Instead of a single day of good fortune like yesterday’s auspicious 07/07/07, this has been a week of luck for one reason: rain. Although it can’t be discerned from the surrounding woods with their uncommon fullness bordering on rainforest-like lushness, this summer has been uncommonly dry. Late spring and summer started out so well it wasn’t conceivable that midseason has me contemplating water conservation and rationing. I’m thinking the “D” word but trying hard not to say it.

Incredible greenness abounded in early June, recreating a vision of Irish green everywhere. I took unseemly pride in the richness of it though I remained mostly an incidental spectator. I took it for granted it would remain so, relying on the typically abundant rainfall to keep everything hydrated, priming for a replication of last year, a perfection of summer.

Two weeks into it, weariness began to appear. I have given in to my fascination with Geranium phaeum and have inserted them as often as I dare into many of the plantings. Hardiness, ease of culture and propagation, quick to grow, early and long flowering (usually), bee attracting, an ability to accommodate and add fullness in any allotted space, thriving in part-shade (its preference) through full sun, and the simple beauty of its dusky, white-eyed and swept back petals are why I like it.

Last year they were beautiful all summer and this year not so good. They’ve stopped flowering and turned yellow, falling open and showing off parts of themselves I would rather not see. The other Geraniums have followed suit, along with assorted Salvias, Filipendulas, and other random plants, yes I’m talking about you Veronicastrum. Flower buds have aborted and even worse never developed on a few plants. Others struggle and gone straggly, sending up a few flowers and then quickly browning out, as if eager to be done with it all, giving up on the season and trying to hang on for a different and better growing year.

Early on, before inserting and opening the earth for the first time here, I had decided that all perennials and most shrubs would receive attentive care and watering to aid in establishing them during their first growing season but ever after they would be on their own. I make an exception for trees and will continue watering them until they show by their growth and performance that my assistance is no longer required. I’m in the Northeast, I reasoned to myself, and my days of endless hand and sprinkler watering are behind me. It is a hard line I have established but I’ve held true to it for the time I’ve been in New York. It has not been easy this year but I have stuck to that philosophy, mostly, but last week you would have caught me sneaking a slow trickle to a favored plant.

Because of my background, the possibility of a drought dryer period is never far from me. Reliant on a well, I would rather hoard water for household use than plants in the garden. That decision seems a little insane considering the gobs of money that has been spent outside but that is how I feel.

This is still a farming community and everyone talks about the weather. The dryness has helped with the haying, ensuring the first cut was perfect but will there be more? The corn is worrying, staying short and wondering how large and full the ears will be. A dry summer affects the fall color, hurting tourism in an area that is already struggling and precarious in the best of times.

Each week, it seems, clouds build up and darken, showing the promise of rain. But then they pull apart and scatter or, even worse, blow by, dumping the rain elsewhere but not here. This isn’t the first time we’ve been dry but I’m more sensitized to it this year than before and I don’t know why.

This week it rained, including the last four days. Not enough to exult in but enough to nurture hope. Is it the vanguard to better days or a blip and aberration to an establishing pattern?

Here was my problem: fill a space along one side of my porch. Because of a change in grade, the plant needed to be 5 feet or taller but width wasn’t as crucial. The plant had to be herbaceous because winter snows are shoveled off the porch and onto or over this area; a shrub would soon be crushed by my shoveling, and become a pile of broken sticks. The ability to tolerate full sun, medium to dry soil, and wind were additional requirements. My solution was Rudbeckia ‘Herbstsonne’ (syn. ‘Autumn Sun’).

This is a plant that does well here, even when wind-whipped. The lower third of the stems is awkward and unattractive, the bottom leaves developing brown patches and edges, dessicating and drying up when the flowers begin opening. This action is described as senescence, and in this case the lowest stem leaves are sacrificed as the plant allocates more energy into its floral parts. This is a common occurance in many plants, especially Lilies and New England Asters (Aster Symphyotrichum novae-angliae). My S. n-a. ‘Andenken Alma Potschke’ tries me yearly.

But that isn’t a significant part of the plants’ growth that concerns me because the view I’m interested in is this one, from the porch. In a year with plentiful rain, like last year’s, plants will be over 6 feet and liberally cover themselves with flowers in late summer and early autumn. The previous year was a dry one and the flowers grew even with the porch, pretty enough but not the display I had been aiming for.

