Organic Gardening

If you’ve ever seen pinks (dianthus) spreading its charming gray green leaf tones and giddy little fringed and fragrant flowers through the Cape Cod cemeteries and along the roadside, you’ll know you must have them on your own home property. What a variety of dianthus are yours for the growing.

White, pink and mauve flowers with fringed and tangled petals —fragrant always. These long-lasting lovely little harbingers of early summer are utterly irresistible.

Consider the area where you’d like to naturalize dianthus. They need full sun, will hold their own in field grass if given a good start. They like light sandy soil but will thrive in poor soil if it is on the sandy side, not clay. When you have selected a possible area for your project, buy a few plants and set them out and see what they do the next year. This we did in a part of our meadow where the black-eyed susans and daisies grow. The few plants thrived so we started our project. (more…)

Producing your own hybrids can be profitable. Your first step will be to take pollen from one flower and place it on the stigma of another. The best time is when the blossom has been expanded at least 3 days. The pollinated flower will drop off, and you will notice the formation of a half-sphere—this is the seed capsule, within the calyx. Seeds ripen in 6 to 8 weeks when the capsule splits. Clip the capsule to keep the seeds from falling onto the soil. Remove and store in a cool dry place. Vitality of seeds diminishes with age.

There are endless possibilities in gloxinia hybridization. Most of the species will cross successfully with hybrid forms. And since the species have a richness and flexibility of foliage that is lacking in modern forms, they should be good material for you to use in your hybridizing program.

Should some of your hybrids impress you and your customers as really choice, you may want to work on the strain. Do it by self-pollinating the plants or by pollinating the hybrids with one of the parents, depending on which trait you wish to encourage and enlarge upon. (more…)

The hay-scented fern (Dennstaedtia punctilobula, 2-3 ft.) is found in sunny openings in rocky woods where its light green lacy fronds grow in dense masses. It spreads madly, and even when transplanted produces new fronds from underground runners all season. The fronds taper gradually at the tip. When cut, crushed, or dried, the foliage gives off a wonderful sun-on-the-meadow scent.

Interrupted-fern (Osmunda claytoniana, 4 ft.) is very like the cinnamon fern but the identifying feature is its freedom from tuft at the base of the pinnae. On the sporophyll the orderly march of pinnae up the stem is interrupted by a section of twisted curled dark brown spore cases—a most interesting feature and, of course, the reason for its name. Very hardy, very easy, very beautiful.

The lady fern (Athyrium filisfemina, or Asplenium filis-femina, 3 ft.) though delicate to look upon, is tough, and a rank grower. By fall it becomes raggedy and loses its color, but all summer its soft green fronds and feathery look make it a must. The curved fruit dots are one of its identifying features;
also, the pinnae increase in length sharply from the tip of the frond to the base, giving it a triangular look.

Maidenhair fern (Adiantum pedatum, 1-3 ft.) is a delicate, lovely species that grows in rich moist leafy soil. It will be content in a rocky, well-drained location, especially on a steep bank. In the spring the fronds uncurl in small wiry button¬hook designs of a deep magenta color. These fronds open into a sort of semi-circle pattern. The whole effect of the plant suggests, in color and texture, wild columbine, or meadow rue. This is the fern that dances. The fluttering delicate pinnae are ever in motion, so susceptible are they to every breeze. New fronds constantly emerging from the running rootstock produce fresh green foliage from April to September. This is one of the most beautiful of all ferns in its swirling patterns, its rhythms, and dancing grace.
The marsh fern (Dryopteris thelypteris, 2 ft.) grows under the speckled alders, or perhaps you’ll find some plants in a sunny bog among the cattails, facing their fronds helter skelter in any old direction. This is a rampant grower. Its lower pinnate are very long, and the pinnules of the sporophyll appear pointed because of reflexed edges.

The New York fern (Dryopteris noveboracensis, 1-2 ft.), though related to the marsh fern, is different in that the fronds taper at both ends. New Yorkers are said to burn their candles at both ends, hence its name! The fronds, thin in texture, grow erect and are arranged in parallel ranks facing the light. Stems are smooth and scale-free. What a pleasant odor the fern emits when crushed, and what a fine ground-cover it creates, multiplying and spreading rapidly. Look for the fruit dots on the margins of the pinnules. (more…)

The joys and adventures of growing ferns are countless. Being perennial they return year after year. Many ferns thrive in dense shade where few other plants will live. Some are evergreen. Most are easy to grow, requiring literally no care and upkeep. Ferns multiply rapidly, remain lovely all summer, seldom are seriously bothered by insects or diseases. The appeal of a fern lies in the exquisite beauty of its form, texture, and its various shades of subtle foliage color. Incidentally where you have ferns you will also have birds: the furry down that covers the young fern fronds makes ideal nesting material.

If you have but three trees and a little shade, ferns will convert this to a real woods setting, small in scale perhaps, but genuine in feel and atmosphere. Whatever small wooded area they grace, ferns seem to enlarge it. They even bring the feel of woods where no woods exist at all, as when planted on the north side of a wall, in the lea of a building, or in any protected shady place.

What’s more, you can dig almost any fern you need from the wild; few species are on conservation lists. (Check first, just to be sure.) (more…)

We have a real ?primrose path,” with lots and lots of primroses! Although at first you may feel that any large tended planting is incompatible with my constant emphasis on carefree gardening, you’ll soon know it is not. That’s chiefly because primroses are so easy and obliging.

At any rate, it all began one recent April—with spring fever in the air, warmth penetrating the soil, and three delightful primrose plants in a grocery store window. Large and lush and yellow they were as they caught the sunlight that golden morning. It was one of those days when anything could happen and all of it good—but how could I have anticipated where just three primroses would lead?

