Still Silently Seeking Seeds

Well, you know how it is - when seedlists appear I go right into seek mode, flagging corners on each page of printed copies, making a mental note of where I would grow that species in the garden, deciding what really is the difference in that subspecies or the other, do I want to travel someday to that habitat, and do I need it - really (yes). Seeking is one of the blue ribbon emotions in animals according to what I read in "Animals Make Us Human" by Temple Grandin. It did not take much for me, albeit an animal, but at the top of the chain, to relate personally to what I read, especially about curiosity. Grandin's blue ribbon emotions “generate well-organized behavior sequences that can be evoked by localized electrical stimulation”. So change out the words "localized electrical" for email. Seeking, I understand, is anticipation, curiosity and desire all rolled together. Don't confuse this with pleasure. As any seed-aholic knows, it's the trill of the call...anticipation to investigate...the "what's new!" as one opens the list. Even if I don't order a thing, the world, my world, will be further framed with exploration, understanding and sense. I don't have to smell the flower; just the wonder will do. According to Grandin this emotion is from a genetic basis, not a learned behaviors. This is exactly what I tell my family - it's genetic! Yes I agree. To be truly happy, I instinctively peruse any seedlist that comes my way.

A mere glance at my first NARGS seedlist (back in the 1980'ies) evoked expanding images of my favorite vision-the garden and the wild. As I became attuned to various collections/collector's lists, a kaleidoscope of images poured out. At that time I was very much a devotee of Carrol's Alice, and remember I immediately sensed "burning with curiosity" when I saw an unknown seedlist on my friend's Norman's kitchen table.  Credit him for feeding me an endless supply of lists, many private as he regaled me with stories of packaging seeds on Ev Whittemore's kitchen table for the (then) ARGS. For me each seedlist opens "curiouser and curiouser." Is that a species new to cultivation or is it a rename like Spongiocarpella to Chesneya purpurea? Just when one thinks they have the coloring book of the world finished, something else, fantastic and amazing, pops up on a list. And so far, I am only up to the rock garden plants.

This should give you an idea of the restraint necessary to pass up the opportunity to open a list, any list. When Holubec's list came just before the holidays, I swooned. But briefly, as there were pressing gifts to find for other people, holiday parties, small grandchildren to tend, oh and add in the Big Project due at work. So I procrastinated, since it actually takes time to mail an order. But to be fair, I just kept up with the little people and could not think of anything else.

But during the hiatus of the Christmas holidays, I was on auto pilot. Not a thought but "get the order in" prevailed when the NARGS seedlist alarm went off in my desktop calendar. In case of a seedlist like this, it matters to get one's order in immediately, for a place in fulfillment line. So I, and let me humbly say, in two brief evening sittings, got the online order submitted and paid before a disciplined work ethic could prevail . (Yes, online seed sources are very dangerous. Congratulations to NARGS for making their list so accessible for seed-aholics everywhere to imbibe before reason or the three year old demands attention.)

The annual tea with "seedy" fellows, mostly western Astragalus

Other lists came flashing in via email. By then restraint conditioned from the hundreds of daily emails (the ones that make it past the spam filter because I really want to read them - someday) easily took hold. Alplains snail mailed their catalog, bypassing my conditioning. What a great list! The listing of phlox captured my sensibilities. Pages marked, I was ready to order them all. But wait. As I cleaned up after the holiday clutter I was taken aback by my gardening tins. There were hundreds of seeds I did not get to sow last year! Argh.


Time to regroup. I swore on the spot I would not order until I had sowed every packet in the house. Alpines that is. No need to think of vegetables until February or March. This resolution was short lived. I attended my local Primula Society meeting at Matt & Joe's. The chapter had purchased a share in Chris Chadwell's expedition and was dividing the seeds. How could I refuse to try Primula reidii one more time?  I know just the spot for it now - positioned at the grit base of the sax crevice bed. Who knows when seed will available again?