I really didn’t know what I was going to plant in the bed but was open to anything. I prowled nurseries, seeing plenty of candidates but nothing seemed right or satisfied me. I found ‘Herbstsonne’ at a local nursery and knew my quest had ended. They were extravagant plants at an extravagant price, large healthy specimens in 5-gallon containers. I couldn’t help myself and bought two of them, feeling ridiculous for buying perennials in such large containers and doubly ridiculous for forking over the money. The plants quickly established themselves and realized my floral dream during their first year with us. They have increased in width each year, growing fuller and thicker but never rampant, mindful of my distaste for colonizing plants.

I first met this plant many years ago at a nursery. A Not For Sale sign was prominently posted but it didn’t keep me or other interested customers from admiring it. Rich green foliage topped with extra-large flowers, their bright yellow petals surrounding a prominent raised center of green received many admiring looks and perhaps a little lust, even from snobbish jaded plant aficionados. There is a gentle argument going on in plant circles regarding its origins: is it nitida or laciniata or a hybrid of the two? Whatever the outcome, ‘Herbstsonne’ will rise above it.

I have spent a large portion of my life with a hose in my hand and at this juncture I should be able to measure my hose-time in years and not hours, days, weeks, or months. I want my tools to work well and achieve my purposes with a minimum of problems. I also want the labor of watering to be easy.

I can barely remember the earliest days when I watered without a hose-end shutoff valve. They give me precise control over the water flow and are water saving devices to boot. I’m able to water the soil in my containers and not their surrounding environment and that’s a good thing, no matter where you live. I prefer the metal type because of their durability. I’ve had mine for years and when they start leaking – something all of them will eventually do – they can be repaired simply and easily. Unscrewing the single screw at the lever disassembles them and the parts are removed through the new opening. Take the rubber o-rings to your friendly neighborhood hardware store for exact replacements and pick up a few washers for spares while you’re out, you’ll be glad you did. Reassemble the valve and you’ll be able to enjoy another year of trouble-free use. I don’t like the plastic valves because I’ve had them split apart from structural weakness. I also don’t want valves with paddle handles as they’ve dug themselves into my hand too many times and take away from the pleasure of watering. Beware of valves with swivel hose connectors as they have a tendency to leak fairly quickly.

Shutoffs give me independence from my faucet and when I put them in-line while connecting lengths of hose, I achieve more versatility in my hose runs. This is really useful when I’m trying to keep newly planted trees well hydrated. I have a lot of hoses, almost a fetish actually, and leave them in place rather than dragging them around. Hoses can be heavy when filled and I’ve accidentally dragged them through other plantings, something my plants don’t really care for. The fun really begins when a y-connector valve for running more than one hose is hooked up to the faucet. You can go really crazy if you add in multiple y-connectors. It is a fetish.

The best tool I have found for watering seedlings and small transplants is the Wonder Waterer. It is a pricey little thing but there is nothing better out there. Imagine trying to spot water a few cells in a plug tray. Now imagine the tray is 10 by 20 inches with 512 compartments and you need to hit the edges and a few other cells. There is nothing else that will work except this tool. It has extremely fine holes that break the water into the gentlest of streams, not washing out or damaging the littlest plants but giving them the soaking they need. A shutoff valve is a necessity as the WW works best on very low pressure. Eliot Coleman also proselytizes this tool in case I haven’t convinced you.

I use a breaker when I have general hose watering to do. My first nursery supervisor quickly spelled out the difference between a sprinkler and a breaker. A sprinkler is for watering broad areas of lawns and landscape plantings. A breaker attaches to the end of a hose and is used for controlled hand watering. I prefer a round head to a fan shape, as it is easier to keep the water where I want it to go instead of hitting a lot of unwanted areas. I have very poor water pressure and can’t use a normal sized breaker so I’ve turned to a smaller version of the big ones. I sometimes feel slightly emasculated that mine isn’t as big as everyone else’s but it does a fine job nonetheless.

