Category: Stories

Er, Too Much Coverage?

When botany and advertising collide.  Here we have the latest from AT&T.
The advertisement description’s in quotes.


“We open on an urban setting and see a vine begin to grow up a
pillar.”

What kind of vine?? It looks like a mutant clematis, though the leaf arrangement’s wrong, and there are no orange large-flowered ones. Oh well, let’s not be picky. At least it’s some kind of ornamental plant. We’ll call it Clematis broadbandii. Definitely non-native, though.


“From there, we see various landscapes being covered with
similar vines.”

What the…well, I guess the overpass does look better. And the city’s doing a great job keeping it out of the road.


“As the seedlings grow, they sprout brilliant orange
flowers, covering the cities, towns, and countryside’s in a spectacular
orange hue.”

Honey, drive faster. This neighborhood gives me the creeps.


This is ridiculous… I’m calling Linda Chalker-Scott! Or maybe Jeff Gillman, for a fair and balanced herbicide recommendation; or maybe Bert Cregg could suggest how to cut it back. Holly Scoggins is a flake; she’d just tuck Bounce sheets everywhere...


“Coverage is a beautiful thing. AT&T covers 97% of all Americans.”

Dear AT&T: the National Invasive Species Council will be in touch. Unless their call gets dropped.

Winter Trade Show Report

Disclaimer: The information and images below should not be construed as any sort of recommendation, remedy or advice. Just some cool and/or weird stuff I saw at a green industry trade show. Plus this blog needs more photos.

Was at the Mid-Atlantic Nursery Trade Show (MANTS… and yes, there is a Pennsylvania version…PANTS) in Baltimore a couple of weeks ago.  It’s a wonderful opportunity to visit with past students (now gainfully employed – yay!).  I also get to personally thank the nurseries and other businesses that generously support our Horticulture Department and Garden.  I’m more "herbaceous" so I tend to get more (professionally…and emotionally) out of the floriculture summer trade show and conference in Columbus, Ohio (OFA)  If you dig hot new tropicals, annuals, and perennials – it’s THE place to be.  MANTS tends to be more landscapy/woody.  There are umpteen wholesaler booths filled with dormant, ball & burlapped trees and containerized shrubs. There are WAY too many Bradford pears still out there (see Bert’s post below).  Honestly. 

Foot traffic was good (10,000 + registrants) for the 300 exhibitors: wholesale nurseries, garden center suppliers, liner and plug growers, landscape and nursery equipment manufacturers.  Also, all of the allied businesses you might not think of – inventory software, nursery insurance companies, universities and colleges, grower organizations, tag and pot manufacturers, etc.,  always a fascinating vertical and horizontal cross section of this business of growing and selling plants.

On with the show…

Propagation nurseries make the world go ’round.
This IS the proverbial candy shop for greenhouse and nursery growers.  Each flat holds 36, 78, or 105 little plants.  Two flats…would fit in my tote bag. Heh.


Succulents continue to be hot. Here’s Kalanchoe thyrsifolia ‘Fantastic’.
Fantastically awesome.


Even better…check out the pot made from (very) compressed rice hulls. Nice color, pretty shape, biodegradable. You’ll probably see more of these in the near future.


Display promoting the book "Creating a Deer and Rabbit-Proof Garden".  Artificial flowers – that may be the ticket…no, wait, it’s an artificial deer, too.


WANT. My 1972 John Deere 750 is on its last legs/tires. Plus this one would fit down our blueberry rows, AND it has a cup holder.  The brochure is now pinned above my desk.

Great name for a nursery:

that’s Holly, Woods, and Vines if you can’t read it.

Also the home of…


Faux moss-covered faux rocks. Intriguing.

Finally, there’s always a peek at trends in pots (pottery pots), garden art (tasteful or not) and other items coming soon to your local independent garden center…


Lots of antique and rustic looks out there, also galvanized is big.
I loved the fishy pots. Alas, one can only look, and then place an order. Minimum quantity – one pallet. Maybe if we all went in together…

Organic Honey?

As there seems to be a good deal of interest in the topic of honeybees, and I’m a beekeeper, albeit relatively novice, I thought I might continue a bit of discussion.

