Wanna see my cannas? :-D

About 5 maybe 6 years ago a co-worker gave me a 5 gal pail with some canna tubers in it. He didn't give me any instructions on how to plant them only that they needed to be dug up in the fall. I thought, sure...why not. That's no big deal...I can handle that. HA!!!

Here I am after 5th season with 6 laundry baskets, 3 big mesh laundy bags, a couple of grocery bags, and a few large potting containers FILLED with the 'dug up' cannas. Would you believe that I started THIS season with only *3* mesh laundry bags...and I gave HALF of those away in the spring! (You can't see *all* the baskets...they wouldn't fit in the picture!)

Now, all I have to do is clean them up, cut off the roots, and pack them in peat moss. Uh....wait a minute...little voice in back of head whispers "julie forgot she still has *another* bed to dig!" Ughhhhhhhhh.

LOL
~julie~

Do you have a photo of them all in bloom?

Jody

Jody...if you want to hang on a minute...I'm sure I can find at least one bed with part them in bloom. :-)

~julie~

Julie, I can relate, if I get to it, I'll take a pic of my "operation", every night since last Sunday I've been digging and cleaning bulbs. I finally decided that when you have to haul them by the wheelbarrow loads, you've got a problem, but I still do it every year.

One year I dug them all in 2 days and used a snowmobile trailer, tilted, to wash them, and the water and soil drained off nicely. Man, am I sick or what??

I'm leaving work early today to get at some more, they must get finsihed soon, the frost is starting to hit really hard, and mine are drying in the barn. Only trouble is that rotten cold I have, I don't feel too spunky.........but it will come once I get my garden clothes on!!

Legit

Legit, I'm giggling here...because I know exactly what you're going through. An snomobile trailer, eh? What a GREAT idea! And I just *happen* to know where I can find one. Mwwwwaaaaahahaha...look out boys! Mama's on her way! LOL (Hope you feel better REAL fast. You're going to need to in order to get all that digging and cleaning done. Can't wait to see your pics!

Well, I could only find a couple of pics with the canna beds. I usually don't take pics of them in particular (other than the flower heads) because they're used as backgrounds. But here's collage that shows one bed...(out of 5 and several containers LOL).

Upper left: I believe that's a Florence Vaughn
Upper right: Dawn Pink
Lower left: my CIB (Center Island bed in back yard)
Lower right: Pretoria

I've got 'Spitfire', 'Lucifer', 'Maudie Malcomb', 'Journey's End', 'Stadt Feltbach', 'Yellow Futurity', and 2 varieties of the tall standard types...green leafed and bronze leafed. (Oh yes...and I ordered some 'Richard Wallace' and 'Madame Butterfly' to add next spring. (LOL & LOL I guess I *am* turning into the "Canna CAween" after all.)

There ya go!
~julie~

Sheesh - that's a mother lode of canna there. I am canna impaired (can't overwinter the darn things) I bought two new ones to try this year - froze last night, so I am gonna get the shovel out and start a digging!!

You GO girl!! Don't want to see you lose these cannas! :-D

~julie~

Hey, Julie! The collage is all green!

Jody

Boy am I glad I'm not the only one that can't see the collage.

I even left the thread and came back to try again.

Whoa!!! That's BAD!!! I even previewed it and opened the link as soon as I uploaded it. Something weird happened...so I'll try it again.

Ok...I see it perfectly in *this* preview...I'm sending.

~julie~

I see it...how about you?

~julie~

Beautiful!

"all I have to do is clean them up, cut off the roots, and pack them in peat moss"... you forgot to add replant them next spring and repeat the process every year thereafter. You and Legit are gluttons for punishment.

Back when I first began gardening by myself, I dug 240 individual holes and planted about 240 caladiums and dug several hundred individual holes and planted several hundred gladiolas into this clay nightmare over here. They came up that year and really were spectacular. The following spring I waited and waited and waited for them to come back up and to double. Then I waited some more to see this wave of color sweeping my property to beautify my landscape. Nothing. Zip nadda zilch... no caladiums and no gladiolas. So, I went back to where I bought them with the bags and ever so politely told the gal who was the head of the department that they had sold me hundreds and hundreds of defective bulbs that I slaved to get in the ground on my knees with a little spade for days on end. She ever so politely told me to read the bag. I read the bag and ever so politely asked her what her point to the exercise was. She ever so politely pointed to the Zone 9-10 printed on the bags. I ever so politely thanked her and asked her to please be so kind as to refund my money, all of it. It was then that I got an education on Zones. Ouch, the pain of humiliation. Classic example of how when one is dumb one pays.

Nowadays, I plant things like iris that don't have to be dug up. I am just blatantly too darn old and lazy to have to dig things up because my knees seem to be making sounds I've never heard before. Much better to view them in somebody else's yard. Trust me, when I see those plants growing in a yard I know it's a labor of love or they wouldn't be there. Thank you Legit and Julie for creating lovely gardens that include these types of plants for people like me to enjoy as eye candy.

Equilibrium,

When I see the same person in the threads I'm watching I like to check their favorite website. Well...I clicked on your username and then your favorite website. However, the website gave me a The page cannot be displayed error. This has happened with other favorites , so I usually type the name of the favorite web page followed by .com. Sometimes this works, and without thinking I tried with your favorite page. Luckily, I realized my mistake before the photos were loaded onto the page, but it hijacked my davesgarden.com in the drop-down menu and then wouldn't let me close the page!!!

Beware, don't do what I did!!! The name of the favorite web page is Wild Ones !

Jody

Edited for typo's.


This message was edited Oct 28, 2005 6:10 PM

"lib" That is such a touching story...and I mean that earnestly. It's funny when you look back on it, but I know there was a time when that same level of innocence belonged to me, too. Every now and then I have to STOP and make my self remember that several of my friends and, in particular, my DIL, haven't gone through the learning process yet. They don't the difference between annuals, perennials, biennials...and have no idea that the tulips they plant this year will probably bloom next...but may fail to push up a single leaf the following.

We all go through those tough lessons...but wouldn't it be nice if we could take a shortcut? My shortcut was called Dave's Garden...and I'm mighty glad I've been able to ask questions here so I don't have take my bulbs back and get a costly education. LOL

You're right on calling cannas, glads, caladium and others "a labor of love". They are. With the way my knee and back have complained this year...it probably won't be something I'll continue for too many more years.

Thanks Jody. Now I don't realy understand what you're telling us about the HiJacked website. I'll have to go back and read your post a little more carefully.

~julie~

LOL @ Equilibrium. I love how you told that story! See.......it happened so that you could bring a smile to all our faces when you told us about it. But yeah...OUCH!!

I remember my dad and his canna bed that I just KNOW he didn't want to do every year, but did it because my mom loved it and wanted it. They were the classic orangey-red ones. My parents don't live in that place anymore, and though my mom has gorgeous gardens, I don't think she has one canna. I'm sure my dad told her he didn't want to see any of those things again. LOL.

Julie, yours are wonderful! And E is right...a true labor of love!

By hijacked I mean every time I went in to the address drop-down menu and clicked on davesgarden, it would take me back to the same x-rated site.

Jody

Hmmmm....I've never had that happen to me (yet!) But, every now and then my drop down gets cleans out by some mysterious action. THAT ticks me off....but not nearly as much as if I was being redirected to site like that. MAN! I'd be ....welll if you put a 'P' in front of 'issed' you get the right word. :-|

~julie~