Late Spring Primula Watch part 1

This is a photo dump of primulas from late May until the solstice. Click to enlarge.

I built a new primula bed last year and filled it with P halleri, P frondosa, P mistassinica, and P gemmifera, along with a few auriculas. The pink and purple flowered section Aleurtia primulas look similar to one another, and I am not sure these are all correctly identified. Sometimes seed is misidentified, or seed can migrate to the wrong end of the seed tray, or labels get mixed up. (The plants labelled P gemmifera are definitely not, though the seed was said to be. So what are they?) A few of the plants pictured are still in pots, waiting for a place in the garden, mine or someone else’s.

New primula bed with year-old seedlings

Primula gemmifera, the sign (incorrectly) says, and Primula halleri (looks like) in the new bed

Primula farinosa (unless it’s not).

Primula frondosa (if it is).

Primula gemmifera (it’s not)

Another not Primula gemmifera.

Primula mistassinica (pretty sure)

Primula halleri (definitely)

Long-throated Primula halleri

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I had a tray of three-year-old P veris seedlings (cowslips) from seed collected from my polyanthus primulas. Because there was P veris in the garden nearby, and P veris is a parent of the polyanthus primulas, the seeds came up as P veris (though not pure P veris).  I now have too many cowslips and no longer bother collecting seed from polyanthus primulas. Rather than throw these old seedlings on the compost, I planted them like bedding annuals in clumps of two or three under the rose bushes. Most are yellow, but a few red and orange ones add some excitement. They will be large clumps in a couple of years. Photo below, and then a couple of choice specimens from a previous planting (against the fence, north-facing).

A profusion of cowslips, safely out of hoof-reach of any cows

light orange cowslip

Orange cowslip

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These seedlings were over-wintered indoors because they were very small. Most are Barnhaven polyanthus primroses, but the one in flower is a P elatior. Looks like there is a P mistassinica in there too. The pale, long-stemmed leaves are the last of the indoor leaves. The two darker plants will be Cowichans. All will flower next spring among the Barnhaven primroses already in the garden.

Young primula seedlings (P elatior and Barnhaven polyanthus)

A Barnhaven polyanthus

A couple of primulas from Barnhaven’s blue mix

A spectacular Barnhaven polyanthus

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This is my first polyanthus primula, bought at Riverdale Greenhouse more than 15 years ago. It had a name but it’s long lost. It has been much divided over the years and will be again this summer. It beats the showier ‘Pacific Giants’ primroses by virtue of its smaller flowers, held apart and lifted above the foliage (cowslip-like), not clumped together right on top of it.

Primula x polyantha.

Silver lace polyanthus, bought at Apache Seeds three years ago

Primula cortusoides (centre) and ‘Pacific Giants’ primroses

Primula cortusoides flanked by vivid Pacific Giants primroses.

Going Localo

Arrived at the library an hour before it opened, so went for a walk, camera in hand. I often do this and then don’t get around to posting the pictures.

This is Zocalo, a small inner-city home decor shop and garden centre in Little Italy. I bought the shiny black pan I call an alpine trough here. And a bunch of pots. I bought my cherry tree here. My red-leaf sand cherry (shrub). My Gentiana acaulis came from here. And a Siberian iris….

Entering the garden shop in the courtyard at Zocalo.

This is the view of the courtyard from the backyard looking through the potting shed.

The view of the courtyard (fountain, lovely lady with pink umbrella) from the backyard (big pots, perennials and trees), through the potting shed (smaller pots and ornaments).

The fellow in the blue cap is coming to assist the lady with the pink umbrella. Earlier, he came up to me, rather quickly, and I felt I may have been profiled, not as somebody who would steal but as somebody who would curl up behind the barrel planters and spend the night. I had been going to the library — a quick in and out and then back home — and had left home in my gardening clothes. I was knee-stained and grimy. Zocalo is the inner-city garden centre for people who put on clean clothes to go shopping.

The lady is about to get helped.

Get your pots here.

Lots of pots in the yard behind the potting shed

The tomato for $3 is ‘Cherokee Purple,’ one that I bought in a flat of 12 for $1 at the neighbourhood elementary school a few days earlier. (Smug.)

