clear: still: 27ºF


Deck the halls with balls of allium. The rafters in the botanical garden’s Garden Center are hung with dried stocks of giant alliums. The topper for the tall pine tree in the atrium is an dried allium seed head too. I’m guessing that the heads must have been saved from the blooms of giant alliums that were planted in the median of driveway to the garden entrance.

By tradition the pine tree in the atrium is hung with ornaments made by the volunteers who work at the botanical garden. Each of the ornaments was once a dried hardshell gourd. The volunteers then saw, drill, paint, and embellish them until something fanciful is created. Visitors to the garden center can vote for their favorite ornament or make a bid to buy any of them. Here’s my vote for this year -- a dipper gourd turned into a grinning blue whale.

I’ve been looking for a camellia that would do well as container plant. It would have to be no bigger than a hibiscus so that I could move it in and out as the weather changed. I’d need a plant that is easy to take care of. It would have to bloom indoors in the fall or winter. And it would have to look good – glossy leaves and lots of attractive blooms. A scent would be nice too. This morning I found a candidate. A three-foot tall potted camellia shrub labeled Camellia hiemalis ‘Chansonette’ that’s blooming in the Linnean glasshouse. It has lots of doubled-flowered soft pink flowers. I read that ‘Chansonette’ is a slow growing plant – which makes it ideal for something that’s going to spend its life in a pot that I’ll have to move around. It even has a vague fragrance that I’d describe as similar to what a bouquet of non-fragrant roses smell like after they’re been in a cooler for a while. The Royal Horticultural Society says camellias are easy to grow in containers as long as the soil mix is acidic, so I think I’ll check a few of the local garden centers when I stop by to pick out a Christmas tree.

Each of the pyracantha shrubs planted along the overlook to the temperate glasshouse has one of these tags dangling from an outside branch. The tags don’t say what they are for or what they do, but they do identify their source: Biobest Biological Systems, an international company based in Belgium that develops pollination and biological pest controls.

The Biobest packets on the shrubs are likely meant to protect against thrips, a insect that is no longer than an a dime is thick. Thrips live on the fluids that they suck out of the cells of plant leaves, flowers, and fruit. They leave behind scared or severely damaged plants. The Biobest sachets hanging on the pyancantha contain beige colored predatory mites (Amblyseius cucumeris). They are about the same size as thipes, but they're faster and more agile. More importantly, they also feed on thrips. The predatory mites pierce them first to disable them. Then they eat them.

Each of sachets hanging on the pyracantha are miniature breeders. They contain about a thousand predatory mites that will be automatically be released to eat thrips and breed thousands of more hungry mites for several weeks. Bon Appetit!

Last summer I used elephant ears as centerpieces for my larger container pots. After the first light frost, their leaves sagged and then began to brown. I’ve always treated elephant ears them as a single season plant – get a pot of them in the nursery a couple a weeks after the frost and throw them out after the cold returns. Can they overwinter in this Zone 6 climate? Apparently this botanical garden thinks so. They’ve held on to their crop of Elephant Ears (Alocasia plumea ‘Jurassic Dark’) planted along the walkway to the Chinese Garden. The leaves have been cut back and the ground around the bulb is mulched, but for a plant accustomed to the tropical humidity of Southeast Asia, I would have expected the top to be covered with a heavy layer of mulch. Should be an interesting experiment in survival. As if I needed another reason to look forward to spring.




thick overcast with some drizzle: light wind: 48ºF


The end. The first widespread killing freeze last week ended the life of most summer plants and flowers that were still hanging on.

The display gardens is filled with these yellow sticks. Each stick identifies the spring bulbs planted around in that spot. The sticks are temporary. More formal black markers with white typeset lettering will replace them when the bulbs bloom. I’ve always preferred the sticks though. They’ll be here all winter to remind garden visitors of what’s to come. Once in a while I take pictures of the sticks and then look up the names of the bulbs in my Brent and Becky’s Bulbs catalog. Seeing the pictures makes it easier to imagine what’s to come. Here’s the tulip pair underneath this stick: Happy Family: “a wonderful multiflowering [reddish pink] tulip with one large flower (the 'daddy'), one medium sized flower (the 'mom') and several small flowers (the children); a whole family on one stem!” and Mariette: “an incredibly elegant deep, satin rose [lily-shaped] tulip with silvery white base and edges.”