Ok, but that is all I told myself. No ordering until everything is sowed. So I set to work mixing up soil-less potting mix with sand blasting grit, 5 to 1. After packing small seedling pots full of the mix, I spread the seeds on top for things like penstemons, barely covered saxifraga with grit, and completely covered astragalus and oxytropis (which I had soaked) with a hefty half inch of the grit. I went ahead and planted Ranunculaceae types, even though I have had poor luck with second year sowings. But I am a gardener, so hope prevails.

Chorispora bungeana soaking in warm water

When I was soaking the pea family seeds in preparation, I thought to include Chorispora bungeana just to give it a boost. This delicate little brassica from Afghanistan and Pakistan did plump up eventually, and it turned the water a light green! After its photo, I added a little pineapple juice to the cup and stirred. Several more seeds sank to the bottom and plumped.

Now all seeds needing stratification have been sown and placed outside. The weather cooperated and added a light covering of snow. This morning is was -12 F (-24C) and going colder tonight. We'll have a short thaw next weekend. Perfect. That leaves plenty of time for the 92 species to put under lights in the basement. Next weekend!

This has temporarily limited my enthusiasm for sowing. So I must be silent when I seek through the lists. Don't you miss out. Check out exotic Holubec or western US Alplains  or Chadwell Seeds and order. Grow something new and marvelous. Pot up a few extras to share at meetings. See you there.  Happy Gardening!

March Wins "Cruelest Month 2012"

NARGS Annual/Western Study Meeting March 9-11 2012

On the road to the Bellevue Botanic Alpine Rock Garden

We arrived early for the NARGS Study Weekend entitled "Stop the Car", full of hope for mild spring weather on the tour of the pre-conference garden visits. First stop was Bellevue Botanic Garden. Clouds surrounded us but I thought the weather might be called hopeful. Granted, it did not take much to inspire me since home was covered with several inches of ice and snow as I left. And storm coats were shed!

Bellevue Botanic Alpine Garden

Alpine Rock Garden sign

My friend Anne had been following the progress of this Alpine Garden with great interest for many years. I remembered seeing the original plans back in the '90ies, but had not heard much about it recently. NARGS member Micheal Moshier had drawn up the plans and supervised the installation. (Remember Roy Davidson's splendid little book Lewisias ? Micheal was the illustrator.)

The Rock Garden -what a grand place! Though we beheld it a few weeks before the spring flush of growth, the winter bones were enough. We were thrilled. Things were opening...

Down the garden path

As I recall, the garden began as a rock outcropping, focusing on rare plants. It was quite unconventional for the rock gardening world. Sometime later, vertical additions were made, resembling more of a Kew like standard. Now it is a settled garden: shrubs and trees classically framed a half circle of paths meandering through reclining rocks. There are many vertical features.

Winter garden bones flanked by narcissus

There was plenty of color, albeit for the most part earth tones. Erica was everywhere, providing sustenance for the few bugs that were out. Bulbs were just up, dotting the landscape.

Buns softening the rock garden

By this stage in the garden's life, plantings are large enough to drape and flow. There were the usual suspects, mostly common ones to take the thrashing of the crowds. While it is very difficult to keep extra choice species in a public garden, the gardeners made up for it by superbly growing the what they had.

A variety of daphnes at the base

Lucky for Bellevue to have Rick Lupp (Mt Tahoma Nursery, who does amazing things propagating daphne) live so nearby. As one might expect, there were many, very nice daphne sprinkled about. We encountered the curator trimming them back as we progressed down the path.

Exit to the Perennial Garden

Bellevue WA has its own share of weather woes, as do we all. Many of the rhodies were out when they had killing temperatures. And it was funny to think of the season not to be late enough for the rock garden, but just right for the perennial garden show. But we took the curator's word and made an exit stage right. And yes, what I would have called a woodland garden was in progress. But more on that at another time.

