Archives: Book Reviews

“Field Guide to Sedges of the Pacific Northwest” is regarded by reviewers across the country as one of the best field guides on any topic, and is even better in the newly released 2nd edition. Included are entries for all 169 species, subspecies, and varieties that grow wild in Oregon and Washington, with typically 4-6 photographs or diagrams of each. An extensive key helps with identification, as do detailed tips with each entry, while comments discuss habitat, ethnobotanical uses, and the significance for restoration.

Published in the June 2015 Leaflet for Scholars Volume 2, Issue 6.

Kew Gardens has begun a very helpful series of books for gardeners known as The Plant Lover’s Guides. One of the best, partly because of the scarcity of other books on this topic, is The Plant Lover’s Guide to Epimediums by Sally Gregson. The availability of both species and hybrid epimediums has exploded in recent years, and this guide will introduce you to the new Chinese epimediums – “these are the divas” – as well as all the old favorites for dry shade. I’m especially impressed with the photographs as I know from experience the delicate flowers of this genus are very difficult to capture.

Published in the May 2015 Leaflet Volume 2, Issue 5.

“Weeds of North America” is an excellent new guide to more than 600 invasive plants throughout the United States and Canada. Designed in field guide style, the photographs are a particularly strong feature of this book, with 3-5 for each plant, including leaves, flowers, and seeds. The text includes a description of the life cycle, jurisdictions that have identified the plant as noxious, and details on the reasons for concern, including displacement of native plant habitat, toxicity to livestock, and/or status as an alternative host of a serious plant disease.

Published in the May 2015 Leaflet for Scholars Volume 2, Issue 5.

Grass Valley, California is on the outer rim of our region, but the gardening columns Carolyn Singer has written for her local paper are worth knowing about, especially for gardeners in the foothills of the Cascades. “The Seasoned Gardener” is a compilation of those columns and gives advice for areas with lots of rain and a wider temperature range than for those of us close to the Sound.

She is also very experienced with the ravages of deer, and throughout gives ways to manage Bambi. A couple of older titles by Singer, recently acquired by the Miller Library, address this concern more directly. “Deer in My Garden” (2006 – with much of the writing done while the author spent the summer of 2005 in Seattle) led to “Deer in My Garden: Volume 2” (2008), the first with an emphasis on perennials and subshrubs, while the latter considers groundcovers and edgers.

Both are part of “The Yucky Flower Series,” honoring the advice of her then 3-year-old grandson: “The deer wouldn’t eat yucky flowers!” So that is what she planted and her deer-resistant recommendations are based on her own experience, or those of gardeners who grew trial plants for her, knowing that in the interest of science (or cervid consumer selection), the trial plants might disappear.

While yucky to deer, the selected plants are all quite lovely to gardeners and would make many other recommended plant lists. Most are drought tolerant and adapted to a wide temperature range. Best of all, the author enthusiastically rates the maintenance requirements of most as “EASY!” to “VERY, VERY EASY!” Deer or no deer, these are great garden plants.

Excerpted from the Spring 2015 Arboretum Bulletin.

We all know that invasive, non-native plants are one of the biggest problems for the health of both our native plants and native animals. Sharon Kallis has come up with an interesting approach to dealing with these invaders – weave them into art! She accurately describes her book, “Common Threads,” as “…part philosophy and part toolkit.”

The toolkit is the easiest part for gardeners. An extensive technique chapter on making baskets, ropes, clothing, and other everyday necessities can be applied to many plants you have on hand. Kallis hopes that readers will apply her techniques to invasive plants wherever they live. Fortunately for us, she lives in Vancouver, B.C., and so her examples are easily found throughout this region.

The philosophy part of “Common Threads” more closely addresses the art community, encouraging the use of local materials as art supplies. She tells how her introduction to gardening was through a Means of Production garden, “…a place that artists could get involved and learn about where their materials came from [and] develop a seasonal awareness to material acquisition.” She’s also keen that an artist understands that resources are not limitless by asking such questions as, “How many plants does it take to make the six cups of dye you might want for that project?”

A significant part of the book includes interviews with an interesting cross section of artists and managers of public spaces, including some with involvement in both arenas. She encourages artists to think of the value of creating impermanent art using plant materials, as well as the collective good of group art projects in public spaces, and art as a form of honoring and memorializing.

Excerpted from the Spring 2015 Arboretum Bulletin.

Eileen Stark has a mission: to convince other gardeners of the Pacific Northwest to embrace the native plant palette in designing and planning our gardens. In this pursuit, she is not alone, but “Real Gardens Grow Natives” is one of the most thorough efforts to review the benefits of native plants, combined with basic garden techniques and design principles (she is a landscape designer in Portland).

