Veggies

I still grow edibles even though you wouldn't know it from all my rose posts lately. So far this has been one of the best tomato growing seasons ever for me. The disease and insect pressure is low probably due the dry weather. They all have lots of flowers and one has some tiny fruit. The varieties I'm growing this year are: Indigo Rose, Green Zebra,  Paul Robeson, Isis Candy, Woodle Orange, Solar Flare, AAA Sweet Solano, and a few others whose names escape me right now.

I've also grown my first successful cauliflower in the Earthbox. Hurray! It is an heirloom purple variety that I grew from seed. I still have a few other varieties that I hope will make it in all this heat.

EPCOT Flower and Garden Festival 2012

I made my first visit to the 2012 Epcot Flower and Garden Festival this week. I always enjoy seeing all those lovely impossible plantings. This year was even better than the last. Here are some of the sights:

Queen of Sweden, Jude the Obscure, and Young Lycidas

 I have new beauties in my garden this Spring. Three more Austin roses have bloomed. Young Lycidas is similar in color and bloom form to Munstead Wood, but more "mauvish" and a little larger. The scent is also a nice medium strong old rose. 

 

 

 

 

Jude the Obscure sure earns its unofficial title of the best smelling Austin rose. It smells strongly of citrus and fruit in my yard. The bloom is a lovely large globular yellow that isn't too quick to open. I don't see any peach on the blooms yet. Maybe it needs colder temps to show those colors?

 

 

 

 

 

 

Queen of Sweden has these wonderful upright facing blooms that are densely packed inside and large and cupped on the outside. I saw a bee today trying to burrow into the flower. It has a nice unusual medium light scent.

I am very happy with all of my new Austins. Sadly my Abraham Darby has left the garden. It wasn't doing well and I pulled it out to discover a disease in the graft. It really isn't a mark against the variety though. There is some sort of cane fungus in one area of my garden that is lethal to roses. I think I've learned my lesson and won't put any more there. I will be getting another AD if the cuttings I gathered don't root. It was a great rose.

  

Port Sunlight

It's a double post day because Port Sunlight also bloomed. These have a really lovely yellow apricot color that reminds me of...sunlight! The only negative I can mention about the flowers is that they seem to open fast and probably won't stick around long.

Munstead Wood

Today Munstead Wood bloomed. It lost a few buds to the dreaded oak tree worms, but it's still very impressive. The color in the photo is close to the actual color. It reminds me of a larger, scented, and more dense petaled version of Burgundy Iceberg. I hope it doesn't also acquire the propensity for black spot that Burgundy Iceberg had. The scent is a very traditional old rose scent, which I like.

Princess Alexandra of Kent Rose

It's been a while since my last post. Even though I haven't kept this blog updated, things in the garden have still been growing. The weather has been rain free and unusually hot for this time of year. Remember my bare root roses in the last post? They are all thriving and coming into bloom now. Princess Alexandra of Kent is the first to bloom and is the fastest grower. The flowers are a warm medium pink and are darker on the reverse side of the petal. The scent is nice and noticeable sort of  an old rose smell with something else added.Stay tuned to see the other roses.

Princess Alexandra of Kent with Souvenir de la Malmaison

David Austin Rose Order

I came home a week or so ago and found a large box of David Austin roses waiting for me. This is my late Christmas/early birthday present. I have six new baby roses! After much consideration, I ordered Munstead Wood, Port Sunlight, Jude the Obscure, Princess Alexandra of Kent, Queen of Sweden and Young Lycidas. 

Those of you from Florida know it has been unusually warm and very dry lately. My plan was to try directly planting these bare root roses into amended beds, but for various reasons I wasn't prepared and the weather wasn't the best. On the Austin website I read that bare root roses may struggle to get established in temperatures consistently over 70 degrees. I just don't want to experiment with these expensive and dear treasures, so I decided to give them a year in large pots before planting in the ground. Maybe I'll try planting one of those cheap bare root Odd Lots roses to see if bare roots can thrive in Florida.

The order came wrapped together in a plastic bag. I think it benefits me to live close to the distribution center in Texas and to get one of the first shipments of the year. All of the roses were fresh and most were in good condition. One rose, Port Sunlight, had some pretty serious damage to two of its main canes. Poor little thing is sending up many basal breaks to try to replace them. It looks like a vigorous trooper. I did contact customer service though because I was worried it wouldn't make it, and they promptly took care of the problem to my satisfaction. All of my new babies have broken dormancy and have tiny sprouts all over them. I am all anticipation now!