I’ve been beekeeping for three years, and I sold my first honey harvest this fall.  Six gallons, divided into pint and half pint-sized jars.  As a newbie, extracting the honey from the frames and getting it into the jars was, by far, the messiest thing I’ve ever done.  It’s like wrestling with a living thing…the garage and kitchen still have sticky spots.  It also took forever – honey moves through a three- pail, three-filter system (eventually removing particles down to 200 microns) like…cold molasses.  Once it was properly subdued and contained, I looked into what was required for labeling.  Very interesting. And very, very, vague.

Honeybees have been described as “flying dust mops” – there is no way, unless the beekeeper owns all the land in a several-mile radius, that one knows what they’re getting into.   Our girls’ primary duty is pollination of our four+ acres of blueberries, so their primary pollen and nectar source in late spring is our four acres of blueberries. After that, they hit the sourwood, wingstem, mountain mint, and the smorgasbord of of perennials and annuals in the garden borders. We don’t use any pesticides on our farm (the cabbage looper and stink bug invasion this year is really testing me on that one). But that doesn’t mean the gentleman next door isn’t using Sevin on his squash or pyrethrins on his potatoes. And our bees are just as likely to be over at his house as ours (despite my stern lecture to them).

Noticing the honey labeled “USDA Certified Organic” sold for a premium at both my local grocer and favorite “natural foods” store, I spent some time digging as to certification standards, and whether it would be worth it to get certified. 

I came up fairly empty-handed.  There does not seem to be any USDA National Organic Program certification standards for honey.  Apparently there are some trade-law guidelines that allow honey to be imported from Canada and Central/South America labeled as USDA organic.  Very confusing, and very weird.  But apparently some U.S. honey producers, both large and small, have gone ahead and slapped USDA Organic labels on anyway.  Along with other meaningless statements like “Superior grade” or “All natural”.  Some states such as Pennsylvania are pushing for NOP standards, noting their beekeepers are at a disadvantage, marketing-wise, if they cannot certify their honey but Canadian or Argentine producers can.  On another front, beeswax, especially older wax in frames that are in brood hives for several years, can accumulate pesticides brought in from foraging bees like nobody’s business. So I’d also look askance at claims of products containing “organic beeswax.”

Pure Nelida: the story of one Viva Farms participant

Nelida was born in a subsistence farming community in Oaxaca, Mexico. She escaped an abusive alcoholic household at 14 by going to live with her (soon to be) husband’s family, who took her in, then took every opportunity from that moment forth to remind her what a burden she was for them.

After marrying at 16, the young couple migrated north to the US in search of a better life where they found farm work. They toiled 12 years on commercial farms in California, then headed further north, seeking farm work in the lush Skagit Valley in Washington State.  They added children to their household until they were nine in all…plus a steady stream of cousins, brothers, nieces, nephews, uncles, and others who’d joined them in their search for the good life. With family, Nelida’s work multiplied: farm worker by day, Oaxacan mother/wife by night.  Life in Washington wasn’t exactly the American dream, but Nelida knew it was better than the nightmarish situation her relatives faced back in Oaxaca.  Then, one day, things took a turn for the worse.

One of Nelida’s sons fell violently ill. When the traditional herbal remedies she learned from her grandmother failed, Nelida pleaded with her husband to take the boy to the hospital for tests.  Her husband refused, petrified of hospital bills (he had no health insurance) and of being fired for missing work. But a man’s greatest fear is no match for a mother’s love.  She looked her husband straight in the eyes and told him, “Si tu no eres lo suficientemente hombre para salvar tu hijo, yo mismo le llevare’ al hospital.” (If you’re not man enough to save your son, I’ll take him to the hospital myself.) She didn’t have a driver’s license at the time so she carried him to the closest hospital.

The doctors diagnosed the boy with late-stage leukemia and ordered treatment immediately. They told Nelida that if she’d waited even a few more days it may have been too late. Nelida quit farming and dedicated herself to her son’s recovery. She accompanied him back and forth from Mount Vernon to the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center in Seattle for weekly chemo treatments. Between treatments she made and sold tamales, empanadas, pan de burro, fresh tortillas, anything friends and local Mexican stores would buy. She needed every penny she could earn for the cancer treatment, which she was determined to pay for herself.

When her son achieved remission, Nelida did not return to being a farm worker.  She stepped up the organic production like she’d always done at home. She crammed pots and trays of vegetables and herbs into her kitchen window-sills, into her tiny balcony, her front doorstep, anywhere she could put them. When a community garden was created in her farm worker housing complex, Nelida was the first to sign up for a plot.  She was delighted with her garden plot but wanted more ground. Couldn’t she just use the whole 1/2 acre, she would ask the residential director. That would be enough space to feed her family and even sell a bit of surplus.

