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Post by durgan on May 26, 2010 18:41:27 GMT -5
www.durgan.org/URL/?HNICR 26 May 2010 Columbine (Aquilegia) Columbine is an early perennial, Spring flower and adds some color to the garden area.
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peppereater
Breeder in Training
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just tell me when to shut up
Posts: 230
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Post by peppereater on Jun 3, 2010 17:46:23 GMT -5
Columbine is gorgeous, but has the characteristic so many perennials do that puts off many home gardeners, it has a very brief bloom period and then adds little interest to the landscape. Used with this understanding in mind, primarily as a specimen, it's dramatic.
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Penny
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Post by Penny on Jun 4, 2010 6:16:05 GMT -5
Just gorgeous!
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Post by roper2008 on Sept 3, 2010 10:29:35 GMT -5
The hybrid columbines are really cool and my McKana Giant bloomed longer than the regular columbine. If it survives the winter, will add two more hybrids.
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blah
Tomato Gardener
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Post by blah on Sept 22, 2010 23:02:28 GMT -5
Columbine is cool! ;D I have 2 growing in my drive way on the east side of the car port. I didn't plant them there, I guess they decided that this was a good place to move to. They survived "green" all through the winter! They must be hybrids ?
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Post by flowerpower on Oct 27, 2010 6:42:21 GMT -5
The hybrid columbines are really cool and my McKana Giant bloomed longer than the regular columbine. If it survives the winter, will add two more hybrids. Columbine is very hardy. I very rarely lose one over the winter. The only pest I see is Leaf Miner. They don't destroy the leaves, so I don't worry.
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Post by bluelacedredhead on Oct 27, 2010 7:47:31 GMT -5
They grow well in shade. I've found this out since moving here. On the farm, I had one out front in full sun on sand. It survived, but barely. Here, there are several in a woodland setting. They seem quite happy and bloom much longer than the full sun setting I had before.
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stratcat
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Post by stratcat on Nov 4, 2010 22:30:22 GMT -5
Here are a couple shots down Mom's private drive when I didn't mow in May, 2007. Aquilegia canadensis L. moved in-Red Columbine. In town, I have some purple columbine that came with my house back in 1979.
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Post by flowerpower on Nov 5, 2010 6:56:27 GMT -5
The wild red is that common in MI? I actually had to buy one and it's a mini type. I only see the wild purple around here. Occasionally, I will see a pale pink growing wild. One yr I bought a pack of the McKana Giants. There was a mistake in the packing. Several of the plants turned out to be "Nora Barlow", which is a small double flower. A really cool looking bloom.
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stratcat
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Post by stratcat on Nov 5, 2010 11:02:33 GMT -5
Hi, Flowerpower. Looking at the USDA County Distribution map of Red Columbines in Michigan, I see 77 of 83 counties have native or naturalized populations. Just looked up pics of Nora Barlow-that is nice!
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carolyn137
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Post by carolyn137 on Nov 9, 2010 8:02:47 GMT -5
A. canadensis is also naturalized widely in NYS.
When I moved here in 1999 I met the wife of the couple that had this house built and Ruth was one of the most passionate persons I've ever known about wild flowers.
Her husband had died of Alzheimers a couple of years before I moved here and she had moved to a home in the village and we became fast friends b/c I have a love for wildflowers as well.
She had carefully moved to here non-endangered species so I have several large clumps of canadensis as well as bloodroot and ginger and wild lupines and so much more. And she took me to all her secret locations elsewhere to show me where to find yellow and pink and showy ladyslippers as well as the common maroon and other Trilliums, Dutchman's Breeches and lots more.
Around here hepatica is known as Mayflower and I have lots of that as well. I knew all that she showed me b/c starting back when I was actually a Girl Scout we had a man from the NYS Biological Services who took us on many field trips everywhere, and then when I was in college I took several semesters with a faculty member who taught us so much more about everything in nature. DEspite the weather we went out every single session and that could be brutal, considering it was near Ithaca.
I have to walk across a bridge from the 1800's to get to my front door and under that bridge runs a brook which then cascades over a 30 ft waterfall next to my deck. And all along the banks of that brook are ferns of all kinds and bluebells and May Apple and a lot more including watercress in the brook.
I've planned and created many perennial beds since moving here and my faves are those perennials that are fragrant, so lots of Dianthus and roses, and also many peonies that I moved from the old farmhouse where I was raised that were my grandmothers and some I know well, like Festiva Maxima, but most I just know as the rose one, etc. My grandmother also loved perennials as well.
And yes, I have cultivated Columbine here as well, McKana Giants and some shorter ones that I think have Songbird as part of their name.
Now that I have to use this walker Freda, who cleans for me, also now does all the gardening and she always makes sure that I have bouquets of flowers inside every time she's here.
I think of myself sometimes as being a born again Druid herbalist, representing the paternal side of the family which is English on both sides, since all that's in nature is what I love the most.
