The last one is planted!

[Linda P]

The last hosta acquisition of the year went in to the ground yesterday...just a little bit shy of my self-imposed 'get them planted
by Oct 15' deadline. I was appalled when I was forced to look at the number of new ones I got this year, the year I was
only going to add 4 or 5 special ones. Well, when you attend two conventions, the midwest Hallson gathering at Renaldo's,
go on a hosta trip to the annual gathering at Hallson's, and stop at Walters Gardens...besides the usual trip to Hornbakers,
and the local hosta club swaps and sales, I guess I might have known that 4 or 5 was a little unrealistic.
I've actually not made a hard and fast count, but I know it's way, way too many!!!
Next year, yeah, that's it...next year I will only add 4 or 5.
How many do you have left to plant? How far over your proposed 'hosta budget' did you go this year?
Are you out of room? Do you care? Shall we even talk about what hostas we hope to add to the collection next year?

Linda P

[Chris_W]

Congratulations! Yesterday we also planted our last hostas. I almost couldn't believe it as I thought for sure it would never end. I really didn't buy as much new material as I usually do, which was a good thing as sales were also down this year, so then what did I go and do? I bought some more new things from Walters that will come next week But I got the spots ready for them, so I can almost consider them half planted, can't I?

Thankfully the weather has stayed pretty nice all month. Now we have to move on to the new perennials and shrubs and try to get the nursery cleared out and back in the ground. Then on to other projects and start splitting wood for the winter... The work is never ending, but it is nice to cross hosta planting off the work list

[renaldo75]

That's great, Linda & Chris!!

Linda - I'll answer none of those questions you wound up with. Not gonna go there.
My hostas will have to stay in pots over winter I'm afraid. I will get some in the ground yet, but
things got way out of control here this year as Linda knows... I'm not going to dig another garden
here [unless I win the lottery].

[JoshS]

I'm going to plead the 5th with Reldon...LOL!

[AlwaysWeeding]

I got some from last year, some trades, some shared purchase, and a few I bought. Too big a pile. I got the same with Lilies, Daylilies, some perrenials. Gonna be alot in the garage this year again. The ground is so dry and hard right now, it took so long to plant some lilies yesterday! The weeds kept grabbing my ankles, too, to slow me down.

[renaldo75]

You'd better watch out, CJ!! You'd be in big trouble if we had to deal with kudzu vine up here in Iowa..

A Little Hosta Garden of Horrors.

[mooie]

12 more to go...hopefully this week..Been a horrible gardening year in E Central Illinois...

teresa

[ViolaAnn]

My own hostas were all planted several weeks ago - actually nearly a month. Was out of town for a week in September and didn't move anything once I got home. But at that time I moved a couple of divisions into the hosta garden at my church. Went to look at them a week ago and the squirrels have dug them up. I didn't get a chance to get back this week so I must do that tomorrow - see if I can salvage them with more soil and water. The church is under construction and off limits - have to get water from someone who lives down the church. Fortunately the hosta garden is not within the confines of the construction fence. But we don't get by there as often to check on things since we are worshiping elsewhere at the moment.

[Linda P]

Chris...good for you! Reldon...No lottery win yet? Darn. Just hope this winter is better
to you than last winter was!
Josh..I have a feeling that you may contribute to the demise of my good intentions next year.
CJ...the ground is hard as rock here too. I've been watering for the last few weeks. The hose
is on all day most days, moving from one place to the other. I water for a while, let it sit for
a day, then weed that spot while I water the next, etc. The weeds were just out of control.
Mooie...it was not a good gardening year up in this part of Illinois either. The plants looked
good through the first part of the summer, but the excessive rain and heat and humidity set
off a lot of rotting problems...not to mention a couple of cow escapes. It's awful what
a 12-1400 pound cow can do to a hosta crown. Let them trample around when the soil is constantly
wet, and you have divots that take a lot of work to fill. I didn't notice til late in the summer
that they had run through the chicken yard. I thought they had stayed on the path, but at least
one decided to veer into the lush hosta foilage, and stomp the crowns of a few biggies...Lime Piecrust,
Sum It Up, Green Sheen...and a few others, all suffered terribly.
ViolaAnn...too bad about the squirrels. I hope the hostas will be okay. I had one I dug up to do a heat
treatment on, and then somehow forgot to plant it. It sat out on the ground with no soil on the roots
for several days. I popped it in some water to plump it up, and planted it. Hopefully it will survive..
first I scald it, then shock it with cold water..then leave it laying to dry out. Hosta abuse!!!

So, no one wants to 'fess up to thinking about what hostas to add next year?
I can say that I'd love to find Titanium..don't know if it's available or not, as I haven't checked.
Frank Lloyd Wright, Tickle Me Pink and Smoke Signals are a few others that look interesting.

Well, I'm off to get the sprinkler going and weed the spot I watered yesterday.
Happy planting for those of you who are still at it!!!