I’ve visited the holiday flower show three times to find a poinsettia named ‘Red Glitter.’ It’s a variety released just this year by poinsettia grower and breeder Paul Ecke. Red Glittter is listed as one of the plants featured in the show, but it’s not in the display hall. If it was there it would be easy to spot because it’s one of the “jingle-bell” varieties – red bracts with a sprinkling of white speckles. Finally, this morning I found Red Glitter. Instead of being in the display hall, I found it in the Linnean glasshouse. This morning dozens of pots of Red Glitter are lining the walkway in the house. Each plant has very different markings. Some are just speckled white; some have violent streaks of white; others have well-marked bands of white. What I like best about the plant though is how intense the colors are and how the deep greenish-black of the leaves helps to set off the reds and whites of the bracts. As much as I like looking at Red Glitter, I don’t think I’d buy it. It probably would appeal more to those adventurous folks who like to decorate their houses with multi-colored lights for the holidays. I’ve trimmed mine with all white lights this year.

Repeat anything a few times and what was surprising becomes predictable and expected. That’s how it is with this crop of fall flowering snowdrops. I was astonished when I saw them blooming in the Bird Garden a few years ago. Now I come back to the same spot every year expecting them to be in flower. There’s a fall-blooming variety talked about on the web called Galanthus reginae-olgae but who’s to say whether the clump flowering here is that or not.


Before today I never noticed this tree. In summer a tree with green leaves like this one doesn’t stand out much. In December though, it's unique. The leaves on this tall tree growing near the work shed at the far end of the Japanese Garden are still glossy green. Oddly enough, it has clusters of catkins dangling from the ends of some of its branches and small cones like these attached to the ends of others. The label wired to one of its lower branches identifies the tree as Alnus cordata meaning alder tree with heart-shaped leaves. My reference book, Flora, says the tree’s common name is Italian Alder. Since it’s native to southern Italy and the Mediterranean islands, it shouldn’t be growing here where winter temperatures routinely go far below freezing. However, this botanical garden’s website says that the Italian Alder does ‘best in cool climates” and that it “does not perform well south of USDA Zone 7.” Since the tree’s obviously growing and thriving here as well as around the Mediterranean, I’d say it’s a standoff between the experts.

Writing in the late 1800s, Thomas Wentworth Higgins, an activist writer and minister, wrote an essay on “The Procession of the Flowers.” He wrote about the native alders he observed in Massachusetts in words that reek of slower times, “No symbol could so well represent Nature’s first yielding in spring-time as this blossoming of the Alder, the drooping of the tresses of these tender things. . . How patiently they have waited! Men are perplexed about their own immortality; but these catkins, which hang, almost full-formed, above the ice all winter, show no such solicitude, though when March wooes them they are ready.” For the impatient, I've read that catkin twigs from alders, like those of pussy willows and forsythia, can be picked in late winter and forced to expand and open indoors.





fast moving dark clouds: windy: 54ºF


New planters like this one are being put in place on the low wall around the fountain near the garden. The cardboard shipping cartons that they arrived in say they come from Longshadow Planters, a company about 100 miles southeast of here that also made the industrial-sized planters in the Ottoman Garden. Longshadow makes planters and garden ornaments that take a forklift to move. They use a manufacturing technique called dry casting to make their products. An article in Masonry Magazine says that dry casting uses white cement mixed with an aggregate of gravel and crushed limestone, but no water. Instead of water, the dry mix is compressed into molds with pneumatic rammers. When the pounding stops, the pieces are taken out of the molds and put into damp curing houses for a day. Then the pieces get a final sanding, polishing, and washing before being packed and shipped . The planters being installed here look as though they’re from the Longshadow’s “Highwood” planter collection. If so, they’ll weigh-in at about 300 to 500 pounds each.

If I could pick just one of the Longshadow creations to have, I’d choose their sculpture of the Recumbent Lion. People who build houses and public buildings meant to impress or intimidate have traditionally added sculptures of a pair of alert lions to guard the entrances. Longshadow has softened, tamed, and reversed that symbolism by sculpting lions who are asleep at the job.

The Camellia Sasanqua 'Yuletide' is in full bloom in the Linnaean glasshouse. Its single petals make it look like a shrub rose tacked to a tree and festooned with over-sized bright yellow stamens. In places further south of this botanical garden, I’m sure that many people will have their holiday season marred by frost-bitten ‘Yuletides’ planted in their backyards. Here though, our ‘Yuletide’ camellia, growing safely under glass, never disappoints.

Poinsettias and Christmas: Legend has it that the coupling started when a poor Mexican girl wanted to give the Christ child a gift. She had no money, but she did have a guardian angel. Her angel told her to gather a bouquet of weeds from along the roadside and place them on the altar before Christmas Mass began. Just as the Mass began, the bouquet of weeds suddenly turned into a spray of beautiful crimson poinsettias. And with that miracle, red poinsettias and Christmas were forever linked.


