Schefflera taiwaniana

There it was, right in front of me. I could touch it, I could take pictures of it, but I just couldn’t buy it.

Patience. 2012.
Estimated to be widely available in 2012.

Is that the spring of 2012? I didn’t ask…I was a little choked up just hearing the year. A full year and a half from now, at best. This beauty has been on my lust list since first seeing a picture on plant lust’s posterous in 2009. Then, during his talk at the Yard Garden and Patio Show in February 2010, Dan Hinkley stunned the crowd with several pictures of this plant growing in his Washington State garden. The plant lust in that room was running very deep. A hardy Schefflera, who would have thought!

These Schefflera taiwaniana were at the Oregon Association of Nurseries Farwest Show in Portland this week, at the Monrovia booth, of course.

I know a couple of you have been lucky enough to get your hands on one already. The Monrovia rep I spoke with said that they released a few plants earlier this year. Those were the ‘mother plants’ they couldn’t take any more cuttings off of and still have live (at least that’s what he said). You lucky lucky few.

The rest of us will just have to wait until 2012.

Time to check in on the Kennedy School gardens

Setting in the afternoon sun enjoying lunch with a friend I realized I’ve never talked about one of my very favorite features of the Kennedy School gardens, the courtyard!

Originally opened in 1915 as an elementary school, the building has an interior courtyard completely surrounded on all sides and open to the sky. As you might imagine this creates a cozy little microclimate.

In my dreams I have an interior courtyard like this in my home. Oh the things I could grow! Wouldn’t that be fabulous!?

It’s a popular space and bustling even on a weekday afternoon.

Naturally I had to have a walk around outside too, just to see what’s new.

Like all great gardens it's always changing and you always notice something different.

More beautiful bark on a tree I can’t name (anybody?)

It's Echium Love

Another of my hopeless passions…Echium. Hopeless because I live in Portland, Oregon, not Southern California. They are not a hardy lot, these Echium. But I love them so.This year’s collection numbers 7; a mix of good sized plants and little seedlings, seedlings that I am optimistically hoping will live through winter to see another sunny summer. Last year, (the first year there was an Echium in my garden) there were only two. It’s a quickly growing addiction isn’t it?I’ve been collecting pictures of the Echium in my garden (and others) for 4 months now, thinking I would put together some fabulous and educational post. But I think I’ve taken so many pictures that it’s a bit overwhelming and I keep putting off actually doing it. It’s time to finally plunge in and make it happen. This isn’t the educational post I had envisioned but maybe a few pictures will be enough to push one or two of you into trying these fabulous plants in your garden.

The first Echium purchase of the season was mail order from Annie’s Annuals. Two Echium fastuosum, “Pride of Madeira” both shown above shortly after planting in April.

And then an early visit to Cistus Nursery set me up with another flashy variegated Echium, already with a bloom spike, which I am afraid is really the only way to see them bloom in our climate…unless you have a green house.

Shortly after that an Echium wildpretii joined the growing collection.

Followed by two Echium x wildprettii 'Rocket' which for some reason I put in containers. Maybe because I (surprisingly) had empty containers at the time and I was a little gun-shy about putting them in the ground since they are on the edge of being hardy here in Portland?

Well it’s amazing to see how much they’ve all grown. It makes it worth having these Echium and treating them as annuals here in Oregon. These next two are the ones from Annies, pictures taken August 18th.

And the variegated one from Cistus, picture also taken Aug 18th.

Last Friday I had the opportunity to see an Echium x wildprettii 'Rocket' that Patricia (one of my plant lust cohorts) had planted in the ground, rather than in a container. Lush don’t you think?

I promptly went home and put one of my pair in the ground. Insurance you see. One in the ground, one in a pot. Hopefully one of them will make it through the winter.

Besides watching my personal Echium collection I’ve also been keeping an eye on a couple growing at the neighborhood McMenamins restaurant, Kennedy School (more on the Kennedy School gardens tomorrow). These rasberry colored bloom spikes are E. boissieri I believe.

And since I’ve watched these successfully overwinter I’ve collected seeds (with the gardeners blessing) and will try to propagate them. Cause I’m an Echium addict.