The Garden Professors™

Rogues gallery

You know the word “rogue” as a noun and adjective, and probably from when Sarah Palin “went rogue” during her time as vice presidental candidate.

But you may not know that it also a verb. That’s the way I use it most often. I rogue plants and I complain — often — about seed producers not doing enough roguing.

To rogue means to weed out inferior or off-type plants. It is a critical part of producing and maintaining seed selections of plants. Whenever you are growing fields of plants for seed production, be it tomatoes or zinnias or corn, you get off types. Chance mutations, seedlings produced from errant grains of pollen from another variety, or just change of the diversity within the population. So one has to rogue — walk through the fields and pull out flowers that are the wrong color, corn plants that aren’t yielding enough, all the unexpected variants to keep the variety true to type.

The annoying thing is that a lot of seed producers cut corners — particularly, it seems, for annual flower seed — and don’t bother. The results can be very frustrating.

The worst are flowers in mixed colors. Maintaining a good mix of multiple colors requires careful roguing to ensure one color — due to greater vigor or just chance — doesn’t come to dominate. Lots of companies just don’t seem to bother.

Last year I bought a packet of Zinnia ‘State Fair’, an old, and wonderful seed strain, which was supposed to come in the full mix of zinnia flower colors.

I got pink. That’s all. Just pink. My whole row was pink. Not my favorite color of zinnia. Clearly the pink plants slowly came to dominate the fields of whoever is producing these seeds, and instead of roguing out some to bring the color mix back into balance, they just let them go rogue, and I got stuck with just one color.

The ‘State Fair’ zinnias were also supposed to be double, like this.

They weren’t. Single flowered forms will almost always come to dominate seed strains unless rogued out because they’re easier for insects to pollinate and thus tend to produce more seed. Clearly no one bothered, because every plant I sowed out gave me just a single row of showy petals.

I’ve had similar experiences with countless other varieties of seed annuals. The picture looks great on the packet, but sow them out and mostly what I get are rogues, not the variety I was after. The lack of roguing is a plague… bad enough that a friend in the horticulture industry once mentioned casually to me that, of course, cosmos varieties are only worth growing when they are first introduced. A few years without good roguing, and their desirable characteristics are mostly lost.

So more roguing please. I love growing big blowsy annual flowers from seed. I’m tired of them all going rogue.

Creative Lighting for Seed Starting

As we get close to the time to start tomato, pepper, and other seedlings indoors, I thought I’d share this picture of my older sister’s seed starting setup from few years ago:

Two desk lamps with compact florescent bulbs. Not traditional, but worked great. Just a reminder that you can get creative when it comes to lighting for seedlings, using whatever fixtures and layout works for your space. The only rules are to use florescent or LED bulbs, not those old fashioned incandescent bulbs which have poor light for plants, and err on the side of more light rather than less to make sure you get compact, healthy plants that will transition to the sunny outside world without drama.
Joseph Tychonievich

Allium Fever

Ornamental onions are hot patooties. From big, bold, purple globes to small pink half-moons, there is no end to ornamental onion-y goodness out there with 30+ species and cultivars in the trade. There’s no substitute for ornamental onions in regards to architectural drama – the perfect geometric foil to wispy grasses, floral spikes, and umpteen daisy-thingies. The seed heads from the sturdier species will persist and add interest to autumn and winter perennialscapes (not sure if that’s a word).

Art-of-Gardening-COVER-3D-1 — Not one but TWO cultivars of Allium on the cover of the fabulous new Chanticleer book…

All are members of the Allium genus, just like those onions sprouting in your kitchen counter veg basket – hence the deer- and small mammal- resistance factor. However…there are some issues.

Can be short-lived. I have first-hand experience with this – plant, enjoy for a year or two, then…where did they go?
Bloom time is rather vaguely defined. Most catalogs list “early summer” or “late spring” for most cultivars. But if you want continuous purple orbs, what’s the order of bloom?
Can be expensive. Bulbs for some of the mammoth “softball” sizes will set you back $5-$7 each (the bulbs themselves are huge). This is of particular concern due to the first item.
Foliage failure. For some of the largest species and cultivars, the foliage starts to die back around (or even before) bloom time. Not a lot of time to put the necessary energy back into that big honkin’ bulb.

We already have a multi-year lily perennialization trial going in conjunction with Cornell and some other institutions. I thought I might try the same thing with Allium.

Student worker Lauren, after a long day of taking data on a gazillion lilies.

Unfortunately, I had this bright idea in November – well into the bulb-ordering season. I tried to compile as complete an inventory as I could, ordering from several vendors. Ended up with 28 species and cultivars – as much as the space prepared (check out that nice soil!) could hold, at our urban horticulture center near campus (Virginia Tech is in Blacksburg, USDA Zone 6, about 2000′). We put five or seven bulbs (depending on size) in each plot, and replicated the whole thing three times.