That’s when I met Nelida. When she told me how she had transported special plants and seed with her from Oaxaca to California, tended them in the migrant camps and then moved them up to Washington with her, I knew she was an ideal candidate for the new Latino farming program I was helping WSU Skagit Extension launch in the valley.

Nelida enrolled immediately in our first bilingual Sustainable Small Farming and Ranching course. She graduated and signed up for the more advanced Farm Business Planning course, in which she developed a business plan for a three acre diversified organic farm.  She now leases 1 acre at Viva Farms (Washington’s first bilingual farm business incubator) and two acres at a second site. Her goal is to purchase 10 acres with a house, where she can live and expand her organic produce sales that now complement her already established food business.

When we met to develop a name and logo for Nelida’s one-woman organic farm and food business, I could think of only one name to encapsulate her brand personality: PURA NELIDA, like the saying pura vida but with Nelida as the life force.  I asked Nelida what symbolized pura vida* and purity for her. She thought for a moment then smiled and replied, “una cebolla blanca“(a white onion). So that’s what she is seen cradling in the logo we designed for her farm.

So to those who feel discouraged by how long it has taken for us to farm as if we love and cherish life…I offer one of Nelida’s organic white onions: let its crisp, sweet, spice and purity cure you of your ills. Soon you’ll understand why, when I stand and behold Viva Farms, I am apt to repeat “Pura Vida…” again and again, like a mantra.

For more information about WSU S
kagit County Extension and Viva Farms, please view our websites at http://www.wsu.skagit.edu and http://www.vivafarms.org. [Note: Nelida (via Viva Farms) is offering a weekly box delivery in partnership with Growing Washington, another non-profit that serves beginning and Latino farmers. 20 weeks, mid June-Halloween. $25/wk small share, $36 large share. It’s a great way to support the next generation of sustainable farmers. Contact sarita@growfood.org to sign up.]

Don McMoran is an Agriculture and Natural Resources Extension Education in Skagit County, Washington.  You can reach him at donaldm@co.skagit.wa.us

“Leave” Them Alone…Adventures in Extension Podcasting

We’re on the topic of communication this week…how can Extension personnel communicate best with their audience/stakeholders. It used to be via racks of Xeroxed “Fact Sheets” at your local Extension office. A few of these are said to still exist, but with states gutting their extension budgets, the costs of printing have become prohibitive.  And more critically…where do YOU go for information?  A musty file full of handouts? Heck no. Electronic media is tailor-made for extension. It’s virtually free, easily updated, and reaches a vast majority of clients.  Bert already covered YouTube, as well as posted the BEST extension video ever, courtesy of Utah State.  So I shall not be redundant.

At Virginia Tech, we have some folks utilizing the Power of Podcasts to communicate whatever point they’re trying to make.  Dr. Mike Goatley, our Turf Extension Specialist, has done especially well with the technology.  He presents practical advice in a very user-friendly package.  He nearly always cites relevant research.  The information presented in the audio file (MP3) is also available in some sort of text format, whether a fact sheet, script, or PowerPoint handout, often with hot links to the research literature cited.  You don’t even need an iPod; just click on the link and your media player of choice will open and play the audio.

For today’s example, I’ve selected one of my favorite Goatley-casts… his guide to lawn leaf management entitled “Leave Them Alone.” Effective, informative, and very convincing…all in 4 minutes.  Take a look and listen here… 


Mike demonstrates with his mulching mower.  The safety glasses are a nice touch. I wouldn’t have thought of that.

Water is the answer!

Wildlife week continues!  My humble experience with my own gardens past and present, as well as our campus garden, is that the presence of water virtually guarantees the presence of wildlife.  One of the National Wildlife Federation’s top requirements for becoming a  Certified Wildlife Habitat is “supply water” (another requirement: "$20 fee").   Water is, of course, the beverage of choice for most animals (though I did hear of a squirrel that preferred beer). And some creatures require it as a substrate in which to reproduce (that sounded a bit clinical).  Unfortunately, the popularity of water gardening, according to garden trend surveys and such, peaked in the late 1990’s and has decreased since.  I’d imagine this goes hand in hand with the desire for “no maintenance” landscapes. Whatever. I will not have a garden without moving water in it.  

