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Anatomically Correct Horticulture

P71026Certain fruits and vegetables were so much more palatable before studying botany. Knowing what they really are sort of puts a damper on things.

Real fruits, including those known as vegetables, are no problem. We all know what they are, and they have the seeds to prove it. Just like flowers reward pollinators with nectar, many plants use fruit to get animals and people to disperse their seeds. Therefore, the fruit is designed to be eaten.

The majority of vegetables are fine too. It seems natural to eat leaves, stems, roots and even flowers. Things get a bit weird with petioles of rhubarb, celery and cardoon, since the leaves are not eaten. Cinnamon bark and saffron stamens also seems a bit odd. What about maple syrup? Is it a vegetable too?

Then there are fruits and vegetables that are not what we think they are.

You will never look at a potato the same way knowing that it is a subterranean stem known as a stolon. If it is looking back at you, it is because it has eyes, which are actually modified axillary buds, which only stems are equipped with. It it were a modified tuber or or a tuberous root like most of us think it is, it would not have these eyes.

Pineapple might be watching too, with its many eyes. Each eye actually represents a flower. What we think of as a pineapple fruit is actually a densely crowded collection of distended and fused flowers. Does that mean it is a vegetable like broccoli or cauliflower?

Strawberry is sort of fruity; but only what we think of as strawberry ‘seeds’. They are actually single seeded fruits known as ‘achenes’. Really, those little black things are outfitted with everything that they need to be classified as fruit. The red part of the strawberry is only a ‘receptacle’ for the achenes.

Everyone knows that fig trees do not bloom. So, how do they make fruit? Well, they technically don’t make any visible fruit; but they do bloom. What we think of as a fig fruit is actually a weird inside out inflorescence, with minute flowers on the inside. Each species of fig is pollinated by a particular species of minute wasp that enters the inflorescence through a very small hole at the end. Minute achenes about the size of strawberry achenes are the crunchy bits in ripe figs. To make figs even more unappealing, some wild figs contain the eggs and larvae of the wasps that went inside to deposit their eggs before dying there. Yum. Most garden varieties attract the wasps, but lack the necessary floral parts for the wasp to want to leave their eggs there. They therefore do the job of pollinating without dying inside.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 5 Comments

Butterfly

P71022Before you send me a comment about it, I am already aware that this is a very bad picture. It was taken with my primitive telephone because it was convenient at the time. This tired looking butterfly might not have waited for me to get the camera. It passed away, seemingly peacefully, right there on the hood of the old Chevrolet. It did not seem to be injured in any way. It probably simply expired like butterflies do after breeding. It is a natural process that the butterfly did not seem to be too distressed about. It gets no obituary because I am not qualified to write one. We are not sufficiently acquainted. I do not even know the specie of this butterfly.

Now that he or she is deceased, I ponder the beauty of these insects. They are so graceful and very colorful. They flutter about like animated flowers. Everyone likes them. Some of us grow flowers that attract them to the garden, and plants to sustain their baby caterpillars.

All flowers are designed to appeal to their pollinators of choice. Those that are pollinated by wind lack color, fragrance and other bling, but are very abundant. Those that are pollinated by flies smell like what flies like. Those that want to attract nocturnal pollinators are fragrant, luminescent (with ultraviolet patterns that are invisible to us), and open at night. Bee pollinated flowers use infrared patterns, and lots of other colors that bees like, and reward them with nectar and superfluous pollen. Well, you get the point. Floral structure, size, patterns, color, fragrance and schedule are all designed around pollinators.

It is difficult to say what butterflies like. They visit such a variety of flowers. Some have abundant pollen. Others have a bit nectar. Some are tiny flowers in dense groups. Others are larger composite (daisy-like) flowers. Butterflies can see both infrared and ultraviolet color, so it is hard to know what they see in flowers.

Some of the clustered small flowers that butterflies like are alyssum, fennel, goldenrod, phlox, Queen Anne’s lace, verbena, yarrow and of course, butterfly bush. They also like flower of the mint family, such as bee balm, lavender, oregano, rosemary and the various sages. Their favorite composite flowers include aster, calendula, cosmos, marigold, coneflower, zinnia and all the daisies and sunflowers.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 18 Comments

Rain!

P71020Something really crazy happened last night. From out of nowhere, a profusion of drops of water started to fall from the sky! It continued to fall for a while, and got everything wet. Soil that had been dry and dusty became rather muddy. As crazy as it sounds, it is not impossible, and actually happened repeatedly last autumn, winter, and into spring. In fact, it was so abundant that the San Lorenzo River filled with all this strange sky water, and flooded worse than it had since the flood of 1982! People in other less arid climates are more familiar with this sort of thing. It is actually no mystery. It is known simply as ‘rain’.