I consider shut-off valves and good breakers to be essential tools and include the Wonder Waterer for serious seed growers. Watering wands are not necessary but they make the job a lot easier. I have found that wands with handles that have built-in levers for easy on/off water delivery to be not so easy because my hand soon gets tired from depressing the lever. Short wands are good for maneuvering in tight spaces. My porch is the sole haven for shade lovers and a short wand keeps me from bumping and marring the plants. A longer wand is ideal for vegetables, beds, and landscape plantings. I think a 36-inch one is good and if you can handle the awkwardness of it, a 48-inch length even better. And remember: you don’t have to be a person with magical abilities to use a wand.

You should have some hose menders on hand, too. Female and male ends and an in-line one will take care of all your hose repair needs. I use my hand pruners to cut out the section of hose with the leak. I then soak the cut ends in a cup of hot water to soften them, insert the mender, and tightly screw the girdling sections together. My hoses stay leak-free for years when I do it right.

Watering cans add versatility and convenience to the mix. They come in a lot of different sizes and styles; get the one you like and ignore well-intentioned-but-not-wanted advice for others’ preferences. I like a can with a large opening on top to make it easier for mixing fertilizers and drenches. A replaceable rose, the sprinkling end of the can, is also good as I’ve plugged mine up by applying a heavily organic fertilizer and realized too late I should have filtered it first to remove small insoluble particles.

When the season is over I remove the wands and leave everything else joined together. This helps me get ready the following year, as I don’t have to hunt down the hiding places of the small parts. Everything is unscrewed halfway to keep them from getting annoyingly stuck and I can make changes or repairs as needed without cursing my previous year’s lack of forethought.

After a long couple of months of unseasonable cold and a blast of winter last week, we have earned this week’s fine weather. The lingering ice sheets from the Valentine’s Day storm left me yesterday and I can finally work the soil in the garden. Excuse me, I think some hoses need to come out of hibernation and be readied for another year’s service.

The Gertleys have a way of taking many common garden objects and making them extraordinary. Ornamental molding on tomato cages may sound peculiar but when you’ve seen how the Gertleys use it you will wonder why it isn’t commonly done. Many of the structures have finials, end caps, and posts with ornamental flourishes but instead of looking fey or twee you will be saying yes! to yourself as you’re reading.

Starting off with Tools and Materials, the book is divided into four additional sections:

• Trellises and Plant Supports
• Tables, Benches, and Plant Stands
• Structures for Growing Plants
• Garden Tools and Accessories

Each project begins with a gorgeous photograph showing the item in use. It is then followed by a complete materials list (including fasteners), easy to follow stages of construction, and diagrams explaining construction nuances. If you opt for a protective finish, the authors often use solid and semi-transparent stains, they will let you know when to apply it during construction.

I freely admit I am not the handiest person in the world and I feel the Gertleys are writing for me. Never condescending, their writing is lucid and easy to understand. This book is appropriate for every level of ability and remains an essential element in my library.

My current project is a cold frame, the less glamorous cousin of a greenhouse (remember my dream?). The cold frame will give me a protective growing area to get a jump on our short growing season. This one has very generous proportions, 7 feet long by 5 feet wide, that will give me plenty of room to space out the plants as they grow bigger. I will also be able to fit large propagation mats on the bottom underneath the plants, giving added protection with their heat during chilly nights and making a more versatile growing environment.

The most unusual feature of this particular cold frame are the four windows, two in front and two in back, rather than the more commonly found one window. This will allow easy access to every section within and also gives me a lot of options for ventilating, a key element for any growing structure. Another feature is more subtle - the middle support board for the windows has a 10 degree channel cut into its upper surface. If it is raining and the windows are closed, the water will drain off the front and back of the cold frame instead of sliding under the windows and dripping on the plants below. That kind of thoughtful detail permeates the Gertley’s designs and is one more reason I recommend their book.

My cold frame will look different than the picture for several reasons. My board widths are different as I am recycling lumber from a portico that fell down from snow several winters ago. I am also substituting heavy 6ml greenhouse film for the glass in the windows, as it is also a supply I have on hand, along with the fasteners and leftover stain from the house. In fact the only supply I had to buy were the hinges for opening the windows. I am still building my cold frame and looking forward to its completion and using it. That’s if the snow would ever let up and go away.

