Pollenatrix

Blogging the march of invasive species

A better read than a horror flick, this blog tracks the destructive path of flora and fauna in places they ought not be.

Sweet sweet peas

Mmmmmmm.... Sweet peas. I can never get enough of their candy colours and sweet smell. I came across this article this morning, and am now dreaming of where I could actually stick some seeds in the ground; maybe I can persuade Ursula, kind mistress of our apartment block garden, to set aside a little space for them?

Full Article:

Savoring the sweet pea

Joan S. Bolton - Special To The Record
11/28/04

Fetching. Charming. Undeniably adorable.

What is it about sweet peas, that so many warm and fuzzy adjectives immediately come to mind?

The scent? The ruffles? The delicate color combinations?

Whatever the appeal, it's certainly timeless.

Indeed, the history of sweet peas dates back to the Moors, who cultivated the Sicilian wildflower (Lathyrus odoratus) in the mid-1400s.

In 1699, a Franciscan monk named Father Frances Cupani shared seeds with gardening friends in England and Holland. Cupani's sweet peas bore small, pungent, purple and burgundy flowers on short stems. Remarkably, they've withstood the test of time - I grew my first Cupani's Originals five years ago, and they've reseeded every winter since.

But the real frenzy hit in the late 1800s, when an Englishman, Henry Eckford, got hold of the plants and started breeding. By 1900, some 300 varieties of sweet peas were available, with more than 100 developed by Eckford. All of the sweet peas bore pretty flowers. But their scent was the main attraction.

That changed the following year, when Silas Cole discovered a mutation of a grandiflora sweet pea called Prima Donna in the British garden where he worked. This new sweet pea had ruffled edges and large, rose-pink flowers measuring 2 inches across. The garden was at Althorp, home of Earl and Countess Spencer, Princess Diana's grandparents.

Named for the Earl, the Spencer sweet pea bore little scent. But because of its size and novel, ruffly petals, it quickly became the parent of most modern-day efforts to produce larger, more prolific blooms with frilly petals on longer stems.

Sweet pea mania hit the states as well, with the Central Coast sharing the fame.

It began in the late 1800s when a Lutheran minister, the Reverend Lewis C. Routzahn, hybridized sweet peas in Arroyo Grande on land owned by his father-in-law, T.H. McClure.

Then in 1907, a Scotsman, John Smith, convinced a Lompoc bean farmer, Robert D. Rennie, to grow sweet peas. The experiment was such a success that W. Atlee Burpee created Burpee Floradale Farm in the Lompoc Valley two years later, with sweet pea seeds - including some of the varieties developed by Routzahn - as a leading crop.

Unfortunately, the shift in breeding bigger and showier flowers came at the expense of fragrance. The smaller, more pungent varieties nearly faded away.

But then in the 1980s, yet another Englishman, Peter Grayson, sought to resurrect the more strongly scented, older generations. Grayson located more than 50 heirloom sweet peas throughout the world, and encouraged other preservationists to follow his lead.

That, coupled with a growing interest in antique and fragrant plants in general, has prompted specialty nurseries to begin offering the varieties that gardeners tended so many years ago. Those include my Cupani's Originals. They are often labeled as antique, heirloom or heritage sweet peas.

Getting growing

Plant flowering sweet peas from now through December, and by early next spring, the delicate blooms will send their sweet scent wafting through the garden. Indoors, their fresh fragrance and stiff, long stems are perfect for arrangements.

Actually, you can sow annual sweet peas just about any time on the Central Coast. But the vining plants perform best during cool, moist weather. Traditional varieties send up long runners with curly, grasping tendrils. There are ankle-high, bushy types as well. Years of breeding have resulted in a wide range of colors, including pastel pinks, purples and whites, and bright reds, magentas, yellows and blues.

Cultivation is the same, whether you grow vines or bushes, antiques or moderns.

The plants grow best in rich, moist soil, and in full sun. They do equally well in pots, planter boxes or the ground.

If your soil is heavy clay, dig a foot-wide and foot-deep trench. Add rich, organic material to improve the drainage. Or form a long, raised mound and work in loose, fertile amendment.

If your soil tends to sand, still work in organic material to retain moisture and supply nutrients during the growing season.

Most sweet peas send out flexible vines that grow 6 to 9 feet and clamor for support.

The flowers are charming while twining through a lattice or chain link fence. But the interlocking tendrils are miserable to unravel after the vines decline.

Setting up a temporary system may prove less frustrating.

You can create a trellis by pounding two 6-foot posts into the ground and tying twine between the posts at 6-inch intervals.

Stretching bird netting between the posts works, too. But again, it's difficult to disentangle the vines at the end of the season. Rolling up the mess and tossing it is not very ecologically satisfying, either. I've tried both methods, and settled on using a widely spaced wooden trellis instead. It's a lot easier to clean up.

