DC Trip was Plant-tastic! (part 1)

...unfortunately, I'm terrible when it comes to traveling that I don't take many pictures.

I realize that this is especially unfortunate when person such as myself has a blog and many people who read it like pictures :\

Part of the reason why I don't really have pics of DC and the landscaping and plants I'm going to talk about is because I find that carrying a camera around and taking pics all the time makes me feel like I'm losing out on my fun and time when traveling (stopping and taking pics all the time and etc.) and when I take pics for 'looks' I take forever and as my husband and I were wanting to cram in a LOT of Smithsonian museum time, stopping often to take pretty pics was not exactly (pardon the pun) in the picture.  Also, my sister and brother-in-law accompanying us on parts of this trip had super badass SLR cameras that put mine to shame and while I'm not competing with their camera-tude, I almost feel a sort of "what's the point?" in taking pics when their cameras are around (and I can try to ask for pics from them later), except for the fact that my eye is interested in very different things than their eyes and so I do end up regretting not having taken my camera with me more often when I find particular plants or textures interesting.  Perhaps on another trip when I'm not having to rush!

But anyways, allow me to use my "talent" with words to whisk you off to a faraway place called Washington DC also known as, Our Nation's Capitol.  Let us hope that I can give the required thousand words that  picture gives to make up for the lacking of eye candy here.

I lived in the concrete jungle of Chicago a long while ago and never saw much interest in plants or landscaping, nor was it expected with their relatively short warm season I suppose.  I've been to California many times and when it comes to plants there, they don't count when I can compare locations on plants, landscaping and etc. because plants are abundant and happy there all the time, any time just about.  Californians barely need to do anything, and really don't to have trumpet vine running prettily and rampantly all year around, and have rosemary as a common form of edging on the side of the highway and so on and so forth.

So, I was pretty impressed getting to Washington DC to see a ridiculous amount of landscaping and diversity of plants not only our nation's capitol but in the random neighborhood my sister in law was in (granted, being the capitol of our nation they might be putting a special foot forward and my sister's neighbor was a bit of a plant nut which could be considered outside the norm).

Granted once again, Thomas Jefferson, a plant nut himself, may have caused this lasting impression for DC's plant cool-ness but nonetheless, allow me to be impressed that a non-tropical city such as this (in a state that's not tall like Cali and thus have a million zones) is so plant-tastic!  (I must parenthesize here that I have not been to famed Buffalo and its Garden Walks too, so maybe we can just say that I've been a little sheltered since my incarnation as a plant-o-holic?)

Before heading to DC proper I was thrilled to see that no one in my sis-in-law's suburb appeared to take particular care of their lawn.  Weeds and clover everywhere! Score! No little tags proclaiming particular landscaping companies, no stupid crunchy fertilizer pellets ruined my walk as I took the dog out, no idiots watering their lawns at 2pm or after a rain.  It should be noted that most of the lawns were somewhat on the smaller side and that there were lots of trees, but the notice that there were TREES (and lots of them) is a happy reminder of what a few good deciduous trees can do for a neighborhood in the cooling, habitat for animals, and less watering for grass way.

I was really pleased to see too that the National Lawn was also in the same state as most of the suburban lawns I saw earlier.  Loads of weeds and clover, but it was still relatively green.  Maybe I caught it on a particularly bad week, or maybe the Gov decided that it did have better things to spend their money on than lawn maintenance especially when how many thousands (if not millions) of people tromp all over it a day.

Despite all the buildings everywhere for all the many departments and agencies of whatnot and all in the capitol, any little bit of green space that could have just been relegated to a simple lawn mow job was actually really nicely landscaped with hardy, interesting shrubs and many perennials.  I didn't recall seeing many generic annuals like petunias, but there were lots of smoke trees (love!) and mahonias (both of which are actually natives to Washington interestingly) and other eye-catching plants in those spaces with relatively little grass to cut.  Maybe even less lawn to mow in total for a building than the lawn at my house (sad, really).

 Another thing which I found pretty cool of note was the use of tall permanent concrete planters all around many of the buildings.  These planters appeared to be there to delineate the sidewalk of the building from the street, eradicating the need/use of a grassy parking strip and probably also being safe for pedestrians from cars on top of being mostly easy to tend to.