We’ll take data over the next three years on time of emergence, bloom time and duration, foliage duration (have a nifty chlorophyll meter that can help quantify that), some growth measurements, and perennial tendencies (or not). My hope is to end up with a really specific chronology of bloom times plus life expectancy. Yes, this was just a patented Holly wild hair; luckily I had some general funds to cover it. But I do think our little onion project will be of interest to more than a few folks, whether professional landscape designers or home gardeners. I know I’m excited to see the results ($30 for five bulbs – yeek)!

Upside-down growing

I was poking through old photos and came across this oddity:

What you are looking at is Japanese maples (Acer palmatum) being grown hanging upside down. I saw this year ago at a nursery in Japan. (You are also probably looking at a disaster of girdling roots in those tiny plastic pots, but that’s another topic) When I asked about them, I was told that they are weeping forms, and grown this way temporarily before being planted in the ground right-side up.
Looking at the image, it makes me think that the particular variety grown here might have a mutation that makes them negatively gravitropic, and so respond to the pull of gravity in the opposite way a normal plant would. (For more on that see my earlier post on gravitropism in corn) Growing them upside down would allow them to produce a fairly normal branching pattern, and then once plants, new growth would, presumably, cascade down from the established trunk and stem.
Anyway. That’s your oddity for the day.
Joseph Tychonievich

Love notes of genetics and physiology for Valentine’s Day

A St. Valentine meme compliments of my "friend" the self-styled Rev. Apostle, and Bishop to the Stars, Joel L. Watts. — A St. Valentine meme compliments of my “friend” the self-styled Rev. Apostle, and Bishop to the Stars, Joel L. Watts.

Ahhh….’Tis the time of year when we celebrate romantic love in homage to a 3rd Century priest who came up a head short for performing unsanctioned Christian weddings. (It is also of note that St. Valentine, or Valentinius as his friends called him, is the patron saint of bee keepers but, strangely, not of birds, flowers, or trees).

In celebration, many suitors, partners, spouses, fling-seekers, and woo-wishers will flock to florists, grocery floral counters, and even gas stations to purchase flowers, namely roses, that have likewise been beheaded.

Those roses, with all of their tightly wound petals, look nothing wild-type roses. Modern roses are the product of many centuries of breeding that started independently in China and the Mediterranean region.

So if the wild-type rose has a single row of five petals, how do breeders get all of those extra petals? They can just come from nowhere, you know.

The simple answer is that tissue that turns into stamens in the wild-type flower are converted to petal tissue. While early (and even contemporary) plant breeders may not understand the mechanism responsible for the doubling (gene expression), research is showing that the same gene is responsible for the doubling in both the Chinese and Mediterranean set of species/subspecies.

In a nutshell, what happens is that the different regions of the flower – sepals, petals, stamens, carpel – develop in response to the expression of a set of genes. It isn’t just the genes acting alone, though; it is their interaction in the tissues that makes the difference. These genes are grouped by the floral part they affect and are grouped as A-Function, B-Function, C-Function, and E-Function.

If you want to learn a whole lot more about it than I can ‘splain (it has been a few years since my last plant physiology class), this paper thoroughly explains the gene expression and evolution of the flower. Their figure depicting the flower model is informative, yet simple. I’ve included it (and its accompanying caption) below.

The ABCE model of floral organ identity. Sepals are produced where A function acts alone, petals where A and B functions overlap, stamens where B and C functions combine, and carpels where C function acts alone. In the eudicot genetic model Arabidopsis thaliana, APETALA1 (AP1) and APETALA2 (AP2) are the A-function genes, APETALA3 (AP3) and PISTILLATA (PI) together specify B function, C function is specified by AGAMOUS (AG), and multiple SEPALLATA genes provide E function. http://www.pnas.org/content/107/52/22570

In the paper “Tinkering with the C-Function: A Molecular Frame for the Selection of Double Flowers in Cultivated Roses” researchers show that in lines from both regions of the world produced double flowers as a result in a reduction of expression of the C-Function gene AGAMOUS (RhAG) leads to double flowers. In Arabidopsis (every plant lab bench jockey’s favorite model plant), this reduction shifts expression of the A-Function genes toward the center of the plant, turning stamens into petals and carpels into sepals.

Now, one question I get from time to time is “why don’t these roses smell like the old-fashioned roses?” One answer is that as we breed for looks, we are breeding out genes responsible for scent oil production. So Shakespeare was actually wrong when he said that “a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” That isn’t true these days.

So, I wish you a perfectly lovely Valentine’s Day, no matter how you celebrate. Just remember to whisper sweet nothings of floral gene expressions in your sweetheart’s ear. And remember to stop and smell the roses – if it is a variety that has a decent scent.

Founding GP under fire… for doing her job.

Susan Harris over at Garden Rant has done a terrific write up of all the details, so I’ll be brief here: Linda Chalker-Scott, the founder and fearless leader of The Garden Professors, is facing possible termination from her job at Washington State because she’s doing exactly what it says in her job description — extension, providing gardening information to the public — instead of bringing in big research grants. Universities love grants because they means money, and educating the public doesn’t. And money, more often than not, trumps little details like actual job descriptions and the educational missions of public land-grant universities.