Our first pond-building experience. Dig 11′ x 16 hole with concentric steps. Place excess soil behind pond to create stream/falls/unintended volcano. Line, add river stone and gravel. Add water and LOTS of plants to disguise said volcano. 

Voila.

True story that has nothing to do with wildlife*: We put this house up for sale one spring when the garden was kickin’. Within 10 minutes of the Realtor putting the sign out front, a truck drove up. The couple walked straight to the pond (at this point outfitted with a spiffy patio) and said "We’ll take it."  I said "don’t you want to see the inside of the house?" and the young woman responded "Sure, I guess we need to."  Sold it at 99% of asking price. Never underestimate the value of landscaping!!!

Back on topic…The sound of moving water is an essential part of the experience for me. Makes pulling weeds in the vicinity almost pleasant. Fish, tadpoles, snails, and salamanders populate our wee pond.

"Burrdurrrrp."

Watching the birds bath on the shallow gravel beach is delightful. The pump runs all winter, keeping the water moving and mostly open.  I’m pretty sure that in the dead of winter, it’s the only unfrozen water source for quite a distance, judging from the multitude of critter tracks in the snow.

Water makes a garden more pleasant, adds value to our home, and increases the odds of survival for the wildlife during the toughest times of drought and cold.  Now get digging.

*Actually, there was a wildlife-related incident…when the buyer’s Realtor took them down the exterior steps to inspect the cellar, he reached inside the door and put his hand on a 5′ long black snake wrapped around the light switch. That was almost a deal-breaker.  Point being…if you create a wildlife-friendly yard, they will  come.  All of them.

The Deer Thing

Gave a talk last week to the Arlington, Virginia Master Gardeners and friends (howdy!).  What a wonderful group. I was warmly welcomed, they brought awesome goodies, and even laughed at my silly anecdotes.

As is inevitable during any plant presentation, the topic of deer came up. When the question arose of whether a particular perennial that I had enjoyed in my own garden was deer-resistant or not, I responded with  “I’m not sure, I don’t have a deer problem.”  I regretted my words the moment they came out. The audience erupted, and I swear cupcakes were (figuratively)  flung at my head.

1. It was incredibly insensitive of me.

But I didn’t know! I was gently informed that yes, deer were indeed a huge problem. Arlington is tucked deep within the Beltway, right next to D.C. Though they have some nice green spaces and lots of big trees, I wouldn’t describe it as suburban, which is where I’ve heard all the deer problems were in Northern Virginia.  The D.C. metroplex is bumper-to-bumper traffic about 22 hours per day, at least in the experience of this Country Mouse. How they haven’t been wiped out by deer-vehicle collisions, I’m not sure. Maybe the traffic never goes fast enough. I feel just awful for these folks. One lady described afterward how she couldn’t even have pansies in a container on her patio.  She said she gardens “in her dreams.”  I misted up. 

2.  I then had to try to explain why I don’t have a deer problem.

I’m not sure!  What’s worse, I haven’t had too much of a problem at any of my previous residences (just digging the hole deeper, aren’t I). Currently, we live in the Country with a capital “C”, on the side of a mountain, surrounded by forests, pastures, streams, etc. There’s minimal fencing.  The nearest neighbors* are not very near. We should be crawling with deer.

Don’t get me wrong, there are plenty around – picturesque herds roam the hayfields across the valley. Driving home at dusk in the spring and fall is an adventure in deer-dodging. They do occasional visit closer to the house, traipsing through our blueberries, and eating fallen apples, or nibbling the tops out of my okra. They have damaged some of our veg garden, but no worse than our own destruct-o-chickens.  But they rarely mess with the ornamentals. Of which there are LOTS.

* Incidentally, most of those (very nice) neighbors possesses multiple rifles and armloads of 30-06 rounds. I know this because deer season is nigh, and everyone’s adjusting their scopes and blowing out the dust.  Blam, blam, blam.

My best guess as to our relative freedom from deer damage? Neighbors who enjoy deer steaks, plus an active assault-hound program. OUR weapons of choice:


Bebe (B.B.) the Basenji-mix and Bunny the Whippet. Faster than speeding bullets. Joel is asleep so I graciously cropped him out.

Not very fearsome as depicted here, but two sight-hounds can give the deer a run for their money. They love to patrol the grounds. Plus it’s great exercise for the little couch lizards.

