Butterflies have been busy

Pipevine swallowtail larvae on aristolochia

We know it’s hard for some folks to wrap their mind around being excited when insects eat your plants, but that’s how nature works.  In the best scenario, the insect eating the plant is as beautiful or more so than the plant their eating.  I just snapped this photo of the larvae of the Pipevine Swallowtail devouring all of our aristolochia (pipevines) in the garden.  This actually doesn’t harm the plants, and before long, your garden will be filled with these beautiful butterflies below.  No spraying, please. See the top 25 flowers that attract butterflies here.

Lantana camara Star Landing with butterfly (62966)A pipevine swallowtail enjoying a lantana nectar snack here at Juniper Level.

 

2011 Plant Delights Nursery July Newsletter

It’s been great to connect with so many folks as they discover our Facebook site, although we have a long way to go to catch up with mail order nurseries that have been using it for several years. Facebook allows us to share images and tidbits about cool plants that may look great between newsletters and open houses. It also allows us to promote special events and pass along news that pops up too quickly to mention in our monthly e-newsletters We’ve posted some great agave (century plant) photos there that aren’t to be missed. Visit our Facebook Page!

Last week was a real treat when a bus load of fern fanatics from the Hardy Fern Foundation and British Fern Society descended on Plant Delights. It was great to spend over 5 hours talking about and looking at ferns with a bunch of pteridomaniacs. You can read more about the folks that visited and see photos on our Facebook page at Visit our Facebook Page!

Next on the Plant Delights schedule of events is our Summer Open Nursery and Garden which starts this Friday. The dates are July 8-10 and 15-17. Visitor Page Our final agave to bloom this season, Agave ‘Silver Surfer’, will be in flower for Summer Open House…should be opening any day…don’t miss the chance to see it in person!

Summer is an amazing time in the garden with the maximum number of plants in growth, but it’s like pulling teeth to get folks to visit this time of year…we hope you will be the exception. In conjunction with this year’s Summer Open House, we will be hosting members of the Southeast Palm Society on Saturday July 9. In the morning, the group will be meeting at the garden of local member CJ Dykes and will be visiting Plant Delights after lunch. Hopefully, you can attend the entire event, but if you can’t make it for the morning part, you can still chat with other palmophiles here in the afternoon. You can find out more on the palm meeting by clicking here

Speaking of the gardens here at PDN, we are looking for some extra garden help this summer…a 40 hour/week position that will last from now until at least October. Duties include typical garden work like mulching, planting, weeding, watering, etc. If you’re interested, please email Heather at heather@plantdelights.com. Yes, it’s hard physical work, but the chance to learn a huge number of new plants is hopefully enticing.

Due to the overwhelming demand for our spring propagation class, we have added another section for Saturday August 20. If the past is any predictor, this will sell out as well, so be sure to register soon, either on our website or call the office at 919-772-4794.

Have you ever wondered why a plant died even though the catalog listed it as winter hardy in your zone? Undoubtedly, there are some catalog errors in zoning, but blaming all failures on improper zoning often keeps us from discovering the real problem, which may take more study. The rating of a plant’s winter hardiness indicates that the plant can, under the proper conditions, survive these temperatures…not that it necessarily will survive.

We’ve written quite a bit about winter survival of marginally hardy plants, and I’d like to share some additional recent observations. Through the years, I would notice a plant that would survive in one part of the garden, while the same type of plant would die only a short distance away. We’ve all heard of microclimates in the garden, where one area stays warmer than another, but in most cases we didn’t observe that to be the distinguishing factor. What we observed was that survival of marginal plants was always better when they were growing near a larger shrub or tree. This indicated to us that winter survivability was actually tied more to soil moisture than microclimates. We’ve stressed for years the importance of well-drained soils, but since our soils here at PDN are sandy loam, there had to be something more at work.

