Geraniums - Pelargoniums

I recently had the opportunity to speak at an event honouring a group of people whose gardens were nominated for recognition. I was allowed to choose my own topic and I decided to talk on how I went about learning more on the topic of Horticulture. I then spent some time showing slides that illustrated what I learned from the sources from which I learned about the topic.

I didn't mention the annual geranium in my talk but this was one of my first ventures into the world of cuttings. When we were first married, we would take cuttings from the previous years supply of geraniums and tried to coax them through the Winter. We would often lose half our crop, probably because of the way we started the cuttings.

We tried rooting them in water but that just didn't work for us as the cuttings would rot and die. We tried putting them right in the soil and that worked to some degree but we again lost a significant number of the cuttings for some reason. It wasn't until years later that I mentioned my difficulty to a Master Gardener that I learned to allow the cutting to dry overnight in the refrigerator before putting them in soil that I was most successful. Now most if not all the cuttings survive. I learned too from the same Master Gardener that starting geraniums from purchased seed is almost always 100% successful.

I know that many gardeners will dry out their plants, hang them in a cold cellar and repot them the following year again with mixed success but I'm doing alright with cuttings now that I give them 24 hours to heal before potting them up.

Much to do in the next few weeks

Over the next few weeks, I need to save the annuals and tender perennials that I want to keep for next year. The Dahlias and Amaryllis have to be cleaned and put into the cold cellar, cuttings of Geraniums, Sweet potato vines and Plectranthus taken and Echeverria preserved. Once again I am going to try to overwinter some pond plants that include Colocasia (Taro) and Cyperus (Papyrus).

I still have some tomatoes to pick and some potatoes to dig up. There are seeds to collect as well. I tried growing 4 O'Clocks in a container this year and the experiment worked quite well.

And then there are some areas of the garden that I plan to change. This includes planting a Clethra that has been in a container for several years and a dwarf Elm that was purchased this Summer. There are still a few Jovibara and two dwarf Astilbes yet to be planted as well. I'll likely plant a few bulbs too (Tulips and Alliums)

After all of this has been completed, I'll begin the cleanup. I feel a little like Alice's white rabbit.

What's in bloom now?

It is always interesting at the end of September to do a review of what is in bloom. The other day I was at a fellow Master Gardeners place and she has a Clematis Josephine in bloom. While the flowers are smaller than they might be during the blooming seaon for Josephine, the flowers are nevertheless attractive.

While there are the usual Asters, Anemones, Sedums and Helenium, there is a clump of Iris Immortality that is reblooming along with several clumps of Spiderworts. My C texensis Dutchess of Albany still has some blooms on it too although they are much like Josephine mentioned above. The flowers are smaller and not as perfect as they once were.

An unusual occurence is a stand of New England Asters that when planted many years ago were crimson in colour. Now, the stand is as large as it was several years ago but now is completely purple. There is still a stand elsewhere in the garden that is the crimson colour but this one has changed.