The poinsettia tradition continues at the holiday train show that just opened this week at the botanical garden. Hundreds of pots of poinsettias separate the children from the trains they would like to touch. True to form, most of the plants at the show are some shade of red, with some orange, white, and speckled ones scattered here and there.

My favorite poinsettia this year is this soft-pink colored one with its narrow sculpted bracts. The variety is labeled ‘Eckory’ DOLCE ROSA. The plant is a patented variety of the Paul Ecke Ranch where nearly three-quarters of the poinsettias sold in the country get their start. Dolce Rosa is a cross between a pure white specie of poinsettia discovered growing wild in the mountains on the Pacific side of Mexico and a red poinsettia of another specie. From what I read, this kind of mixing of some newly-discovered wild specie with a well-mannered tamed horticultural variety excites people who breed poinsettias.

Most of us who buy a poinsettia aren’t that interested in a plant’s pedigree. We care about how long it will last or how fussy it is about light and water. Most of all we want a “pretty one.” I read an interview with Dr. Ruth Kobayashi, the breeder of Dolce Rosa, who says that aesthetic qualities like size and color of the bloom, the arrangement of the bracts around the berries, and the color and arrangement leaves has a lot to do with whether people will buy a plant. But she adds that “Aesthetics is one of those very subjective things. . . You have your favorite, one that attracts your eye. . . In people we call it charisma. I’m not sure what to call it in plants, but that’s pretty much what it is.”

I especially like the last part of the interview with Dr. Kobayashi. Even though she’s a poinsettia breeder who sees millions of poinsettias every year, she’s still moved when she talks about the fate of the plants: “These are like family, like friends and it’s really hard after the season’s done. We throw them out, after they’ve shown us all of their glory. I can’t be in the greenhouse for that. It’s thousands of plants that need to go to the dumpster. If I go into the greenhouse and I see that it’s getting started, I leave because it’s just too hard to take.”

After looking at hundreds of red poinsettias in the holiday show, it’s interesting to look at color preferences in tulips. On the rack outside the garden shop all the red ones have been sold. Even at blow-out prices, the whites and yellows are hard to move.





sunny: calm: 62ºF


A botanical garden without tropical water lilies wouldn’t amount to much. What would photographers do without them? Kids have fun pointing at them. Ducks treat them as obstacles to swim around. They’ve been part of this botanical garden for more than 100 years and some 40 varieties of tropical water lilies were created or developed here.

I looked longer at the water lilies this morning because after finishing my walk, I was going to see the Monet water lily show that opened at the art museum last weekend. Monet painted hardy water lilies, not tropicals, but what-the-heck?

The highlight of the show is a massive 42-foot long triptych of three of Monet’s water lily paintings. The paintings were last shown together in 1956. When that show ended, they were separated and sold to three different art museums.

The curator’s book that accompanies the show says that Monet started work on these mural-sized paintings in 1915 and then continued to work on them for another decade. He said they were his “Grand Decoration.”

The lilies in Monet's garden pond at Giverny and the water itself were the models for these paintings. In 1893 Monet diverted water from a nearby river to make his pond. Liking what he did, he tripled the size of the pond and added the now famous Japanese drum bridge that now appears on refrigerator magnets everywhere. Talking about the water lilies in his garden pond, Monet said, “I planted them for pleasure without dreaming of painting them. Suddenly I felt there were fairies in my pond. I took up my brushes and palette and, since then, it has been almost my sole model.”

Water lilies were the in-plants of turn of the century Europe. The craze began when color was added. Before French nurseryman Joseph Latour-Marliac crossed local varieties with ones from African and Asia, hardy water lilies were white or at best a pale yellow. Latour-Marliac’s hybrids were different though. They brought exotic tropical colors to water lilies with a pallette that ranged pink through fuchsias and dark reds.

Monet ordered at least seven of these new exotic varieties for his pond. Monet’s original order forms are still preserved at the archives of French water lily grower Latour-Marliac. In fact, many of same varieties of water lilies that Monet ordered for his garden are still listed in Latour-Marliac’s most recent catalog.

The curator of the art exhibition says that because Monet ‘treated blossoms as color accents” it’s difficult to be specific about what the varieties of lilies are in the paintings on display. However, he goes on to say that the “intense red blooms may be identified as the William Falconer species that Monet acquired in 1904.” Perhaps curator was able to get a closer at the paintings that we visitors who are being watched by guards and kept from getting too close by ropes and alarms. I can say that I saw a spec of red in one of the paintings, but who can say? Here’s a link to a photo of a ‘William Falconer’ with no impressionism added.