Many of these permanent planters were simple: full of mondo grass, or other tall grasses, trailing naked jasmines and the like, but in a tall planter were sufficiently nice as a long set down a sidewalk.  As you might have noted, these plants were all pretty nearly perennials, which is an awesome cost-saving thing.  I found it sort of funny that the the Department of Finance building was one of a few locations that did  not have their planters filled with any plants.  Maybe they deemed it a unnecessary and a cost-saving measure?  Come on guys, mondo grass is cheap!  Even accountants need a little more green (in the living kind sense!)

Interspersed between the buildings were little gardens and the Smithsonian museums, all of which were landscaped not just prettily but interestingly.  My interest is peaked at unusual plants, but even more so when the unusual plants (of no edible interest that I was aware of) are planted with EDIBLE plants.  Lots of basils, and ornamental peppers and random herbs (or maybe it's just that I knew those plants were herbs that are edible or medicinal that made me interested).

The Natural History museum's entire perimeter was lined with many wonderful edibles one of which was nigella, aka love in a mist or black cumin, a plant that I loved as a child and didn't know what it was despite it running rampant in my mother's flower bed (until she decided she didn't like it anymore and ripped it all out).  I only came to know what this plant from my childhood was a few years ago and I have been desperately trying to get it to grow in my garden.  The seed pods in the museum beds were dry and ready to drop, and here is where I made a gardener's sin: I took a seed pod.  *covers face*  I do not condone stealing and think it's pretty abhorrent, but seed gathering I feel a little less bad about.  "But what if everyone took a seed pod?" my brain asks.  I know, I know, so bad and the Smithsonian doesn't deserve tourists like me, but a nice donation will be made soon-ish?  There are many seeds and I don't really buy souvenirs, so I usually take a rock, some sand, a leaf, drift wood or the like as my souvenir when I go on trips, obviously most never on an institution's property... so this is my guilt and man, am I guilting here (as I should).  Writing... check.... for Smithsonian... donation...(should I write "for the seed pod?" on it?)

This whole seed pod just brings down a whole slew of apple-Adam-Eve and 'Beauty and the Beast' tales in my head.  If anything, I can say that a Smithsonian garden person working on another garden was going to offer me a pod of nigella anyways (after I had already taken one from the Museum of Natural History... but I didn't mention that...)  No excuses though still.

But yeah, that whole seed thing, DC trip and more, tomorrow at my blog!

Cat's eyes: Hellebore's in seed

I was puttering around the garden when I noticed some odd looking things on one of the hellebore's leaves:

At first I thought they could be pest eggs, or little cocoons, but after they rolled right off the leaf into my hand I knew I had my mini-gold mine:  hellebore seeds!

They are surprisingly pretty, like gray cat's eyes, little gems  or black freshwater pearls.  If they didn't eventually turn into hellebores, I'd want to turn them into beads and make lovely drop earrings with them.  If, also hellebores didn't take forever to go to seed (at least to me) wouldn't these make great freshwater pearl substitutes?! (Except the seeds seems to lose water and get a bit shrivel-y like which is less attractive.)

(I like how they are next to my wedding band... though the colors aren't so good here in the pic,  I think they're prettier than diamonds)

(My postman, who was coming by at that time admired them and said they reminded him of "some awesome tempered steel," to which I replied was "very romantic." :)  He grinned and said he was more of a mechanical guy!)

I am sad to say, that while I have heard that hellebores self seed, I think, as the bed they were in is full of other things, I might have been pulling up little seedlings in the past years.

D'OH. (actual dictionary word now!)

Either way, now I have seeds, fresh ones that I can sow in their own happy little pots so I will know what a hellebore seedling looks like in real life (and not just on the internet if I so care to research it).  I know that this will be a red hellebore (more pink/mauve if I say so).  I do somewhat lust after the other colors and would like to cross my hellebores with my neighbor's, who has done nothing with his and didn't even know what they were (his mother planted them).  Mystery colors, that's what I want!

(

(Hellebore flower+bee=seeds! and now sad and dried out looking open pods)

To help me with propagating my gems, I turn to my trusty The American Horticultural Society book, Plant Propagation, edited by the nearly unbelievable gentleman's name, Alan Toogood. (A gift many Christmases ago by my wonderful sister in law).

In summary:
-sow fresh seed immediately as old dry seeds can be spotty in germination
-seed may need a winter to break dormancy
-will germinate in autumn or spring, and flower after 2-3 years.

Unfortunately, not many more details.  Hurray for the internet!  Of course there'd be a a society for hellebores!

