A few weeks ago Frank went out to till up some beds in preparation for planting. The tiller was soon impacted with a strange, sticky, soil-like material. This substance was entirely new to us, so we sent a sample off to Texas A&M’s soils lab. After much deliberation, the lab said that it hadn’t seen anything like this in a very long time. They said that going back to their archives, they found that our sample closely resembled something known as “mud”, but they couldn’t be sure because such a material hadn’t been found in Texas in recent history. The best they could tell us was to refrain from tilling until this substance was no longer found at our farm.

We are having one of those winters that we usually just get to read about. Cool, rainy, and dark. The kind where you are supposed to curl up by the fire and read seed catalogs. Actually, we have been working in, and on, the greenhouses, (we are building yet another–No.8) and catching up on construction projects (after 4 years, our new bedroom is done, finally creating a child-free zone in part of our house!). But for those of you who actually get comfortably snowed in, sitting by the fire, here are a few new (or new to us) varieties to look for.

Rudbeckias
Our all-time favorite flower this year was Rudbeckia triloba. We mentioned this plant in the past as a recommendation from Bob Wollam in Virginia (Bob got his info from Janet Foss out on the West Coast. How in the world do you farm out there where it rains, Janet? All that mud. We’re stymied!) Anyway, this is the first season we cropped it, and WOW. Tons of tiny, tough Black-eyed Susans on tall, wiry stems, in the heat of August. The flowers are like little yellow and black buttons. Some of the stems were 4 feet tall, with huge sprays of flowers. It looks great in bouquets, the customers loved it as a straight bunch, and a local floral wholesaler saw it and said “That! I’ll take that if I can get it from you.” It’s a winner.
R. triloba is technically a biennial, but it blooms the first year from seeds started in early winter, and our plants have now formed big rosettes after blooming like a perennial, so who knows what it is. We do know that it is one heck of a tough plant. There are still flowers on the plants here in mid-December! This plant seems just as happy at 40 degrees as at 110!

Seeds are available from Jelitto Seeds (502-895-0807). To start this and other perennial rudbeckia seeds, mix the seed with an equal amount of damp, fine vermiculite, put them in a ziplock bag, and refrigerate for about 30 days. Then sprinkle the seed/vermiculite mix over a 200 cell tray, cover lightly with some coarse vermiculite, and in about a week you’ll have about 110% germination! When the seedlings are big enough, separate the clumps, and plant each plant in 72 cell plugs. Plant them out whenever they are big enough. We spaced the plants 1 foot apart in the row, with 4 rows in a 4 foot bed. Tenax support netting is a must.

Another nice Rudbeckia is Rudbeckia fulgida var. deamii. (Also available from Jelitto) This is a true perennial, and it is another cousin of the popular rudbeckia ‘Goldsturm’. It blooms late, with R. triloba, but has larger flowers than triloba, about 2 inches across. By growing the R. fulgida varieties ‘Goldsturm’, newmanii, and deamii, along with R. triloba, we can spread out the rudbeckia season from June until early fall.

Here in Texas, all perennial rudbeckias do best if cut very late in the day, using a hydration solution such as Chrysal OVB.

Red sunflowers and yarrow
For the first time in many years there is a new sunflower that we have worked into our regular planting schedule. We grow mostly the ‘Superior Sunset’ variety for our large flowered bunches, and ‘Sunbright’ for our bouquets. We try most of the new sunflowers that come out, but none measure up to these two, in our opinion. This year Ball Seed released a new red flowered variety called ‘Sundown’. Finally, a non-branching red with large flowers and a stable color pattern. The stems get 5 feet tall. and the flower color is a clean, two-tone yellow and dark red. The petals are long, with good substance. And best of all, the necks are strong, so the flowers don’t droop after handling like other reds. This one is a winner, but it seems to be the best kept secret in the cut flower world. Ball Seed (800-879-BALL) is the only catalog that has it, and they don’t seem to have made any effort to publicize it! Ball gets kind of grumpy dealing with smaller growers, so they set up a company called Colorlink, for smaller quantities. Colorlink, however, seems to be based out of Lake Wobegon, MN, and some growers have had trouble tracking them down, so call up Ball and ask them who your area rep is. Your Ball rep will tell you how to get this seed. The Ball catalog also lists some new branching and semi-double types that you might be interested in.

One note about Sundown. We found that it will not stand being held too long in the plug tray. The plants that we held set a bud too early and had small flowers, even though the same crops of Superior didn’t. Our best crops came from plants set out right on time (about 2 weeks from sowing in a 72 cell tray). Maybe direct seeding is best for this one.

Walters Gardens (888-925-8377) has a new Achillea that we will be trying this year. It is called ‘Red Velvet’, and it is a millifolium type with beautiful soft red flowers. It looks like it will compliment two of our other favorite yarrows, ‘Terra Cotta’ and ‘Fireland’ The red would look good with those other earth tones. Walters grows huge divisions, and you can whack them into three or four pieces, and plant them all in very early spring. You’ll make your money back and more the first season.

