Six on Saturday – 19/8/2023

Categories six on saturday59 Comments on Six on Saturday – 19/8/2023

Yet again, it’s blowing a hoolie and chucking it down, at the end of a week when a couple of dry days were something to be very grateful for. I’m far from being on top of the mess that is my allotment, but it’s better than it was. The garden has also had an early first round of autumn clear-up, now that openings are a fast fading memory; was it really only last weekend?

Six things from the garden then, as per “the rules”, which I must find a way of pinning to the top of my blog so I can skip repeating this bit every week.

One.
Last week I put in Agapanthus ‘Northern Star’, growing in our front garden behind yellow Cosmos and I remarked that I was glad that the last of our visitors would be gone before the pink Amaryllis belladonna opened up to join the party. They are now open. Amaryllis are lovely in flower but are in leaf in autumn and winter, dying back in spring to leave a bare area around the bulbs for the summer which doesn’t want to be filled with anything too dense or the bulbs won’t get the summer sun they need in order for flower buds to develop. Not wanting a bare patch at the front of the bed to be the first thing people saw, I planted a number of young plants of yellow Cosmos around the bulbs. They really struggled to get going in the heat of June, so the bulbs got all the sun they needed and I have by far the greatest number of flower stems I’ve ever had on this clump. Eventually the Cosmos got their roots down and they are also now pretty floriferous. It’s a colour combination that is going to get your attention, that’s for sure. There’s a supporting cast of orange and pink Alstroemerias in the background too.

Two.
Hesperantha huttonii appeared in a pot of Scarborough lily years ago, producing a slender leafy stem but no flowers for a few years then flowering and setting seed, which I collected and sowed. Eventually the whole pot full of seedlings were planted as a ready made clump and this is their first flowering. There’s a fine line between subtle and underwhelming, this looks like one of those plants that sits right on that line.

Three.
Eucomis, like the two above, is another South African bulbous plant. This variety though is American raised, a hybrid with E. vandermerwei as one parent, and given, along with a few others, Hawaiian names. I have bought both ‘Aloha Kona’, which is what I think this is, and ‘Aloha Leia’, which I need to track down. It’s in a pot and will go in the tunnel to spend a dry winter. It’s relatively short at around 30cm.

Four.
Last year Fred sent me seed of Canna tuerckheimii. Sown in mid April, they were in three litre pots by the winter. I put them in my tunnel and by late winter was convinced they had succumbed to the cold. They hadn’t; in spring they started shooting and eventually I planted three in the ground. Two are now in flower, probably 2.5m tall. I have to admit though, that the blooms are something of a disappointment, being relatively small and un-showy for Canna. I have plans for them though, in that I am going to create a big foliage planting with Colocasia, Musa and Begonia ‘Torsa’; the Cannas will be right at home in their company.

Five.
For the last two or three years Fuchsias, which we have generally found easy to grow and which we value for their late flowering, have been getting a whole lot more difficult. Fuchsia gall mite has been hitting more plants each year and hitting them harder. Then we started getting damage from Fuchsia flea beetle and that also seems to be getting steadily worse. We made the decision to get rid of any plants seriously infected with gall mite and there are several in the garden that have ceased to be worth having because of flea beetle. This plant though, I had been walking past and thinking it was rather good, trying to place it, recall its name. When I looked at the label it was something I didn’t recognize; so against all our intentions, against all semblance of common sense, we are still getting new varieties. If gambling can be recognized as a medical condition, I’m certain that plant addiction should be. The name is Fuchsia ‘Shrimp Cocktail’, pretty, free flowering and so far unaffected by gall mite, flea beetle, capsid or rust. I just doomed it, didn’t I.

Six.
This is what I am talking about, Fuchsia gall mite. Several people have said to me that that think they might have it but are not sure, to which my reply is that you will know if you get it. This is a far more debilitating condition than any other that Fuchsias suffer from, except for perhaps a handful of varieties which while not immune, are highly resistant. If it’s one shoot on one plant you could try keeping it under very close scrutiny and removing affected growth as soon as you see it. It worked for us for a while.

For several weeks my computer has been misbehaving badly, freezing in the middle of things, shutting down unexpectedly and so on. Diagnostics pointed to serious, and expensive problems. It’s getting on a bit, so I came to the decision to buy a new one. Since I placed the order, it has behaved perfectly. Death and taxes may be life’s only two certainties but there are a few things run them close.

Published by Jim Stephens

Gardener, no-dig allotmenteer, camellia enthusiast. I love colour, it cheers me up. Retired nurseryman.

59 thoughts on “Six on Saturday – 19/8/2023”

  1. Pingback: Six on Saturday: Magic Seeds – Our Forest Garden

  2. I wonder whether I too suffer from a serious gardening condition. I cannot just be satisfied, as the seasons change I love different plants, as plants succumb to diseases I fall out of love with them. As composts disappoint I vow not to have so many pots, yet they increase in number. Lovely Fuchsia and I hope this one will be resilient for you.

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  3. This weather! lol. Yes, I’m so thankful that we had a few days that were not wash-outs or too windy. But the rest, yuck!
    That pink agapanthus is something else. Your Hesperantha huttonii reminds me that I used to have some, but I think they were taken over by weeds in a neglected part of the yard. I must find a new spot to plant some more. I had no idea how many things could go wrong with fuchsia, sorry to hear that (but good to know).