Again, for the all the details, please see the Garden Rant post, including info on how to help stop this from happening.

Dear big box store: please make up your mind.

Report from the Center for Food Safety, April, 2015:

My photo from July, 2015:

Yes, sometimes folks want or need to kill bees, wasps, etc. But given the current hullabaloo, this particular sales display was too ironic for words.

Of potatoes and blue roses: be a mad plant tinkerer

A few weeks ago, I saw an interesting article in the Wall Street Journal (of all places) talking about people who are bioengineering plants at home to develop, among other things, a true blue rose. I love to see this. “Tinkerers” have long been a proud tradition of people who make true impacts and discoveries. I think of the ultimate plant “mad tinkerer” Luther Burbank who established himself as a foremost expert on developing new plants all from his crazy tinkering that developed the potato that you’ll find at nearly every fast food joint and created plants such as the shasta daisy and the wonderberry. I also think of a contemporary plant tinkerer – my friend and fellow GP Joseph Tychonievich. I love seeing all of his new plants and envy his creativity.

I can only hope that more and more people, and younger people especially, have an interest in amateur plant science. We live in a time when science education has reached a fervor, with about every school and youth program focused on STEM education. We even have 4-H clubs that meet in our office that are completely focused on robotics and coding. While this focus on science is great, my issue is that it focuses mainly on the “sexy” disciplines (engineering, chemistry, physics, etc) and little on life sciences like plant biology.

I’m heartened to see many many schools adding gardens to incorporate into the curriculum. Here in my county we’ve helped build and advise over two dozen school gardens. I’ve also seen some new tools to inspire young plant scientists, including an online community of scientist mentors who give guidance to budding plant science students (Planting Science). Who knows, maybe we’ll inspire a new generation of Luther Burbanks. We can only hope.

Is a tomato a fruit? Or a vegetable? Yes. And yes.

I’m not sure why this is the question that just won’t die, but I got it again at a event where I was speaking recently, so I am hereby going to issue the final, official, definitive ruling on the age-old question: Is a tomato is a fruit or a vegetable?

The answer is:…

(Drum roll please)

Both!

That’s right, folks. Vegetable and fruit are not mutually exclusive categories! Fruit is a technical, botanical term like leaf and petiole and petal which refers to a specific part of a plant. Vegetable is a cultural term referring to parts of plants that we eat.

In other words: lettuce is a leaf and a vegetable, celery is a petiole and a vegetable, broccoli is a flower bud and a vegetable, and a tomato is a fruit and a vegetable.

The real mystery to me is why this question always comes up around tomatoes and only tomatoes, when there are lots of other vegetable-fruits in the grocery store. Peppers, zucchini, pumpkins, eggplants, and cucumbers are ALL fruit. And vegetables. But somehow no one seems to wonder about them.

Joseph Tychonievich

Why you (probably) shouldn’t be starting seeds yet

As a beginning gardener I learned that to give plants like tomatoes and peppers more time to grow and produce the largest possible crop, it was best to start the seeds early indoors.

As soon as I learned that, I wondered: Well, if starting my tomatoes 6-8 weeks before transplanting them outside is good, surely 10 weeks would be better, right? Or 12? Or 16?

Turns out, earlier isn’t always better, and here are some of the reasons why.

First, you probably don’t have enough light. If, like most home gardeners, you are starting seeds under florescent bulbs, it is difficult to give sun lovers like tomatoes and peppers enough light. Light intensity drops off rapidly as you move away from the bulbs, so you know to keep the bulbs right above your seedlings. This works great when the plants are small, but as they grow it becomes very difficult to give both the tops and the bottoms of the seedlings enough light. The result is dying lower leaves and spindly, unhealthy growth.

Secondly, you are almost certainly going to get some crappy root systems. If you’ve followed this blog for a while, you’ve no doubt read Bert and Linda talking about all the potential problems with the root systems of container grown trees and shrubs. Well, most of the same problems develop with other plants grown in small containers. The roots start circling and they are slow to grow out of the rich soil of the container and into the native soil around them once transplanted into the garden. The longer your transplants grow indoors, the more likely they are to develop problematic root systems. Keeping transplanting them up to larger and larger containers can help mitigate the problem, but that quickly takes up far more space than most home gardeners have for there seedlings.

How big and impact that circling root system will have on the health of the plant varies by species. My personal experience growing zinnias, for example, is that they handle circling, pot-bound roots so poorly that plants from seeds sown directly in the garden quickly over-take and out-perform plants started weeks earlier indoors.

So follow the recommendations for the timing of seed starting. It really does work better. You should be able to get advice on when to start seeds from the catalogs you are shopping, extension offices, or you can use Margaret Roach’s excellent seed sowing calculator.

If you DO decide that earlier is better, that you can provide the light and generous pot sizes to avoid problems, there’s no harm in giving it a shot. But if you do, try starting a second batch at the later, recommended, time and growing the two side-by-side in the garden so you can really compare and see which perform best in the actual conditions of your garden, and if all that extra time and space under your lights or in your greenhouse was really worth it.

Joseph Tychonievich