January is CAMELLIA month in the Florida Home’s garden and at least two blogs will be dedicated to this amazing cornerstone of the North Florida garden. We now have approximately 31 Camellia bushes planted in the yard, with 3 or so additional ones propagated in pots from shoots off of our largest bush in the back yard. When we bought the Florida Home, the grounds had only three: two large C. sasanqua bushes flanking our front door and a large and old C. japonica bush in full sun next to our small vegetable plot. Since then, we have added two more C. sasanqua, three C. sinensis (tea bush), two C. reticulata next to the bench swing, and the remaining 20+ C. japonica. These blogs will mostly deal with those blooming now, the C. japonica. They are thriving from along the fence mixed with azaleas, across the back of the yard under a solid canopy of oaks, across to the avocado and citrus trees. They constitute the foundational plantings of the shade garden, along with gingers and small palms, with space between bushes for ferns and bromeliads. Perhaps the most amazing qualities of C. japonica are their blooming season in the depth of winter and their extraordinary diversity of flowers. This yields vases of blossoms when there is little providing color. This week’s blog will feature the sculpted blooms with symmetry of form and color.
TAProots
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