Saxifraga 2014

[Michael J Campbell]

Saxifraga longifolia, thinking about flowering.

[Mike Ireland]

Hope your not feeling too lonely David.
Will these Saxifraga help?
Like Michael most labels are now under the cushions.
Trough includes :-
Sax Tenerife
Sax Pablo Picasso
Sax kotschyi x wendelboi & Allendale Goblin

[David Nicholson]

That's great Mike. It's always good to see how others grow them and an important use of the Forum for participants to pick up tips.

Do you cover them at all to protect them from wet or just leave them to get on with it?

[Mike Ireland]

David, they are just left to their own devices.

[Maggi Young]

I know there are some  saxifraga species that very difficult to grow and which are grown under glass and make fine show plants when they are grown well- but the joy of these plants to me is the 
species and the sheer number of hybrids that are both available and easy to grow.  The pleasure to be had all year from the likes of a trough of saxes, as shown by Mike, above, is tremendous. Great little cushions of differing foliage then the  fun of the flowers in just about any colour you fancy - and all able to manage pretty well by themselves in the garden, on a terrace, a balcony, a doorstep -  what more could  be asked of a little plant? 

[Matt T]

...also easy to propagate, wind resistant, cheap to acquire...the list of merits goes on! I only have 'Your Song' in a mixed alpine trough at the mo, but will soon be looking to pick up a few for a new Sax-only trough.

[ChrisB]

Mike the troughs look wonderful.  I think I'm going to do one too but before I start want to get a bag of limestone chunks.  We only have sandstone hereabouts and the saxifrages definitely do better with some limestone around them.  I may just take the BDs advice and use concrete chunks if I can't find the limestone I want.  Was thinking too that it might be better to exhibit them amidst limestone. My Prince Hal has it's roots tucked under our paving slabs and I think that's why it has survived here all these years.  We came in 1995 so I think it's settled in nicely to stay alive so long without any dead spots appearing in its middle.  Here it is in full bloom today

[Tim Ingram]

Really wonderful sax. troughs! This has tempted me to pull Malcolm McGregor's tour de force of the genus off my shelves and again to see how beautifully written and informative books can be. Did anyone see that extraordinary picture of Saxifraga florulenta that Cliff directed people to on the AGS website? Isn't alpine gardening extraordinary.

[Maggi Young]

Did you mean Cliff's link to this video (and others just as good) ?
Hard to find anything on the AGS site with no search facility.

[Roma]

That trough is lovely, Mike.  I've been meaning to do that with saxifragas for years.  I think you have just spurred me on enough to get on with it.  I have some in an overgrown raised bed and some in pots, all looking a bit worse for wear.  I have potted some Irishman's cuttings from the raised bed and ripped up and potted bits of some of the others so have plenty material to get started with.  It will have to be granite, not tufa though or maybe I could try smashing up a concrete block.  Husband will probably complain.  He does not understand my plant addiction.
 
Saxifraga cinerea
Saxifraga 'Quarry Wood'
Saxifraga 'Redpoll'
 

[ruweiss]

Some plants flowering now:

    Sax. burseriana
    Sax. Jan Neruda
    S. opp. Theoden Seedling
    Sax. opp. rudolphiana

[Tim Ingram]

Oh, at last a gardener's world for gardeners Maggi! I would be very proud to have made a film like that.

[K-D Keller]

Some Saxifraga from my garden.

First picture: Names beginning front left to right.
Winifred, yellow (lost lable) , Eduard Manet
x kellereri, Judith Shackleton
Klondike, S. burseriana

The other pictures: Saxifraga federici-augusti, Saxifraga iranica, Saxifraga x apiculata „Gregor Mendel“, Saxifraga oppositifolia.

[David Nicholson]

Lovely Saxes all.


Some of mine:-
Saxifraga apiculata 'Gregor mendel'
S. anglica 'Cranbourne'
S. 'Peach Melba'

[ChrisB]

My Peach Melba has a similar habit David flowers few and far between I've not seen it on the show bench much either.  However the flowers it does have are lovely...