Hole-y Hosta

How are your Hosta? Are they hole-y?

Although this is Easter weekend, this is not a religious post. While many people certainly feel that Hosta have been heaven sent, I'm writing about the Holes in them.

Hosta are amazing plants. If they grow in your area, you should never garden without them. There is such a huge selection of foliage patterns, colors and sizes, I don't even consider the blooms but they can be lovely too.

It's no wonder that Hosta tours are generally in early June around here. The foliage has fully flushed out by then but it's still clean and pristine.

A wonderful thing about Hosta is that they are still beautiful months later. There's only one thing, they usually have some holes in the foliage by then.

At the very right side of this photo you'll see the plain green foliage of a Hosta. I have quite a bit of this variety. It was given to me by a woman in my garden club. Stuck in the middle of the three huge clumps she gave me were tags from the nursery she had bought them from. While I could read the name of the nursery, the name of the Hosta was obliterated.

See the holes in the leaves? Most people would blame those holes on slugs. Ewwww, slugs! I hate slugs, in fact, I'm a slugaphobic. But as much as I'd like to blame those slimy creatures, I have to confess that these holes were probably not caused by them. First of all, I have few slugs here. Secondly, this location is out by the street, around my mailbox. The soil there is gritty from the sand the town spreads during winter snow. It's also very dry out there, the worst conditions for slugs. So why the holes? Well, little twigs falling from the trees above will cause those holes.

I do have some Hosta in the garden that seem to beckon and call the slugs to come and dine. Those leaves look like swiss-cheese by late summer. I couldn't find a photo of one of those today but will keep looking.

In this photo though you see one or two larger holes. Again, this type of hole is more likely caused by twigs falling from the trees above. If your Hosta are planted under trees as so many of them are, then you will just have to live with those holes.

Of course there are also the holes caused by Calie-the-wonder-doodle chasing chipmunks through the Hosta bed. I decided to spare you from those photos as there's very little Hosta left to see.

Still, aren't they beautiful?

In the middle of the night

I learned several important things tonight.

First of all, I learned that if you try to take photos of Hosta at 10:00 p.m. in the dark with only a flood light shining, every moth in the neighborhood will dive bomb your head.

Secondly, I learned that when you least expect it, an angel will step forward and deliver big fat juicy clumps of Hosta at the last minute. These luscious clumps just arrived and will spend the night in our breezeway.

We are under severe flood warnings for tomorrow. 2 to 3 inches of rain plus more in many areas are expected along with strong winds. There's even a special warning to expect basement flooding. I just finished moving as many pots as possible under some kind of shelter. Tomorrow is the last day for me to prep everything for our big plant sale on Saturday. I have my husbands white water rafting outfit (slicker and matching pants) waiting for me to wear. Still, for the first time ever I might be potting in the garage.

The last lesson I learned tonight was a tough one. I had to run to the school to speak to the band parents about the sale and give some instructions. I was running late and ended up not cleaning my nails nor even remembering to change out of my muck shoes. The meeting was half over when I got there.

I talked about the plant sale. A parent asked if it was ok if her son worked the afternoon shift instead of the morning shift. I didn't understand what difference it would make and then realized she was concerned if her child worked in the afternoon and we sold out by 11:30 that he would not get credited at all. I assured her that no matter what time we sell out, children that arrive for the afternoon shift would get full credit just as the morning shift students.

My phone just rang, quite late for here. It was a friend who was at the meeting and she told me that the whole time I was speaking there were several parents snickering and saying "she actually thinks she's going to sell out...she'll be lucky to sell half that stuff".

I'm heartsick...

but I'm also a gardener and I'm one of the most optimistic people I know. My mind is still whirling trying to come up with other plants I could dig at the last minute. My mantra is, "it's for the kids".

It can be dark in the middle of the night.

Here's looking at you...

On Tuesday I saw this Hosta when I was leaving the home of one of our garden club members. It struck me as such a odd sight, I was thrilled that I had my camera in my bag.

In my own garden I have been noticing Hosta that are getting that "donut" shape. Lots of ring but no jelly in the middle. That was my thought when I took this photo.

