Flower: Exploring the World in Bloom

Phaidon Press is noted for their exquisite art books, capturing in print garden subjects from many different media. “Flower: Exploring the World of Bloom” is the 4,000 year story of human fascination with flowers as told in over 300 images.

Edited seamlessly by Victoria Clarke, the book begins with an insightful essay by Anna Pavord, the author of “The Tulip” and several other books that examine the human history with plants and landscapes. She does an excellent job of setting the background for the art that follows, noting that “the images in this superb collection could have been arranged by chronology or theme, but instead pictures have been cleverly paired on facing pages to highlight revealing or stimulating similarities or contrasts.”

This book is fun! You can open anywhere and immediately dive into a story told in both prose and images. It’s also huge, a hefty tome worthy of any coffee table. At first glance it might see like a lot of lovely fluff. But read on! It is an excellent and easy-to-digest history book as well as art exhibit.

A stain glass window by Louis Comfort Tiffany of wisteria looking out on Long Island’s Oyster Bay is contrasted on the opposite page with a 17^th century Japanese tea pot with overglazed enamel, also depicting wisteria. A 19^th century, hand-colored lithograph of a bouquet of peonies is matched with a 2011 watercolor designed to look like an herbarium specimen, also of peonies.

The subjects come from around the world and reflect developing traditions. A 1973 painting using gouache on paper is a recent stylistic example by a member of the Kwoma people of Papua New Guinea, adapting their practice of bark painting formerly used to decorate the ceilings of ceremonial buildings. This is complemented on the opposite page by the image of a bag made with glass beadwork from the last half of the 19^th century. Equally colorful as the Kwoma piece, it was created by an anonymous member of the Nēhiyawak peoples of eastern Canada. The use of glass beads reflects incorporation into the native artform a new material after contact with European traders.

The book is nicely supplemented by ending appendices that include a timeline of flowers in human history, the symbolism of flowers, and short biographies of key artists represented. This is a book that takes time to digest, but that is time well spent.

Excerpted from the Summer 2021 issue of the Arboretum Bulletin

Glass Flowers: Marvels of Art and Science at Harvard

Flowers made of glass is an unusual expression of floral art, but the more than 4,300 models in the collection at Harvard University were not intended as art objects. Instead, these were teaching tools showing a selection of primarily North American native plants and frequently grown exotics for botany students in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Created by the Czech father-and-son team of Leopold and Rudolf Blaschka, this collection was revived by a major conservation effort and enhancement of the exhibit space over the last ten years.

Celebrating that effort is a new book: “Glass Flowers: Marvels of Art and Science at Harvard.” There are several authors, but the stars of this book are the amazingly close-up and fine focused photographs by Natalja Kent. There have been earlier books on this collection, but none capture the beauty of this restored collection like this new publication.

Excerpted from the Summer 2021 issue of the Arboretum Bulletin

Rare Plants: The Story of 40 of the World’s Most Unusual and Endangered Plants

I first glanced through “Rare Plants’ by Ed Ikin for the beautiful plant images: artwork and herbarium specimens from the vast collections of Kew Gardens dating back to the 1700s. These alone would make this book worthwhile, but there is much more. The heart of this book is a collection of essays on 40 plants from around the world that are rare or unknown in the wild. What’s surprising is that many are very familiar to gardeners in the Pacific Northwest.

An example is the Monkey Puzzle Tree (Araucaria araucana) with its distinctive and frequently seen profile on the Seattle landscape. Native to the slopes of Andes Mountains in Chile and Argentina, it is endangered because of its heavy use for timber, slow regeneration because of fires (often deliberately set), and competition from exotics (including eucalyptus) and agriculture.

One traditional way to preserve rare plant is through seed banks, but that is not an option for the Monkey Puzzle – the seeds do not survive the desiccation and chilling typical for these facilities. The author recommends instead growing the tree in suitable climates as a preservation technique, and recommends planting groves to emulate the natural associations of these dioecious plants. Image such a grove in the Chilean Garden at Pacific Connections!