You might also grow your sweet peas in a large patio pots, then let the vines clamber up a patio post.

Or grow the bushy types that reach only a foot or two tall, and stand unassisted.

After you have prepared the soil and set up supports, soak the seeds in warm water for several hours or overnight. Some experts recommend treating the seeds with a fungicide after soaking.

Also, unlike some seeds, sweet peas are finicky if they're not fresh. Check the year on the packet.

In the garden, make a furrow about an inch deep with your hand or a trowel. Drop in the seeds every few inches, then cover them with an inch of soil.

Keep the soil moist until the seeds sprout. Depending on the soil temperature, that may take one to three weeks. Once the seedlings have produced several sets of leaves, thin them to 6 inches apart.

Water your sweet peas regularly if winter rains don't cooperate. Within a couple of months, masses of fragrant, delicate, tissue-papery flowers should begin to appear. Cut the beguiling flowers often for bouquets - and deadhead the rest - to encourage even more prolific blooming.

Joan S. Bolton is a local free-lance writer and garden designer. Her In the Garden column appears biweekly. She can be contacted through her Web site: www.santabarbaragardens.com.

Looking forward to....

Whoopee!! I registered as a full delegate for the 2005 World Orchid Conference today. It's in March, in Dijon, France. My man and I have agreed that I will attend this one sans his company, since the prospect of tagging along with me for four days of orchid frenzy doesn't exactly turn his crank.

While I was in the registering mood, I also signed up for a ticket to the Chelsea Garden Show in London in May. Hoping to beat the worst of the crowds, I bought a membership to the Royal Horticultural Society so that I could attend on one of the members-only days. And bonus... it'll get me free admission to many of England's wonderful gardens, which I plan to exploit as fully as possible during my stay in the motherland. Hubby is coming along on this trip, since there's more than enough to keep him occupied in London during the day while I'm off soaking up the genius of British gardening. Did I mention he's a good sport?

Duchess grows opium and cannabis

The British government has given an aristocrat permission to grow goodies like cannabis, opium, and magic mushrooms in her public garden.

"...the Poison Garden provides an innovative opportunity for us to deliver, in a relaxed atmosphere, simple information on drugs and drugs issues to a section of the general public that can be hard to reach."

Hard to reach? Who knew that garden enthusiasts, grey-haired old ladies, and tourists in raincoats were missing links in the "war on drugs"?

Cool idea, though.

Link: BBC NEWS | England | Duchess grows opium and cannabis.

More about Alnwick Gardens

A rose by any other name....

I've received a lot of very nice email about my Remembrance Day blog entry, and have even heard a rumour that it was extensively quoted in a sermon at an Ottawa church last Sunday. It would be even more exciting if I'd have earned a mention for my naughty behaviour, but no matter, I am honoured and grateful.

On that note, I was trolling the web today and came across some intriguing material about roses. Without being aware of it, my choice of a red and a white rose to mark the occasion was strangely appropriate; could I have tapped into some kind of floral symbolism from the collective unconscious?

The red rose whispers of passion,
And the white rose breathes of love;
O, the red rose is a falcon,
And the white rose is a dove.
~John Boyle O’Reilly

Roses, roses, can't get enough of those bloody roses. ...There is no better allegory for, dare I say it, life, than roses."
~Robert Hunter, lyricist for the Grateful Dead

KEEP READING

I think the most common modern association with roses is as a symbol of love and beauty. We've all heard the expression, a rose between two thorns:

A Roman myth tells how a beautiful woman named Rhodanthe, being persistently pursued by her numerous suitors, sought refuge in the Temple of Diana. Diana, the goddess and protectress of maidens, became incensed at this and turned Rhodanthe into a beautiful rose and the suitors into thorns. Reference

 

But here's where it gets interesting. There are many more layers of meaning that I was either not, or only vaguely, aware of.

Roses evolved into a symbol of unity in England during the 15th century, when King Henry VII ended the War of the Roses and adopted the Tudor Rose as the emblem of the new Tudor dynasty -- a combination of the white rose of the House of York and the red rose of the House of Lancaster.  reference: Wikipedia

As a symbol of martyrdom, the rose has few equals in the floral kingdom. A Grateful Dead fan, Professor David Dodd from the University of Colorado elaborates:

When held by a martyr, the red rose signified 'red martyrdom' or the loss of life, and the white rose 'white martyrdom' or celibacy.

There's more...

"...Throughout ancient Christendom, the red rose symbolizes the blood and agony of the crucifixion of Jesus. In ancient Persian mythology, a nightingale's self-inflicted breast wound turns a white rose red, changing colors because of the bird's egocentricity."

"White roses symbolize reverence and humility. In medieval Christian Europe, Mary is represented by a white rose as a symbol of her purity. In Wales, white roses represent innocence and silence, and are often placed on the grave of a young child."

