It wouldn’t be the holiday season without poinsettias dressed in brilliant reds, pinks, whites, and even variegated forms adding festive color to our indoor and outdoor holiday displays. At 12 to 18 inches in height poinsettias are the perennial favorites. Create a dazzling display by placing different varieties of poinsettias in a large grouping of five plants or more and arrange to highlight the mass of color.

Wegman’s has a large selection of poinsettias from 4 inch containers to terra cotta pots with 3 different colors. Check out the new accent color poinsettias--Strawberries and Cream, Winter Rose Red, Peppermint, Jingle Bells or Picasso.

Pointers for Poinsettia Care
When you bring your poinsettia home, remember that it was raised in and has spent all but its last few days in a greenhouse. It is a living plant and although indoors in the family home or office is not the most ideal environment, there are steps you can take to prolong its beauty:

They just came in and they are brand new! In full bloom, these Shooting Star Hydrangeas are must-haves! In five inch pots with gorgeous green leaves, these lacecaps have blue centers and 12 petaled long stemmed flowers surrounding the tiny center blossoms. Shooting Star can be treated as an indoor plant for several weeks--we have them teamed up with red poinsettias--for a spectacular display. Keep this plant in a cool, well lighted spot. When it has finished blooming indoors, it will make a beautiful container plant outdoors. Mr. Ed had to have one for his lovely bride.

With all of the Thanksgiving preparations, don’t forget to pre-order your favorite bare root trees, berries, vines and roses. All of our bare roots are 10% off if you pre-order and pre-pay by November 30. This gives you the greatest selection and assures that your choices will be available as soon as bare root stock arrives from our growers early in 2009.

You can reserve the AARS Winners for 2009--Carefree Spirit, Cinco de Mayo or Pink Promise. For rose lovers--bare root is the most economical method to add to your collection. Wegman’s has all of the AARS Winners, as well as many other roses, available in bare root. Our 2009 Rose List is arranged by color so it’s easier to choose that perfect addition to your garden. The Rose Gallery link will bring you to pictures and information about each individual rose to help you in choosing the perfect rose.

Click on the links below for more information:

Bare Root Berries, Grapes and More

Bare Root Fruit Trees

Flowering Bare Roots

Multi-Fruit Bare Roots

Bare Root Roses

Thinking about a more sustainable Christmas this year? Each year, living Christmas trees are becoming more popular because of their many advantages over other types of Christmas trees and they are a gift to the environment, too. There’s no recycling and the tree will grow and become a source for cut greens for holiday use year after year.

Some of the biggest advantages of using living Christmas trees are the lessening of fire hazard, their future use in the landscape and the fact that they may often be used more than one year as a living Christmas tree in the home. Living Christmas trees offer year-round beauty when planted in the landscape after Christmas and can also serve as outdoor Christmas trees for many years to come. Planted in the landscape, living trees also become a yearly source for cut greens to use during the holiday season.

We have a large selection of variable sizes of potted Dwarf Alberta Spruces, Colorado Green Spruces and Colorado Blue Spruces.

The care of a living Christmas Tree is a bit different because it is a living plant. But with a little planning and care you can enjoy a new tradition that will live in your yard for many years to come.

We have prepared a special Care Guide for Living Christmas Trees that you can print. Just click on the link and download it.

Care Guide for Living Christmas Trees

The question is---What kind of flower is that?!? Christmas Cactus, Zygocactus, Crab Cactus, Thanksgiving Cactus: all of these names, names, names can get very confusing. The wholesale growers have resolved the problem and refer to those cacti which bloom between November and March and look best in a hanging basket as Holiday Cactus. In days past, those which bloomed about the end of November were called Thanksgiving Cactus, those which bloomed toward the end of December were Christmas Cactus and those which bloomed in late March or April were Easter Cactus. But, there is a difference!

Thanksgiving Cactus or Crab Cactus (Schlumbergera truncata) Zygocactus (the variety Wegman’s now has available) has joints (that’s what the segments are called) with sharply pointed lobes, one-and-one-half to two inches long. This cactus starts to bloom during November and may be one of several colors: red, pink, white, orange or yellow. This is the most common of the three cacti but despite its blooming time, most people refer to it as a Christmas Cactus.

The Christmas Cactus (Schlumbergera bridgesii) or has rounded oblong one-and-one-half to two inch joints. It blooms early in January and has only one color--orange-red. The shape of the flowers on Thanksgiving and Christmas Cactus is the same. Both of these cacti grow to be up to 40 inches across and 12 to 18 inches tall with 75 to 200 flowers.

Easter Cactus (Rhipsalidopsis gaertmeri) is the smallest of the three holiday cacti. The joints on the Easter Cactus are oval shaped, one-and-one-quarter inch long and one-half inch wide. The plant may be six inches tall and eighteen inches wide with reddish-orange starburst shaped flowers.

If all this is not complicated enough, the bloom period can be adjusted forward or backward. Schlumbergeras are short day plants; they need a long, non-interrupted dark period (night) and a low temperature period (50°F or less) in order to bloom. If these conditions are not met, blooming will be delayed or prevented. For the Bay Area gardener, the easiest way to meet these requirements is to grow the plant out of doors in filtered sunlight away from any artificial light source. Once the flower buds start to show, the plant can be placed wherever desired. The Easter cactus is a long day plant and blooms as the days get longer (and the dark lessens). The Holiday cacti can be left out of doors all year round or brought inside when the flower buds start to show. If you hold off too long before bringing the plant indoors (buds three-eighths-of-an-inch or more long) the buds dry up and fall off.

All of the Holiday cacti are epiphytes; that is, in their native environment, they live attached to trees. They gather their nutrients from dust, decayed leaves, dead insects, bird droppings and similar organic matter. Rain is their water source. A good potting medium can be prepared using 8 parts Gardener’s Gold Potting Soil, 3 parts mini-mulch bark and 1 part perlite. A few tablespoonfuls of cottonseed meal will take care of fertilizer needs for the first six months. After that, Mr. Ed uses 14-14-14 Osmocote every 4 months. If the cacti get too much sun, they will bloom well but the foliage will be bleached and less attractive. If they do not get enough sun, they will have fewer blooms. Mr. Ed has never seen any diseases on any of the Holiday cacti. Seldom, mealy bugs may infest the plant. The quickest, easiest cure for mealy bugs is to spray them with undiluted rubbing alcohol. A good quality Vodka will work almost as well. When the mealy bugs turn brown, they are dead.

Mr. Ed has all three of the Holiday cacti in various colors and some with fruit (which is another complicated story). One is on exhibit at the nursery with 200 blossoms at this writing.

• Unique 4-Brace System offers wide base support for maximum stability
• Galvanized steel base and durable supports that won't rust
• Will last lifetime
• Unique 4-Brace design makes it easy to set up
• Braces can be adjusted to make crooked trees stand straight
• Don't have to trim off the lower branches
• 2 1/2 gallon pan
• Available in galvanized
• Adjusts to any size trunk