Ghostwater Garden

What's in a Name?

One reader writes:

Hi

im curious to why u choose this name. do you know what it means.

Is there a significance ?

Do I know what it means? 
Well, yes and no. 

I now know much more than I did, thanks to the Wikipedia entry on Djinn But my answer was thus:

Fair question:

'Djinn' as a canting* play on my name, and for the watered down story versions - parallel to those of the the european Fae - of the Djinn that I read as a child.  I realize that, like the Fae, the Djinn carry much more power than most folks realize, but that was not my intent in picking up the name.

*Canting as I mean it explained here.

I'm not claiming to be some kind of 'genie in a bottle' with all the answers to any garden question, although I'd love to have more knowledge, and I don't mind sharing what I do know.

Now you know. 

Male and Female Flowers

Some time ago on the LiveJournal Gardening list, the question came up: How do you tell if you have a male plant or a female plant in the Goatsbeard (Aruncus) family?

I have the Dwarf Korean Goatsbeard (Aruncus aethusifolius) and knew that I had seen two very different types of flowers.  These are all going to seed now, but I pulled one of each to demonstrate the difference.

From what I read on a site discussing the larger goatsbeard (Aruncus dioicus) (sorry, I didn't get the link at the time), the larger, showier flowers (top in photo) are from the male plant and the smaller, denser flowerheads are from the female.  This seems to be borne out by my example, as the female flower (below in photo) is forming a thick clump of seeds. 

Two plants will produce a plethora of seeds, which in my zone five climate, seem to have a 100% germination rate.  They are easy enough to identify as they sprout, and thinning them or weeding them out entirely would not be a terrible chore. 

I leave the seedheads on all winter, as they are quite decorative in the snow.  Areas with heavy snowfall would not see this however, as these dwarf plants are only about twelve inches tall. 

A quote

The incomparible Henry Mitchell writes in his essay "On the Defiance of Gardeners" (The Essential Earthman) that "It is not nice to garden anywhere. Everywhere there are violent winds, startling once-per-five-centuries floods, unprecedented droughts, record-setting freezes, abusive and blasting heats never known before. There is no place, no garden where these terrible things do not drive gardeners mad...There are only gardeners and non-gardeners. Defiance...is what makes gardeners."

(stolen entire from a comment left at Prairie Point by  M Stevens)

Here's a Question...

I picked up a bargain pot of something called 'water parsley' at a big box store about a month ago.  They had a whole table full of water plants for a buck each.  The water parsley is nice, but I really spent Mark's dollar on the two tiny water lily leaves I saw in the pot.

I have since separated the obviously rangy Oenanthe sarmentosa (also called javanica?) from its lilliputian pot mate. 

 

I am hoping that the lily will turn out to be a Helvola.  This Nymphaea (water lily) is a miniature that only spreads from 1 to 3 square feet, so an 18" pot can be sufficient for it to thrive.  It is known for multiple blooms and has a lovely butter yellow flower.  (Those leaves in the photo on the right are dime-sized or smaller... a tiny, tiny thing, this lily.)

So here is my question.  I have a lily that is (potentially) hardy to zone four, if it doesn't freeze.  It is currently sited in a pot on an unheated sunporch, which will dip down to freezing in mid-winter, when I usually bring the tender plants out there into the house for a bit.  The Missouri Botanical Garden site suggests lifting the rhizomes for winter and storing them in a "cool root cellar or garage where winter temperatures do not dip below freezing but preferably do remain in the 40-45 degree F range."  Which sounds to me that the plant should be dormant when you lift it? I have an active (if slow) growing plant. 

Does anyone out there have water lily advice? 

Stats and Referrers...

You know, I kind of wish you could go back and talk to the people that are googling or yahooing for your page. I'd love to know why this person was looking for Michigan gardens, and if they found what they were looking for.

I've been thinking about doing a set of links for michigan sources/ gardens. I was even at a seasons-end event at my most local greenhouse, looking at a sea of about 80 other faces, thinking about standing up and asking if anyone had a web page, but I chickened out. I'm just not that bold. But I am curious. Maybe next time.

Of Interest

It's interesting to scroll through the referrer's log for my pages. One search result turned up this page along with the one that brought my visitor in: Ontario Gardener

This goes on my list of possible subscriptions. I get a passel of garden mags already, but one centered in Ontario is sure to focus on plants that will do well in Michigan.

It is a frustration of the national magazines that they just can't be all things to all people. And while I do enjoy reading about plants that do well elsewhere... sometimes it feels like there are whole issues full of plants that I would be insane to try to grow here, much as I might love them. (Crocosimia 'Lucifer' for example, I tried, in the best location I could find. The hummingbirds fought over nectar rights. For all of one summer. Sigh.)

