CHEERFULNESS
For the past few months I have read a lot about the art of growing food. In fact, I have read enough about growing vegetables–in back and front yards, in pots and even in window boxes–to last me for the next ten years. Toothsome photos of glamorous vegetables, like Multi-colored Swiss chard and red-ringed Chioggia beets, have shown up in more magazines than Angelina Jolie. I have also been alternately inspired and amused by the efforts of a group of extremely earnest chefs, gardeners and sustainable food advocates to convince the new President to turn part of the South Lawn of the White House into a vegetable garden.
Food gardening is a wonderful thing and I indulge in a bit of it myself. But I think that in hard times, it is foolish if we don’t also remember food for the soul. This is why ornamental gardening is so important. While you can’t or probably won’t be inclined to eat daisies, gladioli or roses, their presence in the garden and in your house in bouquets can make the difference between merely existing and really living.
We all have to watch our pennies of course, and the best way to have beautiful flowers while watching pennies is to grow at least some of those flowers from seed. People get very flustered by this idea, because they have visions of tilling and tending, weeding and feeding and generally laboring long and hard for a handful of blossoms. If you pick the right plants, nothing could be farther from the truth.
You also do not need a greenhouse to raise annual flowers from seed. Most of the easy-to-grow varieties can be sown directly in the ground once all danger of frost has passed. To prepare the ground, forget about tilling. In the next couple of weeks, as the snow recedes from your beds, go out and cover them with a layer of newspaper two to three pages thick. Rake several inches of leftover dead leaves over the newspaper. If you have daffodils or other spring-flowering plants coming up through the ground, work around them. When you are finished, go inside and peruse the garden catalogs until real spring arrives. By that time night time temperatures will be fifty or above and the soil underneath your newspaper and leaves will be loose, relatively warm and friable. Rake aside the leaves and newspaper remnants and put them on the compost pile to finish degrading. Your soil will only need a quick raking to be ready for your seeds.
To find some of the easiest annual flowers, start at the end of the alphabet. Zinnias, which bloom from mid-summer through frost, are a snap to grow and yield more flowers than you can imagine. For long-stemmed cutting garden beauties, try Zinnia elegans, especially the ‘Benary’s Giant’ series, which includes carmine, lime, orange, rose and scarlet-flowered plants. Soaring up to four feet tall, they are great for the middle to back of a sunny border. On the opposite end of the height spectrum, try the little Zinnia haageana, ‘Starbright Mix’. These are low enough to use as an edging, and bloom incessantly
Everyone knows about sunflowers, but I am always surprised that more people do not grow Tithonia rotundifolia, otherwise known as the Mexican sunflower. It is as tall as some sunflowers, but the flowerheads are smaller, with about twelve petals apiece. As far as I know, Mexican sunflower only comes in one color–orange–but it is bright, beautiful, easy to grow and attracts butterflies like nobody’s business. Kids also love tithonia.
There are many kinds of annual cosmos on the market, and all of them are pretty. ‘Psyche White’, which is a “crested double” variety, features a full row of white petals surrounding a second row of shorter, “crested” petals. It is a great garden filler that can bring disparate flower groups together. If, for example, you have planted a clump of ‘Green Envy’ zinnias in one spot and a flashy pink rose nearby, fill the space between them with ‘Psyche White’ cosmos. Your planting scheme will look less preppy and more coordinated. When repeated through the garden, clumps of white-flowering annuals like cosmos, zinnias, poppies or nasturtiums draw the eye and bring coherence. Of course white cosmos are hardly the only game in town. I am especially fond of Cosmos bipinnatus ‘Seashells Mix’, which features red, pink and cream blossoms that are quilled or rolled into tube shapes. They make great cutting flowers and are easy to sown directly in the garden.
Most gardeners have their own favorite annuals and the list usually includes species and varieties remembered from childhood. My fondness for zinnias, in fact, comes from second grade, when we started seeds in Dixie cups to give to our mothers on Mother’s Day.
Grow all the food crops you want this coming year, but don’t forget to nourish your senses with easy, inexpensive annual flowers.
Local nurseries, garden centers and mega-merchandisers offer racks of garden seeds starting about now. Another good source is Select Seeds, 180 Stickney Hill Road, Union, CT 06076, (800) 653-3304 or www.selectseeds.com.