Margaret Thornhill 
Every February, I walk through my Zone 8a garden with my morning coffee, and the camellias are usually putting on their best show. Last winter, though, I stopped dead in front of my ‘Debutante’ — a pale blush japonica I’ve grown for fifteen years. Her blooms had turned a muddy, sickly brown seemingly overnight. Not … Read more
A few years back, I nearly lost one of my most treasured plants — a gorgeous Camellia japonica ‘Adolphe Audusson’ that had been growing in my Zone 8a garden for over a decade. The leaves had turned a sickly, yellowish-grey on top, and the undersides looked like someone had dusted them with dirty white chalk. … Read more
Every spring, I walk my garden after the last japonicas have finished blooming, and I face the same question I get asked more than almost any other: should I be deadheading camellias? It sounds simple. Pull off the dead flowers, keep things tidy, move on. However, after twenty-plus years and a collection that now runs … Read more
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Every spring, I get some version of the same message from a fellow camellia grower: “Helen, I pruned my camellias and now they won’t bloom. What did I do wrong?” Knowing when to prune camellias is honestly one of the most critical pieces of camellia knowledge you can have — and it’s one of the … Read more
I killed a ‘Nuccio’s Gem’ once. Not through neglect, not through frost, but through water — or more precisely, through watering it the exact same way in July as I did in February. It sat in my Zone 8a garden looking increasingly sorry for itself all summer, leaves yellowing at the edges, new growth limp … Read more
Every spring, I get the same email from frustrated gardeners. Their camellia is lush, green, and absolutely thriving — except for one glaring problem. No flowers. Not a single bloom. If you are dealing with a camellia not blooming, I want you to know something important: this is almost always fixable. After twenty years of … Read more
Every spring, I walk my garden and feel that familiar mix of excitement and mild guilt. The camellias are pushing out fresh growth, and I know it’s time to fertilize. For years, I fumbled through this — overfeeding here, forgetting entirely there — until my ‘Debutante’ japonicas started throwing chlorotic yellow leaves and my prized … Read more
I was standing at the RHS Garden Show last spring when a gardener approached my display table with the question I hear at least once a month: “Which camellia should I buy—sasanqua or japonica?” She held two plant labels, clearly torn between them, and I smiled. After twenty years growing over two hundred named camellia … Read more
“`html Three years ago, I redesigned a bed around my beloved Camellia × williamsii ‘Donation’. It had become a lonely specimen, gorgeous in February but surrounded by bare earth and the wrong neighbours. I realised then that camellia companion plants weren’t a luxury—they were the difference between a specimen shrub and a garden that sings … Read more
