I'd have to say it's the Charles Grimaldi.
Karyn

Yes, If I was doing that experiment with only 1, I'd say CG also.

If its cold-hardiness we're talking about, arborea has been the hardiest for me. I can put it outside 1-2 months earlier than Charles G.
Anything in the arborea group (Sphaerocarpium) such as arborea, sanguinea, vulcanicola, and hybrids like x flava will be much more cold hardy.
I'm sorry to say though that I really doubt anywhere in 6b will be able to consistently overwinter brugs without serious protection. Even if they were able to make it, they would probably be set back far enough not to bloom.
- Tom

I don't have any arboreas, but I have a couple CG's..maybe I will get the nerve to risk one..after I take cuttings of course, hopefully it will be big enough to take from.

Tom, I would definately give it protection..maybe a cage filled with leaves then wrapped like one would do for a banana here.

How much cold can the arboreas take?

I know the gerberas and brugs are completely totally dif plants, but the only protection I ever gave the gerberas in that spot was a light leaf blanket, if any at all.

O I hadnt thought of this till now..should I not plant it close to the house like that? Are their roots destructive?

Daniella

Daniella their roots are vigorous, but not really destructive in my experience. Against a brick wall with shade after 11:30 would probably be great, as long as they can take the heat in the hottest part of the summer, which could mean watering every day for short periods.
Your plan sounds good, make sure to put a top on the leaf bin so it stays drier, and do make sure it's an extra plant you could spare to loose. Woody trunks will probably do better than green.
Arboreas can take another 5 or 10 degrees colder than average brugs. You know those late spring frosts (~30 deg) that can cause all the leaves to go black on regular brugs? Arboreas laugh at those, ususally no damage at all. They suffer in summer heat though.
- Tom

Daniella if you are talking hardy as in being able to survive the winter inground in your zone forget it. It's not happening unless you have some weird zone 7b micro climate. I meant that the brug that can take the most abuse/neglect and still bloom and grow beautifully is a GC.
Karyn

I don't know about species or anything, but heres my story:

I have a frosty pink cutting that i grew into a nice three foot plant. I originally did not know anything about climate zones or anything, but like all houseplants here in Cal, i planted it outdoors when i got tired of it. It grew to five feet by the end of summer in the ground. Then it was killed down to a tiny stub during a freeze in Jan of 2007. The freeze lasted roughly a week and the low temperature were in the low 20s. As soon as temps began warming back up, it shot up to eight feet tall and 6 feet wide in only ONE season (Feb - Dec). This is a very BAD photo (it was taken with my phone), but is does a good job of showing the whole brugmansia plant. Believe it or not, this is the Frosty Pink 10 months after being frozen to the ground in the freeze.

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My 2 cents is that although the brug is killed to the ground, if its roots remain alive, it will grow to a decent size and flower before being hit by another freeze the following winter. You could probably treat it as a returning perennial if you protect its roots from freezing.

ok that does it I NEED a frosy pink.

Mary

Heres a better picture of the Frosty Pink in full bloom in November of 07, ten months after being frozen to a tiny stump in the ground.

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Josh that tree is gorgeous as is the rest of your garden. Those bright red dahlias just jump out at you. I'd expect a brug to return from the roots even if you had a freeze in your zone but not in NJ. The ground becomes frozen solid most years quite a ways down. It's usually fairly moist as well which just adds to the cold problem. I'm a zone warmer and even in well protected areas can't winter a brug over outside. There's some folks around here that don't have a problem but I think they have a micro-climate that allows the brugs roots to remain alive.
Karyn

Very nice plant Josh!
But I have to agree with Karyn that there are so many other factors, a freeze is not a freeze. :)
Huuuge difference between Z9 Cali & Z6b-7 NJ.
- Tom

Beautiful Josh!! I can't wait to get blooms!!! Yes, those dahlias are so pretty too.

Thank you Tom. OK I neeed some arboreas!! Lotsa watering isn't a problem for me.

Yes I agree, very big dif between the two zones. Jersey's freezes are way worse than zone 9's.

But, on the other hand..This winter I had a leaf mulch cover of 6" on some of my beds. The ground under those blankets never froze. Even when everywhere else in the yard was frozen for long periods at a time. I was amazed at what that leaf cover did. In January I was putting up fencing to keep the puppy out of my beds. I was having a hard time getting the posts in on the outside perimeters, ground was just too frozen, so I tried the inside where the leaves were, pushed em over a lil, and those fence posts went in with no effort at all. The ground wasn't frozen at all, meanwhile there was ice everywhere else, including on top of the leaf blankets. And that's with just 6" of leaves. So if I treat the brug like a nana and protect it well, and keep it dry..? I'm gonna try it. If I get any arboreas, I will use one of those, otherwise I'm gonna try a CG.
I'll cut it down to the ground before first frost, or should I not? root the rest of it indoors, Give it some really good protection, and we'll see what happens.