To confirm our theory, last spring we installed a new replicated planting of some new, marginally hardy lantanas. One row was planted just on the south side of a hedge of Ilex ‘Nellie Stevens’, while the other was planted 75′ away in the open garden. Drainage was equal in both sites and neither had a microclimate advantage over the other. After a winter low of 14F, which included several weeks of alternating cold, wet and frozen ground, we got some great results. In the row by the hollies, 14 of 16 lantanas survived with 12 of the 14 growing vigorously and flowering. In the open row, only 5 of 16 survived, with just 2 growing vigorously and flowering. If we had experienced a dry winter, we would have undoubtedly seen a less dramatic difference. We have previously noticed similar results in the garden with marginal salvias and agaves, but without a replicated trial, we were just guessing.

In using this information to help you better site marginally hardy full sun plants, it is important to locate them far enough away from the shrub/tree that the sun will not be obscured, but close enough that the roots keep the soil dry. This will take some experimentation such as sticking a shovel in the ground outside the drip line and continue moving outward until you see the soil moisture change…best done after a heavy rain or irrigation. I hope this helps you to better site marginal plants in your garden and consequently have better success.

In the nursery, we discovered last month that a couple dozen Mukdenia rossii were shipped out instead of the proper Mukdenia rossii ‘Karasuba’. Due to a liner supplier mix-up, we didn’t catch this until the plants had matured. If you ordered a Mukdenia ‘Karasuba’ and it doesn’t color up red when the weather cools, give us a call and we’ll get you the correct plants or a credit/refund.

On June 30, the historic Garfield Park Conservatory in Chicago found itself in the path of a devastating hailstorm that knocked out over half of the glass panes in their greenhouses. Fortunately, no one was injured in the disaster. Cleanup is underway and will be followed by the search for funds to replace said glass. You can follow this link for some amazing images as well as to donate for the repairs.

http://www.garfield-conservatory.org/
Through the years, many of you may have purchased plants with a tag that read “Athens Select”, based on the trials and recommendations of University of Georgia Professor Dr. Allan Armitage. With Allan’s recent retirement, the program also finds itself shutting down. We’d like to personally thank Allan for his tireless work promoting great garden plants.

The latest in a series of recession-era nursery collapses is the 475 acre Nurseryman’s Exchange of Half Moon Bay, California…a large wholesaler ($62.7 million) of indoor plants to box stores including Home Depot, Wal-Mart, Sam’s Club, Safeway and Trader Joe’s. With over 2.5 million square feet of greenhouse space and nearly 10x that much in debt ($24.5 million), Nurseryman’s Exchange has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and is up for auction sale on July 13…get your money ready.

The mail order nursery industry lost a stalwart this month with the passing of Jan Ohms, 85. Jan was a fourth generation from a Dutch bulb growing family and a graduate of the University of Connecticut, where he majored in horticulture and landscape architecture. Jan was the owner of John Scheepers (retail) and Van Engelen (wholesale), both catalogers of Dutch bulbs. Jan purchased Van Engelen in the mid-1970s and John Scheepers from his uncle John Scheepers in 1991. In 1995, Dutch tulip breeders Konijnenburg & Mark named a red tulip after Jan Ohms in recognition of his efforts to promote Dutch bulbs. Jan is survived by his wife, Faith.

Horticulture near the nation’s capital took a hit last week with the death of Don Riddle, 62, the founder of the well-known Homestead Gardens. Riddle was found dead on his boat, the victim of an apparent suicide. Riddle founded Homestead Gardens in 1973 in the town of Davidsonville, Maryland, and started a nearby wholesale growing operation in 1985 that covered over 250 acres. In 2010, Don opened to a second location in Severna Park. Homestead was named US garden center of the year in 2004 by the Garden Centers of America and Nursery Retailer of the Year in 2008 by Nursery Retailer Magazine. Don was also honored by the Garden Center of America with its Lifetime Achievement Award in 2008.

