October Notes 2017

I’m waiting. Waiting for the birds to get where they are going, the squirrels to finish the chestnuts, the rabbits to hunker down in their warm holes for the winter. Then I will come out of my hole and get to work planting not so native seeds for spring, trimming sick elderberries, cleaning up the vegetable beds, collecting chestnut husks for the fire, planting winter rye and harvesting the sweet potatoes. For now I’m picking okra which is kind of like an Easter egg hunt. The part you eat is the seed pod and it has a way of hiding itself. If you don’t get it at the perfect time it get’s big and tough. I’m also continuing my quest for knowledge about this mysterious plant world around me.

On the blog, Awkward Botany, I’ve found that maybe weeds aren’t so bad. That in cities they are a big help with erosion, carbon sequestering as well as water, soil and air filtration. Who knows maybe people will someday be lining up for the latest cultivar of prickly lettuce.

Is the pinkish plant caught by the light a weed or a good garden plant? I’m going for the good garden plant.

My plan for buying local ecotype seeds from Ernst Seeds  didn’t quite pan out. They only sell seeds by the ounce or more and didn’t have the ones I was looking for but I haven’t written them off and their hard copy catalog, while not much to look at photo wise has some really good information, lots of seed variety and it’s great for getting me off the internet. I ended up buying non local ecotype seeds from Prairie Moon Nursery in Minnesota where I could get them in the small quantities I needed. I’ll go into that more when I plant them next month.

I also ventured out into the field or in my case woods in search of local ecotype seeds and what I found, low and behold, was seeds. The place is just down the hill, it’s actually the riparian area along a creek known as Sligo Creek where a 10 mile narrow strip of land has been allowed to turn back into woods made up of a good number of most likely true native plants or local ecotypes as well as non natives. Yes, there are the usual native trees such as beech, tulip poplar, and oak but I was surprised at the variety of herbaceous plants, kind of hard to believe given the large deer populations and other aggressive non native plants (mostly lesser celandine, bush honeysuckle and English ivy). The herbaceous plants I found are unassuming plants but the way they grow together somehow fits the scene. Some form large healthy stands while others are scattered, just a few here and there. Each has interesting qualities especially as a community.

Asters are scattered in with other most likely native flora.

It just so happens an actual botanist lives in the area and in 2003 tried to record all of the plants along Sligo Creek. It’s an impressively long list with all kinds of names I’ve never heard of. Bosc’s panic grass, straw-colored cyperus, stellate sedge, glomerate sedge, Willdenow’s sedge, carrion flower, arrow-leaved tearthumb, hog peanut, pencil flower, brushy aster, Florida blue lettuce, wild licorice, cleavers. I could go on and on.

Bottlebrush grass highlights the background of this flood plain along Sligo Creek.

I know the world is changing fast. 2003 is a long time ago, but as I walked through this woods, I noticed a good number of plants I’d never seen before and a few such as bottlebrush grass (Elymus hystrix) I’ve seen in Prairie Moon’s catalog from Minnesota. I gathered a few seeds from the bottlebrush grass as well as some from something I think is called honewort and a few others but I think the point I’m making here is that if local ecotypes can survive in a place so disturbed as this, imagine what else is still out there in places not so disturbed. In other words, I have hope. Maybe things aren’t as bad as they seem. Maybe there is something still worth preserving. Maybe all is not lost. Not that I’m against change or anything. Not that I’m a hopeless romantic longing for past forgotten times.

Could this be a thornless hawthorn tree?

I also discovered a grove of trees, some with red and some with yellow berries. After doing various online searches I decided they must be some form of hawthorn but they didn’t have thorns so I’m left wondering. I’m not done yet. I took a few berries and planted them around my garden.

I wonder if plants growing even as close as Sligo Creek which is no more than half a mile from my garden are even suitable to grow in my garden which is not a riparian area although it does catch runoff from my roof and other nearby hardscapes. I realize I probably shouldn’t be picking too many seeds from Silgo Creek as there aren’t huge populations of these plants and the ones there probably have a hard enough time surviving without me messing with their natural reproduction process. But it’s good to to notice what is there.

