Nita-Jo Rountree move to the Bellevue, Washington 15 years ago after many years as a Master Gardener and the owner of a landscape design and installation company in Atlanta. She quickly learned to separate reality from the myths of our climate and she has used that knowledge to specialize in roses, one her favorite plants – perhaps her very favorite plant (she’s a bit coy on this subject; I know she loves hydrangeas, too).
She has chosen an impressive list of roses in all classes, all bred for health, or that have proved their durability in our region without a lot of fussing. Many of them are recent introductions that reflect the work of hybridizers for the home gardener, but she doesn’t ignore species or historical roses.
I have a passing knowledge of rose varieties, mostly from a brief period of heavy immersion in gardening with roses many years ago. At the same time, I learned a lot about the frequent spraying and other chemical rites of rose growing, as this was the expectation in almost every rose books of the time. Today, I only know a handful of Rountree’s recommendations. There is a good reason for this as her newer, recommended varieties don’t need the level of coddling I learned, thus avoiding the potential damage to the garden environment, the wildlife of the garden large and small, or to the gardener.
Rountree is emphatic in her most important advice. “Remember: The most important key to successful rose growing is choosing the right rose for the right place. Many books and articles about roses give generic advice for growing roses in a wide range of climates. They are of little specific help for growing roses in the Pacific Northwest.”
Excerpted from the Summer 2017 Arboretum Bulletin.
Gardening books that use a calendar format are especially valuable to newer gardeners, and having one that’s tailored to our region is even better. Best of all is having an author who worked in the Washington Park Arboretum for many years! Christina Pfeiffer brings her considerable experience to “Month-By-Month Gardening Pacific Northwest” and has consultation help from Mary Robson, a retired Horticulture Extension agent for Washington State University.
The same pair collaborated on a 2005 book, with Robson taking the lead on that publication. This new book begins with a short but very meaty introduction chapter covering the basics. The monthly chapters that follow build on the introduction with topics cleverly positioned when you’ll most likely want the advice. For example, in June we learned how to turn an area of your lawn into a garden bed, perfect timing so it will be ready for fall planting.
I appreciate that each month begins with a section on planning. What do you want from your garden? What is working well? What needs changing? Only after you’ve asked and answered these questions, do you start doing. These activities sections include planting and all aspects of caring for common garden plants ranging from annuals to trees. Lawns and houseplants are considered, too.
You are also encouraged to get out to nurseries and plant festivals, and to see our native plants where and when they are at their peak. Enjoying your own and other gardens is important, too. During July, “pause to revel in the beauty and bounty the garden has to offer. This is a time for picnics in the shade and leisurely strolls at local parks and gardens.”
Excerpted from the Summer 2017 Arboretum Bulletin.
As a boy, I did not embrace the hobby of making models. Yes, I had a train set, but no desire to create a world of villages, forests, and the like to surround the tracks. Instead, I wanted to be outside in the garden and working with full-sized plants.
This makes me feel a bit inadequate to review “Gardening in Miniature” by Seattleite Janit Calvo. However it turns out that at its heart, this is a gardening book, with sound design advice and cultural tips, just all at 1:12 (one inch = one foot) scale, or even smaller.
“Using the basic garden tenets of anchor point, balance, layers, texture, color, and focal point, you can plan your miniature garden with confidence,” the author states encouragingly. Step-by-step, fully planned projects provide lots of guidance for the beginner. I worried that plants would not stay to scale, and indeed they might not, but it’s easy to swap plants in and out.
I learned from this that while there is some overlap in principles and techniques between miniature gardening and bonsai, they are largely distinct pursuits. However, they can be combined by making a bonsai the centerpiece of your miniature garden. Will I take up miniature gardening? Probably not. But my eyes have been opened to a whole new—and quite small—world.
Excerpted from the Spring 2014 Arboretum Bulletin.
