Lilacs with a Rant
Why do I love my Lilacs so. Let me count the ways.
1, 2, 3 those were all free.
I have to love 4 because it cost me 45 bucks when it was only a tiny sprig.
I’m ready to rant but first how about a pleasant little something. The show is about to begin. The Lilac’s flower buds are just beginning to open but they make a good warm up act.
Here’s my white.
A common Lilac seen all over the area.
Now the normal lavender lilac that’s all too common but never unappreciated.
Get ready – this is my favorite.
A deep dark purple bloomer that is not often seen outside the Town of Canton but I’m working on that. My favorite is easy to share, it produces suckers like no other and it’s blooms are the deepest purple around. It blooms just a bit later than the more common types around but I think you’d agree it’s worth holding your breath for.
This was already planted at our first house when we bought it about 30 years ago. Even then it was a very large shrub (15 feet high and the clump had a diameter of 20 feet or so) – from experience with it I’d guess at that time it must have been at least 15 years old. For a long time I believe I was the only one to have anything like it. But since then I’ve been the Johnnie Lilac Sucker and have planted them in countless other places. I can’t help but to spread this one around.
Before I go into my rant – here’s what inspired it.
I’d give it a little slack and say the buds have a yellow tinge but the white one’s buds are just as yellow. There’s no way can you say the flower is yellow. White is white unless you put on yellow sunglasses or jab a stick of butter in your eyes.
I don’t have to love the mail order nursery that sold it to me 14 years ago. Yea, that’s right. That long ago and it cost $45 for a twig. It was supposed to be ‘Special’ and a yellow lilac would have been a thing of wonder. The pic in the catalog was yellow, the description went on and on about how special it was and the price made me believe it was yellow. But reality set in with the first blooms that only turned out to be white. Since that first bloom opened I haven’t bought another thing from White Flower Farm. It’s not nice to fool your customers.
I’m sure everyone has had a similar experience. The catalog or plant tag says one color and the plant turns out to be another. The worst are those that say ‘BLUE’ – what they really mean is ‘if you gouge out your eyes with a spoon this shade of purple may look blue’. Same for red being orange, orange being yellow and on and on it goes.
Misleading tags are one thing and I guess to be expected with all the hype that goes into marketing. But what will make you pull your hair out through your nose are the customers at nurseries that just have to pull out a tag and then place it in a different pot or flat. That pretty yellow columbine you though you bought is purple, the red bee balm is white, the white astilbe is pink and on and on we go again. Vegetables are extremely frustrating when you buy a tray of one type of tomato and end up with another or that pumpkin turns into a squash and lets not even get into the peppers. Mix and match takes on a whole new meaning when thoughtless people browse at the garden center. And I’m being kind when I call those morons thoughtless.
