Posts | Deborah Silver & Co.

Hellebores: Recent Forms

I have only been growing helleborus orientalis in my garden for 10 years or so. Why I was so late adding them to me garden is a mystery. Perhaps they were done blooming by the time I started haunting nurseries for plants. I may have missed them. Perhaps the time it took a hellebore to grow into a decent sized blooming plant was too long to make commercial production widespread. Whatever the reason, I am a fan now. They are sturdy plants with thick leather like foliage. Many of them are hardy in zone 4, which means very hardy. They thrive in light to medium shade, and like alkaline soil-perfect for my yard. In a mild winter, the foliage is evergreen. The color of the petals eventually fade, but they hold onto the stalk for a long time after the flower is spent. In June my plants will look like they are covered with green flowers. My plants are a strain grown from seed called Royal Heritage mix. This mix has been around for a fairly long time, and produces somewhat muted flowers from dark purple to pink, white and green.
Hellebores increase in size slowly, so the prices for good size plants can be considerable. The flowers emerge on leafless stalks in early spring-late March or early April in my yard. The new season’s leaves come from the ground after the flowering cycle is over. They are long lived, and make dense clumps some 18 inches tall or so. They are willing seeders, should you have the mind to grow them on. The species helleborus orientalis features nodding flowers, meaning they face down. You would have to get down on the ground to look up into their faces, or cut the flowers and float them in a bowl.

One can now find varieties with yellow flowers-shocking, this development. The first yellow hellebore I ever saw in person-I could not take my eyes off of it. This development was only the beginning. Breeders in Japan, England, Canada and the US (and no doubt in many other countries) are breeding plants with double flowers. Spots. picotee forms. unusual colors. Helleborus Black Oddyssey is just that-an inky black. Helleborus Ivory Price is a strong grower, and features flowers that face up. Michigan hybridizer Chris Hansen is responsible for breeding a breathtakingly beautiful group of hellebores known as “Winter Thrillers”. Improved flower color, flower size, plant vigor, and foliage are the trademark of these plants. He has been breeding hellebores for over 15 years; his newer introductions are stunning. There is a wealth of information about hellebores on line now. If you are interested, make a cup of coffee, and explore.

I have never been so much a fan of double flowers. The singles just appeal to me more. This is a preference that is being challenged by the new varieties of double hellebores. A flower such as this is very hard to pass by. A fan of double bloodroot might well be taken with this hellebore. Many of the newer named hellebores are available via the technology of tissue culture. Helleborus orientalis hybrids of old were all seed strains. No technology existed to exactly reproduce a particular plant. Not that I do not treasure seed strains of hellebores. There is always the chance of once in a lifetime spectacular plant. No one discusses the beauty of seed strains better than Carolyn from Carolyn’s Shade Garden.

A love for seed strains of hellebores implies a gardener that can successfully bring on seedlings or grow successfully from seed (I am thinking Joseph Tychonievich who grows for Arrowhead Alpines in Michigan)-or that gardener who is intrigued by the prospect of a seedling that is yet to flower. Not your thing? Lots of hellebores are available true to name-meaning they are being reproduced by tissue culture. I do have a few plants from my Royal heritage mix that are extraordinary in plant habit and bloom-others are not so swell. This named cultivar, Anna’s Red, is an outstanding plant. It was named after Anna Pavord, UK gardener and writer.

No matter what you might fancy, there is probably a hellebore that will appeal to you. Hellebores, in my opinion, are part of that group of plants that I call fancy plants. Fancy, as in new hybrids of hosta. Fancy, as in unusual. Like the Rembrandt tulips-although their news is now centuries old. Lots of rare and gorgeous plants that gardeners are prone to become besotted over are not such great growers. But I feel convinced that the new hybrids of hellebores are rugged plants. I feel confident in saying any effort you make to grow them will be rewarded.

I have never seen one that did not make my heart pound a little faster. This single flower with an anemone center-wow. Though I have always favored green or white single flowered hellebores, I see no good reason not to change my mind. Interested further? The book “Hellebores – A Comprehensive Guide”, written by C. Colston Burrell and Judith Knott Tyler is a classic. Judith’s nursery, Pine Knott Farms, is a major supplier of fine hellebores. Even a casual internet search will provide lots of information and sources for this stellar spring blooming perennial.

Rob always has a fresh idea for Detroit Garden Works. This winter has been so severe and so long, I doubt anyone will be turning over the dirt much in March. The freezing and snowy landscape notwithstanding, every gardener will be ready to talk plants the first day we hit 40 degrees. He has a plan for a big opportunity for some gardening conversation. In late March, we will have over 600 hellebores available for review and purchase. A helleborus Festivalis.

