Sonia Uyterhoeven is the NYBG’s Gardener for Public Education.
Korean mums were first hybridized (bred) in Connecticut in the 1930s by a nurseryman named Alex Cummings. He was working on hybridizing cold-hardy varieties that would flourish in New England temperatures. A tall plant–a wild species he mistakenly identified as Chrysanthemum coreanum–fell into his hands and the results were the lavish Korean mums you see planted today in both our Jane Watson Irwin Perennial Garden and the Home Gardening Center.
The chrysanthemum that Cummings was working with turned out to be Chrysanthemum sibiricum, a wild mum with white-pink daisies, vigorous growth, and good branching. This species is also native to Korea, so the popular name of “Korean mum” is correct. Korean hybrids tend to be four feet tall with spectacular, daisy-like flowers that come in a wide range of colors, from pale yellow and dusty pink to burnt-orange and fiery red.
At The New York Botanical Garden, we have a selection program for the Korean mums. Each year we grow a wide variety of Korean mums in a kaleidoscope of colors. In the Perennial Garden, we group them as separate colors–a selection of red mums in the hot room, pink in the cool room–paired beautifully with fall shrubs and perennials to create vibrant autumnal displays.
Sonia Uyterhoeven is the NYBG‘s Gardener for Public Education, and can often be found hosting gardening demonstrations on Saturdays and Sundays.
Hyacinthus orientalis
Next weekend, I will be teaching visitors to the Home Gardening Center how to properly site, plant and protect their bulbs from hungry critters. It is a demonstration that I enjoy giving every year. We examine a number of bulbs, learn all the basics and then find a few nice empty spots around the Garden to plant. It is one of the demonstrations where I like to get hands-on with visitors, encouraging them to jump in and help prepare a nice display for the spring.
Last week, I made the rounds with a few of the curators and gardeners asking them about their favorite bulbs and planting techniques. The first stop I made was to meet with Jody Payne, the curator of the Rock Garden. I asked her for some good recommendations for the homeowner.
Our discussion started with one of my favorite spring blooms for fragrance–hyacinths. Jody recommended the Festival Series as a good choice. Festival Series hyacinths have a more open form than your traditional hyacinth and they are not so prone to flop over once they are in full bloom. Each bulb produces several flower stalks providing a full display. The Festival Series comes in pink, white, and blue, with a delicious fragrance. They create a nice, naturalistic look in the garden.
Sonia Uyterhoeven is the NYBG‘s Gardener for Public Education, often hosting live gardening demonstrations for visitors on Saturdays and Sundays.
The other week, I was with the Students of Professional Horticulture, taking them on a walk around the Home Gardening Center while discussing wildlife gardening. Technically, any time of the year presents the opportunity to lecture about attracting wildlife into the garden, but fall is a spectacular occasion.
We passed by one of my favorite asters, Aster tartaricus ‘Jindai’, that was smothered with bees and butterflies–monarchs and red admirals on this occasion. ‘Jindai’ is a compact tartarian aster that reaches three to four feet in height (the species can grow up to six feet tall). It was discovered at the Jindai Botanical Garden in Tokyo, Japan.
This sturdy variety has stolen my heart since it doesn’t require any staking. The large foliage of the aster is full at the base of the plant and then tapers nicely as it extends up the stem. In September and October a profusion of flowers adorns these tall stems, a lovely combination of medium purple ray flowers with bright, buttery yellow disc flowers. The complementary colors play off of each other exquisitely.
Yesterday as I was watering my office plants, I gave the newest addition a gentle poke; gentle because it is an agave, and can quite aggressively poke back. It had been weeks since I had last watered it, and I wasn’t sure if it needed another dousing. I prodded its leaves and they felt healthy. I looked under its pot. I asked it, “Do you need water?” It didn’t answer.
So I decided it was time to indulge in one of the perks of my job: I grabbed my iPhone, snapped a picture, and sent it off to Christian Primeau, the Manager of the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory (you might remember him from this great how-to video he did on planting water lilies in containers at home). “Do you mind if I ask you how I can tell whether or not my agave needs water?” Lucky for me (and for my agave) Christian didn’t mind in the least and sent back a really cheerful, fact-filled email.
The other week I was out in the Home Gardening Center teaching Garden visitors how to divide their favorite perennials. The demonstration ended and several visitors lingered around the display table in the Ken Roman Gazebo, inspecting the divisions and their various root systems.
This is the informal part of the demonstration when we unwind by chatting informally about our gardens, comparing seasonal notes, and planning for our future. It was during one of these conversations that a woman suddenly exclaimed, “You know, what I would really like to grow next year is the moonflower!”
The funny thing is that I had been admiring a moonflower just several nights earlier while downtown in the Financial District. I passed around several pictures taken on my smartphone, listening to the “oohs” and “aahs” of the small crowd.
