My Garden

Last time I looked at an old American hosta coming to Britain for the first time. Now two brand new hostas from Belgium, both raised by Danny van Eechaute.

‘Color Festival' (left, click to enlarge) is a very dramatic hosta in spite of its medium size. It features rich, deep green foliage, a little over 6in/15cm long and 3in/7.5cm wide, with a bold cream central splash tinted with green as each leaf unfolds and which matures into bright white with rich creamy yellow and greeny cream flashes at the edge. The contrast between the consistently deep green edge and the bright centre is very striking and made more stylish by those neat flashes and the slight variability of the central splash.

Maturing to a clump about 21in/53cm across by about 131/2in/34cm high, pale lavender tubular flowers are held above the foliage in mid summer.

‘Color Festival' is a sport of ‘Enterprise' registered in 2007.

‘Border Street' is a bold variegated hosta with a very attractive pattern of harmonising tones. The green rippled foliage, about 10-12in/25-30cm long and 8-10in/20-25cm wide at maturity, with a slight bluish tint and edged with a variable margin of cream, is bold without being too garish. It also has tubular pale lavender flowers. The plant itself matures into a clump about 40in/1m  across and 24-28in/60-70cm high .

‘Border Street' was raised from open-pollinated seed of a streaked seedling of ‘Lakeside Roy' and registered just last year.

You can order ‘Color Festival' from Bali Hai Nursery and also from Sue Proctor Plants. You can order ‘Border Street' from Bali Hai Nursery.

 
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Every year new hostas arrive on the scene. You'd think that with so many being grown already - there've been almost two thousand listed in the RHS PlantFinder over the years - that we wouldn't need any more.

Well, some perhaps we truly don't need. But as hosta enthusiasts bring together new combinations of size, leaf shape, colour and pattern - not to mention flowers - valuable new types are appearing.

Bali Hai Nursery in Northern Ireland make a point of bringing many new hostas to British gardeners. But they also bring over from the United States varieties which have somehow been ignored over here.

‘Big John' has been around in the States for some time (it was registered in 1986) but it's not been available here before. And it really is big. Mark Zilis, writing in his superb Hosta Handbook, says: "'Big John' is synonymous with "huge" in hostas. Not only does the mound of foliage become massive, but the individual leaves are the largest of any hosta, narrowly beating out ‘Sum and Substance' for that honor. The record breaking 21in x 163/8in (53.3x41.6cm) leaf was measured in 1988... Since then no leaf I have measured (probably more than 5,000) has exceeded those dimensions."

Setting aside what we'll charitably call the "dedication" of someone who measures over 5,000 leaves of just one variety of hosta - that really is an impressive plant.

‘Big John' reaches a massive 32in/81cm high by 6ft/1.8m wide! The leaves are bluish green at first, becoming dark green by early summer and have the puckered look of H. sieboldiana parentage; in fact ‘Big John' is a seedling of H. sieboldiana ‘Mira'. It also features bell-shaped white flowers striped in lavender which are held just about leaf level in summer.

If your garden is large enough to feature such an impressive plant, or you have a huge container, you can order Hosta ‘Big John' from Bali Hai Nursery.

Two more new hostas next time.

 
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In recent years we've all got used to those photinias with their bright red young growth. They're evergreen, vigorous, easy to grow, and colourful, and when their clusters of hawthorn-like flowers appear, followed by red berries, it's an added treat. Now we have a new variegated form.

Discovered in Oregon as long ago as 1991, Photinia x fraseri Pink Marble (‘Cassini') is a relatively upright, evergreen shrub whose foliage opens reddish green with irregular deep pink margins then as the foliage matures it becomes a rich green with white edges and with splashes of white on the green part of the leaf. With leaves in all colour stages on the plant at the same time the effect is dramatic.

Pink Marble is less vigorous than other photinias, which is not bad thing, and so will not only make a more accommodating garden plant but is suitable for large containers. It can also be grown as a low hedge and each trim will be followed by a new flush of pink-edged red leaves.

Pink Marble was found as a sport on a plant of P. x fraseri at a wholesale nursery in Salem, Oregon. I would guess the parent would probably have been ‘Red Robin' but this is not confirmed.

You can order Photinia x fraseri Pink Marble (‘Cassini') from Gardening Express.