Martin Luther chose a white rose as a symbol of faith (the "Luther Rose", otherwise known as the "Luther Seal"). His explanation:

"...Such a heart should stand in the middle of a white rose, to show that faith gives joy, comfort, and peace. In other words, it places the believer into a white, joyous rose, for this faith does not give peace and joy like the world gives (John 14:27). That is why the rose should be white and not red, for white is the color of the spirits and the angels (cf. Matthew 28:3; John 20:12)..."

Roses were attributed with powers of purification that were put to practical use during the Middle Ages. Reference

• Rose petals were strewn on the floor and used to freshen clothes. In times of plague, people carried posies for protection (c.f. "Ring around the rosie").
• The rose was considered a remedy for many maladies. The dog rose is so named because its root was said to cure rabies.
• The rosary is related to the rose (see the intricately carved German rosary bead at the Cloisters). The rosary chaplet presented to St. Dominic was scented with roses. Monks' rosaries may originally have been made with hardened rose petals.

Alchemists are interested in white and red roses for their yin/yang qualities, in doing whatever it is that alchemists do:

"A lady recently called me with an interest in learning more about the symbolism of the rose in alchemy, particularly in the polarity of the red and white roses.... I explained something of the male/female polarity and how it figures in alchemical work and the sulphur/mercury pair which predated the later trinity of sulphur/salt/mercury."

The rose has been described as a symbol of "flawed and mortal humanity". 

"According to Ambrose, the thorns of the rose were a reminder of human finitude and guilt as the roses in the Paradise Garden had no thorns." reference

"A tapestry at the Cloisters depicts a stag (youth) hunted by the hounds of old age: heaviness, heat, cold, ague, suffering. The stag is depicted leaping toward a rose bush (with thorns)." reference

A red rose (often held in a hand) is frequently used as a symbol of socialism or social democracy.

"In 1907, Mary MacArthur of the British Women's Trade Union League visited the United States to support the growing women's labor movement. During her talks in Chicago, she argued that women must work for more than just increased wages. Her message was summed up in a quote she attributed to the Qur'an: "If thou hast two loaves of bread, sell one and buy flowers, for bread is food for the body, but flowers are food for the mind." The Women's Trade Union League probably turned that thought into the slogan that inspired James Oppenheim's poem." reference

Of the many socialist/social democratic parties that use the red rose as a symbol, the Swedish Social Democratic Party explains that "the red colour is said to be a sign for the stuggle againt material poverty and the flower for the struggle against the spritual poverty."

The Phillipino party "PDSP" -- a little less concise -- explains their symbol as "a fist holding a red rose with two green leaves, on a white background. The fist stands for militancy in promoting the authentically humanist values symbolized by the red rose with its green leaves. Justice, liberty, equality, participation, solidarity, the health of the environment, respect for religion, peace, and progress are among the most important of these values."

Our own Pierre Elliott Trudeau -- with his strong belief in Canada as a "Just Society" --  always wore a red rose in his lapel.

Roses have long been associated with secrecy. In Germany, Sebastian Brant's Narrenschiff, [Ship of Fools] of the late fifteenth century reads: 'What here we do say, shall under roses stay.'" This Web page, "Roses: History, Legends and Customs" offers some interesting historical perspective on this particular meaning:

The rose had been sacred to Bacchus, god of wine, as well as to Venus. At banquets for these gods, wealthy Romans would lay on couches spread with rose petals. Around their necks they wore garlands of roses. Chaplets of roses crowned their heads. Reclining on their beds of roses, they ate, drank, and gossiped. Anything said under the rose - the rose garland hung on the wall or the rose chaplets on their heads - was sub rosa. This Latin expression meaning "under the rose" is still a common way of describing something to be kept secret. But there are other explanations of how the phrase was attributed to secrecy. Cupid was said to have bribed Harpocrates, the god of silence, with the rose to prevent him from revealing the love affairs carried on by Venus. Queen Elizabeth I is said to have worn a rose behind her ear, probably copied after the Spanish. Some say this was a subtle way of expressing that the wearer "heard all and said nothing." There are those who claim the expression was started during the time of the War of the Roses in 15th century England. There were two taverns near the Houses of Parliament, one displaying the red rose, the other the white rose. Each tavern was frequented by adherents of one or the other faction, and conferences were held in great secrecy. The participants, in referring to their conversations, would not divulge their secrets, saying they had taken place "under the rose."

The origins of the name "The White Rose" for the German resistance against the Nazis during WWII is unknown, but I suspect the answer lies somewhere between its symbolism for secrecy and everything else. I think I must have followed their lead in my choice of a flower to honour them, and am intrigued by all the different paths of meaning it opened up. Maybe there is something to this collective unconscious thing. At any rate, it's kinda deep.

 

"In gardens, beauty is a by-product.  The main business is sex and death."
~Sam Llewelyn

Working out in the Green Gym

I love the British. They combine passion and eccentricity into a delicious brew of crazy-like-a-fox scenarios that help liven a flower-blogger's day:

Link: BBC NEWS | England | London | Working out in the Green Gym.

