The colorful swan in southern Colombia Louisiana garden series endless

　　Louisiana gardeners seldom grow columbines (Aquilegia species and hybrids) in their cool-season flower gardens. This probably is due mostly to unfamiliarity with columbines -- there is no tradition of using columbines here in the Deep South -- and lack of availability in local nurseries.
Enlarge The Times-Picayune Swan Blue and White Swan series columbine gallery (5 photos)

That's about to change. A relatively new hybrid columbine, called the Swan series, has performed so well in LSU AgCenter trials it has been named a Louisiana Super Plants selection for fall 2011.
Columbines are among the most graceful of garden flowers. The foliage is lacy and bluish-green, and reminds me of large maidenhair fern fronds. The slightly nodding flowers are complexly formed and often include two contrasting colors.
A notable feature of the flowers is the long spurs that extend behind the petals. These claw-like spurs reminded people of the claws of eagles, and that's how this plant got the Latin name Aquilegia, which is derived from the Latin for eagle (aquila). Interestingly, the common name -- columbine -- is derived from the Latin name for another bird, the pigeon or dove (columba).
Swan series columbine
The word "series" has a different meaning from the more commonly used terms "variety" or "cultivar."
All of the plants that belong to a particular variety look exactly the same or very similar: they all have the same, shape, size and color of leaves and flowers and grow to be the same size.
A series, on the other hand, is the result of a focused breeding program that produces closely related but different varieties of a particular plant. These varieties have been bred to be very similar to each other except for a particular characteristic, such as flower color.
So when creating a series, plant breeders develop several individual varieties of a particular plant that share many common traits, such as genetic background, size of plant, growth habit, cultural needs, size and shape of flower and time of bloom. But the varieties differ from one another in one or two significant characteristics -- typically flower color. Within the series, each group is a separate variety and gets its own variety name.
This is the case with the Swan series columbines. The varieties in the Swan series are all very similar in everything except flower color.
Within the Swan series, the varieties are named based on the flower color, and include Swan Blue and White, Swan White, Swan Yellow, Swan Pink and Yellow, Swan Burgundy and White, Swan Violet and White, Swan Rose and White and Swan Red and White.
The outstanding range of beautiful colors is one reason the Swan series was chosen as a Louisiana Super Plants selection. The flowers are also larger than other columbines, and the plants are more vigorous in growth.
Growing swan columbines
In milder climates with cooler summers, columbines may be short-lived perennials that tend to bloom in summer.
Here in Louisiana, however, we grow virtually all columbines (other than Hinckley's columbine) as cool-season annuals that begin blooming in the spring and are removed when they finish blooming in early summer.
Transplants of Swan columbines available at your local nurseries should be purchased and planted now and through the fall. Fall planting allows for the most spectacular floral display in the spring.
Planting can be done all winter and as late as the end of February and still produce excellent results. Plants in 4-inch pots are a great size to plant in fall because they are economical, and the plants have all winter to grow and develop.
Larger sizes often will be available and are especially good when more immediate impact is desired or when planting later in the season.
Typically, the plants you plant in the fall or winter will not be in bloom. Columbines grow over the winter in the garden and bloom in the spring.
Don't let this deter you from planting them. During winter, they produce mounds of attractive foliage that looks great with other cool-season bedding plants, such as pansies and dianthus.
In the spring, generally from March through April or early May, the plants send up stems with clusters of large, elegant, colorful flowers. By May, the plants will be finished flowering and can be removed from the garden (compost them) and replaced with summer bedding plants.
Swan columbines grow well in full sun to part shade. They are one of the few cool-season bedding plants that blooms well in part shade (as does another Louisiana Super Plant, Camelot series foxglove).
Enrich the bed where they are planted by incorporating generous amounts of compost or other organic materials and a light sprinkling of general purpose fertilizer into the soil.
Space Swan columbine transplants about 12 inches apart from the center of one plant to the center of the plant next to it.
Hinckley's columbine
Columbines aren't entirely unheard-of in the New Orleans area. The New Orleans Botanical Garden in City Park has introduced gardeners to a columbine that actually survives as a short-lived perennial here.
The yellow-flowering Hinckley's columbine (Aquilegia chrysantha var. hinckleyana) is native to just one county in western Texas. It has been grown at the Botanical Garden and sold at their plant sales for the past 15 or 20 years, and you see this plant occasionally in area gardens.
Hinckley's columbine blooms with bright yellow flowers in spring and early summer and generally survives for two or three years, sometimes more. New plants are grown from seeds as needed to replace old plants as they die.
Hinckley's columbine thrives in well-drained, partially shaded locations and is drought-tolerant despite its delicate appearance.
Try Super Plants
The purpose of the Louisiana Super Plants program is to identify superior plants for Louisiana landscapes, make sure wholesale growers are growing and retail nurseries are carrying the selections and get the word out to the gardening public about these outstanding plants.
In addition to Swan series columbine, there are two other selections for fall 2011: Redbor kale and Belinda's Dream rose. These plants were featured in earlier columns.
To see photos and read about all of the beautiful and reliable Louisiana Super Plants selections, check out the Louisiana Super Plants website at www.lsuagcenter.com/superplants.
You will also find a list of nurseries in your area that are carrying Louisiana Super Plants.

