What?

Found this the other day. It looked pretty bad last Fall, and I thought the November freeze had killed it, so I left the pot out unprotected for the rest of the winter.

YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO BE DEAD!

This is Jacaranda jasminoides. It's more purple or maroon than the common J. mimosifolia. Evidently the inattention over the summer, coupled with being left on a heat-reflective deck, hardened it off enough to survive.

Perhaps it's worth trying as a wall shrub in the Northwest.

On Evolution and Names

Well, spank me red and call me a bad blogger. If you must know, life has been happening. Funny how it keeps doing that.

Anyway, I was reading Sean Hogan's book Trees for All Seasons, and there I encountered a gardeners' myth that refuses to die: that our favorite unusual rose-family trees are closely related to each other. It's an attractive thought, that Polylepis and Leucosidea and Lyonothamnus and Vauquelinia are part of the same group of garden-worthy trees that somehow got scattered across the globe. Unfortunately, it's also wrong.

I thought I'd blog about this topic, as it not only fits nicely with my research interests (essentially the interface of geography, non-floral form, and evolution, should you want to know), but also provides good system in which to discuss evolution and why we change names. Be prepared for vocabulary overload.

WNPS Backpack 2014

My first was at age 12, and my first introduction to backpacking, as well.  I've missed quite a few since then, but I managed to make it to this year's Washington Native Plant Society Annual Backpacking Trip down on the Dark Divide.  Besides, there was one mention of a plant from the previous trip to this location that I simply had to confirm.

I arrived at the trailhead an hour late, but unafraid because botanists and other native plant people are the slowest hikers I have ever encountered.  We stop to make sure that everyone has seen each new species we find . . . there is no such thing as adequate sampling until we have found every last species on our path.

So it was without hesitation that I took time to photograph the views from the start of the Sunrise Trail.  It was propitious, too, since we'd end up hiking out in the middle of a cloud, and since my camera would remember every five pictures or so that it had decided that something was wrong with the lens, and refuse to let me take any more.

First Time at Heronswood

I had never been to Heronswood, and I missed the May open garden despite planning to go, so I decided that I would not miss going this July.

You know what?  My alarm didn't go off (we tested it after I did wake up).  And you know what?  I went anyway.

We arrived close to 1:30, just after the event's halfway point.  First thing, I made my customary list of all the plants I might want from all vendors.  Then I crossed off all the plants that would drive me (too far) over-budget over an excellent lunch of fry-bread.  (The place is, after all, now owned by the Port Gamble S'Klallam tribe.)  Then I bought the plants.

Impatiens mengtszeana and I. puberula from Keeping It Green, Echinops ritro 'Taplow Purple' and Sarracenia leucophylla 'Tarnok' from Sundquist, Eucryphia x nymansensis 'Nymansay' and Eucalyptus neglecta from Celestial Dream, Geranium palmatum from Windcliff Plants, Rhaphithamnus spinosus from Longbranch, and Berberidopsis corallina, Grevillea victoriae 'Murray Valley Queen', and Myrceugenia ovata var. nanophylla from Desert Northwest.

My plants, my babies.

After a stop at will call, it was off to the more exciting part of the trip: touring the garden.

Mortality Report, Episode 1

Things are beginning to grow around the garden, and that means that it's time for the annual tour of what's no longer growing.  By which I mean dead.  Rotting or dessicated.  Dead.

Last winter was particularly hard on plants here in western Washington, what with early frosts, deep freezes, and generally cool conditions at the tail end.  Even plants that survived multiple of the previous winters, plants that weathered some of the coldest temperatures in the last few decades, plants that I payed good money for, dammit, decided that this past winter was just too much to handle.

There seem to be some patterns, though.  Antipodeans did poorly (excepting members of Gaultheria and Ourisia modesta).   Chileans, with a few exceptions, did well.  Native plants got hit hard, but mostly by slugs.  And enough plants died because of my stupidity that I don't feel altogether bad about buying them again.  It may be a few years for some of them, though.

So, in alphabetical order, here is a fairly comprehensive list of plants that didn't survive the winter.