Chrysanthemums in the Season of the Sticks

It is well and truly stick season in Vermont. "What is stick season?" you might ask. It is one of the six seasons experienced every year in this tiny mountainous state. Vermont has winter, mud season, spring, summer, autumn, and then stick season. Stick season is how Vermonters refer to the time of the year after all of the leaves have fallen off the trees, and before the snow starts to fall. At least some Vermonters, as there does seem to be some regional and generational specificity to the term. Nonetheless, the majority of the trees at Mutton Hill do resemble giant sticks clinging to the hillside, save for the marcescent oaks, which are still shrouded in brown papery leaves.

The gardens are well on the way into their long winter's sleep. There are still a handful of flowers trying to defy the inevitable, but I am afraid that this week's predicted 5° F (-15° C) will put paid to them all. I am still harvesting leeks and parsnips from the garden, but for the most part, until the sap starts to flow again in the spring and we begin syruping, there are few actively growing things to occupy me in the gardens.

Inside, however, November has been about chrysanthemums. Lots of chrysanthemums. Admittedly, probably too many chrysanthemums. I have long loved the blowsy heirloom chrysanthemums that I would see in old paintings or illustrations, but until relatively recently, I didn't know where to get any or how to grow them.

Then, about three years ago, a gardener that I follow on Instagram shared a post offering some rooted cuttings of a couple of heirloom mums that he grew. I contacted him and ordered a few. Then, another gardener that I follow wrote a post discussing how heirloom mums had fallen out of fashion, but that there was a small nursery that still supplied them to florists and specialty gardeners. That autumn, when the cuttings from earlier in the year began to flower, I was enchanted and quickly contacted that small nursery. I wasn't the only one who was interested, though, and I had to have my name put on the waitlist for the following spring. I also discovered and joined the National Chrysanthemum Society.

The following spring, I felt lucky when my name was taken off the waitlist, and I was able to order six new varieties. When they bloomed that autumn, I was well and truly hooked. I spent the winter locating and reading a number of books on growing exhibition chrysanthemums (most of which were published before the turn of the last century). I also found a book from the 1960s that covered how to grow them as bonsai!

By this past spring, there were two new nurseries that were selling cuttings, so of course, I ordered some from them as well, including a couple well-suited to be trained as bonsai. Of course, I still ordered some from the original nursery as I didn't want to be dropped as a customer. I think that you can see where this is going. At this point, I could probably open my own small chrysanthemum nursery!

I grow my mums outside all summer, but when the first frosts threaten, I pull them all into my greenhouse, which becomes standing room only. Walking into the greenhouse on a cold day is both heavenly and chaotic. The air within is redolent with the scent of chrysanthemum, but it is difficult to move without snagging flowers or breaking stems. This is due to both the fact that I have way too many chrysanthemums for the size of the space that I have, and that I am somewhat lacklustre at pinching them back.

Every spring, I convince myself that I will be diligent about trimming them up and disbudding them (necessary to get the best flowers and to control their wayward ways). But I am easily distracted, and in the end, if I am lucky, about half of them will be well-behaved. The others will run roughshod behind my back, with sprays of blooms that twist any which way. This year, I have decided, however, that I won't buy any new varieties, that I will propagate fewer next year, and that I will keep them all in good form. Of course, the new offerings haven't been released yet, and you always want a few extra plants in case something terrible happens, and, and, and...

Who am I kidding? I am fairly certain that next autumn, I will once again be a gardening contortionist basking in the chrysanthemum jungle in her greenhouse.