‘Rain’ is like free water. Really, we do not need to pay for it! It falls from the sky, and waters the garden so we don’t need to. It might be the only water that areas outside of the garden get. Some plants out there have been waiting for it since it stopped falling from the sky last spring. Rain that does not soak into the ground drains into creeks and rivers, which flow into reservoirs that store it for later use. (Local reservoirs don’t really save it for later use directly, but use it to recharge groundwater; but that is another story.)

Another advantage of rain is that it tends to get things wet, which makes them less combustible. This is rather useful when forests nearby are burning. The Bear Fire near Boulder Creek is not quite extinguished. In fact, it is not yet contained. This rain should help with that. It probably will not do much for what is already burning, but should slow the already stagnating progression of the fire.

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White Trash

P71018Long before my white supremacy garden (https://tonytomeo.wordpress.com/2017/09/21/white-supremacy/), I noticed that some white flowers were inferior to their more colorful counterparts. Brent (to the left in the picture in that other article I just cited) is often pleased to remind me of it. Only a few flowers are at their best in white. I, of course, am pleased to remind Brent of them. Then, he reminds me that black flowers are very rare, as if that makes them special. I then remind him that most black and dark flowers are pollinated by flies, so must imitate the fragrances of what flies are attracted to.

Callas, lilies, gladiolus, camellias, oleanders and dahlias all excel in white. They are at least comparable to their more colorful varieties. White callas, gladiolus and oleanders are actually superior to those more colorful. Some but not all varieties of rose, hydrangea, wisteria and tall bearded iris are exquisite in white as well.

Then there are plants like bougainvilleas, crepe myrtles, geraniums and angel’s trumpets that are less impressive in white. Bougainvilleas and crape myrtles just are not quite as bright in white as they are in their vibrant pinks and reds. White geraniums and angel’s trumpets are relatively weak, and white geraniums do not drop faded flowers efficiently.

Many white flowers do not even try to impress. They throw their pollen to the wind and let it do the work. Color is for flashy flowers that want to attract pollinators. Pyracantha and photinia flowers, for example, are neither colorful nor big and flashy, but are very numerous. They are somewhat fragrant, just in case some sort of pollinators happen to be interested. Other wind pollinated flowers do not even offer that much.

Nocturnal flowers that rely on nocturnal pollinators might be big and fragrant, but are mostly insipid pale white. Some are slightly blushed with yellow or pink. They are not bright white only because they do not actually use the brightness of their white to get noticed. They instead use ultraviolet or infrared color that is invisible to us. Many of these seemingly bland flowers have rather flashy patterns of stripes, spots and blotches that are only visible to nocturnal animals and insects who can see ultraviolet or infrared light. Many flowers that are active during the day use this technique in conjunction with visible color (that we can see) as well. Regardless, it does nothing for us, since we can not see it.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 13 Comments

Fire!

P71018Fire is part of life here. It is a risk that those of us who live in the Santa Cruz Mountains must accept. We live in forests full of abundant vegetation fuel, where fire crews and equipment have limited access. The horrible Tubbs Fire that recently burned an urban neighborhood in Santa Rosa demonstrates how destructive, risky and unpredictable fires can be. That neighborhood was in town, outside of forests, where fire is not such a commonly accepted risk.

This morning, October 17, on the anniversary of the Loma Prieta Earthquake, our community woke to a fire of our own. The sunrise looked more like a colorful sunset, with orange and tan smoke everywhere. The ash that had fallen from the sky made it seem like there had been a cremation party last night. It is getting to look like Pompeii around here. The fire started last night as a house fire near Bear Creek Road outside of Boulder Creek, and moved into more than a hundred acres of forest. Crews from as far away as San Jose responded quickly, and seem to be containing it. The region was evacuated, and Bear Creek Road was temporarily closed. The fire is only 5% contained as I write this before noon. Fortunately, the humidity is up, and the temperature is down.

Fire is more than a part of life for us. It is part of nature. Although almost all fires here are caused by human activity now, fires had been burning forests and wildlands long before humans arrived. There certainly were not as many fires, but without anyone here to suppress them, they burned much larger areas for much more time. A fire started by lightning early in summer could burn for hundreds of miles until extinguished by a storm the following autumn. A single such fire could easily burn more area than all unnatural fires now burn each year. There were likely several such fires annually. That is why old photographs show that California was historically not as densely forested as it is now. Forests simply burned more regularly.