Barrel planters, trees and shrubs. This is where I bought my cherry tree … three years ago?

Plants and cute things for sale

The courtyard floor

Here are a couple of hell strips planted up by the adjacent residents. Both are wild-looking or naturalistic (true “low-maintenance” gardening) and continue the planting style from the residential property. Very impressive. I’d like to get violets to grow in the grass on my hell strip, maybe a few cowslips, but that’s probably as far as I’d go.

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Home again. Here is the Gentiana acaulis (stemless gentian) I bought at Zocalo. It is spreading well and looks healthy, though not putting out a great many flowers.

Bloomin’ ‘Eck!

Has success spoiled That Bloomin’ Garden Show and Art Sale? Obviously not. Look at this parking lot, packed full minutes after the hall has opened.

“The event brings out over 1000 gardeners and shoppers from around the city to our Avenue.” The parking lot is going to be full all day.

But in That Bloomin”s early years (how often do you get to use two apostrophes side by side?), there were more plants to buy. There were tables of plants in the parking lot and along the sidewalk. It was an event for people who lived within walking distance of the community hall. There was hustle and bustle, wagons and wheelbarrows and pick-up trucks, people carrying trays and bags full of plants. Moved indoors to make way for the vehicles of cross-town drivers, the event is now “a beautiful, serene atmosphere with classical music.” (Last year, the classical music had to compete with an atmospheric waterfall/fountain thing, and the art strained to be seen under the serene lighting, mistakes not repeated this year.) Serenity is lovely, but it draws a hush over the room. Serenity stifles commerce and conversation. (The neighbourhood paper reports that this year’s event, a “great success,” attracted around 1500 people, who were “treated to soothing classical music.”) And serenity takes up space. At a garden show, you want to see lots and lots of plants. Where That Bloomin”s organizers have erected a stage for musicians, there should be a great big table loaded with greenery (interesting perennials in small pots).

One year, the third or fourth, I think, I bought the Lewisia cotyledon in my little alpine trough (as I call it) — a spectacular plant. I bought it with two other plants (3 for $10), a ‘Wanda’ primrose that did all right for a couple of years and disappeared (I may be nursing a last bit of it in an unlabelled pot), and a third plant I don’t recall. But three good perennials for $10 (even $12, even $15) is a nice score. This year’s show had only three plant vendors among the many crafters, information-pushers and membership-drivers (also, the naturalization group had a few wildflowers for sale). One vendor was selling big tomato plants — on the 12th of May. Another had bedding plants and hanging baskets (pelargoniums, petunias, marigolds, etc). And the Devonian Botanic Garden was selling impressive unseasonably large perennials (flowering size, greenhouse grown, complete with illustrated and bar-coded tags) — aiming, like the crafters and artisans and basketeers, at the Mother’s Day market — as well as a few smaller plants, two of which I scooped up.

The plants I bought: a geranium (cranesbill) with dark red leaves and a japanese painted fern — sold (and propagated?) by the Devonian Botanic Garden.

Outside, the swap table offered maybe six plants, sticks with one or two leaves on them, too shabby and muddy to be allowed indoors. (Something similar happens at Seedy Sunday, in March (or did last year; I didn’t go back). The main hall is full of vendors, and the seed swap — the proper centrepiece of the event — is crammed into a back room along with a few vendors who booked too late for a good table.)

Lewisia cotyledon in the alpine trough — bloomin’ right

So — what to do? The second weekend in May is too early for a perennial swap, too early for tomatoes and cucumbers and basil. It’s the perfect time for a lovely Mother’s Day gift fair, featuring hanging baskets of flowering annuals, along with home-spun pottery and hand-strung jewellery, chamber music and carrot cake.

The first weekend of June is the right time for an outdoor plant market and perennial swap. The Edmonton Horticultural Society’s plant swap is the last weekend in May (way the hell and gone out in the west end, when it should be at the Central Lions Rec Centre, along with the compost sale). The neighbourhood elementary school’s tomato plant sale is the first week of June — the ideal time to plant tomatoes, though by now most people have bought theirs, and the school has trouble selling donated garden centre surplus for $1 per flat of 12 or 18 (large plants in 4-inch pots — crazy).