Downloading it onto the computer the first thing that struck me was the way it looked like lots of little eyes peeking out of the foliage. Does it look like that to you too?

This was an immaculate garden and it seemed like almost everything was in a perfect ring. This was the Astilbe.

Of course when I got back home I found no perfection, just lots of Old Country Gardens tumble (that I so adore). I wish I had pulled that silly dandelion before taking this photo.

Plant sale craze is in full swing, sorry for the sporadic posts. I'm off again to buy a mini-blind to cut up for more tags.

Till later,

Melanie

Heavenly Hosta 2

Yesterday I promised I'd show some of the Hosta I have in sunny places. Keep in mind that my gardens are on Long Island (just east of New York City) so this might not work for the deep southern locations. Also, even though we have 1.3 acres, we are surrounded by tall trees so there is no such thing as direct sun from sun-up to sun-down.

On the left is Hosta 'Spritzer' which I bought at a daylily auction (yes, I know...) it turned out to be one of the best auction buys I've ever made! The plant to the right is Pulmonaria 'Raspberry Splash'. This location gets full sun from early in the morning until at least 2:00pm and then quite a bit of filtered light after that. The Pulmonaria wilts a little in the summer on a hot day but quickly recouperates in the late afternoon.

Here you can see the same spot from another angle, what this photo doesn't show is that there are lots of daylilies planted in this area too. You can see how the chartreuse color in Hosta 'Spritzer' shines like a beacon in the garden. Also in the back drop (still getting 5 hours of morning sun) is Hosta 'Blue Angel' which is now so massive that I need to divide it this spring.

One last shot of this area, this is in July and while full sun is shining here (I hate how full sun washes out the colors in photos). Hosta 'Spritzer' now has a few holes, either slug damage or broken twigs from the dying Cedar tree just north of this bed (my neighbors tree of course). But it's still hanging strong and adding lots of foliage interest to this garden.

Hosta are also great perennials for planters that you plan on leaving outside for years. Clay pots will shatter here but cement planterss or the new fake ones make it through the winter just fine. This spot also only had morning light but last year we increased the front stoop by quite a bit and even further out with more direct sun, the Hosta did fine.


My all time favorite Hosta so far is this cultivar 'Sea Fire'. I've been back to Schmidt's farm dozens of times and never saw it for sale again. This year I'm going to bite the bullet and split my clump but I don't think I'll offer any for sale. I'll plant all those pieces in nice rich sunny soil with lots of yummy composted manure. Maybe in a few years somebody will be able to talk me into sharing a piece :-)

This last shot is out along our back property line. As I mentioned yesterday, right after this was planted the neighbors took out most of their trees (they live south of us so those trees cast shade into our yard). This garden is 5 years old now and this photo is 2 years old. I really have to get in there and divide like crazy this year!

Take a careful look at that white fence in the back drop. My next post will be about choosing the right kind of fence for your garden. I wish somebody would have explained that to me in the past as we've made mistakes here too.

Oh yes, I saw my first crocus bloom today! What a surprise!!! Photos to come soon :-)

Bye,
Melanie

Heavenly Hosta

As I've become familiar with different plant societies and plant collections, I've come to realize that my various collections are not considered large by people who specialize in one plant. Yet, for the average gardener, I think my collections would actually be considered quite varied, even bordering on the brink of obsessiveness.

A few days ago I mentioned that my Hemerocallis collection (Daylilies) topped out at 450 different varieties. Today I'd estimate it to be somewhere in the upper 300 range. My Hosta collection is quite smaller with about 140 - 150 Hosta varieties. Gee, that sounds like hardly anything.

Shade gardening was something I had little interest in until 5 or 6 years ago. Shady spots were spots I couldn't grow my beloved perennials and I bemoaned those areas. Little did I know how much I would come to love to work in those delicious gardens. Nor did I realize just how many beautiful plants would thrive in those cool, shady areas.


Collecting Hosta was easy at first, only four yards away from me was a perennial plant farm that specialized in Daylilies and Hosta. Their Daylilies were older varieties and I didn't shop for any of those but the Hosta, well, when you have no Hosta, any Hosta is desirable.