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September Notes 2017

The Final Touch

I once was camping during the Fourth of July at a place called Janes Island State Park right outside of a very small town named Crisfield on the Eastern Shore. There was a fireworks show in the town so we went. It wasn’t an extraordinary show but the night was beautiful on the water. The moon was out. It was a big event in a small town. At the end of the show during the grand finale, a boy yelled out, “It’s the final touch!” That’s kind of how I feel about my garden right now.

Speaking of the garden, since we’ve gotten so much rain I haven’t had to water in months. In fact, I really haven’t had to do much other than the usual pulling of porcelain berry and bindweed and cutting dead looking ugly stuff (it has to look pretty ugly for me to cut it). I keep wanting to cut down the really sick elderberry so I can plant something else there but the birds like it so much I just can’t bring myself to do the job. So I’ve been learning about ecology and ecotypes which have led me to spending way too much time on Ernst Seed’s website browsing through local ecotypes I’d like to have and trying to fit square pegs into round holes. This is doubly irritating as their website is somewhat on the slow side so I ordered the catalog which might keep me off the internet at least.

Back to my so called ecological garden, I’ve discovered pollinators of all sizes love porcelain berry flowers to the point I didn’t want to pull it but then the insanely large white snakeroot exploded in bloom which they seemed to like better so I didn’t feel so bad about pulling the porcelain berry.

In a much older post, I called this grapevine but actually it’s porcelain berry (Ampelopsis brevipedunculata), an invasive plant in my area but the pollinators do love it.

White snakeroot (Ageratina altissima) in background. Doesn’t look like much until I get up close and really look. That’s when I see.

I think this photo captures the shimmery effect of all the pollinators.

And flies like it too.

Not only do pollinators love the white snakeroot explosion but so do birds like this common yellowthroat warbler who’s been hanging around for weeks and even, to my utmost joy, used a bird bath I set aside especially for it (actually I think it’s a her).

There is a warbler in there.

One day I saw a redstart and a flycatcher as well as the other usuals; cat birds, song sparrows, wrens, robins, mockingbirds and the like all in there together. This is probably because the explosion of white snakeroot is covered with not only large and medium sized bees, but also these tiny ones that look like ants with wings and probably are ants with wings. And I even had time to smell the white snakeroot explosion, a sweet smell like spring which is nice at this time of year.

It seems I may have three different strains of white snakeroot. Well, there are two plants that look noticeably different from the white snakeroot explosion plant.

White snakeroot (Ageratina altissima) mystery plant?

White Snakeroot (Ageratina altissima ‘Chocolate’) This one looks like one called Chocolate. I have no idea how it got here but I’m glad I let it grow.

In addition to the activity in the white snakeroot, we’ve made some other strange wildlife observations. One day, my husband noticed a squirrel walk right in front of him looking like it was wearing a fur coat. It turned out to be a mother squirrel carrying her baby. The fur coat was the baby’s tail wrapped around the mother’s neck.

I thought milkweed was poisonous but apparently not to rabbits who’ve recently taken quite a liking to it. I’ve seen them take down entire stalks from the bottom and devour the entire thing at one time. This can’t be good for any monarch larvae or eggs that might be attached to the plant.

I’ve noticed a squirrel chewing on this same piece of bark under our wood pile. We’ve also noticed rabbits chewing on the corner of our neighbor’s brick garage. We’ve guessed they’re sharpening their teeth which is probably important so they can bite through tough milkweed stalks and nut shells. The chestnuts, with their thorny husks have been falling from our chestnut tree and landing in our driveway and making a loud bang when they hit the tin covering our wood pile.

As for my food, I harvested seven butternut squashes and would have probably gotten more if two didn’t split and rot on the vine and the plant didn’t die of mildew from all the rain. The turnips I planted a month ago have finally taken off. I guess rabbits don’t like them too much. The roots aren’t ready to eat but I’ve been eating the greens as well as those from some much older radishes. My favorite way to eat them is destemmed and stir fried in a little olive oil, salt and water. Cooked just until tender.

