Everyone has been getting into the holiday spirit here at Big Bloomers. Even our girl Alley has started getting cozy with a certain "holiday" bear.

Here's wishing everyone a Merry Christmas and a very Happy New Year.

I've been experimenting at work and at home with winter pots of evergreen perennials for shady areas. I have a covered north facing front porch that needs lovely pots of green to scare away the winter blues. On my own front porch autumn fern look lovely year round. Saxifragia is also very nice (we call them strawberry begonias up north and grow them as houseplants). Here in North Carolina potted up on my front porch they are gorgeous all year.



These are two pots that I am trying at work.



This first pot is specifically for shade and includes two heuchera, one saxifragia, one hellebore, two Disporopsis (Asian Fairy Bells) and one Aspidistra elatior. Flowering spans from late winter with the hellebore and ends with the heuchera in mid summer. The Fairy Bells and saxifragia bloom in the spring. They have done well this fall even with the unusually low night temperatures we have been experiencing.









The second pot is cordyline with violas. You could put this one in full sun but even on this shady covered porch area the violas are blooming well and the cordyline has benefited from the microclimate here.









So think out of the box when it comes to winter pots.

Where's Alley?

Can you find our girl Alley in this photograph?





She was very well pleased that John constructed these lovely perches for her.

HUMMINGBIRD DAY, 2008

Hummingbird Day was another rousing success. It was a cool and cloudy day which was great for the hummers and great for us. I think Susan "bagged and banded" three hummers in all. The Lee County Master Gardeners seemed to be busy whenever I had a chance to check, answering questions and giving advice. I wish I would have had a chance to listen to all of Mike Papay's talk on drought tolerant gardening but we got very busy and I was needed elsewhere.

Thank you to all our customers who came and spent the day with us, to Susan Campbell, she is always a pleasure, the Lee County Master Gardeners, hopefully this can be the first of many plant clinics they hold here, to Mike Papay for letting us all pick his brain and a special big THANK YOU to my PIC Peggy who inspired us all to make this year's Hummingbird Day the best one ever.

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WHERE'S ALLEY?

Kerry took this picture of Alley on Friday. She looks a little forlorn doesn't she. Alley's PIC and best bud Peggy has been gone all this week on vacation, off gallivanting and having a great time. Alley thinks vacations are over-rated but mostly she just wants her buddy back.

PLANT OF THE MOMENT-AGASTACHE 'SANGRIA'

Today at work the owner John called me into his office to show me something on the computer. He was looking for information on a specific plant and happened across a website that not only described hundreds of different plants but also provided gorgeous pictures of each one. One of the first pictures he showed me was Agastache 'Sangria'. He casually mentioned that we had a bunch in the greenhouse. They were started late and brought into the selling greenhouses late so we still had them in four packs which explains why I wasn't growing them since I knew that I had already purchased all the agastache that we had in four packs early in the season. I got out of the office as quickly as I could and made a beeline to the herb greenhouses where I found said four packs. I was very impressed with the plants. All were growing strongly upright, looking very healthy and vigorous.

Agastache 'Sangria' is an agastache mexicana and is hardy to zone 7. It actually likes and THRIVES in dry soils which I have no trouble providing in my gardens of sand. Its leaves are lemon scented and can be used in teas and the flowers are edible. Its also a first-year-flowering perennial so I will get plenty of blooms from the four plants in my four pack this season. They do best when pinched back early in the season to keep them compact and branching. They will eventually grow to around 48 inches tall.

It just goes to show you that at any time, even when you least expect it, you might just by chance run across or have pointed out to you...a plant of the moment and for this reason Agastache 'Sangria' is my plant of the moment.

Summertime...and the living is heaty!

We have been keeping busy here this summer at Big Bloomers. With the recent rains combined with some good sales on annuals we have had a steady stream of customers. If you haven't signed up for our contact list and want to be informed by email of our sales just visit that section of our website and sign up for notification of sales and events.

Sundays always seem to be the slowest day here and being so would be an ideal day to come and shop. On a recent Sunday, Ashley, who happens to have a wonderful, natural eye for putting together a combination planting basket decided to plant the huge strawberry jar we have had here sitting empty for a number of years. Didn't she do a fantastic job!