Christmas Rose

I grow a lot of Lenten Roses.  Fields of Lenten Roses.  Last year I harvested a shoe box full of seeds.  I couldn't begin to guess how many tens of thousands of seed were in that box.  To plant them all I tilled up thousands of square feet with my tractor and broadcasted the seed like chicken feed.  The field in the picture above was planted that way back in 2003.  Beautiful.

Each year, around this time, I watch the gardens as the old growth from last years perennial cycle lays over to die and decompose while the new growth begins, sending up its initial volley of foliage shoots.  The flower stalks come next but oh my gosh, there here.  Mid December and my Lenten Roses are beginning to bloom.  Two years ago none of this happened until late Feburary but that's a post for a different day.

This post is about the Christmas Rose, the second 'common name' for the hellebore Orientalis.  The first common name for h.Orientalis is the Lenten Rose.  So why Christmas Rose.  Here's my observation.  With all  the thousands of Lenten Roses growing here on my farm, the earliest flowers that bloom are almost always white.  I don't know why that is but it surely defines why this color variant of the h.Orientalis could take the name of Christmas Rose.  As we see this year, the whites are unfolding their blooms just in time for Christmas.

The Lenten Rose Almanac January 2011

The phrase that comes to mind when I describe the Lenten Rose in January is this: The darkest hour is just before dawn.

Most of my plants go unattended throughout the year. In other words, most of them don't get cut back in late September, early October and because of that the decomposing old growth from last year is now painfully obvious.

To manicure mature Lenten Rose, you can cut them to the ground in early fall.....around late September, early October. If you do this, you won't have all of this decomposing foliage which is part of the natural cycle of the plant but is not very pretty to look at in a manicured flower garden.

If you have mature plants, right about now, look down into the center. Those are the flower buds. So, here they come. The flower stalks of the beautiful hellebore Orientalis, commonly know as the Lenten Rose

January is also the month when seeds that dropped from the flowers, last May, will be breaking ground as seedlings. I haven't seen them yet in my garden, it's a little early, but they're coming soon.

To summarize, the Lenten Rose in January is starting to send up young flower buds, last years foliage is continuing to lay over and decompose and seedlings are pushing up through the soil.

OK, let's leave it there. Next month we will see these baby flower buds become strapping young flower stalks.