This is a fantastic book.

Discussed in rich but readable detail, and profusely illustrated, are thirty of those beautiful and fascinating spring flowers which mark the passing of the snow and ice and the sudden rush of new growth – and not just in the north east, but over much of the country.

Plant by plant, from baneberries to wild ginger, centuries of scientific research are brought together with decades of enlightened personal observation to present detailed accounts of some of our favorite plants. But not just descriptions, far from it. The ways in which these plants fit into their botanical families, their relationships with their habitat, their pollination, their seed dispersal, their medicinal and other practical uses – it’s all there.

And here’s the thing: we know we can trust its combination of science and experience not only because it’s clear that it’s written by a scrupulous fanatic! But also, from her years as a tour leader at the New York Botanic Garden answering the questions of visitors – interested, of course, but not necessarily knowledgeable – Carol Gracie knows how to present her fascinating material in a way that scientists will respect, and everyone else can understand (with occasional help from the excellent glossary).

The book is also packed with wonderful pictures. In fact my only criticism of the book is that, in places, there are too many squeezed on to the page. I don’t think there’s a dud amongst them, but sometimes the page is just too full.

I first looked at entries on plants I’d recently researched myself including skunk cabbage, Symplocarpus foetidus, where her account of the plant’s mechanism for generating so much heat in its early flowers that it can melt snow and keep insects cozy includes an important detail that I’d missed! And I was thrilled to discover that it’s the box turtle, wandering up to 60m a day, that not only distributes seeds of may apple, Podophyllum peltatum, but through keeping them in its digestive system for a week while it wanders also greatly improves their germination.

So… whether you grow these plants in the garden or simply admire them on rural (or sometimes urban) hikes, I’m sure you’ll find this book fascinating. If you need more superlatives, just ask.

Spring Wildflowers of the Northeast by Carol Gracie is published by Princeton University Press.

• The habits and habitats of thirty familiar spring flowers revealed
• Detailed but easy-to-read text
• Huge number of exceptional pictures
• Gardeners and wildflower enthusiasts will be fascinated
• Not just for those of us in the north east US
• Put it on the short list for plant book of the year

                 

One of the unexpected stars in the garden this summer was an American native weed – jewelweed, Impatiens capensis. I’d seen it growing by creeks in this area, of course, and I always thought it was an attractive plant with its sparkling, red-spotted, orange flowers (left, click to enlarge). But the nearest wild plants I’d seen were a mile or two away, so I suspect that the seeds that produced the plants in our garden came in on my boots.

So: “What was it doing growing in your garden?” I hear you cry. “It’s a weed!” Well, when I spotted a seedling, just a few inches high, I thought I’d not pull it out as a weed but just let it do its thing – the flowers being so pretty. That first year, we had just a seedling or two which, in a dark and dry part of the garden, produced just a couple of small spindly plants. But, every year, it seeded. We pulled out most of the seedlings - which is easy when they’re small - and left one or two to flower.

This year we never even spotted the seedling between shrubs outside the guest room window until it emerged alongside the indispensible Physocarpus Coppertina (‘Mindia’) and behind Weigela Wine and Roses (‘Alexandra’). It flowered for months, never dominating, but always there. Always sparkling.

Of course, now we’ve let that one plant grow to almost 6ft/1.8m high, it will have produced so much seed that next year there’ll probably be hundreds of seedlings. And, again, we’ll pull most of them out and leave just one or two.

But it just shows how an ignored and unadmired native weed can add colour and character to the garden tapestry – if we just open our eyes to its beauty.

You can buy seed of Impatiens capensis from Horizon Herbs in North America, and from Plant World Seeds in Britain.

On the way to the Smilacina/Maianthemum I wrote about last time, in an open area on the other side of the same road, is a patch of Iris versicolor. This one I have definitely spotted before, in a soggy patch (kneeboots required) about 30ft/9m from the road but easily visible.

In years past the plants seemed all pretty much the same shade, but this year they are strikingly different. Perhaps I’d become a little blasé and just not noticed how the clump had developed and changed but take a look at the picture (above, click to enlarge).

Sorry I didn’t have my boots with me and couldn’t get any closer, but I thought I’d better take a quick pic. But actually this view (click to enlarge) shows the variability better. Dark blue plus various pale and bicolored forms… This is exactly the sort of variation that leads to new varieties being introduced to gardens. Hmmm… Definitely worth a closer look. I’ll go back with boots when the rain stops.

Next time: a native with gold foliage…

I’ve been driving along this road, close by our Pennsylvania home… probably every week for more than ten years. Then just the other day, right by the side of the road, I noticed this plant. Perhaps it just never flowered before although the rough grass along the road there is rarely cut.