A strong argument for calling Magnolias Tulip Trees

I grew up with a large Southern Magnolia in a small backyard. Its great size dominated the space, smothering the ground below and adjacent plants with massive quantities of leathery leaves and sucking up all available moisture with large surface roots. I was unknowing of its survival tactics and found its main purpose, from a child’s viewpoint, was scaffolding, aiding my climbs and elevating me beyond the neighboring houses.

I remained oblivious of the Magnolias surrounding me until I went to an exhibit of collected works from the studio of Louis Comfort Tiffany. Along with the iconic nature-inspired lamps, vases, and other decorative pieces, were two sets of large windows. The wisteria panels were breath taking, combining delicate colors and impeccable composition into master works of astonishing beauty. But it was the Magnolia windows that have been with me since. Created for Laurelton Hall, Tiffany’s home in Oyster Bay, New York, they embodied the simplicity and spirit of the trees: white blossoms supported by thick leaded stems and branches, traced onto a sky of clear glass. I never expected art to profoundly affect me but it did. (A current exhibition of Tiffany art and objects from Laurelton Hall is at the Met in New York through May 20.)

When the calendar shifts into March and April, I can’t help but think of deciduous Magnolias. Whites, pinks, creams, maroons, yellows, and rose, they provide an aerial counterpoint to the bulbs growing below them. Most common are the myriad varieties of Saucer Magnolias, M. x-soulangeana, but if you have a chance to see one their parents, M. denudata, don’t miss it. An enchanting vision of pristine elegance, it has an appealing grace often lacking in its progeny. M. campbelli is a big tree and also has the largest flowers, 18 inches or more. It’s worth visiting warmer areas of the country to see them, as they are too tender for here.

Cold climates can also grow Magnolias. The smallest is Star Magnolia, M. stellata, often seen as a multi-stemmed shrub. Flowering when young, its flowers with strappy tepals densely cover the plant, I’m guessing to overcompensate for its small size. M. kobus is more tree-like, with white flowers in spring. It is slow to flower, sometimes taking ten or more years, and is not often grown.

M. x-loebneri is the superb hybrid between stellata and kobus and is highly recommended. Flowering when young, it combines the flower form of stellata and the size of kobus into a garden enhancing small tree. Common varieties are ‘Leonard Messel’ - pink flowers, and ‘Merrill’ - white flowers. My ‘Merrill’ anchors a small border and is always a pleasure when blooming and afterwards.

Full sun and even moisture are their main requirements but placement is important too. Nothing looks worse than a Magnolia clipped into an unnatural form or trying to maintain a large tree in a location that’s too small. Fragrance has always been a hallmark of Magnolias, with each species and variety contributing its unique flavor. Tropical species of Magnolias and their near relative Michelias can be suffocatingly powerful when in bloom.

Magnolias are of ancient lineage and are considered one of the earliest flowering plants. I once visited a Primitive Garden consisting of plants from earlier days. The plantings featured Magnolias that had been underplanted with ferns and cycads with horsetails (equisetum) and Gunneras added for contrast. Anchored by Ginkgos, the garden made for a thought-provoking display.

There is also a Magnolia Society that includes a complete cultivar and description list.

Winter seems to still be with me. The nights are consistently in the low 20s and snow remnants remain on the ground. Mostly on the north sides of hills and buildings, and hiding behind large trees and objects, the white has not completely gone away. Large swaths of lawn and fields are now visible and the remaining strands and patches of snow can look like washing laid out for drying or ice fields in miniature or ocean foam left behind by the surf. I didn’t think I would feel nostalgic for it but I do and will miss it after it’s gone in a week or two.

But the landscape is coming awake and one of the first groups of animals to become active after a winter’s hibernation are the amphibians. I’ve seen tiger salamanders coming out of the woods by a roadside, heading towards shallow waters and ponds, eager to reacquaint themselves with the world and get on with their lives. I like them, as with all of the native wildlife, but my favorites are Rana clamitans (rana=”frog” clamitans=”loud calling”), commonly known as Green Frogs.

Named for their coloring, they are the first of the frogs to start calling, their loud gulps sound like school kids trying to impress their cronies. Even before the sweet chiming of the Spring Peepers, Greens are gulping themselves for attention, seeking to impress and woo mates. Even with these chilly nights, if the days are warm enough, I can hear them.