Friends who knew Don tell me he lived large and spent large, living up to the public image that he had created. That trait left many industry folks scratching their heads when he started a multi-million dollar expansion in the midst of the recession. Friends suggest those financial decisions may have been a tipping point in Don’s life, along with the death of his father in January. Don spent much of the last decade serving on an array of boards in a number of nursery industry societies…a track that I have personally watched ruin many horticultural businesses. At the time of his death, Don was the First Vice-Chairman of the American Horticulture Society. Don is survived by his wife Laura, son Brian, daughter Quinn, mother Evelyn, and brother Gerald. We wish Don’s family and the Homestead staff the best in keeping the nursery and garden center afloat.

After my mention of Team Backyard Bow Pro, I got a note from Ramon Bell of the NC Bowhunters Association (NCBA), which provides a similar service…so let the deer hunting begin. You can find out more at www.ncbowhunter.com

We’d like to share a great opportunity for the right person at Peckerwood Gardens of Hempstead, Texas. John Fairey, the founder of both Peckerwood Gardens and Yucca Do Nursery is looking for a new garden manager, since current garden manager, Chris Camacho will be leaving to move closer to his family. The position entails the overall management and care of the approximately 10 acres under cultivation at Peckerwood Garden. It entails supervising watering, pruning, organic fertilizing and pest control, open days program and private tours, working with volunteers, propagation and small nursery operations, and accessioning plants. It includes the opportunity to be involved with plant exploration when travel conditions improve in Mexico, and to learn an overwhelming palette of plants and the history of their introduction to this country. To find out more, you can email Peckerwood at info@peckerwoodgarden.org

The Public Television show “In The Garden with Bryce Lane” filmed a segment at PDN last week. The segment is scheduled to air on September 10, 2011. You can find a schedule in your area or watch on line at http://www.unctv.org/inthegarden/

Remember that you can now follow the Top 25 Best Sellers live at http://www.plantdelights.com/top25.asp

Enjoy

-tony

2006 Plant Delights Nursery October Newsletter

It’s starting out to be a great fall at PDN. It’s actually hard to believe that it’s already fall…especially since we still haven’t seen those major hurricanes that we’ve been promised! Not only has the weather been superb, but fall has brought out garden visitors en mass. We just finished the best attended fall open house in our history, followed by a wonderful visit from participants at the 30th Anniversary J.C. Raulston Arboretum Symposium. It was great to have so many folks visiting for the first time and seeing others returning for the first time in a decade. We would like to personally thank everyone who took time out of their busy schedules to attend either of these events.

We’d also like to welcome a great new crop of PDN volunteers. Our volunteer program, which started in 2003, has swelled to 12 people, including some that have been here since our program began. Volunteers spend their time helping in either the botanic garden or research divisions. In exchange for their invaluable hard work, they not only go home with excess plants and knowledge, but know that they have contributed to making the gardens even better for the next group of visitors. It is our hope that in the next few years we’ll begin laying the groundwork for a foundation and friends group to assist in the eventual transition of Juniper Level Botanic Gardens to a public garden (hopefully a long time from now). We’ll keep you posted.

From the nursery end, we have a couple of plant snafues to report regarding plants shipped early in the year as Hemerocallis multiflora. Due to a vendor error, the plants that we shipped are Hemerocallis fulva instead of the plant pictured in our catalog, which also turned out not to be H. multiflora. We got the original plant from China and thought we had it identified correctly…guess not. The plant we pictured is now most likely an exceptional form of H. citrina. Also, we had a few of the Echinacea ‘Sunset’ to flower with distorted petals. If you have Hemerocallis multiflora and your plant flowered orange, or an Echinacea ‘Sunset’ with distorted petals, simply contact our Customer Service Department at office@plantdelights.com for a credit or refund. Please accept our apologies for this error.

We’ve made quite a few production changes that have helped us produce even better plants for the upcoming season. Due to our hot summers, we have very high losses on some plants that do not fare well in containers. This year, we switched many of our production houses to a new silver reflective shade cloth… the one that many open house visitors asked about. This has made a huge difference in over-summering plants such as hellebores. Where we lost virtually our entire crop in 2005, this year was the exact opposite due to the new reflective shade. I think you are going to be amazed when you attend our winter open house in February.

