Why doesn’t my plant look like it did last year?

I get versions of this question often. You have something in the garden, but this year it looks a bit different than it did before. There are a bunch of different things that could have happened to cause this change, and I’ll attempt here to make a complete list of them.

Rootstock

Trees and shrubs, including things like tree peonies and roses, are often grafted, so the part with the pretty flowers or delicious fruit is stuck onto the roots of a different variety, often not as pretty/useful/tasty but more vigorous and/or easier to propagate.… Continue reading this article “Why doesn’t my plant look like it did last year?”

Puya report!

For all five of you that might have paid attention to my posts on the genus Puya (which does in fact rhyme with booyah…thank you my west-coastie friends):

Here’s the update that you’ve been waiting for!

Puya is a horrifically spiny, painful, and hateful genus in the Bromeliad family. Native to the Andes, the fish-hook-like spines snare passing mammals; the rotting flesh provides nutrients to the exceptionally lean soil of the arid steppes on which it sort of grows/becomes grumpier.… Continue reading this article “Puya report!”

The Science Behind Fall Color

In many parts of the U.S., particularly the northern U.S., we are blessed each year by nature’s display of bright color dotted through the landscape. Fall color of leaves at the end of the growing season provides a remarkable encore in the landscape. There are many trees and shrubs with great autumn leaf color and I will address some of them in my next week’s post, but this week, I will talk about what actually happens inside the plant during autumn.… Continue reading this article “The Science Behind Fall Color”

Thoughts on reproducibility and reliability in science

You’ve probably heard about a project that attempted the replicate 98 psychological studies and found that only a third of them were reproducible, the other two thirds produced different results – sometimes very different, more often only somewhat so.

Though psychology was the subject of this study, you shouldn’t assume the results were unique to that particular field. The are plenty of reports of similar failings and the so-called ‘Decline effect’ in other scientific disciplines.

So why is that?… Continue reading this article “Thoughts on reproducibility and reliability in science”

Another unnecessary tree failure

The end of August brought an unseasonable rain- and windstorm to the Puget Sound region. We had some spectacular tree failures which I missed seeing as I was out of town. But one of our Facebook group members, Grace Hensley, was on the ball and took some great photos of a fallen purple-leafed plum. The first thing you see is the complete lack of a stabilizing root system.

Now look at the base of the trunk, which is actually a massive circling root that has girdled the trunk over time.… Continue reading this article “Another unnecessary tree failure”

Ray’s 2015 Tomatoes

I thought I’d share some of the new varieties of tomatoes I’m growing this year, along with some old favorites.

First up is a picture of a new variety from Dr. Harry Klee’s research at the U. of Florida called Garden Gem, along with Blush from Artisan Seeds.

Garden Gem is a new hybrid, poised to take the fresh market grocery store tomatoes on. Same disease resistance, same shipping quality, but with much improved flavor. … Continue reading this article “Ray’s 2015 Tomatoes”

Don’t just stand there like a statue

Posted by Bert Cregg

 

Reading through Linda’s recent article in Arboriculture and Urban Forestry “Nonnative, Noninvasive Woody Species Can Enhance Urban Landscape Biodiversity” (Arb. & UF 41:173-186) reminded me of some thoughts I had while I sat through a talk by Doug Tallamy at the New England GROWS conference back in February.  As most GP blog readers are likely aware, Tallamy is the author of Bringing Nature Home.  The basic premise of the book is that native insects only feed on native plants and therefore the use of exotic landscape plants will cause ecological food webs to collapse and the end of the world as we know it.… Continue reading this article “Don’t just stand there like a statue”

Where double flowers come from (sometimes)

Doubling of flowers — the development of extra petals — is a common mutation, and often beloved by gardeners. Sometimes double forms of flowers become so popular that gardeners hardly recognize the single flowered, wild-type. Wild roses, for example, have just 5 (or, in once case, 4) petals and look totally different than the extra petal flaunting varieties familiar from gardens.

Doubling usually happens when gene expression gets mixed up and bits of cells that were destined to develop into anthers develop into extra petals instead.… Continue reading this article “Where double flowers come from (sometimes)”

Master Gardeners are Great, And They Deserve Better

If you’re looking for cat videos, birthday reminders, and a method for spying on old friends then Facebook is pretty useful, but for cold hard facts?

Not so much.

Well, actually we’re overstepping here. It’s really not Facebook. After all, Facebook is kind of like a blank sheet of paper. The paper doesn’t tell the truth or lies, it’s the person who writes on the paper. On the Garden Professor’s Facebook page we do a pretty good job of offering science based information to people.… Continue reading this article “Master Gardeners are Great, And They Deserve Better”

When Plants Attack! (each other)

When you talk about killer plants, your mind may conjure images of a man-eating plant in “Little Shop of Horrors,” insect-eating Venus flytraps or poisonous plants like deadly nightshade.

While all of those scenarios are interesting in and of themselves, what about plants that attack other plants?

I’m talking, of course, about parasitic plants. These plants thrive on stealing nutrients from other plants, either weakening them or, quite possibly, killing them.

Parasitic plants connect themselves to a host plant and siphon off the sugars that plant produces and the nutrients it pulls from the soil.… Continue reading this article “When Plants Attack! (each other)”