Carolyn
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Post by bluelacedredhead on Nov 9, 2010 9:17:01 GMT -5
Carolyn, I can appreciate flowers. There are lots of perennials here, but they were here when we bought the place in 2009. Poor Flowerpower...I kept emailing her pics for identification last year, but she was on dialup until recently and couldn't open most of them. I
I think it's a lovely gesture that you have moved your Grandmother's flowers to the home you live in now. We had lilacs on the farm that apparently came from a homestead the previous owner's family owned since 1782. When she passed in 2006, so too did the lilacs...
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carolyn137
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Its all my fault
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Post by carolyn137 on Nov 9, 2010 10:22:06 GMT -5
Carolyn, I can appreciate flowers. There are lots of perennials here, but they were here when we bought the place in 2009. Poor Flowerpower...I kept emailing her pics for identification last year, but she was on dialup until recently and couldn't open most of them. I I think it's a lovely gesture that you have moved your Grandmother's flowers to the home you live in now. We had lilacs on the farm that apparently came from a homestead the previous owner's family owned since 1782. When she passed in 2006, so too did the lilacs... Blue, the farm I was rasied on was originally owned by the Shakers from the mid-1700's onward until my grandfather bought the 90 acres in 1905 for $5,000 and sold 1/2 of it the next year for 6K, paid off his mortgage and had an extra $1,000. Because it was an historic place originally, it was an outlying farm of the original Shaker settlement near the Albany airport formed by Mother Ann Lee, I have some wonderful diaries of what was planted and when, and when I was a kid there were still some of the original apple and peach orchards as well as red raspberries, black raspberries and white and black currents. Along side one barn there were a row of lilacs that were about 20 ft tall, and I don't care what anyone tells me, they were the most fragrant ones I've ever experienced. When I moved here Ruth had planted just one lilac in the back, and as trees encroached it did worse and worse so I bought 5 new lilacs and planted them as well. There is nothing so wonderful as a bouquet of frangrant lilacs mixed with branches of wild apple, of which there's a lot around here as well. But there are many older homes here dating back to the late 1700 and early 1800's and I ASAP found a couple of families that would let me take branches from those deep purple ones as well as the whites, and they too were very fragrant as well. There were also lots of what we called Syringa at the farm, Mock Orange is another name, and the fragrance of those was outstanding. I bought two different ones for here, but they just don't have the scent that I want. Best of all was the following. The road to our farm was bordered on one side by two rows of tall pines and mixed in near the house were some crabapple trees. Dianthus came up every year from the pine needles and on rainy days the fragrance of those dianthuses was the most wonderful I've ever experienced. I don't know how they got there but as the years passed they disappeared. How I wish I'd harvested seed but as a kid I didn't even think of that. I also still maintain the old fashioned Hollyhocks of my grandmothers or maybe those were originally Shaker planted ones; they were still going strong when I was a kid and still were when I harvested seed to bring them up here, plant them and enjoy them/ Memories, I love them. ;D Carolyn Carolyn
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Post by flowerpower on Nov 10, 2010 9:36:01 GMT -5
I do enjoy the Lilacs in the Spring. I think one of them is probably over 100 yrs old. I have to chop a few big pieces off one of them. If they get too tall here, the wind snaps them off. I'd rather use the chainsaw. Also the blooms get too high for me to pick. lol I was thinking of getting the really dark purple variety. If I saw one on sale maybe. One of the previous owners planted a good amt of perennials. I am totally grateful for all the early 70's Daffs and Tall Phlox. They are very heavily scented. I noticed the wild birds were eating the seeds from the phlox. So for the past few yrs, I have just left them. I would assume they are hybrids. I do find volunteers on occasion. I see some very nice color combos on these plants. But most importantly, the scent is still there. I have a few Peonies. Maybe only 40 yrs old. They didn't plan for the future when planting. What a terrible spot. lol But I see alot of their plantings are too close or they were not thinking about mature sizes. Who plants a pine that will grow 80 ft on the south side of a dwarf apple tree? The poor apples get hardly any sun. I will leave it there since it probably will outlive the Pine. They are both only 15 ft from the main road. The pine is starting to take a beating from all the salt, dirt.. It's nice to have flowers that are not only beautiful, but have sentimental meaning. My BF could normally care less what flowers I plant. But he did ask me to put in some Lily-of the-Valley that came from his grandma's house in Bklyn. The original bulbs were probably planted in the 1920's. It's actually one plant he doesn't mow down on me. lol There is a hydrangea from there too at my inlaws. But I can't get them to live here.
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Post by bluelacedredhead on Nov 11, 2010 8:19:18 GMT -5
I love it when people such as yourselves (Carolyn and FP) care enough to move plants to another home that are from family. I had those lilacs from a neighbours family, but never had anything like that from my own. Enjoy!
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