Don’t be fooled. I have no magic touch. I regularly kill plants, mostly ones newly planted due to my inattention, but also, ones not ideally positioned. This is a part of gardening, and while I’m disappointed by losses, I understand that I must experiment and occasionally stretch a plant’s limits and my own knowledge.

Most plants are successfully grown, and while there’s little need to understand the reasons, if a plant has perished for reasons beyond my lack of care, I hope to discover why. And so it was that after repeated failures with the anyone-can-grow-it Rozanne geranium, I tried again. This repeated attempt came after I began to collect other equally simple geraniums and after a long history of seedlings of the dark leafed ‘Espresso’ seeding itself around the garden. Why should one geranium be difficult?

While I never quite dialed in to positively figure the reasons for Rozanne’ failures, my go-to in this garden is that soils in many sunny areas are damp. So, if I can fix that or find a sloped, drier spot, the chances for success are greatly increased.

In any case, two Rozanne were planted, one at the forest’s edge where it gets late afternoon sun and tumbles over rocks. The second was planted on the slope of the lower side of the small greenhouse, and this one in particular has shown rambunctious growth. Wandering stems have climbed over neighbors and up the trellis of a past bloom clematis. I’m not one to interfere much with happy plants, but it’s clear Rozanne will require attention so she doesn’t overwhelm every neighbor.

If taming is necessary, I expect it to be simple, and Rozanne is a sterile hybrid, so there’s no problem with it spreading by seed. Lessons are taught by the garden every day, and while there are times when a one and done is appropriate, I’m thrilled that Rozanne has been successful, perhaps too much so.