Select Your Cut Christmas Tree This Weekend

This is the weekend to select your live Christmas Tree. There are several options to consider:

• purchase an already cut tree
• cut your own at a tree farm 
• select a balled and burlap tree to bring inside for Christmas and to replant outside  after the holidays

All of these are great options and actually all choices are indeed environmentally friendly as Christmas trees were commercially grown to be cut or dug.


The top selling cut Christmas trees are:

• Scotch
• White Pine
• Douglas Fir
• Noble Fir
• Fraser Fir
• Balsam Fir
• Colorado Spruce (best if locally cut as the tree is stiff and does not allow for shipment)

Though the Noble Fir is often times listed as the most popular tree, my experience was that the Scotch pine was the more popular and affordable tree, and generally, half the price of the fir varieties.

Most customers have a deep passion about the trees they select and the reason for their selection.

For this writer, the Firs are my favorite as they have soft needles; great fragrances; and ornaments and lights display nicely on the tree.

Finally, the top selling Christmas tree producers are the states of Michigan, Pennsylvania, Oregon and New York. And generally, the National Christmas or Rockefeller Center Christmas Trees have been Norway Spruces.
　
Tomorrow:
How to Select and Maintain a Cut or Live Christmas Tree

The Regal Scottish Thistle Symbol in Meyda Tiffany Stained Glass

The Regal Scottish Thistle Symbol in Meyda Tiffany Stained Glass

Poinsettias Today Maintain Their Color Well Past The Holidays

Tomorrow will also be the beginning when poinsettias are being purchased to add to the holiday decor.

Years ago when I was just a kid, my parents would host a Thanksgiving dinner with some of their very good friends.  As a gift, the family would  arrive bringing  a large red poinsettia to be enjoyed through the holidays.  Well, back then (say 40 years ago) that poinsettia would be leafless by the time Christmas rolled around.   And those that maintained their bracts, were a source of discussion as, "Compared to last year's plant this one lasted to December 20th!"

The poinsettias of 40 years ago, just did not hold onto their leaves and bracts as they do today.

This past summer, in August, my parents still had the poinsettia from Christmas 2010 with most of the bracts still on the plant.   So, with deliberate hybridization, poinsettias have come along way and are therefore much studier in the average home environment. 

Here are some basic care tips  of poinsettias courtesy of  the Illinois Univeristy Extension Office.

Essentially their recommendations are:

• Be careful when transplanting the plant in the cold weather as just a few minutes outside could cause the plant to drop its bracts.  So wrap the plant during transport home.
• Six hours of light daily is ideal for poinsettias.  
• Poinsettias require daytime temperatures of 60 to 70°F and night time temperatures around 55°F. High temperatures will shorten the plant’s life. Move the plant to a cooler room at night, if possible.
• Check the soil daily and be certain there  are drainage holes in the pots. Water when soil is dry. Allow water to drain into the saucer and discard excess water. Wilted plants will tend to drop bracts sooner.
• Fertilize the poinsettia if you keep it past the holiday season. Apply a houseplant fertilizer once a month.
• Do not fertilize when the poinsettia is in bloom.

Do these things and if you are lucky you may have a poinsettia lasting through the summer---or as most people do--discard the plant after the holidays!

Poinsettias, the Most Popular Potted House Plant

Well, Thanksgiving is the official kick off of the holiday season and the time Poinsettias hit the store shelves. The actual genus species name is Euphorbia pulcherrima.

Native to Mexico, Euphoria pulcherrima, actually is a small shrub or tree, which can reach a height of 2 to 16 feet. The flowers on Euphoria pulcherrima are actually small yellow blossoms surrounded by colorful leaves called bracts. Typically, the bracts come in a variety of colors from orange, pale greens, pinks, or whites with red being the most popular and traditional color.

Euphorbia pulcherrima was renamed Poinsettia after Joel Roberts Poinsett who was the first first United States Ambassador to Mexico appointed by President John Quincy Adams in the 1820's. Poinsett took some of the cuttings of Euphorbia pulcherrima back to his green house in South Carolina and thereafter the offspring were popularly referred to as Poinsettia.

Ambassador Joel Poinsett

If you want to learn to share some Poinsettia facts and trivia with your dinner guests there is a great site, University of Illinois Poinsettia Pages.    When you review this site, you will learn that

• Poinsettias are not poisonous to people and might cause indigestion only if you ate over 500 bracts.
• Poinsettias are the most popular potted houseplant and  represent over 85 percent of the potted plant sales during the holiday season, with  ninety percent of all poinsettias are exported from the United States.
• Poinsettias are commercially grown in all 50 states with California being the top poinsettia producing state.
• The Paul Ecke Ranch in California grows over 80 percent of poinsettias in the United States for the wholesale market and Ninety per cent of all the flowering poinsettias in the world got their start at the Paul Ecke Ranch.

• With $220 million worth of poinsettias sold during the holiday season, seventy-four percent of Americans still prefer red poinsettias with the remainder of consumers selecting whites and pinks.

　

Cranberries a Holiday Favorite

Went shopping yesterday and the bags of fresh cranberries are being cleared off  the supermarket shelves just in time of course for the Thanksgiving holiday and Christmas season.

Cranberries are in the family of plants in the subgenus Oxycoccus of the genus Vaccinum. The varieties of cranberries  are native to northern North America, northern Asia, and northern Europe. Some varieties of cranberries, some which are low creeping shrubs (2-8 inches in height), or whereas others are vines, which can reach a length of 7 feet.

Though there are different species and varieties of cranberries, most cranberries have flowers, which are dark pink, the leaves are small and evergreen, and the berries are larger than the leaves of the plant.