The beautiful flowers in the sun

　　
　　Supplied © Enlarge photo
There is nothing like the beauty and fragrance provided by fresh flowers cut straight from the garden.
Samantha Turner, from Garden Elegance in Subiaco, said that as well as providing a readily available supply of beautiful blooms, another advantage of growing your own cut flowers was that your supply could vary with the seasons, depending on what you decided to plant.
So which plants are best to provide fabulous floral displays? We asked the experts for their recommendations.
ROSES:
Robbie Melville, manager of Melville Nurseries in Carmel, said roses were ever-popular because they were inexpensive and provided beautiful perfume and flowers for 10 months of the year (from September through until July).
Hybrid tea roses were the best for cut flowers.
"Kardinal, which is a red rose, is probably the longest-lasting cut rose and will give two weeks in a vase if looked after properly," Mr Melville said.
BULBS:
Lorraine Hoglin, general manager of fresh flower wholesaler Everbloom Flowers, agreed that roses were a great option for cut flowers but when they were not flowering, bulbs would just about be ready to bloom.
"Daffodils, iris and freesia are good to plant," she said. "These can be planted in the same area as the roses and only need to be pulled up every second year and divided; they are dormant when the roses are flowering.
EVERLASTINGS:
WA is famous for its stunning spring wildflowers, which also make for gorgeous floral arrangements.
Waldecks' Hilton Blake said Bracteantha bracteata, or everlasting daisies, were easy to grow, and also recommended Lucinda's Everlastings seeds (available from Waldecks Garden Centres), which could be simply scattered in autumn.
"Ten grams of Lucinda's Everlastings will produce a 10sqm carpet of the magnificent flowers in spring," he said.
"The cut everlasting in a vase will last a month or so but the flowers can be hung upside down in a dark, airy position to dry and used as a dried flower for the entire year."
PLANTING TIP: "Everlastings are so easy to grow that they will almost grow anywhere, but an open sunny position will give you the most amazing display of colour," Mr Blake said.
SWEET PEAS:
Ms Turner recommended sweet peas for their ease of growing and beautiful colours.
Sweet peas were available in dwarf varieties growing up to 40cm, or traditional, which could grow to more than a metre.
"Small ones are ideal to grow in a pot," she said.
"Sow the seeds in autumn in a full sun position, making sure the taller varieties have support.
"This doesn't have to be fancy because the peas will cover it.
"Sow in autumn to have flowers in spring."
PLANTING TIP: Ms Turner said sweet peas may benefit from a little dolomite lime dug into the ground at planting if the soil is not already alkaline.
KANGAROO PAWS:
Ms Turner said kangaroo paws made for great cut flowers because they were long lasting.
There was also the choice of planting dwarf or large-stemmed varieties, depending on how big you wanted your flower arrangements.
"The Big Red is large and gets to about a metre, or for dwarfs, Bush Gems are smaller and available in lots of colours including yellow, red and violet," she said.
Flowering from early spring, kangaroo paws were best planted during winter in full sun.