The solution. Two events: in early May, That Serene Mother’s Day Gift and Wellness Fair; in early June, That Bustlin’ Lush Outdoor Plant Swap and Sale.

I have barely room in the garden for the 20+ tomatoes I started from seed — why did I buy 12 more out of a school gym? Because they were a dollar. (Eight and a third cents each.)

Spring Bulb Report

I planted bulbs in 2009 and 2010. Most of them failed to appear the next spring. Those that did grow up, and came back again this spring, are some tough and determined plants.

Fritillaria meleagris

There are six Frittilaria meleagris at the relatively sunny front of the wet-shade bed. They are increasing — doubling up, but still look sparse. They look like they belong among other tall, thin-leaved plants, such as grasses in a wet meadow, which I don’t have. I took seed last fall and have seedlings this spring, which I will keep in a pot to maybe, in a few years, get the mass-planting effect on a small scale.

Fritillaria meleagris bud

I don’t grow hybrid tulips, with their freakishly oversize, plasticky flowers. But I decided to try species tulips, thinking they might be hardier and more natural looking. I planted a big bag of mixed bulbs. The hardiest turned out be what I assume are Tulipa tarda. There is also, three years on, one round, red flower, which may be a Tulipa humilis. The Tulipa tarda have spread seed around, and this spring the seeds were sprouting.

Tulipa tarda?

Species tulip — Tulipa tarda?

Lone red species tulp — Tulipa humilis?

Considering how many bulbs I planted, I should have great drifts of crocuses. Instead, I find a crocus here, a crocus there. These few are quick to increase, though, so maybe I will one day have those drifts.

a pale blue crocus in the alpine trough

a yellow crocus in the alpine garden

The snowdrops (Galanthus) have featured on the blog before. Their survival rate is similar to that of the crocuses, about 1 out of 8.

Snowdrop

The hardiest and most vigorous daffodil I’ve tried is a white multi-flowering type named ‘Thalia.’ They are packaged as “Rockgarden Narcissi,” but they stood too tall and wrong-looking among the primulas in my rock garden, so I dug them out this spring and stuffed them in a pot. After they had finished flowering, I dumped them out and separated them into ten pots, two or so bulbs to a pot (there were five bulbs in the original package), which will sit in the sun through the summer. When the foliage has died back, I will replant the bulbs in a suitable spot.

‘Thalia’ potted, a few days past their best — a pack of five bulbs much increased in their third spring

A couple of the mini narcissus have come back for a second and third spring. The most vigorous of these is ‘Jetfire.’ I found a few ‘Tete a Tete,’ but only one of the tiny ‘Hawera.’

Mini Narcissus ‘Hawera’

‘Tete-a-Tete’

I have fewer of this fritillaria in flower than last year, some bulbs putting up only foliage.

Fritillaria michailovskyi

Finally, the reliable, ever-increasing purple globe alliums.

Purple globe allium (ornamental onion)

Ex/(s)ite/me(a)nt

Found this post I wrote last summer and forgot to finish.
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Some pictures from today’s [August 27] walking tour of a one-day art show called In/stall/ed organized by artist-run-centre Latitude 53. Seventeen art installations, each one in a parking stall, in Edmonton. A pun is the lowest form of humour but if you slash it to bits it’s the highest.

I liked this exhibition called “Framing Ground.” The stuff in the frames was collected from within a single block in the neighbourhood.

There are pieces broken off cars and things thrown or fallen from cars. There is a page of Social Studies notes. There is a frame full of dried leaves and another full of leaf mold.

The artist had collected these discarded or fallen objects and I re/collected them with my camera.

As I did, a sketchy-looking character lying on the grass in the park across the street watched me and took pictures. The local perv? I flatter myself. No. When I was half a block away, I turned back, and saw this yellow-shirted fellow had got up and gone to examine the show I had just left. He was the artist, looking to see whether I had added a gum wrapper, shopping receipt, or a page torn from my notebook.

I like the show because it is about the neighbourhood and the people who have passed through it, a neighbourhood in which I often walk and notice odd and troubling items of litter (a single party shoe –). It is about making things from crap and junk (the frames as well as the stuff inside them), so both repudiation and redemption. It is about gathering and sorting the evidence. It is about putting frames around things that do not belong in frames, letting you see what a frame can do and what it can’t do. (It’s about what was inside the frames before –) It makes you look again and see more than you did. Simple and cunning. Four stars.

