What Would YOU Call It?

If it were your job to give an official name to the cultivar of the flower from which this petal was taken, what would you call it? Don't think too hard or you'll miss the obvious answer. I questioned Daughter #2 when she was here last weekend and she nailed it on the first guess. So did Romie.

I had forgotten about ordering this chrysanthemum last fall and this spring it arrived in the mail from Bluestone Perennials. I think maybe they ran out or something, or I may have ordered too late for it to be sent last fall, but it was a nice surprise when it got here.

Of course, you'll remember I said I was never planting mums again, but this doesn't count. I said that after this got here and was planted. Besides, as I also said before, there are exceptions to every rule. There are so many pretty mums out there, I guess I can't help myself. This time of year, I JUST WANT THEM. But I need to figure out how to keep them alive for more than one season.

Mom and Grandma both gave me some that they had in pots and didn't want to plant in the ground, so I planted those last week. I didn't put them where I want them to stay because for one thing, I don't even know where that is. The other thing is that I want to wait and see if they live through the winter, so they are now in the Orphan Garden until next spring.

The ones I'm asking you to name, however, ARE where I want them and it's too bad I didn't take a picture of them when my 'Disneyland' rose was blooming at the same time. The colors go very well together, which is why I put them where I did in the first place. They also blend nicely with the other new mums I bought when Mom and I were in Cleveland the last time ('Bolero').

So what name rolled off your tongue when you saw that first picture at the top of the post? If you said "Matchsticks" you would be correct. That wasn't too hard now, was it?



(By the way, I did pinch these back up until July 4th, but you can't tell it, can you? Maybe they would have been even taller if I hadn't. Bluestone does list them as being tall.)

Join

Phytoremediation

When I first skimmed through the article about trees being injected with rabbit liver genes to clean up toxic waste, I thought, "News of the Weird." But when I slowed down and read it in detail, my thoughts changed to, "Now that is cool."

Published in Scientific American on October 15th, the report is that a French hybrid of an aspen tree has been proven to clean trichloroethylene (TCE) from groundwater. TCE is a carcinogen and is the most commonly found contaminant in U.S. toxic waste sites. It's in insecticides and fungicides as well as dyes, spot removers, adhesives and paints and is very likely in the water that I drink.

Like many of our friends and neighbors here in the rural midwest, we have our own well that provides our drinking water. The water goes through a sophisticated filtering system that's contained in our basement. We have it mainly because of the high sulfur content our water has and it does a pretty good job of removing that, although it doesn't take it all out. It also removes many impurities, but I honestly don't know if it takes care of anything like TCE. We were more concerned about the sulfur because of the smell and the corrosive damage it does to pipes, electrical wiring, and appliances, and we just try not to think about things like carcinogens that might be in that water. It's always been a concern in the back of our minds though.

Our bodies remove such toxins, but many times at the expense of our livers. So scientists, knowing that plants inherently help clean the air and water, figured out a way to boost that natural cleansing ability by introducing genetic material from rabbits into aspen and poplar trees. Tests proved they removed up to 91 per cent of TCE and it removed ten times the amount of benzene (another carcinogen) from the air as 'normal' aspens.

The studies involving the use of poplars in phytoremediation (restoring balance to a polluted environment using plants) have been conducted for over ten years. One of the things still left to be determined is the effect these altered poplars have on insects, birds, and other animals that may eat them.

_________________________
Information gleaned from Scientific American and Environmental Health Perspectives.
Photos from (1) Wikimedia and (2) University of Washington.

Waiting For First Frost

Last year, our first frost was in the first couple of weeks of October. I remember this because my friend Kat was visiting from Florida and she helped us carry plants into the house in a hurry. I wasn't prepared for the frost for some reason and we were really scrambling to get everything in and it was windy and COLD.

We haven't had a frost yet, but it's just a matter of time, and from the weather reports, I'm betting by next week at this time any annuals still left in the garden will be mush. But I'm ready for it! Shocking, isn't it? The Queen of Procrastination has done a pretty darn good job of getting the gardens ready for winter. In the last week or two, I have:

• Pulled or cut dead foliage and tossed it on the compost pile
• Cut the hostas back to about six inches so insects can't set up housekeeping in them for the winter
• Watered plants that were new this year or that are small or weak with root stimulator in an attempt to get the roots healthier for winter
• Dug the tender bulbs (Callas, cannas, dahlias, oxalis, sprekelia, tigridia, tritonia, amaryllis, gladiolus, caladiums), bagged them in mesh bags or sawdust, and labeled them
• Dug tender plants and potted them up to bring inside for the winter (pelargoniums, rosemary, bougainvillea, 'Diamond Frost' euphorbia)
  
• Repotted houseplants that needed it and brought them into the house (jasmine, dracaena, aloe, orchids, kangaroo fern, heliotrope, passiflora, abutilons, schefflera, Norfolk Island pine, Boston fern, abutilons, tropical hibiscus, pilea, cacti and other succulents)
• Took the campanulas I had in containers and planted them in the ground
  
• Dug the brugmansias and potted them up. Cut them back and shared the cuttings and also am rooting some here
• Did some mulching, although I'll wait to do the roses and other things after we've had the first frost
• Brought in garden art and pottery; Romie drained the fountains
• Took the two plants out of the pond and planted them in the ground for winter
• Continued to gather seeds from plants still producing them (cosmos, morning glories, etc.)
• Pulled what few weeds were in the beds (thank you, mulch!)
  
  

I still have to cut back the clematis and pull the morning glory and hyacinth bean vines, but I'll wait until the clematis has been bitten by the frost before cutting those, and I'm still collecting seeds from the other vines. Those are still blooming anyway. I need to get the pond cleaned out a bit and I hope to do that this weekend.

I mentioned that I watered plants that were new this year or that are small or weak with a root stimulator. When I was in Cleveland shopping at Petitti's with Kim (blackswampgirl), I asked her and one of the employees there what their opinion was about the root stimulator. Would it do any good or would I just be wasting it?

My theory is that if it beefs up the root system, the plant will stand a better chance of surviving whatever kind of winter we have coming our way. Kim said it might be interesting to use it on one plant and not on another and compare them in the spring. The Petitti's employee said he hadn't heard of doing this, but it wouldn't hurt anything. We'll see!

Though I got all the brugs dug and potted up, most of them are still outside on our front porch. They are the ones that had blooms on them and I'm going to wait to cut them back until they're finished blooming. If frost happens before that, I guess I'll just cut them back anyway. So right now, it's a jungle on our front porch, but those blooms are just too pretty to cut and the fragrance is out of this world, especially at night.

I'm working on a couple of bulb orders, because I really want more crocus and daffodils next spring. There are some oriental lilies on the orders, too, because I had a miserable showing of those this year. I don't know what happened, but the majority of them disappeared. I was especially disappointed that 'Muscadet' didn't return, because that one was exceptionally pretty and highly fragrant.

So while I'm not yet "done done" with winter prepping, I'm about as done as I should be right now, with maybe the exception of the bulb planting. I feel that way only because I hate planting bulbs when I'm out there shivering and with my teeth chattering. But that's how it is every fall. Why should it be any different this year?