I guess it's time to come in

The geranium on my balcony seems oblivious to the rest of nature, which is preparing for winter. It just keeps blooming and blooming... I had no idea that geraniums were so cold hardy -- it's still putting out buds for new flowers.

The sun may be shining at the moment, but the weather forecast looks ominous... below freezing on Monday, and maybe a little snow (schnee!!! My new German word for the day). I'm not taking a chance; the geranium is coming indoors!!!

Blog Find

There are a hell of a lot of blogs out there. I've just spent the last couple of hours surfing through garden-related blogs, and though you have to wade through a lot of unripe compost to find the good stuff, I did come across a few that are worth keeping track of. The name of the launch-pad for my evening exploration says it all: More Blogs Than You Have Time To Read.

That brings the number of blogs I check in on regularly up to 57. Fifty freaking seven!!! It would take me hours if I had to surf to each one of these sites every day to see if there's something new to read. But it doesn't. My secret? Well, not so secret, the early-adopter types latched on to it ages ago: RSS feeds and a news aggregator.

It sounds complicated, but it really isn't. Basically, you get something called a "news aggregator", which automatically scans the blogs you want to keep track of for new entries, and presents them to you all in one place. Sometimes it's just a synopsis of the new entry, sometimes it's the whole article, but there's always a link to it. Easy to scan, easy to read or ignore, without a whole lot of surfing.

The "news aggregator" is just a piece of software. Like your email, it can be something that resides on your computer -- for example, Microsoft Outlook. Here's an aggregator that you have to download and install -- it's good, but it costs money: NetNewsWire. Better yet is an aggregator that's online, like Hotmail, and free: Bloglines.

How do you tell the news aggregator thingy what sites to keep track of?? Well, the site has to have an RSS feed. Whoa, you say, what's an "RSS feed"? Scroll down the left column of this page, and below the list of photo albums you'll see a link called "Syndicate this site (XML)". Clicking on this starts to download a file, but we don't care about that; all you really need to know is the name of that file, which in my case is "http://offpollen.typepad.com/pollenatrix/index.rdf". That's my "RSS feed". Then you plunk this RSS feed address into the news aggregator (i.e. "subscribe"), and voila, it's now on the roster.

And you bloggers out there, who don't have an RSS feed on your sites.... ANNOYING!!! Imagine we're back in the 70's, and telephone answering machines have just been invented, and you don't have one yet. Hello!!! Go get one!! No one has the time to keep dialling your number until somebody picks up the phone...

By the way, here are a couple of my evening blog finds:

Horticultural, a personal blog written by an editor of the UK newspaper, The Guardian.

Garden + Living, nice pictures, good writing, but no rss feed... booo

And my all time favourite, Devil's Excrement. To quote the tag line, "In Spanish one word for orchid collector is quite fitting: "orquidiota" or "orchididiot" in English. I confess being one."

A serious matter of pebble theft...

In the absence of a garden of my own, or an overgrown and overpopulated grow room and invading raccoons to blog about (I liquidated and left my favourite orchids in the care of my friend Jocelyn of Beaver Valley Orchids when I left Toronto), I am turning more and more to the British media. The British take their gardening very seriously, and google searches uncover a treasure trove of deliciously eccentric horticultural news.

I don't think they mean to be, um, eccentric. It's just that they're so... earnest. Take this news story:

TV garden makeovers blamed for beach ruin.

Amateur gardeners keen to re-create designs seen on television have been taking pebbles, often by the sack-load, from Chesil Bank, which forms part of the Jurassic Coast world heritage site in Dorset.

Could the heroic Ground Force crew be responsible for this outrage? The cuddly and charming Alan Titmarsh? The delectible russet-haired amazon woman Charlie, who wears tight t-shirts and forgets to wear a bra while she swings a shovel? I quote: "Only in England could hefty shoulders, two visible nipples, a Hampshire burr and a penchant for gardening turn a 33-year-old yokel ("earthy country girl" are the words she prefers) into a household sensation."

For many years, visitors have taken the odd keepsake from the beach, perhaps an unusually-shaped stone to display on a mantelpiece or to decorate. Recently, however, the odd pebble has turned into tons - taken to create garden features.

In the most extreme cases, pilferers have driven on to the beach at night with tractors and trailers to scoop up pebbles and shingle. Others have used wheelbarrows or sacks.

I admit this is a serious matter. It's weakening the beach and poses a threat when big storms batter the coast. But I had to giggle when I read this:

In most cases when Mr Moxom and his colleagues (nature reserve wardens) have seen people taking pebbles, they have simply spoken to those involved.

However, in a few cases, offenders have driven off and police have been called in to track them down from their vehicle registrations and retrieve the pebbles.

