Norm Nakanishi is a collector through and through. It’s the hundred or so treadle sewing machines, the rows and rows of clivias, the too many bromeliads to count, plus the serious cymbidium collection that would make any commercial grower green with envy.
But we came to see the chrysanthemums, maybe the county’s largest private collection, not in Nakanishi’s yard, but in back yards he’s borrowed in Anaheim.
It’s October, so these late flowering darlings of the fall garden are in full bloom. The spiders, the pompoms, the incurved, the reflex, the quills, he’s got them all and plants them in rows, just like a crop.
Since Nakanishi, a retired agriculture teacher at Westminster High School, and his wife teach floral design, the rows make sense when it comes time to harvest the flowers.
The 110-plus temperatures the week before didn’t slow them a bit. “Chrysanthemums aren’t waxy like succulents. They don’t store water. Instead, they transpire heavily, so if you give them enough water during a heat spell, they’ll be fine,” he said.
Chrysanthemums have a long history in Japan dating to the 8th century A.D., but an even longer back story in China to the 14th century B.C where they were grown as medicinal herbs. Mums have been cultivated in America since colonial times.
Chrysanthemums have traveled around the world, but Nakanishi’s collection proves that we can grow just about all of the grandiflorums (florist types) in Southern California gardens.
Nakanishi treats them as perennials. They grow in spring, bloom in fall, then he cuts them back before their winter dormancy.
“Mums aren’t too particular about the kind of soil they are in,” he said. “Just keep them moist, not too wet and not too dry.”
Nakanishi recommends a regular feed schedule: a balanced 20-20-20 during spring and summer, then switch to a high bloom formula such as 10-20-10 when the buds are forming, then switching again to a high nitrogen 30-10-10 or something similar to revive them after the bloom period, but before they go completely dormant.
Nakanishi doesn’t go to great efforts to win the blue ribbons either.
“I’m not a show jockey,” he said. “I’ll choose my best flowers before a show, but I won’t go out of my way to grow the perfect flower.”
Don’t miss seeing these spectacular flowers up close and personal at the 67th Annual National Chrysanthemum Show and Sale at Sherman Gardens and Library next weekend. Chrysanthemum growers from all over the U.S. will be there, and so will Nakanishi.
Contact the writer: cmcnatt@ocregister.com or 714-796-5023