I saw a few shows that I did not photograph because, at first, I wasn’t sure it was okay to, and sometimes because there was a person in the show, and photographing the person seemed, to me, too intrusive. Of these, the best are “My Dido, the Orator,” and “Carspace.” In the first, the artists’ grandfather, in his easy chair, talks to whoever sits in his parking-space living-room (chairs, a coffee table, books and magazines). The room was full when I went by, Dido was indeed holding forth, and his listeners looked like they were having a good time. “Carspace” is a dance inside a minivan. The driver/dancer gets into the car when you arrive. She sits in the driver’s seat and turns on the car stereo. But she doesn’t sit for long. Soon she is dancing all about the inside of the car. This means rolling over the seat backs, kicking her legs up, flipping her feet out the windows. It’s a dance about loving the music (The Beach Boys) and loving being inside that car. She seems to move freely within the confining  space. She is doing what we would do in a car if we were not strapped in and if we could do what the music on the car stereo moved us to do. Who remembers being a kid, pre-seatbelts, and jumping from the front seat into the back seat? She was having that kind of fun. The dance is not erotic, but car-dancing could be the new pole-dancing. It could be. It is strange because the car is private space, almost domestic space; it feels like watching a private act that we should probably not be watching. We always sneak a look at people in their cars. Here we have permission to look. Imagine if, waiting in stuck traffic, people unbuckled and danced for each other. Five stars. Fantastic.

This is “The Hush Box.” Inside, the walls are covered in black cloth. You sit in a black chair and cover your ears and your eyes. The sign outside says you can stay as long as you like. There is no time limit.

I don’t stay long at all. It reminds me of the outhouse on my grandparents’ farm, where you wiped with a page of Sears catalogue. It reminds me I recently heard  that in South Korea public washrooms are meant to be places for meditation as well as defecation, both together. Doing a good shit is like doing yoga. I’m not saying I feel like taking a shit. But my thoughts are tending in the shit-taking direction, so I see no benefit in staying any longer. When I get out, conscious of how little time I have spent inside, I say to the volunteer attendant, “There actually is a time limit.” “What?” “It’s not true that there is no time limit.” “How is that?” “The exhibition closes at 5.” It is now past 4:30. In the flattest, driest, most sarcastic deadpan, she says to me: “Oh, you made a funny.” (What, art is allowed to challenge us, but we are not allowed to challenge art?) This gal was questioning our contemporary expectations of civility in an extended art-institutional setting. Or else she was hot and tired. Either way, next year (let there be a next year) she has to have her own performance installation. People will ask her questions: she will humiliate them. This miserabella was, for me, the discovery and rising star of the In/stall/ed event.

In the same school parking lot as the Hush Box (two stars), was an installation devised by two people, one of whom described himself as an Andy Warhol for our times; Paris Hilton’s tweets and Hello Kitty product packages were his Campbell’s soup tins. So we have a bit of lawn made from squares of turf, a couple of lawn chairs, a little table, and a cooler of lemonade.

You can, if you like, sit in the chairs and drink the lemonade. (Pull out your Hello Kitty-skinned phone and read famous strangers’ tweets.) The set-up is called an “archetypal North American vacation site;” it is supposed to “question our contemporary work ethic.” If we work to get a vacation, and this is the vacation we get, we are going to wonder why we are doing this shitty job. There’s more to it. Because the parking space is at an elementary school, and school teachers are envied and despised for their summer vacations, the installation reminds us to hate teachers but also comforts us with the idea that although teachers may be on a long vacation, they can never get away from the terrible job. It is right there behind them, in the back of their mind, haunting them, spoiling every day (each day more than the one before) until they return to it. Work provides the vacation and also ruins it. Five stars for teachers, one star (Paris Hilton) for the vacation pad.

I didn’t get to see all the installations. Some had shut down before I got there. At some I didn’t understand what was going on (a chair facing the back of a TV). There were some pieces by artists who know what they are doing and some pieces that explore the boundary between artist and idle hipster or artist and arts student waiting to go back to school. All in all, it was good and interesting and fun. Hope it happens again.