Keyword: Reviews

Planting Design for Dry Gardens is an excellent book but unfortunately is poorly titled. Author Olivier Filippi lives in the south of France and the original French title, Alternatives au gazon, or “alternatives to lawn” more accurately describes his work, a very detailed and practical study of the options for replacing resource demanding turf grass.

A translation of a different type, from the parameters of Filippi’s classic Mediterranean climate to our more modified version, will take some work on the reader’s part. I found the effort worthwhile, as it exposed me as a gardener to ideas not typically found in a Pacific Northwest oriented garden book.

For example, Filippi does not recommend using a drip irrigation system for a dry garden of groundcover plants. Instead he advocates hand watering, using temporary basins created around the new plantings, so that plants will more likely to survive without supplemental watering once established. Many other general gardening topics, from planting to attract beneficial insects to concerns about invasive plants, are addressed from a refreshingly distinctive, continental European perspective.

Published in the November 2016 Leaflet Volume 3, Issue 11.

Susan Haltom has written about restoring an historic garden, that of author Eudora Welty in Jackson, Mississippi. Haltom had the advantage of knowing her subject’s creator over the last few years of her life, learning that Welty did not want the garden to be “pretentious, inappropriate, or filled with plants chosen for showiness.”

The resulting book, “One Writer’s Garden,” co-written with Jane Roy Brown, is primarily an engaging biography of this 20th century master of novels and short stories set in the American south. Many of her stories have garden or gardening themes, likely inspired by the family garden. The final chapter not only recaps the restoration process, but also brings to light the gardening practices and customs of the garden’s heyday in the 1920s through 1940s.

Excerpted from the Fall 2016 Arboretum Bulletin.

Peter Hatch has been the Director of Gardens and Grounds at Monticello, near Charlottesville, Virginia, since 1977. I find his recently (2012) published “A Rich Spot of Earth” to be the most engaging of the Miller Library’s several books on Thomas Jefferson’s famous home.

Hatch is a skillful writer, blending much of Jefferson’s own words into his narrative. The narrative tells how the former President was enthralled with all matters of gardening, especially of food crops throughout his life, despite his many public duties. He was also deeply involved with the fabric of his local community and region, and seemed to value friendships that did not overlap with his professional career.

Not surprisingly, I found the chapter on gardening books in the presidential library especially interesting. I think all gardeners will find something of value in the discussions on Jefferson’s approaches to garden layout, planting methods, soil amending, staking, seed saving, and dealing with pests and weeds – you’ll easily forget that your mentor lived roughly 200 years ago.

The second half of the book is subtitled “A Catalog of Selected Monticello Vegetables.” Similar to many how-to books on vegetable gardening, this is an evaluation of the many favorite crops grown on the estate, broadly divided by the edible portion of each, including fruits, roots, and leaves. Most of the selections are familiar, but some were used in different ways than we do now, and some the modern reader may find a bit odd.

For example, nasturtiums were grown primarily for their seeds, while the flowers were only a garnish. Jefferson had a passion for sesame (Sesamum indicum), and experimented unsuccessfully with different pressing techniques to produce oil.

Finally, every gardener has his or her favorites, and “Jefferson fussed over his garden asparagus far more than any other vegetable.” It was only grown in “in carefully amended beds because this long-lived perennial…was a major investment.” I think most gardeners can relate to this type of obsession.

Excerpted from the Fall 2016 Arboretum Bulletin.

Andrew Moore’s “Pawpaw” is the result of an individual’s love for a favorite fruit. While it is a native small tree to 26 states in the eastern United States, the pawpaw is still unfamiliar to most Americans.

To those who love this fruit, Asimina triloba has been sadly overlooked. The author compares it to the blueberry, another native that was relatively unknown 100 years ago, and was included among the “wild foods that Americans gathered and ate.” The blueberry, thanks to the dedicated work of a handful of enthusiasts, has become a mainstay of the American diet. The pawpaw lacked such champions.

Moore writes most of the book like a travelogue, visiting growers and enthusiasts throughout the native range of the pawpaw. You get the impression that but for a few twist of fates, the pawpaw might have come to share the blueberry’s popularity. While this is not a culture book, you’ll pick up some ideas from the many stories on how to grow your own and even more ideas on how to prepare the fruit for eating.

