Blog – Page 77 – Ellis Hollow

Pickle your paperwhites

pickled paperwhites experiment It’s that time of year. If you’re tired of paperwhites flopping over, you can use a dilute mix of hard liquor or rubbing alcohol to keep them a third to a half shorter without reducing the number or size of the blooms.

This technique made the big time in Leslie Land’s January 12, 2006 Gardening Q&A column in the New York Times:

Start your bulbs in plain water. When roots have formed and the green shoot is 1 to 2 inches long, pour off the water and replace with a solution of 4 to 6 percent alcohol. If you are using 80 proof liquor (40 percent alcohol), that works out to one part gin (or the like) to 7 parts water.

Rubbing alcohol (either 70 or 100 percent isopropyl alcohol) can be substituted; just remember to dilute it more. Keep the beer and wine for yourself; their sugars damage plants.

This advice is based on a Cornell undergrad research project carried by Erin Finan (â€™05) under the supervision of Bill Miller, our flower bulb expert in the Department of Horticulture. You can read more about the technique on the Department’s blog.

I should have some news about a new twist on this technique in the near future.

Something other than gardening

Since Susan at GardenRant plugged me as an off-topic garden blogger, I figured I’d better make an off-topic post. My neighbor Lynn is pining for Wilco, so maybe I should do a Monday Music post. One of the better versions of Handshake Drugs:

Actually, Ellis Hollow has pretty much deteriorated into a garden photo blog. I usually let the pictures do the talking, as it’s way harder to bullshit with images. Explore the categories, please, if you’re looking for politics or other topics. They’re just fewer and farther between these days.

Oh, and I could use a few Farmville neighbors, if any of you are playing.

Garden Bloggers Bloom Day scan

Hat tip to Carol at May Dreams Garden for hosting. More bloom day scans here. It’s easy. Give it a try. Directions here. At least we still have Felder’s three keys to designing with form, ’roundy, spiky, frilly.’

Colors are somber around here in November. Guess that’s why I rushed the season on poinsettias.

Poinsettia season

If you had asked me what I thought of a pink poinsettia sight unseen, I’d have probably said ‘Not so much.’ But I’ll admit, I kind of liked this one:

After work earlier this week, I swung by our greenhouses to try to catch the crew from Hortus Forum, Cornell’s student horticulture club, preparing plants for their regular Friday plant sales and their big poinsettia sale Dec. 7 and 8. I had to leave before most of them arrived. But I was able to shoot this year’s poinsettia selections.

A longer shot of the pink poinsettia.

A more traditional red.

Perhaps my favorite, a red with frosting.

A white.

A white-splotched red.

Christmasy.

I love getting close up to poinsettias.

Some long shots.

Panorama. First time I’ve used photomerge in PhotoShop.

Supersized.

The new view

Fred (right, below) kind of likes the new view.

The trunk of the Norway maple always cut your focus short on the tree itself and surrounding plantings. Now, the eye wanders to the bed on the north side of the veggie garden and the woods, wetland and ridge beyond.

It’s going to take some getting used to.

Bonus grass shots from last weekend …