Hard Freeze Tonight

Hepatica x transylvanica opened soon after my return, but did not last long in the heat

 Tonight, two weeks later back at home, we are about at the point of the Bellevue Garden. And we are expecting our first hard freeze in almost a month. After I flew back, I did not bother to unearth my storm coat - until today. My first job upon return was to cover the greenhouse with shade cloth - in March! All last week it was short sleeve weather. Rod started putting in the patio stone to finish off the crevice gardens and got a sunburn for his efforts.

Helleborus thibetanus opened later in the week

Everything sprouted simultaneously, from Corydalis solida to Helleborus thibetanus to the sax bed. And tonight they issued warnings for a hard freeze. At dinner it was already freezing outside. I guess this is what the Bellevue Garden lived through. Keep your fingers crossed!

Jeffersonia dubia seems prepared while J. diphylla 's head is not even out of bed

Saxes add some color to the gray days of March

Saxifraga oppositifolia - will it frost kill?

Year of the Black Water Dragon

Happy New Year to You!

Outdoor Nativity in Sharon CT

From Korea, Nam Hee writes that the Black Dragon sign comes only once in 60 years, this time on the 23rd of January via the lunar calendar for the Chinese/ Korean New Year. This year, 2012, is special and we may start all over again. Good news! As I write this on the last day of the year of the white rabbit, I see many benefits from a change. (To be fair I am just recuperating from a nasty virus, which does color my view, but does give me time to finally start blogging again.)

Rider enjoys the kachelofen

By the fall of last year, I thought perhaps to give up gardening, at the very least, vegetable gardening. The hurricane drowned any fire in my heart as I watched a bountiful plot of winter squash rot in the standing water. I still had not put the garden to bed when the October snowstorm dumped its load so I sank into the proverbial winter armchair for November. That is, when I had a chance to sit. Rod tore out the Helios, a masonry heater he is developing. In its place he constructed a tile kachelofen, complete with wrapping maple bench. Translation: I spent most spare moments cleaning up construction dust again and again. 

The weather then reverted, the snow disappeared, and the early bulbs shot up. So ok, I was a little inspired and worked in the garden. Yesterday, we finally had a little snow cover, but the forecast for tomorrow, Monday - the Chinese New Year - is rain. Yuk. Ok, probably zone 6/7 plants will survive outside this winter and last summer was a good year for green beans and garlic. But many exotic seedlings in the nursery did not make it through the fall. Germination was good in the spring, but they disappeared after the hurricane. The record 73 inches of rain for last year was definitely not to their liking. (Note- kept the seedpots as there may be germination again.) The crevice beds fared much better. Drainage is the key. All the acantholimons made it. There was even a rebloom on Iris mellita in the warmth of late November.

The beaver pond one the way to Sharon

During that black spell on the weather in the fall, I couldn't even bear to look at seed lists. There were some great plants mentioned, I found out later. My regret mounts as I check out Holubec's, truly stellar list this season. And the pictures of his travels are breathtaking. It was in the midst of the family Christmas holiday season when I saw his website, and quickly made a wish list on Pinterest.

Veltheimia bracteata

Do you know that site? It really fills the need for those of us who think visually. After you join you are given a little Pin button for your browser. Then you can grab webpage images and add them to your pin boards, hosted on their site. Most people use it like we as children did with an old Sears catalog, circling wants, or later on as we grew up, tearing out pages to keep in a folder of ideas. The main board feed is rarely of interest to me, but if you know where to look, there is great humor. And yes, it can be yet another addictive escape exit for middle of the night. Too, it's a great place to sort out one's emotions visually.

Alan Bradhsaw's Alplains list is again the best of the west. While I have quite a bit of seed to sow from my travels to Colorado last summer, there are a few items on his list I know are must-have. Of course, I need to order them first before I tell everyone about them! And don't forget the society lists of NARGS and APS.  Chris Chadwell even is sending out a list this year. There is still time.  So I will use this day, where I am forced into bed by a cold, to catch up and order. It is a good year to start over again.

Finally some snow cover on the garden!