Beth and I met a group of Greens last year while hiking on nearby State land. The destination was a large beaver pond, unexpectedly carved into a hillside. Two groups of frogs were vocalizing, calling from opposing ends of the pond (very Sharks/Jets, Yankees/Red Sox, or insert your favorite rivalry).

The Peepers were heard but not seen so we headed for the other end. Filled with Greens, they had spaced themselves evenly across the surface, floating with legs extended, so ridiculously open that even I could spot them. They silenced themselves as we approached but the drive to reproduce was too intense and the outlying ones were soon calling, quickly joined by the rest. Those moments added to one of our best hikes ever.

An aquatic-loving frog, Greens are never far from water and noisily splash and dive for cover when alarmed, consistently giving themselves away. It’s a puzzling behavior because if they remained still I would probably overlook them. Large bodies of water aren’t necessary and any shallow waters will do nicely. I reliably find them in a roadside ditch that is amply fed by rains and a seeping spring. A wetlands on a small scale, its only a foot wide, the ditch is also a home for cattails, sedges, and damselflies.

Frogs and other amphibians are not having an easy go of it, trying to survive in an increasingly manmade world. Along with the ongoing destruction and drainage of wetland habitats, climate change and a fatal fungus are devastating their populations. An essential element of spring would be lost without the frogs’ sounds.

Picture yourself in a boat on a river,
With tangerine trees and marmalade skies

I grew up during the Beatles era and “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” has always been a fave in my top five. From the start, there was speculation that psychedelic drugs influenced John Lennon when he wrote the dreamy, trippy imagery into his song. But couldn’t he have been inspired by a morning such as this?

Winter is a time of lower humidity, bringing greater clarity to the sky. Stars are brighter and seem closer, almost touchable, than in other seasons. The angle of the sun’s rays striking the northern latitudes is more acute, passing through thicker layers of atmospheric gases. Evenings and mornings can be beautiful and oftentimes spectacular, as can be seen here. Sunrise and set may not be warming the chilled earth but they are undeniably uplifting.

Somebody calls you, you answer quite slowly,
A girl with kaleidoscope eyes.

“Yeah, right,” I thought while looking out the window. Maybe if you were lucky to only have that much. Many of my neighbors and myself had more and it depended on which side of the street you were living. It is days later and I’m still trying to clear away some areas and, of course, the daily wind blow. And don’t even ask about getting my truck stuck.

But I was fully informed for a storm of this size because I have a secret weapon: weather radio.

My town is equidistant – roughly 60 miles - from three metropolitan areas and none of them provide accurate or specific coverage for where I live. The Internet is equally lacking, trying to give me information from those same metro zones.

Sponsored by NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration), weather radio is my solution and has proven itself in giving me timely and reliable forecasts. In addition to snowstorms, it also gives me alerts for thunderstorms, flooding, wind warnings, and other weather events. A special radio is required to receive forecasts. Mine came from Radio Shack but there are other sources here.

So far it’s been doing its job of keeping me safe and relatively sane, even if nature decides to bless me with more snow.

Seed catalogs have been piling up in neglected must-read piles for several months but I hadn’t the heart or inclination to attend to them until now. I am just as easily seduced by their pictures and descriptions of the newest and greatest as anyone and can see my garden flooded with their luscious colors and visions of Elysian Fields here on Earth. Or something like it.

Most of the generalist catalogs don’t offer clues to the originators of their seeds. How many of you know which seed companies developed Explorer Petunias, Majestic Giants Pansies, and Zowie! Yellow Flame Zinnia? If you said PanAmerican, Sakata, and Goldsmith you are either in the industry or unusually observant and informed.

So what goes into making all those beautiful plants in seed form available to us? My work in the flower department for a large wholesale seed company gained me invaluable seed sowing, germinating, and growing knowledge as well as an understanding of the research behind something as seemingly simple as a seed.

It all starts with the plant breeders. Their job is to develop proprietary plants that will improve on current lines in addition to creating new classes and colors of plants. Breeding goals include strengthening current lines as well as broadening their color ranges, disease resistance, weather tolerance, early and uniform germination, early to flower, uniformity of plant size, and floriferousness. Sometimes there are breakout developments. This is the case with the Explorer Petunias and the rest of the companies have been playing catch-up ever since.

