March 2022 Newsletter of the SSM Garden Club

Garden Club News

Tussie Mussies and the Language of Flowers

Sunday, April 10

 2-4 pm

Don't know what a tussie mussie is?  Tussie mussies were small bouquets popular during the Victorian era.  Each flower, which was assigned its own meaning and message, allowed the

giver of a tussie mussie to send a subtle note of affection to a friend or lover.  Educate yourself on the language of flowers and the history of this craft while creating your own tussie mussie (for yourself or for a loved one!) We are plannlng for an in-person program in April. You may register HERE

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                                              Daffodils  

Narcissus is a genus of predominately spring flowering perennial plants of the amaryllis family, Amaryllidacceae. Various common names including daffodils, jonquils and narcissus are used to describe all or some of the genus. Wikipedia

Depending on  which botanist you talk to, there are between 40 and 200 different daffodil species, subspecies or varieties of species and over 32,000 registered cultivars (named hybrids) divided among the thirteen divisions of the official classification system.  Daffodils multiply in two ways: asexual cloning (bulb division) where exact copies of the flower will result, and sexually (from seed) where new, different flowers will result.

Seeds develop in the seed pod (ovary), the swelling just behind the flower petals. Most often, after bloom the seed pod swells but it is empty of seed. Occasionally, wind or insects can pollinate the flower during bloom by bringing new pollen from another flower. When this happens, the seed pod will contain one or a few seeds.

Daffodil hybridizers pollinate flowers by brushing pollen from one flower onto the stigma of another. Then the resulting seed pod can contain up to 25 seeds. Each of these will produce an entirely new plant – but the wait for a bloom for a plant grown from seed is about 5 years!

After daffodils have flowered you can dead head the bloom so that energy goes into building the bulb for next year’s flower instead of seed production. Before removal of the leaves, they should be allowed to die back naturally until they are at least yellow.

There are thirteen descriptive divisions of daffodils.

 

American Dream 
Division 1 - Trumpet Daffodils

                                                

Pacific Rim
Division 2 - Large Cupped Daffodils

Emerald Light
Division 3 - Small Cupped Daffodils

Rose Garden
Division 4 - Double Daffodils

     

Akepa
Division 5 - Triandrus Daffodils

Saint Louie Louie
Division 6 - Cyclamineus Daffodils

Wendover
Division 7 - Jonquilla Daffodils

Early Pearl
Division 8 - Tazetta Daffodils

Lemon Cooler
Division 9 - Poeticus Daffodils

Cornish Cream
Division 10 - Bulbocodium Hybrids

Trigonometry
Division 11a - Split-cupped Collar Daffodils

Jodi
Division 11b - Split-cupped Papillon Daffodils

Mesa Verde
Division 12 - Other Daffodil Cultivars

N. rupicola subspecies watieri
Division 13 - Daffodils distinguished solely by botanical name

Itsy Bitsy Splitsy
Miniature Daffodil

Upcoming Daffodils Shows:

Washington Daffodil Society

The Alexandria Valley Scottish Rite Temple

1430 W, Braddock Rd, Alexandria, VA 20322

Open to the public April 9, 2-3pm and April 10, 10am-1pm

Maryland Daffodil Society

Vollmer Center at the Cylburn Arboretum, Baltimore

April 21, 10am-3pm

2022 National Daffodil Convention

The Northeast Region is hosting the American Daffodils Society's 2022 National Convention at the Wyndham in Gettysburg, PA . The show will be open to the public on Friday, April 29 from 2-6 and Saturday, April 30 from 9-5.

The Garden Club is a body of the Sandy Spring Museum

Learn more about our activities and how to join the Garden Club.

https://www.sandyspringmuseum.org/programs-and-events/garden-club

email:  gardenclub@sandyspringmuseum.org or call 301-774-0022.

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