As V-Day blooms, a guide to cut flowers
Gardening expert P. Allen Smith suggests alternatives to red roses
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Keep love in bloom with flowers Feb. 8: Not sure what to get your partner for Valentine’s Day? Gardening expert P. Allen Smith reveals great gifts that might be in your own backyard. Today Show Home |
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My favorite gift to give on Valentine’s Day is flowers. I like the idea of a hint of spring arriving at a loved one’s door just when it seems that winter will never pass. It’s a wonderful reminder that sunshine and blue skies are on their way!
Whether your sweetheart has a brown thumb or loves to get their hands in the soil, you can’t go wrong with flowers. Although red roses are the classic Valentine’s Day flower, there are so many choices available. So get creative!
Basketful of bouquets
Flowers are a wonderful way to say “I love you.” To make the statement even more personal, why not put together the arrangement yourself? Here’s a simple gift idea I featured in Woman’s Day that I still use: a whole basketful of blooms. The beauty of this present is that the vases can be removed from the basket and put wherever the recipient wants fresh flowers.
Gather enough juice glasses or small vases (2 to 3 inches high) to fit snugly into a basket.
Head out to your local florist and choose your combination of flowers. Or try my selections of 10 stems each of white and pink mini carnations, pink and red sweetheart roses, red tulips and pink ranunculus.
Make each bouquet by gathering a bunch of the same flowers in one hand just below the blossoms and then trimming the stems to 4 inches. Wrap a rubber band around the stems to hold them securely together, then push the band up the stems just beneath the base of the flowers.
Drop the bundle into a water-filled vase. Trim more from the stems if necessary. Repeat this process for each vase. Add a ribbon gift card and you’re ready to deliver your one-of-a-kind gift.
Flowering houseplants, hothouse shrubs and forced bulbs
I feel safe in saying that by February most of us are tired of winter. Even with the daring blooms of early daffodils, winter honeysuckle and quince, it can be a pretty dismal month. I suppose that’s why flowers are such a nice gift on Valentine’s Day. If your special someone has a green thumb, consider giving them a flowering houseplant, hothouse shrub or forced spring bulbs. The blooms will last for weeks and with proper care, the houseplants will bloom again and the shrubs can be planted out in the garden. Here are a few to consider: African violets, primroses, orchids, cyclamen, bromeliads, miniature roses, peace lily, gardenia, azalea, hydrangea, lily of the valley, paperwhites, amaryllis, hyacinths, tulips, mixed bulb gardens, muscari.
Rosebushes
Give the special gardener in your life more than just a single bouquet: A rosebush will provide fresh flowers year after year. And now is the time to order roses. Just be sure to be around when it comes time to plant! Here are some of my favorites: new dawn, collette, old blush, russell’s cottage, sarah van fleet, lamarque, the fairy and white meidiland.
Rex Perry’s tips on how to make cut flowers last longer:
An aspirin in vase water does nothing to extend the life of cut flowers. Now that we’ve debunked this flower arranging myth, do any of the other folktales for keeping flowers looking fresh actually work?
First-cut fables
The first step to fresh-looking flowers is stripping all leaves from stems that will be below the water line. Submerged foliage encourages bacteria growth in the container water. Remove at least 1 inch from the bottom of any flower stems that have been exposed to air. Legends abound as to the best way to cut, slice, or crush stems before placing them in water. Cutting stems at a 45-degree angle really does help most flowers absorb water. Some woody-stemmed flowers benefit from slicing their stems, but you can’t go wrong with a diagonal cut. Use garden shears or a sharp knife to cut stems. Common household scissors can crush the vascular systems of the flower stem, inhibiting water uptake. As soon as you make the cut, plunge flowers into a vase or container filled with lukewarm water.
More winter gardening ideas |
Vase water demystified
Aspirin, vitamin pills, vinegar and pennies are just a few of the more common folklore additives used unsuccessfully to preserve flowers. What works are ingredients that prohibit bacteria, feed the flower and encourage water uptake. Commercial flower preservatives contain a blend of these ingredients that can extend the life of cut blooms by days. The Brooklyn Botanical Garden recommends a homemade mixture that works as well as the commercial variety. Mix 1 teaspoon sugar, 1 teaspoon bleach and 2 tablespoons lemon or lime juice in a quart of warm water. Warm water is important because it’s more easily absorbed. However, cold-weather blooms, such as tulips, thrive in cold vase water.
Keep petals at their peak
All living things wilt a bit with age, but there are steps for maintaining cut flowers in their prime.
- Keep fresh flower arrangements away from heat, direct sunlight and ripening fruit.
- Check the water level in the vase every day.
- Recut the stems of limp blooms and discard any that do not recover.
P. Allen Smith is the CEO of Hortus Ltd., a media production company responsible for two nationally syndicated half-hour television programs, numerous magazine columns, a popular Web site, a best-selling series of garden-design-lifestyle books, lecture series and news reports that air on stations around the country as well as on The Weather Channel. He is also the principle in P. Allen Smith and Associates, a landscape design firm.
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