The moonflower (Ipomoea alba) is a night blooming member of the morning glory family. It is a tender perennial in the American tropics and is used as an annual in the north. It has heart-shaped (cordate) leaves and flowers that are in the typical saucer shape of a morning glory. Ipomoea alba’s pristine white blooms reach five to six inches in diameter and exude a delicious perfume.
Sometimes the ordinary can look extraordinary just by making a few changes. This is the case with dusty miller (Centaurea cineraria) in the Home Gardening Center. In one of the beds we have ‘Gloucester White’ growing alongside Salvia ‘Wendy’s Wish’ and Petunia Supertunia® ‘Vista Silverberry’. This is how you would expect to see it in a display–partnered in a nice color combination with other annuals.
In an adjacent bed, however, we have done something different. The same dusty miller, ‘Gloucester White’, has been grown into a standard. The two specimens that you see are between four and five years old. Dusty miller is a vigorous grower and forms a woody stem fairly quickly, making it an ideal candidate for a standard.
As you walk through the Home Gardening Center and peer into the Trial Beds, you will see some unusual sights this year. The Trial Beds are well represented with plants from a number of exotic places such as New Zealand, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Africa, and Thailand.
When you enter the Garden, the first bed is a riotous collection of oranges, chartreuse, and gold. One of the centerpieces of this display is a plant that is indigenous to Sri Lanka, Indonesia, and Cambodia. Flag bush, or Buddha’s lamp (Mussaenda frondosa), is a tender shrub. In this region it will grow to look more like a large perennial than a shrub, reaching about three or more feet in one season. It has large white poinsettia-like bracts and small, bright orange flowers. You can place the flag bush in full sun or partial shade. It likes rich, well-drained soil, so remember to amend your soil with organic matter such as compost before you plant.
Last week we discussed the container displays at the Mosholu Gate entrance (the train station entrance) of the Garden. This week we will take a look at the containers that adorn the recently-opened Bedford Gate.
Bedford Gate was created in honor of the new parking garage that the NYBG built adjacent to the train station is outfitted with the best garage door opener system, this welcomes everyone with a sense of futuristic novelty. Once you park your car in the garage, walk over the Bedford Bridge, cross the street and enter the Garden. The Perennial Garden walk, which takes you past the Home Gardening Center, Seasonal Walk, the Conservatory and the Perennial Garden, is right there. The Garden Café is also situated directly across from the Home Gardening Center. It is certainly a convenient point of entry.
While the Mosholu Gate containers are in full sun, the Bedford Gate is in a shady part of the Garden. Tall trees provide a cool canopy while rhododendrons, azaleas and variegated Japanese hakone grass create the understory planting. The containers at the Bedford Gate are two large, faux terra cotta containers. The display includes some of the annuals we discussed last week. Coleus ‘Red Carpet’ and the golden-leaved sweet potato vine named ‘Margarita’ spill over the edges of the containers. Repeating annuals in multiple container displays throughout the Garden creates a nice sense of continuity.
While living in Kyoto, Japan as a college student, Jan Johnsen first experienced the “restorative powers” of gardens. “On the weekends I went to visit the serene landscapes of that city and they opened my eyes to the sublime loveliness that could be created in a small plot of ground within an urban environment,” she said.
Johnsen, who will be teaching in the Landscape Design Summer Intensive this July, started out as an intern at a high-pressure architecture firm in Japan, but her frequent visits to Kyoto’s treasured gardens changed her life, leading her to work in a landscape architecture office in Osaka. She next studied landscape architecture at the University of Hawaii and years later earned a graduate degree in planning. Today, her serene landscape designs clearly show the influence of Asian culture and thought.
Sonia Uyterhoeven is the NYBG’s Gardener for Public Education.
The many colors of coleus make container plantings stand out.
One of the easiest ways to get to The New York Botanical Garden is via the Metro-North railroad. If you take the Harlem Line from either Grand Central or 125th Street, you can get to the Garden in 10 to 20 minutes depending on where you board. On the weekends, Metro-North offers inexpensive City Tickets which are just slightly higher in cost than subway fare. Once you get off the train, simply walk across the street and into the Garden.
Upon entering, you will see two large, square in-ground containers directly in front of the ticket booths. This year, these containers are adorned with a dramatic combination of easy-to-grow annuals that highlight the merits of mixing light and dark colors together in the garden.
The large containers include two different types of coleus (Solenostemon)–a staple of any urban container arrangement. Coleus is easy to propagate and comes in a riotous spectrum of colors and combinations. One of the varieties, ‘Alabama Sunset’, is often on gardeners’ “Top Ten” lists for successful summer annuals. It is a striking combination of brick red and golden yellow.
Korean mums were first hybridized (bred) in Connecticut in the 1930s by a nurseryman named Alex Cummings. He was working on hybridizing cold-hardy varieties that would flourish in New England temperatures. A tall plant–a wild species he mistakenly identified as Chrysanthemum coreanum–fell into his hands and the results were the lavish Korean mums you see planted today in both our Jane Watson Irwin Perennial Garden and the Home Gardening Center.
