Nine new garden plants have been awarded the prestigious honor of being an All America Selection (AAS) for the year 2001. These new cultivars have been judged as superior in their class based on their performance in test gardens all over the country.
For the flower garden, the first award winner is Zinnia “Profusion White,” a daisy-like, white zinnia with good resistance to powdery mildew. The sun-loving plants spread 12-24 inches and are loaded with 2 1/2-inch blooms. AAS promises that no pinching or pruning is needed to keep these plants looking good all season.
Next is Portulaca “Margarita Rosita” that looks more like a rock garden plant than the typical moss rose. The plant forms a compact mound reaching 12-14 inches across topped by 1 1/2-inch semi-double, rose-colored blooms. This plant is ideal for patio and container gardens and is especially tolerant of heat and drought.
Eustoma “Forever Blue” adds a compact variant of this lovely but usually gangly garden gem. Large, 2 1/2-inch blue-purple blooms adorn the dwarf, 12-inch, well-branched plant. Also known as Lisianthus, Eustoma does best in full sun and will continue to bloom all season when faded blooms are promptly removed.
Nicotiana “Avalon Bright Pink” is yet another dwarf selection for patio and container gardens, providing a blush of bright, pastel pink atop a mounded plant of 10 inches in height and spread. No need to deadhead the old flowers makes this a good choice for edging the flowerbed.
Sunflower “Ring of Fire” is a bold and bright addition to the garden with 5-inch diameter blooms with a chocolate brown center ringed with red, then gold. This late-bloomer reaches up to 5 feet tall, commanding your attention just when other sunflowers are starting to fade.
Over in the vegetable garden, AAS judges selected four new cultivars as deserving of their award. Sweet Corn “Honey Select” is a “Triplesweet”™ type, a relatively new type of sweet corn that has improved keeping quality, sweetness and tenderness by combining the genetic improvements of both the sugary-enhanced and the supersweet types of corns. The 8-inch ears mature about 79 days after sowing.
Tomato “Jolly” produces lots of small, 1 1/2-ounce salad tomatoes, up to 14 fruits in each cluster! The plant has an indeterminate growth habit so it will keep on growing and producing until frost. Staking or caging is recommended.
Grilled vegetables are all the rage these days so it’s quite appropriate for Italian grilling pepper “Giant Marconi” to join the ranks of AAS winners. The peppers reach up to 8 inches long and can be harvested either green or ripe red.
And to accompany those grilled peppers, why not try onion “Super Star,” a mild, sweet, white onion that can be grown in both cool and warm weather. Most other onion cultivars are specific as to whether they will bulb under long days or short days. Super Star will bulb regardless of day length.
The AAS winners are selected from many new cultivars, based on garden performance as well as production performance in the greenhouse. Although no plant offers a guarantee of success in an individual garden, the AAS winners have proven themselves worthy over a broad range of growing conditions. Try these new selections alongside your old standbys so you’ll have a means of comparison. AAS winners should be available through local garden centers and mail order catalogs next spring.
[Photographs provided by All-America Selections.]