Arugula works as both food and cover crop.

Arugula is making a nice ground cover/salad green and it looks like I’ll be getting some tomatoes after all. The squirrels ate all the tomatoes from a group of four plants but one plant remains. It was planted later than the others and in a different location. It looks healthy unlike the others and the forever green tomatoes are finally turning. So, maybe if I want tomatoes I need to plant them later in the season so when they finally get ripe, the squirrels are too busy collecting nuts.

I’ve really come to like roasted okra. I like to roast it until it gets kind of charred, about 40 minutes at 400°.

In the front yard garden, a work in progress, the marigolds are finally doing what I intended which is work as a cover crop, define the border and be pretty. I’m not sure the African variety  (in background) goes with the style but they certainly are ostentatious and yes, I will be designing my future front yard garden around NOT having an ugly rabbit fence. I wrote a post listing some crops rabbits don’t seem to like.

The white snakeroot is looking kind of scraggly here so I’m getting ready to cut them down. I took up the sod on the slope and planted winter rye. I’ll be going into more detail about that at some point.

For now, the air is calm, but things are happening. The locusts belt out their final calls. Squirrels are gathering nuts. Rabbits are just eating. Birds are starting their migration. There’s a lot for me to do too but I’d better get out and enjoy the final touch before the show is over.

The Mysterious World of Ecotypes

This Great Blue Lobelia (Lobelia siphilitica) is not a local ecotype but the bees don’t seem to mind.

I’m browsing through my favorite native plant catalog getting ready to order some not so native plant seeds from a place in Minnesota. The photographs and print quality in this catalog is so good sometimes I look at it just to loose myself for awhile. Then I somehow run into a conundrum as I cross reference the plants in this catalog with other native plant resources. This actually happens often in the world of native plants as it’s not so easy to know what’s native and what’s not. The conundrum has to do not just with how to define what’s native but even more importantly how to decide if the plant material will perform its ecological duties while not causing ecological harm.

Organizations such as the USDA, Wild Ones, as well as my own local native plant society, suggest it’s best to buy plants native to the region where they will be planted. They seem to suggest that a plant in its natural habitat (the place where species with basically the same genetics have grown since before European settlement) will offer the best ecological services while being the best adapted to to its environment.

The key word here is region. Apparently scientists have figured out that these natural habitats or ecological regions have actual boundaries and can be separated from other regions according to similar characteristics such as geology, soil, terrain and climate. They call these regions, ecoregions. A plant growing in the ecoregion it originated in before European settlement is known as a local ecotype. They suggest planting local ecotypes prevents the gene pool of true local ecotypes from becoming diluted therefore maintaining plant biodiversity. Something like that anyway.

It’s complicated but it does make sense except when I examine the EPA’s ecoregion map, my garden seems to sit smack on the line between the Southeastern Plains that goes down to Louisiana and Northern Piedmont that goes up into New Jersey. That’s a pretty big area. I don’t know how Louisiana can be called local to Maryland. And since I’m on the line between two regions, which do I choose?

The other dilemma I face is practicality. Once I figure out from what region I’m suppose to get these plants for my garden, where in that region am I to get them? My local native plant society lists local nurseries that may have them. They suggest I ask them if the plants I’m buying originated in my region. Most of the plants are around $10.00 each and for some reason these places don’t sell seed. It would cost a lot of bucks to fill my garden with plants from these places. I like to buy trees and shrubs from these nurseries because they’re the bones of my garden but when it comes to growing forbs and grasses where lots of plants are needed to cover the ground, I’ve found seeds are the way to go.

With this in mind, I have several options. First, I could buy one plant, wait until it makes seed and then spread that seed but somehow that’s just not very enticing. Unless the plant is really aggressive (like common milkweed) it would take years for it to make seed if that one plant is lucky enough to survive.

