When The Going Gets Tough, Botanize!

A lot of the people in my life had very unusual holidays. Certainly the economy had something to do with it, as did the weather, and a sad variety of different illnesses.

Mine have been a bit "off" as well, but nothing that a little botanizing won't cure. So I'm headed to the Osa Peninsula in Costa Rica to lose myself (one hopes not literally) in the wilds of Corcovado National Park. I've never been that far south in the country but I've now reserved a hammock with my name on it.

And now for something completely different...

For years now, I've had a hankering to botanize in Turkey and see the ancestral home of tulips, crocus, iris and who knows how many other genera that evolved in that part of the world. Lo and behold, this looks like the year I'm going to get there.

It's all due to a woman named Holly Chase, an NPR listener who heard I was laid off and immediately deluged me with ideas for recreating myself.

And while I can't say I'm ready for a major overhaul, one of Holly's ideas is now a reality. Turns out she's been organizing tours to Turkey for several decades, and guess who'll be leading the next botanical one in April?

It's twue! It's twue! WANNA GO?

2:48 AM ET | 12-29-2008 | permalink

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Camellias At Dusk In A Chinese Garden

If it isn't already on your radar for the trip you will inevitably take to my fair city, Portland, OR. (enough about theirs), do not choose between this and fill-in-the-blank: Powell's, Multnomah Falls, Forest Park, your sister-in-law's. The name of the game here in any weather is the Classical Chinese Garden.

I am no indiscriminate city booster. And never mind that my voice is on the audio tour (snore). I have watched this garden grow and mature since its opening in 2000 and I now consider a good many of its plants my personal friends. As such, I can think of no other garden open to the public where it's absolutely always a good time to visit (OK, so skip it when it's crowded). Of course there are richer moments than others -- particularly when fragrances float on the air -- but the garden is simply too complex to reveal itself in any single day.

I fear you're going to want to know the name of the persimmon tree above. The number of Diospyros species is frightening so as of this writing I can't say for sure, except that because it's in the Chinese garden, it ain't going to be one of our native trees.

9:51 AM ET | 12- 2-2008 | permalink

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What Happened to November?

I know it's amusing when death takes a holiday (see: movies, books, musicals, The Sopranos, etc), but infinitely less popular when a blogger does the same. And I didn't even go anywhere, at least not physically, though I do remember enjoying myself with Florence Of Arabia. And unless it was a nightmare, I'm pretty certain I was burgled; certainly, all my jewelry's gone.

As for the garden, it too seemed to have missed November having opted to stay October an extra couple of weeks. That's over now. The gold, pink, orange and red that's been flying like confetti now looks as celebratory as moldy cardboard -- though the bite-size birch leaves do seem scattered like golden coins.

Hang on, something's just come back to me: a trip to the Chinese Garden here in Portland with my mom. Alas, though, I was without my camera, so I didn't think you'd want to hear about the sweet scent of small-flowered osmanthus or the delicate petals of fall-blooming camellia without
being able to see for yourself.

Forgive me if I was wrong and allow me to make amends. If there's still any light left after work today, I'll revisit the delicate camellia and ask her to pose...

2:32 PM ET | 12- 1-2008 | permalink

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Welcome To Candyland: Portland's Platt Garden

Maples, rhododendron, stewartia and fall crocus; tree bark backlit by warm, benevolent light. When last we visited the Platt Garden, my favorite of the plant meccas in this gardenesque town, even its often modest vine maple was feeling very fall.

Go ahead, pinch yourself. It won't change a thing. Life in this landscape is merrily but a dream.

Among the genera championed by the late Jane Platt -- a tradition continued by the very present David Platt -- is the misunderstood rhododendron, a plant that is so much more than the average American landscape would lead you to believe. Admittedly, we're able to grow a huge variety of the shrubs in the PNW that might not thrive elsewhere, but my guess is there are still quite a number of the straight species rhodies worth a shot. (Straight species refers to plants as they appear in the wild, before they've been hybridized and "improved".)

What all the Platt gardeners know -- there are three generations plus a Buddha-like one year old -- is that leaves can be just as astonishing as flowers. And while the garden does have ample rhodie flowers each spring, the best rhododendron foliage holds its ornamental own year-round.

Many of us gardeners are collectors; I've got a couple of nice species rhodies myself. But the genius of the Platt Garden is the placement of its specimens with an eye towards the combination of texture, color and size.

Sounds like a simple formula but if you're a gardener you know how easy it is to get it not quite right (I don't believe any attempt in your own garden is wrong). If you're like me, you just let the plants do the talking and hope the conversation's interesting but in a garden this large you're talking cacophony if the leafy choir isn't in synch.

Speaking of tapestries, you don't need a whole lot of material to create one. Not if you know how to play with plants.

With any luck, we'll hear from one of the Platts shortly, if only to tell me that I've gotten a plant i.d. wrong. Kailla, Buddha-mother? David, slave to Flora? Hope you guys'll stop by!

11:41 AM ET | 11- 7-2008 | permalink

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An Autumnal Peek At A Great American Garden

The campaign promises are over; now to deliver the sublime, as we throw open the gates of a private Portland garden on the headiest day of American democracy we are ever likely to know.

The Platt Garden owes a great deal of its design beauty and plant palette to another of Portland's best places for plant nerds, The Gardens of Elk Rock at Bishop's Close. The plant passions of that garden's founder, Peter Kerr -- who scored plants regularly from the East Coast and England -- have resulted in a number of tree and shrub species that are the oldest of their kind in the PNW. Kerr had two daughters, both of whom gardened. The younger one was named Jane.

One more teaser pix before the tour continues tomorrow. It's an image you've likely seen in one form or another before, because when it comes to pure sensuality, few things can beat a stewartia shedding its bark.

11:14 PM ET | 11- 5-2008 | permalink

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The Sun Break Season

Election Day 2008 and the city of Portland feels particularly benevolent today. The sun broke through an hour ago after a long hiatus and is now illuminating the considerable remains of what's been an autumn worthy of the name.

The mood here at my coffee house feels friendlier and more buoyant this morning; here in this bubble, there was never any contest how this town was going to vote. This state, either (as viewed from this bubble, that is). After considerable eavesdropping, I can't say anyone's talking about the election, but I would like to think all my ersatz young office mates are intensely aware of what hangs in the balance.

Anyway, enough stalling. On the outside chance that you've noticed, I've been gone more than a week.

What with my beagle's week-long disappearance, then -- three days later -- the burglary at my house (the dogs and I were sleeping at a friend's) and the unrelated but simultaneous burst of my water heater (a day after I'd moved my entire downtown office into my basement) followed in lock step by the inevitable invasion of my body by a vicious flu that has yet to release me, I've been AWOL from Talking Plants.