The deer explosion has turned many people off from gardening (both novice and experienced). To have something you’ve grown and/or spent a chunk of money on – there one evening and gone the next morning – must be very, very frustrating.  My heart goes out to the kind and hardy gardeners of Arlington and all others for whom deer are an absolute plague. 

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Lungs and Plants

As a third grader I distinctly remember my teacher telling our class about how it was bad to smoke because the smoke would make your lungs filthy.  She used her aunt as an example.  It seems that this aunt was a heavy smoker.  One day this aunt was eating popcorn and accidently inhaled a piece.  About 6 months or so after she inhaled it she coughed it up and it looked like a little piece of tar.  Funny how some stories stay with you.

The interesting thing to me is that my third grade teacher’s aunt isn’t the only one who has inhaled a seed, and that the inhilation of the seed needen’t mean curtains for the plant.  Recently a gentleman inhaled a pea (or bean, the exact type of plant still appears to be a bit up in the air — ) which sprouted in his lung http://pagingdrgupta.blogs.cnn.com/2010/08/13/plant-sprouts-in-mans-lung/?iref=NS1http://pagingdrgupta.blogs.cnn.com/2010/08/13/plant-sprouts-in-mans-lung/?iref=NS1 and last year there was a gentleman from Russia who apparently had a fir growing in his lung (though it seems more likely that the man actually inhaled the tip of a more mature tree — too much vodka? — My question is whether there were roots, and if so, does that make this a novel way to root a fir cutting?) http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1169861/Shocked-Russian-surgeons-open-man-thought-tumour–FIR-TREE-inside-lung.html

After doing a quick search I also found a case where a child had a germinating seed of an apple in his lung, a case where a germinating bean caused a young girls right lung to collapse. And, apparently, both children and adults inhale grass seeds now and again though I couldn’t find much information on how frequently these seeds actually germinate in the lungs.

I wonder, is this the beginning of an interesting coevolution between plants and people?  Could a plant evolve so that the seeds were inhaled by humans, grew in our lungs, and then, later were expelled to be inhaled by other humans?  Just a random thought on a slow Thursday.

Pigmented Mulch in Paradise

Just back from a quick vacation to Little Cayman island.  Truly a dot on the map – the whole island is about 7 miles long and a mile wide. Only 150 locals and a couple hundred tourists are on island at any one time.  It’s beyond laid back, with few attractions other than the resident iguanas and red-footed boobies (booby jokes abound).

Airport terminal/post office/fire station.

The big draw is diving – LC is the home to Bloody Bay Wall, one of the most famous dives in the Caribbean.  The reef drops off like a sheer cliff, from 40-60′ to more than 1000′.

All the action is underwater!
(Let me know if you want to see more slightly blurry diving photos.)

“Fascinating, Holly.  But what does this have to do with painted mulch?”

The extent of the landscaping for most yards: conch shells arranged in interesting designs and/or piles. But as we pedaled past a rather upscale condo, I came to a screeching halt. A gorgeous Bismarckia nobilis had caught my eye, but then I saw what was under it. Egad.

Everything comes to Little Cayman by a weekly barge or little prop plane and is wildly expensive. Four-pack of batteries? $15. A six-pack of beer is $20. TWENTY DOLLARS!!!

So, good readers, what we have here is possibly the most expensive mulch on the face of the earth. I can’t even imagine.


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The Importance of Not Leaving Your Veg Garden Unattended for a Week in July


Small dog snout + normal-sized cucumber provided for scale.

This problem is self-explanatory and probably not at all atypical for our readers. Pattypans became UFOs; grey zucchini, footballs.  Note that it’s been very dry here in the Blue Ridge. I shudder to think what would have happened with normal rainfall.


Beans amuck! Scared the hell out of Joel when he opened the fridge. But they wouldn’t fit in the bucket!

If you haven’t tried yard-long beans, give them a shot sometime. Super easy to grow, just need the usual pole-bean structure. Pick daily, or they get out of hand. They have a rich, “beany” flavor and no strings attached. Best sauteed – I toss them with a bit of sesame oil and soy sauce in honor of their Asian heritage. Leave ’em long to impress the kids! I bet one or two beans equals a full serving of vegetables.


Yard-longs (Vigna unguiculata subsp. sesquipedalis)  come in both green and a dark red that keeps its color after cooking! They’re actually in the cowpea genus. Normal green bean at top of plate for scale (it now has a complex).