 
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Dahlias are enjoying a new resurgence and rich dark colours are also becoming increasingly popular. Bring the two together and you have a sumptuous new dahlia - ‘Karma Choc'.

The Karma Series of dahlias, developed by the same Dutch breeder that created the popular Happy Single series of garden varieties, has been bred as a cut-flower dahlia but its special features make it a great garden dahlia too.

So Karma dahlias are not only prolific, and with flowers carried on strong straight stems, but each bloom lasts up to twelve days in water. And of course the flower form is excellent and the colours are tempting.

The latest to be introduced is ‘Karma Choc'. Reaching about 90cm/3ft high, everything about the plant is dark: the foliage is rich purple-bronze in colour, the stems are reddish-black and the elegant 5in/12.5cm water lily flowers open deep a Bourneville chocolate colour and mature to deep black-tinted crimson.

‘Karma Choc' was raised in The Netherlands by Aad Verwer and was selected in 2002 from seedlings resulting from the pollination of an unnamed dahlia seedling by the rich red ‘Karma Naomi'.

You can order Dahlia ‘Karma Choc' from these RHS Plant Finder nurseries and from Mr Fothergill's.

 

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You can now follow me on the micro-blogging service Twitter at http://twitter.com/Graham_Rice !

This will help me let you know when new posts go up here at my RHS Trials and Awards blog as well as at my RHS New Plants blog and my Transatlantic Plantsman blog. And I’ll occasionally bring you other news - such as when I have an article in the RHS magazines The Garden or The Plantsman.

But, you may ask, how do you follow me on Twitter? Well, there’s a page of ideas on the Twitter website. And for real newbies there’s a handy video on the Twitter help pages.

Twitter is just another way of keeping in touch and passing on the news. First there were drawings on the walls of caves, now there's Twitter!
 

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Earlier this year I mentioned the excellent new dwarf hybrid buddleja from America both over on my RHS Trials and Awards blog, and also on my Transatlantic Plantsman blog. It's also bveen a big hit at the RHS Buddleja trial. It's not been available in Britain till now but as of yesterday you can order it from Gardening Express.

Buddleja 'Blue Chip' (Lo and Behold^TM Series) has a number of good things going for it

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You can now follow me on the micro-blogging service Twitter at http://twitter.com/Graham_Rice !

This will help me let you know when new posts go up here at my RHS New Plants blog as well as at my RHS Trials and Awards blog and also at my Transatlantic Plantsman blog. And I’ll occasionally bring you other news - such as when I have an article in the RHS magazines The Garden or The Plantsman.

But, you may ask, how do you follow me on Twitter? Well, there’s a page of ideas on the Twitter website. And for real newbies there’s a handy video on the Twitter help pages.
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The Norfolk-based plant breeding company Floranova has been a pioneer in the creation of new annuals and container plants for the last thirty years. Many of the best annuals that we grow have been developed by them and this years see another breatkthrough - a new type of Nicotiana (flowering tobacco).

In recent years nicotiana have been plagued by a highly destructive disease, tobacco blue mould. It wiped out the last nicotiana trial at Wisley and, especially for parks but for home gardeners too, there's always a risk that the nicotiana season will be cut short.

‘Whisper' is a completely new type with two unique qualities. Firstly, its flowers change colour as they age - they open pure white, then blush and turn pink then deep pink. With all shades on the plant together the effect is delightful. Plus - it's disease resistant.

Nick Bellfield-Smith, the Floranova plant breeder responsible for creating ‘Whisper', told me: "It's derived from a cross between the rarely seen N. mutabilis and the familiar type, N. x sanderae. It's been about five years in development. We were looking for different routes to disease tolerance/resistance as well as the characteristic of the N. mutabilis flower starting white and turning to pink.

"In our trials this year ‘Whisper' has done extremely well remaining healthy and showing plenty of colour well into September. And at 80-100cm/32-40in it gives height and elegance to the back of the border. In contrast the standard bedding types became infected at the beginning of August and were dead sticks within three weeks!"

You can order seed of Nicotiana ‘Whisper' from Mr Fothergill's Seeds and from Plants of Distinction or order plants from Dobies.

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At the Hampton Court Palace Flower Show this summer, Suttons showed their expanding range of grafted vegetable plants. Now you can order them.