They traveled home, packed carefully among the butter and carrots and chile sauce. The groceries disappeared in due course. But by the second season those three primroses, planted informally in the wooded area along our brook, had doubled their size and number of blooms. Obviously they liked their environment. In England the hedgerows glow with primroses which receive only ordinary care. Why not have an “English Woods” on our Connecticut acres, with not dozens but hundreds—maybe someday even thousands—of primroses running riot in sweeps, in clusters, and with utter abandon? Why not indeed? (more…)

Instead of growing our daffodils and other spring-flowering bulbs formally-in beds and borders-we naturalize them.

This reduces care to almost nothing. What a pleasure just to plant, knowing that with most of the bulbs no further work is needed!

For the greatest effectiveness we grow these naturalized bulbs in broad sweeps. You don’t need a great deal of land to do this. A drift of a few dozen in a small area will be comparable, in its own way, to a great mass of bulbs.

The method is important: Plant bulbs fairly close together and not in symmetrical rows, but informally, casually. One way to do this is to scatter bulbs on the ground and plant each one where it falls. Of course you will always want to have three or five bulbs of a certain variety in front of an old stump or lichened boulder for a specific effect, but in general you should think in terms of large numbers. (more…)

About a half-century ago Reginald Farrar discovered the butterfly bush or buddleia in Kansu, China. Every June this delightful shrub becomes a purple waterfall of fragrant flowers.

Prune immediately after flowering or by picking the blossom sprays for the house. Plant in a rich, well-drained soil, and sunny location. While the blooms open in profusion in June they also continue the rest of the summer. They attract myriads of butterflies, especially in late autumn, hence the name.

Spirea is another “immigrant” from the Himalayas. From English gardens comes the variety Spirea arguta, the garland spirea, a foolproof hardy sort. Give sun, rich loam, moist location, and in June it is transformed to a tumbling mass of white flowers. The mahogany red seed pods in July are equally attractive. A wicked young woman so beguiled St. Peter with several sprays of meadowsweet, so runs the tale, that he inadvertently let her slip into heaven. Spirea was also a Middle Ages “strewing herb,” and Queen Elizabeth’s favorite. With this they “strewed her chambers withal.”

The Rose of Sharon, originally from Syria, suggests the great hibiscus flowers of the tropics. (more…)

Gloxinias grow best in porous soil. I use equal parts of leafmold or peatmoss and sandy soil with a 6-inch pot of processed cow or sheep manure for each bushel. Before planting, soak tubersin a 1-200 solution of Carco-X or other fungicide. Apply the same solution to the potting soil of tubers, cuttings, seedlings or seed, and wait about two days before planting. Subsequent applications direct to moistened soil in the pots of growing gloxinias will keep them free of common troubles.
Start fertilizing as soon as you see flower buds, and continue at biweekly intervals until the plant reaches its peak of bloom. Use a fertilizer which contains the minor or trace elements (boron, manganese, etc.). If these are not present in the brand you are using, switch to another, or buy packaged trace elements and apply them in conjunction with the major-element fertilizer.

Light and Water For Gloxinias

Plenty of light is essential but avoid direct sunshine which burns leaves and wilts flowers. On the shaded top deck in the greenhouse, where I grow most of my gloxinias, they receive on a summer day about 2000 foot-candles of light at 12:30 P.M. Plants raised in poor light tend to grow too tall and are slow to bud.
Gloxinias grown under constant water level, that is, where the soil is always kept moist, bud much faster than those wa¬tered only when the soil obviously needs it. (more…)

Edna Roberts in Maine started her greenhouse-for-profit in a glassed-in chicken coop, but now she is the owner of a whole range of greenhouses! Since the African violets she raised in her makeshift house were good enough to win prizes, she decided to sell some of them. Now she stocks the very latest as well as “the best of the older varieties.” Florists in nearby towns use her as their source of supply. The important thing is that she first made a success of a small greenhouse, and then went on to larger and more profitable ones.

African Violets and Orchids
George Wissell of Cedar Rapids, Iowa, has a 10- by 10-foot affair, built for approximately $350.00. He grows only African violets and orchids. The orchids hang from the roof to obtain more light and to help shade the African violets. Two double-shelved benches are at the sides of the house. Fluorescent lights under the first bench adequately light the plants growing on the lower bench, which is about 6 inches above the floor.

In such small quarters, Mr. Wissell does an excellent job of hybridizing and growing. All the plants, except those kept for hybridizing, are sold to local stores or hobbyists. This constant profit promotes his hybridization in a big way. (more…)

Making A Peaceful Place In Your Garden

You should arrange at least some part of your limited “man-made landscape” to provide an area where you can rest and think, a peaceful observation point. I prefer a natural “planted” space instead of the old-fashioned gazebo garden-house structure. Though we all want some gay flowers and brilliant sunshine, we also need the seclusion of a quiet area, a cool reflective private spot. Here you will almost taste the freshness of the air you breathe. You can listen to the mourning doves, and the phoebe—the wind rustling the maple leaves. Smell the warm dry scent of summer, the fragrance of the lilac drifting on the breeze.

Our own private retreat is a cool shady spot—a hillside above the brook. A hillside and a brook are, of course, not essential. They just happened to be there for us.
Bulldozed level, this terrace hideaway is twenty feet long and fourteen wide. Two spreading maples provide shade. We made a small retaining wall about two stones high (three in some places) to hold back the bank on one side, and hold the land up on the other side. A rope hammock is attached at one end to a cedar post, set for the purpose, and at the other end to one of the maples. (more…)