I'll bet the cops just love those calls. "Police. Open up. Put the shovel down and back away from the pebbles!!!".

Death of the front garden leaves British cities in peril of flooding

If you've lived in a big city for any length of time, you probably have witnessed the steady loss of green space that is under the control of private property owners. Perhaps your neighbours, frustrated with sharing a driveway between houses (hello, Toronto), are converting postage-sized front lawns to parking spaces. Or perhaps small neighbourhood post-war cottages are being torn down and replaced with monster-sized homes and miniature-sized lawns (Vancouver, that's you!). I've even seen front-lawns in inner city neighbourhoods completely paved over by lazy owners who obviously don't enjoy yard work.

Finally, the Brits are raising the alarm:

Death of the British front garden leaves cities in peril of flooding
Traditional lawns disappear under concrete to make parking spaces

Until now the trend has provoked anger on purely aesthetic terms. But government advisers are warning that the disappearance of the suburban front garden threatens millions with far more serious consequences and could ultimately help to bring Britain's major towns and cities to a grinding halt.

They say the loss of front lawns is exacerbating the threat of widespread flooding following thunderstorms similar to those of recent weeks. Updated advice from the Environment Agency urges home owners to 'resist laying concrete or Tarmac over the whole' of front gardens.

Front lawns provide a vital natural sponge for rainwater in urban areas. Without them, rain simply runs off driveways, increasing the likelihood of downpours overwhelming antiquated sewerage systems. The widespread flooding that followed the recent downpours, when millions of gallons of water were dumped on towns and cities in a few hours, offers a pointer to what will come...

The environmental concerns do not end there. The loss of sunlight-absorbing plants can intensify the 'heat island effect', making the centre of cities several degrees warmer than the surrounding countryside.

Opium Poppies in the Garden?

Whoops. A flower grower in California was raided and busted for growing those kind of poppy plants. 19,000 opium poppy plants were seized.

"Daniel Campos swears he didn’t know that the poppy strain he was growing was illegal, the kind which contains the raw ingredient for opium, morphine and heroin. He was selling them as cut and dried flowers only, he said. They were one of the dozens of types of flowers he grows in San Martin and Watsonville."

Fortunately for him, the DEA believes him and has decided not to press charges.

Got any in your backyard? I wouldn't know either. There are apparently about 120 poppy varieties, and only one is illegal. It is papaver somniferum.

Poppies.org ( The Continuing Adventures of the World's Most Controversial Flower") says that "Papaver Somniferum seeds are a legal product in almost all countries, although it may not be legal to actually plant the seeds in your area."

You know, they look an awful lot like the poppies I used to have in my garden...

I'll leave with this rather provocative but very interesting article: Narcophobia and the Opium Myth

"The British government - and others including Canada and several US states - are re-evaluating their narcophobic views which took root a century and a half ago in China and led to the Opium Wars."

"As modern medicine developed, the new European medical associations sought moral authority and legal power by transforming opium from a European and Asian folk remedy into a controlled substance.

At the same time, narcophobia became an effective scapegoat for China's rulers. Opium was both the enemy within - morally depraved and physically weak addicts - and the enemy outside - conniving foreign powers bent on enslaving the country."

The article goes on to state: "Opium's impact on health has been dramatised. Medical evidence points to only one effect - mild constipation."

Mans Dies After Ingesting Common Garden Plant

Oh man... here is a tragic story. The Toronto Star reports that a young man from Toronto was back home in Newfoundland for a short break from his promising acting career, when he died from eating a plant called Monkshood.

While home, Andre hooked up with friends and former classmates, taking a short boat trip on July 30 to Silver Fox Island.

While they explored the foliage, it's believed he ingested or came in contact with sap from the plant, his father said.

The group left the island for the mainland mid-afternoon. Then Andre took the boat by himself to nearby Fair Island, where the family had lived in the early 1960s.

There, Andre was to have dinner with his aunt at his father's cabin.

"He ate half his supper and said he didn't feel right. He said something wasn't right," Bill Noble related slowly, with obvious difficulty.

"His aunt called around 6 o'clock to say Andre was really sick and he had to go to hospital."

An ambulance was waiting on the wharf when Andre arrived after the 15-minute boat ride from Fair Island.

They planned to take him to the hospital in Brookfield, about 25 kilometres away but, by 7 p.m., Andre was dead.

Jack Strong, a Newfoundland horticulturist, said ingesting as little as five millilitres of monkshood sap can be deadly.

"Only five millilitres, that's a very small amount," he said. "Cases of poisoning have been reported when the leaves were mistaken for wild parsley, or the roots were mistaken for horseradish.

"And even if you're exposed externally, on the skin, a sufficient quantity can still cause poisoning. That's why if you do come in contact, you have to wash your hands quickly, or I'd be inclined to wear gloves.

"If the contact was accidental, it could be that the stem or leaf was broken and the sap came out and got into a cut, or even through the skin."