Celosia and wildflowers
Gloeckner Seed (800-345-3787) has a new celosia that we love. It is called ‘Supercrest.’ It had been available as a deep burgundy, but now there is a mix. This is the most amazing celosia. It has big fuzzy combs in a variety of colors that are like those old antique wool carpets with all the Victorian looking roses in them. The colors are in shades of antique rose, mauve orange, bronze,etc… This one’s got “Martha Stewart” written all over it! The combs can get a foot or more across, on 4 foot stems, and they take all sorts of bizarre shapes. Our customers absolutely loved them, and we have standing orders to grow a lot more next year.

These celosias take a full season to mature, so start them early in short season areas. Don’t set them out until the soil is warm, however, or they will stunt.

We have finally found a seed source for one of our best cut wildflowers, the Engelmann, or Cutleaf daisy (Engelmannia pinnatifida). This plant blooms in mid-spring here in Texas, and it gives us our best yellow color for our spring bouquets. The catalog says they are hardy up to Nebraska, so they will probably grow anywhere. The plants are perennials that grow 2 foot stems arising from clumps of roughly cut leaves. Each stem branches at the top, and can carry 20 or more small yellow daisies. The flowers really give a cheery wildflower look to the bouquets.

We bought our seed from Native American Seed (800-728-4043) in Junction, Texas. The seed is not cleaned, so you will get a packet of round seed pods containing many seeds. We just rubbed handfuls between our palms over seed flats, and then lightly covered the crumbled pods. 1 ounce of seed pods filled about ten 128 cell trays. Germination is not the best, but we will probably get about 500 plants.
We like to cut the stems when four or five flowers are open. They need to be cut into a hydrator, and keep them out of the sun and wind until they are conditioned. After that they last about a week.

Speaking of wildflowers, we tried a goldenrod this year that was a standout. It is a variety called ‘Tara’ and we got it from Here and Now Garden (503-357-5774). This wonderful plant actually comes from Holland, and is a long way from being a wildflower. We call them ‘Solidago’ now, lest anyone think they might get hay fever from their wild cousins (a cruel, false rumor spread by ragweed lovers). This is truly an elegant plant. The 2 foot stems are topped with a lacy pyramid of yellow flowers. They have a great texture for bouquets. It is also a tough plant. Once established, the heat was no problem. The same goes for cold. Even now there are some florist quality stems out in the field, after several very hard freezes.
We bought the plants as divisions. We planted them a foot apart in both directions. Plant the divisions in late fall or early spring. We got ours in the ground in mid-season, and we lost some plants at first. But the ones that grew, really grew. They form big clumps, and you can get a lot of stems the first year. Solidagos are naturally fall blooming plants, but we have had this variety flush in the spring, and again in the fall if cut back. The cut stems needed no special care other than the standard preservatives. We cut the stems just as the first flowers on the tip were open.

New Shasta daisy
Another perennial that looks promising is a new shasta daisy called ‘Crazy Daisy’, bred by Benary. Crazy Daisy is a shasta with multiple rows of petals, giving it a fluffy, quilled look. The plants are supposed to get 2 to 2 1/2 feet tall, a bit short for a shasta, but still tall enough to cut. The bright yellow centers give the double flowers a nice contrast.

We haven’t grown this one yet, but if it is like other true shasta daisies, you’ll want to start your seeds early in the year so that you have well developed plants going into the winter. Shastas need a fair bit of winter chilling, and for the past few years, our shastas have not performed well, but now that Texas seems to have drifted back out of the Sahara, we’ll be giving this one a shot.

Shasta seed is easy to start. We just sow it on the soil surface and cover lightly with vermiculite. Fire ants like to eat the seeds here in the south, so watch out. Pot the seedlings up in 72 cell plug trays, and set them out when ready at 1 foot spacings.

The flowers have a good vase life, but avoid shaking and jostling the cut stems too much or the necks can get weak. Thrips have been a problem for us on the early daisies (the ox-eye types like May Queen) but they are usually gone by the time the later, large flowered shastas are in bloom. Crazy Daisy is available from many seed companies.

Light blue campanula
Last, but certainly not least, there is a new color in the Campanula ‘Champion’ series. These anually-blooming campanulas have become a staple of our spring line. The original colors are pink and blue (actually purple), and now we have a light blue. It is a very nice color–actually a clear light lavender blue. It will be a nice addition to soften the mixed bunches of pink and purple.

We’ve gone into campanula culture in detail in past issues, but in a nutshell here you are: The seed is pelleted. We start it around Oct 1st., in 392 cell trays. Then we bump them up to a larger cell size, and by late Feb. they go out in the field. The seedlings are very cold hardy, so you can adjust our schedule to you location so that you set them out in very early spring, your time. This series will bloom in late May here in Texas. Rainy weather can be quite a problem as the big bells catch the water, and bees also do a lot of damage by pollinating the blooms, so we try to cut the stems just as the terminal bloom opens and the side buds are colored up. Once in preservative they will last almost 2 weeks, and the side buds will all color up and open.

So, now we all have something to look forward to. Y’all can curl up with your snow and wood stoves and slippers and stacks of catalogs and we’ll sit here in the miserable 40-degree rain and think it is the prettiest weather we have had in a decade. After all that drought, it has been raining for almost two months now. Frank’s been going through all the flyers for the winter farming conferences like Eco-Farm in California. He’s looking for a seminar entitled “Farming in Wet Soils – What to do when it rains at your farm.” It’s been so long we done forgot how!