Being a bit more specific, they suggest sowing under a quarter inch of soil (pretty much the 3-4 seed depth rule), will need to be stratified (aka, just let it sit outside for some seasons and wait), cite that it might take up to 6-18 months for germination and potentially take 3-4 years for flowering (bummer).

I wonder if I might be able to induce germination by freezing seeds for a day or two (works well with nasturtiums I have found).  I'll probably try that with a few of the seeds just as an experiment.  A couple of pots just sitting in the same area and conditions that the current hellebore is in, one with just fresh sown seed which will just sit around and be naturally stratified, the other pot with some previously frozen seed.  Of course, the problem with forcing the seeds to germinate early like that is that it will be forced to fend through the summer.  Oh, my curiosity can be cruel, sorry seedlings!

I'll update you (in 6-18 months apparently) if anything crops up and I don't forget about the pots :)

Plant Catalog Porn: Baker Creek Seeds (and now I am on a complete plant/seed moratorium for the rest of the year)

Alright, kind of late jumping on this bandwagon here, but for a while I also had a slight moratorium on plant catalogs in addition to my not buying seeds from catalog  as I had so many seeds in backlog already and in effort to save money and support local groups/businesses.

But after my sister in law told me about the rareseeds.com catalog (which I didn't realize at the time was Baker's Creek Seeds which I often would drool online over) I decided I would finally order their free catalog.

Here's where I get teenage girl-y:
OMG!  It's so beautiful and awesome that I can't believe that give this catalog away for free.  GIANT, glossy paged (not so sure how environmentally friendly or cost effective that is), but I went through EVERY page lusting after all the heirloom, non-GMO seeds that I can later seed save from (!!!) and thus save money still yet in the long run!

This is literally what their catalog looks now in my hands.  DOG-EARED. Yep. I want every edible (and herb) available just about:

Not only are the featured pics lovely Many of their descriptions are humorous and informative and have background stories which make the seeds even more endearing.

The only annoyance about the size of the catalog is that because of its size, space is precious and basic helpful info such as height, width, growing conditions and etc. are left out (not like places like Gurney's don't do it either), so it's very forgivable and I tend to like to research my seeds prior to purchase ahead anyways.

I did end up purchasing something (guilt) because I have never seen it anywhere else: Hibiscus sabdariffa seeds, aka at Baker Creek 'Red Thai Roselle.'  THESE are the seeds/plants I've  been looking for everywhere.  It is the source of the red hibiscus tea that my husband and I so love and I've been on an edible hibiscus (the Haight-Ashbury being the closest to this roselle and note almost all hibiscus are edible) collecting spree due to this one plant.

The seeds came very quickly (so hurray on that fast shipping thing!) but I was once again somewhat annoyed by lack of information once again on the packet as to expected size/height and etc.  Granted I understand that growing conditions can cause many differences in plant size, it's nice to be able to provide that. 

Either way, splendid experience thus far and I'd like to add that their website has a "wish list" section... one that is filling up very quickly for me!

I would also like to anonunce that am putting myself on a COMPLETE MORATORIUM for the REST OF THE YEAR for plant/seed/pot/garden accessory purchases unless it's a dying vegetable plant that must be replaced emergency (aka tomatoes) or a need to treat plants for a disease/pest scenario. UPDATE: or for supplies (seed/soil) needed for food for next year's crop or a covercrop for the winter/spring.

After all the wonderful plant sales in the area and local stores have seed sales up the wazoo, AND now these Baker Creek Seeds being purchased (because I apparently couldn't help myself in this one case) I feel like I am full up on good plants/seeds and need to work with what I have (so early on in the year too! Kind of sad)

So, no new clearance plants, even if the price is amazing, no seeds, despite sales.  Only trading or propagating (which I always do anyways) here on out!  Wish me luck (I hope I don't go crazy).


LINKS OF INTEREST:
 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roselle_(plant)
http://www.hort.purdue.edu/newcrop/morton/roselle.html
http://www.suagcenter.com/documents/HibiscusTea.pdf
http://www.pfaf.org/database/plants.php?Hibiscus+sabdariffa
http://rareseeds.com/cart/products/Thai_Red_Roselle-719-0.html
http://www.southernexposure.com/productlist/prods/71301.html

Ze Seeds! Ze Seeds! A garden fantasy.

The seeds have actually been sprouted up for a few days now, but my have they made progress!

