Precipitation and Participation

My New Violas From Tomás

Firstly I want to say thank you to a lovely plantsman who sent me ten shiningly healthy violas in exchange for five of mine, a most generous trade, I'm sure you'll agree.  Trading plants is another joy of gardening, and imagine my delight on opening the carefully packed plants to discover Viola 'Molly Sanderson', which I told you I lost two years ago, nestling amid violas I have never seen, nor in some cases even heard of, before.  How I look forward to seeing them flourish and flower !  Tomás, believe me they are truly much appreciated.

The rain today is that falling straight-down, no-nonsense kind of deluge.  The only way to see my violas is by pressing my nose to the foggy kitchen windows, but I know the plants are probably loving the unexpected precipitation, especially since the temperatures are still around 18 degrees celsius.

Viola 'Columbine' blooming away

Viola 'Etain' October Blooms

The cuttings I took during the last week or so are still perky and greener than green.  I didn't come across one seedhead yesterday as I pottered around the tubs.  It looks almost as if  the bees and hoverflies are taking 'industrial action' (which strangely means the very opposite of how it sounds).  or perhaps it is holiday time for pollinators - I'm sure they can take holidays too, like the rest of us.  There are usually bees (mainly the bumble ones) busy in the garden right through December, so they have hardly gone into hibernation.  Maybe they will all be back with the sun.  There are still many violas in bloom, in some tubs just one or two, while in the case of violas 'Etain' and 'Columbine' the plants are still covered in blossom.  Interestingly, in the case of the latter, there has been a change, in that the deadheads which used to be so hard to remove now just snap off at the base of the flower stem - perhaps there is some kind of seasonal cause for this new behaviour.  I know other growers would fervently urge me to trim all the flowers and foliage off, in the interest of the production of cuttings, and perhaps to give the plants a rest from spending their energies in flowering, but I tend to go with nature in this, and will not be cropping back my plants yet.  Those two violas have been in bloom steadily since early April and are looking very upbeat about it.

Car Boot Sale Viola Book

Here are two more viola books, one by Roy Genders, who has written umpteen books on different garden plants, some on gardening generally, many on specialist plants.  I can't remember where I read the interesting comment that this prolific writer plagiarised his own books constantly in his production of endless garden works, but I have always enjoyed everything he wrote and learned a lot from his books.  The second volume is one I found at a car boot sale, casually thrown into a box of mixed items.  Naturally enough I was instantly attracted by the cover illustration.  It is a small work of some thirty-two pages only, full of common sense.  The illustrations inside are copies of pencil drawings, but very helpful in their clarity.  Look at the cost of this little book !  I paid fifty cents for it,  I will allow someone of more mathematical ability to decide how much its value has inflated or otherwise since its publication.  There is no date on it but I am guessing it is a good few decades old.

Recommended Viola Book

To go back to Roy Gender's book, which is full of good stuff, in his list of viola species he mentions how the species Viola gracilis is very much involved in the ancestry of the garden viola.  The editor of the other book, T.W. Sanders, who I see from the cover was a one-time editor of Amateur Gardening , gets to the question of "what constitutes the difference between a Pansy and a Viola.  Well, first of all, both are Pansies and both Violas; they are merely distinct types of the same genus and species."  Now no-one could dispute that the viola known as 'viola' has a lot of Viola tricolor in its blood, but the horn at the back of its flowers loudly proclaims the importance of its Viola cornuta ancestry.  Other writers stress the participation of Viola lutea in the viola's origins.  It would be wonderful if there were an apt, catchy name for the so-called viola, to halt all the confusion. 

Near the top of this blog, on the right, are  two links.  The top one is to the Viola Tub Forum, and if there is anything anyone would like to say about violas, please feel free to go on and post.  This little forum is literally in its infancy, and if people have anything they would like to say there,  posts would be really welcome.  You can start your own threads, it's not necessary to keep to what I have blogged here.  Eventually we might be able to use the forum to set up viola exchanges, even.  You can write about violas, pansies, viola species, seed sowing, cuttings, varieties, anything, it's your forum.

Viola 'Orange Sorbet' yesterday

The second link is to the website of the National Viola and Pansy Society of Great Britain.  It's a fascinating website, and you never know, you might even be tempted to become a member.  Graham, who runs it, is a goldmine of viola information and enthusiasm.  I have not the competitive urge myself, but I know some people would really enjoy growing and showing plants if they got into it, and for this reason alone the society would welcome you with open arms.  If, like me, you just want to grow violas for the sheer interest and love of them, you will still find a lot to inspire you in the NVPS, which is almost one hundred years old now.

I don't know if it's raining where you are, but we have had more than enough now, thank you. Maybe when I write again the sun will be shining down on us and our violas.

