Fall can be an incredible season of blooming shrubs in the landscape if you do a little planning. Right now, the Hana Jiman camellia's blossoms will stop you in your tracks. This plant is a variety of Camellia sasanqua and blooms heavily in October and November. The blossoms are large, semi-double and white with a deep blush of rose pink spreading from the margins inward.
Camellias may bring to mind the spectacularly beautiful Camellia japonica and the Camellia reticulate, but Hana Jiman proves the Camellia sasan-qua offers a lot for the landscape and deserves much more widespread use - and this could be said for camellias in general.
Horticulturists and landscape designers promote the idea of planting evergreen shrubs as the bones of the landscape, and rightfully so. A camellia like Hana Jiman has everything you want in a leaf, with striking, dark green, glossy leaves that feel like polished leather. The shrubs reach around three metres tall and almost two metres wide. But it is not just leaves - they also have thousands of buds that open over time. At the Columbus Botanical Garden in Columbus, Georgia, it is among the showiest in the garden and attracts pollinators .
Sasanquas like the Hana Jiman are more sun tolerant than the Camellia japonica and usually will withstand colder temperatures in the winter. Hana Jiman is recommended for zones 7-10 and is cold hardy to -15 C. Like all other camellias, they require acid soil, but sasanquas tolerate greater extremes in moisture than will most japonicas.
Shrubs like the camellia can be the real foundation of the landscape. They create a backdrop, lead us toward a path or contrast the colour of the perennial border or drift of annuals. Now is entering the best time for planting woody shrubs and trees, including camellias.
By planting woody ornamentals as soon as possible in the fall, root growth will increase dramatically before next spring.
Though top growth may have ceased, roots will continue to develop during the cooler fall weather. When new leaf growth resumes in the spring, the root system will already be established and able to supply the plant's requirements. Planting now will give your plants almost a full growing season's advantage over those planted next spring.
Norman Winter is executive director of the Columbus Botanical Garden, in Columbus, Georgia, and author of Captivating Combinations: Color and Style in the Garden.
