Gazania ‘Big Kiss White Flame’ — Runner-up, 2012 AGA

Beauty pageants sweep the spectrum from bad reality TV to the Westminster Dog Show. But here, as you might have guessed, swimsuit competitions and obstacle courses aren’t all that high on our totem of concerns. Instead, our brand of popularity contest skips the stage glitz and gets right down to the core themes of plant competition: hardiness, longevity, and the aesthetic of the perfect flower. Over the course of next year’s American Garden Award selections, we’ll be pinning down the plants that best display those traits. Better yet, we’ll be doing it with everyone’s help!

Each year, the AGA organizers reveal an exclusive selection of top-rate flower cultivars, all in the running to become the next “Best in Show.” But as judgment by jury goes, we’re not talking about ivory tower botanists and professional rosarians behind a gavel. Nope, this is strictly a public affair–you, me, and anyone willing to chip in their two cents can vote. And with trial beds spread throughout nearly 30 botanical institutions across the United States, including the NYBG, that gives almost everyone a chance to pitch in and choose the next Miss America of the plant world.
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Meteorology is something of an inexact science. Some days, forecasting the weather seems a little closer in discipline to fortune telling. And after all of the comforting reassurance (we were so set on it!) that the cold was behind us and nothing but picturesque spring days lay ahead, the hard freeze set to plow through New York tonight has shoulders slumping in gardens across the region. But, while it’s tempting, skip leading a pitchfork mob to your weatherman’s house. Shooting the messenger never solved any problems, especially when nature is such a fickle character.

The inbound chill may be grim news for many of the early blooms that sprung out of dormancy at the first sign of warm weather. But which petals will pull through, and which are facing the axe? We asked Kristin Schleiter, our acting Director of Outdoor Gardens, to chime in with her take on the situation. Depending on what you’re keeping in your home garden, you may be in the clear.
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Welcome to our new video series: Plant Talk with Kristin. Who’s Kristin? Kristin Schleiter is the Garden’s Curator of Outdoor Gardens and Herbaceous Collections. What does that mean? It means that Kristin knows plants: The best plants for shade, the best plants for color, the best plants for four-season interest. In this new series, Kristin will be sharing all that knowledge with you, so that you can make your garden a more beautiful, sustainable, and easy-to-care for place!

Kristin’s first show is all about shade plants. So take a look, and let us know what you think! We’d love to know which topics you would like to see Kristin tackle in the future. Leave a comment with your thoughts below.