Re: Artemesia 'Powis Castle'

Here in mid latitude New Zealand  "Powis Castle" grows almost all year 
round and can take any frost we are likely to get, which is not much. The 
down side is that we need to trim it lightly during the summer to keep it tidy. 
Funnily enough I have not seen it trimmed as topiary which is a shame as 
it would make a beautiful plant. We once grew them in 12 pint containers 
with the topiary idea in mind but then we shifted the nursery to Wanganui 
and left the plants behind. I must give it a go again. 
Generally, for garden purposes we find it best to keep new plants coming 
every year from cuttings because although the older plants regrow well 
when cut back hard they lose something in form and are quite tatty looking 
for a while in early spring.
I have one growing presently in half to 3/4 shade hard up against some 
pine trees which keep it very dry, hard and slow growing and it still looks 
great.

Terry Dowdeswell
Wanganui
New Zealand
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
terry@delphinium.co.nz
http://www.delphinium.co.nz
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

> In a message dated 3/24/02 5:23:46 PM Eastern Standard Time, 
> jknoble@warwick.net writes:
> 
> << Wow!  Claire, you have no difficulty growing this plant all the way
> up 
>  there???  Now I think I'm really going crazy.  Here in Northern NJ,
>  I've lost 2 (separate attempts) in a bed that has at least 6 other
>  Artemesia cultivars that are doing great, >>
> 
> 
> Somewhere along the way this got mixed up - we do grow it and have for
> years but it will not live over in the open garden.  I root the
> cuttings in summer sometime when I think of it and keep those young
> plants in a cold frame allwinter.   In the late spring, I put the
> young plants into the gardens where I think I would like a mass of
> grey foliage.  You can get a pretty good sized plant by midsummer in
> good soil and enough water.  This plant takes a lot of water while
> growing.  Also, here in upstate NY, full sun.
> 
> The older plants are potted, grown in large containers and kept in the
> cellar all winter mostly dormant.  When they become to large we start
> new ones in the pots.  Potted A. Powis Castle is easy to keep over. 
> As long as the temp stays low, it is a late starter.
> 
> I saw one of these made into a topiary in the Winterrowd/Eck garden in
> Vermont.  It was overwintered in cold storage also.  There was a stem
> about two inches in diameter.
> 
> Sorry, no magic in upstate NY.  The cold frame that keeps these plants
> and others like them is nearly half sand.  A great many plants will
> make it with that treatment.   After the ground freezes here, we fill
> up the frames with leaves and leave them that way until the middle of
> April, sometimes later.  One year I had some kind of Hebe, a no-no in
> New York and it lived over and bloomed a second year in pure sand.  
> 
> The thing with this keeping overwinter semi-hardy plants is that it is
> a lot of work.  We kept a bay tree, Laurus nobilis two winters
> outdoors by burying the pot in a huge pile of woodchips.  The plant
> had grown too large to house indoors and we gave it a try.  
> 
> Claire Peplowski
> NYS z4
> 
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
> To sign-off this list, send email to majordomo@hort.net with the
> message text UNSUBSCRIBE PERENNIALS

---------------------------------------------------------------------
To sign-off this list, send email to majordomo@hort.net with the
message text UNSUBSCRIBE PERENNIALS
Other Mailing lists | Author Index | Date Index | Subject Index | Thread Index