Many plant species know how to work with fire. A few, such as the giant redwood and coastal redwood, survive fire by being relatively noncombustible. They only burn if other vegetation around them gets extremely hot. Most of the pines do not mind burning because their cones open to disperse seed after getting cooked by fire. The seed germinate quickly the following winter to reforest the area that was just cleared by fire. If they are fortunate, they grow up and dominate the forest before other vegetation does, only to burn again a few decades later.

Then there are a few plants that take this technique a step further. Monterey pine is innately sloppy. By that, I mean that it holds much of its old dead limbs instead of shedding them. Lower limbs collect significant volumes of fallen needles, instead of letting the needles fall to the forest floor. Consequently, when a Monterey pine forest burns, it gets hot enough to incinerate competing vegetation and its seeds. Monterey pine cones do not burn completely. They insulate the seeds within just long enough to survive the quick and hot fire, and then open afterward to disperse seed. This is a significant advantage to the Monterey pine, even though they get incinerated too. Not much more than their own seed survives to dominate the forest.

California fan palms (and the related Mexican fan palms) collect long and very combustible beards of dead fronds. When they burn, they likewise incinerate everything below them. The single terminal buds of the palm trees remain safely insulated inside their thick trunks, and will regenerate later as if nothing every happened.

This tactic sounds violent, but it works for the trees that use it. However, enhanced combustibility is not such an asset in home gardens. That is why it is so important to either plant combustible plants at a distance from homes and buildings, or to maintain them so that they are not allowed to collect fuel.

If palms are allowed to wear their beards long enough to reach the ground, other combustible plants should not be allowed to get too overgrown around them. Alternatively, palms can be allowed to wear long beards if the lower portions are pruned up and away from other combustible plants.

Just like there are several plants that are not notably combustible, there are some that are notably combustible. Pines, cypresses, firs, spruces, cedars, junipers, acacias and eucalypti, although useful and appealing in the right situations, all happen to be notably combustible.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 9 Comments

Redwoods

P71014It is hard to beat redwoods. Seriously! There are only three specie, which are now three different genera; but one is the biggest tree in the world, one is the tallest tree in the world, and the third is one of only a few conifers that are deciduous. The biggest and the tallest are both native to California. The deciduous redwood is from China.

Dawn redwood, Metasequoia glyptostroboides, is the deciduous redwood from China. (See the picture above.) It was discovered relatively recently, in 1944, so is not nearly as popular in landscaping as the other two redwoods are. Ironically, it is actually better for urban gardens because it does not get as tall as other redwoods. The tallest forest trees (that need to compete with other tall trees) are a mere two hundred feet tall. More exposed urban trees rarely get half as tall. Also, dawn redwood is adaptable to a broader range of climates than the others are.

Giant redwood, Sequoiadendron giganteum, is the biggest tree in the world. It lives in isolated groves in the Sierra Nevada, where old trees can get to be more 3,500 years old. The tallest are more than two hundred and fifty feet tall, with trunks more than twenty five feet wide near the ground. The trees are so massive that they could not be harvested without shattering much of the wood within. Of course, wild trees are now protected from harvest. They protect themselves from wildfires with thick bark and by branching so high above other vegetation.

Coastal redwood, Sequoia sempervirens, gets about half as old, but about a hundred feet taller than the giant redwood. It lives on the coast of California, from Oregon to Monterey County. It has been extensively harvested because the wood is so resistant to rot and insects. Harvested trees regenerate quickly from roots, forming families of several genetically identical trees. Coastal redwood groves are dense enough to exclude other trees, and produce enough debris to prevent seeds of other specie from germinating. They are less combustible than other trees, and protect themselves from wildfires with thick bark. Their foliage regenerates efficiently if burned.

I grew up only a few miles outside of the natural range of coastal redwood, and now live amongst them. I never get tired of them. As majestic as they are, the trees that were harvested earlier were even bigger. I build an outhouse and a shower out of two hollow burned out stumps of coastal redwood. Another nearby stump is big enough build into a shed. It only needs a roof on top. Even after a century, the burned old growth stumps are still intact. They rot very slowly.

The area burned in the 1950s only because so many other more combustible trees grew back with the secondary growth after extensive harvesting of the old growth trees. Much of the secondary growth that was burned while only about half a century old recovered, and is now about a century old. Trees that grew after the fire are now about half a century old. As the forest thickens, firs, oaks, madrones, maples and bay trees get crowded out. Redwood really know how to manage their forest.