In the jobs department, we have an opening and are looking to fill our Propagation/Production Supervisor position with a very special person. This is the person who propagates and overseas the potting of every plant that we sell, so it goes without saying that this is a very important position. If you have an interest in learning more or to forward an application, please email Heather Brameyer in our HR Department at heather@plantdelights.com.

Last month, I talked about some of the plants in flower this fall, but I didn’t have time to write about all the ones I wanted to mention, so here’s a little follow-up.

Fall is certainly the season for salvia… especially the S. greggii and S. microphylla types. These desert salvias simply love the cooler nights and begin to flower equally or better than they do in spring. The range of colors is from reds through to whites. If blue is your color, then Salvia guaranitica is your plant. S. guaranitica ‘Argentina Skies’ (light blue) and Salvia guaranitica ‘Black and Blue’ (dark cobalt blue) are both still in full flower. Need lavender?…no problem, the range of Salvia leucantha cultivars are ready and flowering. If yellow is your color, Salvia madrensis ‘Red Neck Girl’ is just what the doctor ordered. The huge spikes of butter yellow will be opening shortly. If this is too tall, Salvia nipponica and Salvia koyamae are woodland groundcover salvias…very cool.

One of my favorite groups of the fall garden is the hardy gesneriads (African Violet cousins). For purples, try the colorful achimenes with their pansy-like flowers. If orange is your color, the continuous-flowering Sinningia sellovii is just waiting for the hummingbirds… birds not included in the shipment. If you like your plants a little on the bright and gaudy side, the brilliantly stunning Gloxinia ‘Evita’ is one of those plants that you just have to see to believe – just ask anyone who has attended our fall open house. For a little more demure shade of red, Gloxinia ‘Chic’ is just perfect. One last favorite gesneriad is the breathtakingly beautiful Titanotrichum oldhammii with its long tubular yellow flowers highlighted by an orange-red throat.

While many of the hardy hibiscus are still producing a few scattered flowers, several other mallows are still in full swing. The US native, Malvaviscus drummondii with its unusual reddish-orange turban-like flowers is a hummingbirds’ delight. Another great native mallow for fall is Pavonia lasiopetala. The small but bright pink flowers are a welcome addition to the fall garden.

I mentioned a bit about hummingbirds, but this is a great time to think about plants that will entertain and feed hummers as they pass through your garden. If you garden in the South and you don’t grow cestrums, why not? Few plants provide the duration of color and look splendid as we head further into fall. Think big yellow and orange mounds of color! Another hummer favorite is manettia or firecracker vine. This amazing non-intrusive vine doesn’t really get going until late summer and fall, when it becomes a feast for hummers and gardeners who like bright orange flowers. More hummer food… how about Cuphea micropetala? Think flowers that look like miniature cigars. Your hummers won’t mind this smoking section. Finally… I promise, another hummer favorite is Bouvardia ternifolia. The brilliant tubular flowers on this Mexican native just scream for the hummers. If you plant all the aforementioned plants together, you’ll need body armor to get near the bed to tend the flowers.

What else is blooming now? Plenty! Lantanas are at their peak, as is one of the late Elizabeth Lawrence’s favorites, Kalimeris pinnatifida … both, virtual flowering machines.

If you’ve got shade, we’ve even got fall flowers for you. The easy-to-grow hardy Cyclamen hederifolium is in full flower throughout the woodland, as is the stunning pink Begonia grandis ‘Herons Pirouette’. How could we talk about fall shade gardens without mentioning the wonderful Tricyrtis ? …many of which are currently in full flower, with flower colors from purple to yellow. I’ll end with one of the least known, but most spectacular fall woodland plants that we grow, the underappreciated Rabdosia longituba …won’t you please adopt one today?

There’s so much more that I don’t have time to mention, from solidago to aster, and from polygonum to costus. While some of you in the northern zones have already closed down your planting for the year, much of the rest of the country is still in full fall planting mode. We’ll let you continue to browse and hope you’re enjoying your fall garden as much as we are.