Karyn, There was a guy who posted in an old post from '06 that was brought up again the other day..said he was in Jersey and had successfully done it..I emailed but he hasn't gotten back to me.

Wish me luck. I can't stand losing plants, but I love to experiment.

Karyn, I really think I can do it, like I said I have had the gerberas return in that spot for a few years. As well as others that are supposedly zones 9-11 only. If those plants' roots can remain alive there, I think I can do it. I hope, lol.

Thanks Tom, Karyn, Josh
Daniella

daniellalell, let me throw this at ya! We have grown FP in the ground for 3 years in our open are, with it coming back each year smaller and blooming later. So do you honestly want to leave them out? Sangs and Arboreas didn't not come back after the first year. Granted they can take the cooler weather but not in the ground above zone 8? I have learned that some of the tissue culture plants will take colder weather, that is why we are seeing
D. Missouri Marble return and the test plant we have from
TNN is loving the cooler temps in the brug house. Matter of fact the cuttings we took bloomed all winter to our surprise. Do you honestly want to put it in the ground if you know it won't come back?

Karma, I am willing to experiment on just one as long as I have taken cuttings from it to ensure I will still have something. I don't know for a fact it won't come back, that's the whole point of testing it out. With proper mulching and protection, it may come back. Maybe smaller, maybe scraggly and crappy lookin..maybe not. Maybe..Maybe not. That's the whole point of an experiment isn't it.
You did it and learned in your area, it didn't work well. Now I will do it, and see what happens. I have a lil hope after that other poster in NJ said he was successful with it. For all I know he may have been full of crap, but I don't know. Like I said, I am willing to risk losing that one as long as I have the cuttings from it first.

When you had yours in the ground how did you protect them over the winter?

Daniella

Daniella, ours was also a 4 year old plant. If I would sink one in the ground I won't sink a youngster but a fully developed one. We mulched with straw with a tomatoe cage upside down, covered in plastic and them a rainbarrel over it. We do this also for our palm that is in the center bed out back. The FP's trunk didn't come back but new shoots appeared in July, it was a smaller plant and just barely had time for one flush before it was time to cover again. The old zone of 7 was what we were at that time now we are 8. Hope this helps? Location has a big deal on this also. In a protective area there should be no problem, but ours was in the middle of the raised bed in the front yard.

Daniella it's certainly worth a try if you have extras. Besides the cold the biggest cause of root rot is moist soil. Even if it doesn't freeze cool & damp = rot. That's the big problem I have here. We have horrible soil, almost solid red clay and it stays wet. If you have better soil (which I think everyone else on the planet does! lol) it might work. I tried it with a few varieties that I didn't care if I lost. You'll have to keep us posted on how they do. Good luck.
Karyn

Thanks Karma & Karyn. The soil in that area dries rather quickly, so I am thinking that if I make sure and wait till the soil is dry before I cover it, I think it should be OK?
This is the where I plan on putting it. This pic was taken May of '06. Chose this pic since it wasn't filled in yet, and you could see the area better. This is under my kitchen window, and under a window in one of the bathrooms as well, so to have a fragrant brug there would be perfect.

{{gwi:469931}}

See how dry that soil gets? I can't remember if I amended it last year, but at the time of the photo I know it didn't have anything extra in it. At the same time though, the hose spicket is at the corner of that corner, and drips into there every time we use the hose. PIA but, the plants in that spot love it. The gerberas love that spot, and have multiplied well there, but the original plants keep coming back as well. And in the washtub are osteospermums coming up. That was their 2nd year there. I was completely shocked to see them coming back after spending the winter in that washtub with just a leaf covering.
I do plan on extending that corner out a bit before I put a brug there. And the washtub will pobably have to go to another spot.
Will def let you all know what happens.
Thanks,
Daniella

Daniella, looks like a well protected spot and appears dry, so go for it!

I say go for it. If you never try how will you succeed? Just keep a backup or 2.

