Mum’s the Word for Our Cool, Rainy Fall

Last autumn, and the autumn before that, I had a hard time warming to chrysanthemums--the weather was simply too hot and muggy and chrysanthemums too much a part of crisp autumn mornings that blossom into sunny days.

But this fall I have no such difficulty. That torrential rain of a few weeks back soaked the ground and made the garden wet and wintry and the nights have been as crisp as a potato chip. Even a few days of Santa Ana winds at the beginning of the week didn’t dampen my enthusiasm, so when I saw them unloading flats of chrysanthemums at the nursery, I was ready.

Serious chrysanthemum growers begin with little rooted cuttings back in the spring and follow a regimen of pinching, fertilizing and staking (that’s because chrysanthemums are perennial plants that take all summer to get ready for fall flowering). The rest of us--starting as late as we are--can’t grow the spectacular mums seen at flower shows, but we can fill the flower beds with what the nursery trade calls bedding chrysanthemums--those short, stubby mums now being sold at nurseries in full flower in four-inch pots.

Extending the Season

These can be planted right now and they’ll bloom for at least a month more, extending the flowering season almost into Thanksgiving. Where you’re now taking out marigolds and zinnias that are over the hill, quickly rework the soil and plant bedding mums.

Because they’re already in flower, they aren’t cheap, so plant them where they’ll be the most noticeable, where their fall-foliage colors can most add to the season.

I’m most fond of the rust-like colors since it’s difficult to think of any other flower that comes in this hue and because the flowers remind me of autumn leaves lying on the ground.

Since they won’t grow much bigger than they are, don’t leave much space between the plants or the effect will be a bit spotty. Be sure to water often the first week or two, so the roots can get out into the soil.

And don’t overlook the possibility of planting a few of these bedding mums in pots; they are first-class container plants.

If you become bitten by the chrysanthemum bug and want to try your hand at the fancy, full-figured types, plan to visit Sunnyslope Gardens on Huntington Drive in San Gabriel sometime this fall. This nursery specializes in prize-winning mums and is a blaze of color this time of year. You can buy some chrysanthemums there now, but the idea is to see what you like and then place orders for cuttings that will be ready to plant next spring.

Here’s a new wrinkle in gardening: instant hedges. I saw them at Sperling’s Nursery in Calabasas, but they are being grown by one of the largest wholesale nurseries (Hines) so they should be showing up all over town. Joe Sperling and I kept asking each other why we didn’t think of this. These instant hedges are grown in long narrow fiber pots and you plant them, pot and all. They’re already trimmed to shape and you simply butt as many together, end to end, as you need. Keep them thoroughly watered at first so the roots can grow through the fiber pots and keep up with the trimming and shaping. They’re called “Hines Hedges” and the following hedge plants are available in these unique containers: boxwood, boxleaf euonymus, dwarf myrtle, Pittosporum tobira “Wheeler’s Dwarf,” and eugenia.

If you have steppingstones that are simply set on dirt or sand and there’s even an inch of space between them, consider planting oxalis in the cracks. Chances are one of the weedy oxalis varieties, with their clover-like leaves and tiny yellow flowers, already grows there, but that’s not what I’m talking about.

The oxalis for sale at nurseries right now is the “Grand Duchess” strain, with much bigger leaves and inch-across flowers in magenta-pink, white or lavender. It will not become a weed and, if it spreads at all, it does so slowly though it will come back year after year, only dying down for the summer. The tiny umber bulbs should be spaced about 4 inches apart and planted an inch deep. To keep the soil from getting too soggy, especially in summer when the bulbs are dormant and want to be kept on the dry side, I usually dig out several inches of soil and mix in some coarse sand--what building supply stores call “washed sand”--before putting the soil back between the pavers.

The plants only grow a few inches tall and they’ll stay even shorter if threatened by foot traffic. I have some by the front door and the constant crunching from the kids going in and out of the house on everything from soccer shoes to skateboards hasn’t dampened the enthusiasm of this little plant--it just hugs the ground even tighter.