Every gardener has a big interest in plants. The plants are a bridge where every gardener of every persuasion might meet. That bridge is a place to be. A chance to move from where we are, given a little conversation and exchange, to where or how we might want to be gardening. We hope you are able to join us March 22nd and 23rd at Detroit Garden Works for a little taste of the spring to come.

A double pink hellebore might be just the thing to chase away the late winter blues.

Posted on: March 3, 2014 21 Comments

Filed Under: flowers, Plants, Detroit Garden Works, Picture This Tagged With: spring flowering perennials, helleborus orientalis hybrids, helleborus orientalis

The 2014 Gardening Season

Though nature had no plans to attend the opening of Detroit Garden Works today for the 2014 gardening season, the robins in the tree next door are here right on schedule. Rob says they look to be the fattest robins ever. I personally think they have their feathers fluffed out to the max-trying to defend themselves against the extreme cold. On the news this morning, the following. The combination of cold and snow this winter makes this the worst winter we have had for 130 years. This means that the oldest gardener in my zone is experiencing a record breaking and a particularly heart breakingly endless winter for the first time. This going on 64 year old gardener can attest to the accuracy of this statement. I have never.

Taking the 2013 version of Detroit Garden Works apart, repainting and cleaning, reinventing and redoing with all the new things for 2014 is a big job. Both of my landscape crews are instrumental in helping out the shop staff with this transformation. This means that both Steve and I have been there with Rob to plan and consider every move that gets made. Keeping up with the winter landscape design work for projects on deck for spring, with a big dose of Detroit Garden Works on the side means I have been really busy. This level of being busy helps to keep my mind off the winter that has engulfed us all. Though my landscape design practice is the love of my life, the shop is a close second. How so?

All of what Rob buys interests me. Containers, sculpture, fountains, tools are an integral part of gardening. But placing every element in a 10,000 square foot space in an interesting and well designed way is a challenge. But I am happy for the work-this greatly informs my landscape practice. I am dealing with objects big and small. Lots of colors. This line and that one. This shape that relates to that one. A garage full of pallets of objects I have never seen before all need to have a home, a scheme. Rob does the vast majority of the buying for the shop. It falls some to him, and a lot to me about how to present his collection. It is not so much different than designing a landscape for a particular property, and a particular client. Objects from many countries in February, each with their own shape, color, texture and mass ask for an arrangement that will please the eye. Making sense of a whole world of disparate objects can be exasperating, but it is a job I would not trade for any other.

Designing a landscape asks for everything a gardener has available to them. A love of the living earth. A plan to compost, which will enrich any planting. A plan to plant. Lots of energy and good will. Faith in one’s convictions. And a plan that personally expresses what that gardeners values and needs from their garden. A plan that is coherent. Dissonant shapes, forms, textures and colors all ask for some sense to be made. And sense can be made of those things in many different ways. How Rob puts a series of things together is very different than mine, as it should be. I can’t be privy to why he selected certain things, until I start to work with them. Even then, I may visualize them in a very different way. As much as I enjoy poking around the pallets, I more enjoy making a melody from a lot of different voices.

Surfaces really interest me. Some are shiny. Some are smooth and matte. Some are rough textured. Others are dark-some are light. One surface contrasted with another generates interest. What is happening near the ground level interests me as much as what is at eye level. Then there is that vast space overhead. My first moves in the shop always involve covering the walls, and populating the air space. Part of that had to do with staging the work. An empty room is the ideal place to navigate with a big ladder. Once that work is done, everything else is arranged to fit in the physical and visual space.

Anything that generates an interest in the garden is of interest to me. What I like is big and wide-a lot. On a good and rare day, it is deep. Any person who responds to the garden interests me, whether it comes via my landscape practice, or my shop. Any place that encourages people to garden is my idea of a good place. Rob and I both subscribe to the idea that a great garden shop ultimately should provide an experience of the garden.

I will confess I am tired out from the work of the past month. But this kind of tired is a good kind of tired. I was truly thrilled that Detroit Garden Works opened for the 2014 gardening season as usual March 1-even though our winter rages on. I am pleased we have been welcoming gardeners of every persuasion for 18 years, come March 29. We were happy to have gardeners gracing our gates today. Spring is a state of mind-is it not?

