Garden To Vase

Garden to Vase: A 4 week digital course in cultivating cut flowers

Weighing in on landscape fabric

I’ve recently received several questions about using landscape fabric when growing cut flowers. This is a really important question for the cut flower grower, especially if you’re interested in growing in a more ecologically sound way.

Here’s a Q&A with one of my Garden to Vase students on this topic…

Q. I’ve been thinking about my summer mulching strategy and am wondering if you have some insight into my dilemma. The use of landscape fabric as a seasonal mulch is so popular with flower growers these days, and I’ve been using it on about half my garden beds over the past two gardening seasons, following the approach of burning holes and planting into them. I’ve appreciated how much it has diminished my summer weeding labor, but I’m not certain it’s best for my soil’s health and biodiversity. When I pulled it up at the end of last season, I noticed the color and texture of the soil seemed diminished compared to leaf-mulched soil, and it was an absolute fire ant city under there! Not to mention, on a smaller scale where one bed isn’t necessarily all one crop makes the rotation of crops over the course of the season really tricky with fabric. Still, living in the south where the heat and the weed pressure are so intense in the summertime, I do love the comprehensive weed suppression the fabric provides… I’m curious to hear your thoughts on these alternatives. Have you used landscape fabric in your garden, or know of anyone who’s tested its effects on soil health?

A. There are many problems with landscape fabric and you’re spot-on that it is terrible for your soil health. As you know from my course, health, and in particular soil health, is the secret to a great garden that’s less susceptible to pests, disease, plant failure.

Why is landscape fabric such a problem? It’s mainly because the fabric blocks the cycling of organic matter in the soil. As a result, you’re essentially killing off your soil organisms, which can cause all sorts of problems.

My approach is all about replicating and enhancing the natural processes that happen already in nature, not thwarting them (which is what landscape fabric does). Does this require more effort? Yes, but when you weigh that against the risk of crop failure from disease and pests and other issues that can arise, it’s 100% worth it.

Is there any good time to use landscape fabric? I think the only acceptable use for it is in pathways, but even then, I don’t use it now that I have dialed in better methods for weed suppression (including sheet mulching with cardboard and wood chips, or planting micro clover as you can see in the image below)

I totally get that it’s hard to not be tempted by landscape fabric, especially if you are growing on a larger scale, or trying to expand your growing space. But if you can, see if you can shift away from using landscape fabric (and instead practice mulching as a way to reduce weeds which sporting your soil health).

If you do decide to use landscape fabric, wherever possible, replenish the soil at the end of your season (a good application of well-made compost and/or AEM’s are great ways to bring some balance back into the garden).

Loving on Narcissus

Could there be a better cut flower than narcissus?

There are so many reasons to love this flower. They are deer resistant, largely pest-free, dead easy to grow and never need dividing.

The flowers (of which there are endless varieties) can be cut and stored well in advance of them blooming in the field, and they have a great vase life.

All that said, here are 3 tips to help ensure you get the most out of your narcissus in the garden and in the studio.

  1. don’t cut the foliage. If you want a good showing next year, leave all the foliage (in other words, just cut the stem with the bloom on it). This foliage will absorb the energy of the sun, feeding the bulbs for the following growing season.
  2. if you have empty pockets in your garden, fill them with narcissus. This is a great way to maximize space. Narcissus work well interplanted amongst other perennials (think peonies, roses, hydrangea). The only key here is that you need to ensure that there’s adequate drainage in your beds – another reason why I love narcissus is that the bulbs can withstand moisture in the garden while the bulbs are dormant (late summer/fall) but only if the water isn’t pooling.
  3. store separately. When harvesting your flowers, you’ll notice that the stems weep a viscous fluid. This can be toxic to other flowers. Just store your cuts overnight in a shallow bucket of water to let them drain. After that, they can be safely arranged with other flowers.

Loving on Narcissus

 

The Magic of Repeat-Flowering Roses

For the flower grower, June is the month of the rose. Along with the peonies, columbine, foxglove, and bearded iris, here on the Northern hemisphere, it’s undoubtedly one of the best times of the year in the cutting garden.

It goes without saying that we want to have as many blooms as possible in the cutting garden. In the rose patch, part of this comes down to selecting the right roses. That means choosing roses that are floriferous, will grow well in your zone and microclimate and are in-demand. But also means in choosing roses by their bloom cycle.

Some roses will bloom once in the late spring. These are called ‘once-flowering’ roses. And there are a few roses that will bloom non-stop throughout the growing season. These are called ‘continuous-flowering’ roses.

‘Repeat-flowering’ roses are in between – they produce multiple flushes of blooms starting in late spring all the way through till frost (although their subsequent flushes will not usually be as abundant as their first).

Continuous-flowering roses sound like the holy grail for the cut flower grower, however, the volume of roses they produce throughout the season will be roughly equivalent to what a repeat-flowering rose will produce in their primary flush.

So for the cut-flower grower looking for a continuous supply of blooms, repeat-flowering roses are indispensable. The good news is that most modern shrub roses, including most David Austin roses, are repeat-flowering.

Some of my favorite repeat-flowering roses include:

  • Boscobel
  • Abraham Darby
  • Leander
  • Crown Princess Margareta
  • A Shropshire Lad

A few others I love are Tranquility, Jude the Obscure, Distant Drum, Honeymoon, Koko Loco, and Claire Austin.

Below are some images of how I’ve used them in arrangements, and a few things you need to have in place in order for them to keep blooming.

Repeat-Flowering Roses image

This is a bowl of three of my favorite repeat-flowering roses, Boscobel (the dark pink rose), and Crown Princess Margareta (the orange rose), and Evelyn (peachy pink).

Repeat-Flowering Roses

Tucked into the right side of this arrangement is Leander, a glorious spray shrub rose that has wonderful, medium-sized mid-toned pink blooms. On the left, Crown Princess Margareta tumbles out of the front.

A single multi-bloomed stem of Crown Princess Margareta on the left of this arrangement.

An arrangement with Abraham Darby, Boscobel and Crown Princess Margareta.

Crown Princess Margareta

To get the most out of your roses, here are a few tips:

  • All roses need a great home in the garden, with deep, rich, well-drained soil, but this is especially true for repeat-flowering roses.
  • Winter pruning (and training in the case of climbers like A Shropshire Lad) is essential.
  • Dead-head spent blooms.
  • Feed and water regularly throughout the growing season (foliar feeding is a great option), and remember that roses typically require more food and water than other shrubs or perennials.

Reflection: Emerging from Winter Part 2

Here is Part 2 of Reflections on the Emerging from Winter workshop with Soil & Stem in April 2018. Click here to read Part 1.

The flowers we worked with in the workshop included: specialty narcissus, parrot tulups, hellebores, ranunculus, fritiallaria, clematis, akebia, spirea, amelanchier, viburnum, quince, camellia, anemone and dogwood.

I love reflecting on the individuality of the students who came to the workshop. From their questions to their favorite flowers, from the color palette to the shape and flow of their arrangement, their finished arrangements are so unique and perfectly express the beauty of spring.

Emerging From Winter

EmergingFromWinter-79

 

 

Special thanks to the growers of these stunning flowers: Busy Bee Farm and Florals, Cartref Gardens and Ninebark Farm. And with gratitude for the support from A Fox in the Flowers, Charlotte and the Quail and Kelly Brown Photography. And thanks to the incredibly talented growers and designers who joined us for the workshop including Darlene, Kathleen, Carol and @houseatwindsor @backcountryblooms @littlebirdbloom @perennialgatherings @flower_fort @jillloveslace @alison.lopakka.joy.