Toronto spring garden cleanups for the 2014 growing season!

Toronto has gone through a really rough winter and your garden beds are showing it! A spring garden cleanup is in order to get your garden off to a great 2014!

I'll help with your gardening needs by:

• removing leaves and debris from your garden beds left over from last fall

• pruning away the dead stalks and leaves from old perennials

• gently turning over and cultivate the soil in your garden beds, adding new compost or topsoil as necessary to rejuvenate the soil without chemical fertilizers

• removing any annuals from last year

• pruning shrubs and small trees for diseased, dead or crossing branches

• edge, with a spade, your garden beds to create a crisp and tidy look

Call me at 416-515-2780 or email me  info@pauljunggardening.com to set up an appointment soon as my calendar becomes quickly filled!

Centennial Park Conservatory 's Tropical House

Warmth, colour and high humidity in late winter?

My last post titled "Centennial Park Conservatory 2014 Spring Flower Show: Colour riot in Etobicoke!" showed many gaudy blooms, for this time of the year, in this west-end Toronto public greenhouse. Toronto experienced this past week a thaw (over zero Celsius/ 32 F for a couple of days anyway) and with the melting snow and runoff, all the debris and garbage previously buried now emerges. It's actually quite disgusting to see and dodge around the countless cigarette butts, coffee cups and piles of dog excrement: out of sight, out of mind.

Or better yet, take a look at these pictures and imagine being in a warm, quiet and tranquil place.

Centennial Park Conservatory
 tropical house amaryllis 

This Conservatory has three separate buildings open to the public: the entrance leads you into the main "tropical house" and from there you can go into the "cooler" section that displays the seasonal flower shows and another section that displays desert plantings like cacti and succulents. Something for everyone and with the total area being around 12,000 square feet (sorry, no metric here!), you needn't spend the entire day.

Here are some highlights of my visit to the tropical section. With the sound of the waterfall, the automatic misting system and resident parrots, it's not that hard to suspend your disbelief and imagine you're in warmer climates--until you step outside and face the dreary weather.

Anyway, enough whining, spring supposedly is around the corner so just enjoy!

Centennial Park Conservatory
tropical house path

Centennial Park Conservatory
path tropical house

Centennial Park Conservatory
tropical house bed 

Centennial Park Conservatory
tropical house 

Centennial Park Conservatory
tropical house amaryllis bed 

Centennial Park Conservatory
tropical house white amaryllis

Centennial Park Conservatory
tropical house amaryllis bed 

Centennial Park Conservatory
tropical house waterfall

Centennial Park Conservatory
tropical waterfall 

Centennial Park Conservatory
moth orchid  tropical house 

Centennial Park Conservatory
 tropical house Phalaenopsis orchid  

Centennial Park Conservatory
 pink moth orchid 

Tropical yellow orange impatiens
 at Centennial Park Conservatory 

Variegated tropical hibiscus "Snow Queen"
at Centennial Park Conservatory 

Centennial Park Conservatory
tropical house's statute 

Centennial Park Conservatory 2014 Spring Flower Show

Colour riot in Etobicoke!

Are you sick of the snow yet? Can't afford to fly south this year (like me)? Well, I'm doing my bit with my version of colour therapy. My last post showed some life-affirming green pictures from Allan Gardens Conservatory's Spring Flower Show but I would be negligent for not mentioning that there's a "sister Conservatory" (my words) out in Toronto's west end that displays similar seasonal flower shows and permanent tropical and desert plantings. The Centennial Park Conservatory offers a wonderful respite in winter as well for west-enders.


Today's post will cover the spring bulbs and arrangements in CPC's north wing. (It's a separate area dedicated to the seasonal flower shows.) You wouldn't know about the Arctic blasts going on outside the glass panes: trust me, it was a trek getting there from downtown Toronto but well worth it.

Design-wise, nothing too elaborate. Just effective use of massing cyclamen, daffodils and kalanchoes.

Enjoy!