Each fall the botanical garden where I walk replaces its summer-blooming flowers with chrysanthemums. There are hundreds of mums blooming all over the garden at this time of year. And except for a few special ones planted in the Japanese Garden, most of the mums are in mass plantings. They’re the kind of mums that every hardware store and supermarket are selling now on their sidewalks and parking lots.

What’s so special about mums and October? October, I learned, is the month of the kiku — or chrysanthemum in Japan. In many public gardens the month is marked by displays of a few special mums of exceptional beauty arranged in complex, artistic ways.

From what I read, there are three unique kinds of kiku arrangements. The first called “Ogiku” is based on a single flower. One large perfect blossom is perched on top of a single tall stem with no side-shoots at all. Then dozens of these perfect specimens (usually in lavender, white, and gold to resemble the traditional colors of ceremonial horse reins) are displayed in diagonal lines with shortest in the front to tallest in the back.

“Kengai” is another arrangement. In this style, small flowered mums are trained to resemble a cascade or a waterfall. They’re designed to drape over a ledge or a wall to look as though they’re flowing from the top to the ground.

The most intricate kiku arrangement is called “Ozukuri” – a thousand blooms. This arrangement looks almost impossible to bring off. In it an artist works with a single mum for over a year to get it to produce hundreds flowers that all bloom at the same time in the shape of a huge dome-shaped array. As far as I know the only places in America to see Ozakuri displays are the “Fall Flowers of Japan” show going on now at the New York Botanical Garden and the Longwood Gardens Chrysanthemum Festival opening later this month. Watch this YouTube video to see how the Longwood Ozukuri comes about.

The keepers of the botanical garden where I walk have planted a dozen or so special specimen mums along a wall in the Japanese Garden. Each is a single stem is topped by a single 3-4 inch flower. Every plant is unique. They’re meant to be appreciated as individuals, not as parts of any classical kiku arrangement. Most of the plants here still are in bud, but when they bloom I’m betting some will have quill petals; others will look like mini-rotini pasta shells or have spoon-shaped petals. I’ll return to see what happens to each of them.





clear: light breeze from the north: 48ºF


After this weekend, no more big events at this botanical garden. The biggest and best attended event of the season – “The Best of Missouri Market” will likely bring about 40,000 visitors to this botanical garden by the time it ends on Sunday afternoon. For the 20th year, vendors fill the big-top tents set up just outside the garden gates. Inside I saw people selling bouquets of cockscombs, young redwoods, hand-carved wooden cardinals and puffins, alpaca shawls, eucalyptus-scented bath salts, pewter nativity sets, dried gourds, and whirligigs made of scrap metal. The biggest crowds though were knotted in front of booths that offered things to taste. I counted six wineries that were pouring non-stop. Then there were pecans to taste, honey spread on crackers, and lots of booths offering cubes of smoked sausage or goat cheeses speared with toothpicks. As in past years though, the booths offering hot, spicy pickles, chips, sauces, salsas, or marinades were the crowd favorites.


I visited the festival garden twice this week -- once last night and again this morning. Last night was to see what the market had to offer and to take a rarely offered evening walk of the grounds. This morning I skipped the market and took a long walk in the garden instead. I took pictures of this same sloping arc of the geodesic dome last night and again early this morning.

Last night I noticed that one of the booths at the Market had a dawn redwood (Metasequoia glyptostroboides) on display. The potted specimen was about eight feet tall and was meant to call attention to a new variety of redwood that was patented by this botanical garden. It’s named ‘Raven’ in honor of Peter Raven, the former president of the garden.


When I went for a guided tree walk a few months ago, the leader said that the 'Raven' variety was marked as being different from the other redwoods seedlings planted in here in 1952. All of the redwoods in the row planted in front of the Lehmann Building are now about 70 feet tall. They all started from seeds collected from a site in China where redwoods were rediscovered growing in the wild after having thought to be extinct for 50 million years. The ‘Raven’ variety was thought to be unique enough to be given a plant patent because of its neat pyramidal shape and its uniform arrangement of branches along its trunk.

I must be tuned into tall trees this morning. Otherwise how could I have missed seeing this one -- it’s the tallest tree in the temperate glasshouse: the Taiwania cryptomerioides. My plant encyclopedia, Flora, says it’s native to Taiwan, parts of mainland China, and to Myanmar. In the wild it can grow up to 180 feet tall. Kew Garden’s website says it’s “a monster of a conifer.” The largest in Asia and a relative of the giant sequoias and California redwoods. In China, the tree is now protected because its wood been logged to near extinction because it has an attractive reddish hue, a pleasant scent, and decay resistance -- all features that make it a popular timber for use in temples and for making coffins.

