Fred's Garden Blog

A few weeks ago I started my second greenhouse project for Sommer Gardens, a new hoop house.  This project followed the completion of a large shade house friends and I constructed during the holidays. While I really wanted to build a nice greenhouse with a heater and fans, finances dictated I switch to a less expensive hoop house kit.

The kit arrived on a 16 foot pallet, three quarters of a ton of tightly bound galvanized steel pipe ready to be assembled. Its new home was going to be an open air growing area on the north side of our recently completed shade house project.  This area had been cleared of plants earlier when the shade house was completed and the plants relocated inside it.

The first step was to level the land.  The area had a 2.5 foot slope from one corner to the opposite corner.  Once the ground was fairly level we assembled the hoops and set the supporting poles in concrete around the perimeter.

The following day we installed a perimeter rail and raised the hoops.  The hoops were then secured with purlins to bind them together.  After that we constructed the end frames which further secured the structure and will eventually support a sliding door.


With the structure now complete, the sand floor was covered with ground cloth and the sprinkler system assembled.  I opted not to bury the sprinkler pipe in case I decide to change the sprinkler type down the road.  When completed, this hoop house will be used to grow out seedlings and plants for my online store that opens in a few weeks. I also be using it for propagation.

Check out this cool bloom on a new Angel Trumpet seedling from cross involving Brugmansia Bergzauber x Color Point.

The long corolla teeth and soft orange color give the bloom an appearance of a flame.

I like the looks of this one and plan to carry it forward in my watch zone this year.  I've already incorporated it into my spring breeding program both as pod parent and a pollen parent.

A recent bloomer in my Angel Trumpet forest was this seedling from a cross made between Brugmansia Miss B Haven x Daydreams. 
The blooms are giant in size and the one pictured above was at least 10 inches across.  The one shown below was equally as wide with a length to match.

The plant is also on the larger size and this seedling easily reached 8 feet tall before blooming for the first time.  I plan to cross this one back to several other large flowered cultivars I have to see if I can create a few more monsters.  I would also like to see if I can get some color into the next generation of seedlings.

The blooms seem to be equally split between compact and separated corolla skirts.  Perhaps after a few more bloom cycles the plant will settle down and produce more consistent blooms.

When you make an Angel Trumpet cross with two classic ladies, you can usually count on some of the offspring being watchers. Here's one seedling from the cross I made between Brugmansia Painted Lady x New Orleans Lady that I feel is worth watching for a few more seasons.
Most pf the blooms on this seedling have had the bloom form pictured above.  Sometimes it will produce a bloom that strongly resembles its father, New Orleans Lady, as you can see below.

Although my sense of smell is not that great, I was able to pick-up a nice scent on this one.  I'm sure it was the influence of New Orleans Lady's genes.

I plan to wait until summer to decide if this one should be a keeper or not.

I'm a big fan of wild corolla teeth.  When I spot a new Angel Trumpet seedling with long and crazy teeth, it almost always ends up in my watch zone.  Here is one I've been watching for the past year.  It's corkscrew tipped corolla teeth continue to grab my attention.

This seedling is the outcome of an unknown cross with Brugmansia Rubirosa as the pod parent.  The long lasting blooms have remained snow white in all seasons, which is a plus. 

Often blooms on a new seedling will slowly change over the first few bloom cycles, but this seedling has kept its wild corkscrew tipped corolla teeth from the start.

To me this one is a keeper and is worthy of naming and registering.  I plan to chop it up for propagation next month and if the cuttings root well, it will earn itself a name.

One Angel Trumpet that has really been putting on a show this winter is Brugmansia 'Herbstzauber'.
This beautiful cultivar is just winding down from a mega-flush.  I bet I had over 100 blooms on my cluster of plants.  It was a challenge to capture a photo showing the giant flush because it was occurring at the same time we were finishing my shadehouse construction. All my large plants were bunched together closely to give us more working room.

Brugmansia 'Herbstzauber' is Monika Gottschalk hybrid and it grows extremely well here in Florida.
I must have pollinated at least 50 Hebstzauber blooms during this recent flush so now the waiting game begins to see how many crosses take.  I already have about 10-15 seed pods hanging on the plants from crosses I made this fall.  If I'm able to get another 10-15 to stick I'll be extremely pleased.

One of my goals with the crosses I made is to combine the beautiful blooms of Herbstzauber with cultivars that have more attractive foliage and more compact growth habits.  With all the crosses I made I'm sure you will see a more improved Herbstzauber style cultivae in the next year or two.

We were doing some cleaning in our office and I came across this vintage areal photograph of Sommer Gardens circa 1984.  This photo shows my retail garden center on US hwy 27 just north of Clermont.

Note the results of the devastating back to back record breaking freezes in the early eighties. Those freezes killed off thousands of acres of citrus in Central Florida, forever changing the landscape of Florida.

The building pictured is the old railroad depot that used to sit in downtown Clermont.  My parents bought it in the 1960's and had it moved to HWY 27 and turned it into a roadside citrus packing plant to sell oranges from our family citrus groves. 

I put my first triathlon on in Clermont back in 1984 and a few years (and freezes) later I was out of the nursery/landscape business and working full time in the fitness/triathlon business.

The rest is history...  :)

Brugmansia 'Angels Golden Showers' has finally bloomed for me and I'm excited to be able to start using it in my hybridizing program.
The color is actually darker than what is shown in these photos.  So far all the blooms have been triples, starting out with separated skirts.  As the blooms mature the corolla skirts re-curve back and the bloom becomes more compact.
When the bloom is fully mature, it has a strong resemblance to one of my Daydreams x Ludger's Windsong seedlings.  I'm anxious to cross the two back and forth to each other the next time they are both in bloom.

Now that this plant is growing in a more controlled environment in my shadehouse, I hope to be able to get some better pictures the next time it blooms.

This Angel Trumpet seedling has just earned a spot on my keeper list.  It is from a cross I made between Brugmansia Naughty Nick x Cleopatra.

The blooms sort of have a flying nun look to me that is sort of cool when the plant is loaded with blooms. 

The creamy white blooms are very thick textured and average 3-4 inches across. During cool weather they pick-up a slight apricot color as they age.

The plant growth has been vigorous, but not quite as crazy as its mother, Brugmansia Naughty Nick.  Right now the plant has topped off at just under 8 feet tall.  It is also just as comfortable growing in a pot as it is in the ground.  It is also a fairly frequent bloomer, even in the heat of summer.

I plan to use this one in my breeding program through spring and then after that start propagating it for a future release.  Watch for this beauty to be officially named and registered later this year.

Here's a final batch of photos of winter blooms from my hibiscus collection.  Hibiscus 'Orange Lagos' pictured below is one of the brightest oranges I have ever seen.
If you like your blooms more delicate, Hibiscus 'Cajun Princess' is a good choice.

It is easy to see how Hibiscus 'Flame Thrower' got its name.

Below is Hibiscus 'Improved Crimson Ray'.
Multicolor Hibiscus 'Gone Fishing' and its jumbo sized blooms make for one impressive plant.
And finally Hibiscus 'Sun-Charm' is a real charmer with its ruffled blooms.