CACTUS AND SUCCULENT SHOW AND SALE!

I had a great idea at last Thursday's market. For some reason there was a lack of interest at my table and a great interest at others. I decided a great way to gain interest is to bring some interesting plants from my succulent collection and make it BIG! I plan on bringing some of my show plants, large mother plants (not for sale) and quite a few smaller plants (for sale). The sale will probably take place on December 17th at the Mid-City Green Market from 2:30 to 7:00. The plants I will be selling will most certainly be a limited quantity. If you are a serious collector or would like to give an unusual plant as a Christmas gift try and get to the Can Company early! Feel free to drop by even if you are not interested in a purchase. Keep checking back for updated info.
Thanks!
Mammillaria threase & assorted cacti
Astrophytum myriostigma
Mammillaria ritteriana

Cripplers!

I finally got motivated to start all of my fall veggies...again. I probably sewed 10,000 seeds since the last day in July & I had every single one of them die on me about 2 weeks ago. Thank goodness for cool weather! I just got back from a trip to the Texas Hill Country! While I was there I received a large load of Horse Crippler Cactus (Echinocactus texensis). I will be bringing five specimens to market on Thursday. Four are in one gallon pots & one is in a five inch. These are some superb looking cacti. They are very hardy & easy bloomers in spring. They also grow exponentially faster with Louisiana's rain fall than central Texas'. Next Spring I hope to bring some of the larger specimens. When I say large I mean LARGE! Some of these plants are having trouble fitting in a five gallon pot!
In other news...Last week at the market I brought a small collection of seeds for sale. They are all seeds I harvested from plants I grew then packaged them myself. They have been stored properly for the last year & germination rates should be high. This Thursday I plan on bringing seeds to California poppies, Liatris, Texas Bluebonnet, Love in a mist and Red buckeye. The buckeye seeds were collected in the last few days. They are ready to be sewn immediately! Hope to see you at market.
Jesse

bushy germanders!

WILL THIS RAIN STOP?! It has been unseasonably warm even by south Louisiana standards as of late. It is becoming near impossible to grow cool weather crops successfully without a green house. Not to mention every time we get these monsoon style rain storms it washes all the soil and seeds out of my seed flats. I'm giving up until we get some cooler dryer weather. On the positive side...I am going to be selling loads of beautiful one gallon bush germanders (Teucrium fruitcans) this week! I will also be pushing some thin but still stunning Gulf Mulhy grass (Muhlenbergia capillaris) along with some three gallon Tulip Poplars (Liriodendron tulipifera) Not much else to report. I have made a few trips to the other location this week. All my one gallon Echinacea, Rudbeckia and Penstemon cobeas will be over wintering there. Hope they like it! I don't know if I have made a rant about the huge cache of buckeye nuts I've come across. Well, they are germinating like mad right now & I am half way pleased to announce that I have a good handful of albinos!!!!!!!!!! I have a feeling they will die do to a lack of chloraphil though. I'll share pictures.

Slacker

I'm getting pretty bad about posting. Sorry about that. I've been sewing flats like mad lately. Unfortunately my lack of consistent attention to all these seed flats, heavy constant rain and extreme heat after a few days of cool weather have been killer on many seedlings. The weather has been great for cuttings though. Lots of roses have been rooting very nicely! I've also been potting up trees and grasses into larger pots. These include Tulip Poplars, Sycamores, Persimmons, Gulf Muhly and Texas Bluegrass. These guys are beginning to look terrific! I have recently commandeered a source for seed to one of the Native Buckeyes (Aesculus pavia). The seeds are germinating a lot more quickly than normal. I will leave with a picture of them.

hectic

So, it has been a while since I last posted. I just haven't had much time or much in general to write about. I have been planting like mad lately and now I am in dire need of bringing more plants out to the new location. In the past two weeks I have only been able to make two trips out there and I have not brought very many plants either time. I have been making adjustments on the irrigation though. Everything seems to be working out well so far. Last I heard was that Saturday night those plants got six inches of rain in six hours! I hope none of the aloes got uprooted. Here at the home base I have been sewing loads and loads of seed flats & having the pleasure of watching the seedlings pop up. I can't wait till the weather gets cooler so the struggling fall vegetables and herbs can flourish. Luckily though, most of the fall bedding plants are happy as can be. I'm glad I got the seeds in the soil so early.
This past weekend was spent in Birmingham, Alabama. I had a very nice visit and was shocked at how much potential this town has. I am willing to bet it grows exponentially in the next five to ten years. While I was there I was able to take cuttings of several new types of Sedum, a native succulent growing on a granite bald probably in the Portulacaceae family, seeds to a beautiful Datura that was a perfect cross between the native white and that gaudy double purple and last but certainly not least Castanea dentata a.k.a. American Chestnut (The story of this tree has intrigued me almost all of my life click here for more). I believe that the seeds I aquired are American crossed with Chinese; however I must admit that most of the 30+ Chestnuts in the area did look as if they had the blight at one point in their life. This means that they are either true Americans or Chinese crosses from a time when the crosses didn't have a very good resistance to the blight. This is why I am going to be selling these fellas just south of their historical range. Hopefully they will have a better chance of living a blight free life this way. Send me an e-mail or comment if you want first dibs!
Your pic.-o-the post is of the succulent growing in habitat in Birmingham. I will eventually look it up. But if someone happens to know off hand I would be delighted to be informed. The other plant is Whitlow Wort (I ought to think about growing that one).