There are some suggestions that a pawpaw will grow well here, and one Oregon nursery, One Green World in Portland, is listed as a source. If reading this book whets your appetite, you can visit the nursery this fall for variety tastings and pawpaw ice cream!

Excerpted from the Fall 2016 Arboretum Bulletin.

Rowan Jacobsen, the author of “Apples of Uncommon Character,” lives in Vermont and is fascinated by apples, but instead of a grower he is primarily an “apple stalker” to use his own term. He credits many professionals for his knowledge, including Tom Burford, author of “Apples of North America,” who “helped me see the eternal in the apple tree.”

The author’s list of favorite varieties, including some that originated outside North America, is the principal part of this book. These include ‘Spokane Beauty’: “This Brobdingnagian apple is probably the best to hail from Washington State….yet its fame has not spread beyond the Northwest.” He notes it may be the largest apple known, but retains its crispness and “…makes wonderfully zippy sweet cider.”

Another favorite is ‘Hudson’s Golden Gem’ from Tangent, Oregon (east of Corvallis). He describes this apple as thinking it’s a pear in shape, coloring, russeting (freckles on the skin) and “…the intense aromatics. Even the granular texture is pearlike.”

Jacobsen is a well-known food author and he particularly enjoys sharing his favorite recipes for apples, and making recommendations on which varieties to use for each (although he also urges the reader to experiment). While I expected a number of desserts, I was surprised to learn that apples can be used in everything from appetizers to salsa to pot pies.

The photographs of each dish will have you drooling, and throughout the photographs of the apple varieties are engaging and distinctive, with some taken at Harmony Orchards in Tieton, Washington.

Excerpted from the Fall 2016 Arboretum Bulletin.

Tom Burford has a goal to restore the apple to near the diversity and prominence it enjoyed in America during the early 20th century, when one nursery catalog alone listed 17,000 cultivars. He is optimistic that this return to greatness is happening. To further this effort, he has selected 200 varieties that he regards as “apples of the real world” (not the supermarket), to feature in his book “Apples of North America.”

The A-Z encyclopedia of these varieties is the heart of the book. All are of American origin. For example, ‘Hawaii’ was introduced in Sebastopol, California and has a “distinctive pineapple flavor and is exceptionally sweet when grown in western regions.”

‘Criterion’ was introduced in 1973 from Parker, Washington (south of Yakima) and while it does well in our region, in more humid apple growing areas, such as the author’s home in Virginia, it does not color well and is more susceptible to diseases. It is noted as being one of the best apples for salads as it does not oxidize quickly after slicing.

Many apples do not store well but are delicious for fresh eating. Others are noted for baking, pie-making, cider-making, or even frying. Some don’t look that great. ‘Kinnaird’s Choice’ is mottled red with purple spots, and would like be rejected by most shoppers. However, it was a mainstay during the Great Depression because it was dependable and its good flavor worked well for all purposes.

The book concludes with a section on “Planning and Designing an Orchard”, a very detailed look at the cultural needs of apples, from planting, propagation (including rootstocks and grafting), pruning, and dealing with diseases and pests. He even tells you how to properly eat an apple, a “mind-expanding experience.” He finds it “…mildly irksome to see someone eating an apple while walking down the street, unaware that a body sense event is happening, and perhaps focusing on something else entirely at the time.”

Excerpted from the Fall 2016 Arboretum Bulletin.

“If you are a student…you have chosen a truly auspicious time to take up the study of soil science.” This encouragement is found in the preface of the new fifteenth edition and is explained by emphasizing the growing need across many fields for scientists and managers with this expertise.

This venerable publication – the first edition was in 1909 – can be read in depth, but at over 1,000 pages more likely will be used as a reference book for learning about a particular interest or to solve a specific problem. Throughout, it is very readable, and will be of value to those at almost all levels of soils knowledge. While this new edition is restricted to use in the Miller Library, the still authoritative fourteenth edition (from 2008) is available to check out.

Published in the October 2016 Leaflet for Scholars Volume 3, Issue 10.