But I've a new lease today, in no small way due to this morning's sun break, which shines all that much brighter in a soothing (fine then, gray) climate like ours. And when that light illuminates the leaves of maples, stewartias, euonymous and aronia, you wonder why we're not all walking around dumbstruck by the inherent beauty of this world.

So here's my own campaign promise, before the votes are counted: join me tomorrow for an exclusive tour of one of Portland's finest private gardens and I guarantee -- whatever the outcome of the election! -- an invitation of limitless faith.

Go ahead, you skeptics, Google the Platt Garden! I guarantee you won't find another candidate who's got what I got for you...

2:03 PM ET | 11- 4-2008 | permalink

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Last Of The Season's Wildflowers

This just in from the Nature Conservancy's Rob Taylor, who lives in the Wallowa Mountains town of Enterprise, Oregon: the last flower still standing in the Zumwalt Prairie is blue gentian.

Earlier this summer, Rob took me on my first trip into the Zumwalt, where he woks as a field scientist. The region has subsequently stolen my heart. Check out this link to see why.

Send pix of the last wildflower standing in your area to Talking Plants!

11:58 AM ET | 10- 4-2008 | permalink

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Flower Phobia Cured By Fall Color

Back in June, while visiting the romantic garden of my friends Len Porter and and Peter Goldblatt, I confronted a chronic weakness I would have to overcome. Call it Fear Of Flowers.

I've justified it for years despite abuse from esteemed colleagues (just ask Nina Totenberg). I've even gone to great lengths to intellectualize it; consider this excerpt from my book, Plant This! :

As for choosing plants by their flower -- well, given the fickle nature of beauty, I trust this ornamental feature least of all...Which is not to say I'm perverse enough to covet a garden without bloom. But when you balance their capacity for transcendence with their utter unpredictability, flowers can break your heart. Obsessing over them is much like throwing yourself into an unstable relationship that has no real substance only dizzying sex.

Fine, so grow plants for their flowers...

On the whole, I still stand firmly by the idea that flowers are the icing, not the cake. But that's still no excuse for a plant lover like myself to cop out when it comes to choreographing color. On this first day of October, with nary a leaf turning crimson or yellow, I'm more grateful than I've been all year for the flowers now in bloom.

For my favorite color, orange, I've got the tender perennial lion's tail (above) and the low-growing, self-seeding annual Begonia sutherlandii. I'm also trying a variety of unusual, orange-tinged dahlias from Cistus Nursery here in Portland.

For magenta, I rely on that ever-blooming, always-scrambling, black-eyed Geranium 'Ann Folkard'.

And for blue, I vote with the hummingbirds: hardy salvias including S. patens, surely the truest bluest of flowers, and that towering giant for the back of the border, S. guaranitica.

1:06 PM ET | 10- 1-2008 | permalink

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Can You Answer This Riddle?

From Oregon to Maryland, coast to coast, with stops along the highways of the midwest, it's now electrifying roadsides, brightening streams and illuminating woodlands. Though it sings the same notes first introduced by the daffodils of spring, it's the last brash wildflower of the year. Last hint, its botanic name rhymes with How'd Your Day Go.

The answer is?

10:59 PM ET | 09-23-2008 | permalink

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300 Downed Trees And Counting

The good news is that all of the Houston Arboretum's staff is safe and sound after Hurricane Ike. The inspiring news is that volunteers armed with gloves, tools and tons of good will are helping clean up debris.

Which leaves us with the somewhat sad news that lots and lots of big oaks have bit the dust along the Houston Arboretum's Alice Brown Trail.

The Arboretum is a 155 acre sanctuary native forest where hummingbirds are feeding and birds once again singing after the storm. But the hiking trails are still unpassable. If you're in the neighborhood and would like to help out, contact Lori Hutson.

9:55 AM ET | 09-18-2008 | permalink

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Another Mystery Solved

We've just had a query from DillyBean over at our discussion group about mystery plants and with a little help from our friends over at Timber Press (what? you don't know about this outstanding horticultural publisher?), we have lift-off.

Based on some elemental surfing, it would appear the shoo-fly plant is inordinately fond of Illinois, since few other states (w/the exception of California) have websites showing where this weedy non-native has naturalized. After planting it voluntarily, Chicago gardener Mr. Brown Thumb has since decided to nip his in the bud.

Nicandra physaloides is hardly poised to take over the planet, and if you can look past its coarse leaves, the flowers and the dried seed husks are quite ornamental. I found a nice assortment of comments about the plant posted on the U.K. website, Plants For A Future. And should you want a variegated form (who am I to judge?) check out Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds.

Oh yeah, about this "shoo, fly!" thing. The plant's reported to have insect-repelling properties, particularly against white fly.

7:59 PM ET | 09- 2-2008 | permalink

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Stumped No More

Eileen Vennum sent in a pix of a mystery plant she and her husband have been seeing in spring along the roads of east Texas. Before reading any further, wanna hazard a guess?

The answer's Sambucus canadensis, good old elderberry, a beloved and sentimental native plant used for everything from pies and wines to whistles. Chances are just about everything you want to know about elderberries you can find here.

So what else you got for us, folks? We love playing matchmaker, introducing you to the mystery plants in your world.

10:49 AM ET | 08-28-2008 | permalink

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No Stump Speech, Just Stump Me

One of the on-going discussion groups at the Talking Plant Flickr site has focused on that age-old gardening question, "What the hell is that plant?". Thanks to the page's moderator and TP's best friend Andy Carvin, we've had some interesting species pop up for identification now and again.

I expect you'll be seeing a lot more peculiar seed heads, fruits and unusual late-blooming flowers -- or perhaps you've got a file of stuff you're still wondering about -- in which case, consider this an invitation to post your unidenfied flora and if I can't figure it out, no doubt one of our community can.

You can either post your pix here (with a few useful hints, please!, like location and season pix was taken) or send me an e-mail with jpg attached and again, as much info as you can recall.

OFFER IS LIMITED, PLANT GEEKS STANDING BY...

11:26 AM ET | 08-27-2008 | permalink

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Fear of Pruning

Pruning. It strikes a certain terror in those of us who love our plants and can't face doing anything that might harm, disfigure or discourage them. You know who you are. Funny, though, I never thought I was one of you until I hit a brick wall concerning my sorely overgrown manzanita.

With a big party of my own coming up this Labor Day Wkend, I knew it was time to tackle my exuberantly happy plant. Note that I didn't obsess over whether it was the right time of year to prune it; I've long gotten over that. Instead, I was taught years ago that the best time to prune a plant is when you're standing in front of it with clippers in your hand. Otherwise, the seasons roll by and the years roll by and before you know it the plant's so out of scale that all you're left with is the most drastic option. File under do what I say, etc....

The crew assembled two days ago during an uncharacteristically rainy summer day (I am not being facetious). The four of us discussed our options, everyone voting for their approach of choice. Ultimately, all our opinions came into play and we let loose on this wonderful specimen that -- none could deny -- had to be lassoed, even if the result (gulp) might be loss of life. Not immediately, but I'm aware it could happen, which is exactly the kind of trouble you can get into when you put off regular pruning.