They seem quite happy in my mini greenhouse and I will be sad almost when the greenhouse is empty.  I'll be an empty mini-greenhouser "Oh how they grow up so fast!"  Wait. Stop.  This is too close to the idea of myself propagating, aka having children.  I still have a good 5-6 years before my eggs start totally dropping off!  There's so much to do, so many vegetables I need to grow to can little jars of pureed stuff I need to make in preparation for that time...  But seriously, biological clock is NOT ticking despite all the links my mom sends me about babies.

There's nothing more hopeful than seeing seeds germinate.  The swell of the soil by an impatient little plant cracking open its piece of earth.  I can totally empathize.  Even the part where it is unceremoniously taken from its comfy bit of land and transferred to larger and larger pieces of land UNTIL IT CANNOT BE PAMPERED ANY FURTHER AND MUST COMPETE!

Oh the world can be such a harsh place.   But, only the strong can survive in Persephone's garden :P  I can forsee my children to probably not be so forgiving to me as a parent...

The tomatillo seeds have been amazing!  One night there was nothing and the next, 5 seedlings pop up, all straight and "Hello there!"


I'm a little concerned that maybe they plants will be getting a wee big in the year and I will just have to plant them out earlier than I expect... maybe late March? Mid April?  Eh, a cheap bottle cloche and/or sheet will do the trick if need be.

I am going to PACK this garden tight this year and really go seriously French Intensive.

The tomatoes will probably be tucked in with the all sorts of lettuces and root vegetables growing this year as they'll grow well above them.  The tomatillos could sprawl (like the tomatoes I suppose, but why possibly promote waste and disease and encourage pests?

The goal this year was to not only have high quality and quantity of crops, but also "make it
 prettier."  "Prettier," is a concept a little more foreign to me, but with this past winter, I have been seriously tired and have been craving color, bees, birds and a place that's more.. approachable.  It was mostly attractive before I think, but I'm really looking for something to knock my socks off.

Tall order eh?

Well, we all can have our fantasies.

Save the Basil!

Luckily I have LOTS of basil in volume and variety, but unless I want to re-purchase them all each year, I have to make a mad dash each end of season (well, only mad because I procrastinate) to get all my cuttings, seeds, and basil preservation in.

The seed issue is only for the sweet basil which I like to use as companion plants around many of my vegetables like the tomatoes every year, so I need that in abundance.  I often forget to cut the flowers/racemes of the other basil varieties off, so many of them self seed in my garden, oftentimes better than the sweet basil which I wish would!

As basil grows quite large, I only take about 3-5 cuttings per plant to make for a manageable pot each winter and then let the actual plant itself die down.  Well, what is left at least after I harvest all leaves possible to freeze chopped up in jars with a little canola oil for easy scraping out or whole leaves in bags for flavor and visibility in soups (LIKE TOM YUM). (Ok, if that Tom Yum thing gets annoying, please someone tell me, but it's so hard to suppress the enthusiasm for something so great).

Basil Preservation Primer (very simple):
Fresh/overwintered:
Take your basil cuttings, strip the last 2-3 leaf nodes of their leaves and place in a cup of water in a sunny place.  After they form some good roots, pot them up and enjoy!


Frozen -in Jars w/Canola oil:
Strip all the leaves from the basil you wish to preserve.  Puree the leaves in a food processor or blender as fine as you like, drizzle just enough canola oil that it doesn't look oily and won't affect the flavor of what you will eventual cook them into.  Find an appropriately sized jar and freeze.

Frozen-in cubes (aka Basil pops):
Same as instructions above minus the oil addition.  Place the basil puree in ice cube trays that you can leave you basil either in, or pop them all out eventually for storage in a freezer bag and use the trays to make more basil cubes.
(Um, I would have shown you a picture of this, but it really wasn't pretty... lots of brown... if consensus states that they want to see real, pureed Basil pops in the raw I will post it, but yeah... a little icky)


Frozen-whole:
After rinsing leaves, freeze them whole, or on a tray if you wish.  I don't care if mine are wrinkled and get all crunched up, as long as they are relatively whole I'm happy.  This method is if you like to see your basil.  Fragrant of course still, but not like fresh as you can imagine.

But for the most part, your basil is not going to be as pretty as what you can find in a tube at the grocery store because that stuff has color stabilizers and preservatives and etc.  If you are fast and your basil is still looking at its peak (which is doubtful about now) you can prob get a reasonably lovely colored puree.  Mine for the most part always gets a bit oxidized and brown tinged at the edges, but it's still delicious!