A book by Jekka McVicar called Seeds: the ultimate guide to growing successfully from seed (Lyons Press, 2003, $22.95) will help you turn your seedy hopes into plant reality. Thirteen chapters are divided by types of plant including ferns, grasses, shrubs, perennials and herbs. The practical information that applies to all kinds of seeds, such as what type of soil to use, and how to break seed dormancy, is included in the last chapter. Color photos illustrate throughout.
For online tips for seed starting go to:
http://cru.cahe.wsu.edu/CEPublications/pnw0170/pnw0170.pdf from Oregon State University.
Much fun is found in The Curious Gardener, published by Anna Pavord in 2010. This collection of writings from the British newspaper The Independent includes a serviceable gardening calendar for our region, but I’d especially check it out for the pure pleasure of essays written by a kindred, but at times contrary, gardening soul.
She begins with a tongue-in-cheek, astrological calendar of gardening signs (as a Pisces, it is good to know my intuition will help me “…recognize that a plant is in difficulty long before it is past saving”). Later she judges potential lovers by the choice of flowers they give on Valentine’s Day.
This same article brings out her political and environmental side, as she laments the ecological disaster caused by the huge business of producing cut flower roses in South America during the northern hemisphere winter.
An added bonus are the wood engravings by Howard Phipps, carved on the end grain of a block of very hard boxwood, using a technique that reached its pinnacle in the mid-19th century. It’s appropriate that the artist used a hand press from 1862 for the final images.
Published in Garden Notes: Northwest Horticultural Society, Summer 2017
The subject of Environmental Horticulture, a new book in the Miller Library by Ross Cameron and James Hitchmough, is best described by the book’s subtitle: “Science and Management of Green Landscapes.” The intended audience is broad, but I would recommend it for professionals managing large landscapes used for almost any purpose, and for students researching landscape management principles.
This book covers many topics, beginning with the value of green spaces for human well-being and biodiversity. Many types of plantings are considered, ranging from trees and shrubs to bedding plants, and including formal settings and semi-natural grasslands. Even plantings as diverse as lawns or sports turf and green roofs or rain gardens are studied with the same depth of research as other types.
The authors define Environmental Horticulture as “…the subset of horticulture that is concerned with the use and management of plants in public and semi-public environments.” They discuss how this term is nearly the equivalent of “urban horticulture” or “landscape horticulture” with the difference uses reflecting national preferences. “Urban horticulture,” for example, hasn’t caught on as a descriptor in Great Britain.
The authors are on the faculty of the Department of Landscape at the University of Sheffield in England. Although some of the terminology is distinctly British, much of the discussion is based on North American research. One of the most valuable assets of this book are the references, which include many American sources.
Published in the May 2017 Leaflet for Scholars Volume 4, Issue 5.
The H. J. Andrews Experimental Forest east of Eugene was established in 1948. At nearly 16,000 acres, it covers the entire Lookout Creek watershed on the west side of the Cascades. The Forest is used to study ecosystems, wildlife, logging practices, and many other natural and human processes in both old-growth and managed forests.
Started in 2003, the Long-Term Ecological Reflections program through Oregon State University sponsors “writers-in-residence” to spend one to two weeks in the Andrews Forest. Collectively, they have “…come to know the forest via the paths laid down in stories, stories told in anecdotes, photographs, essays, and poems, or in hypotheses, data, and graphs.”
The founders of this program are ambitious; they expect it to continue for 200 years. Fortunately, as readers, we don’t have to wait so long to read the results. Some of the early creativity is now captured in the book “Forest Under Story.”
This is a collection of poems, essays, and even field notes. Interspersed sections titled “Ground Work” provide the scientific basis that supports the more artistic writing. The black and white photography of Bob Keefer offers further context. This is a book to savor slowly, with lessons that are applicable to all coastal forests.
Excerpted from the Spring 2017 Arboretum Bulletin.