Now don't expect to be wowed by the "After" shot; truth is, after two hours of four people pruning both this and several other shrubs, my garden actually looks relatively untouched. That gives you some idea of how exuberant it's become this summer, and as readers of this blog know, there's a good reason: the call of the wildflowers. No regrets here.

Now for an invitation you do NOT want to turn down: if you're concerned about what/what not to prune right now, operators with answers are standing by...

1:17 PM ET | 08-22-2008 | permalink

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Xeriscaping Still Gets Bad Rap

Yet again, the art of landscaping with minimal watering takes a hit. In a lushly photographed New York Times article with the yummy title, A Sustainability That Aims To Seduce, author Stephen Orr paraphrases (note emphasis) a few landscape architects as suggesting that xeriscaping can result in "dusty summer yards full of scrappy native species".

I'm not bashing the landscape architects or Orr, per se. The article's thesis is that even people who can afford hiring landscape architects are increasingly environmentally sensitive, and even landscape architects (long-maligned for their lack of expertise/imagination in using plants) are integrating xeric principles and celebration of place into their designs.

What gets me is the lack of acknowledgement that the days of "scrappy native species" are also over. These days, people who love plants and live in hot, dry areas now have unbelievable choices. It's a revolution in gardenworthy species that began in New Mexico with David Salman's High Country Gardeners, and continues around the country and the world.

It's a solid-enough article for the NYT, but if you're not among the privileged and the monied -- who often seem to lack the great, good sense that they have to share the planet -- this last quote may stick in your throat.

... the message of conservation and environmental responsibility cannot be couched in punitive terms if it is to succeed. "People shouldn't have to make a choice between beauty and sustainability," Ms. Cochran said. "Our work is designed so that I am able to say to our clients during a presentation, 'Oh, and by the way, its also sustainable.' "

11:25 AM ET | 08-21-2008 | permalink

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Mr. American Horticulture Redux

Before I overwhelm you with the deep purple and mandarin orange of the promised bromeliad in Dan Hinkley's garden, let me show you how he uses more accessible plants in show-stopping ways.

While we're looking at spikey foliage, get a gander of this seemingly simple moment, which in fact is a complex combo of color, size and shape. And genera, of course, but in any DJH garden, that is the name of the game. His plants are far from merely decorative; each tells a story from his incredibly rich and adventurous life (despite the fact that he claims he'd rather be home with Robert and the dogs. Ha!).

ALRIGHT! No more dawdling. Here is the plant that stole my heart during my unreasonably brief visit to the maestro's garden in Indianola, Wash.: Dyckia 'Cherry Coke'.

I better get this thing posted so all I've left to say is thank you, Mr. Hinkley, for setting the bar so ridiculously high, that I need never worry about being worthy. I am but a humble worm.

2:19 PM ET | 08-12-2008 | permalink

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Mr. American Horticulture

No doubt there are a whole lot of crowns he'd rather wear -- a whole lot of sequined costumes, too -- but once you've won most of the awards in your field plus won over all the people, not one of whom (damn it all) has an unadoring thing to say about you, it's time to ascend the throne and wave to all the little people.

Meet Dan Hinkley, as he's never been seen before.

I have no intention of being "fair and balanced" about DJH. Not after a dozen years of seriously irreverent friendship. It's hard enough having a friend who is absurdly talented and internationally feted; imagine how it pains me to have to share him with Martha.

Anyway, the reason for this post (the same reason as hers, alas) is that I'm just back from a 12-hour overnight stay at Dan and partner Bob's home in Indianola, Wash. (From Portland, figure a round trip drive of 10 hours.) Why a 12-hour stay, you ask? Why not 18 or 24? Well, you see, being such a good friend, I am simply grateful for the few waking hours we had together, before I was bodily removed from the house and chauffeured to the ferry before the arrival of the higher-ranking, European, 48-hour guests.

But hey, look what I saw:

There's just no end to the list of different species Dan's introduced to horticulture in his nearly two decades as a force in the plant world (not counting his years before that teaching). Thousands have been grown from the seeds he's collected on plant-hunting expeditions in the temperate world; thousands more were existing but little-known plants he popularized during his years as a nurseryman. I still have notebooks filled with the Latin names of plants I first encountered and fell in love with at his previous home with its vast, magical woodland garden.

Now he's worshipping the sun.

I'm looking forward to blowing your mind with tomorrow's entry about Dan's purple-leaved, tangerine-flowered HARDY bromeliad ... and I've got the pictures to prove it.

11:00 PM ET | 08-11-2008 | permalink

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Henbane Vs. Fat Hen: Pick Your Poison

So have you heard about the feature in the British magazine where a certain deadly plant is recommended as a salad green?

Mistakes happen and a British chef made a doozy when he confused the truly spooky nightshade family plant, henbane (Hyoscyamus niger), with the not-entirely-innocent weed, fat hen (Chenopodium album).

Yet neither are quite as horrible or wonderful as the headlines about the chef's gaffe would lead us to believe.

Fat hen, according to one source, is an acceptable if bland substitute for spinach with leaves that are best not eaten raw, at least not in large quantities. Evidentally, many of the species contain saponins, particularly toxic to cold-blooded animals (it was a favorite tribal way to stun fish). Fat hen is also contraindicated for arthritis.

Of course I also enjoyed reading that when eaten with beans, fat hen can prevent gas.

Henbane, as any readers of Shakespeare know, kills -- or at least disturbs the nervous system, "as if some diabolical force took possession of the brain and prevented its functions."
On the other hand, the Egyptians smoked it to dull toothaches and if you've ever had one (a toothache, that is) you can imagine how grateful they were to have it.

Henbane was also used in the Middle Ages to to flavor and enhance the effects of beer (Pilsen=Bilson=German word for henbane. Check out this overview.

I picked up fabulous salad greens at the farmer's market yesterday with lots of spicy weeds. Alas, no altered states...

12:02 PM ET | 08- 7-2008 | permalink

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Eve's is Open for Business

In another attempt to answer Talking Plant's most popular query, What Would Eve Do?, the answer is...

Party!

Who knew that all it would take to get this relatively reclusive woman to socialize was to revamp her neglected side yard. Behold the evidence:

Naturally there is no Eve; I'm the relative recluse (big duh). But now that my courtyard's doing the talking for me, the genetic sting is gone from keeping visitors amused (see: Roz Levine). Mind you, it does take me a few days to recover each time I socialize, but I've been assured it will get easier.

It's taking me much longer to recover from the cash spent on my urban hideaway, and I've only just begun to put in plants (an enviable state, isn't it?). You've already met my new Aechmea (which, alas, has not yet been potted) but this is my first opportunity to discuss the plant that's one of my key architectural elements, Firmiana simplex, the Chinese parasol tree.