The main customers for the seeds are plug and bedding plant growers and most of the seed producers gear their work to satisfying them and only incidentally the home gardener. The growth stages of seeds and seedlings have been divided into four sections. Stage 1 is when water, temperature, and light are manipulated to initiate activity within the seed, causing it to germinate and the seed coat to split. Stage 2 is the emergence of the root and seed leaves from the seed and the appearance of the seed leaves – also known as cotyledons - above the soil. Stage 3 is the growth of the seedling up to the point the first true leaf is formed. And stage 4 is the growing of the plant to a size it can be transplanted or sold.

Seed companies have devised several methods and techniques to aid the growers. Priming is a process of germinating the seed almost to the end of stage 1 but before the seed coat splits. The seed is held in a type of stasis, waiting for water and temperature to be added so it can continue growing. This helps the plug producers achieve quicker and more uniform germination in less than ideal conditions.

Detailing is the process of cleaning seeds so they can more easily be sown by mechanical means. A Marigold seed is a good example. If you look at an untreated seed you will notice a light colored “tail” on the end of the seed. Detailing removes the tail, making it easier to sow in a plug tray. Plug trays are usually always based on a design size of 10 x 20 inches and vary in the number of cells from as low as 50 up through 600. The tail of the Marigold seed gets hung up on the edges of the cells when the number of plugs per tray goes over 200.

All mechanical seeding machines (I sometimes jokingly call them “sowing machines”) that I’m aware of use an air vacuum to aid in sowing. Small portable machines will have interchangeable heads, called manifolds, with varying hole sizes and patterns depending on the type of seed and the number of cells per tray being used. I once used a manifold with holes too large for my seed and proceeded to suck all my seed away. Luckily the seed wasn’t too valuable or scarce and I was able to resow after changing manifolds. I ended up marking all of my manifold heads to insure my accident wasn’t repeated. Large stationary seeders don’t have plate-like manifolds but have small tubes that look like hollow needles to accurately place the seed in each cell of a tray. They dip down into a community trough of the desired seed and repetitively and quickly sow perfect trays.

These machines will also create a dibble, a slight depression in the middle of each cell prior to sowing, that helps to center the seed and slightly reduce the depth of the soil in each cell so a covering may be added if that is what is needed for the seed to germinate. Vermiculite was and is my preferred covering. Its advantages over a soil cover are: it remains friable but retains moisture, it comes in various size grades which is useful if many different size seeds are being sown, it has a strong color contrast with soil so its far easier to cover each seed with a precise layer, and some seeds like to be nestled in but not completely covered and I have never been able to achieve that with soil. I always used the last technique when germinating Primula seeds. I’m still not sure if it was essential but I did it with my first sowings, had great germination success, and continued using it.

Pelleted seed is now commonplace. This was done to aid the seeding machines. It achieves a uniform size and eliminates the irregular outlines of many types of seeds. It also allows for easy sowing of tiny and miniscule seed. The smallest seed I ever handled was Begonia seeds. They were dust-fine and impossible to sow mechanically in their raw state. I always broadcast sowed them in a flat. That worked fine but made for labor intensive transplanting.

The advantage to using plug trays with many small cells, besides the economic advantage of increasing the number of plants being grown in a specified space, is that seedlings grow quickest when their roots are tight. Zinnias were ready for transplanting 14 days after sowing and Pansies were always 21 days. The disadvantage of the trays was the need to maintain a proper moisture level. Most seeds in stage 1 need moist to wet conditions and then kept slightly drier from stages 2 through 4. Little cells, especially on the edges, can dry out quickly and you may lose some plants from inattentiveness. Overly wilted plants rarely come back strong and are perfect incubator hosts for pests and diseases.

In pure technical language, an F1 hybrid is the offspring from two plants that have been crossed. But the commonly accepted standard is an F1 hybrid is the offspring from two separate in-bred lines of plants. An in-bred line means plants that have been self-pollinated, seed collected and sown, and the plants grown to a stage they will flower and the process is repeated. Plants that show they are off-types or out of the standard being in-bred for are culled along the way. The goal is to get a genetically pure strain of the plant, where each member of every generation appears to be the same. The magic of an F1 is achieved when two plants from different in-bred lines are finally crossed to each other. The parents may be small and unassuming but the progeny are often spectacular. Most of this process of establishing the in-bred lines is time-consuming, labor intensive, and very expensive. There is a huge investment behind this work and is why some seeds seem outrageously expensive.

