Merry Mixup December 2015 Warm Weather's Effect on Plants

 This December on Long Island, the weather has been unusually mild.  As a result the flowering shrubs and bulbs are mixed up!  They are sending out blooms and growth several months too early.  This is a Winter Jasmine flowering plant. 

 A beautiful Sky Blue Vinca blossom.

 Peach colored Japonica flowers.

 The next year's buds for the Montauk Daisey.

A male Holly

Mint leaves coming up in the Blueberry Box.

 Grape Hyacinth leaves popping out.

 A Raspberry!

 Cat Mint flowers in a planter box.

A new shoot for a Day Lily plant.

 My favorite late blooming Chrysanthemum, but this is really late.

The new plants at the base of each stem for that Chrysanthemum.

 Snow Drops shooting up.

 A Yucca which never looked this good all summer.

 Ferns around the White Walnut tree.

 Hydrangea buds showing up too early.

 One of the Knock Out Roses trying to bloom.

 I tip over planter pots for the winter months, so that the contents and pots don't freeze.  But the plants continue to grow.

 A remarkable photo of one of my Bridal Wreath shrubs.

 A purple bloom on a perennial.   What will happen to these plants come Spring.  I guess that I will have to wait, but after the last two really snowy and cold winters this is a gift!

Happy Thanksgiving 2015

Happy Thanksgiving from the Jarvis House.

 My kitchen  hutch, made of pine, is a wonderful place to display holiday collectibles.

 I partnered the fall objects with greeting cards that I water colored.

All of the pumpkins and gourds are faux! 

 This is one of my Callicarpa bushes.

 The first one that I planted did so well in my garden that I have added two others.  When you trim the stems in the Spring, the bush produces a huge crop of berries.  In the wild, the berries are sparse.

The berries are very attractive to winter birds, like Cardinals, Blue Jays, Mocking Birds, Cat Birds, and last year,  Robins.

 This is a perennial Chrysanthemum that I propagate each year.  Originally, many, many years ago, it came from a bouquet that my Mother received.

 This particular Chrysanthemum  roots in wet soil, whether in a pot or the earth, without hormones. Just cut the green stems and plant.  Keep it watered. This year my starts produced flowers.  A much better bet for a frugal  gardener like me. The hot house plants bloom for a very short time.  These remain until Thanksgiving.

 The grafted split leaf maple

The split leaf maple that I grew from two leaves, picked out of someone's lawn forty years ago.  A true mutant plant.

 The remaining blooms from a blue hydrangea.

 They turned red late in the fall.

 A knockout Rose,

 which is still making buds.

 The Marigolds out front.

Still blooming, and what a color.  Grown from last year's seeds.  A much better choice than Chrysanthemums.

 The Crepe Myrlte

 whose leaves turn red and yellow.

 Marigolds in an urn,

 and near the birdbath, both grown from last year's seeds.

 Blue Berry plants

The Euonymus shrub.

 The Oak leaf Hydrangea

with its bronze leaves and flowers.

Happy Thanksgiving to all.

Perfect Pruning with Judith Ogden

On Saturday, April 11, 2015, I tagged along with my friend and gardener, Jane, to Ogden's Nursery in St. James, Long Island. 

 Judith Ogden was giving an outdoor, hands on seminar on pruning, at Nissequogue Farm.  She is an award winning Landscape designer.

 Ogden's Design & Plantings, Inc. isn't a retail nursery, but rather by appointment only, for landscaping projects, but open to the public monthly at seminars from April to September.

 Nissaquogue Farm is meticulously laid out and tended by Ms. Ogden.

There was a wonderful old shed which sheltered large landscaping pots and iron trellises.

 When we got there she was ready with pruning tools of every sort.

 She explained the different types of pruning shears. These were useful for snipping off

 spent blossoms on certain white hydrangeas.

She expertly gave us instructions regarding where to cut the hydrangea canes.

 What I liked about Judith Ogden's seminar was her authenticity.  She is the gardener!  In her world, a perfect landscape happens over time and with considerable work.

 Then we took turns cutting the hydrangeas back.

 One of the ladies compared completely dead branches to live ones.  Stems with green still showing could be used to propagate new plants by putting them into wet soil, and keeping them wet for the season.

 Pruning rejuvenates the hydrangeas and reduces the chance of disease by eliminating dead material.  With regards to Hydrangeas, only these white ones which make buds on new growth, not the blue ones which make buds on last year's stems, should be pruned. 

 Here she is topping off a tall variety.

 Judith Ogden tackled a huge Callicarpa, one of my favorite shrubs, otherwise known as Beauty Bush or as I call it the purple berry bush.

She reduced its size with the long shears, by snipping off the tips of the branches.  This will result in many more berries for the birds to feast on in January.

 Rose of Sharon

 Butterfly bushes

 Spriea

 Rose bushes, were all on her list to prune that day.

 And so we did too,

strengthening the plants.

 I started pruning my shrubs late in March.  This is one of my Knockout Rose bushes.

 You can see that it is already pushing out new strong growth.

 A Spirea which I severely trimmed back is now covered with new leaves.

 White Hydrangeas are putting out many new leaves.

These shoots are coming off of stems that I just pushed into moist soil in a plastic pot and kept them  in the shade and wet last summer.

 Another white hydrangea that is coming back after pruning

 This is an Oak Leaf hydrangea that I cut way back

 because it was covering up a clump of white Bleeding Hearts.

During the winter I go outside and clip sleeping branches of Japonica and Forsythia to force bloom.  This month,  I brought them outside hoping to see roots develop later on in the summer.  Then I will plant them directly in the soil.

Nissequogue Farm (Ogden's Nursery) is located at

 650 North Country Road, St. James, NY  (631) 473-5064,

Visit her website: www.ogdens.com/calendar for future seminar dates.