Here's what firmiana offered me beyond all other runners-up: strong vertical lines, good winter color (the trunks are bright green all year), tropical foliage and in a few years, a luscious shade canopy. And let's face it, the courtyard needs a lot more cover now because of all the concrete which has made the mid-day sunshine all the more brighter and hotter.

Despite considerable warnings of its invasiveness in the U.S. (e.g., Texas and the Southeast) I am not concerned about them spreading here in Portland's inner city. One bad winter anyway and they're likely to get cut back to the ground. While they'll small enough, I also have the option of pruning their flowers before they set seed.

But enough politically correct apologizing, I doubt there are a dozen mature parasol trees in the entire state.

Whadya think?

4:43 PM ET | 08- 1-2008 | permalink

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Pass the Vapors. This is One Hot Plant.

It's an expensive habit if you don't have a friend with a greenhouse (I'm working on it), but many of us who crave sexy summer plants indulge in naughty delights like echeverias. It was while shopping for these fleshy opalescent beauties -- yet to be planted, pix to follow -- that I came across a spectacular plant now waving at me from my garden.

It's said to be an unnamed cultivated variety of the Brazilian living vase bromelia, Aechmea mulfordii. Even if you know nothing about plants, know this: an unnamed cultivar is hot news.

I know nothing, nada, about bromeliads. But I've got an impressive source. Burl Mostul is the proprietor of Rare Plant Research outside Oregon City, a mecca for all us poor plant slobs who cannot, like Burl, scour the world for jaw-dropping vegetation. Sigh.

So here's the story Burl told me behind his orange/pink/mango-colored aechmea:

I went to Honolulu to go to the Lyon Arboretum plant sale. It's pretty big. And I met this little Japanese woman there, her name was Hatsumi Maertz, and she had some interesting bromeliads. And then I asked her if she had more at home. She said 'Sure!' and I went to this place in Pearl City.

When I got there, all you could see was bromeliads. Front and back. She was just an amazing collector. (Note: Burl didn't know at the time that Hatsumi Maertz was one of the founding members of the Hawaii Bromeliad Society).

Anyway, she had a lot of everything and this one stood out because of its color and size, more compact unlike the the more straggly ones. The normal A. mulfordii is green, but she'd gotten this cultivar from somebody else, you know how plants get passed around. So I rented a pick-up and bought at least 20 offsets from her, among a bunch of other plants.

I've had them about five years or so and I've only sold about 30 or 40 so far. This is the first year they're ready for sale. I have NEVER seen a color like this.

This is the part where I have to tell you that Burl doesn't do much mail order. But you can always drop him a line.

4:52 PM ET | 07-16-2008 | permalink

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TP Fall Photo of the Year

The dogs and I have survived another 4th with the help of Benadryl (for them) and two loud movies (for we three). Managed to get a hike in and saw our lovely native lily, Lilium columbianum. Always leaves me a bit wistful.

D'you garden? High time we started swapping notes about the living, the slugged and the dead.

But when last we met, I was in the midst of celebrating Talking Plant's first anniversary with an array of particularly fabulous photos that premiered on the TP Flickr site. And yes, I now realize I was largely celebrating alone.

Yet in the hopes you're still stopping by as things far more pressing compete for your attention, I thought you'd enjoy a memorable blast of vivacity from last fall.

2:35 PM ET | 06-30-2008 | permalink

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Summer Eye Candy on our Anniversary

In August 2007, a gender-unknown person by the name of Cy Savino uploaded a stunning close-up of a bee in multi-hued buds. Almost a year later, I now know her real name.

Cynthia Savino spends her summers as a dance instructor at the Albuquerque Academy. She's also a fencing enthusiast talented enough to coach. And she belongs to a number of Flickr groups aside from Ketzel's, including Secret Life of Plants and The Flower Show.

The girl's got an eye for plants and invertebrates, for sure. Congrats, Cynthia, on being named TP Summer Eye Candy of the Year!

A bug in a bud has got to be worth at least two in a blog -- which brings to mind one of the best-loved creature pix of Talking Plants' first year. It dates from September 2007 and was credited to Judie Dunn (alas, we haven't had any submissions from her in a while). The title of that day's blog was Beautyberry and the Beast.

We've had so many wonderful summer pix in the last year, to pick one is certainly not to diss another. We've featured a few of them on the NPR homepage billboard just in the last week, but you never did get to see the one below in its entirety.

There's still a little time left for you to nominate your favorite of our first year's TP Flickr Pix. But if you're not up to the challenge, come back tomorrow for more of the best of the best ...

2:33 PM ET | 06-30-2008 | permalink

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Dirt Nerd's Gotta Pea

The lead story this morning in the Talking Plants world (I didn't hear from you so what else could I lead with?) is Dirt Nerd's pea seedling. Isn't she sweet?

Well if that doesn't work for you, perhaps the thoughtful musings over at A Thinking Stomach will:
"What possible kinds of salad greens can one grow when it is 105 degrees Fahrenheit on Monday and 50 degrees Fahrenheit (and spitting hail the size of nickels) on Thursday of the same week?" asks blogger Christina from Pasadena. Check out her answers.

OK, how about...

An old friend showed up in the Talking Plants inbox the other day. If you'd like to meet one of the people in the world I most envy, check out the latest from the fabulously talented (and obscenely young-to-retire) Margaret Roach. Her blog is Away To Garden.

Sure I wish I had a couple acres in upstate New York. Poor me, all I've got is this:

10:44 PM ET | 05-26-2008 | permalink

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A Plant Nerd Worthy of the Name

Ever so slowly here at TP, strangers are becoming regulars, and regulars are becoming friends. So as I continue dodging your most-asked question, What Would Eve Do? (she'd chew her nails to the bone worrying about how much angst to reveal; I promise an update, soon...) I thought I'd introduce you to one of the many sensational photographers in the TP Flickr pool, an anything but garden variety acolyte of the Goddess Flora.

His name is Rob Illingworth, he says the "real"gardener in the family is his wife Sharon (I guess that makes him, what, chopped liver?), and the couple lives 7 miles north of the MN border in Oh! Canada. Judging by their Flickr page, her passion is woodland and rock garden plants and his is everything she grows.

If it takes a family to create a portrait like the one below -- the plant is Hepatica -- consider this union blessed.

A self-described "plant nerd with a bias to growing rather than plant classification" (aha! he does garden!), this serious amateur recently visited one of the country's more imaginative and certainly better-endowed public gardens, Chanticleer in Wayne, PA. Its website does not do it justice, but Rob's photographs do.

Surprisingly, it wasn't his destination. He had, shall we say, less romantic plans. Rob was visiting the mid-Atlantic region because of a trillum symposium he'd signed up for at a nearby native plant mecca, Mt Cuba. Now that is one serious plantfest of a place. "I went to the symposium not as an expert, but as a keen grower," Rob wrote, "feeling that we could grow many more trilliums here despite our climate."