Stark is a realist, knowing that “…naturalistic, ‘real’ gardens aren’t created overnight, and what will work best for your site may not be apparent right away.” She discusses in great detail the ecology and habitat of native plants and the animals they support. While size does matter—”…many wild species have space requirements beyond our wildest dreams…”—she still encourages us to see our gardens, however small, as part of a larger system.

The last half of the book is an encyclopedia of recommended plants, divided by sunlight requirements. Within these categories, the author has organized her list alphabetically, so that a grand fir (Abies grandis) is only two entries before the wee nodding onion (Allium cernuum). While I found this odd at first, it forces you to consider the full range of scale for your garden, and to put nearly as much thought into your groundcovers as the trees and shrubs.

Each entry has the usual cultural requirements of any garden encyclopedia, but here you will also find the environmental benefits of each, especially to wildlife, and other typically associated natives. There is also a handy list of traditional garden plants that these natives could replace, while still providing your desired ornamental impact.

Excerpted from the Spring 2015 Arboretum Bulletin.

“Garden On, Vashon!” is a most intriguing book, and one that’s hard to categorize. In some ways, it’s a basic gardening book, tailored to the specific soils and microclimates of Vashon and Maury Islands. At the same time, author Karen Dale is telling the history of the islands from a ground-up perspective, beginning with the last ice age, but rapidly moving to the human history of the last 100 years or so.

She easily moves from history to present day, from accounts she has researched to her own style of memoir. The result is charming and recommends this book to readers of regional history as well as gardening. Throughout there are lots of gardening tips, such as when to plant for winter crops and when/how to prune your apples. Or not. “All over the Island these old apple trees stand—carpeted with green moss, shagged over with lichen and mistletoe, into their second century but still bearing fruit.”

Vashon is famous for its history of fruit growing, with the Strawberry Festival a fixture of every July. Unfortunately, there are very few strawberries grown on the island anymore, even though the crop was a mainstay in 1909 when the Festival began. Why has this happened? This is a fascinating story, which this book addresses from a historical perspective, but also from the author’s empirical efforts to understand the difficulties of growing a good crop of this luscious fruit.

The stories of island nurseries—such as the Beale Greenhouses, once one of the largest producers of cut-flower roses and orchids—are thoroughly documented, as is the Vashon Garden Tour. This latter chapter includes a lot of names, but even a casual read through shows how closely tied the island horticultural community was and still is to Seattle and the rest of the mainland.

Excerpted from the Spring 2015 Arboretum Bulletin.

Donald Olson brings extensive experience as a writer of novels, plays, and travel guides along with his passion as a gardener to “The Pacific Northwest Garden Tour.” He also brings the zeal of a convert. As a native Minnesotan and world traveler who now lives in Portland, he extols our gardens, our native landscapes, and our climate – yes, even the grey of winter.

The focus is on the three major metropolitan areas of the region: Seattle/Tacoma, Vancouver, B.C., and Portland, and this book is essential to consult for travel to any of these. Even as a nearly life-long Seattle area resident, I discovered there are local treasures awaiting my discovery, including the Evergreen Arboretum and Gardens in Everett and the newer gardens of PowellsWood in Federal Way and Soos Creek in Auburn.

Donald Olson praises the 1915 design by the Olmsted Brothers of the Dunn Gardens in Seattle, noting how the “essential Olmsted aesthetic remains intact” a century later. He notes that reds, purples, and whites were favored in the design, while yellow was “severely frowned upon.”

At the end of this Dunn Gardens entry, Olson mentions the newer Curators’ Garden, tucked in behind the visitor center and created by co-curators Charles Price and Glen Withey “…using a bright, brilliant palette of plant color decidedly different from the muted tones favored by Olmsted Brothers. There’s even yellow.”

No trips in the planning? This is still a book easily read cover-to-cover, especially for the history and the author’s often witty turns-of-phrase. The Lake Wilderness Arboretum “…rescues old gardens that have lost their owners and moves them phlox, stock, and marrow to new digs at the arboretum” while at the Elisabeth Carey Miller Botanical Garden it was “…Betty who wore the plants in the family.”

Like most garden tourists, I enjoy visiting destination nurseries, and many are included by Olson, especially those which have lavish display gardens. Of course, you’ll read about the gardens and nurseries you know, but don’t skip over the unfamiliar; I’m already thinking of a garden tour in the Portland area to share the author’s special passion for several of his recommendations there.

Excerpted from the Spring 2015 Arboretum Bulletin.