While I’d love to join you in the garden, it’s that time of year when the staff locks me away to begin writing the 2007 Plant Delights Nursery catalog. You’d be amazed how well solitary confinement works to stimulate the creative juices and make the imagination run wild… quite similar to too many shots of an adult beverage. Surely, you didn’t think a sane person writes this catalog? As always, there are many cool new plants in the pipeline… just waiting for the 2007 catalog to hit the presses.

For those who entered our Top 25 Contest, be sure to check out how your favorite plants are selling. There was some minor shuffling in the Top 25, but the only new entry was Selaginella braunii that nearly cracked The top 25, by rising to #27. Only a few more months remain before we announce the winner of our Top 25 contest… we hope your picks are measuring up. If not, you’d better get your gardening friends busy!

Please direct all replies and questions to office@plantdelights.com

Thanks and enjoy,

-tony

2001 Plant Delights Nursery December Newsletter

It’s December, which means only a few more weeks remain before the new 2002 Plant Delights Nursery Catalog will hit the mail. All of the plants have been selected, the text has been written, and the photographs have been selected. Now, all that remains is to finish putting everything into a publishable format. David Lee, our master graphic arts designer/shipping manager is spending nights and weekends putting this all together.

Over 150 new plants and over 700 color photographs grace the pages of the upcoming 2002 catalog, expanded from 96 to 116 pages. We hope to have good stock on all items, although anticipating demand for a new plant is anything but an exact science.

We have essentially stopped shipping plants for 2001, unless we are apprized of a horticulture emergency to which we could respond. Newly arriving orders will be scheduled for spring 2002 shipment. Remember, there are still gift certificates. If you’re tired of getting new ties, socks, or more golf balls than you could possibly lose, you could always drop a hint for a Plant Delights Nursery Gift Certificate. A simple call to our Customer Service folks at 919.772.4794 gets one on the way, so you’ll be ready when the new catalog arrives.

From the staff at Plant Delights, we hope you have a great Holiday Season and we hope to hear from you when the new catalog arrives. God Bless America!

Final 2001 Top 20 sellers as of 12/01

1 ‘Colocasia Black Magic’
2 Muhlenbergia capillaris
3 Colocasia antiquorum ‘Illustris’
4 Salvia leucantha ‘Santa Barbara’ PPAF
5 Lobelia ‘Cotton Candy’
6 Gaura ‘Pink Cloud’
7 Tanacetum vulgare ‘Isla Gold’
8 Athyrium filix-femina ‘Frizelliae’
9 Veronica ‘Royal Candles’ PPAF
10 Athyrium ‘Ghost’
11 Lantana ‘Miss Huff’
12 Dicliptera suberecta
13 Lilium formosanum
14 Hosta plantaginea
15 Vinca minor ‘Illumination’
16 Verbena ‘Snowflurry’
17 Tradescantia ‘Sweet Kate’
18 Sedum ‘Purple Emperor’ 19 Veronica prostrata ‘Aztec Gold ‘ (formerly V. ‘Buttercup’ PPAF)
20 Physostegia virginiana ‘Miss Manners’ PPAF
21 Coreopsis ‘Sweet Dreams’ PPAF
22 Yucca rostrata
23 Lamium maculatum ‘Anne Greenway’
24 Brunnera macrophylla ‘Jack Frost’ PPAF
25 Alstroemeria ‘Freedom’ PP 9,393

-tony

2001 Plant Delights Nursery October Newsletter

It’s hard to believe, but the year is coming to a close…and without a hurricane to hit the US! Fall has been beautiful and consequently lots of folks have been planting in their gardens. Frankly, with all that’s gone on in the world this fall, the garden is truly the place to be. I can easily remember back to the “good old days” when we didn’t know a Taliban from a telephone.

The change in consumer purchasing habits due to the terrorist disaster has had tremendous effects on our industry with many small nurseries folding up shop, while major players such as Burpee went in to Chapter 11 bankruptcy. I cannot emphasize enough…patronize your favorite nurseries, be they local or mail order. Many small and some larger nurseries simply cannot endure income slow downs, particularly in the fall and winter.