Open the florist woman

　　
　　Storm Emin at work in her florist shop in St Albans. Photograph: Frank Baron
The man on the end of the phone has an audibly guilty conscience. His tone is sheepish and he doesn't know a dandelion from a day lily. One thing is clear: he needs mollifying flowers sent at the double to his spouse.
"We can always tell when a man's in trouble," says Jean Dennis, owner of Bloom florists in St Albans, Hertfordshire. "The trick is to find out how much trouble he's in and then work out how to get him out of it."
Gerberas might be his salvation, a single rose, or an artful spray of lisianthus, depending on the nature of his sin and the preferences of the wronged partner. The future of the relationship is then in the hands of Storm Emin, who creates the striking floral confections which distinguish Bloom from common-or-garden florists. She and Dennis will even help the anxious sinner phrase a suitable message and send him a text when the bouquet has dispatched, hoping that it all works out.
Most of life's dramas are brought to Bloom's unassuming door. Their bouquets hail babies and baptisms, they ornament brides, congratulate graduates, comfort the sick and honour the dead. And, of course, apply first aid to ruptured romance. There's a story behind every new order and a grasp of rudimentary psychology is a skill as vital to modern floristry as green fingers, since flowers alone will make nobody's fortune when they are so cheaply and readily flogged by supermarkets.
"In a recession, flowers are the first things to go," says 27-year-old Emin, although she has noticed a resurgence of people buying flowers to take to a dinner party. Those wanting to make a fragrant gesture can grab an acetate cone of carnations from a petrol station for half the price of one of Bloom's bunches, but it can be a false economy. A single stem, gracefully beribboned and co-ordinated with a hostess's upholstery, will speak far more eloquently and it is likely to outlive its supermarket relations by several days.
"People go by the look of flowers without thinking about the quality," says Emin, who has spent the morning trimming sheaves of eucalyptus stems. "Our flowers are cut fresh from the nursery and come straight here to be conditioned and refrigerated, whereas supermarket flowers languish for up to two days in a warehouse and then are dumped in buckets on the shop stands without proper preparation."
The unofficial counselling services are, however, the ingredient that sets good florists apart from superstores and it's this that has helped Bloom to flourish while many florists have gone to the wall. It was a failing business when Dennis took it over in 2009; now sales are up 70% on last year thanks to the personal service, a blitz on networking sites and a 7pm closing time which caters for panicked commuters who have remembered the wife's birthday on the train.
It helps, too, that the shop has diversified, offering picture framing and greetings cards. "The cards draw people in affordably," Dennis says. "They come to the till to pay for a card and then pluck up the courage to ask the price of a lily, whereas people can be nervous about entering a traditional florist because they're unsure what they want or how much it will end up costing."
While Emin is scissoring her eucalyptus in the back room, an elderly lady sidles up to the till. She eyes up the stands of exotica and looks nervous. Dennis strides over, exuding kindly authority. The customer needs flowers for a relative's funeral, but doesn't know where to start. Dennis steers her from thoughts of a wreath to a basket of flowers that can more suitably be donated to a hospital after the funeral and she agrees to write out the attached message since the customer mistrusts her own handwriting. "A big part of the job is a listening ear," she says. "You can always tell a funeral party when it comes in and you have to put them at their ease, hear out their story and encourage them to think things through."
Emin, having trimmed and tidied that morning's delivery, is now darting about the shop floor plucking blooms from stands and crafting them into pre-ordered bouquets that Dennis and her brother then deliver at any time, on any day. "I like open orders most because I know which flowers are at their best at the moment and which will best suit the environment they're wanted for, but some people have set ideas which can be a challenge," says Emin.
"When I first started in floristry a bride wanted sprays of purple, red and yellow with white gypsophila. She obviously didn't know what she was talking about, but she insisted we go ahead and when she came and saw the results just before the wedding, she burst into tears. Since then I always warn people if I think their ideas won't work."
Brides are both the lifeblood and the torment of florist. "A lot of people think that you make big money from weddings, but that's not true," Emin says. "Consultations take an hour or two and we don't charge for them and the conditioning and arranging of the flowers can take a whole day. One day this summer I was organising flowers for a wedding for 12 hours – 1,080 carnations and 200 lisianthus had to be conditioned, divided and arranged and I had a massive blister on my hand from the scissors."
