My abject apologies for being late in posting this week. I’ve been in Angel’s Camp, California since Tuesday – a lovely, wonderful place – but without anything above 2G wifi. Needless to say, posting on the blog was impossible. So I’m in the Sacramento airport, enjoying a glass of wine and a crab Louis before I leave for Seattle, and finally able to access a 4G connection!
In any case, here’s the beginning of Season 2’s podcasts. … Continue reading this article “Podcast Season 2 is here!”
Bert’s post yesterday reminded me of some work one of my graduate students did about 10 years ago. We were curious to see whether a transplant fertilizer containing phosphate was correlated with foliar iron deficiency, which is visualized as interveinal chlorosis:
What Scott did was to plant 10 rhododendrons per treatment into pots containing containing a name brand azalea, camellia and rhododendron food (5-5-3) at 0, 0.5, 1.0, and 2.0 times the recommended amount. Here are some of the results of that study:
Total number of chlorotic plants
Total foliar iron vs.… Continue reading this article “Phosphate toxicity and iron deficiency”
Virginia Tech (my institution of employment) does a good job of bringing newsworthy research and outreach stories to the university’s home page. With a huge college of engineering, robotics seems to be the dominant theme (no matter how lame the robot is) closely followed by solar-powered cars etc. So it’s a rare and thrilling event when a news items with a horticultural topic is featured on the VT web site!
As I read it yesterday, my heart sank a bit.… Continue reading this article “Any PR is good PR…I think…”
One of the nice things about my job is that I get to work with a lot of other researchers who work in a lot of different areas. One of these areas is molecular biology and I certainly know people who have genetically engineered plants to do one thing or another. Maybe it’s because I know so many people who work with them, but I’m not fundamentally opposed to genetically engineered crops. Which isn’t to say I’m not concerned about certain genetically modified crops, but in general I think that the systems we have in place to review them have done a decent job of making sure that nothing too terrible is released.… Continue reading this article “The Genetically Modified Kentucky Bluegrass Problem (The Anger As Promised)”
At a lively hobnob with friends and colleagues, the discussion ranged from critique of the Virginia Tech offensive line to the logic/mystery behind commercial carbon offsets. Someone mentioned Domino Sugar’s efforts in that direction. Apparently their product has been certified “carbon free” by a business carbon offsets program that they pay a fee to. This led to hoots and snorts as to their selection of terminology since it involves a molecule (sucrose) that is 27% carbon.… Continue reading this article “Sugar and Spice and Misnomers”
Here it’s already Wednesday and no GP postings! My excuse is that I had a seminar to give yesterday before catching a late night flight to Pullman. Bert (who should have posted Monday) must still be lost in a mai-tai fog somewhere in Hawaii. Or maybe he’s looking for Holly, who’s been AWOL for a week. They’re supposedly at the ASHS meetings. Right.
I’m kind of liking the idea of finding fun new products for the busy gardener. … Continue reading this article “Amazing water slices!”
Please tell me – am I crazy? Or just not the gardening trend-setter that I should be? Should I be spending $10 on this? Check out this excerpt from Garden Cuttings Newsletter, with the note “Please feel free to use this information in your stories and columns”:
“Instead of sending dried leaves and other yard waste to the landfill, compost it! DeComp-9 Organic Compost Booster speeds up the composting process with patented microorganisms that quickly break down leaves, grass clippings and other yard waste.… Continue reading this article “They said to write about it, so I will…”
A few weeks ago I was lucky enough to speak to the Portland Garden Club and see some absolutely gorgeous private gardens. But alas…even in the midst of such botanical riches I still managed to find something to make me shudder.
Now I have nothing against garden remodels – or boxwood hedges (though I generally find them unimaginative). But here’s a good example of shrub salvaging gone horribly wrong:
Deadwood boxwood
And again
It will take a long time for these boxwoods to fill in. … Continue reading this article “High-end WOW (Why oh why)”
Just a short (but irritated) note about the latest fawning over compost tea. Please, people, as Jeff pointed out nearly two years ago on this blog, just because Harvard (and now Berkeley) buy snake oil it’s not transmogrified into science. Middle America would be better served by using compost as a mulch and letting nature make the tea.
Is this title too extreme? I’ll leave that up to you.
Most of you are aware of the frog controversy that surrounds Round-up. A few years ago a professor from Pittsburgh showed that this chemical can kill aquatic creatures if it gets into a pond. Particularly tadpoles. Not that Round-up is intended to be used around water, but still, it is a concern and I don’t want to minimize it. Nor do I want people to forget that other supposedly safer products have their own set of dangers.… Continue reading this article “Sunday Bloody Sunday”