I can only imagine the notes he took; something tells me this is the guy who'd you'd most want to cheat off during a final. Anyway, among the many pix he's posted from Chanticleer, this one is Rob's favorite:

So many Illingworth pix, so little time. Be sure to take your own tour through his photos.

And who, might I ask, are you?

2:46 PM ET | 05-22-2008 | permalink

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Too Hot to Hike

A heatwave descended on the Pacific Northwest this past wkend and it has not been kind to people, pets and plants. Fortunately, a friend and I got out to sunny Catherine Creek on the Washington side of the Columbia Gorge before the wildflowers fried and the heat nailed us to the wall.

Although the weather's been a crap shoot here and everywhere these last eight weeks, it's been very kind to native plants. I've been lucky enough to follow the entire wildflower progression in both the pouring rain and the odd moment of shine. The shine, of course, is hell for photographs (most of you are way ahead of me, based on your Flickr pix), but I now have a camera that can take it...as soon as I figure out how to point it.

This documents my last '08 trip to Catherine's Creek. It's time to move back into the forest and get ready for the next wave of bloom. On lower elevations we'll soon be seeing Lilium columbianum, our wild orange lily. On higher elevations I'll get to relive what I've already seen.

But I count on Catherine Creek for two serious sun-lovers: purple penstemon on west-facing cliffs, and bitterroot, which turns hot rock into moonscapes of bloom.

I wish I could put into words for those of you who don't or can't hike in wild places what it means to revisit the same wild populations year after year. Even the Obama campaign can't deliver this kind of hope.

1:58 AM ET | 05-19-2008 | permalink

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Not Too Late for the Poppy Reserve

Just a quick note, a gorgeous pix, and a big thanks to TP member Hugh3of5.

If you're anywhere in the southern CA area and you've never been to Antelope Valley, the time is NOW. Admittedly, I've just read that the poppies have peaked, but there's still plenty to see.

Another no-brainer for you So CAL flower power types...here's a number for your cell phone: (818) 768-3533. It's the Wildflower Hotline sponsored by the Theodore Payne Foundation. Let me know if you get somewhere gorgeous and whether I should knock myself out to go, too. I could make it next wkend if you say it's a must.

2:40 PM ET | 05- 2-2008 | permalink

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Behold, Sumptuous Snapshots

A recent walk through the Talking Plants photo garden reveals that your eyes are keen and your imaginations fired. How I treasure you roving troubadours of spring.

Another TP regular didn't have to go very far to find stunning spring ephemerals. The prolific and talented Aleth11 just had to wander into the woods behind her house to behold the sparkle of the truly wondrous Sanguinaria canadensis (that link will take you to the bloodroot profile from my book).

Finally, though there's not a whole lot new to be said about tulips (after moving to the NW, I'm pretty much ready to give them up, except for the unimproved smallest species), TP friend Troye captured a few lovely shots that pretty much tell the story of why they'll always be a market for tulips.

2:17 PM ET | 04-25-2008 | permalink

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If Dogwoods Made Music...

...what instruments would they be, what songs would they sing?

It's a question that floats along city streets and woodlands this time every year, and an answer that changes with the light and time of day. Sometimes I hear a solo oboe, at other times a Baroque instrumental fugue.

I know this much, it's as loud and sublime as it gets during this busting-out-all-over week I'm spending in D.C. Which reminds me of a few musical moments I collected a few years back; perhaps you'll give them a listen and let me know if they sing for you.

11:29 PM ET | 04-23-2008 | permalink

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Remind Me, Why Do We Hate Dandelions?

It's a banner year for dandelions around Portland, I don't ever remember them looking so fulsome and jaunty before. They're strewn like wildflowers along parking strips, lawns and empty lots (the few that are left here in Boomtown) and by and large, their arrangements are quite picturesque.

So what's the deal? Why do millions of Americans prefer using 2,4-D to kill them instead of making dandelion fritters and enjoying the show?

No doubt the answer dates back to the heyday of the British lawn, rhapsodized and defended by no less a plant lover than one of my favorite garden writers, Anna Pavord who wrote, "dandelions are bullies. They simply had to go". At least she had the good grace to feel guilty about buying a weedkiller, but buy it and publicize it she did.

Perhaps a later blog needs to throw open the debate on 2,4-D, still very much in ample supply on the garden shelf but so clearly deserving of more consumer dissuasion. But the focus here is on the dandelion itself.

It's been two decades since the New York Times reported on the "weirdo" Maine farmer who canned dandelion greens. Today, there are dandelion cookbooks, dandelion dinners (strictly upmarket), dandelion blogs and in honor of Passover, Jewish dandelion news:

Conveying the misery of the Israelites' slavery, bitter herbs vary from place to place and even from family to family. Ashkenazim favor freshly ground or sliced, fresh horseradish root, bottled horseradish, or romaine lettuce. Sephardim prefer bitter greens such as endive, escarole, chicory, sorrel, arugula, dandelion, or watercress.

Nearing holiness, let us not forget that dandelions make wishes come true. You just have to do is put your lips together and blow. But if you really can't bear them yet know better than to use herbicides (what, me, guilt you?) garden writer Anne Lovejoy suggests you love them to death.

6:51 PM ET | 04-17-2008 | permalink

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I Sing the Wildflower Blue

Never mind the body electric, mine doesn't seem to much sizzle and sing anymore, but it's no small compensation to have the time, patience and appetite for hanging out with wildflowers which, this very week along the Columbia Gorge, have burst into audacious blues. We're talking a color wave of genera that includes nothing less than lupine (a dozen different species!), forget-me-not, larkspur (a half dozen!) and pools of multi-hued camassia which I most enjoy in bud.

Camas is the Pacific Northwest for many people, certainly for my neighbor's mother who saw fields of them when she arrived in Oregon (a young woman traveling alone from Arkansas) and decided this was where she belonged. And camas has kept untold thousands of indigenous people alive over the millennia, even the not-so-indigenous as described in this excerpt from the Encyclopedia of Northwest Native Plants for Gardens and Landscapes:

On their trek to the west coast, Lewis and Clark saw vast meadows filled with the blue flowers of camas, noting that they looked like lakes in the distance. The hospitable indigenous people rescued the expedition from starvation offering them, among other foods, baked camas bulbs...Humans cannot easily digest raw camas blubs, so they were always cooked first...No matter how they were prepared, poor Meriwether Lewis found the bulbs indigestible, but they helped keep the Corps of Discovery alive...

...unlike the meadow death camas, Zigadenus venenosus, which is also blooming this week. One of my field guides, Wildflowers of the Pacific Northwest notes that much to their later upset, members of the L&C expedition ate this bulb as well.

So, I showed you, now you show me. Natives in the woods, on the roads, by the stream? Post those pix at the Talking Plant Flickr Group and I'll share the best on the blog. If you're not flickr friendly yet, here's how.