(I'll take a guess and say that this is Hosta 'Pineapple upside down cake' in the foreground. In the back drop on the right is Hosta 'Thunderbolt' which in time will become a true show stopper.)

As populated as Long Island is, it still amazes me that there isn't a Hosta club that meets here locally. Hosta lovers in our area travel to New Jersey and belong to the Tri-State Hosta club. It's a large, very active club and local folks love belonging to that group. The only problem for me and most likely for other "younger" gardeners is that you need to set aside a full day for a Hosta meeting. When one has to travel the length of Long Island, through New York City and into New Jersey, it requires a number of bridges/tunnels and tolls. It's just something that's difficult to fit in to a family's busy lifestyle.

(Hosta 'On Stage' is stunning but it has somewhat fragile foliage that suffers damage easily)

I guess I should be thankful that I don't participate in a Hosta club. It allows me to be much more relaxed in growing Hosta. Believe it or not, I've forgotten the names of many of my cultivars! Others have name tags but they've been chewed beyond recognition by my wonder-doodle Calie. Does that lessen my enjoyment in this beautiful plant? Not one iota.

When it comes to growing Hosta, I find them very easy plants, forgiving of many conditions other than full baking sun. Since I don't have full baking sun anywhere here, that's not a problem for me.

While many people think of Hosta as shade plants, I consider them "shade tolerant" plants. In my book, that also means they are "sun tolerant" plants and I find that the Hosta that get 5 hours of full sun increase much faster than the Hosta that are shaded all day. Water is a key ingredient, while they will survive through drought conditions, Hosta thrive with lots and lots of water. Ideally, if you have a wet boggy area, plant some Hosta.

(Hosta 'Queen Josaphine' has leaves that look as if they've been polished with wax)

Less than one year after I planted a new shade border along my back fence, the neighbors behind us removed 30 trees from that property lines. Plants that I thought were going to be growing in full shade were suddenly subjected to mid day sunshine. Instead of looking awful, they thrived! The plants there have grown so large that I need to get in there this spring and do some serious dividing. The only downfall in my opinion was that the tree workers ruined our old wooden fence. The neighbors assured me that they planned on replacing the fence with a much improved model. Unfortunately their idea of "improved" was a 6' high white vinyl fence which is such an awful eyesore now with green mold growing along its surface.

Hosta come in an amazing variety of sizes, leaf shapes and colors. Yes, there's also a difference in blooms but I rarely consider a Hosta because of it's blooms, it's the stunning foliage that gets me every time.

One recommendation I would make to anybody who wanted to add many Hosta to their garden would be don't always buy the variegated varieties. In the above photo you can see the heavily variegated variety 'On Stage'. It would not show up as well if I had another variegated Hosta next to it. Instead, the simple, blue foliage of this lost named Hosta is the perfect foil.

The general rule of thumb is to plant the lighter colored Hosta with more sun while the darker and especially the blue Hosta prefer more shade. I definitely agree that the chartreuse Hosta need more light to keep their bright colors but they don't always hold up well to that light.

The above photo shows Hosta 'Whiskey Sour' (I'm pretty sure on that), a fern, a second blue Hosta and my amazing Acer shirasawanum 'Aureum' tree. While H. 'Whiskey Sour' has a light colored foliage, it's very soft, flimsy would be another good word and it shows damage (sun scald and slug bites) easily.

Some Hosta will get enormous while dwarf varieties might never get larger than the palm of your hand. This photo shows Hosta 'Thunderbolt' which I think is going to some day be a giant. Right now it's been suffering from our 70 lb. doodle who runs along this pathway to chase the many squirrels that frequent this corner of our garden. I expect in another two or three years it will have doubled or tripled in size, just in time for when Calie finally stops those darn puppy rips (she's two years old now).

Tomorrow I'll post some photos of Hosta that I have growing out in my front sun perennial borders. Many varieties are doing quite well there and if you are living as far north as we are here in New York, you too should be able to incorporate Hosta in sunny borders.

See ya! The sun is shining and although it's cold, I'm going outside!