Six on Saturday – 7/1/2023

Categories six on saturday, 45 Comments on Six on Saturday – 7/1/2023

One week into a new year and if there was a notion that a new year should feel like an improvement, it’s passed. January is always going to be like that, it’s a stupid month to start a new year with.

Looking for an upside, I can tell you that for the seven years we’ve had solar panels the January generation average is 135% of the December average and the February average is 209% of the December average. The 2022 December average was 126% of the seven year average. It gets better quite quickly.

Gardeners have to be glass half full types surely, they’d give up otherwise. We’ve turned the corner, the old year and the shortest day and the season of contrived happiness are behind us. Time to look for reasons to be cheerful.

Six on Saturday is how some of us share that cheerfulness and should you be minded to join in, you’d be very welcome. Post six things happening in your garden on Saturday, put a link to your post into my comments with the rest. Simple, though if you want to complicate it, there’s a participants guide to confuse you.

One.
My first is a camellia called ‘Minato-no-akebono’, which means Harbor at Dawn. To me that conjures up the smell of fish and a lot of noise as a new day gets under way. I think it’s safe to say the Japanese see these things differently. In the mild, damp conditions we have here now it is perfumed particularly strongly, similar to Mahonia japonica to my (unreliable) nose. It is a lutchuensis hybrid, meaning a cross between a C. japonica cultivar and C. lutchuensis, which is a scented species. The flowers are quite small but it has lots of them over a long period.

Two.
My second is Camellia lutchuensis, the aforementioned camellia species. As with so many groups of plants, what is quickly lost in many hybrids is a simple elegance. C. lutchuensis has elegance in spades, in its habit of growth, small but abundant flowers, small leaves, sweet perfume. A class act.


Three.
My third is yet another camellia and is also a hybrid between species, in this case between cultivars of C. sasanqua and C. reticulata. C. sasanqua flowers in autumn, C. reticulata in spring. ‘Show Girl’ flowers from December to February, producing blooms 5 inches across. I should have planted it in a sheltered spot but there wasn’t one, so I am likely to struggle for perfect or long lasting blooms, but it seems to be growing pretty well and has plenty of buds.


Four.
Cyclamen coum are doing their thing. It does seem like a strange time of year to choose to flower but the middle of winter is what nature settled on for this species to bloom, not some hybridist. It comes from the countries around the Black Sea, a place we can now quickly find on the map, for all the wrong reasons. It seems to be happy here, spreading to a degree.


Five.
Canna ‘Cleopatra’ comes into the category of looking ahead, in that it got thrown into the conservatory ahead of the December freeze and I noticed today that it had quite a bit of new growth hiding amongst the dead stuff. It’s scrubbed up pretty well though it’s busting out of the pot so I need to do something more with it than a clean up.

Six.
As much as these are flowering now, the reason for including them is all about anticipation of what they promise for later on in the summer. Fred sent me seed of a pink flowered Abutilon last year; I sowed them mid April and selected five distinct forms. I have high hopes of a great display later on and I’m impatient for them to start making new growth.

And that folks is my first six for 2023. Sorry there was no repeat of last week’s blue skies and exotica but at least there are flowers. Sue is going across from Australia to New Zealand later today so it’s not impossible that next week’s will come from there; Whangamatā, before you ask.

Published by Jim Stephens

Gardener, no-dig allotmenteer, camellia enthusiast. I love colour, it cheers me up. Retired nurseryman.

45 thoughts on “Six on Saturday – 7/1/2023”

  1. Good to see camellias flowering at this time of year. I noticed my one plant has lost all its leaves since the cold snap. Pretty, spring colours already.

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  4. I have always thought that January does feel like an improvement, Jim, as it seems lighter and brighter to me and there is always increased activity from the local birdlife, which suggests they agree with me – but perhaps it is because my glass is always way more than half full… 😉 Your comments about your solar panels had me reaching for our statistics, and certainly generation in January is invariably half as much again as in December, but Februarys are usually more than three times December – don’t you just love statistics?! I do, anyway.
    I love the idea of a fragrant camellia and did begin searching for one after an HPS article once, but couldn’t find any at the time – will perhaps try again. Do you use a particular supplier? My very bitty SoS can be found here: https://ramblinginthegarden.wordpress.com/2023/01/07/six-on-saturday-itsy-bitsy/

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  5. Your camellias are gorgeous, love ‘Minato-no-akebono’. I suspect they’d hate my garden, stuck on top of a hill exposed to those south-westerlies and all. My son is over in NZ at the moment – holidaying with m-i-l in Raglan which is south of Auckland on the west coast. Not so great if they are having rain. Plenty of that here right now, most of it in my conservatory and bedroom!!!