These stories are an engaging way to study conservation and threatened plants, and the choice to illustrate using historic documents is very effective. Ikin, the deputy director of Kew’s wild botanic garden at Wakehurst, also raises some difficult questions, especially for plant collectors in the UK and in North America.

For example, African violets (Streptocarpus ionanthus) is a mainstay of the multi-million dollar houseplant industry, but has become exceedingly rare in its native Kenya and Tanzania. The author asks, should these countries receive some of the profit from the selling of these plants? Aloe vera, a plant well-known by many non-gardeners for its presumed healing qualities, is unknown in the wild. However, DNA studies are gradually solving the mystery location of its origin, somewhere on the Arabian Peninsula. When that is pinpointed, should that original host country (or countries) be compensated for this plant valued around the world?

Ikin is always eager to share positive outcomes, too. “Lebanon is pioneering a new approach new land management – a balance between preserving biodiversity and provisioning human need – and the results are promising.“ This is good news for the endangered, Lebanese endemic Iris sofarana, the Sofar Iris with its striking blend of marbled greys and bronze with purple highlights. Also hopeful are new cultivation techniques in Ukraine that are slowing the wild harvest of increasingly rare Galanthus nivalis (known ironically as the “common snowdrop”) to allow for its natural recovery and to ensure income to its the host country.

Co-winner of the 2021 Annual Literature Award from the Council on Botanical and Horticultural Libraries

Excerpted from the Summer 2021 issue of the Arboretum Bulletin

Grasses, Sedges, Rushes: An Identification Guide

[Grasses, Sedges, Rushes] cover

Lauren Brown wrote the classic Grasses: An Identification Guide for the American northeast in 1979. Illustrated with her exquisite and effective line drawings, this book filled a void by providing a field guide to this abundant group of plants typically overlooked in general wild flower guides.

In 2020, the second edition, titled Grasses, Sedges, Rushes: An Identification Guide was released with a secondary author, Ted Elliman. What’s new? The title now more accurately reflects the inclusion (also in the first edition) of other grass-like plants. Each entry now has a photograph, but wisely the line drawings have been preserved and together they enhance the chances for positive identification.

Why am I recommending a book that does not cover the Pacific Northwest? Primarily because this is an excellent introduction to grasses anywhere, and well worth reading for an understanding of the North American ecology and human history with these plants. The western edge of this new edition’s coverage also includes the lands of the former tall grass prairie and some of these species have ranges extending into our region. This book also includes established invasive grasses that are found throughout the country.

“To identify grasses with technical manuals or internet sources requires a fair amount of botanical knowledge, considerable patience, and sometimes a dose of luck. Even Charles Darwin was elated when he first identified a grass.” Brown and Elliman understand the challenges for the beginning grasses enthusiast. Once you have mastered the basics using this gentle guide, I recommend moving on to Field Guide to the Grasses of Oregon and Washington for a more detailed study of the grasses found in our region.

Published in Leaflet for Scholars, Volume 8, Issue 6, June 2021.

New Woman Ecologies

[New Woman Ecologies] cover

The New Woman movement grew out of the Arts and Crafts movement in Britain in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Its aim was to give women new opportunities, especially to do paid work, outside their role of nurturing mother at the hearth. New Woman Ecologies shows how the New Woman and the growing green efforts meshed with each other.

Each chapter presents a different episode in this meshing, using mainly texts written at the time. Carroll moves from two London women starting their own market garden in rural Kent through to women’s participation in the Land Army, a government-run farm work project during World War I.