Posted on by tonytomeo · 25 Comments

Rhody

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It was not easy for me to start this blog. I do not mean that getting it set up and operating was difficult. That part was a breeze. I mean it was not easy for me to go along with the crowd and do something that is so hip, trendy and popular. I never liked trends, and I certainly do not like trends that use the internet and computers. Well, at least I get to write about gardening and horticulture. It is a topic that I happen to be good at writing about. I do not need to post pictures of puppies, kittens, babies, what I cooked for supper last night or where I went on vacation.

This is Rhody, in the picture above. He is a puppy. He is terrified of kittens, barks at babies, will eat anything that I cook for supper, and will go anywhere we might go on vacation. He can not write my blog for me because he can not type. Besides, he does not speak American English, or any other human language. He does not help in the garden much. As I said, he is a puppy.

So, there I did it. I started a blog, and posted a picture of a puppy.

Well, getting back to Rhody. He is a terrier, which literally means that he is terrestrial, or associated with the soil. In other words, he digs. His kind were bred to exterminate rodents, particularly in the soil. Rhody is just now starting to figure this out, but still needs to work on his technique. He has not started to dig for gophers, and actually seems to be more interested in getting more closely acquainted with them when they emerge from their holes and stare at him for more than a few seconds. Rhody just stares back. Perhaps his is in telepathic communication with the gophers, and is negotiating their relocation to a better home on a nearby vacant hillside.

I do not mind. It is bad enough that gophers dig in the garden. I do not need Rhody digging in the garden too.

It is the terrestrial part that Rhody does not seem to understand. He already knows that he dislikes all other rodents above the surface of the soil, such as squirrels, rabbits, deer and horses. The squirrels are not much of a problem, but the rabbits eat big patches of iceplant and other succulents, and have eaten the foliage and buds of several small potted plants. Rhody chases them off every morning.

We still need to work on Rhody’s concept of what a true ‘rodent’ is. The deer had been eating leafy plants in the garden, but have been notably absent since Rhody chased them away only a few times. I do not like him to chase the deer because I am afraid that he might actually catch one. Fortunately, he does not see them until they are already fleeing. Rhody also needs to learn to not bark at horses.

Rhody is not allowed far from the house because coyotes, bobcats and mountain lions live in the surrounding forest, and sometimes come close to home. None of them are known for pursuing dogs, but could get nasty if chased by one. I would be pleased if Rhody worked only in the garden, which happens to be close to the house.

So, in summary, posting a picture of puppy who does what he can to protect the garden from vermin is not completely irrelevant to gardening.

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The Trees Know

P71014The trees look spooky now. Box elders, honeylocusts and alders, and even some of the sycamores, have dropped so much of their foliage since that weirdly hot weather a few weeks ago. The smoky sky as a backdrop enhances the spooky factor. The trees do not seem to be too distressed. They just dropped their leaves a bit early to conserve resources. If they had not dropped foliage by now, they would be dropping it soon anyway.

Trees are not stupid. They know what they are doing. Otherwise, they would not survive as long as they do out in the elements. Sometimes, they seem to know what the weather will do before it does it; like dogs, cats and horses that start to get their undercoats early before a cold winter.

Deciduous trees and other plants defoliate for winter for a few reasons. Those from farther north probably see no need to work so hard to collect sunlight while sunlight is so minimal. Up north, days are shorter, and sunlight is diminished as it passes through so much of the atmosphere at a lower angle. Deciduous plants from colder climates shed their foliage because they know that if they do not, it will get frozen anyway. Those from snowy climates do not want foliage to collect heavy snow that can break limbs. Defoliation also eliminates much of the wind resistance that can break limbs during winter storms. There are a few advantages to being deciduous.

In California, we have a native California buckeye, Aesculus californica. In chaparral conditions, it can be ‘twice-deciduous’. It does not need to be so in less arid regions, such as the Santa Cruz Mountains. It really depends on the weather.

As a twice-deciduous plant, the California buckeye develops new foliage in spring like other deciduous plants do. It stays foliated as long as it wants to; but if things get too dry and warm in the middle summer, the foliage shrivels and falls. To a casual observer, the trees seem to die. However, between the first autumn rain and the first winter frost, California buckeye develops a second phase of autumn foliage to briefly compensate for summer dormancy. This foliage stays late until it gets frosted and falls. Winter dormancy is just like that of any other deciduous tree. In spring, the process starts all over again.