Rob’s buying trips to growers of hellebores all over the US and Canada means we have plants in our greenhouse now, with many more to come. The sight and smell of live and blooming plants is a sight for sore eyes. We have planned an event the third week of March-a Helleborus Festivalis. For every winter weary gardener who has another month of winter to go yet. We have missed all of you that visit our shop! See you soon.

Posted on: March 1, 2014 20 Comments

Filed Under: Spring, flowers, Detroit Garden Works, Garden Design Tagged With: helleborus, Garden Design, design

A Rude Awakening

Our winter, which shows not one sign of abating, has been our snowiest and coldest for 20 years. My landscape has rarely been subject to temperatures below zero – never the extreme below zero numbers that have been routine this winter. A worst case winter like this is bound to have consequences. I fear the spring may not only be an awakening, but could well be a rude awakening. Have I planted marginally hardy species in my garden? Yes. Magnolias and dogwoods are somewhat marginal here. Other trees common to my area, as in redbuds, London Plane trees, sweet gums (liquidambar), and even tulip trees are very sensitive to extreme cold. Many specialty evergreens that thrive in the Pacific northwest that have been planted in my zone may not fare so well. I have already seen many Alberta spruce with substantial cold burn. I know of several long established sweet gums who routinely have crown dieback in a middling cold winter. What will happen to them this year? Furthermore, years of reasonable winter temperatures have encouraged me to try plants that are on the edge of my hardiness zone. This has worked for many years. This year, I may be in for a little course correction.

I am not a worst case alarmist. It could entirely be that I will see little damage. But professional growers I have known for years are concerned about what our spring will bring. I have magnolias which are definitely a zone 5, and maybe a zone 6. For 18 years, those trees have done better than survive. But weather cycles are much longer than my gardening lifetime, and the lifetime so far of my landscape. I am quite sure there is not a single plant in my yard which is 100 years old or better. Bob Schutski, professor of horticulture at Michigan State and well known lecturer in landscape practices, predicts we will have no magnolia flowers this spring. Ouch. I hear of peach growers in Michigan talking about total crop loss. My gardening friend Michael whose barn is pictures above-his mountains of snow may be the least of his worries. He has trees and mature shrubs missing their bark above the snow line.

This picture from his garden is from a mature quince. Every branch which above his current snow line has no bark. The 6 feet of snow we have had so far this winter means that there is little winter food for wildlife. This damage is most certainly the result of gnawing from hungry rabbits. Though the extreme cold will take its toll, the deep snow meant the bark of this quince would become rabbit food. A shrub or tree stripped of its bark can no longer sustain the life of that limb.

The damage to the landscape may not be apparent until the snow has melted, revealing disaster like what is pictured above. Deep snow means wildlife are struggling to find food. Deep snow can be damaging in other ways. When the sun moves higher in the sky, the light reflecting off of the snow can thaw evergreen branches. An evergreen branch brought out of dormancy by the reflected light and heat of the winter sun can burn, or die, once temperatures drop dramatically at night. Tree bark that warms during a sunny day, and then refreezes at a rapid rate may produce sunscald. Most frequent on the south side of a tree, sun scald can kill the inner bark. Winter burn, sun scald, frost cracks-these are all conditions brought on by an extraordinary confluence of extreme cold, extreme snow and sun. Frost cracks, or vertical splits in tree bark from extremely low temperatures, can damage a tree. These splits, though they may heal, are an ideal point of entry for disease and insects. No gardener has any control over any of this. A friend in Chicago has written that she sees frost cracks on London Plane trees now. Circumstances beyond one’s control are never easy to take, but some understanding can help relieve the shock. I have been thinking when spring comes, all will be well in my world. In fact, five weeks hence, I may have issues in my landscape that are not to my liking.

At least I have no deer. My very populated urban area is not a habitat of choice. Were I to walk to my rose garden once the snow had melted, the sight of my arborvitae denuded by hungry deer might make me black out. This gardener whose plants are pictured above-I cannot imagine their anguish. I have had severe damage to my arborvitaes from ice and wind that weighed down and splayed out long branches. Though they have all been professionally staked by an arborist, they have not completely grown out of the damage which dates back six years.

Our winter is not even close to a close. Am I beat down to the ground by the incredibly cold temperatures and relentless snow-yes. So far today we have had high winds, hail, and freezing rain. Though there is nothing I could have done to protect my plants from exposure to any of this, as usual, I have hope.