But there it is, a fat plant with over a dozen flowering stems – Smilacina racemosa (now called Maianthemum racemosum) - feathery false lily of the valley. As you can see (above, click to enlarge), this is not a small plant that would be easily missed. It’s a big chunky perennial that makes an impressive specimen, both with its creamy June flowers and with its red berries later. It’s growing on a north-east facing bank, 3-4ft/0.9-1.2m above the roadside ditch.

A quick look at the Pennsylvania flora website reveals that there are records of Maianthemum racemosum from only two sites in our county – and they don’t include this one. So it’s a new record. Pike County, PA, is 567 square miles (1,469 km²) that’s about the size of South Yorkshire. There’s plenty of the tiny M. canadense (right, click to enlarge) all over the place, but M. racemosum is far far less common.

And why were the twenty five species of Smilacina merged with the three species of Maianthemum? Well, there’s a fascinating explanation in the RHS magazine The Plantsman (December 2005) but unfortunately this is not available online. You could simply say that they are just too similar to be considered different genera, especially when you consider two genetic DNA studies published in 2000. Let’s leave it at that.

Anyway, it’s great to see this impressive clump growing in such a prominent position and to record a new site in our county.

Next time: Unexpected irises

There are nettles, and there are nettles.

The perennial stinging nettle, Urtica dioica, is often the first British wild plant that kids learn to recognise - because they get stung. The leaves are covered in stinging hairs which contain formic acid, histamine and seratonin. Its annual relation, Urtica urens, actually has a denser concentration of stinging hairs, but the plants are much smaller so the damage to a tumbling child is usually much less.

In the US, two native American subspecies are found as well as the European form which is naturalised over most of the country.

The stings are not dangerous, although a related species in New Zealand is rumoured to have killed horses! But they are not pleasant and come with a red rash – especailly after you’ve scratched it. The cure often grows conveniently alongside – rubbing the stung area with dock leaves, broad-leaved dock, Rumex obtusifolius, for example, takes the edge off the pain.

But also often growing with stinging nettles is white dead nettle, Lamium album (above, click to enlarge) – “dead”, with no sting. When not in flower, stinging nettle and dead nettle look alike with the similarly shaped and sized leaves gathered in pairs along upright stems.

The dead nettle stems tend to be fatter and more obviously square, but when the two-lipped white flowers open the distinction is obvious; nettle flowers come in relatively unobtrusive green tassels. Kids tend not trust the distinction.

Stinging nettles are actually very useful plants; paper can be made from the stems; the foliage is important as food and shelter for many caterpillars; the young shoots can be eaten steamed or made into soup. Nettles have also been used to treat a wide variety of maladies.

And keeping nettles in your pocket is said to protect you from being struck by lightning. Of course, if you misidentified the plant and keep dead nettle in your pocket by mistake – when the lightning strikes, dead is exactly what you’ll be.

I’m a big fan of plants that produce different attractive features at different times of year. They’re double-your-money plants which give you two bursts of color or appeal at different seasons.

The blue cohosh, Caulophyllum thalictroides, is another of those unexpected members of the Berberis family – think Epimedium, Podophyllum and Jeffersonia – which are valuable shade-loving garden perennials. And this week Caulophyllum thalictroides is presenting us with the first of its four - yes, four – features.

Aren’t these purple shoots amazing (left, click to enlarge)? And against the marbled foliage of Arum maculatum ‘'McClement's Form’, they stand out dramatically. Caulophyllum would be worth growing even if it did nothing else. [Note to self: Must split that arum and spread it out more to make an even better background.]

Soon, those sultry stems expand and that purple coloring is carried over into slightly bluish foliage, prettily silvered underneath at first. The large leaves seem to vary in the amount of bluish or even purplish coloring they reveal. When growing strongly, each leaflet splits into three towards the tip (right, click to enlarge).

Next on the list are the flowers. Not dramatic, I have to say, but appealing nonetheless, the spikes of small slightly mustard- or bronze-colored flowers are held just above the leaves later in spring. Finally, in early autumn there are often, but not always, clusters of deep blue berries dusted in white bloom.

Few perennials can boast of revealing four interesting features in less than six months.

Caulophyllum has also had many practical uses. In particular this widespread eastern American shade lover has been used by indigenous peoples against a variety of complaints including rheumatism, toothache, indigestion, stomach cramps, fits and hysterics, and especially in relation to preventing conception and childbirth.

And at this time of year, those purple shoots are stretching ever day.

Sanguinaria, bloodroot, is a fleeting spring treat and this spring the double form of Sanguinaria canadensis, the Canadian bloodroot, reminds us of a greater truth.

Take a look at the picture (above, click to enlarge). The plant has been in place for about five years, and it’s grown steadily. But now the center of the plant is dying out, and all the strong flowering growth is round the edge. The doughnut look is really starting to spoil the effect. So, what’s to be done?