It’s a little early for fall blooming witches hazels (Hamamelis Virginiana) to flower, but I thought I’d have a look anyway. A couple of shrubs named ‘Harvest Moon’ have been planted just behind the daylily garden. They’re filled with buds and one of the shrubs has a bloom or two. The flowers were was easy to spot because the leaves around them are still green. Too bad that when most of the yellow flowers open, the leaves will have turned yellow too.





clear: calm: 52ºF


This is prime time for the autumn crocuses. A week ago they were just coming up; next week their watery stems will give out and the flowers will flop over. So this is it. See them now or wait until next year. This clump of white ones in the Rock Garden are Colchicum byzantium ‘Album.’ I’ve never paid any attention to the bulbs after they finish blooming, but Brent and Becky’s Bulbs say that their spring time foliage resembles hosta leaves. Now that I know where and when to look, I’ll wait and see.


Who hasn’t said, “I know that guy, but I can’t quite place him.” For a few months, I’ve felt that way about a stand of trees in the Japanese Garden. They’re growing at the far end of the Japanese Garden. The marker says they’re Japanese Red Pine (Pinus densiflora ‘Umbraculifera.’) When I got home, I suddenly remembered where I’d seen them before. I took this picture of small grove of them at the New York Botanical Garden when I visited in May. I noticed that the trees in both gardens had the same shape and distinctive orange-red bark, but didn’t remember that they had the same botanical name. The trees in New York, called Tanyosho Pines, were planted there in 1908. They've developed long, forked bare limbs that open into umbrella-like heads of needles. The sign beside the grove of trees says that “It is only after decades in the ground that they become as grand and graceful as these trees are today.”


The two trees in this botanical garden have spent “decades in the ground” since the Japanese Garden was dedicated in 1977. So they’re beginning to get some of the color and part of the shape as the ones in New York. Even so, what makes the grove in New York so dramatic is their spacing, location, and number. The Tanyoshos there are located on the busiest walkway in the garden – right between the visitor’s center and the tram ride. There are also more of them – five or six of them – located in a open expanse of lawn near the walkway so that when visitors look up they see a canopy of pine needles. This is a side-by-side picture of the Tanyosho pines in both botanical gardens: the one left is growing in the NYBG; on th right is the one growing in botanical garden where I walk

After seeing the more mature Tanyosho pines in this botanical garden and the ones in the New York garden, I wondered what young ones would look like. Frisella Nursery, a local family-owned nursery and landscaper, is opening a garden to honor their grandfather. The tour of the new garden is planned for October 8th and will include a specimen or two of young Tanyosho pines. My camera and I will be there.

Let’s see. I looked back at my archive of walks and found that my last mention of Wollemi Pines (Wollemi nobilis) was in July of 2007. Then I wrote that all of the trees planted outside had died and the ones planted in the temperate glasshouse were either dead or dying. I took an interest in the Garden’s Wollemis because they were so rare. In fact until 1994 when a stand of Wollemi pines was discovered a in remote park in Australia, all of the trees were thought to be dead -- long dead. Fossil records showed that the last Wollemis were wiped out about two million years ago when the earth’s climate became cooler and drier. Since the trees were rediscovered, they’re gone into commercial production. The idea is to make them less exotic and more available so that avarice collectors will leave the wild stand of trees alone. So even though the Wollemis are now widely available (at a price: $100 for an 18” sprig), I hadn't seen them in years until I spotted this potted specimen in the Linnaean glasshouse this morning. It’s in among the hundreds of other pots of tender platns along the south wall of house. The Wollemi pine is still not very big nor is it not much to look, but it’s here and it’s alive.

Picking up a bunch of alstroemeria at Trader Joes’s -- a little pleasure. They don’t cost much; they last a long time; and seem extravagant because they come from places where it’s always warm. I noticed though that more alstroemeria are starting to appear in this garden. Breeders have tweaked some varieties to handle the winters here in Zone 6. This botanical garden now has five varieties of alstroemeria planted in the display garden near the bald cypress trees: ‘Casablanca,’ (the one still blooming), ‘Tangerine Tango,’ ‘Patricia Lynn,’ ‘Koodare,’ and ‘Koice.’ While all of the varieties planted here have bloomed at one time or another over the summer, none of them are free flowering enough to make a decent-sized bunch.

