That is one gorgeous sight! They look so happy and healthy. Who would think anything about Gold Standard could ever surprise you.

Hi Bruce,

Very interesting! It is something like a Hosta Catch 22... if it is not the slugs eating up and messing with the hostas, then it is the hostas not completing the growing season performance with a final bow or curtsy of the flowers!

Do you think it could have anything to do with the intense/severe treatments used... I remember you mentioned the Metaldehyde for slugs. Is there is too much of some chemical in it -that hosta roots absorbed to prevent flowering this year?

OR

The treatments that you used added more nutrients to the soil to delay or prevent the flowering?

OR

Maybe with more light the Gold Standards are not yet ready and will flower later than usual? I am making an assumption that with more sunlight and warmth reaching them, since you cut back some of the canopy, the cycle for flower production not yet ready for the grand finale of flowers- Photoperiodism or Vernalization.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photoperiodism

It seems that they are "so sensitive" or responsive/reactive to their environment in many ways... and at other times they don't miss a beat.

For all of your efforts to keep ALL those leaves lush and blemish free... and no flower show??? It can't be. Here's hoping that there will be a late summer flower display as a huge show of appreciation to you for keeping the hostas slug free. :)

Here in Wales we have cool and wet summers almost as a defualt. During these very few of the hostas flower and in fact the following spring the scapes appear at the same time as the leaves and then stall before opening.

This summer we had a two month period of warm and mostly dry days and large numbers of plants flowered. As is the way the weather then returned to its default setting, the flowers got spoilt and the polinators disappeared as a consequence.

I keep a lot of my streakers in the greenhouse. Unaffected by the poor weather they have set quite a good amount of seed.

I've come to the conclusion that if I want good seed set then the plants I want to use will have to spend the summer under glass.

Dave

Bruce, are you thinking it's the cooler temperatures?

I was wondering about this....what usually affects flower production? I have a Nigrescens that is very old. Its about 6' wide, grows in full sun. Last year it had 55 flowers. This year, 15 or 20. Last summer was probably wetter, but thats about the only difference as far as weather goes.

A beautiful display, Bruce.

hi bruce ...

and you dont expect that they will bloom late ... i would guess they will ...

i would be very surprised that the whole bed would skip bloom one year ..

ken

btw: surprised no one wants to know what the severe slug treatment last year was ... great sentence structure ... lol ... is my participle dangling???

Thanks for your comments and thoughts about the flowering; no it wasn't the insecticides used to kill slugs or nutrient uptake, as that wasn't a factor (no fertilizer used).

There were smaller blooms on maybe 5 out of 30 clumps; normally 5-8 blooms per clump. The flowers were skimpy to, and nearby Striptease had similar behavior so I am thinking weather (probably more moisture and cooler temps vs dryer summer heat which does help hosta bloom).

I know plantaginea needs heat for their blooms to develop - and their progeny.

Ken, for those inquiring minds; I regularly spray malathion, bleach, ammonia, use table salt and then finally metaldehyde every two weeks until no more in sight.

Bruce

Bruce- Nice planting and a very nice, classic cultivar (I know you have some deep connection with this one!). I don't have input as to why they did not form scapes this year. Many of my Hosta skipped a year or two or three here in NJ as we had had terrible droughts for mutliple years but that was/is not the case this year (cool and rainy......polar opposite of last year!). My Hosta are blooming well this year (those that survived.....several died off the last couple years in the heat and prolonged/repeated drought). I did want to add that 'Gold Standard' is one of the cultivars that got me "into" Hostas. It was the first I bought that was not a standard undulata or sieboldiana. I liked it because it had a nice contrast of light green and dark green, not the white/green I usually saw at that time. This was bought from Clifford Tine in NJ. Later Cliff Russell and his wife further nurtured my love for Hosta. I gained and lost several Hosta but still have a division of my early 'Gold Standard' (the parent plant still resides at my parents place in Pa.).

ive heard of ammonia or vinegar .. but never heard of spraying bleach ... nor malathion ...

im going to have to rethink my whole life ... lol

ken

I consider malathion diluted as labeled to effective for contact on slugs and some residual effect while diluted bleach on very humid nights is very effective on slugs - don't spray concentrated bleach or it will burn the leaves for sure. When they are overwhelming the salt shaker I get out small spray bottle with bleach and whack them.

Thanks for more insight on the slug treatment with details... Good to know and will copy your methods. It will be bad -very bad- for the slugs. Yipee! :)

thx.. i wasnt suggesting the treatment had any connection to the bloom issue ...

i just wanted to know what you slug regimen was ...

ken

Just to show how confounding Ma Nature can be, here's a pic of the Gold Standard I'm growing in the sunniest part of my garden so it will get big fast. You can see the completed scapes with seed pods hanging right next to the new flower scape that has sprung from the new flush of leaves.