We are already looking forward to a big spring, and our greenhouses are nearly fully stocked. Stocked that is with a dizzying array of wonderful new plants. We are working nearly round-the-clock on the 2002 catalog as we finish writing the descriptions and begin the tedious process of selecting photographs.

Several of our staff has just returned from the wonderful Southern Plant Conference in Athens, GA. With seventeen of the top plantsmen in the country as speakers, this was one of the most intense and fun conferences that I’ve ever attended. Held every two years, the next SPC will be held in Charleston in fall 2003.

This has also has been a great fall for chocolate! The specialty chocolate as well as the home-made chocolate chip cookies have been superb…keep ’em coming! Okay, it’s time to get back to the catalog and for you to get back to your garden. See you soon.

Our top selling plants for the season as of October 15, 2001

1 ‘Colocasia Black Magic’
2 Colocasia antiquorum ‘Illustris’
3 Muhlenbergia capillaris
4 Salvia leucantha ‘Santa Barbara’ PPAF
5 Lobelia ‘Cotton Candy’
6 Gaura ‘Pink Cloud’
7 Tanacetum vulgare ‘Isla Gold’
8 Athyrium filix-femina ‘Frizelliae’
9 Veronica ‘Royal Candles’ PPAF
10 Athyrium ‘Ghost’
11 Lantana ‘Miss Huff’
12 Dicliptera suberecta
13 Lilium formosanum
14 Vinca minor ‘Illumination’
15 Verbena ‘Snowflurry’
16 Tradescantia ‘Sweet Kate’
17 Sedum ‘Purple Emperor’
18 Physostegia virginiana ‘Miss Manners’ PPAF
19 Lamium maculatum ‘Anne Greenway’
20 Veronica prostrata ‘Buttercup’ PPAF
21 Brunnera macrophylla ‘Jack Frost’ PPAF
22 Salvia chamaedryoides
23 Hosta plantaginea
24 Alstroemeria ‘Freedom’ PP 9,393

-tony

2001 Plant Delights Nursery August Newsletter

I hope everyone now has received their fall catalog by now. Response to the larger color photos has been wonderful, which is really good because they were really expensive. The catalog is filled with many choice new items, so don’t be left out as plants begin to sell out. So far fall orders are far exceeding last year, which as Martha would say, is “A good thing”.

We have just completed construction of a new underground irrigation tank, which will take the place of the one that collapsed back in June. This has been a time consuming and obscenely expensive task, that has left facilities manager Larry Blakeman, claustrophobic, covered in mud, and probably thinking about finding an air-conditioned office job. In the same area, Gary Mazur and Joe Steele of Raleigh’s Envision’s Co. are just finishing the installation of the new patio pavers around the new Southwestern Garden. We can’t wait for you to see this area, filled with agaves and cacti…truly amazing!

We would like to welcome two new employees to the permanent Plant Delights staff. Sarah Gwynn has replaced Cindy Brooks in our office. Sarah has already made great headway in the task of pronouncing some of those long Latin names. Cindy has returned to the less stressful life of taking care of family and some part-time work. We would also like to welcome Brian Hicks, who joins us in our newly created position as Plant Pathologist. It will be Brian’s job to keep the plants healthy and free from insect and disease.