I can’t count this daylily that’s blooming in the Daylily Garden as the last bloomer of the year. It wouldn’t be fair because I’m certain this heavily ruffled, golden fringed very trendy daylily ought to have bloomed in July. I think it’s blooming now because some savvy gardener willed it to and then planted it out here for us visitors to enjoy. This daylily is such a recent arrival that it doesn’t even have a name plate yet.





overcast: calm: 57ºF


All of the grassy areas in the botanical garden were aerated last week. The work must have been done after the heavy rains on Wednesday because the cylindrical plugs of soil extracted by the aerators haven’t lost their shape. Grass seed has also been sown on the bald patches of the lawns and sod has been put in place along the sides of walkways worn down by crowds of summer visitors.

Squirrels are everywhere. They’ve nearly polished off the not-yet-ripened acorns from the saw-toothed oaks in the entry plaza. They’re biting the stems off the softball-sized Osage oranges and then picking at the fallen fruits. The pawpaws in the English Garden are gone. So is every one of what thought would be the most the abundant crop ever of Japanese persimmons in the Chinese Garden. A few years ago the ripe persimmons lasted long into the fall. Here’s a picture that I took in mid-November 2003 of the fruit that was on the same trees that are now bare.

I don’t know what the Garden is doing to manage their growing population of squirrels. On their website they maintain a c’est la vie attitude, “Unfortunately, little can be done to control squirrels.” They go on to say that relocating squirrels, making the surroundings less attractive to them, and repelling them with pepper sprays all have their shortcomings. While the garden’s website doesn’t specifically mention it as a control method, it does show a picture labeled “natural squirrel control with fox kit.” For several years the garden did have a small number of red foxes in the English Garden. But, a keeper recently told me that all the foxes are gone now. So what’s left? There’s a rogue white cat that I see wandering the garden once in the while, but it’s more likely to go after easy preys like birds than to tussle with a squirrel.

Back in 1997, the botanical garden used another way of keeping down the squirrel population – they shot them. They stopped when an article in the newspaper exposed the practice. A garden official admitted "I hate like hell to have the story out - but it's the truth." I don't know what else to say." He added, "We've stopped [but] what we'll do in the future, I don't know . . . This is a museum, and they come in and eat our exhibits." From what I can see, the cease fire holds and the squirrel are winning. In these more conservative times though, I wonder if there’s a stronger constituency for resuming the war.

I spotted the first autumn crocus (Colchicum autumnale) of the season this morning in the Ottoman Garden. I’m hardly the first to notice their September flowering though. In the 16th century Gerard wrote in his Herball, “The floure of Saffron doth first rise out of the ground nakedly in September, and his long small grassie leaves shortly after.” Most years I think of how flimsy and short-lived the crocuses are. It’s rare that I see them blooming and upright at the same time. This year because of an article I read last week, I look at them differently. The article said that researchers have known for a long time that a chemical in autumn crocuses has anti-cancer properties. But because that chemical can’t discriminate between cancer cells and healthy cells it hasn’t been used much. Last week a cancer research institute in England reported that they were able to alter the molecule of the crocus’ cancer-killing chemical so that it stays inactive until it reaches the cancer tumor. Then like a smart bomb, it detonates in the tumor killing the cancer cells and leaving the healthy cells unscathed. Right now, that’s how it works in mice. If all goes well, clinical trials will begin in about 18 months.

Last week I noticed that the botanical garden had a job opening for a rosarian. When I looked today, the opening had been filled. And none too soon. The rose gardens are as poorly cared for as I’ve ever seen them. Nearly all of the beds are toothy with gaps left by untended or diseased plants. Some of the beds have no shrubs at all. Signs left over from early spring read, “Some of the roses in this bed have died due to the severe winter, Even though they look like they’re suffering now, these roses will soon be the size of other roses in the bed.” Not! They’re still suffering. I’m looking forward to see what new leadership brings to these gardens that used to be exquisite.

While I’m at it, add another thing to carp about: the All-American Rose Selection winner for 2011. It has a great name – “Walking on Sunshine” and a pedigree from the rose people at Jackson & Perkins. The AARS writers say, “This rose should be an easy success for those new to roses because of its fantastic bloom production, plant vigor and good disease resistance. It produces clusters of bright yellow anise scented flowers which finish light yellow in color.” Admittedly, it’s now mid-September, so maybe “Walking on Sunshine” has seen better days. Still, I think it’s destined to be a lackluster performer in the nursery trade. Given a choice between a small yellow rose and any of the “Knock-Out” AARS winners, I’d pick a “Knock-Out” hands-down.

