Spring | Dirt Simple

Flowers For Cutting

I arrange lots of cut flowers for clients intended as Mother’s Day gifts. It may be old fashioned or expected, but I do believe the gift of flowers or plants is so appropriate for a Mom. My Mom was a scientist. Her view of the world had to do with experiments, statistics, dispassionate reasoning and disbelief without solid verification. But she did in her own special way nurture me. We had a very long and very intense relationship over the garden-once I got old enough to understand that gardening, and a love for nature and all growing things was a way of life-not always so pretty or stylish, but genuine and connected.

Julia died suddenly and unexpectedly in 2001. For 2 months, I turned every light on in the house before I went to bed. I could not sleep, unless the house was ablaze with light. I finally went to see my doctor-she told me everyone expresses their grief differently-I should not be concerned. I eventually turned the lights off. As much as everyone expresses their grief differently, everyone expresses their joy and appreciation differently. The shop was jammed over Mother’s Day weekend-we did our best to help every person express their feelings in a way that satisfied them.

I also do cut flower arrangements for clients. Any orders I have for Mother’s Day flowers, I take seriously. There is a son, a daughter, a husband, a niece, a friend, wanting to express their feelings via the flowers. I order flowers in season, and fresh for these arrangements.

The Dutch do a vastly better job of growing Dutch iris than I ever could. A California farm has delphinium belladonna available. The white sweet peas-I confess I do not know where they came from. The white tulips-from my own garden. The mix says spring. Hello, and Happy Mother’s Day. Thank you for all you have done for me. All my love to you. The arrangement is densely flowery, in a fairly formal shape .

The arranging of the floral orders for Mother’s Day-I spend a fair amount of time with them. Why so? My clients are asking that I interpret their caring in a way that accurately represents them. I understand they are entrusting me with an important message. I take the time. And I enjoy it. Working with cut flowers is time well spent.

Whether the arrangement is big or small, formal or casual, subdued or bright and sassy in color, the message is fairly universal. Thanks for helping me to bloom, Mom.

Tulips, Dutch iris, and bupleurum

Lisianthus, white dendrobiums, pale yellow gerbera daisies, and lavender freesia

white ranunculus, iris, and bupleurum

tulips, ranunculus, and orlaya

white Dutch iris, yellow and white ranunculus, belladonna delphinium

If you arrange your own flowers for your home, or as a gift, proper conditioning is really important. I recut every stem on a steep slant, and put them in fairly deep water which is lukewarm. I try to find a very cool spot to set my buckets for 24 hours. This treatment gives the stems time to take up water. Cut flowers are delivered to me in boxes-they need to take a deep drink. This step is especially important if the flowers are arranged in floral foam, as opposed to a vase filled with water. The foam will quickly obstruct the pores of the stems, and impede the uptake of water. The stem and flower should be juicy.

I cut each stem again, as it is arranged. Taking the time to condition the flowers will give them the longest possible life in the vase. This is true whether you buy flowers from a florist, the grocery store-or if you cut flowers from your own garden. A bouquet from fresh flowers from the garden makes a very personal and thoughtful gift. What spring garden flowers make great cuts? tulips, grape hyacinths, spring flowering branches as in dogwood or viburnum,, hellebores, peonies, iris, delphinium, sweet peas, early clematis, trollius- the list is plenty long.

It is not only a pleasure to be able to bring the garden indoors, it is a pleasure to share it with someone near and dear.

Digg Digg

Posted on: May 16, 2013 19 Comments

The Magnolias

In most every year I have written this blog, there is an essay about magnolias. I have a big love for them. The flowers are dramatic and showy-I so welcome a gesture of this magnitude after a long winter. A good bloom is never a certainty. They bloom early in my spring-which also means they bloom late in my winter. Last year, given a string of April days in the low twenties, every bud was reduced to a gooey black rotted mess, hanging from the branches. That hanging persisted well into the summer-a vile reminder of the capricious nature of spring weather.

But when the magnolias are good, they are very very good. My neighborhood has plenty of old saucer magnolias in evidence. Some are planted very close to the foundations of homes-they do not seem to mind this. Many have multiple trunks that have grown to considerable size. A saucer magnolia in full bloom is heart stoppingly beautiful. My saucer magnolias are a hybrid of magnolia soulangiana, named Galaxy. The day I planted the three of them in my driveway garden, they had long spindly arms-gawky, they were. The one tree with the most sun has grown to a considerable size.

The second tree will catch up to tree number one in the next few years. Tree 3 took a giant hit in the trunk from a careless truck driver in the driveway. Late this winter I took down an old Norway maple in this area whose girdling roots have been hard at work squeezing the life out of it. So little of the canopy was green last year-looking at it made me wince. It was time to give up the maple, in the interest of the health of the magnolias-and a group of parrotias.

This cool spring made for a glorious magnolia bloom season. I admired them up close. I stood under their blossom laden branches. I admired them from afar. Why this love of magnolias? The spectacular bloom aside, they are a very handsome tree. The grey bark is beautiful. The mossed bark on old trees-sensational. The leaves are large, and glossy. Their winter shape is strikingly architectural. They are beautiful trees, no matter the season. Their mature size is a size that any modest city property such as my own, could accommodate. I have a city lot and a half, which is home to 11 magnolias-no kidding.

