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GardenOpus

🌱Gardening & Botanical insights from award winning Horticulturist, Author, Designer & Consultant Robert F. Gabella.😎 across Social Media.

An award-winning Horticulturist and project consultant, my education in Ornamental Horticulture, Business Management and Leadership plus 3 decades in the trenches of the Horticulture industry offer a unique perspective into a many-faceted world that even seasoned gardeners find puzzling. My work in the industry has involved B2B young plant and proprietary genetics brokerage, landscape services con

sulting and project management, wholesale and retail sales management, procurement, business process consulting, information technology - plus authorship of high-impact features for B2B trade and home gardening periodicals. Book Previews at: http://www.GardenOpus.net

On the Web: http://www.GardenOpus.com and http://www.OpusEmpowered.net

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11/09/2025

🌱☃️Thus effectively ending the growing season for all but the toughest hardy plants - though some will hang on - and with many trees still well foliated Fall cleanups will continue for weeks.🍁🍂 WINTER WEATHER ADVISORY through early tomorrow as temperatures drop, and Northeast winds drag colder air across warmer Lake Michigan, dropping snow all the way to DuPage and Will Counties - locally 2" - 6" - with the possibility of 1 to 4 feet along the near Lakeshore - though some areas will get little to none.😎

11/08/2025

🌱For , some of a group of 18 exhibition - - I did NOT grow to perfection!😅 These are not the squashed down masses of bloom sold everywhere in the late Summer and Fall for garden and landscape use, but traditional forms grown in what seems like a bygone era.

In this phase of the trial, I first chose the earliest blooming cultivars from King's Mums, a specialty supplier to Botanic Gardens and hardcore competitive exhibitors. Most exhibition varieties are too late for our photoperiod to bloom under natural day length and require special shading. I did not want to give them any special treatment, so for Chicagoland bloom must be mindful of first hard freeze date.🥶

Then I grew unpinched with no disbudding (removal of side buds for larger and more perfectly formed individual blooms) to observe. Most will make it to the next round - though a couple I didn't care for either for flowers or growth habit - these are some I liked. In 2026 will train & display, hopefully to perfection.😎 -

11/01/2025

🌱🎃 As Halloween Shenanigans come to a close - funnier than me singing "Werewolves of London" is tryin' to get the fake hair outta my mouth - it got into EVERYTHING!
🍕🍺😅

10/24/2025

🌱 It's all about 'Vera Seyfang' - I'm just the 🐵 monkey for scale. Had trouble even wrapping my arms around it to get a decent pic. In my posts the other day (oops apparently not here - please check my other social media LOL!) how Formal Decorative (FD) 'Vera Seyfang' (Baynes, 1958) is a bit irregular for an FD - but once fully open the rays do synchronize, the precision - and SIZE (AA - 10" or larger this one is just over 13") - line up. Also helps that I'm not a great big guy, makes big look even bigger!😃 -

10/18/2025

🌱🍷 sure seem to love the great outdoors - which should be no surprise, as that's where these traditionally housebound indoor garden prisoners 😄 are originally from. 'Bristol's Tropical Sunrise' - a Dr. Ralph (Rob) Robinson/The Violet Barn original - is no exception!😎 Flowering today, October 17th in my Suburban Chicagoland garden. - - yup that family with and so much more.

10/17/2025

🌱💜 Something different in the ( ) department - uncommon in cultivation, but they deserve to be more than just quaint collectors items in the hands of a relative few. Meet S. 'Jung's Fairy Prince' - a semi-miniature that languished in '24, was slow to emerge in Spring, but has now decided it's time!😃 Spring, Summer & now Fall outdoors bulked it up.💪 Supersized (the pale green leafy hat that holds the floral business together) will change color to match the (colorful tubular & petaloid part of the floral business). - - those relatives again!
The Gesneriad Society, Inc.
Gesneriads

10/09/2025

🌱🌹For the Misuse of a Hashtag on the Wrong Day Department 😅 worked in office till dark on - so will burn past all the Thursday garden hashtags for 'True Passion' (Ping Lim, 2018) in deep orange-red with excellent 🥶 Winter hardiness & disease resistance. No fragrance which is not surprising for in this color group - but you can see them from down the block 🔥 which makes up for it.😎 - .

10/06/2025

🌱🤍STILL WORKIN' IT. Even after persistent heat & drought & little extra attention from me, ( , ) 'White Pearl' is still kicking the blooms. Among the hardest working & most continually flowering I grow. From late May - early June until sometimes November, everyone who comes to the front door gets a greeting from this one.😎 - aka .

10/04/2025

🌱🔥A very warm October with the rewards of August sown Persian Cucumbers - here at a client site - paying off. An even later sowing here at home is now bursting into bloom.😎

10/02/2025

🌱🌹 in October usually means cool weather perfection - though temps flirting with 🔥 90°F/32°C in Chicagoland make no big difference to ( ) 'Distant Drums' (Dr. Griffith Buck, 1984). A tough, Iowa-bred fragrant favorite in lavender pink & buff-tan. American Rose Society rating 8.0. - , but of course.

Iowa State University

09/30/2025

🌱🔥More from the Department - AA (10" or larger) ID (Informal Decorative) 'OMG' (Swan Island Dahlias, 2018). First year trialing this one and will definitely grow it again - immense flowers are nearly a foot across even when lazily grown. You can see in pic 4 that I have not been as diligent as usual with the disbudding (removing side buds to put energy & size into the main flowerhead), nor to water or feeding this year, giving my just the minimum - sooo many competing obligations. Not to worry, during the past week they've gotten a couple of extra drenchings and will get a light liquid feeding as well.

Newer, & not yet a winner of major American Dahlia Society awards, should do well in both garden judging & the show bench. Though registered as ID - - the ray florets are so precisely rolled & arranged, to me it presents more as - . 🙏TY Chris Brown for help with the photos - as well as the watering! -

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