O thank you for the go-ahead..I was gonna do it anyway, lol. But now I feel much better about it. Will give you updates of course!
SJN, exactly!! :)
I will def have an extra just in case. I wouldn't do it with one I didn't have a back-up for.
Daniella

Daniella, keep us posted on it. Really you never know until you try something. Speaking of experiements, remember when we were talking about watering brugs with colored water and I think it was Bonnie that was saying she cut daffodils and put food coloring in the water. I tried this a couple of weeks ago and they didn't turn...I did it with red food coloring and used maybe 20 drops or so in a small vase with 6 or 7 flowers. Anybody know if you've got to use a lot more food coloring for this? I want to try it again while the daffs are blooming.

You can color a stalk of celery with food coloring in water but you really can't do flowers. It's a special absorption dye made specifically for the floral industry. They have an injection method where they can actually dye each petal of the flower a different color.
Karyn

I know that carnations absorb food dye. We did this in elementary school. We took white carnations, split the stem down the middle, placed half the stem in a blue-dyed glass of water, and the other in a red-dyed glass of water. The carnation turned the respective colors in no time - both colors on the same flower.

josh

Josh is right, from what I read about dying the cut flowers, you have to slit the stem..maybe about an inch or two, if memory serves.

Sorry it didn't work out for ya Michelle. I'm still a lil bummed my experiment with that didn't work out. Death isn't a good way to end an experiment, lol. Poor lil dats.
Try slitting them next time, and let us know what happens!

Karyn..do you have access to that special dye? You could really have some fun with flowers! lol, I'd be injecting everything I could get my hands on! I'm so curious how the nat color and the art color would react..would they mix?

Michelle, are your daffs yellow? I don't have a big enuf collection of daffs yet to cut any..So, you have to let me know if it turns red or orangey, please. I am SO curious about this. My daffs aren't blooming yet. I keep expecting them to anyday, but they just keep slowly getting taller, lol. I think they know they are being watched, and they're toying with me.
Daniella

DH buys them already colored. I could probably get some but don't want to dye flowers. lol Besides that I have no idea what the process is. The flowers that they use this stuff on become a very intense color, almost like they'd been dipped in a tub of dye.
Karyn

Daniella, the daffs I tried were white. Not even a hint of the red color after 2 days. Probably wasn't using enough dye. I will slit the stems this time and see what happens... Will post pics if they do anything.

Cool Michelle!

Karyn, you never look at a flower and think, wouldn't that be even prettier if it were..whatever color..?

I just have too much fun tinkering, always curious.

Daniella

I dislike the dyed flowers. The colors that are used are so unatural looking. You should see some of the dyed blooms that DH carries, carnations, sunflowers and mums are the varieties I can think of that are dyed and I'm sure there's others. I like my flowers just the way they are.
Karyn

I agree some can be ridiculous, lol. But some flowers that aren't naturally a baby blue for example, would be beautiful. Can you imagine a baby blue brug? I think it would be to die for. Now a cobalt blue brug on the other hand I think would just be hideous, lol.
Daniella

Check this out Daniella
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All of the lacy looking red around the edges is from the dye. The little yellow miniature daffs took up a little but you can't see it in the pic.

Yep, I would say CG and Frosty Pink. I had a Supernova and Creamsickle that didn't survive the hot sun in so. Miss, but it may have been first year caregiver's messups.

Jim

WF the white daffs look really pretty and very natural. If you hadn't said that was dye I'd never have known.
Karyn

oooohhh Michelle, so pretty! Thank you for posting. Was that with the slit or no? It does look very natural. Good job! Thank you for posting the pic!!

Jim ,thank you for your input!
Daniella

Daniella, I did slit them at least 2", probably more. I think that was the trick. They've taken up more red today and the center cups (I'm not a daff expert so whatever they're called!) have turned more of a pinky-color and the red edges are a lot bolder. Karyn, this is really not what I expected them to do but I like the look!! :) I cut flowers a lot just to have a few in the house and I'll do this with the dye again and some different flowers just to see what happens. The red water in the vase alone is really pretty. Will have to try for that baby blue brug as soon as I've got a white blooming. On 2nd thought - Daniella, you do the baby blue and I'm shooting for a purple!

OK Michelle, if I get a bloom! I just got my first cuttings starting in November, so I don't know if I will have any blooming this year? Hopefully!!
Some of my cuttings have already had the sub-equal leaves, so cross your fingers for me!
I will def try with some dats though.
Then again, you'll probably get brug blooms before me, so you may as well do the baby blue as well as the purple.
Did you know they sell food coloring now in pastel colors & neon!! I'll still give it a go when and if I get blooms.
pix pix pix!! :)

Daniella