Our top selling plants for the season as of September 1, 2001

1 ‘Colocasia Black Magic’
2 Colocasia antiquorum ‘Illustris’
3 Salvia leucantha ‘Santa Barbara’ PPAF
4 Muhlenbergia capillaris
5 Lobelia ‘Cotton Candy’
6 Gaura ‘Pink Cloud’
7 Athyrium filix-femina ‘Frizelliae’
8 Veronica ‘Royal Candles’ PPAF
9 Tanacetum vulgare ‘Isla Gold’
10 Athyrium ‘Ghost’
11 Lilium formosanum
12 Lantana ‘Miss Huff’
13 Hosta plantaginea
14 Dicliptera suberecta
15 Vinca minor ‘Illumination’
16 Sedum ‘Purple Emperor’
17 Lamium maculatum ‘Anne Greenway’
18 Verbena ‘Snowflurry’
19 Salvia chamaedryoides
20 Physostegia virginiana ‘Miss Manners’ PPAF
21 Tradescantia ‘Sweet Kate’
22 Brunnera macrophylla ‘Jack Frost’ PPAF
23 Veronica prostrata ‘Buttercup’ PPAF
24 Alstroemeria ‘Freedom’ PP 9,393

-tony

2001 Plant Delights Nursery August Newsletter

We have finished our mid-summer inventory and our fall catalog, which is back from the printer and in the mail. We hope you enjoy many of the new treasures as well as the return of several old favorites

Our top selling plants for the season as of August 1, 2001

1 Colocasia ‘Black Magic’
2 Colocasia antiquorum ‘Illustris’
3 Salvia leucantha ‘Santa Barbara’ PPAF
4 Muhlenbergia capillaris
5 Athyrium filix-femina ‘Frizelliae’
6 Veronica ‘Royal Candles’ PPAF
7 Gaura ‘Pink Cloud’
8 Lobelia ‘Cotton Candy’
9 Tanacetum vulgare ‘Isla Gold’
10 Athyrium ‘Ghost’
11 Lantana ‘Miss Huff’
12 Dicliptera suberecta
13 Lamium maculatum ‘Anne Greenway’
14 Vinca minor ‘Illumination’
15 Sedum ‘Purple Emperor’
16 Lilium formosanum
17 Salvia chamaedryoides
18 Tradescantia ‘Sweet Kate’
19 Verbena ‘Snowflurry’
20 Physostegia virginiana ‘Miss Manners’ PPAF
21 Brunnera macrophylla ‘Jack Frost’ PPAF
22 Veronica prostrata ‘Buttercup’ PPAF
23 Baptisia sphaerocarpa

-tony

2001 Plant Delights Nursery June Newsletter

Hi folks..it’s us again. We have finished a very successful spring open house. It’s always great to see so many folks indulging in their favorite addiction…plants. We have been busy propagating and hope to have most items that were out earlier back in stock in a couple of more weeks. Our next event is a visit from the American Hosta Society Convention which arrives in town next week to the tune of 450+ people. Once the group departs, it’s back to work on the fall catalog that is due to be mailed in mid-August. Remember that our summer open house is scheduled for July 6-8 and 13-15. This is when we have quite a few out-of-towners that visit for the first time. We look forward to meeting you in person. The gardens have never looked better, so bring plenty of film. We have just added a new summary of our results with winter hardy palms in our garden this winter…check it out in the articles section. Below, you will also find our updated “best sellers” list. Check and see if your favorite made the list. Our top selling plants for the season as of June 5, 2001

1 Colocasia ‘Black Magic’
2 Athyrium filix-femina ‘Frizelliae’
3 Veronica ‘Royal Candles’ PPAF
4 Gaura ‘Pink Cloud’
5 Muhlenbergia capillaris
6 Salvia leucantha ‘Santa Barbara’ PPAF
7 Colocasia antiquorum ‘Illustris’
8 Lobelia ‘Cotton Candy’
9 Tanacetum vulgare ‘Isla Gold’
10 Lamium maculatum ‘Anne Greenway’
11 Athyrium ‘Ghost’
12 Vinca minor ‘Illumination’
13 Salvia chamaedryoides
14 Dicliptera suberecta
15 Sedum ‘Purple Emperor’
16 Lilium formosanum
17 Tradescantia ‘Sweet Kate’
18 Brunnera macrophylla ‘Jack Frost’ PPAF
19 Verbena ‘Snowflurry’
20 Physostegia virginiana ‘Miss Manners’ PPAF
21 Baptisia sphaerocarpa
22 Syneilesis aconitifolia
23 Lantana ‘Miss Huff’

-tony