Grafting tomatoes is not a new idea, far from it, but this whole new generation of grafted vegetables will transform your veg growing. There are tomatoes of course, but also a wide range of other vegetables available as grafted plants.

The idea is that heavy cropping and full flavoured varieties are grafted on to rootstocks specially developed to resist soil pests and diseases, bring extra vigour, be happy in cooler greenhouse conditions (or even outside) and fruit over a longer period. They cost more than seedling plants - but the extra heavy p&d-free crop more than makes up for it.

Both Suttons and their sister company Dobies - whose list features one plant with two different tomato varieties grafted on to it! - have these grafted vegetables available to order now.

To order, just click the variety name to go direct to the page on the website.

Dobies
Chilli pepper ‘Fireflame' Delicious and hot (but not too hot), 17cm/7in red chillies.
Chilli pepper ‘Sunflame' Yellow sister of ‘Fireflame', with 15cm/6in chillies.
Cucumber ‘Pacto' Prolific 20cm/8in cues with mildew resistance.
Melon ‘Sienne' Sweet and aromatic orange-fleshed melon with attractive striped skin.
Pepper ‘Magno' Virus-resistant green pepper maturing to orange, and unusually easy to grow.
Tomato ‘Twins' Two plum-fruited varieties - ‘Dasher' (red) and ‘Sunorange' (orange') - on each plant

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Zinnias have developed into one of our easiest and most colourful of summer annuals - as long as you sow the seed direct into the soil. And it's not so much the large flowered types that remind us of show chrysanths that are so successful, it's the bushier, more prolific, smaller flowered varieties.

New in this style is ‘Frazzy Jazzy'. Each fully double flower has petals which are dark at the base and pale at the tips, creating dazzling colour combinations: crimson and cream, scarlet and orange, purple and white... The result is a continuing sparkling display of delightful double flowers which can be enjoyed in any sunny place in the garden and also cut for posies for the house.

But they dislike being sown in pots or trays and then pricked out for planting later. Better to sow them very thinly, direct into the soil, in May or June, thin them if necessary and them just let them get on with it. I always find that the best technique is to make your drills with the corner of the rake or the point of a cane, then soak the drills thoroughly, sow the seed on the wet soil and cover them with dry soil. That will give them a flying start.

You can order seeds of Zinnia ‘Frazzy Jazzy' from Mr Fothergill's Seeds.

 

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The range of colours available in both old-fashioned Grandiflora sweet peas and the modern Spencer sweet peas is simply amazing and for this new season Thompson & Morgan are releasing two exclusive blends that bring together a huge range of varieties.

‘Heirloom Bicolour Mixed' (left) is exactly what it says on the packet: a blend of old-fashioned heirloom Grandiflora sweet peas, renowned for their exceptional scent, and all with bicoloured flowers. The blend includes the classic ‘Cupani', in maroon and mauve; ‘Painted Lady', in pink and white; ‘Lady Turrall, in magenta and lilac; ‘Butterfly', in mauve and white, and ‘Indigo King' in violet-maroon and violet and many more.

T&M are also introducing ‘Sweet Dreams' (below), a blend of fifty one - yes fifty one - different varieties all chosen for the their fragrance, their exhibition quality blooms and their good garden performance. Many of the varieties included are award-winners and this blend comes with more than the usual number of seeds in the packet - sixty seeds rather than the forty five or even twenty five of many mixtures. Of course, with more than fifty different varieties included you still probably won't get a plant of every single one.... You'll just have to buy more packets!

And don't forget: the best time to sow sweet peas is not in the spring but in the autumn. October and November are the best months so the time is right to sow these new sweet peas now. Let them get established in pots through the winter ready for planting out in spring at the time when you would otherwise be sowing seeds. It gives them a real head start.

You can order seed of sweet pea ‘Heirloom Bicolour Mixed' and sweet pea ‘Sweet Dreams' from Thompson and Morgan Seeds.

 
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We've seen some lovely rudbeckias appear in recent years but this one is a little bit special. Selected for planting all over the great American city of Denver, Colorado, to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the founding of the city, Rudbeckia ‘Denver Daisy' is now available in Britain from Dobies Seeds. And it's a very dramatic plant.