Breeding work is centered in Japan, the U.S., and Europe. The production of the F1 varieties is usually done where labor is cheap. This work is worldwide and is most common in Central and South America but I know of production areas in Africa, too. India and China will undoubtedly become major producers, as they have some of the cheapest labor on the planet.

Even I am getting tired of myself at this point, so I will finish with germination and growing guides. If I were working in the industry today, the Ball Culture Guide would be my constant companion. No matter what your knowledge level, if you follow the advice in this book you will achieve success. What seeds need darkness, kept uncovered and in darkness, have unusual germinating temperatures? This book has the answers. Its only drawback is it is limited to popular annuals, cutflowers, and vegetables. Thompson & Morgan have an on-line germination guide. It lacks detail but makes a good starting point. My favorite wholesale seed company is PanAmerican and I never worked for them. Click on “How to Grow Information” in their Product Information section of their site. I perfected my Aquilegia growing by following their advice. It also has the information in different languages. I don’t particularly like The Seed Site but maybe you will find it useful.

All of these plants are well known, popular, and easily recognized. I have many in my garden and would guess most of you have at least one, too. What sets them apart is they are best known by their botanical and latin names without referencing a “common name”. Take the last three plants: Hydrangea, Delphinium, and Rhododendron. These are not easy or intuitive names. It’s our familiarity that allows us to pronounce and spell them, although the silent “h” in Rhododendron used to trip me up long ago.

What prompted me thinking about this is a recent article by a local columnist. A common plant, a native, was being discussed. In a backhanded way, the author was making fun of its botanical name. I agree that it has a long and challenging name. Phonetically spelling its name and explaining why it was chosen for the plant would have been helpful but wasn’t offered. Here is a link to a pronunciation guide.

Plants are not given their names by whimsy, capriciousness, or to trip up anyone’s tongue. Some names are given as honorifics. Care to guess whom Washingtonia, Franklinia, and Jeffersonia - palms, a tree, and spring woodlanders - were named after? Others denote place of origin. Californica, idahoensis, missouriensis, and pensylvanicum are named after states. Japonica = Japan, sinensis and chinensis = China, nepalense = Nepal and taiwanense = Taiwan for countries in Asia. Kathy’s Colchicums can be included here, being named after ancient Colchis, an area on the Black Sea.

A name often describes a plant’s feature. The sizes, margins, shapes, colors, and surfaces of leaves and flowers all have specific words expressing an attribute. Names are sometimes given that show a physical relationship to other plants. Ones I have run across include references to the leaves (folia) of Alders = alnifolia, Birch = betulifolia, Horse Chestnut = aesculifolia, Elderberry = sambucifolia, and Elm = ulnifolia.

My favorite is a name that describes a plant’s growing environment, a real help for deciding placement in the garden or if I’m going to have success with it. Examples include: alpestris and alpicola = from mountains, palustris = from marshes, sylvestris = of woods, saxatillis = of rocks, montana = from mountains, glacialis = from cold areas, and arenaria = from sandy places.

Plants are occasionally renamed based on rules that can be found here. I gnash my teeth when this happens, as the changes discourage the names from common usage. Cimicifuga is now Actaea and Solenostemon has replaced Coleus. Most American species of Asters have been shuffled into Almutaster, Canadanthus, Doellingeria, Eucephalus, Eurybia, Ionactis, Oligoneuron, Oreostemma, and Sericocarpus with new alternate spellings for some species. Many of the commonly grown garden Asters are now in Symphyotrichum. I’m having a hard time changing.

I usually memorize all of my plants’ botanical names – I am such a plant nerd - but there are some that I prefer the common name to the latin. Snapdragon, Hollyhock, and Daffodil come immediately to mind. And even I think horticulturalists who insist on using Lilium, Rosa, and Tulipa are being picky.

Bonus: If you aren’t completely bored and have the time, visit this page. Why are the zoologists having more fun than the botanists?