Monday, April 13, 2009

Daffodils - Doubles

I've written about a lot of the spring bulbs, but up until now haven't tackled the daffodils since they are such a large group, especially in my gardens. They are just everywhere from one end to the other, between all of the peonies and scattered throughout the daylilies. I think the best way is to tackle one division at a time and this morning it will be the doubles.
Daffodils have been divided into thirteen divisions for classification purposes. Miniatures have their own division which doesn't have a number since they can be a number of different shapes. A daffodil is in the miniature division if the bloom is under 1.5 inches in diameter. Doubles are in division 4.
This first one is called 'Christmas Valley'. It is a deep rose, but I expect that with a Christmas name, it might be more red some years. Colors on daffodils are extremely weather dependent. Pinks and reds are expecially variable.

This next one is 'Pink Parade'. This one is a pretty reliable pink, rarely coming out in that orange/peach color that so many pinks do.
I like this one. It's quite bright and called 'Smokey Bear'. No idea where the name comes from, but that is probably the case with most named plants.



This double is has orange/deep gold for its extra petals and is called 'Grosvenor'.

This last one is 'Cheerfulness' and is a double, but is also a tiny flower with 3 or more blooms on a scape. This one is different from the others in a major way besides size. It is extremely fragrant, smelling much more like a hyacinth than a daffodil. One small scape can fill a room with fragrance. It is more properly classified as a miniature, but since it is, by appearances, a double, I've added it here. I'll probably do that with the other miniatures as I work my way through the division.
Off this morning to neaten up the garden at our local post office. When they finally built our new post office (the old one burned and they had been using a room at the firehouse for over 3 years) the postal service in one of their dumber moves, built it with a garden space in front. That's nice, but the postmaster isn't allowed to 'garden' it during business hours (though they're expected to clean the building) and there is no money allocated to planting or upkeep. We volunteered to do it and planted grasses and daffodils around the two light poles, added a variegated sweet gum and put hostas at the base, put daffodils around their sign by the road and then put perennials in the bed at the front of the building. Everything is growing well, but just needs a bit of weeding and some fresh mulch. It does perk up what would otherwise be a pretty ugly prefab building.
Happy Birthday to me.
Jane


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