“Mason bees” the sign beside the cylinder of paper tubes used for their nesting places says. Mason bees are native species that carry more pollen to orchards and gardens than do honeybees. The don’t make honey, but neither are they apt to sting or aggressively pursue people. I learned that female bees will lay their eggs in these hollow tubes. After each round of egg laying the female bee adds a dollop of pollen for the emerging young to feed on. Once a tube is filled with eggs and pollen, the bee closes off the end with a dab of mud. The eggs hatch in summer and feed off the pollen until spring. Then they break the seal and emerge as adults. This must not have been a good year for mason bees at the garden. Only three of the dozens of open tubes in this nest are occupied.





mist: calm: 64ºF


Right on schedule. When the Japanese Festival wrapped up over Labor Day and so did the summer plantings in the botanical garden’s main display gardens. Canna’s got replaced with cabbages and budding chrysanthemums. (I’ve stopped calling them “mums” ever since I read garden catalog reviewer Katharine S. White’s denouncement of shortened words: “I detest the cozy flower abbreviations. “Mums” is probably the most repellent of the lot, unless it is “Glads.”) While all the fall plants are in, none of the labels are. By next week though, the new things will get their names.

I felt sorry for the pots of Begonias named 'Art Hodes' that I saw in the in the Linnean House a few weeks ago. I thought their keepers had forgotten to water them. Everything in my experience told that me a plant with drooping leaves needs water. I've watched the three pots of 'Art Hodes' for a month now. Their leaves still droop. This morning I felt them. They're sturdy, course, leathery - definitely not dying. This is new to me -- a tough crusty-looking old plant that looks as though its dying, but isn't. I goggled through ten pages of 'Art Hodges' begonias on the web to see if others noticed. No one had. Sellers had only glowing descriptions. Here's one of them: "Art Hodes’ is a striking beauty with its luminous halo of fine red hairs that cloaks the large textured tropical leaves of this handsome begonia" A horticulturist from the botanic garden in Toledo had more measured words: A begonia with a little bite to it and a tough as nails mentality, is probably the best way to describe the Art Hodes selection of rhizomatous begonia. The textural allure of this plant outweighs its slightly annoying flowers." Perhaps the keepers of this botanical garden have their reasons for putting the pots of 'Art Hodes' so near the walkway in the Linnean House where visitors can hardly miss them. I would have chosen somewhere else. An aside: Art Hodes (long on the e) was a blues and jazz pianist best known in the 1930’s and 40’s. But I don’t know how his name got hooked up with this begonia.

Too late for the Japanese Festival a week ago, but the cool, damp weather brought out these pleated umbrella mushrooms growing outside the Linnean House. A quick match of what I saw with google images identified them as a pleated inkcap nicknamed “Little Japanese Umbrella” (Parasola plicatilis). Descriptions I read said they appear in well-mowed grass after an overnight rain. Like daylily blooms, these inkcaps will last just a day. For a brief time in the morning the mushrooms have the parasol shape in this picture. Then they spread their spores, decay, and completely disappear within a day.

Who knows why, but when I saw a couple of clumps of switch grass (Panicum virgatum 'Northwind') growing near the bench in the Bakewell Court, I remembered a State of The Union speech made by President George W. Bush in which he mentioned switch grass being as a promising new source of ethanol. I looked up his speech. It was made in 2006. In it he said, “We will also fund additional research in cutting-edge methods of producing ethanol, not just from corn but from wood chips, stalks, or switch grass. Our goal is to make this new kind of ethanol practical and competitive within six years.” Where’s switchgrass now? The six years are up. According to an article in the New York Times published in July, “While production pathways are available that make ethanol from those feedstocks [switchgrass and miscanthus], the processes are currently expensive and cumbersome, and not yet proven to be commercially viable.” So no fuel from switchgrass yet, but it's still an attractive ornamental.

A cooler morning means that the some of climbing moonflowers (Ipomoea alba) that bloomed last night in the Scented Garden stay open a little longer into the day. The blooms are still full and their characteristic starfish shape is still well-marked. Gone though is their fragrance. When I grew moonflowers in my garden, I would frequently go out on still summer nights to stand near the moonflower plants to be enveloped by their perfume.