1:04 PM ET | 04-15-2008 | permalink

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Mystery Plant Alert

Little did I know when I grabbed this shot that it would end up making me nuts.

So far, two esteemed colleagues have offered two different opinions about what this native NW perennial is: a forget-me-not relative (think blue) or a composite (think generic yellow daisy). I'm skeptical that these buds will open to yellow; admittedly my first thought was a kind of borage, but now I'm convinced it's not. Can you help?

2:06 PM ET | 04- 9-2008 | permalink

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An Avalanche of Yellow Lilies

Despite several downpours and hailstorms a day, we've also had ample sunbreaks (I'd never heard that term till I moved to Oregon), which means the forests and mountainsides of the Columbia River Gorge are officially in flower.

The grass widows (formerly known as Sisyrinchium, now split off as Olsynium) are just about done in, but the camassia has yet to begin; larkspur and lupine, except in the odd hot spot, are still playing it safe.

Not so the glacier lilies (aka yellow avalanche lily), no ma'am, no way!!!

In case you've never met, Erythronium is a fabulous genus and a very garden-friendly plant, with lovely, pendulous flowers ranging from white to yellow to pink (not all in one flower, of course). It also comes in species with showy, mottled leaves.

And while I'm making introductions, consider spending a little time with Keith Wiley, one of horticulture's most electric plantsman. Several years ago, Keith visited the Pacific Northwest searching for erythronium. Just an update since he was last here; Keith is longer with The Garden House, but did show up recently in the Royal Horticulture Society Journal.

11:54 PM ET | 04- 6-2008 | permalink

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Bloom and Bust

First, the bust. Progress of the side yard project, What Would Eve Do?, would thus far indicate that Eve wouldn't do a damn thing, at least not this week. Except perhaps obsess over the budget, or and whether or not her home was worth putting more money into, in which case I'm definitely channeling her energy.

Now the bloom. I only noticed this first one yesterday when I took out the short-tine rubber rake (my favorite tool) and started scraping off winter's brick-thick layer of leaves. Many of you will recognize this flower immediately, but let's give the more easily amused among us a chance to guess.

This lovely plant's complete invisibility in my garden, hiding as it does behind a variegated yellow phormium, is proof enough that it's time to get out the drainage spade and rearrange the perennials. Remind me, somebody, when I replace that beloved, misplaced spade...

And for delicacy #2, I've been watching this upright flower cluster burst open over the last few days. If you love the straight species in this genus as I do, you could i.d. this big-leaved girl from across the block. But that doesn't mean she isn't still a revelation when it comes to flowering shrubs.

4:32 PM ET | 03-13-2008 | permalink

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F-E-C-U-N-D!

I admit the word doesn't have quite the energy of R-E-S-P-E-C-T — a la Aretha — but I could spell it out and shout it out all the same. After a month in D.C. (and I loved every minute of it), I am back in the Pacific Northwest. This place is moist, lush, dense with smells and is excessively, embarrassingly, unrelentingly fecund!

Having spent a good deal of time in Dumbarton Oaks, I was doggone delirious to walk my own Penninsula Park and discover so many of the same fundamental design strengths: exquisite proportions, elegant paving patterns, bold lines (primarily boxwood), and a strong sense of identity.

On top of that, all the beautifully pruned specimens in the sunken rose garden were breaking bud (leaf bud, that is), and the huge formal fountain was throwing off fireworks of water and light.

Yes, and the sky was dark blue (the cusp of evening), the old-fashioned street lamps were aglow, and the air was swooning with the fragrance daphne. Shrubs of the stuff are tucked throughout the park and as with all daphne, I could smell them without knowing where they were.

Plus, not a soul was in the park but me and the beasts. I still have to pinch myself that I live a few blocks away.

HOWEVER ... as I write from the isolation of an office where my only colleagues are canine, I am now keenly aware of the trade-off ...

AND SO ... given that the great joy of living here is the green of this Northwest world, I am recommitting myself to my long-neglected garden (I had back surgery a year ago and just never made it back into swing).

INTRODUCING: The Great Garden Makeover. Photos, interviews, step-by-step instructions, all here in the weeks to come on TALKING PLANTS! I'm collaborating with a few people and my first meeting is tomorrow, so I'll post notes shortly after.

11:22 AM ET | 03- 3-2008 | permalink

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Fetid Adder's Tongue, Yum!

It is with some guilt that I will continue to celebrate spring-flowering shrubs and bulbs, knowing that your ground may be not even be close to thawing. But during my stay in DC, I've been corresponding with colleagues in Portland, and was sent a pix of this intriguing native plant by Ed Guerrant, Conservation Director for the Berry Botanic Garden.

Ed, a terrific native plantsman, was featured in a seed bank story for NPR's Climate Connections series. I asked him to pen a few words on this cool California native.

A plant with flowers like these would be noticeable any time of year, but to find the flowers of this reportedly fungus gnat pollinated plant, it is necessary to wander either into its native habitat in Northern California, or make our February homage to a little patch that has been growing at the Berry Botanic Garden for as long as I can remember here at the Garden (1989). It is sort of our Punxsutawney Phil, but without the predictive powers. Nevertheless, Scoliopus in flower it is a harbinger of the spring to come.

So what's popping your wild or cultivated woods? Got winter aconites, snowdrops, crocus, daffs? How about some bold, blueaceous Chionodoxa? I saw one shimmering blue note of this Glory-in-the-Snow at Dumbarton Oaks yesterday, where the chionodoxa are naturalized in the lawn. If you're in or around DC, check back in two weeks for peak bloom.

10:25 AM ET | 02-24-2008 | permalink

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Gloom Or Bloom?

Rumor has it the bulbs are poppin' in Portland, OR. after a glorious weekend. And there are thousands of little blossoms like the one on the left now blooming at Dumbarton Oaks. So much for the Z7 and Z8 edges of the country what's up in your front yard?

Seedheads of sweet autumn clematis are about it these days for the floral fantasies of some TP members. If you are in need of chlorophyllic support, join the Talking Plants Flickr Group and let us ooow and aaah over your small triumphs.

10:38 AM ET | 02-19-2008 | permalink

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Amazon: A Reluctant Goodbye

Well, it's time to move on from our week in the Amazon. At least to the exclusion of the rest of the world. No doubt Rosario Costa Cabral and the planet's other inspirational farmers, gardeners and environmentalists will continue to be our guests on Talking Plants.

A few parting shots, if you will; not a whole lot to say, just some photos I have yet to share.

Admittedly, I didn't spend a great deal of time mastering the names and kinds of of Amazon flora (a good reason to go back). Little, in fact, was blooming but on our canoe trip, we did manage a small breakfast bouquet.

But there was no missing the dollop of green that came floating down the river like an emerald island (below). It was water lettuce, a staple of American water features coast to coast. This is a wonderful annual aquatic; seeing it was like running into an old friend.