Well, nothing now; it’s too late. By the time the flowers are over the rounded foliage you can see emerging amongst the blooms will be too large; dig it all up, split it and replant at that stage and you’ll do more harm than good. The time to do it is either when the foliage has died down later in the year, or next spring just as growth is stirring.

One thing I suppose I could do is to remove all the old tired soil from the center and replace it with fresh, so that this year the fat rhizomes can grow inwards into rich soil as well as outwards. Then perhaps there’ll be more to split when the time comes

A huge range of other perennials suffer from the same problem: phlox, hardy chrysanthemums, many hardy geraniums, heleniums, and many more. Many of these benefit from being split every three or four years. But hostas and hellebores, in particular, are best left to make ever-fatter clumps; they spread slowly, and even if the centers do become doughnut-ised it doesn’t usually show.

For more on the spring delights of these lovely plants, check out my earlier posts on sanguinarias:
Star of the spring garden
Sanguinaria - the spring overture

Britain’s most distinguished writer on natural history brings his accessible erudition to bear on plants which can both destroy precious ecosystems and beautify urban dereliction and war torn landscapes.

Considering both how eucalyptus took over the Florida Everglades to such an extent that in some areas there were 8 million trees per square mile and how native poppies sprang up so memorably on European battlefields, this effortlessly wide ranging and engagingly written book.

"Weeds, as a type, are mobile, prolific, genetically diverse,” says Richard Mabey. “They are unfussy about where they live, adapt quickly to environmental stress, use multiple strategies for getting their own way. It's curious that it took so long for us to realize that the species they most resemble is us."

Weeds: In Defense of Nature’s Most Unloved Plants by Richard Mabey was published recently in North America by Ecco and last year in Britain by Profile Books.

• Combines scientific research, folklore, personal experience, fun and fine judgment in one enjoyable book.
• A vital read for gardeners, naturalists, and anyone interested in both native plants and invasives.

         

There’s a lot of nonsense talked about invasives so it’s refreshing to see one of Britain’s most respected botanists talking some real sense. David Pearman is a former President of the Botanical Society of the British Isles and a leading light in the development and publication of one of the most vital British plant publications of our times, the New Atlas of the British and Irish Flora.

In a piece entitled The Alien Invasion Myth which appears in the current issue of The Garden, the membership magazine of the Royal Horticultural Society, he writes: “For the last 20 years I have coordinated our Society’s largest network of botanical recorders (from the Botanical Society of the British Isles): together we have accumulated about 18 million records, covering the entire area and 4,000 species. In simple terms, the data shows that most aliens are rare; that they occur overwhelmingly in and around towns and transport networks; and they are generally uncommon in the semi-natural habitats that we most want to preserve. Recording alien plants is, broadly, a recent phenomenon, and all extrapolations are to be taken with a pinch of salt.”

He goes on: “But the real, inescapable line is that our countryside and flora is changing like never before, mainly from abandonment of traditional management practices and pollution. It is largely ‘native’ plants that are to blame – look at the chalk downlands of southern England (choked with gorse on the dip slopes) or our rivers (a vast increase in reeds, due to higher nutrients).”

Of course the situation is slightly different in North America where there’s more genuinely natural habitat; in Britain almost all habitats are, as he puts it, “semi-natural” – most woodlands, meadows, mountains and aquatic habitats show the hand of man in some form. But in North America there’s also a tendency to rip out any non-native plant that turns up before anyone has had the chance to record its distribution or study its tendency to spread – or, perhaps, its tendency simply to fade away.

Changes in management, and pollution, are the drivers of change in Britain’s natural habitats, says David Pearman. We can hardly blame plants for what happens as a result.

 

Himalayan balsam image by ArtMechanic used under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license. Thank you.

I’m sure that at about this time of year, you’ve come to expect an enthusiastic post about American native witch hazel. There was one back in 2007, and also one in 2009. There’ve been more. Well this year – not quite. American native witch hazel – yes. But with a twist.

The picture shows our rapidly growing Hamamelis x intermedia ‘Pallida’; its has large, bright yellow spidery spring flowers. Here, on its spreading branches, you see its fall color on the wane and turning biscuit brown before it finally drops off. But, in the middle, on a very vigorous and absolutely vertical shoot which is only a couple of years old, are some bright yellow leaves.

That bright yellow foliage does not belong to H. x intermedia ‘Pallida’. It’s foliage on growth which has shot up from the rootstock on to which is ‘Pallida’ is grafted. A scattering of small flowers opened not so long ago to confirm that the vertical growth is a shoot of H. virginiana - the American native witch hazel, H. virginiana - on to which varieties of the spring flowering Asian witch hazels are grafted.

So not only is this ‘Pallida’ an impostor without its trade mark strong scent, as I remarked last year, but its rootstock is threatening a takeover.

Where are those pruners?