YORKTON - First things first: thank you to everyone who attended the Yorkton and District Annual Fruit, Flower and Vegetable Show this week—it was great to see you all and have a garden visit! We always appreciate that you come to see the show, because we all enjoy presenting the interesting things that out gardens have to offer this year. Hopefully you found some ideas and inspiration for new plants to try next year.
But these events don’t just happen, so thank you to everyone from the Hort Society who helped make it a success: everyone who brought exhibits, those who helped with the myriad of tasks involved in set up and take down, and those who attended during the day as “garden hosts” to our visiting guests. We also thank our friends at the Parkland Mall for their ongoing support, and thank you as well to our friends at Yorkton This Week and Access for their great help. All these things contribute to a great show!
Now, out to the garden! New things we tried that we would try again: our containers had a new addition, gaura. We first saw this plant in beautiful container plantings in Edmonton, but it was new to us then. When we saw it in a greenhouse here, we were so happy to add it to our container collection! Gaura is a tall, delicate and elegant plant, with lance-like leaves and very pretty small white flowers. (We also have pink) They are beautiful because they are so wispy, like small butterflies floating among the other plants. You know how I like plants that move in our containers: dancing grasses and cascading vines. So gaura fits in perfectly.
In our climate, we would grow gaura as an annual. It likes to have at least six hours of sun a day, and is one of those happy plants that can tolerate heat and dryer conditions. But it does need well drained soil—no wet feet!
This plant is also called beeblossom and wandflower. Though it might not make it over winter, I would like to move it to the garden later in the season, transplant it carefully, and see if it might make it through winter. What a delight that would be!
A plant project that Keith tried this year was anemone. We tried it before with limited success, but the beauty of the flowers is well worth the risk to try again! You might know them as ‘windflowers’, because their name comes from ‘anemos’, the Greek word that means wind.
Anemones come from corms that are planted in springtime. We would plant them about an inch apart and two inches deep, in moist, not wet, soil. Once again, we want well-drained soil. They like an area with at least four hours of sun a day, or light partial shade. The corms we had were small and I did not hold out much optimism for their success, but Keith forged ahead undaunted, and it was worth it! We are rewarded with the most amazing blue-purple blooms from a variety we believe is called “Mr. Fokker”.
The plants have the leaves at the base, and taller flower stems rising from the base. Though they might survive over winter in some areas, I don’t know if Saskatchewan gardeners can count on that. To avoid disappointment, we might want to treat them as annuals and plant new corms in the spring. And if they do survive, extra bonus!
Start a garden notebook and make notes of the wins and the misses in the garden, or plant combinations that just seem extra special! We always think we’ll remember, but then next spring we get too excited at the greenhouse and might forget what we are looking for! Visit the hort society website at www.yorktonhort.ca and stay tuned for what’s coming up!
Thank you to our friends at YTW for their fine work! Have a great week!
