Winter Planters with Willow

This year I chose to decorate my winter planters using willow as the main material.

The planters at the back door each has 10 large branches of the curly willow, Salix x 'Red Corkscrew Willow' placed in the middle.  

To complement the yellow and orange colours I made wreaths of Salix dasyclados and S. sachaliensis 'Sekka' and placed them on the edges of the planters.

It was easy and I like the look - although I might have added a few, small green branches had the soil not been frozen by the time I started to work on the planters - I was lucky to get the willow rods in place before the soil was too hard.

The low, black planters at the front door are filled with branches of Salix x 'Flame', a few S. sachaliensis 'Sekka' (Japanese Fantail willow), and "sprigs" of evergreens.

As we do not have Christmas lights on the house, we decided to wrap two very large wreaths and three big stars - made with fresh rods of Salix dasyclados - with strands of clear mini lights and hung them at the front of the house over the holiday. It looked great and I will have to take photos to show next year.

Salix x acutifolia is interesting with a white bloom on the dark wine coloured stems and I  used it as decoration on my advendt wreath this year - looking beautiful along with light purple ribbons. As I made a couple of Christmas decorations for the table, I also added a few stems for interest.

It is the last day of 2010 and I wish you all a Happy New Year with good health and lots of laughter.

Words and photos by Lene Rasmussen,Willows.

Pussy Willows?

At the end of winter/start of spring some willows are among the earliest bloomers, providing nectar for the "early bird" - or should I say the early bee and other insects hunting for food seemingly long before any flowers are around.

For many people "Pussy Willows" are a sure sign of spring and a few branches with the fuzzy little catkins are picked for a vase.

What is a "Pussy Willow"? Some sources name the North American native willow Salix discolor and Salix caprea (Goat Willow, native to Europe and parts of Asia) as being pussy willows while other sources ad other Salix species under the title. In your mind, do you think "Salix discolor" when you hear pussy willow? or just any willow, blooming with catkins?

When you grow willows for basketry and/or cuttings, you most often harvest the rods before any catkins are visible, but this winter we had lots of snow in the field, so when spring "suddenly" came a few of my willows started to show their beautiful catkins.

These are from some "wild" willows that I have, maybe one of them is Salix discolor.

Salix dasyclados

Salix 'Americana'

Salix koriyanagi 'Rubykins'

Salix sachaliensis 'Sekka'

 

Salix viminalis

My Salix acutifolia doesn't show any catkins, but take a look at the blogpost about them at my blogger friend Vivian (Piletossen) - they almost look unreal.

Words and photos by Lene Rasmussen,Willows.

A will to grow

Willow has an enormous growth power and will grow in almost any soil condition when established.

I had used some clippings from my willows for a Christmas decoration along with cuttings from a blue spruce and the beautiful seed heads from my irises. To prevent the spruce from drying out and drop it's needles, I stuck it all in wet oasis and kept it moist all the time.

The cuttings from my Dragon Willow (Salix sachaliensis 'Sekka') started to root and grow almost immediately. I kept removing the shoots until just after Christmas and then I just left it alone.

Yesterday, when I wanted to "dismantle" the decoration to throw it out, it looked like this. The willows had rooted in the oasis, had numerous shoots and even a couple of catkins.

Willows contain a natural chemical called indolebutyric acid IBA which is a natural plant growth hormone and you can actually make your own "rooting hormone liquid" from willow twigs.

Because of this, the most common method for propagating willow is by cuttings.

You just cut a piece, the size of a pencil, (preferably from a one year old shoot during the dormant time of the year) and stick it in the soil. Keep it moist and it will grow.

Amazing........