8 of my magnolias are planted in the half lot, in the front of my yard. They are under planted with boxwood. They are yellow magnolias-yes yellow. Hybridized by Phil Savage, the blooms of the magnolia “Butterflies” are the most astonishingly gorgeous pale yellow imaginable. I met Phil Savage when I was young, and working for Al Goldner. Al was a landscape designer who owned a nursery. He loved plants-and he loved design. I was so lucky for my exposure to him, and his work. Al made it his business to introduce anyone designing for him to people who grew great plants. So many years later, I treasure that experience.

Phil owned a large property in my area. Though he passed away a few years ago, that property is loaded with magnolias-many of which exceed 60 feet in height. I had occasion to see his trees in full bloom a few years ago, courtesy of a niece, who is a client. I was astonished at what I saw. Yellow, peach, pale pink and hot pink flowers on magnolias that towered high above the ground. My pictures of his property are so bad-I would not publish them. But the experience of his vision about magnolias-this I will never forget. This is why I plant magnolias, any time I have the chance.

The bloom, even in a really great year, is not long. Should you need more than that momentary experience of their shockingly beautiful flowers, consider their leaves, and their gorgeous shape. I for one do not mind an experience of the garden that is fleeting. Every season has its perfect moment. I do not need any plant, any garden, or any landscape to to do more than their season. I do not hold the brevity of a season against any tree. As for Phil Savage’s property-yes. It has been sold. The buyer I would guess has no interest in that magnolia forest the likes of which I am sure does not exist any where else on this planet. The new owner has another idea in mind. I hear from friends and colleagues in the growing community that there is a plan to take cuttings. I so pray this plan comes to be.

A plan to preserve and nurture the magnolias bred by Phil Savage-this seems a fitting essay for Mother’s Day weekend.

Posted on: May 11, 2013 6 Comments

Filed Under: Plants, Spring, Woody Plants Tagged With: galaxy magnolia, Magnolia Butterflies, magnolia Galaxy, Phil Savage, saucer magnolia, saucer magnolias, spring blooming magnolias

The Spring Season

It’s hard to pick a favorite, but the spring season has an aura like no other. Any plant, whether it be a tree or summer flowering shrub, a bulb or a perennial, responds to nature’s call to break dormancy, and grow. From the biggest maple to the smallest hepatica, the plants are growing. There is a lot of commotion in the air. The plants are not pacing themselves, as they do in the heat of the summer. They are not slowing down, as in the fall. Or asleep, as in winter. It’s full speed ahead. The atmosphere in the garden is fully charged, electrified by all that energy being brought to bear-all at once- on the landscape. Rob has been taking instagram pictures the past few days. The options for filtering and electrifying color makes this spring container really feel like spring.

Each of these hellebore flowers tells a story about my collection. I have a fair number of plants. I especially appreciate the form of the flowers. But what I love about them the best is that they make a grand show in the spring. The hellebores coming into bloom are like the bells of spring ringing out. They are quite hardy. Old clumps are large; the foliage is evergreen until mid winter for me.

Sanguinaria, or bloodroot, is a native Michigan wildflower. A single leaf rises out of the ground, entirely curled around a single flower bud on its own leafless stalk. What a story this is, yes? The single white flowers are open for a few days at best, before the petals drop. If you do not check the emerging plant often in the spring, it could be you will miss the flower altogether. The small leaves are strikingly shaped and veined. Soon after flowering, the plant will go dormant until the following year. The spring season can be fraught with icy and windy weather. Though it is the same length as all of the other seasons, spring seems to come and go in an instant. The time of the bloodroot- hours.

The crabapple “Donald Wyman” has bright pink buds, and a profusion of white flowers. A crabapple blanketed in flowers is one of spring’s most breathtaking events. In a cool spring season, they are a delight to the eye for a week or better. The teardrop shaped petals-how do they manage to stay attached on a windy spring day? Crabapples in bloom-glorious.

In swampy areas, the skunk cabbage forms massive leafy clumps that look good enough to eat. However, skunk cabbage is poisonous to mammals. The plants will warn you. The leaves when disturbed smell like rotten meat. This spring beauty has luscious looks, but should be admired from afar.

Today’s pansies and violas look much different than their more self effacing ancestors. This particular bicolor pansy, with its distinctive dark whiskers, is saturated with intense color. This is spring blooming at its most robust. Though the pansies and violas do not really pick up steam, and flower heavily until the beginning of June, each individual face announces the coming of spring in the most cheery way imaginable. They are so unlike any other flower in form and color. Fault me if you wish, but a pansy in August would be out of place. They belong to spring.

Rob’s instagram photograph of a dark speckled hellebore proves that spring can also be moody and sultry . Rainy and chilly. It also makes the point loud and clear that the atmosphere of a landscape can be altered by light and color-to spectacular effect. Creating a mood, or an atmosphere in a garden is one of the most difficult aspects of landscape design. It cannot be taught, nor can it be forced. It can be aspired to. Spring is that season that every gardener can turn loose of the past, and start fresh. The sap rises in the plants and the gardeners alike.

The saucer magnolia features very large flowers of great substance. The queen bee/Sarah Bernhardt of the spring flowering trees, this magnolia likes cool spring temperatures, but not too cool. Warm spring temperatures, but not too warm. A good bloom demands next to perfect conditions as if it were a God given right. It seems like every Michigan spring features some weather element or another which causes all of the petals to fall to the ground in a heap. A thick mulch of magnolia petals on the ground-that would be our spring.