I just read this book, published in 2010. It's printed in China with financial assistance from the Canadian government, which annoys me somewhat. But I thought I'd tell you, my garden buddies, about it, because it might be of some value to you.
It's called "new perennials" not because the plants themselves are new, but because the author feels they could be used more in Canadian gardens. (Actually, he said "should", but you know how I feel about "should".) Unfortunately, like most Canadian gardening books I've laid my hands on so far, it's all about zones 3 and up. There are five plants rated to zone 2 and one for zone 1, but if you look the zone map for Canada, the vast majority of the land is in zones 0 and 1. Granted the majority of the people are in zones 5 and up, but since I'm in the minority, it annoys me. I'm in zone 0a, thank you.
The other thing with these garden books is, they're wrong about the zone ratings. Except Lois Hole, who was smart enough not to put zone ratings in her book of perennials, since it's not unusual for perennials to succeed even three zones out of their rating. Peonies, for example, are rated by my suppliers as zone 4, but there are tons of them growing all around town, so no. And the zones themselves are wrong too, because I'm supposedly in the same zone as Iqaluit, when obviously there are considerably more plants thriving here than there. I think the people who made the hardiness map didn't really bother with the territories. I suppose they figure we don't grow anything up here.
Anyway, back to Williamson's book, I don't really care what he has to say about zones. I can ignore the fact that he's too bossy and he had his book printed in China (which shows, by the way). What really annoys me, ultimately, is that I read through the whole book and didn't even like his plants. I only picked four: crocosmia, Jack-in-the-pulpit, shooting stars, and toad lily. I considered pitcher plants, but they eat insects, and there aren't many of those on my balcony, plus they'd eat the wrong ones. If they could focus on the mosquitoes and leave the wasps alone, that would be fine, but mosquitoes are not attracted to plants and wasps are, so they'd kill the bugs I like and leave the pests alone.
I suppose four new plants might be lots, given how crowded my garden is already, but I'll find somewhere to put them. That is, if I can find them at all. Because the flip side of the fact that they're not used much is, suppliers don't carry them. Chicken and egg, I suppose. So none of my regular suppliers carry any of them. I did find one variety each of shooting stars and Jack-in-the-pulpit from my supplier of rare plants, where I got my baobabs. For the rest... well, I suppose my garden is pretty full as it is.
Anyway, since most of you are well to the south of me, maybe you'd find more of use in this book than I did, so I thought I'd mention it. But get it from the library, don't buy it. No need to subsidize China further when you could be sending your money to, say, Somalia instead.
It's called "new perennials" not because the plants themselves are new, but because the author feels they could be used more in Canadian gardens. (Actually, he said "should", but you know how I feel about "should".) Unfortunately, like most Canadian gardening books I've laid my hands on so far, it's all about zones 3 and up. There are five plants rated to zone 2 and one for zone 1, but if you look the zone map for Canada, the vast majority of the land is in zones 0 and 1. Granted the majority of the people are in zones 5 and up, but since I'm in the minority, it annoys me. I'm in zone 0a, thank you.
The other thing with these garden books is, they're wrong about the zone ratings. Except Lois Hole, who was smart enough not to put zone ratings in her book of perennials, since it's not unusual for perennials to succeed even three zones out of their rating. Peonies, for example, are rated by my suppliers as zone 4, but there are tons of them growing all around town, so no. And the zones themselves are wrong too, because I'm supposedly in the same zone as Iqaluit, when obviously there are considerably more plants thriving here than there. I think the people who made the hardiness map didn't really bother with the territories. I suppose they figure we don't grow anything up here.
Anyway, back to Williamson's book, I don't really care what he has to say about zones. I can ignore the fact that he's too bossy and he had his book printed in China (which shows, by the way). What really annoys me, ultimately, is that I read through the whole book and didn't even like his plants. I only picked four: crocosmia, Jack-in-the-pulpit, shooting stars, and toad lily. I considered pitcher plants, but they eat insects, and there aren't many of those on my balcony, plus they'd eat the wrong ones. If they could focus on the mosquitoes and leave the wasps alone, that would be fine, but mosquitoes are not attracted to plants and wasps are, so they'd kill the bugs I like and leave the pests alone.
I suppose four new plants might be lots, given how crowded my garden is already, but I'll find somewhere to put them. That is, if I can find them at all. Because the flip side of the fact that they're not used much is, suppliers don't carry them. Chicken and egg, I suppose. So none of my regular suppliers carry any of them. I did find one variety each of shooting stars and Jack-in-the-pulpit from my supplier of rare plants, where I got my baobabs. For the rest... well, I suppose my garden is pretty full as it is.
Anyway, since most of you are well to the south of me, maybe you'd find more of use in this book than I did, so I thought I'd mention it. But get it from the library, don't buy it. No need to subsidize China further when you could be sending your money to, say, Somalia instead.
No comments:
Post a Comment