Second, I could try and find places to collect seeds in the wild and I admit the very idea of foraging through a meadow filled with wildflowers sounds inviting but the natural areas nearby are generally forests where the plants are mostly trees with understory plants. My garden is not a forest. It’s more like a forest edge where the soil has been farmed for centuries and then divided into housing plots at the beginning of this century. It’s an environment nothing like it was before European settlement. And I must add I’ve hiked through many natural areas in my two regions and I’ve never seen meadow plants such as sneezeweed or great blue lobelia anywhere.

But the real question I think is, are the not so native plants in my garden causing ecological harm? Are they weakening gene pools or becoming invasive themselves? They certainly aren’t having any problem thriving. Pollinators of all shapes and sizes love them. Migratory and common city birds, rabbits, squirrels, chipmunks, voles and deer hang around them. That’s all I know.

While writing this, I seemed to recall one of the native plant seed companies I don’t usually buy from. The company, Ernst Seeds, located in northwestern Pennsylvania focuses on larger projects such as highways, not small gardens like mine. They don’t put out a beautiful catalog intended for small gardeners and tend to sell in bulk but it just so happens that when browsing through their online catalog, the word, ecotype pops up for each plant item they sell. It seems the seeds they sell originate from all over the East Coast. The ecotype is listed according state, not region, but it’s a promising start. I’ve purchased seeds from them before and I was able to buy them by the ounce at a reasonable price. It just wasn’t as easy as throwing a pack of seeds into a virtual shopping cart. At any rate, I think I’ll give them another try and hopefully I’ll be on my way to being a more ecologically correct gardener.

 

Pretty Garden Crops

The pretty flower of an okra plant (with a bee in it).

I’m trying to come up with some pretty crops for the front yard garden (for next year). Ones that I don’t have to surround with a not so pretty bunny fence or that don’t start out pretty and then turn ugly like gangly, disease prone, indeterminate tomatoes. So far, I’ve come up with;

1. Okra – This plant is very pretty and tall (plants can reach 6 feet). It needs a good amount of space, approx. 5 feet between rows and 18″ between plants. Likes warm weather.
2. Arugula – It’s pretty, tasty and grows fairly quickly. I like to sprinkle the seeds around and rake them in gently with a hand held 3 prong cultivator where they can grow to work as a ground cover as well as salad greens. Also, if left to go to seed (flowers are pretty to me at least), will reseed in the fall. Likes cool weather.
3. Peppers – Pretty, bushy plant in many varieties but I think the ones with the smaller hotter peppers tend to be the prettiest. Needs to be germinated indoors at least a month prior to planting in my area. Also needs a good amount of phosphorus. Looks good with herbs like basil or parsley. Likes warm weather.
4. Cherry tomatoes – Because of the small fruit size these plants tend to remain attractive especially when planted with other pretty herbs (like basil and parsley).
5. Mustards – Also a quick grower and many interesting varieties. I plant it the same way I do arugula and it works very well as a cover crop. Greens can get a bit on the bitter side if too mature. Likes cool weather.
6. Radish – These are fun, fast growing and fairly goof proof. Can be planted as a cover crop and with other crops such as tomatoes and peppers. Roots need to be eaten before they get too big and bitter. Greens can be eaten any time. Likes cool weather.
7. Squash – I grow at least one butternut squash plant every year which yields at least 5 (or more) large squash. The plant is attractive but sprawls everywhere and of course you can’t mow it when it creeps into the lawn. Smaller less sprawly squash plants like summer squash might be a better option. I plant summer squash later in the season as they seem less prone to the dreaded borer worm. I’ve never had a borer worm problem with butternut. Likes warm weather.
8. Perennial onions – Haven’t tried them yet but some varieties such as Egyptian Walking look promising. I’m guessing they may need contained as the name implies they are spreaders and the catalog calls them “hardy”.
9. Sunflowers – If you like sunflower seeds. Unfortunately for me squirrels and rats do.