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    1. Can’t remember if we went to Raglan; do remember Pirongia, which is nearby. You’re probably right about camellias not being happy in your exposed garden, even if they coped, the flowers would likely get trashed.

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  7. January is my birth month so it is a good one for me. Also my first born son and my Dad so I can’t say bad things even though the temps are crazy sometime. As for plants…I do need a camellia and cyclamen added to me new space. New because it is all being redone to grow more cut flowers for Growing Kindness.

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    1. I’m not sure that my preferring July to January has much to do with my birth date, consciously at least. That you ‘need’, rather than just ‘want’ a camellia and cyclamen is noted and approved of. No matter that neither is much use for cut flowers. Gardeners everywhere speak the same language.

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  8. It is bright and sunny in Central Alabama of the American South today. The pattern of warm but rainy days and cool but sunny days is our normal for this time of year.
    The freeze over Christmas was a shock to the landscape and the aftereffects are becoming more evident.
    Thank you Jim for the message of better things to come.
    Here is my effort for this week.

    https://mensgardenvestavia.wordpress.com/2023/01/06/five-for-friday-6-january-2023/

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    1. Wonderful Camellias! While I am well acquainted with the genus, these species are unfamiliar and beautiful. I was shocked to spy a Camellia (sasanqua?) on my street this year, the flowers burned by the cold. I had thought it was too far south for them. Plants have a way of fooling you. I have been wondering about Abutilon for here as well, so pretty. Here is mine, thanks for hosting. Had a laugh about January being a bad month, etc! https://theshrubqueen.com/2023/01/07/six-on-saturday-some-success/

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      1. It’s routine here for camellia blooms to be damaged by frost, this year it took the last flowers of most of the sasanquas. The unopened flower buds seem pretty resilient so there are usually new blooms out within a couple of weeks.

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    1. There are a couple of summer flowering Cyclamen, purpurascens and colchicum, but they’re relatively obscure. We get C. hederifolium flowering by July in warm years, perhaps they’re even earlier with you?

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  18. It’s not looking like gardening weather today. Steady rain and so gloomy we still have the lights on indoors! Just as well there are some Sixes to read for my weekend gardening fix. I enjoyed your apt introduction Jim, and so good to know just how much more daylight we will be getting soon, fingers crossed. The camellias are gorgeous as ever.
    Here’s my Six https://www.hortusbaileyana.co.uk/2023/01/new-year-new-shoots.html

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  19. Beautiful camellias Jim. I’m taking a short break from my blog to focus on studying for some exams at the beginning of February. But I’ll definitely be back once they’re done (I’m still at the despairing “why won’t anything stick in my brain, why am I doing this again? stage of revision).

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  20. This is strange. Regardless of what you think of your Six, they are more flowery and colorful than mine. That is not the totally strange aspect. This is. Our weather has been difficult, and comparable to that which is expected from other climates. I have been more concerned with cleaning up the mess than the pleasantries of bloom.

    Six on Saturday: 2022 Ends II

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  22. Happy New Year to you Jim, many thanks for continuing with this weekly get together. It is such a delight to see your camelias, are they all outside? As for that lovely Abutilon, it was such a surprise to see it in flower. Maybe you have been using growing lights and tricked it into thinking it is summer, or maybe it is not dependent on day length for flowering? It would be interesting to know. Here are my six: https://noellemace.blogspot.com/2023/01/six-on-saturday-start-of-new-year.html

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    1. That’ll have been fun for the drive down from Aukland. I see they’re forecast rain all week, and very ordinary temperatures. I love that I can get a forecast for Whangamatā at the click of a mouse. I wonder if there are live webcams Sue could go and stand in front of.

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