for beautiful gardens
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Flower Arranging: 4251 Pennsylvania Avenue, Kansas City, Missouri 64111.
flower Arranging Quarterly appeared on the scene in early 1985. It is a small but elegant quarterly magazine devoted to the art of flower arranging in America. Membership is $14 per year.
Floramerica, P.O. Box 263, Westwood, Massachusetts 02090.
Garden is a bimonthly magazine published by the New York Botanical Garden for $10 a year. It is scientific in approach and free with membership at the garden.Take a bucket of tepid, not cold, water into the garden and plunge the cut stems directly into it. (Cold water to a flower has the same effect as a cold Shower to a gardener: Shock!) Use a sharp Knife or scissors to cut the stems, and take more length than you think you might need to ensure plenty of stem for flower arranging. When cutting, never pull at the stem. This can bruise and damage cell walls, restricting the free movement of water. Cut flowers continue living and need all the water the stems can take in. See Also Birthday Flowers:Nicotiana alata originally came from southern Brazil, and its birthday flowers once opened about 6:00 P.M. But hybridizers have been busy and the birthday flowers now stay open most of the day. Yet it is at night that the sweet fragrance makes its mark. Two cultivars are especially recommended: 'Grandiflora Alata' growing 3 feet high, with large white birthday flowers often 2 inches across; and 'Lime Green' reaching 30 inches in height, with birthday flowers the shade of lime sherbert.These flower between late spring and mid-summer and should be pruned as soon as their birthday flowers fade. First cut out thin and weak shoots, and those that cross a shrub's center Then cut out to within a couple of buds of their base all shoots that have borne birthday flowers. The removal of flowered shoots leaves young ones that will bear birthday flowers during the following year If shrubs have been neglected for several seasons, many can be rejuvenated by cutting back the complete shrub. However this usually means foregoing birthday flowers for one season. On The Other Hand See Flower Border:The wonderful thing about gardening is that you are free to create as you wish. Lovers of shrubs can establish a shrub border, while wonderful spot beds can be made with annuals; and roses can be really spectacular when they are grouped together. But surely the most interesting sight of all in the backyard must be the flower border that provides a little bit of everything annuals, perennials, shrubs, bulbs and roses.Cosmos daisies (Cosmos bipinnatus), have been in every garden that we've ever had. They produce all summer long, make great cut flowers, and even the lacy foliage grows to good effect in the border. Plants are tall and perfect for the back of the border. Look for 'Can-dystripe' with white petals edged with crimson or 'Sea Shells', the new flower that has petals that curve in on themselves like delicate denizens of the sea. Plants like full sun, are half-hardy annuals, and take about 5 days for germination. |