Centennial Park Conservatory Spring Flower
Show 2014 cyclamen kalanchoe 

Centennial Park Conservatory Spring Flower
Show 2014 cyclamen kalanchoe 

Centennial Park Conservatory Spring Flower
Show 2014 cyclamen kalanchoes 

Centennial Park Conservatory Spring Flower
 Show 2014 cyclamens kalanchoes 

Centennial Park Conservatory Spring Flower
 Show 2014 daffodil cyclamen

Centennial Park Conservatory Spring Flower
Show 2014 daffodil cyclamen 

Centennial Park Conservatory Spring Flower
 Show 2014 white cyclamen kalanchoe

Centennial Park Conservatory Spring Flower
 Show 2014 white kalanchoes daffodils 

Centennial Park Conservatory Spring Flower
Show 2014 yellow daffodils

 Clivia miniata Centennial Park 
Conservatory Spring Flower
Show 2014 

Centennial Park Conservatory Spring Flower
Show 2014 cherub statue

Dutch Iris (Iris x hollandica)
Centennial Park Conservatory Spring Flower
Show 2014 

Centennial Park Conservatory Spring Flower
 Show 2014 "Pink Charm" daffodils

Allan Gardens Conservatory Spring Flower Show 2014

Toronto gets blooming early!

And I'm not referring to Canada Blooms, the national (some consider) flower show, held next month. Tucked between New Year's Day and "Blooms", as the locals call it, the downtown Conservatory puts on its yearly Spring Flower Show with much less fanfare. Sorry, no opening night galas or celebrity speakers. But if you're in the mood for a quick hit of colour, warmth and tranquility, Allan Gardens Conservatory is for you. It's very accessible by public transit and admission is free as well.

I live close by and spent a quiet hour or so taking these pictures, among others.  If you're stuck in the middle of a harsh winter like I am and would like to see "purty flowers" instead of dead browny bits of 2013's vegetation (aka "winter interest"), here you go:

Allan Gardens Conservatory Spring Flower Show 2014 yellow daffodils.
Signs of things to come, you have to trust me on this one!

(Just a note: the following pictures are "cyclamen and daffodil" heavy. I imagine tulips, paperwhites, squill, grape hyacinths, etc.,  will be planted later as the show progresses. I'll post more pictures later. For now, enjoy the following:)

Allan Gardens Conservatory 2014 Spring Flower Show cyclamen 

Allan Gardens Conservatory 2014 Spring Flower Show
cyclamen and dusty miller 

Allan Gardens Conservatory 2014 Spring Flower Show
cyclamen massed 

Allan Gardens Conservatory 2014 Spring Flower Show
cyclamen  persicum "stirling"

Allan Gardens Conservatory 2014 Spring Flower Show
  cyclamen persicum 

Allan Gardens Conservatory 2014 Spring Flower Show
 cyclamens 

Allan Gardens Conservatory 2014 Spring Flower Show
 pink cyclamen 

Allan Gardens Conservatory 2014 Spring Flower Show
pink "Stirling" cyclamen

Allan Gardens Conservatory 2014 Spring Flower Show
white cyclamen persicum

Cyclamen persicum "En Vogue Purple"
Allan Gardens Conservatory 2014 Spring Flower Show

Allan Gardens Conservatory 2014 Spring Flower Show
yellow daffodils 

Allan Gardens Conservatory Spring Flower Show 2014 daffodils 

Allan Gardens Conservatory
Spring Flower Show 2014
Helleborus niger "Jacob"

Allan Gardens Conservatory 
Spring Flower Show 2014
 "Jacob" Christmas Rose

Helleborus niger "Jacob" at
Allan Gardens Conservatory 
Spring Flower Show 2014 

These orchids are not part of the Spring show, per se, but they're beautiful nonetheless. (If you happen to know the genus and species, let me know and I'll update.)

Phalaenopsis white moth orchid 
Allan Gardens Conservatory 
2014 Spring Flower Show 

Phalaenopsis pink moth orchid 
Allan Gardens Conservatory 
2014 Spring Flower Show 

Cattleya labiata semi-alba 
Allan Gardens Conservatory 
2014 Spring Flower Show 

White moth orchid (Phalaenopsis) 
Allan Gardens Conservatory 
2014 Spring Flower Show

Allan Gardens Conservatory 
2014 Spring Flower Show
"Vectis Glitter" pelargonium 

When you hear "geranium" you may think of the annuals sold by the flats every Mother's Day weekend at your local garden centre. They're more accurately named Pelargonium instead of (perennial) Geranium. I had to google to determine this type of tender zonal geranium. The pink and red flecks and venation is very cool. The cultivar is called "Vectis Glitter" and the full botanical name for those plant geeks out there is Pelargonium x hortorum "Vectis Glitter".

Do me a favour: don't plant these encircling a dracaena spike in your container.

"Vectis glitter" pelargonium 
or zonal geranium at
Allan Gardens Conservatory 
2014 Spring Flower Show