‘Delerium’. Flowering again this week, this is a cross of Crinum variabile and Crinum bulbispermum, meaning it should be winter hardy in Zone 6. We
Delerium in the Garden Read More »
Last year, we were thrilled when one of our cycads produced a female cone…a first for JLBG. We subsequently impregnated it with pollen supplied from the garden of one or our former volunteers, Mike Papay. Our plant produced a great seed crop (56 seed), which was recently planted. As a point of reference, I should
There’s a reason hostas are the #1 perennial in the US. The incredible diversity of leaf shapes, sizes, and colors are one, combined with the array of climates in which they thrive. It’s long been rumored that hostas don’t grow well here in Zone 7b, but that simply isn’t the case if you prepare your
America Held Hosta Read More »
Not only are bletillas one of the easiest ground orchids to grow in the garden or in containers, they are also one of the few that are easy to grow from seed. We’ve been growing seedlings for the last decade and having discarded several thousand plants (hint…they are all nice), we’ve narrowed them down to
Bletillas everywhere Read More »