The final chapter focuses on the revival of herb growing after World War I. Maud Grieve’s Modern Herbal of 1931 is one text among those which “transformed public perception of local herbs from ‘almost inert’ weeds to potent partners in both domestic and commercial gardens” (p.152). Grieve’s plant entries include medicinal as well as the usual plant and growing information. She also notes connections between plants and other living things, notably people. Her long entry on English lavender asserts its superiority to French lavender not only due to its medicinal qualities but also because it is local and therefore fresher. She also notes its positive effect on the grower. In England the herbal revival was scotched in 1941 by the Pharmacy and Medicines Act, which grew out of fear that giving medicinal information on plants to the masses was dangerous, particularly to pharmacists. The act described the use of herbs as medicine as fairy-tale thinking. Its largely successful goal was to put herb growers, who were mainly women, out of business. The act was repealed in 1968.

All the efforts described in New Woman Ecologies were frustrated in one way or another, but the reader gains helpful background information on one corner of the history of the feminist and ecological movements.

Published in Leaflet for Scholars, Volume 8, Issue 6, June 2021.

The Garden Jungle

[The Garden Jungle] cover

I have read many books on organic gardening over the years, but never one with a focus on invertebrates. With The Garden Jungle I credit author Dave Goulson for opening my heart to earwigs. Goulson is a British professor of biology, bumble bee expert, keen gardener and advocate for sustainable agriculture. I try to be tolerant of the herbivore insects such as aphids because they feed many species of birds and beneficial insects such as beetles and hover flies. However, I didn’t know earwigs were omnivores and would feast on aphids as well as on dahlia petals. According to Goulson, earwigs don’t seek out ears to sleep in, so we shouldn’t worry.

Each chapter starts delightfully with a short recipe for treats such as mulberry muffins or homesteading classics like sauerkraut, cider and goat cheese. The book maintains a positive tone as Goulson celebrates all the creatures we encounter in our gardens, while detailing highly destructive practices committed by the horticulture and agriculture industries. He makes the case that the most egregious practice to be avoided at all costs is spraying pesticides. Another destructive habit is including peat moss in potting soil both because it destroys peat bog habitat, and also because of the massive amount of sequestered carbon dioxide released upon harvest. For each decidedly Earth-unfriendly horticultural practice described Goulson instructs readers on alternatives to achieve the same outcomes.

Goulson weaves in insights from his research, background on natural history and stories of wildlife encounters in his Sussex garden to relate why we should cherish moths, worms, and even the parasitic cuckoo bee. All are members of the garden jungle ecosystem. Once gardeners tolerate or maybe even love the creatures in their gardens, Goulson is sure that the planet can be saved.

Published in the Leaflet, volume 8, issue 6, June 2021.

Iwígara

The earliest gardeners in North America were not European settlers but the peoples of the indigenous nations, especially in our region. “All native peoples of the West Coast engaged in some form of complex and sophisticated ‘gardening’ of their homelands.”

This observation is by Enrique Salmón, the author of a new book on American Indian ethnobotanical traditions. The book’s title tells part of the story. “Iwígara” (i-WEE-jah-rah) is the concept that humans are no greater than other forms of life in the natural world, including both plants and animals.

Ethnobotany, the study of the use of plants by human cultures, is an important way to understand different civilizations. Sadly, much of the existing literature can bog down in academic minutiae. Not so with “Iwígara” and Salmón’s excellent story-telling! This is a lively and thoroughly readable account of eighty plants significant to the indigenous nations of North America, told using delightful legends and the common practices that have bonded peoples and the plants of their local landscape.

Salmón is an accomplished scientist and an active collaborator with others in his field and he used that network to help determine the plants to include. He also brings a more personal viewpoint. As a member of the Rarámuri (rah-RAH-mer-ree) nation of northwestern Mexico, he learned the plant traditions from his mother, grandmother and other family members “who were living libraries of indigenous plant knowledge that has been collected, revised, and tested for millennia.”

An example is the entry on cedar. “Native peoples in the Pacific Northwest tell a story about a good man who gave unceasingly to his community.” After his death, “the Creator, so impressed with the life this man had led, decided that a great useful tree would grow from the man’s burial site.” According to this legend, this was the first western red cedar (Thuja plicata).

