Some scientific blogger types post lavish entries about their gardens and about their work in them. I cannot be considered a true "scientific type" but since I'm a blogger I get to post something about my garden too, even though I won't use the word "lovely" to describe anything in it. On Saturday I moved my plants out onto my terrace. The terrace faces southwest and gets only afternoon sun. It is also very dry because the wide overhanging eave prevents anything but the heaviest rain from watering the plants. So all summer long I am out there faithfully watering them.

The only plants that survive well under my terrace conditions are cacti, succulents, and geraniums (that is, the common Pelargonium type of geraniums.). I have tried to grow other plants but they usually get fried. One year I was able to grow zinnias but that must have been a milder summer than usual.

I have grown geraniums for years. I grew my first crop from seeds sold to me by Thompson and Morgan. I planted the Tango Orange variety because I love the orange color of the flowers. Electron Blue flowers, though they exist, are much harder to grow. This year I've planted the Centaurea "Blue Diadem" variety also known as "bachelor's button," which I've had some success with in the past, but I don't know whether it will grow well. It's easier to grow "Pyracantha Orange" flowers. The dependable geranium plants came up and provided me with many years' worth of brilliant scarlet blooms. The color is more like what artists refer to as "Cadmium Red Light," an orangey red. They survived many cutbacks and re-potting jobs. Geraniums are so tough that you can cut the plant back to a stem and it just puts out new branches. And you can stick the cut-off stem into a pot of moist soil and it, too will put out roots and new branches and become a plant of its own.

This year I was astonished to find that though my geraniums kept blooming, their scarlet blossoms came out a wimpy peachy pink. Pink! Why? Is it because the plants are old? Or because I haven't fertilized them? I've heard of other plants reverting to a less exciting "base" color. In fact, some of my African violets (which stay indoors all year) also lost their stripey blossoms and reverted to plain purple, which was fair enough, but why did it happen? These plants were not grafts or composites, they had a continuous existence with the original plant though they might be offshoots or grown from cuttings of the original. I will try to find out from an online garden forum why such a change might happen.

Meanwhile, the cacti will have some trouble adapting to the stronger light but they usually survive and then start to grow after their winter dormancy. Among them are "Bucky," my Discocactus which bloomed so brilliantly last year and the year before. Some other cacti are spiny pillars which have grown from tiny shoots. Alongside the cacti are a whole lineup of aloes, probably variegatas, all descendants of a few that I grew from seed many years ago. These spiky, ugly potstickers produce big stalks featuring vertical rows of tubular flowers, also pink (Can't get away from it!) and can survive the desert conditions of my terrace. I like my plants to be survivors, even if they aren't the prettiest things in the garden world.

Posted at 3:18 am | link