I am excited to introduce to you a completely new type of Fireworks at Longwood Gardens—Clivia miniata ‘Longwood Fireworks’!

The tall, single stemmed chrysanthemums you see in the Conservatory here at Longwood Gardens are quite different than the mounded shrubs loaded with small flowers that you find at your local garden center. These are a specialty florist type, the product of hundreds of years of breeding to reach those stately heights and flower size and are not winter hardy for us in Southeast Pennsylvania.

Do you hear the word chrysanthemum and picture those simple household flowers from the local garden shop? At Longwood Gardens, we take the ordinary mum and make it extraordinary, turning it into a work of art—the Thousand Bloom Chrysanthemum!

In January 2010, we posted a blog about our “King of the Conservatory,” Encephalartos woodii. The Encephalartos is the most prized plant in Longwood’s Conservatory since it is extinct in its native environment of South Africa.

The first Himalayan blue-poppies (Meconopis ‘Lingholm’) of the season went on display at Longwood Gardens just before the opening of the Philadelphia Flower Show. Unlike last year when some plants went to Philadelphia, this time the blue-poppies can be seen only here at Longwood.

Starting Saturday, October 9, 2010, you will be able to experience an exciting, new area of the Gardens: The East Conservatory Plaza! The East Conservatory Plaza has been in the making for over 3 years. From the beginning, we worked with the renowned, British landscape architect Kim Wilkie.

Longwood often hunts the globe for new or extraordinary plants to conserve and showcase in the Gardens. Recently, I went on a different sort of expedition—to inspect the plants for Longwood’s new East Conservatory Plaza green wall. My mission was to identify any potential pests or diseases that could threaten the new display.

If you haven't visited the Student Exhibition Garden, time is running out! The gardens will be dismantled in October to make way for the PG class of 2011's gardens next spring. To find out more about the Student Exhibition Gardens, visit Longwood's website at www.longwoodgardens.org.

Cascade chrysanthemums have long been at the heart of Longwood Gardens' annual Chrysanthemum Festival. Longwood grows specialty mums (Chrysanthemum x moriflorum) that originated in China and Japan and are selected for their ability to create beautiful and lasting forms. Over the years, Longwood's amazing show of form and color has been continually modified and refined. Guests marvel at the captivating shapes and often ask us how we create these wonderful pieces of horticulture. The following is meant to highlight a little behind-the-scenes action and hint at some of the spectacular forms you will see this November in our Conservatory.

Our cannas are being threatened! Plants all around the world are being infected by viruses that can affect the beauty of the plants and can eventually lead to death. Unchecked, this could lead to the end of cannas. Do I have your attention? Well, don’t panic because here at Longwood we have some projects underway that will hopefully give new life to the beautiful canna!

This year, Professional Gardener (PG) students broke new ground—literally and figuratively—as designers and creators of the newest garden display at Longwood: The Student Exhibition Garden.

What is a champion tree? For over seventy years the Pennsylvania Forestry Association has located and inventoried the largest specimen of each species that grows in Pennsylvania. To be a champion, a tree must be larger than all of the other reported trees of the same species.

Late March and early April is a time when people are ready to get out of the house and explore the outdoors after all the snow has melted and tiny springtime treasures begin to emerge. At Longwood Gardens we're just bursting at the seams with beautiful flowers 365 days of the year!

When guests first walk into our Conservatory, they are overwhelmed by the huge variety of plants that are growing under glass. You can see plants that grow in all different regions of the world, from the tropics to the Mediterranean and even the desert.

Christmas is a time for bringing families together under one roof, and that's just what we've done here at Longwood Gardens... with plant families, that is! I invite you to get to know the familiar poinsettia a little better while appreciating their cousins as well.

Longwood Gardens established hardiness trials and a breeding program in the early 1960’s to evaluate and develop camellias that can tolerate colder winters. These efforts have lead to the release of two of the hardiest Camellias ‘Longwood Centennial’ and ‘Longwood Valentine’. As Camellia breeding and hardiness evaluation continue at Longwood Gardens, the selection of commercially available hardy camellias will increase.

The Thousand Bloom Chrysanthemum (known in Japan as Ozukuri) refers to a technique, originating in China and expanding to Japan several hundred years ago, for growing an extremely large Chrysanthemum, with a goal of producing the maximum number of flowers possible on a single plant.

This time of year everyone is talking about the stunning chrysanthemums in the Conservatory--but I would like to point out the beauty of a different, incredible, autumn-blooming plant! The genus Salvia represents the largest group of plants in the Lamiaceae family.

It's my favorite time of year in the Conservatory with the arrival of more than 60 Fuschsia baskets, each measuring more than three feet in width!

I love this time of year in Peirce's Woods. Even though it means the time for extreme humidity and lugging heavy hoses is just around the corner. The beauty of the woods in bloom makes me forget all that.