Blessings to your and your family! May all your seedlings make it through planting out.

Colorado Day 11- Horseshoe Mountain 1

July - the road to Horseshoe

   Has it ever happened to you, one of those days, when even getting lost with a GPS, or turned back by impassible snow-filled roads, has not thwarted your chance for a stellar day that will glow in your memory for all time? I dreamed of Horseshoe Mountain during years of rock garden club slide shows, knowing someday I would connect with the majesty of the place. And it was still a surprise, this place, overwhelming all my senses with saturated color in earth and sky as only as a high mountain can. No it was not altitude deprivation!

Trifolium nanum

Since the Jeep would not traverse the blocked road, I backed up, parking at the crook, and walked the right fork pointing up to the mine. This was now an ATV road, but washed out in some places by the rains. I know that because the mine owners were zooming uphill noisily on ATV's, stopping only to check me out, and warm me about the fate of others who were trapped in a rollover for many days during the previous year. I assured them I had cell reception on my phone, but really in my heart I knew this day was mine. It was early in the day, the sunlight a white gold, adding sparkles to the opening flora. Encouraged by Trifolium nanum and Hymenoxis acaulis as well as some large budded Arenaria obtusiloba I ventured up the steep path with long breaths. Parking elevation was probably about 12,000 feet. That of an East Coast landlubber for years now, my system was no match for the altitude and it was slow going. (Have you tried growing the trifolium? Germination does not seem to be the problem. Seedlings in my garden were strong until the August wet melted them down. However, hopeful I will remain to see if they will like the xeric area, when I try them again!)

Here and there was an unfamiliar plant: fleshy leaves not more than 8 inches high, fantastic parallel veining with a blush of red at the base and tips. Seems noteworthy that the plants yet to bloom were at lower elevations. A hundred yards or so uphill I spotted the bloom - Frasera speciosa, so-called "Monument Plant" standing high in the alpine zones of the West. I never met a gentian I didn't like and this was quite novel. Seed of gentiana is usually pretty effortless to grow, as long as it is still viable, so it too goes on my want list.

Frasera speciosa

As I continued uphill, scrophs started making an appearance, first being Penstemon hallii. While detouring around a washout and though some scrubby salix, trying to keep my summer hiking boots out of the mud,  I almost stumbled over the bewitching Chionophila jamesii. A whole colony were reveling in the moist shade of the willows, not underneath, but in clearways within the scrub. They were showstoppers against the black earth.

Chionophila jamesii

Chionophila jamesii grouping

Chionophila jamesii - the 'snow beloved'

A little further up the path there were others who also seemed to like the moist seeps like my old friend Sedum integrifolium - the King's Crown.

Sedum integrifolium

Other moisture lovers were there too, like mertensia (maybe ciliata?), mixed with a little trifolium (maybe dasyphyllum?).

Mertensia with Trifolium

Next, looking very mossy and errant but rouged for a somewhat of a good showing, was a very soft Silene acaulis. This is one plant that never completely seems to relax in the garden, preferring its loose ways in the wild to treat us to the best bloom. Oh, well, it does set seed very prodigiously.

Silene acaulis

 About then, the first eritrichium, aretioides, that blue, made itself known, followed by the white bloom of Phlox condensata and purple Polemonium viscosum and Phacelia sericea and more penstemons. The road again beckoned "upwards" with glints of gold.

to be continued...

Colorado Day 10- Boreas page 3

Boreas kept the air flow moving. And the air tasted clean on my palette. As if for proof, my eyes glanced down at my feet. Beautiful white lichen, known only grow in pollution free zones, abounded in pockets, here and there, in the dryer parts of the alpine meadow. A yellow lousewort (pedicularis) interspersed with them. The meadow had a more settled look than the talus - older and packed with the remains of dust and dirt. Someone once told me we get at least 50 tons of cosmic dust falling each day to earth. When I see alpine fell fields such as this mountain's, I wonder that they haven't filled in with the dust. Perhaps Boreas and his brothers blow them into character by sweeping it into the meadow?