Perhaps it's enough to know that the places, people and moments we've been visiting in the Amazon are real and possible.

8:15 AM ET | 02- 9-2008 | permalink

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Plants on Ice

Listen up, friends -- It's now that dead, dried and dessicated flower time of year and we need more TP Flickr Pix friends before some of us get really depressed. We need colors, shapes, lights, action! So skip the holiday shopping (just buy your friends memberships to local enviro orgs, they'll hate you for it), and go snap us some iced flowers and berry frappes...

Truth is we gardeners don't have all that much work to do right now (as if I've done a thing in the last eleven months; this was the Year of the Ruptured Disc), so this is a splendid time to look a bit more closely at things we missed all year, and indulge in the smaller moments that rushed right by during the growing season.

At my place, for instance, it's all about bark and bones -- as in, the dog's soggy stuffed animals and my garden's design bones that are in need of serious chiropractic care.

Winter is also a superb time of year to have a Bad Excuse For A Garden exhibition here on TP...and I know just the "ornamental" cabbage planting I'm going to include. So while you're out walking the dog please scour the neighborhood for any amusing disasters. If I get enough pix that are truly bad enough, I'll put up a show.

12:00 PM ET | 12-16-2007 | permalink

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What's A Four Letter Word for Procrastination?

It's spelled BULB.

Of course the good news is that I never ordered any, so I'm free and clear. But you folks with vital bulbaceous life in the garage (or the basement, or the trunks of your cars) -- how long is too long?

The question reminds me of the afternoon I spent with a very charming man and rose-crazed gardener, the now-deceased actor, John Spencer (he played Leo on West Wing). Mr. Spencer was featured in a Morning Edition series on Celebrity Gardeners back in 2000.

I've often bought more than I've had time have time to plant. And I'm jonesing to buy some dahlia bulbs. So the question is, will these dahlia bulbs get planted? Or, like some of the bulbs I bought, they bloomed in the bag. And I looked at them guiltily when I pulled the car in coming back from Warner Brothers every night. And they never saw the ground!!

You can hear the entire series at the bottom of this page.

So...no prizes for the best procrastinators among you, but plenty of good company. Check out some of the competition at Garden Rant.

10:18 AM ET | 11-29-2007 | permalink

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Fernier Than Thou

It all started with an e-mail from the celebrated California horticulturist and landscape designer, Roger Raiche, titled "With Fronds Like These, Who Needs Anemones":

In one of those small triumphs that will never change the world, but which are personally very satisfying, I finally came across a rare variant of a common fern that I had been hoping to find for nearly 25 years now.

I got the e-mail yesterday and once I found a few hours to read it (I jest, but it is the size of a magazine article), I thought of you guys, or shall I say I thought of the bonafide plant freaks among you.

His story is a very simple one. It's about his decades-long search for the native Californian Lyman fern, not because it was rare or endangered -- in fact, it's in the trade -- but because he simply wanted to see it in its native haunts.

It's a story for fern lovers, plant hunters, grail-seekers and hortiholics. If you've got a little down time and words like polypody and pinnae don't scare you, read on...

Continue reading "Fernier Than Thou" »

10:31 AM ET | 11-16-2007 | permalink

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Author of 'Exodus' Honored by Plant?

Leon Uris (1924-2003) wrote the epic Exodus about the founding of the State of Israel. You probably never read it but you might have seen the movie with Paul Newman, Eva Marie Saint and the ill-fated Sal Mineo (poor guy, a roller coaster ride through Hollywood, then murdered during a botched burglary in his late 30's).

Until the end of the 20th century, I thought author Uris had a plant that was named in his honor: Leonotis leonurus. I figured the change of spelling at the end - from "is" to "us" - was some Latin mannerism.

WRONG.

Leonotis leonurus is a South African mint family member otherwise known as Lion's Tail or Wild Dagga, though I've never heard it called anything but leonotus (leeya NOtice). A valuable medicinal (I think it's particularly popular in South America), the trade calls it a "tender perennial" so you'll still buy it in the hopes that it won't die come winter, but for most of you it's going to be an annual.

I garden in Z8 where my leonotis has been surprisingly reliable year after year. Or it was before Zoe Mae moved in. Alas, she has chosen that exact spot where dear Leon is growing to plant her four padded feet and stare down anything that walks down the street.

This, of course, is unacceptable. Such a plant deserves much, much better, simply incomparable for the late fall garden when everyone but salvia's petered out.

And it's color! Pure, thirst-quenching orange. If you didn't know better, you'd think the plant in full flower was a fake: densely clustered spider-legged whorls of flowers growing in tiers along a square-stemmed stalk.

Check and see what others' experience with this plant has been in your area if you're skeptical, but I can't imagine you'll regret giving it a try. Once upon a time I tried a cultivar named 'Staircase' or 'Ladder' or Giraffe Legs', who the hell remembers, it was a towering 8' but way too lanky.

Stick with Leon's namesake.

12:29 PM ET | 11-13-2007 | permalink

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Gorgeous, But Heartbreaking. Plants, I Mean.

Scouting around for ways to delight and engage you, I stumbled on a blog entry at Gardening Gone Wild about one woman's love affair with an unfamiliar but very handsome tree. End result: Disaster.

Turns out the tree is one a friend of mine is jonesing for: Robinia pseudoacacia 'Frisia'.

So this got me wondering about the gorgeous plants I've fallen for that I'd NEVER plant again.

My opening bid: A euphorbia named 'Portuguese Velvet', with the nicest euphorbiaceous foliage I've still ever seen.

Four years after ripping it out, I am still pulling out at least 100 seedings/season, AND, I'm now seeing runaways in gardens down the street.

Mea culpa. Though I do still love it. And suspect when it isn't so damn happy, it's perfectly safe to grow.

So, you? Ever been done in/done wrong?

2:39 PM ET | 09-11-2007 | permalink

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Maypop Memories

The gig's up. The mystery's solved. The Flickr Pix of the Week was Passiflora 'Incense'.

One of this hybrid's parents is commonly known as Maypop, and just about everything I know about the plant -- also known as Passiflora incarnata -- I found out this week from you.

All I'd hoped was to tease out a few passiflora experts with our Talking Plants Flicker Pix of the Week. And I did find a few.

But I'm happy to report I got way more than I bargained for. Click here and you will, too.

For instance: Chris has learned not to kill caterpillars (right, Chris?) because they could turn into Gulf Fritillary butterflies; Jason uses the plant's flowers to make tea; Michelle used to pretend the flowers were ballerinas, with three sets of arms and three heads; and Serene has a recipe for passiflora juice.

In addition: it's the Tennessee state wildflower, it's rich with Christian symbolism, and it does a wicked imitation of that creature immortalized in the 1958 classic, The Purple People Eater.

Finally, I'm aware of at least one person in our community who did NOT use a search engine to come up with the mystery plant's name. Congrats, Tai Haku.