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Where There’s Smoke . . .

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Do not work in the garden today if you happen to be in a region inundated by smoke from wildfires. The air is too toxic. The picture above was copied from the East Bay Times yesterday. It shows smoke obscuring much of the view of northern San Jose from the East Hills. It might be Milpitas. It is difficult to recognize.

The news says that this is the worst air quality recorded in the Santa Clara Valley, even worse than when we had smog back in the 1970s, and even worse than when there were serious fires much closer to home in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Even the smoke from the Lexington fire in 1985 was not so thick.

If you must work in the garden, do not use machinery that might ignite vegetation near wildlands. Something as simple as a weed eater striking a stone can make a spark that can ignite overgrown grass. Barbecuing out in the garden is something that should be postponed for better weather.

The breeze that might move some of the smoke out of the area also accelerates fires that continue to burn, and increases the fire danger. Any new fires that get out of control are very likely to spread very rapidly. All the rain last winter enhanced the proliferation of vegetation. Recent unseasonably warm and arid weather desiccated much of the vegetation. Now, there is an abundance of vegetative fuel everywhere.

Wildfire is part of life in California. Many of us know how fire is an important part of the ecosystem, and how many plants in the wild benefit from it. However, none of this is any consolation when so many homes have been burned.

Posted on by tonytomeo

Bastards!

P71011Palm trees did not impress me much when I was young. Although striking in the right landscapes, they did not ‘do’ much. They made no fruit. They made no firewood. Only the big Canary Island date palms made any significant shade. What they did make was a big mess that was difficult to rake. They were expensive to maintain. They sheltered rats and pigeons. Their seedlings came up in the weirdest places.

Back then, the only two palms that I was really familiar with were the Canary Island date palm and the Mexican fan palm. Windmill palms were common too, but because they are so much less obtrusive, they did not get my attention. Queen palms had not yet become a fad, so were mostly in older neighborhoods outside of my world. I was aware that there was an odd type of Mexican fan palm, but never gave it much thought.

Then I went to college . . . and met Brent, from Southern California, where palms are more appreciated. I also met more palms that I had either ignored earlier, or had never seen before. After a while, Brent showed me around coastal Southern California, including the Pacific Coast Highway and Santa Monica, where I saw palm trees at their best.

I will never forget turning onto Bedford Drive in Beverly Hills, where the Beverly Hillbillies drove when they came to town. I had never seen Canary Island date palms and Mexican fan palms like that before. They were so majestic! They were so tall! They were so uniform! It did not change what I already knew about palms, but it did give me a different respect for them.

That odd Mexican fan palm that I mentioned earlier was actually the California fan palm, or the desert fan palm, which is classified as a distinct specie. It gets about half as tall, but twice as stout, with fluffier foliage. Because it is shorter and stouter, it stands straight, without bending like the taller and lankier Mexican fan palm does. It is also more genetically variable because it naturally grows in isolated oases rather than a contiguous range.

After seeing the California fan palm growing wild outside of Palm Springs, around the springs that Palm Springs is named for, it became my favorite palm. It is very stately in the right situations. It lines North First Street at Saint James Park in San Jose, and flanks the Palm Driveway at the Winchester House. Unfortunately, it really prefers to be out in the aridity and warmth of the desert. It looks rather sickly if it gets too much water.

While cruising around the Los Angeles area, Brent pointed out a few ‘bastards’, which are hybrids of California fan palm and Mexican fan palm. Apparently, they are not distinct specie, but rather subspecie. In other words, they hybridize freely. Each parent has attributes; and the bastards get the best of both.

Mexican fan palms, whether I like them or not, are very tall, elegant and graceful. They are exquisite skyline trees, with leaning or bowing trunks that can move casually in the wind. California fan palms are stout, stately and formal. If not watered too much, their straight and uniform trunks, and canopies of fluffy foliage, work nicely where conformity is desired. Bastards have trunks that are just thin enough to be elegant, but just stout and straight enough to be stately. Their canopies are more ‘lush’ than fluffy like those of the California fan palm.

Until recently, bastards were solitary trees that grew randomly from seed. They were not available in nurseries. If they had been, they would have been very variable because of their random breeding. However, someone took notice enough to cultivate what seems to be a cultivar known as Washingtonia X filibusta. (Washingtonia X filibusta is derived from the names of California fan palm, Washingtonia filifera, and Mexican fan palm, Washingtonia robusta. The ‘X’ designates it as a hybrid.) They are becoming the new alternative to the formerly all too common Mexican fan palm.P71011+