    Here’s my link: https://mominthegarden.com/2023/08/19/a-golden-hue-in-the-garden/

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  4. Pingback: A golden hue in the garden | Mom in the Garden

  7. Goodness, we used to have lots of Amaryllis belladonna dotted around our Southern California garden growing up, but we never had a clump with that many stems at once o.O Very impressive, makes me think I should sink my one sad potted bulb in the garden next spring and see how it does. Also — go, ‘Shrimp Cocktail’, go! What a fun name, I’d get it for that alone lol.

    Oops, almost forgot — my six…

    Six on Saturday | 19th August 2023

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  8. Pingback: Six on Saturday | 19th August 2023 – Little Blue and White House
  11. Pingback: August 19, 2023 Six on Saturday – Gardening in the Prairie

  12. Your six are inspiring, as always, Jim. I like that you grow so many interesting flowers from bulbs. They look terrific, increase, and prove very hardy for the most part. That is an impressive planting of lilies with their Cosmos skirt. It got too hot and dry here in summer for Fuschia some years ago, and I gave up on them entirely. Our local garden center hasn’t even sold them recently. But yours look so pretty, other than the pest damage. It has been a year for all sorts of computer and telecommunications issues. You aren’t alone in that one, either. We had to replace both modem and router recently and the internet service remains spotty some days. The world is rapidly changing, and our challenge is to try and keep up. Thanks for hosting, as always.

    Here are my six for the week: https://woodlandgnome.wordpress.com/2023/08/19/six-on-saturday-part-of-the-plan/

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  13. Pingback: Six on Saturday: Part of the Plan – Our Forest Garden
  15. Pingback: Garden Update – Summer Crops – My Slice of Mexico

    1. Eucomis are from summer rainfall areas of South Africa, dry in winter. I just try to emulate that. I don’t have a tidying up urge at all really, but tatty stuff was falling onto things that had a bit more to give.

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  17. Pingback: Six on Saturday: Coming Out | Rambling in the Garden

  18. I probably don’t have gall mite then, but some of my fuchsias have yellow leaves and black spotted leaves. I cut the worst one right back to a healthy pair of buds so I’ll see how it is next year. Yesterday’s Storm Betty has left the patio covered in leaves from the Goat Willows, but it’s still very windy and showery here so they can wait a while. The few days of sun we had this week was sooo nice, I really hope we get some more.

    Six on Saturday | here comes the sun…

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  22. I laughed at your last sentence. Of course the old computer is behaving nicely now that you’ve bought a new one. It is sticking out its tongue at you.

    It was time to get a new one, and you’ll be glad you did when the break-in period is over.

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    1. It’s always a good opportunity to get rid of the programs I never use and do fresh installs of the ones I do. There always seems to be something that I can’t get back the way I’m used to it being, so I’m primed for a frustrating few weeks.

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  24. Pingback: Six on Saturday. 19.8.2023 | Lead up the Garden Path
  27. Pingback: Six on Saturday: 19 August 2023 – My Tiny Welsh Garden

      1. It is a species that I would like to grow, along with Canna flaccida. If I remember correctly, it is the tallest species, and even taller than Canna musifolia. Do you find that the tops lean over when they bloom?

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      2. The tops on mine are bolt upright, but I think they have a lot more growing to do. The flowers are very small, so no weight to pull them over. It seems they will be wholly deciduous here, so will have to get to whatever height they’re going to make in one season. Are they evergreen or part evergreen in warmer climates, like bananas?

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      3. They prefer to be deciduous. I mean, they are neater if they shed their old foliage annually. They succumb to frost here more regularly than bananas do. Bananas get shabby, but do not die back until after bloom and fruiting. Our cannas get cut back after all their foliage turns brown. However, in milder climates of Southern California, they may never turn brown. Many get cut back to the ground anyway. One of the biggest and best colonies of Canna that I can remember was a big herd of ‘City of Portland’ in Will Rogers Memorial Park. They were removed when the Park was renovated years ago. Immediately prior to that, they looked rather shabby because the gardeners merely groomed out old growth as new growth came up through it. It must have been a terribly tedious job, and maintained the shabbiness. Prior to that, in the 1980s, the gardeners merely cut the entire colony to the ground at the end of winter. It was bare for a while, but regenerated with all new and vigorous foliage. It was SO rad!

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    1. Hesperantha and struggle are not two words I’ve ever had occasion to use in the same sentence here. The “ordinary” pink is borderline invasive and I’m forever pulling it out. The RHS are listing four suppliers of H. huttonii, which probably makes it fairly rare.

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  33. I agree with you about the flowers of this canna. You are already lucky to see them in bloom (which is not yet the case here because I left them in the ground last winter , but they are not dead).
    Can’t wait to see the bed with large-leaved plants you are creating. I do like the Fuchsia ‘Shrimp Cocktail’, an original colour. Finally, the Hesperanthas, that you sent me, flower every year in their pot and I am very happy with them. https://fredgardenerblog2.wordpress.com/2023/08/19/six-on-saturday-19-08-23/

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  36. Pingback: Six on Saturday | here comes the sun… – Cornwall in Colours

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