Reaching about 60cm/2ft in height, the large single flowers are brilliant yellow with a dark chocolate zone at the base of each petal creating a zone of chocolate brown around a purple eye ringed with yellow anthers.

Easily grown from seed as an annual, peak flowering is in mid summer but regular dead-heading will keep it performing well into the autumn. It's especially valuable as it does well in hot summers, in dry conditions, on windy sites and even in a summer deluge - it's altogether a tolerant variety which does not need rich soil or regular feeding to thrive. And, once established, it doesn't need much water either.

Although ‘Denver Daisy' is a self-supporting variety, it's stems are long enough to cut and because the flowers are so large and dramatic you only need one or two in a mixed arrangement - although a whole jugfull would be spectacular. Cut them just as the flowers are starting to open, make sure there's flower food in their water and they should last about ten days.

‘Denver Daisy' is a hybrid of the American native Rudbeckia hirta which was developed in Germany.

You can buy seed of Rudbeckia ‘Denver Daisy' from Dobies Seeds from 1 October.

 

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Cosmos seem to be enjoying a surge in popularity at the moment, I think that not only are gardeners realising what dependable flowers they are for the mixed border but are also beginning to value them as cut flowers. There are number of new cosmos from various seed companies this year, I'll look at some of the others another time.

‘Sweet Kisses', from Mr Fothergill's Seeds, is a lovely semi-double form with broad white petals edged in magenta pink with smaller petals emerging around the bright yellow eye. If you remember the old variety called ‘Picotee', it's the same basic colouring but with semi-double flowers and - unlike the last batch of ‘Picotee' that I grew - every plant will feature that lovely bicoloured look.

An excellent mingler for mixed borders, if you like to pick cosmos for cutting cut them when the buds are showing colour - don't wait for the flowers to open fully on the plant. As soon as you bring them indoors they should open. The flowers should last seven to nine days if flower food is added to the water and it always pays to pick flowers every day, just to keep them coming.

You can buy Cosmos ‘Sweet Kisses' by mail order from Mr Fothergill's Seeds.

 

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Onions are not the most difficult vegetables to grow but there's one problem which can destroy a whole crop in no time - downy mildew. So as we're all now so reluctant to spray our vegetables the arrival of the first onion variety which is resistant to downy mildew is quite a breakthrough.

‘Santero' is a ‘Rijnsburger' type onion with coppery, round to oval bulbs. It's an early maincrop onion for planting in spring as sets and compares well with other varieties of this type - with the addition of that invaluable disease resistance.

Research on creating a downy mildew resistant onion began in the 1980s. Natural resistance to downy mildew was found in a wild species of onion growing in rocky places in the Mediterranean region, Allium amethystinum, which is occasionally seen in gardens. Its resistance was transferred across into our familiar onions using traditional plant breeding techniques but it took a great deal of work to retain all the good growing and cooking qualities of our garden onions and only the disease resistance from the wild species.

Fortunately, you can now order onion ‘Santero' from Thompson and Morgan for spring planting

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As the new seed catalogues start to drop on to the doormat, the time is right to take a look at some of the new varieties appearing in the mail order catalogues for the coming season. So the next few posts here will concentrate on new seed introductions.

Thompson and Morgan have a number of interesting newcomers this season, including some from their own flower breeder Charles Valin, and one of his most exciting new varieties is Viola ‘Allspice’.

‘Allspice’ is a prolific trailing viola for baskets and other containers. It comes in five sparkling colours and here’s the exciting thing – each colour has a different scent. T&M called in Suffolk wine expert Chris Heseltine, with forty years experience in the industry, to apply his expert nose to naming accurately the fragrance of each colour and he came up with these descriptions: white – “honeycomb”, yellow – ‘broom and pineapple”, purple with yellow eye – “woodland”, purple and yellow – “exotic” and pale mauve/pale yellow – “green tea and spring flowers”.

Michel Perry, New Product Development Manager at T&M said: “It’s unique in that it brings fragrances in the depths of winter, a quality not often found in hanging basket plants. Each colour has a distinctly different fragrance. We’ve tried our best to give some idea of the scents, but customers may disagree and we’d love to hear about the fragrances detected!"

You can order seeds of Viola ‘Allspice’ from Thompson and Morgan.
 

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