There are pedantic brides who want to organise the minutiae of their bouquet 18 months in advance – "climate change is making it very difficult to predict what will be available when," Dennis says, "this spring £1m wouldn't have bought you lily of the valley because it finished flowering a month early" – and last-minute brides who come in a fortnight before the big day and want Hollywood extravagance on a shoestring. One rang in on the morning of her nuptials after another florist had let her down and Emin had to construct her bouquet on the spot.
Then there are brides who think that vulgar money-talk will sully the romance. "People are strangely reluctant to tell you their budget so we have to work blind," Emin says. "Then they always throw something at you at the last minute. At one wedding the bride's mother-in-law suddenly insisted I stick wired flowers all over the cake. I'd no idea if she'd consulted the bride."
The long, cold, poorly paid hours of floristry were never part of Emin's life plan. Fashion design was her ambition until a canny careers adviser warned her against the long training required. "She suggested floristry instead, which I thought was the biggest joke ever because I was a tomboy, but I changed my mind after working in a flower factory in Skegness," she says. "I realised I loved flowers."
She completed an advanced national certificate in floristry and has since worked her way round eight florists, including her own shop which she disastrously set up just before the credit crunch. "There's not a lot of money in floristry," she says. "And because of that a lot of people cut corners and take advantage of you. One boss didn't pay my national insurance and another kept my savings for me in his safe then wouldn't give them back to me when I left. You either do something for the money or because you love it and in floristry, it has to be love because even in London £15,000 is a good wage."
The day starts at 8am when Emin and Dennis check overnight internet orders and those from other florists. Flowers are delivered from nurseries three times a week and have to be conditioned, watered and arranged on the stands or stored in the large refrigerator. Then the phone starts ringing, passers-by wander in and bouquets have to be assembled for delivery.
Predicting daily demands is a feat that, if not accomplished precisely, can bring down a business – the stock is a perishable investment. Valentine's Day, which – along with Mother's Day – is the busiest day of the year, is usually a predictable affair involving a single flower, but this year, Emin says, customers branched out and red-hued exotica was in demand. She and Dennis endeavour to forecast demand by keeping abreast of style trends – lilies are currently the most popular flower – but the most important skill is subtly to modify customers' ambitions to suit what's on the stands.
"People who phone in can't see the display, so it's up to us to nudge them and often people who come in don't know what they want, so we can steer them towards what we have that will be appropriate," says Emin.
This they do so successfully that Bloom only bins around £5 worth of stock a day and customers, having had their emotional lives expertly soothed by a flower, often become reliant on Emin and Dennis's counsel to steer them through life's landmarks.
"Money's immaterial, it's what will convey the right message for the occasion that matters," says Emin. "One man wanted to propose to his girlfriend and didn't know how. We suggested a single red rose with a diamanté pin through the leaf. He now rings us up before every birthday and anniversary and asks us to be his personal adviser."
Much of the shop's business is to those amnesiac commuters on the way home from the station. Bloom will text them reminders of important occasions if they request it and leave bouquets out of hours at the neighbouring wine shop to spare them wifely wrath. "To survive when most florists have closed shop, you have to be ready for anything," says Emin. "You can say what you like under your breath so long as you do it with a smile."

Enjoy With Beautiful Flowers

If you love flowers and you like to bring them in your home either as decorative bouquets or as plan pods, then you’ll also love this item. It’s a very unusual vase created by Philippi Design. It’s actually a group of 10 individual vases waiting to be filled with beautiful flowers.

This unusual piece will definitely become an eye-catching decoration in your home. The structure is made of 10 individual chrome-plated brass stems set on a thick glass base. Each piece is 10 inches high by 8 inches long and by 8 inches long. The simplicity of the mini-cases is supposed to allow the flowers to show their true beauty without being challenged by anything else. In most cases, each tube accommodates only 1 flower. In some cases, depending on the flowers you choose, you can place several pieces in one vase. You can choose only one flower type or you can alternate the colors and types to create a more dynamic décor.

This vase is particularly unusual because it’s made of several smaller vases. This allows you to create very beautiful ornaments. However, there’s also a disadvantage. Because of the dimensions you’ll have to find a larger space for this structure. Either than that, it’s a perfect choice for any home. It’s simplicity will allow it to integrate perfectly in any décor.