And here is another good page I just found while checking my spelling of crocosimia... Dig It

Fall Weather

(Acer palmatum 'Viridis,' photo from October 8, 2003)

Fall weather is so changable. Woke up today to a steady, miserable drizzle. By mid-afternoon, it was cloudy but not raining, and the air was actually still pretty warm. After all, this is November.

So I got out and mucked around with some of the fall cleanup chores.

Moved some stuff that had been living on the patio (pots, bagged dirt) out of the path of the snowblower. Found and stashed more of the ceramic pots - in zone 5, no ceramic is 'frost proof', it all has to be emptied, cleaned up and stored in the garage. Trimmed down some more of the weedy looking fading plants (goldenrod and wild asters just look shabby by the time they are done.) I put some of the potted plants into the corners where they will ride out winter's abuse.

I still need to finish breaking down the whiskey keg pond and store the plastic liner, rake all the leaves off the patio, and put all the potted plants in secure places for their winter sleep.

(Sedum spurium 'Bronze Carpet' - Dragon's Blood Sedum, photo from October 8, 2003)

Next year I hope to get my three bin compost area built, and that will make my life easier. I have a plastic composter that is full to bursting, a pile of leaves and miscellaneous trimmings beside it, and half a steel barrel that has mostly gone to rust - also full of potential compost. The making of the triple bin will be a job and a half, though, because of the perp work for it - all the crap that is hanging out behind the garage has to come out and be dealt with/discarded. By spring I hope to have fresh energy for this.

How Not to Use a Tool

If the tool in question is a D-handled fork, and you are me, don't use it to pry the Stella D'oro daylilies out of the front border. (Most especially if the tool in question came from a discounter and is not put together in such a way that the handle is replaceable...) The tool will break. Clean. At the point where the (terribly porous wood, now that I can look at it's composition) handle feeds into the head.

So. Now I have a fork on my wishlist. From Lee Valley, this time. And I might spend twice as much on it, but it will be guaranteed for ten years.

Honestly though, I was using it to dig up the entire lily clump from a raised bed. (There are four distinct clumps in the photo above. Really.) I wasn't trying to divide the rootmass as I lifted it. I was just working to get the clump out of the ground, and I am not sure I was abusing the tool. I just have to stop buying cheap.

Which means I am without a fork until next year sometime. I did without one for years in the past, I can do it again. Sigh.

I did get 17 new plants from two of those clumps. Those are potted up and in the 'nursery' to be given to friends for their new homes. One of the remaining clumps never came out of the ground and the other was divided in two and repositioned further away from the skirt of the Alberta Spruce - which had begun to resent being crowded. I am contemplating trying cheddar pinks - I've seen a variety in a lovely salmon color - in the place where the lilies were.

Are They The Same?

Ladybells (Adenophora)

Campanula rapunculoides

They sure look like it. My 'ladybells' also mature to a dark colored stalk, and the seedcases very much resemble those of other campanulas I have in the garden (Blue Clips, Peachleaved, and others...)

I guess I will have to keep a close eye on their spreading habits!

{Update August 9: Still confused. Stopped by a local growers that was having an open house today, and they had Adenophora confusa that looks just like mine. So I don't know what to think at this point. I think it is a well-named plant.}

I'm Not An Expert...

But I do get lots of questions... all my friends think I know everything, which is very flattering. If they only knew!

But this question came up in my comments:

I wanted to comment here because I had the weirdest thing happen with poppies this year.

I planted them for my first time, from Burpee - live plants not seeds. The leaves grew nicely, but I never got a tall stem on any of them. Then I noticed a bud in the middle of the leaf cluster, which eventually bloomed for a day or two. Just the flower right down at ground level in the middle of the leaves. The stem was all of 1/2 inch or so!

Any idea what might have caused this? Is it because this is the first year? I heard that some perennials don't bloom the first year they are planted...

-=kt=-

I gave it my best shot:

Well. Sandy soil or clay? And when did you plant them, as in: how soon after being put it the ground did they bloom?

I'm going to do some guessing.

These are probably the big oriental poppies. Burpee will propagate these by root division, and the plants themselves will be smaller the first year while they build up root strength. That would be part of what you witnessed.

My big guess is that you put them in only a few short weeks before they bloomed. Lots of plants are programmed by nature to bloom during a certain time of year - when the days reach certain length, the plant knows it is time to bloom. Poinsettias are a prime example of this. Many of the plants that lightly rebloom late in the season are blooming when the day hits that target length again. (Poppies, unfortunately, are not in this group.)

So if you put them in late enough, the plant only had so much time to prepare a flower, and it took a shortcut on producing the stalk.

As for the short bloom time, that is typical of poppies. They don't last but a day or two of glorious bloom. When the plants spread a bit, and they will, you will have a series of bloom stalks that will flower at slightly different times and the show will last a bit longer.

I think that next year your plants will perform to your expectations. If they don't, it will be time to write to the nursery.