September in the Northern Hemisphere

[Mariette]

In my garden, this is the month of cyclamen and colchicums.

This is one of my darkest Cyclamen hederifolium.



The brightest flowers from a distance are the white and the rosy red ones.



Some grow to a rather big size - when the leaves are developed, this one covers a diameter of more than 40 cm.



Together with Colchicum woronowii.



Colchicum ´Neptun´

[Mariette]

Colchicum ´Poseidon´ with small additional tepal.



This one I got as Colchicum laetum hort., in Britain it´s called ´Pink Star´, I think.





Arum consanguineum

[Pauli]

Fine selection!

[Robert]

Hi Mariette,

Thank you for sharing the photographs from your garden! The plants pictured look great. It seems you are able to accomplish a great deal under less than ideal gardening conditions.

Currently, our weather is hot, 97 F, (36.1 C). These are some of warmest (but not the warmest) temperatures we have experienced this “summer” season. This summer was much cooler than what we have experienced in recent years (over 10 years since we have had a cool summer – I’ll be doing the numbers at the end of September).

In our Interior California garden, our early blooming Colchicum “species” have finished blooming and the next wave of “species” with much smaller flowers are blooming. I have no idea what types grow in our garden. The labels are long gone and some are likely hybrids. They look great and do well in our garden. This is the important part for me.

Cyclamen hederifolium is blooming throughout our garden now. Cyclamen graecum grows well in our garden but blooms earlier. I moved many of these this summer to a new location. It was too shady! The flowers and foliage became very leggy and the plants looked terrible. I moved them to a new location with much more sun. We missed the flowers, however the new growth now looks great. This species has such fine foliage. It is perfect for our garden.

These are some recent photographs from our garden. Absolutely nothing special, but I would not garden without them and they thrive in our hot, dry climate.



I enjoy growing, and breeding, tall single Dahlia coccinea hybrids. They hate our dry heat, but they do bloom all summer if the weather does not get too hot. I am breeding for greater heat tolerance. Progress is being made. I am so happy to be working on this project again.



Cotton thrives in our dry heat. Pictured is Gossypium barbadense ‘Sea Island’. This is a brown cotton variety. We also grow a green cotton variety.



The pink flowers buds are also very attractive.



I noticed a somatic mutation on one of our Tithonia rotundifolia plants a number of years ago. We will see where this mutation leads. Each generation I select for yellow and orange flowers.

Tithonia rotundifolia thrives in our hot, dry climate. They provide a great deal of color during the summer, and attract pollinators – including butterflies.



These F2 Zephyranthes mesochloa hybrids bloom off and on late summer into the autumn. This is the most prolific blooming selection so far, blooming much more than other types and colors of the Zephyranthes group in our garden. They are good bonus to our garden.

[Rick R.]

Colchicum x agrippinum - Pic from last week.


And I bought several more bulbs.


And a C. speciosum type, just coming up now.


Claytonia virginica tubers.

[Mariette]

It´s good to see that colchicums do well in Your part of the world, too, Rick! Claytonia virginica is certainly more attractive than C. perfoliata, a common weed here.

Thank You, Pauli and Robert, for Your kind comments!

 Robert, Your cotton has very attractive flowers, for which I tried to grow Okra ´Red Burgandy´ as well as for its fruits. As it proved a failure here, cotton will likely be one, too.

[Rick R.]

i don't find that the Claytonia virginica tubers are very tasty, but the greens and flowers make nice additions to salads.

[Robert]

Rick,

It is amazing that many Colchicums are extremely adaptable to a wide range of climatic conditions. There are many Claytonia species native to our part of California, both annual and perennial species. Some are very ornamental – at least to my eyes. Claytonia perfoliata ssp. perfoliata is native on our El Dorado County farm property. It has also found its way to our Sacramento mini-farm. It taste good, however I rarely eat it.

Mariette,

Cotton works for us – it loves the heat. I have had success growing Okra too, especially on our El Dorado County farm. It likes heat. Our growing conditions are closer to those of Fermi. It only makes sense to grow plant species that thrive in our climate. Many plants used in Northern European gardens do not work for us. Maybe like Fermi, some might be curious about the plants we grow and how we use them.

We had our first measurable precipitation of the season on 19 September. Before this, the last measurable precipitation was on 13 May. 4 months of no precipitation for our part of California during the summer is typical.

 

Colchicum corsicum is blooming now. We have had mixed success with this species in the open garden. These plants set plenty of seed. Some time in the future I will grow more seedlings on to trial in other parts of our garden.

 

This Colchicum moves around our garden. The labels are long gone. I have no idea what it might be. I am fine with this. It works well in our garden. This is the important part.

 

This Cyclamen graecum recovered well from being in too much shade. It even produced a few more flowers. Cyclamen graecum is easy in our garden and requires no special attention.

 

Cyclamen hederifolium is blooming throughout our garden.

 

This Cucurbita pepo has minimal powdery mildew and NO mosaic virus symptoms. By this time of year, in most area gardens this variety has died due to mosaic virus. This is an example of how good seed saving techniques pay off and are extremely important. We follow these techniques with all the seed we produce –food crops and ornamentals.

[Robert]

This trial bed of 2 Brassica oleracea varieties are grown with 100% farm based compost. Nothing more. The fertility comes from the soil and the activity of bacteria, microbes, and other soil life in our soil.  Over a period of 5 decades we turned our nutrient poor, rock hard, poorly draining, kaolinite clay soil on our El Dorado County farm into extremely productive, fertile soil. I am looking forward to reading Eliot Coleman’s new book: The Self-fed Farm and Garden. These are the general techniques we use in our garden and farm. The details for our situation we have worked out ourselves.



Here is a selection of plants from our Sacramento garden:

I grew these Aquilegia barnebyi from seed purchased from Alan Bradshaw (Alplains). They are very different form other forms of Aquilegia barnebyi I have grown in the past. They are much more compact in growth, some tiny. They thrive in our garden. I look forward to working more with this selection.

 


I conducted trials with various accessions of Symphyotrichum spathulatum var. spathulatum I made recently and some from 10-15 years ago. This is one of the newer accessions. They are still not of blooming age, however they are growing extremely well.

 


This is one of the best selections of Eriophyllum lanatum var. integrifolia from this year’s trials. It has a nice compact growth habit and very attractive foliage. There were some flowers this season. I am looking forward to more flowers next spring-summer.

 

This selection of Diplacus aurantiacus still has a flower or two in late September.
Cultivation of Diplacus auranticacus and hybrids is nothing new in our part of Interior California. I still enjoy growing them and enjoy attempting to make a good plant even better.