Recently added comments

Strong plant that blooms repeatedly. The flowers' shape resembles tulips.
The colors may vary from yellow to apricot.

[ | Reply to this comment ]

Very colorful rose with flaming effect... when the corolla is completely open, the flower color turns to fluo coral pink!

[ | Reply to this comment ]

A very particular orange rose, the color of which seems to get fluo. It's strong and it keeps on blooming during the season.

[ | Reply to this comment ]

Antique climbing rose. The very perfumed flowers keep growing continuously from spring to beginning of winter. Flowers aren't very longlasting (even cut).
A super resistant rose that grows quickly and requires very little care (if you don't have enough space, you will need to cut branches from time to time).

[ | Reply to this comment ]

It's a medium size rambling rose (up to around 3 mts height). Branches and flowers starting from the lower part of the plant.
Pros: strong plant, longlasting, strongly perfumed groups of flowers.
Cons: It blooms in waves, a strong 1st bloom in spring followed by generally 2 small blooms (early and late summer). Flowers are sensitive to rain.

[ | Reply to this comment ]

I've grown JAMAICAN MIDNIGHT for a long time and it remains in my Zone 5 garden. It is a black purple throughout the morning. As it approaches Noon, it starts to fade to a more rosy red purple. It certainly benefits from some afternoon shade (so do I). Consistently blooms above the foliage. It is typically top branched, but then again I have it in shade around Noon until sunset. Bud count is about 12 per scape. Increases at a "normal" normal rate.

David

[ | Reply to this comment ]

This variety has the potential to become quite large. Mine were well over 7 feet tall this year, with thick stems that required no staking, with strong fragrance. I just finished digging the bulbs, which were quite large, one being over 6 inches diameter. The bulbs were bright yellow, with no hint of red/purple on them.

[ | Reply to this comment ]

Sun and Sand is 18"H in my garden.

[ | 1 reply ]

"Lily Pons" is named for the famous opera singer. This plant does best given a lot of growing room in a mud bottom pond but can be grown in a deep pot at least 24" across. Not every bloom is perfect, but when it does it is very stunning.

[ | Reply to this comment ]

Purchased this basil for its flowers and was very disappointed:
from six plants not one produced a flower in my zone 5 garden.
I personally consider it not worth the space if not going to flower.

[ | Reply to this comment ]

I have grown this flower in my garden for several years and have noticed the color pattern seems to change over the season producing larger white spots in the heat of the summer.

[ | Reply to this comment ]

When I first planted 'Streaker' in the gardens and it began blooming, I would have described it as more 'pastel' in tones. In 2022, I moved it to a different location. While both locations I would say are in 'full sun' ... it went from more of a 'morning' sun (6 hours or more) to 'afternoon' sun (full sun by late morning and right through the afternoon). And it went from 'pastel' to very 'vividly vibrant' in my gardens. Just an observation, not sure if this would hold true in other gardens or not.

[ | Reply to this comment ]

Raspberry Ripple Cupcake is deserving of its many awards. It is very rust-resistant, and it's a blooming machine here in zone 8b. Strongly recommended for southern growers.

[ | Reply to this comment ]

Just a note on 'Embellished Pink' ... In zone 3, for some reason, I 'almost never' find proliferations on daylilies here. That's why it was so amazing this year (2023) to find not only 'a' prolif on 'Embellished Pink' but I found (3) of them.

I cut the scapes and planted them into potting soil (just at the base of the prolifs, so their roots could grow right into the soil); and, due to cold weather, put them down in my grow room to see whether or not they would 'take'. All three rooted well and are growing happily. Next spring, I will move them to the gardens. Not sure whether anyone else has found (free) proliferations growing on 'Embellished Pink' scapes, but I surely did this year.

[ | Reply to this comment ]

While I was wandering with my camera on the east side of Morton Arboretum, I ran across this species that I never saw before. It has large leaves about 6 to 7 inches long that are dark green and lustrous and turn yellow in the fall. The inner branches are supposed to be slightly corkscrew in their manner. Dr. Michael Dirr wrote that it is originally from China, but is growing in much of east Asia.

[ | Reply to this comment ]

This Alabama Supplejack or Rattan Vine is native to swamp to upland woodlands in the coastal plain of the South from east Texas up to southern Illinois to southeast Virginia down into all of Florida. It is a woody twining vine (liana) that can grow just on the ground or climb high up into trees. Its tough stems have been used in wickerworks. The alternate, simple, shiny, leathery leaves have prominent veins, get good yellow to orange to red fall color, and look similar to Buckthorn leaves, as it is in the Buckthorn Family. The small greenish-white flowers are in small clusters in late spring into early summer. The dark blue fruits (drupes) are about 1 inch long, are eaten by birds, squirrels, and raccoons, and are slightly toxic to humans to eat. Some native plant nurseries in the South sell it.

[ | Reply to this comment ]

While I was wandering with my camera in the Birch Family Collection on the west side of Morton Arboretum in Lisle, IL, I came upon two maturing trees planted there. They were labeled as the Turkistan Birch (Betula turkestanica); however, I found on this Garden.org site that it is now recognized as the Tian-Shan or Tianshan or Tianan Birch. This species is native to the mountain areas of Central Asia. It looks to me much like our River Birch. Its bark also ranges from pinkish-creamy smooth to flaking gray and brown and gray-brown. It eventually will probably become more plated and dark gray-brown when old. The leaves are similar to River Birch also. There is a cultivar of 'Emerald Flare' that has more creamy smooth bark longer than the mother species; sort of like the cultivar of River Birch called ''Heritage.' It is good that the arboretum is helping to preserve this species, as it is endangered in its native habitat. I don't see this as becoming a big item in the USA. Its advantage over the River Birch is that it grows smaller and can tolerate alkaline soils.

[ | Reply to this comment ]

Diamond-dusted, lily-like little beauty, Accentuate the Green reblooms on taller scapes here in 7a. With nutrients and moisture, the rebloom exceeds the initial display. Established clumps put out a light third round of scapes, which is handy if one is using the (fertile) pollen. Very pod fertile, too. Thank you, Tina!

[ | Reply to this comment ]

Concrete Blonde reblooms here in 7a, with huge, substantial blooms on strong scapes.

[ | Reply to this comment ]

So far, I have only seen two trees of this Paperbark Hazel from China in the Birch Family Collection of Morton Arboretum on the west side in Lisle, Illinois in October 2023 and one tree in the Chinese Collection back in late November of 2019 on the east side of the arboretum. It is a beautiful tree Hazel or Hazelnut or Filbert. It has lovely bark that is birch-like and appears in peeling papery rolls of beige and coppery brown. The leaves are smaller than most Hazel and are 3 to 6 inches long, usually 2 to 4 inches long. In landscapes it usually grows up to 50 feet high, but in its native wild habitat it can grow to 130 feet. Its 1/2 inch long nuts are edible, but are not as good for human food as the European or American Hazelnuts. It is fairly fast growing of 1.5 to 2 feet/year. It is resistant to the Eastern Filbert Blight that is hard on the European Hazel.

[ | Reply to this comment ]