Posted on: February 21, 2014 33 Comments

Filed Under: Winter Tagged With: winter kill, winter injury, winter burn, twig dieback, sun scald, salt damage, rabbit damage, frost cracks, deer browse, winter hardiness

A Belated Valentine

I did have Valentines flowers to arrange and deliver Friday, most of which got away from me before I could photograph them. But the process of arranging gave me some time to think about them-the flowers, that is. In the dead center of February, in the middle of a too cold snowy and icy winter, I had tulips, roses, alstromeria, waxflower, ranunculus, lisianthus, tracelium, white button pomps, black red carnations and godetia in my hands. Just the smell of all of that fresh and living was pretty exciting. Like most gardeners, I am used to the dirt that nature dishes out. But this winter came early, and shows no sign of letting up, months later. I have to admit I am ready for a change of seasons. No wonder Valentine’s Day comes at this time of year.

This winter began for us in November. By Thanksgiving, the ground was well on its way to freezing, and we had snow. We are closing in on three months in which we have had snow entirely covering the ground, and cold that penetrates to the bone in a matter of minutes. Of course I am dreaming in color. And thinking about flowers. Nothing in my environment is green now, much less flowering. The work I am doing now revolves around design. This means black lines on white paper. Ideas. Representations of places. All of this work is abstract. I am not standing on a patch of dirt, with the sky overhead. I am not digging holes. I have not one patch of green, anywhere.

This is as good a time as any to talk about flowers. Did I evolve from a person to a person of gardening inclination from exposure to flowers? It could be. I am not a botanist, but my quick take is that flowers make the process of pollination and seeding a visually sexy affair. Some flowers are irresistible to hummingbirds or bees, or moths. That flowers might be attractive to me is not nature’s intent. Some hybrid flowers are sterile. Though they are beautiful beyond compare, there will be no babies. Just me-I have been reduced to a baby state by the length and ferocious nature of this winter. I understand completely that plants do not flower to make my gardening life more beautiful. But they do. What they do for this garden starved person in February-enormous.

There are many things about gardening that satisfy, beyond the flowers. I am interested in outdoor spaces designed to embrace people. I like grass to lay down on, after a long day. I am awed by trees of age. I am interested in texture, mass, motion, rhythm, line, color, and form-in the landscape. There is a fondness and respect for every green plant. Is one better than another? Not really. I may like peonies better than delphiniums, but that is a matter of taste, not worth.

There are some years when the flowering trees enchant. Last spring was the first spring in two seasons that this magnolia bloomed. The previous year, every bud was frosted off by a long late spring cold snap. I was so ready for those flowers to emerge. Other years, I feel like flowers on trees look silly. How could any tree as sculptural and majestic as a magnolia go the frivolous route of tarting themselves up with big blowsy pink flowers? Are the big glossy leaves and pale gray bark not enough? The magnolia stellata outside my window this morning is making ready for spring. How can I tell? The snow this morning is accumulating on the enlarged buds. The snowbuds tell me March is not so far away.

White flowers are not tough to love. They have a fresh and pristine look so unlike the dirt they came from. The white of this double flowered hellebore is all the more striking, given the pale yellow stamens and green flares. I like single flowered hellebores, but I would grow this double without hesitation. Why? I like flowers. Ugly flowers-could those two words ever be side by side? The flowers of butterburrs, Dutchman’s pipe and American ginger are not exactly what I would call lovely, but they are flowers none the less.

Roses fall in and out of favor so fast a gardener can hardly keep up. They can be easy to dismiss, given their ungainly habit of growth, their affinity for disease and Japanese beetles. Not to mention that they are so, well, girly. This overblown pink Carefree Beauty flower is not to everyone’s taste. I grow this rose in spite of all the work they require because I like the flowers.

There are lots of other roses I cannot grow, that are only available to me as cut flowers, grown by someone else. My Carefree Beauty roses would never be available as a cut flower. They last no longer than a day or two when cut. The history of the romance of the rose aside, a flower which can last for a week or better in water is especially welcome in mid February.

I like cut flowers in season. When the tulips are in bloom, arrangements with cut tulips have that extra from the garden cache. But there are no flowers of any description in season in my February. How great it is to have the opportunity to put vegetables and flowers in a grocery cart in February. Tulips, Dutch iris, delphinium and sweet peas in February? Bring them on. Buck brought me a dozen Confetti roses for Valentines. As much as I love the yellow flowers whose petals are edged in orangy red, I am most fond of how willing they are to open wide and flat – this a memory of the roses in my garden. They look so beautiful this morning.

Of course everyone has their own idea of what tugs at their heart strings, come February 14.

Posted on: February 16, 2014 7 Comments

Filed Under: Plants, flowers, Color

Hellebores: Recent Forms

The 2014 Gardening Season

A Rude Awakening

A Belated Valentine

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