Monkshood, or Aconite, which resembles the delphinium, is actually a common plant in home perennial gardens. It is known by many common names including Wolfsbane, Leopard Bane, Tiger Bane, Dog's Bane, Friar's Cap, and Friar's Cowl, Garden Wolfbane, Helmet Flower, or Soldier's Cap.

In older times, it was used to poison meat to kill wolves; it was considered a key ingredient in a potion used to make witches fly; and Claudius I was assassinated by his physician, who slipped him some.

The leaves are easily mistaken for other edible wild plants, and there is a long record of accidental death by ingesting them. According to this very interesting Website:

Somewhere around 1840, two Catholic priests arrived to dinner with other guests of the Provost of Dingwall. A servant obtained a radish from the garden for the guests to use as garnish on their meat, in consequence of which three at the table died, including Father Angus Mackenzie, Father James Gordon, & Father Gordon's grand-nephew.

Aconite acts on the nervous system by first stimulating and later paralysing the nerves of pain, touch and temperature. Taken internally aconite acts on the circulation, the respiration and the nervous systems. It causes severe nausia, slows the pulse, caused the heart to beat erratically, and causes a dramatic fall in blood pressure. Death is usually caused by paralysis of the respitory system.

More information

Race for the True Blue Rose

14 years of research.

27.8 million dollars

A cure for AIDS? Sub-Saharan diseases? Nope. We're talking about a brewery. A japanese brewery, Suntory, who -- according to their Web site -- '...is Japan's leading producer and distributor of alcoholic and nonalcoholic beverages. We are also involved in pharmaceuticals, restaurant operation, sports, music and film, resort development, publishing, and information services.'

Oh yeah, and roses. Blue roses.

According to the Web site, Rugged Elegant Living ('Your Guide to Healthy, Adventuresome, Soulful Living!' -- through genetic manipulation?), Suntory has been working on this project with Australian biotec venture Calgene Pacific since 1990. On July 5, 2004 they announced:

Suntory successfully created the blue rose by implanting the gene that leads to the synthesis of blue pigment in pansies. The color of the new rose comes entirely from the pigment Delphinidin, which does not exist in natural roses. ...There are "bluish" roses on the market created through cross-breeding but the Sunroy rose is the first reported genuine blue rose.

Why would a brewer put all this effort into a developing a blue rose?

As a company in the food industry, we have developed businesses to enrich people’s lives. We have continued research and development activities for our flower operations because flowers adds flavors to people’s lives and help sustain spiritual health.

The flowers are expected to be available for purchase in 2007 or 2008.

Do gooders, my ass. I'm sure it has nothing to do with the estimated $64 million US share of the market annually that the elusive "blue" rose is expected to capture.

As though this story weren't bizarre enough, Britain's news giant The Telegraph announced back in late May that two biochemists conducting research into drugs for cancer and Alzheimer's in Tennessee discovered a liver enzyme that, when moved into a bacterium, would turn it blue.

Professor Peter Guengerich and Dr Elizabeth Gillam, part of a cabal of scientists heroically participating in the single-minded quest for a cure to the 20th century plague, had this to say:

We were aware that there were people in the world who had been interested in making coloured flowers, especially a blue rose, for a number of years.

Dr Gillam had the bright idea that we could capitalise on our discovery by moving the gene into plants - and produce a blue rose.

I suppose you can't separate the spiritual from the physical when it comes to good health. I think they all deserve a medal.

I met a lazy hummingbird...

Saturday was garden day in Vancouver. Meeg and Kris were off dragon-boating, so I took the opportunity to visit some of my favourite places: Vandusen Gardens, Southlands Nursery, and a new one for me, UBC Botanical Gardens.

Vandusen was looking a little like the day after a big party -- this is a place best visited in April and May for its wondrous collection of rhododendrons, azaleas, and its fabulous laburnum walk. Laburnum are trees with long racemes of yellow flowers, very much like wisteria, and at Van Dusen they've been bent over trellis' to form a long cave of yellow flowers hanging down, complemented by the big round purple blooms of giant allium (otherwise known as...onions) coming up from the ground all along the path. But the show was over. Drats.

I've driven by UBC Botanical Gardens many, many times in my life, but this time, I decided to stop. Saturday was hot and sunny, and I needed a place to to hide out from the choking hordes of people and cars milling on beaches, sidewalks, and streets. Apparently, a lot of other people drive by this place too, because there were only a handful of visitors, who soon left this wonderful treasure all to me, me, me. What a great garden!! Roses climbing 40 feet into the old Douglas Firs and Cedar were in full bloom, and the flowering Japanese dogwood trees (cornus Kousa) were so loaded with flowers, the leaves were barely visible. There are some magnificent old trees here, along with a large collection of unusual and interesting plants.