SQUILLY

I don't have much time before I fall asleep typing so I'll try & keep this one brief. Not much work was done plant wise this week. But I did get some plants moved to the new location. I finally set up irrigation at the new location. A spotted squill I gave to someone about three years ago was just severely thinned and the rest was given back to me. This means I will be selling loads of squill soon! This picture of the spotted or silver squill was taken without permission from this web site. I'll put up a picture of my own when I have more time. In the mean while tell this guy not to press charges, cause that would be a waste.

Find your happy place.

After a week of constant potting I'm ready for some change. I hope the plants are too. Today they are going to find their happy place! I made two trips moving the drought tolerant plants to the new location this past week. Thank goodness too. I was getting really cramped around here. Today will be split moving some one gallons into shade, consolidating flats of four inch & moving those flats off the lawn and onto the concrete where the one gallons were. The rest of the day & possibly into the night will be spend seeding flats. I will mostly be doing Swiss Chard, Brussel sprouts, Cilantro, Parsley, Dill, Calendula and I just might do an experiment with getting California poppies, Rose campion, Foxglove and Columbine to germinate in the heat.
Your picture for this post is of my newest mother plant. It is a type of Rain Lily called a Copper Lily (Habranthus tubispathus). I visited the city of Mansfield, La. a few weeks ago and these boogers were blooming like mad all over the place. I found a large patch on the side of a vacant Sonic restaurant where I gathered six bulbs. Hopefully they send off pups quickly or I won't have any to sell for years to come. I was also hoping I wouldn't be able to find it's scientific name because dubbing a plant 'Sonic Rain Lily' really appealed to me.

It was a slow day at work today. All I did was shift some pots around, bump most of the one gallon Liriodendron tulipifera (Yellow or Tulip Poplar) into three gallon pots and transplant several flats of cuttings into four inch pots. I also ordered more one gallon pots. This is partly why things are going so slowly. Once they get here I will be shooting plants out of the wazoo! Specifically Aquilegia chrysantha (Gold or Texas Yellow Columbine) and Lychnis coronaria (Rose Campion). I will probably also be placing many different varieties of Dianthus, Abutilon & Malvaviscus in them as well.
Your picture of the day is of one of my Cheddar Pink Dianthus cultivars.

Greetings,
This past week was spent potting 4" to gallon & making new plants. Hundreds of new plants! I made about four trays of cuttings & just seeded out one flat. The cuttings included Rosemary, Turks Cap, Patrick's Abutilon, Golden Pineapple Sage, Russelia coccinea, spotted tradescantia, Dwarf Lionstail, Shrubby Boneset, Mexican Mint Marigold, Chitalpa & several more I'm sure. The one flat consisted of Aristolochia fimbriata & some very old Lemon Rose Mallow seeds. I will be shocked if either of them germinate. Sunday I ordered some fall seeds. Lettuce, a red Nicotiana, Brussel Sprouts, Parsely, Cilantro, Swiss Chard & Dill. I suppose it is a good start. I'm sure I'll have some tricks up my sleve for fall, but let me know if you have a request. The only significant thing that happened Moday was fertilizer & pyrethrin day. Tuesday was spent moving about 200 one gallon drought tolerant plants to [THE NEW LOCATION]!!!!!!!!!!! The plants included Our native blazing star Liatris, Asparagus, seedling Chinqapin Oak trees, Yellow Bulbine, Pink Rain Lily (Z. grandiflora), Agave (tequilliana, coloradata, weberi & parryi v. truncata), the lovely Texas Blue Grass! & my personal favorite that I can not wait to distribute abundantly around south Louisiana Hippeastrum puniceum (a very elegant simple & small amaryllis).

Quick plant list for Thursdays market.
Assorted succulents, Basil, Brazilian plume, Bush Germander, Cardinal flower, Dwarf Lions Tail, Golden Pineapple Sage, Gollum Jade, Gulf Coast Penstemon, Lemon Balm, Mountain Mist Dianthus, Okra, Oregano, Patrick's Abutilon, Spice Lily, Turk's Cap, Shrubby Bone Set, Salvia madrensis, Clock vine thunbergia (the rambler) & stick tomatoes.

1,2,1,2 this is just a test.

Welcome,
This is my first hand at a blog, so I hope you find it enjoyable. My name is Jesse & I run a very small plant nursery in Baton Rouge. I sell my plants at the Mid-City Green Market in New Orleans at the American Can Company Every Thursday. I also sell my plants to local nurseries. Obviously I enjoy plant diversity. I get tired of seeing Crape Myrtles, Indian Hawthorn, Knock Out Roses & all the Asian Azaleas. Don't get me wrong. I understand the reason people plant them is because they do what they do very well. But what if your diet consisted of the same foods day to day? It would get old quickly, right? I think the animals that use these plants as food and/or shelter would be better off with a little diversity. I also think a little diversity is better for our senses. Why grow a whole hedge of Azalea indica (the common evergreen Azalea notorious with southern plantations) when you can break the monotony with one of the native Rhododendrons (typically deciduous shrub closely related to Azaleas but with a later blooming time). This way you can enjoy a hedge with a longer bloom time & more diverse wildlife visitors.
New, old, unique & antique is a good summary of the plants that I grow. I do prefer growing native plants but I am not obsessed with doing so. I do not grow exotic invasives. In fact, I try not to grow native invasives. I enjoy growing conversation pieces. I think that really sums it all up.
I hope you enjoy this blog. I can go off on rants, so please feel free to harass me if I just need to shut it. Please let me know if you have any suggestions.
Jesse

P.S. The picture is of a Bread Fern (Onoclea sensibilis)