Well, that’s about all I can come up with so far but I’m open to suggestions…

 

The So Called Ecological Garden

While running to get my camera and change lenses so I can capture some bee I’ll probably never have the time to identify or will waste too much time trying to, I often wonder why I work so hard doing these things that most would classify as somewhat nutty. I’m not an ecologist. I’m not being paid to do what I do and now after reading a post written by an ecologist, I wonder if I’m just wasting my time doing what it is I do which I guess could be described as ecological gardening.

The article is written by Chris Helzer, who as The Nature Conservancy’s Director of Science in Nebraska, works to restore and conserve prairies in the Nebraska area. In a nutshell, the article basically seems to say that because backyard gardens are usually very small isolated areas, they don’t save species because the species that are in trouble need large prairies to survive. The species that take advantage of small gardens are usually generalized meaning they can survive in a variety of habitats and don’t need backyard gardens. Granted, the author is referring to prairie conservation, I can only guess this extends to species that rely on other types of ecosystems such as forests or wetlands. Unfortunately, this is because when I think about it, it makes a lot of sense. In fact, I’ve often thought about it but it still doesn’t make it any less of a disappointment. Just because I want it, doesn’t mean it is.

My garden is part of a pretty strange system. The birds are mostly city birds I can almost count on the fingers of two hands; robins, crows, house sparrows, blue jays, song sparrows, mourning doves, goldfinches, catbirds, mockingbirds, cardinals, wrens, a few woodpeckers and every now and then a nuthatch, titmouse or chickadee. Huge flocks of starlings settle over everything and then leave just as fast as they came. I’ve never witnessed a baby bird take its first flight from the nests in my garden because the crows or something always seem to get to them first. I’ve seen rats and voles and chipmunks and deer but these aren’t struggling specialized species. These are the ones who seem to thrive in this kind of urban/suburban environment.

Some rarer birds like warblers and flycatchers come through in the spring and fall. Hawks come down at this time of year trying to snag a rabbit, rat or squirrel. Signs of a fox can be found every now and then. As for pollinators, that’s a tough one because I’ve noticed many, large and small but I have to admit being a complete novice at identification.  Monarchs seem to be everywhere but apparently they got confused because of unusual weather patterns. 

As for amphibians, I’ve heard one frog and it was the most exciting moment ever. Then it was gone.

Rabbits of all sizes are everywhere. They are barely scared of me, sometimes they come so close I’m the one that backs away. This seems to be heaven for them.

The so called wetland I made is really just a swale filled with violets, white snakeroot, some not so native native plants as well as non native ones. It’s nothing close to a real wetland, where water and land have formed complex biodiverse communities over centuries.

So, alas, my garden can not be a prairie, forest or wetland. Ok, I know I may be saving species indirectly by filtering or capturing runoff water that would otherwise be polluting the Chesapeake Bay but it doesn’t quite give the same satisfaction as providing a habitat in my backyard. Nevertheless, I will carry on with my planning, planting and dreaming and if, by chance one of those struggling species should happen upon my garden during their travels, they will surely find this a fine refuge.

Elderberry Issues

I and my garden friends (birds, bees, etc.) love elderberry (Sambucus Canadensis) but it’s been slowly dawning on me they just aren’t doing too well. I have two full grown shrubs. One is about five years old and the other, a seedling from the first, is about three. At first they grow quickly, up and out stopping at around 12 feet all around. It’s at this point and at this time in the season their leaves start looking like this:

And this:

This isn’t fall foliage. I’m not sure what it is exactly. It could be the soil they are growing in was compacted during construction. Or it could be the soil is too clayey because of construction disturbance or it could be a fungus like Fusarium wilt or it could be a combination.

Articles such as this one say to cut away sick branches. Another good one can be found here. 

Well, last year I cut out some sick branches, but maybe not all, and this year it looked worse so it seems like I’m going to have to prune these shrubs pretty much to the ground each year. I ask myself do I want to take that on?

I get the feeling they aren’t growing in their preferred environment. Either that or they are meant to do their thing during the early stages of ecological succession and then give way to the longer living, slower growing stuff. So, this gives me something to think about if anything and maybe some wood for the wood burner.