Weeding the Web

GBBD: Cyclamen never stops

Well, this Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day I'm hoping for some advice. Here's what I've chosen for this month:

I featured this plant at the beginning of the year when I reviewed its Ebersankey Glossy Self-Watering Pot from Fiskars.  The string wick that draws the water from the reservoir has, incidentally, suffered no further diminishment and, as you can see, the plant has at least doubled in size. It has also flowered non-stop - and I'm not exaggerating; it's had bushels of blooms - since last Christmas.

The question I'm asking is, Can it flower itself to death? Should I take it out of its pot, let it dry out and give it a rest, or just let it get on with it? If the latter, I really feel I ought to start feeding it in some way - perhaps a drop or two of plant food in the water.

Any advice would be much appreciated. What do you think?

NB See what's happening to blooms around the world this Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day at May Dreams Gardens.

Garden Bloggers Bloom Day: Amazing Amaryllis

Big and blowsy and always subject some ribald remarks while the sturdy flower stalk extends itself upwards, (anxious observation from mother - "I do hope it'll flower soon."), an amaryllis hasn't graced the windowsill for several years. But this Christmas I was given this one, and I'd forgotten how much I enjoy them.

I've never tried to keep one going past its first year, but this time I'm going to give it a go, according to instructions.

For more blooms growing this month, visit May Dreams Gardens for Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day.

Garden Product Review: Glossy (self-watering pot) from ebertsankey

Glossy is not a word people associate with me. It implies svelte, manicured, sophisticated. (I can hear Husband laughing...). Nor is it a style I attempt in interior decoration (enough with the loud guffaws!).

This is possibly why the Glossy pot that I was given at last year's Garden Press Event disappeared into the cupboard and was only unearthed before Christmas when I delved into the depths for the it's-Christmas-so-we-must-the-effort serving dishes.

Abusing Cyclamen

It resurfaced just in time for the cyclamen. These are tough little souls. Generally, about mid-summer, my mother gets sick of seeing them languishing, motionless, in the outhouse and chucks them into the compost bin.

Some indeterminate time later, I spot them, fish them out again, and put them back in their pots. They survive every time.

They then suffer their winter home on the windowsill, where I forget to water them, or leave their feet too wet, something I don't notice until the leaves begin to yellow.

The Glossy pot for cyclamen

The Glossy pot has been a new experience for all of us. Shiny black, 7 inches (18 cms) tall, it contains a clear plastic pot that slips into the top and a thick string that exits the internal pot and dangles in the water reservoir.

If my opinion were asked, I'd prefer the top of the internal pot to be black to match the external pot, but otherwise, despite my prejudice against plastic, I have to say that it's very smart. Being black and shiny, it needs wiping down a fair amount, but that's because it's near the sink in the kitchen.

One of the corners of the external pot is clear, so you can monitor the water level within, but it's not an obvious deviation from the design. 

The cyclamen clearly loves it. The only time it began to look a little droopy was when the string had become so slimy that I suspect no moisture was getting through. (Note to self - just because the water level doesn't descend, it doesn't mean the water shouldn't be changed.) 

It seems that the string is the weakest link, as it has a woven sleeve around a straight core and, in less than a month, the sleeve has already rotted enough for it to slip off while I rinsed it, leaving a rather diminished thickness. We'll see how the plant fares.

The Human Perspective

According to the ebertsankey catalogue, these are orchid pots, but the pink cyclamen looks really lovely. The plant is half the height of the pot, which makes the proportions pleasing.

One niggle, though, has surprised me. The cyclamen is flowering its heart out, bushy, bouncy, vibrant. All by itself.  In its current state, it's more of an ornament than something to look after (however badly).

Anything wrong with that? Well, up to now, I wouldn't have said so. But (this sounds daft) I miss having something to do. I'm now over-zealous in my readiness to pluck off any flower that looks remotely past its peak.

Am I alone in this? Do you like houseplants that thrive without you? This is the reason I really dislike Moth Orchids. Mine, received two years ago, sits there, in flower, for months.

Looks lovely. Bores me rigid.

So, yes, I recommend the Glossy pot (with a new string at the ready). A row of them on a plain windowsill or shelf, with bright pink cyclamen, or an appropriate orchid, would look very designer-magazine.

Your plant will love it.

You may feel a bit wistful.

Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day: Kalanchoe

With the rain bedraggling everything in the garden, and the begonias finally cut down by frost, the perkiest floral presence is the kalanchoe on the windowsill. This is my type of houseplant - very forgiving, lots of flowers.

 More of this month's Garden Bloggers' Blooms can be found at May Dreams Gardens.

Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day: an old standby

 

Well, what else can you expect in January?  Most of my cyclamen are pink with fuller petals, but this is a bit different.