The iris garden is being renewed. About fifty irises have been put it to replace irises that used to be here. From the labels I looked at, the replacements seem to be varieties developed within the last three years. Many of the replacements are creations of Keith Keppel, an award winning iris hybridizer who’s been at it for more than fifty years. Here’s a stem from a 2011 hybrid that Keppel named ‘Safari Sunrise.’ When it blooms, here’s what to expect: ‘Safari Sunrise’


Most hydrangeas develop a slight reddish burnish as they age. There’s one bordering the Victoria Garden that’s different. When I looked at the Hydrangea ‘Preziosa’ in the summer, it was mostly white with a tinge of pink. Now that it’s finished blooming, it’s looks as though it’s blooming again – this time in a a rich crimson. ‘Preziosa’ is a mophead hydrangea, but the heads are just a few inches across so they’re less likely to bow to the rain and wind. This I thought was the perfect hydrangea. Then I read the botanical garden’s caution about it: “Plants could lose significant numbers of flower buds or die to the ground in harsh winters, thus respectively impairing or totally destroying the bloom for the coming year.” The variety of mopheads I have at home have huge white heads and they flop over every time it rains, but each year they bloom reliably regardless of the winter. Who was it said, “You make your choices and you live with them.”




clear: calm: 85ºF


Labor Day weekend: At the botanical garden that means it’s time for the annual Japanese Festival. It’s time to look again at the over-sized koi windsocks flying from tall bamboo poles and to see the reflection of paper lanterns on the water. The three-day event is expected to draw about 35,000 people.

Traditional and pop culture get all mixed up at the festival. There’s a portable Shinto shire for symbolically moving the rice god from the mountains to the fields as well as vendors who stock Japanese comic books, graphic t-shirts of anime figures, and plush toys of the saw-toothed Domo and the forever cute Hello Kitty.

It’s nice to see that the Candy Man is back again too. Each year he looks older, but each year he’s performing again, agile as ever, entertaining the crowd that gathers around him by deftly sculpting delicate birds out of blobs of spun sugar.

While there are plenty of people here carrying flowered umbrellas and dressed in kimonos, there are also many teenagers who come to the festival for a chance show-off their costumes that transform them from adolescents into little girls and boys or anime characters. My favorite: two teenagers dressed in matching stripped bumble bee outfits toppedwith headbands of bobbling antennae.


If this year follows suit, the summer plantings will get ripped out right after the Japanese Festival ends. Somewhere there must be hundreds of pots of budding mums ready to take over for the mature, tattered cannas, vinca, and celesia in the main display gardens. Get one last look this week because by next week I’m betting they’ll be gone. I got my last look at the plants I liked best this year: Dahlia ‘Eye Candy’ and an Pearl Millet (Pennicetum glaucum) named ‘Jade Princess.’ Neither are at their peak this late in the season, but this is what they looked like in mid-summer. Both plants need more watering, more regular fertilizing, and a better soil than I’m likely to ever give them so I’ll just enjoy them here and steer clear of trying to grow them at home.

The annual bonsai/ikebana show fills the display hall this weekend – flower arrangements on one side and bonsai on the other. A bonsai master was shaping a juniper brought straight from a nursery while an audience of about 50 people stared as he transformed an ordinary shrub into a classical bonsai. Among the bonsai I noticed several displays of miniature hostas like this one. While no one has yet taken to cutting or wiring the leaves of these little ones, they do have a naturally satisfying shape.

In past years the foyer to the display hall was filled with pedestals topped with prize winning bonsai and ikebana vases. This year was different. Instead of real flowers and plants, there was a large arrangement of artificial red, white, and pink camellias scattered among silk camellia leaves mounted atop a tripod of bamboo sticks. The arangement was impressive, but seemed out of place in this kind of show. Nearby a sign explained why the wreath-like arrangement was there: “In commemoration of the victims of natural disasters.” I learned that in Japanese literature the short-lived camellias blossoms symbolize sudden unexpected death. The tough, glossy evergreen leaves represent eternal life.

“At any time in any color,” so says the garden encyclopedia Flora about clematis blooms. For a flower with ‘Virgin’s Bower’ as its common name, I would have thought they’d be more particular. When I think clematis, I first imagine the pinks, purples, magentas of the jackmanii group that climb up mailbox posts all summer. Next I picture the sweet smelling white flowers of the autumn clematis that cover the telephone poles in my neighborhood in the fall. Never would I imagine this coarse-looking plant that’s spread its hairy leaves over a shady corner in the English Woodland Garden. The label says it’s a Clematis heracleifolia. The delft-blue tubular flowers that bloom at the ends of woody stocks remind me of specie hyacinth flowers. Next week I’ll bend down to smell them to see whether they smell like hyacinths or anything at all. These are the kind of flowers that get noticed only because they bloom in this dog-day season. They would be easy to ignore in prime time.


The last daylilies of the year are in bloom this morning. All the rest of the hundreds of varieties planted here have finished flowering. It’s no surprise that a variety named “After Awhile Crocodile” is in bloom. It’s been the season’s last for the past couple of years. Judging by the number of the buds still left on the scape, it will again be the season finale. The other daylily in bloom is a miniature, double flowered daylily named ‘Micro Chip.’ It won a national award in 2010 as the best late blooming daylily.