Indeed, this is a useful tree to many regional cultures for buildings, canoes, tools, clothing, and medicines. Throughout “Iwígara,” well-chosen photographs, both old and new, enhance the stories. “Cedar” is highlighted by an impressive 1914 photograph of Kwakiutl cedar mask dancers.

Published in Garden Notes: Northwest Horticultural Society, Summer 2021

Flora of Oregon, Volume 2: Dicots A-F

The second volume of “Flora of Oregon” continues the excellent work of volume 1, released in 2015, by focusing on the families of dicots from A to F. The third and final volume, in preparation, will be about the remaining dicot families.

While the keys and botanical descriptions are the core of this work, like the previous volume there are some excellent additions. An introductory essay discusses the many considerations and importance of native plant gardens. An appendix provides a long list of native plants adaptable to gardens and their cultural needs. Maps show the most suitable regions within Oregon for each species, and these recommendations could easily be extrapolated to Washington.

Another essay – “Insects as Plant Taxonomists” – deeply dives into the interrelations between plant families and insect families, and how they have evolved together. The authors hope “to inspire curiosity and enlightenment about the many different insect activities that can be observed while outdoors.” A final essay introduces the process for creating herbarium specimens and their importance to taxonomists.

Excerpted from the Spring 2021 issue of the Arboretum Bulletin

Fearless Gardening: Be Bold, Break the Rules, Grow What You Love

“Gardening is not a straight line. There are many detours along the way, and thankfully, you never actually arrive at the finish.” This is a motto of Loree Bohl, a Portland gardener and author of “Fearless Gardening.”

Bohl’s garden typifies this thinking with many, quite non-traditional plants for a Pacific Northwest garden. She is not afraid to try new things and regards the failures as lessons to be learned, and perhaps to be tried again. It might work this time!

Among her favorite plants are Agave, Yucca, and Opuntia. She is another big advocate for using pots: on the ground, amongst the garden plantings, and hanging off walls or the rafters of a covered, outdoor seating area.

She credits her inspiration in part to two noteworthy and innovative West Coast, women gardeners of the past: Ruth Bancroft, who lived to be 109, and Ganna Walska, who lived to be 96. Each crafted gardens very unlike their neighbors, starting at an age when many would be beyond new projects. They are models of how the creative energy of gardening can lead to a long and happy life.

Bohl also profiles several Washington and Oregon gardens that have stretched the plant palette. These include the McMenamins Anderson School garden in Bothell, the Point Defiance Zoo garden in Tacoma, and the Amazon Spheres in Seattle.

Her own garden is another fine example. I was part of a tour led by the Northwest Horticultural Society in 2017 to Portland area gardens that included hers. In an essay titled “Successful Gardeners Kill Plants and So Will You,” she describes how the day before we arrived, despite it being late July, a large, established Grevillea victoriae ‘Murray Queen’ suddenly died. She was horrified, but what could she do. For us visitors, committed gardeners all, it was an excellent lesson and opportunity to commiserate.

Excerpted from the Spring 2021 issue of the Arboretum Bulletin

Oregon Big Tree & Shrub Measurements

The world champion Douglas-fir in height is found in Coos County, Oregon. But what if your interest lies in smaller trees? For example, the tallest vine maple (Acer circinatum) in the country is 46’ high and found in Clatsop County, Oregon. This detail, along with many, many others can be found in “Oregon: Big Tree & Shrub Measurements” by Jack Black.

At first glance, this book may seem like a curiosity, one person’s obsession with finding, measuring, and photographing (typically with a convenient human standing nearby for scale) the largest and tallest of the Oregon flora. However, the charts and especially the photographs gave me strong admiration of the diversity of woody plants in both wild and managed settings.

The roughly 200 species considered are almost evenly divided between natives and introduced species. Short vignettes give the back story for some of the more remarkable examples. Although Black compiled and published this book, his endnotes document the work of many individuals and organizations in finding, measuring, and recording these special trees. It represents a real labor of love by all involved. A new, larger edition was published in 2021.

Excerpted from the Spring 2021 issue of the Arboretum Bulletin