Viola 'Aspasia' enjoys the October sun. The sticks are to deter a determined cat

Cooler Days

Even though I have not been out deadheading so much lately, there are very few seedheads,  the pollinators having obviously been deterred by the suddenly cooler weather.  Today I sat in the kitchen with the Stanley cooker glowing and burping gently beside me, and sorted through my saved viola seeds.  How amazing to consider that each tiny hard seed is a potential viola of goodness knows what colour or habit, that will raise its leaves and flowers to bask in next summer's sun.  I look at my seed trays and ponder whether to sow some now, or wait until spring.  I have read that the saved seed has a short shelf life.  Yet all 2011's seeds overwintered in the kitchen in a sealed jar, and very many germinated when sown in the spring of 2012.  I saved none in 2012, as the crop was very sparse, on account of the tubs along with the whole garden undergoing the upheaval of a total makeover which is not completed yet.

In the white sink - Viola 'Molly Sanderson'

I saw some seeds of a black viola called 'Sawyer's Black' on Ebay, and couldn't resist them.  They arrived last week and, if their picture is anything to go by, they should be lovely.  What seed strain they are from I cannot tell despite hunting all over the web for the information.  I really look forward to seeing if they are anything like Viola 'Molly Sanderson', a low-foliaged totally black viola which I lost two years ago in the unusually cold winter and have not got around to buying again yet.

The thing about having a special plant in your life is that even if the weather is very bad and you can't get outside comfortably, there is so much to read about, to study.  The year that rolls on for me is a viola year indoors and out.  Even general garden writers have words to say in passing about the viola, and herbals also talk about them, since they are edible and have many therapeutic uses which older gardeners knew about.  You never know what you will find said about them. 

Here are two books by the late Rodney Fuller.  The larger one is packed full of information and advice on the care and cultivation of pansies, violas and violettas, including their history and how they differ from one another; there are lists of all the known species, but better still of all extant varieties and cultivars with a succinct description of each one.  The centre of the book has pages and pages of colour photos of many of these plants which is a great help particularly to a beginner.

The smaller book is a little work of art; it describes a mere thirty varieties of garden violas and violettas, and there are entrancing illustrations by the artist Elizabeth Dowle.  This little book would easily fit in your pocket or handbook, to dream over on the bus or train or while in a queue at the doctor's.  Both books are readily available on Amazon and no doubt on many other bookselling sites, and are a delight for anyone into violas.

I suppose some people might be wondering by now about the difference between the viola and the violetta.  Basically it is a question of origin, both having been hybridised in the 1800s by different growers, and although they are said to be different in appearance, personally I find no difference except that which exists between viola varieties in general. The violetta is reputed to be smaller, with the flowers always scented and having absolutely no rays or whiskers on their faces.  However, that description also fits many violas, and I am sure that they interbreed, so the giving of separate names to them is a little of a puzzle.  Violettas 'Rebecca' and 'Zoe' are very unalike to me, for instance, and both much more resemble other viola cultivars than each other.  Perhaps in time it will become clearer.  I really think of them all as violas, to be honest.

Autumn Dreams

Garden Seedling, now lost

I was taking cuttings of several of the violas today, and when lifting the foliage of some, I found lovely healthy little seedlings had sprung up underneath; obviously the seeds don't need a great deal of light to germinate.


A Semi-Double Seedling

This is part of the joy of growing violas - taking cuttings, collecting seed, and dreaming of next spring when these new plants will be appearing.  In the case of the seedlings, there is all the anticipation of seeing the first flowers, and deciding what violas may have parented them.  I am not very organised yet when I collect the seed heads, I don't write down what tub they were growing in or the name of their mother plant.  This is because I am in this for the fun, not for the sole purpose of hybridising.

Black and Purple Seedling

I haven't cut back any of my plants yet, as I am truly reluctant to part with all those glowing flowers, not to mention to thwart the efforts of all the little flies and bees who are visiting them.  Today is a beautiful summer's day in autumn - sunshine, blue skies, temperatures over 20° celsius.



Seedling with flowers of a lovely colour, now tiny

I am posting pictures of four seedlings I had from the last two years.  At least two, the very dark ones, probably had as their parent Molly Sanderson, who then fled with the harsh winter of 2011; I think that viola may not be very hardy, and this impression is furthered by the fact that both these seedlings survived only a year.  I named none of them, as I think it is better to wait and see how the plants will turn out, how sturdy they are, how floriferous and so forth, before endowing them with any title.  The wisdom of this is borne out by the fact that the semi-double viola produced all single flowers in its second year, two seedlings as I said did not survive, and the last of the four, although still here, and as colourful, has produced only very small flowers through the whole summer, after showing in springtime the lovely medium-sized ones it first appeared with two years ago, and which it bore all last year quite effortlessly.