Virginia ablooming
It’s springtime and men’s passions naturally turn to baseball, sex and booze.
Some of us also get a yen for other things, like (please don’t laugh)….. azaleas.
It’s true. And now is when these lovely flowering shrubs are blooming in all their glory around here, especially this year and unlike the bad scene last spring. My own numerous varieties of the azaleas are really showing off their widely diverse blossoming colors and characteristics.
Many of mine also, like myself I must admit, are showing the effects of aging, since I started growing the plants nearly 30 years ago in my yard in Aquia Harbour. Back in the 1980s I even started a little business of selling young starts I’d grown from cuttings.
It was much fun for a long time, but then my back gave out before my interest did, and so I had to close down Azaleas of Aquia a few years ago.
It was most enjoyable. Notice I didn’t say profitable. As a spare-time entrepreneur I found I had too little expertise to succeed business-wise.
But it was hugely successful in one respect: It impressed my old man back home in Texas. A successful rancher himself and a prominent tractor dealer before that, he had been satisfied I suppose earlier in my career when I advanced to become a division director of information in a USDA agency.
Yet, all along he considered my long stint as a Washington bureaucrat a “gravy train,” as if I had made good money doing things nobody in the real world of business valued very much.
Things changed when I started up my little backyard bidness. That’s all he wanted to hear about. In retrospect, I’m happy he was too old to ever get to see my nursery’s layout for himself. It wasn’t expansive, to say the least. But It provided lots of happy talk that he was ever so eager to engage in, Besides, as I once predicted to Aquia Harbour’s former manager Fran Hopkins when I first got permission to start a nursery here in 1987, even if it failed I would still wind up with a yard full of azaleas. I did. I wish she, and Dad, could see them now.
True, some of my azaleas have their problems, growing old along with me. Some of the oldest are getting too big and twiggy, with branches dying from the bottom. But like old friends, seeing them go is painful. So they stay a bit longer.
Happily, many keep on being beautiful just about every spring, although last season was a distinct disappointment. I’m not sure why.
They’re looking great now. That Eastertime frost nipped some of my early bloomers in the bud, turning them brown. But that’s to be expected if you want to grow such early varieties.
Because when they avoid getting frosted, they put on a fine show. “Geisha,” a Glendale variety, is a favorite that blossoms profusely here most years. It’s also one of the hardiest of my plants.
Another early bloomer that defies even the cold snaps that endanger my “Geishas” is “PJM.” That’s the deep purple one blooming at the same time as the forsythias and usually before the redbuds.
“PJM,” like its variants “Olga” and “Aglo” that bloom a bit later and are pinker, acts more like a rhododendron in its growth habit and is very hardy.
Azaleas can be selected for their season of bloom. Some, like the “Gumpo” varieties, may not start blooming until June. And they’re usually not nearly as showy as those reaching full bloom about now.
The newest kinds on the market, and priced accordingly, are azaleas bearing the brand name “Encore.” They have the characteristic of blooming off-season, say in the spring and again in the fall. I have growna few, but have been disappointed. Their blooms are relatively sparse and largely unnoticeable, especially in the fall. I’d stick with the older dependable varieties.
For instance? Try “Hardy Gardenia.” Its lovely creamy-white flowers bloom in late April against a background of glossy green leaves on a plant that seldom reaches hip-high. This was a best seller for me.
Or “Damask Rose.” This old timer has big beautiful blossoms in early May. Like one of its nice newer relatives, “Ho Oden,” it tends to spread out and get big and leggy, but it’s survived many years here, staying in fine shape.
To tell the truth, I love any azalea that’s in full bloom. After all, it’s springtime.
Some of us also get a yen for other things, like (please don’t laugh)….. azaleas.
It’s true. And now is when these lovely flowering shrubs are blooming in all their glory around here, especially this year and unlike the bad scene last spring. My own numerous varieties of the azaleas are really showing off their widely diverse blossoming colors and characteristics.
Many of mine also, like myself I must admit, are showing the effects of aging, since I started growing the plants nearly 30 years ago in my yard in Aquia Harbour. Back in the 1980s I even started a little business of selling young starts I’d grown from cuttings.
It was much fun for a long time, but then my back gave out before my interest did, and so I had to close down Azaleas of Aquia a few years ago.
It was most enjoyable. Notice I didn’t say profitable. As a spare-time entrepreneur I found I had too little expertise to succeed business-wise.
But it was hugely successful in one respect: It impressed my old man back home in Texas. A successful rancher himself and a prominent tractor dealer before that, he had been satisfied I suppose earlier in my career when I advanced to become a division director of information in a USDA agency.
Yet, all along he considered my long stint as a Washington bureaucrat a “gravy train,” as if I had made good money doing things nobody in the real world of business valued very much.
Things changed when I started up my little backyard bidness. That’s all he wanted to hear about. In retrospect, I’m happy he was too old to ever get to see my nursery’s layout for himself. It wasn’t expansive, to say the least. But It provided lots of happy talk that he was ever so eager to engage in, Besides, as I once predicted to Aquia Harbour’s former manager Fran Hopkins when I first got permission to start a nursery here in 1987, even if it failed I would still wind up with a yard full of azaleas. I did. I wish she, and Dad, could see them now.
True, some of my azaleas have their problems, growing old along with me. Some of the oldest are getting too big and twiggy, with branches dying from the bottom. But like old friends, seeing them go is painful. So they stay a bit longer.
Happily, many keep on being beautiful just about every spring, although last season was a distinct disappointment. I’m not sure why.
They’re looking great now. That Eastertime frost nipped some of my early bloomers in the bud, turning them brown. But that’s to be expected if you want to grow such early varieties.
Because when they avoid getting frosted, they put on a fine show. “Geisha,” a Glendale variety, is a favorite that blossoms profusely here most years. It’s also one of the hardiest of my plants.
Another early bloomer that defies even the cold snaps that endanger my “Geishas” is “PJM.” That’s the deep purple one blooming at the same time as the forsythias and usually before the redbuds.
“PJM,” like its variants “Olga” and “Aglo” that bloom a bit later and are pinker, acts more like a rhododendron in its growth habit and is very hardy.
Azaleas can be selected for their season of bloom. Some, like the “Gumpo” varieties, may not start blooming until June. And they’re usually not nearly as showy as those reaching full bloom about now.
The newest kinds on the market, and priced accordingly, are azaleas bearing the brand name “Encore.” They have the characteristic of blooming off-season, say in the spring and again in the fall. I have growna few, but have been disappointed. Their blooms are relatively sparse and largely unnoticeable, especially in the fall. I’d stick with the older dependable varieties.
For instance? Try “Hardy Gardenia.” Its lovely creamy-white flowers bloom in late April against a background of glossy green leaves on a plant that seldom reaches hip-high. This was a best seller for me.
Or “Damask Rose.” This old timer has big beautiful blossoms in early May. Like one of its nice newer relatives, “Ho Oden,” it tends to spread out and get big and leggy, but it’s survived many years here, staying in fine shape.
To tell the truth, I love any azalea that’s in full bloom. After all, it’s springtime.
posted by Ben Blankenship at
12:17 PM