Plant nurseries worth visiting: The Plantation, Weybridge

It's Sod's law that, as a blogger, the moment you decide to go "off-duty" and leave your camera at home, you find something you really want to post. (Yes, I know there are phones with cameras. No, I don't want one.)

Leafing through the Garden Design Journal, Husband caught sight of an advert for The Plantation (who says print advertising is dead?) and half an hour later we were on our way to Weybridge, Surrey, to check it out. A ghastly journey put us in the mood to be disappointed. Instead we were wowed.

You know you're in for something special the moment you arrive. Trees in enormous tubs line the drive and exotic foliage tempts you through the nursery gateway. 

My favourite spot had to be the shady plant section, covered in green shade netting and warmly humid. We entered through a small forest of fatsias, cooed over hydrangeas, brushed against the lovely Hauttuynia cordata, and admired a plantation of tree ferns.

Garden project : a DIY planter for succulents and cacti

Every so often you come across a design that is so basic that you can't believe it's so attractive (OK, so that's a subjective opinion - as Fred pointed out in CD Difference?), but over at the website of ReadyMade, the demised magazine, Kelly, who runs Succulent Love, a company specialising in designs with succulents, gives instructions for a brick patio planter and tealight that I think is charming. You need an old brick and a drill (and, possibly, a burly man on the end of it), but otherwise it couldn't be simpler.

Kelly fell in love with succulents while planning her wedding, and makes surprising use of them in her bridal bouquet . Possibly it works best in Californian sunshine, but it's stylish. If you're looking for inspiration on how to display your own succulents around the house, there are plenty of ideas in her gallery.

Retro plants - the 1970s are back

With my finger on the pulse of the latest trends (why are you laughing?), it seemed only right that we should watch Whatever Happened to the Likely Lads? recently (highly recommended – still full of fun and pathos after all these years). And we were transfixed. Not by a particular witticism or bravura acting, but by the wallpaper…and the carpet…and the sofa…and the curtains. Each was patterned. Differently. It reminded me why I was so glad that the '70s ended.

But, of course, the '70s are back. We’ve had flares (sorry, boot-cuts) for some time and now big patterned wallpaper and hideously patterned china have hit the shops. And, as observed by Apartment Therapy, plants from the '70s are also back; a fiddle-leaved ficus is pictured here in the Peter Dunham interior in an article in Elle Decor.

For anyone wondering what a plant from the seventies might be, we’re talking Rubber Plant, Spider Plant, Jade Plant or Crassula Ovata (that’s Money Plant to a lot of us, though not the one that's much loved in feng shui, which is Pachira Aquatic, often grown as bonsai), Snake Plant (or Mother-in-Law’s Tongue). All, you’ll notice, large leaved and boldly shaped (so you could pick them out against those competing patterns) and mostly, doggedly green (so you could pick them out… etc., etc.).

The other advantage for those days of stagflation was that they’re pretty independent (I did once kill a Spider Plant but only with grim determination), which perhaps, as we’re all going to have to work like navvies in these straitened times, is why they’re enjoying a comeback now.

How to look after your poinsettia

Christmas wouldn't be Christmas on a garden-related blog without a mention of poinsettia. And apparently I'm not the only one to think along these lines.

A survey of 1094 people in 16 European countries conducted last December by Stars for Europe (which, yes, represents the interests of poinsettia growers across the continent) found that poinsettias came third as a symbol of Christmas, just behind Christmas trees and candles.  Mind you, what they seem to have done is lumped "stars and the star-shaped poinsettia" together as a category, so I can't help feeling that the plant might have been clinging to the coat-tails of the celestial body, if you see what I mean.

However, poinsettias, first bred commercially in the USA in the 1950s, are here to stay for Christmas, and I must admit I rather like them.

Rutger's If Plants Could Talk website has a video in which Dr George Wulster looks at different cultivars (Plum Pudding, anyone?) and also gives tips on poinsettia care from the moment you buy it - take a large bag with you to protect it from the cold. Among other tips are that you only need to water when the surface of the soil is dry to the touch.

It also gives what I think is the clearest explanation of what is good, indirect light - when you can see the shadow of your hand on the surface where the pot will stand (without the sun directly on it, obviously).

A watering solution for forgetful gardeners

Remembering to water pot plants is not my strongest suit. Last year, my windowsill chilli plant (Prairie Fire – very cute, eight inches tall) failed miserably, through no fault of its own, bravely offering up prematurely dried chillies between shrivelled leaves on its little twig branches.

So, much as I like to think I can overcome such weakness through sheer willpower, I was interested to try a Plant Genie Watering Globe. You see quite a lot of this sort of thing around. These are very sturdy handblown glass balls with a long hollow stem – fill with water and insert into the soil of your pot.

I got mine directly from the owner Charlie Silverlock when I visited his stand at the excellent Cranleigh Show, Surrey, last year. His company, free2garden, specialises in designer and hand-crafted garden ornaments.