Contrary to popular belief, commercially produced cranberries do not grow in permanent watery bogs.

Rather a cranberry bed is constructed by removing the topsoil and replacing the topsoil with a 2-4 inch level of sand. Dikes are built around the beds to hold the water and there is irrigation equipment to provide watering to encourage spring vine growth as well as provide the flooding of the beds to provide autumn frost protection.

During the growing season, cranberry beds are well watered and fertilized. It is when the berries are red and ready for harvesting the cranberry beds are flooded. The ripened cranberries rise to the top of the water where they are corralled to the corner of the bed and then pumped out of the bed to be cleaned and sorted for packaging or processing.

Interesting facts about cranberries:

• Early American settlers named the plant cranberry because the flowers and stem resembled the neck, head, and bill of a crane. In parts of Canada, the same plant is referred to as mossberry
• 95% of harvested cranberries end up in fruit drinks or canned cranberries whereas 5% are sold as fresh cranberries
• Fresh cranberries can be frozen at home, and will keep up to nine months; they can be used directly in recipes without thawing
• Wisconsin is the leading producer of cranberries, with over half of U.S. production with Massachusetts being  the second largest U.S. producer
• White cranberry juice is made from regular cranberries that have been harvested after the fruits are mature, but before they have attained their characteristic dark red color

　

Dormant Oil Sprays Can Be Applied in Late Fall When Leaves are Off Trees

I have been asked many times what is a dormant oil spray and about its use in the maintaining the trees and shrubs in your landscape.
　
Dormant oil sprays are specific horticultural oils which when applied with the addition of copper fungicides or lime sulfurs suffocate the insects and destroy the disease carrying fungus which over winter on the tree.

With fruit trees, the dormant oil and fungicide combinations will control mites, scale, aphid eggs, leaf curl and shot hole fungus to name a few insect and disease pests which will attack and prevent successful fruit production.

 For those of you who wish to use an organic oil spray there are some composed only of cottonseed oil and there are some recipes as how to make your own spray. I would recommend searching the internet with the phrase "organic dormant oil" and you should successfully locate commercially prepared dormant oil sprays or do-it-yourself recipes.

I did locate one site, Chari's Bugs Online which had recommendations for a commercial organic oil spray as well as a home made recipe.
　
Regardless, oil sprays can be applied in the late fall when leaves are off the trees and temperatures are not freezing. When applied in the early spring, the dormant oil spray is applied before the leaves of the trees and flower buds have emerged.

Planting Amaryllis Bulbs

Our last blog was about amaryllis bulbs and noting that this is the time of year to purchase the bulbs due to their greater availability at the garden centers as well as the ability to be shipped before the freezing temperatures.
　
I prefer to purchase the bulbs bare-rooted due to the fact the bulbs are generally larger, almost always guaranteed to bloom, and I can select the container to plant the bulbs.

As you can see in the following diagram, amaryllis bulbs are not planted deep like other bulbs. Rather the crown of the bulb remains above the soil line.

Though I did not go into details, there are vases available that a bare-rooted bulb is in a water mix and then after blooming generally discarded. (Hyacinths are often times forced to bloom in much the same way.)  I like to save the bulbs and as noted in an earlier blog, I keep the bulb outside during the summer months, bring it inside for a several month period in a cool dry low-light area and then bring it out again in the later part of January.
　
When the bulb is starting to grow, the flower buds are very pronounced and the leaves are very slender. Sometimes there is initial confusion of distinguishing a leaf from a bud, but very shortly they are easy to note the differences.

　

Hippeastrum (Amaryllis) Now is the Time to Locate Bulbs Before the Winter Weather Sets In

Every fall one of my projects is to bring my amaryllis bulb from outside and move it to the dark cool basement to allow the bulb to rest and then bloom again in the winter time. The reason that I am writing about the amaryllis bulb is that this is really the time to order these great bulbs so you can begin the process of preparing the bulbs for your winter enjoyment.

Now, I am going to add a bit of confusion about the name.

Most garden centers and bulb companies sell bulbs which they label amaryllis which are actually Hippeastrum bulbs with are in the Amarylliddacea family. So, technically the most desirable bulbs most gardeners are looking for because they can be forced indoors are Hippeastrum.

Hippeastrum are native to the tropical and subtropical regions of the Americas, Argentina, Mexico and the Caribbean. As with the most of the other available bulbs, the first commercial breeders of Hippeastrum were Dutch growers beginning in the 18^th century. And though the Dutch continue to be large producers of Hippeastrum, South African produces quite a few new bulbs and Japanese growers have developed double flower Hippeastrum.

The true Amaryllis is also known as the Belladonna Lily, which is native to the rocky regions of the South American Cape and they can also be purchased through some bulb catalogs.

Now is the time to purchase Hippeastrum bulbs which are sold as Amaryllis bulbs by most garden centers or bulb companies. Fortunately, many growers market the bulbs as Hippeastrum (Amaryllis) which can help assure the consumer that they are purchasing the correct bulb for indoor forcing. I like that way of labeling and will do so in all future writings.
　　
The best time to start selecting the Hippeastrum (Amaryllis) bulbs is now!

You will have the greatest selection of bulbs either already planted in a soil medium or sold bare rooted (without soil). If you are buying on line over the internet or from mail order catalogs, the bulbs can only be shipped when the temperatures are not freezing.

In my previous life when I worked at a garden center, I would recommend the bare rooted bulbs because you were able to obtain larger bulbs, which I could say with great confidence, would be guaranteed to bloom.