Street Farm is not a gardening book, but I’m reviewing it because it has a powerful message of the benefits of gardening, or – more accurately – urban farming, especially for those who do not have much else to bring hope and well-being to their lives. Author Michael Ableman is the co-founder of Sole Food Street Farms, a charitable organization that includes four farms on abandoned lots in downtown Vancouver, B. C. This book is the story of that organization and the people it has hired to become the urban farmers.
The neighborhoods around these farms are not tourist attractions. The author points out that “…while Vancouver’s prosperity is celebrated, its concentration of poverty and raw desperation endures in the midst of the polished and the preened.”
There are losses on these farms, both of the produce and of the humans who tend the crops, but overall this is a book of hope. Ableman is very clear that this endeavor is not a panacea for the challenges of poverty, mental health diseases, or addictions. He also recognizes his is a position of privilege by always having “…had a place to live and food to eat, and the color of my skin is not black or brown.”
Besides the human stories, all gardeners will relate to the challenges of growing plants in less than ideal circumstances, including outsmarting pests, in this case a sophisticated rat population that only chooses the best vegetables. No less interesting is the harvesting and marketing of crops to the more than 30 restaurants and five farmers markets that Sole Food supplies, plus its CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) shares and donations of over $20,000/year to community kitchens.
Excerpted from the Spring 2017 Arboretum Bulletin.
There are many books in the Miller Library on Japanese gardens and even more on Japanese-style gardens outside of Japan, but very little about the history of Japanese horticultural practices. A new book, “Japanese Horticulture: Origins and History” by Yōtarō Tsukamoto (1912-2005) and John L. Creech (1920-2009), helps fill this gap.
We are very fortunate to have this book at all. Although Tsukamoto and Creech had long planned this collaboration, the manuscript was not completed before their deaths, and it was only through the work of a group of Japanese editors that the book was published in 2015.
The authors begin their study by looking at the rich (over 6,000 species) native flora of Japan, introducing the plant communities by reviewing 26 sites in the national park system. This is an important starting point, as few of the plants used in early Japanese gardens were non-natives. A chapter follows on the iconic plants of Japan, including ornamental cherries, iris, and azaleas, plus a few introduced plants, especially chrysanthemums and peonies.
The book concludes with the long history of visiting horticulturists to Japan, and especially the exchange between that country and the United States, such as the partnership that led to this book. “Among the complexities of Japan/United States relationships, plant have played a singular but often ignored role in fostering a harmonious social environment.”
This book is a rare, new treasure in the Miller Library collection, and as such is not available to borrow. However, for all who are interested in the history of Japanese gardening, or perhaps after attending a tea ceremony at Seattle’s Japanese Garden, I recommend seeking it out when visiting the library.
Excerpted from the Spring 2017 Arboretum Bulletin.
When I first picked up “Design & Build Your Own Rain Gardens for the Pacific Northwest,” I immediately turned to the back to look at the recommended plant list. But this list is placed at the end with good reason. It is not the place to start!
Instead, the authors thoughtfully take you through the many considerations that go into a rain garden. First of all, why do we need them in our (supposedly) rainy climate? How do the various areas of our region differ in their rainfall and geological factors? Once that’s figured out, there is the human element. What do our various cities, counties, and other government entities think about or allow with rain gardens?
Once you have a handle on these questions, you need to look at your own property. What permits do I need? Whom do I need to notify that I’m digging a big hole? Are there incentive programs in my area for rain gardens? How do I want to incorporate this new major project into my outdoor living space, so that it only positively affects my home and the properties of my neighbors? Finally, what do I actually need to buy from the hardware store and nursery to build and plant a rain garden?
These are many questions, but this book takes you through them systematically and in great detail. Many instructive photographs and building diagrams will help, too. I soon found myself getting intrigued by the process. Building a rain garden is not a simple process to complete over a free weekend, but if you are serious about it, this book will be an excellent resource.
Excerpted from the Spring 2017 Arboretum Bulletin.