Over in the Alpine Garden, I came across a Rufous Hummingbird flitting around a large shrub with long arching sprays of red flowers. I stopped and stood quietly to watch him, and in doing so acquired a whole new perspective on hummingbirds. My image of them as industrious little pollinators is shattered. This one was completely unperturbed by my presence, and spent most of his time lounging on a flower stem not more than 4 feet away from me, watching the world go by. Every once in a while he'd buzz around for a quick sip from the flowers, then land back on the same stem. Then, to my great amusement, he got lazy. He'd reach up to try to sip the red bloom over his head, and when he couldn't...quite...reach..., he'd buzz his wings to get just enough lift to poke his beak in, without actually letting go of the perch. Then he'd settle back down. Once in a while he'd give the buds next to him a poke to see if he could get a snack without actually having to move. I was afraid that if I laughed I'd scare him, but he seemed more interested in food, and the other birds around him, than me. Twice he let out a loud and scatchy kind of cheep, and took off in a grand huff to chase other hummingbirds; then he'd land back on the same branch and poke around for another lazy snack from the nearby blooms. Dragonflies bigger than him would whizz by and stop, moving on once they decided he wasn't another dragongfly invading their territory. It was quite a scene.

My final close encounter of the day with birds came at the ladies' washroom entrance. As I approached, I looked up to see two purple martins comfortably perched along the top of the propped-open door. I got closer, and they just looked at me blithely, with a kind of "whatchu looking at?" expression on their faces. By the time I stood at the door, I was right under them and was so close I could have touched them both. Neither moved, and I blinked first. I made a dash through the doorway, sure they were planning to poop on my head. They were still there when I came out.

So You Want to Grow Orchids in Your Garden, Huh?

At this time of year cypripedium orchids grow thick along the sides of the road on the Bruce Peninsula and in other parts of North America. Up on the Bruce, passersby speeding along the highway usually assume the flashes of yellow are dandelions, not beautiful ladyslippers, unless they're in the know. The usual reaction, when people find out, is "I'd like to stop and take some for my garden!!". I've heard it from the lips of my own family and friends, so it's kind of hard to label all of them as evil orchid-poaching environmental despoilers. It's an innocent response from people who don't stop to think that the one little thing we do, which as an isolated event is relatively harmless, is repeated by thousands of others. We all belong to that club, in some fashion.

Without sounding like a nature-bunny nag hag, I try to explain why taking orchids from the wild is a bad idea. The usual mantra of, "if you take one, and everyone else takes one, there won't be any left" usually doesn't make much of a dent. Human beings have trouble with the big picture. I have hit on the perfect rational, and one that's quite true: It's a waste of time and energy. The odds that a wild-collected terrestrial orchids will survive in your garden are about the same as winning a lottery.

Here's why. Orchids have a symbiotic relationship with a mycorrhizal fungi in the soil. Though each orchid seed pod contains millions of seeds, the seeds must land in some soil containing this fungi if it's to germinate, and grow. The odds that you'll have or find that particular fungi in your backyard are pretty slim.

No problem, you say!! I'll just add some of this mycorrhizal fungi to the soil! Well, for those ambitious enough to try, here are the laboratory instructions. Just remember to buy your cypripediums seeds or plants from an ethical grower.

Good luck!

How to get the micorrhiza (chapter 1)
How to get the micorrhiza (chapter 2)

Crazy Geranium Lady

How would you like to water this lady's plants when she goes away (click on the picture to see a larger version)??

200 plants for 200 years

      It's the Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) of England's bicentenary this year, and to celebrate they've drawn up a list of what they consider the top 200 plants of the last 200 years.

Wouldn't it be interesting if someone created a garden using all of these plants?

Looking for wartime gardening stories

The January 2004 ICanGarden.com Newsletter contains an interesting article about someone who is looking for gardening stories from the 1939-1945 era:

"During the years of WW1 and WW2, Canadian gardeners were asked to support the war effort by planting gardens to produce food for the war effort. I believe part of the program was called Patriotism and Production , and was an organized effort to help the Canadian war effort by food production both rural and urban. I am looking for information and stories, and any other information I can find about this time in our Canadian gardening history. I am also interested in any organizations which participated in the program and perhaps grew out of it.

Anyone with stories or resources about the WORLD WAR I - CANADA FOOD BOARD and the Canadian War Poster Collection I would love to hear from them in particular. If you have a story to share, a memory, a picture, particularly media releases (newspapers, flyers) , I would appreciate the opportunity to learn more. If you know of Canadian resources about wartime gardening I would be very excited to locate them.

I am gathering this information for personal interest, although I may eventually create a display for our local Agricultural Fair Archive and Museum if I find enough information. I am also interested in learning more about the school gardening program across Canada and its roots and history. This is an intriguing time in the history of gardening in Canada and our national development. Thanks for sharing your information and any resources you may have."

Contact Ann Marie at allena@rogers.com if you can help her with this.