Linda P

[Bigdaddy1]

I added 12 new hostas to my collection last minute. I had them in the ground on the 9th of October. Hopefully they will survive the winter. I added;

Brother Stefan
Fire Opal
Niagara Falls
Pineapple Upside down Cake
Red October
Revolution
Stiletto
Teaspoon
Toy Soldier
T-Rex
Woolly Mammoth
Zounds

I definately went over my budget this season, but you only live once!



Chris

[renaldo75]

Linda - Naylor had Titanium at MN this summer. Very small plants. I decided I had to have one after seeing the mature one Bob Olson had. There were 3 left when I got back to vending. Someone started talking to me while I was standing in front of the flat. When the conversation about the coolness of Titanium ended, I reached for the best of the 3 and it was gone. But the lady who had overheard the conversation was holding it in her hand smiling smugly. I'm pretty sure it's in the new Naylor catalog though.

That's a nice group of hostas, Big Daddy! You'll enjoy them all.

[Linda P]

Thanks Reldon. I remember looking for Titanium and finding it gone. I considered it before seeing it in Bob Olsen's garden,
and once I saw it there I was smitten. I haven't had the courage (or the time) to look at the new list at Naylor, though I did
download (and promptly misplace somewhere on this infernal machine) the PDF file.
Nice list, Bigdaddy...and they should do just fine for you. I've actually planted them as late as November. The biggest issue
is frost heaving in the spring, so mulch them in after the ground freezes, and you should be safe.
Just keep an eye on them when the days start to get warmer in the spring.

Linda P

[renaldo75]

I held off looking at the Naylor pdf too. [I lasted a week - 10 days. Resistance is futile.] Hoping that the more expensive/limited quantities would already be sold out by the time I did. It seems to have worked, there were a couple already gone by the time I looked. I thought there were a lot of new ones last year, but there seems to be almost double that this year. But they have all the FOoSF group & Don Dean and Rick Goodenough and Kathy Sisson and a few others too. And all of the Marco Fransen & Danny Van Eechaute and the Dutch/Belgium guys. Lots of nice plants!!
It's all on their website now. I just cked.

[Linda P]

You're right again as usual, Reldon. (Don't let that go to your head! )
Resistance is futile. That sums up my hosta story in three words.

Linda P

[renaldo75]

At least, assimilation into the Hosta~collective is more fun than into the Borg collective.

[Linda P]

So true, Reldon, so true. No mechanical body parts are required for hosta assimilation.

And I find that I was mistaken about having planted the last one. I ran across a plant that I had
set aside to watch, fearing that it may have HVX. I am going to put that in the ground somewhere
far, far from its kind. I also have a Honeybells in a hanging basket I won at Des Moines that is
going to have to find a winter home. I may experiment with leaving that one in the pot.

Linda P

[Trudy]

Pleading the 5th with Reldon and Josh!

Have over a hundred seedlings sitting in pots. Plan is to overwinter again in the pots as we did last year. Tip the pots over after frozen and cover with layer of leaves. We have to remember- not uncover early or tip back over to early or the pots will get to much water if they are still frozen.
Found out its easier to evaluate the seedlings in pots over the years. Not that I want to dig another whole bed (I'm with you here Reldon!), that would have to be weeded each year.
Don't have my eye on any new hostas, having to much fun with growing my own seedlings!
Ok, after saying that I do need to look up Titanium in the Library......don't you just love the Hosta Library

[Linda P]

Hi Trudy! Good to hear from you.
My young seedlings are in a couple of raised beds, where they stay for 2 years or so.
I cleared out a spot to make a couple more next year.
Seems that no matter how many times I say "I'm NOT going to grow that many ever again"...
I end up growing more. I didn't keep many from last winter, and the dratted cats dug up some of them.
While I'm down on the number of keepers this year, there will likely be many more next year!

Linda P

[Patrushka]

Good for you Linda! Even with those two you found, you're still doing great.

It sounds like you are staying on top of things Chris. You'll be finished before you know it.

As for those pleading the fifth, it's okay, we all understand.

I can happily say that I only have six more hostas to plant. Three of them are acquisitions from the Hallson Get Together, two are little Francees that came apart when I dug it up because it wasn't doing well (one is replanted), and one is a seedling from Kent that refused to unfurl this spring. The seedling has been sitting in the hole with its roots exposed on top (hosta abuse) and amazingly it' unfurled and is doing much better.

I still have some other perennials to plant. A sedum, a heuchera, some daylilies that the vole divided, several jugs of winter sown plants that overwintered in their jugs last year and some cuttings from a mystery shrub that DS#1 dug up from his yard. The mystery shrub is already temporarily planted by the compost pile.

I'm going to try to get everything planted by the end of the week. Try...I said try.

I didn't go over my budget. I'm not out of room but I probably wouldn't care if I was. I'd find a way. My parents' house was on a postage stamp size lot and I used to tell them to fill the gutters with dirt and plant up there. I haven't even looked at new hostas to add to the collection. Maybe I should go take my temperature.

[Linda P]

Pat...I hope you are not ill, but I think you'd better get out that thermometer!
I love your idea about the gutters...it may come to that.

Linda P