Cotton Seed Meal A Cape Jasmine Snack
February is a lovely month. Camellias and azaleas are blooming. It is the big daffodil month. I can depend on the Little cyclamineus daffodil ‘February Gold’ to bloom February 1.
Many of the “old roses” bloom this month. The first will be ‘Duchesse de Brabant’ (tea, 1857) with pearly-pink double cupped blooms closely followed by yellow ‘Safrano’ (tea, 1839) and then a parade of them.
Much work is to be done now. Dormant spraying should be done the first day the temperature is over 50. Be sure to spray the under sides as well as the tops, then spray the ground underneath.
February 14 for some means “billet doux,” but for me it means feeding all the plants. A good sprinkling of superphosphate for all iris is scratched in lightly and then well watered. Plants must drink their food. A good balanced fertilizer is put into punched holes at the tips of tree and shrub branches.
Do read the formula on your fertilizer and know you are getting what you pay for. Cotton seed meal is good for cape jasmines (gardenias). For small plants in active growth – pansies, calendulas, violas, and the like, foliar fertilizer may be sprayed on more easily and quickly.
Late February or early March is a good time for the first feeding of camellias and azaleas. A regular prepared fertilizer is safest for these. Never dig around camellias or azaleas, for the feeder roots are close to the surface. Mulch with pine straw or old sawdust. Oak leaves chopped or ground are also good. Large leaves may pack and exclude the air.
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