Mail order dreams

Remember pouring over toy catalogues when you were a kid, studying each page carefully and circling your favourites (maybe that horse from the Best of the West, or a Hot Rod race track), dreaming of days to come when they might actually find a home in your toy box?

Well, seed and garden catalogues are the grown-up version of that. Winter is the time to tuck into a cozy chair with a big pile of mail-order garden catalogues, a wool throw over your knees and a hot mug of tea at your side. Though these days I'm more likely to be in front of my computer, surfing through the online versions and dreaming of spring.

Here's an online catalogue that can only be described as "Big League": Paul Christian's Rare Plants -- a UK supplier. I absolutely drooled over the cypripedium selection (a terrestrial type of orchid, many of which are native to North America). The site seems to be ethical, whereby plants for sale are obtained through laboratory propagation or through salvage at development sites.

They ship to Canada. One day I'll have a home for these lovelies, a grown-up toy box of a garden in my back yard!

Blooms in sub-zero temperatures

Thank goodness for my grow room... I think I'd go crazy if I couldn't look at green growing things for months on end. It's still very cold, and a fair bit of snow on the ground. I went outside at lunchtime, and when I returned my face was so red I looked like I had a sunburn. Ah well... there are blooms in my grow room, as well as on my cheeks.

The first spike on the Burr. Nelly Isler finished a while ago, and it since has put out another inflorescence and bloomed again.

The gigantic Phal. Orchid World 'Joe' that I bought from John Marcotte is starting to bloom on four old spikes and two new ones. It has a sweet fragrance and is a stunning plant.

And finally, a pretty pink Geranium that my friend Atilla gave me this summer has two long-lasting flowers. I have visions of propogating this plant and covering my deck with geraniums next summer.

I checked the worm bin the other night, and topped it up with damp paper (I regularly raid the shredders at work and lug bags of the stuff home on the subway) and plant clippings. Lotsa squiggly critters in there, so they must be happy. The bin is half full of worm compost already.

And aphids. Another healthy crop of aphids, unfortunately, on many of my orchid plants. I've been warned to be aggressive about terminating these pests, as they carry virus' from one plant to another. Time to get the Neem oil and insecticidal soap out again... and maybe leave it out this time so I remember to spray again in a few days.

For garden newshounds

      This site makes it easy to find the latest news articles related to gardening, organized by topic: News, Articles and Reviews On Gardening

How do plants know when it's time to flower?

Many plants have a genetic alarm clock that tells them when to wake from their winter slumber and bloom in spring, scientists said on Wednesday.

Exactly how plants know when it is time to flower is a  subject that has perplexed botanists for thousands of years.

But two teams of scientists have uncovered clues that may  help explain why certain plants need a cold spell to stimulate  flowering."

Regency Life and a Rose Garden

Christmas at my house is the season of Jane Austen, and repeated showings of all five tapes of the BBC version of Pride and Prejudice. This year we watched the entire series twice, augmented with an airing of "Sense and Sensibility". I then plowed through the novel "Persuasion", and yep, tonight I just finished reading "Pride and Prejudice". It's an odd tradition for the Christmas season, I suppose. I can't explain the attraction, though Colin Firth as Mr. Darcy does speak for itself.

Curious about the cause of Jane Austen's early death at 41, I did a little searching on the internet. I came across a site that is loaded with interesting background information on Regency life, including biographical details of JA's life. Check out the page on Regency Rose Gardens.

While you're there, don't miss the page on "a History of Pain", and the story about the tough soldier who was annoyed by the screams of the fellow in the next bed, "so much so, that as soon as his arm was amputated, he struck the Frenchman a smart blow across the breech with the severed limb, holding it at the wrist, saying, 'Here, take that, and stuff it down your throat, and stop your damned bellowing!' "

      A growing body of research is giving credibility to the widely held belief that nature can improve health.

"The belief that nature is beneficial for people with illness dates back centuries and is consistent across cultures, (researcher Robert) Ulrich notes. There are several theories, he says, that attempt to explain people's affinity for nature.

Learning theories hypothesize that people associate relaxation with nature, for example during vacations. They acquire stressful associations with urban environments because of aspects like traffic, work and crime. Other scientists argue that built environments are overly taxing to people's senses because of high levels of noise and visual complexity. Nature settings are not as arousing and therefore less stressful.

Proponents of an evolutionary theory believe that humans may have a genetic readiness to respond positively to nature such as vegetation and water because these things were favorable to survival during some two to three million years of evolution.

Whatever the case may be, the capability of gardens to improve health arises mainly from their effectiveness as stress reducing and buffering resources, Ulrich notes.

And while gardens have the potential to help patients and staff cope with stressful scenarios, not any garden will do, Ulrich emphasizes. To be effective in reducing stress, Ulrich has found that gardens must address four main areas: promoting a sense of control, encouraging social support, offering opportunities for physical movement and providing access to natural distractions. "