I send you off into the weekend with the maypop memories of a Glasgwegian. Here's the last two stanzas of Where The Passion Flower Grows, by a fellow flower-lover, Charles M. Moore.

Feel your mind exploding
in the heavy scented air
experience the shiver
as you're captured unaware

A little touch of heaven
where imagination flows
the valley in the garden
where the passion flower grows.

10:18 AM ET | 09- 7-2007 | permalink

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Gotta Problem With Eye Candy?

Here's this week's Talking Plants Flickr Pix winner, a sensational mega-whallop of purple...

This pix was taken by NPR's own Andy Carvin, the best friend a blogger -- and Flickr fan -- could have. After a considerable amount of detective work, Andy was able to identify this species of Passiflora, and now I know the answer, too.

Question is, do you?

2:02 PM ET | 09- 5-2007 | permalink

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A Plantsman's Xeric Picks

Order in the courtroom, here comes 'da judge ... New Mexico nurseryman David Salman of High Country Gardens ... with xeriscape-friendly plant suggestions for every part of the country.

Need a little context? So sit back, relax, and give a listen to this story.

Here's the key to what will grow where: NE, Northeast; MW, Midwest; IM, Intermountain; GP, Great Plains; S, South; and WC, West Coast.

#1 Agastache rupestris (Licorice Mint Hyssop) NE, IM, GP,WC

#2 Artemisia 'Powis Castle' (Powis Castle Sage) all regions

#3 Centranthus ruber 'Coccineus' (Red Jupiter's Beard) all regions except S.
"A bright red flowered, long blooming European wildflower that thrives in hot, dry conditions".

#4 Ceratostigma plumbaginoides (Hardy Plumbago) all regions.
"Long-lived, permanent groundcover used for its bright blue fall flowers and showy mahogany red fall foliage".

#5 Diascia integerrima 'Coral Canyon'(Coral Canyon Twinspur) all regions except S

#6 Gaillardia aristata 'Amber Wheels'(Amber Wheels Blanket Flower)
"Long-lived wildflower that blooms in summer with huge, frilled deep yellow flowers".

#7 Gaura lindheimeri 'Whirling Butterflies'(Appleblossom Grass) IM, S, WC
"Heat loving wildflower that covers itself with clouds of white four-petaled flowers all summer."

#8 Lavandula x intermedia 'Grosso'(Grosso French Hybrid Lavender) NE, IM, WC
"The most cold hardy French hybrid lavender, it is highly fragrant and blooms in summer with long stemmed dark blue flower spikes."

#9 Panicum virgatum 'Heavy Metal'(Heavy Metal Switch Grass) all regions except S
"A unique selection of Prairie switchgrass valued for its blue-gray foliage and tight, upright growth habit."

#10 Penstemon pinifolius (Pineleaf Beardtongue) all regions except S

#11 Salvia 'May Night'(May Night Sage) all regions
"Outstanding long lived European hybrid that blooms with indigo flower spikes and thrives in all soil types including heavy clay."

#12 Salvia 'Raspberry Delight' (Raspberry Delight Hybrid Bush Sage) NE, IM, GP, S, WC

#13 Saponaria x lempergii (Hybrid Soapwort) all regions except S
"Blooming in late summer with hundreds of large clear pink flowers, this perennial groundcover is an outstanding garden performer."

#14 Verbena peruviana 'Red'(Red Verbena) all regions
"A heat loving, very low-growing Verbena with small deep green leaves and screaming bright red flowers."

#15 Yucca bacata (Banana Red Yucca) IM, GP, WC
"A native succulent valued for its sculptural sword-like evergreen foliage, huge flowering spikes of ivory flowers and large, bird attracting seed pods."

This bud's for you, Dave Salman -- with special thanks to Kerry Kirkpatrick -- for providing Talking Plants with something you don't see much of here, truly useful advice.

12:34 AM ET | 09- 3-2007 | permalink

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Heavy Metal Hits

Metallic blue is a preposterous color which behaves badly in front of a camera. Which makes the genus Eryngium the naughtiest of them all. So bravo to our Talking Plants Flickr Pix of the Week winner, who we trust did not doctor this photo of Eryngium alpinum -- the so-called alpine sea holly -- posing here in all its impossibly blue-osity.

I find this genus so captivating, its infertile blue bracts (the feathery bits) so ridiculously showy, its color so consistently elusive, and its demeanor so percussive, I thought I'd regale you with a couple more close-ups. Ready, Mr. DeMille?

I'll wait for you while you check out this gorgeous shot also taken in a Swiss meadow but just last year.

Awesome, right?

OK ... let's give the alpine eryngiums a rest, and move on to a different species (stop groaning). Drumroll, please...

What, you're not awed? I'll find your weakness yet.

Maybe it's native plants, in which case, meet the little guy from Kansas, E. leavenworthii. This is one anatomically nice annual. You'll have to tell me whether it works as a garden plant -- maybe in a meadow? -- but at least you Kansans, Texans and Oklahomans get to tiptoe through fields of it in summer.

OK, I'm just about done, but I must point out that even Shakespeare took note of eryngium.

"Rain me eringoes...." says Falstaff of the candied eryngium root. Turns out it was both a celebrated sweet, and an aphrodisiac.

1:55 AM ET | 08-30-2007 | permalink

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Fragrant Homecomings

If you traveled someplace gorgeous even for a day during this past 4th of July weekend, coming home might have been a drag. Ocean sand swapped for sweaty asphalt; mountain air morphed into the smell of grilling meat (my own personal vegetarian hell). So wasn't I full of gratitude today when, on returning from a shady park, I got out of a hot car onto the hot pavement to be greeted by the sweetest of scents blooming by my back door.

Yes indeed, sweet enough to get a strong whiff all the way in the front garden (admittedly, I do have a small house). Anyway, you get the point; subtle this vine isn't. But when faced with bucolic deprivation, make mine Trachylospermum jasminoides (rhymes with with "whack a low STERNum, sass man BOY tease").

Now here comes the big DUH, particularly if you live in the Southeast or Northwest. I'm talking about the common Chinese star jasmine (doesn't ring a bell? OK, how 'bout Confederate jasmine?). Don't let the plant's common name fool you, though. It may be jasmine-like, but it's not a true jasmine.

And now for the big sigh. This lovely, glossy and well-behaved evergreen vine does not like single-digit temperatures. Perhaps you know better (of course you do, what was I thinking? Please advise). I've noticed that the cultivar 'Madison' is supposed to be hardier, but as we all know, plants don't read. (I crib that line with thanks to Tony Avent.

Caveat: IT'S NOT NATIVE! (once bitten, twice shy) but I've yet to read it's invasive. Just keep it off your trees if you live in Florida, OK?

So, your idea of a plant worth coming home to?

10:10 PM ET | 07- 8-2007 | permalink

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