Arenaria, castilleja, trifolium, to name a few - all usual suspects for this area - now made appearances. And in this dryer meadow, the alpine forget me not, Eritrichium aretioides , stood out with that blue, you know, the one that captures the eye.

Eritrichium aretioides

What is not evident from the first photo (above) is the exquisite little woolly bun at the base. In our eastern gardens that is just about the most we can do with this plant - grow and admire the bun. And yes I have knelt to see the single bloom on Geoffrey's seed grown plant, but it was the foliage that kept me returning to admire.

Eritrichium foliage

Germinating the seed of this plant seems not to be the problem for us at home. And yes, we get plenty of the icy breath of Boreas in the Berkshire gardens. But what I don't sense here in this pass, is the cloying feel of certain fungi mixed with the stale breath of the mugs resulting in the odor we often call "decay." Perhaps it just doesn't reach these alpine zones. And perhaps there never is any humid heat. But it is the bunker at the base of our Goshen ecosystem - forest rot. Our home grown plants (even from seed) of eritrichium are very fussy. When our weather provides the stress of ice and wet, these plants generally succumb.

Storm clouds once again hid the sun and loomed high, giving us a prompt to think about descending soon. We walked to the north side of the mountain, to the pass with Bald Mountain. This whole day had been really an easy and delightful walk for acclimatizing. At these altitudes, it took a while. We stayed at 12,000 something feet for most of the hike. (This is quite a bit higher than one must go for alpine plants in the Alps.) With a look to the skies, a quick lunch was decided.  This pass area was mostly dry gravelly meadow- smaller loose stone, and perfect for a picnic. The first penstemon showed in the lawn as we began to seat. Perhaps a very diminutive version of Penstemon halii?

Penstemon hallii

 As we enjoyed our repast, someone was watching us, moving closer. This Chip 'n Dale cohort was about chipmunk size and a rock hound. So he took the name "Rock Squirrel" as well as some crusts I had thrown in that direction.

Lunch with a self purported friend

This little guy was making such chatter, I nearly did not look the other way - up the hill to Bald Mountain. But when I glimpsed to the bunnery at the base of which I was seated, he was history. Even without much bloom this scene was spectacular with arenarias, Erigeron pinnatisectus, Phlox condensata and trifolium. The plant nearest me I had seen before, outside of Laramie. But still I did not know it. Paronychia pulvinata is a member of the Caryophyllaceae I have never seen in East Coast gardens. What a great mat. (Got to try it!)

Paronychia pulvinata

The name of the phlox next to it immediately came to mind because of the wonderful purple cast and dark spot in the center.

Phlox condensata

As I arose, a little lewisia was underfoot all throughout the area - L. pygmea. What a darling little plant. And so easy to grow from seed. Always add it to a crevice and it will sparkle your garden with alpine remembrance.

Lewisia pygmea

Some rumblings from the skies ended our meal and we were off down the hill on a road more often traveled. It followed the snow melt line and guided hikers with trollius and caltha bloom for markers. Looking a little closer, some mertensia looking foliage was starting to rise.

Trollius and Caltha crowding the snowmelt

A little lower down the path, Rod veered off across the mountain. It would be quicker, he said. Maybe, I thought, but there was a bit of scrubby salix to fence us out. Rod strode right through it, while I on the other hand was enchanted. A very heuchera looking plant was unfolding.Could it be Saxifraga odontoloma, the brook saxifrage? The leaves were so crisp and such a clean green. They glinted even without sun.

Saxifraga odontoloma

After escaping this siren and the salix scrub where it hid, it was back to the fell fields. A lovely minute Sedum integrifolium was a just emerging. The foliage was fanciful - like an elaborate collar from some 16th century Dutch painting. Think Thomas de Keyser. The common name for this plant is King's Crown. Seems more appropriate to call it the King's Collar.

Sedum integrifolium with collar

We high-tailed it down the mountain as more grumblings shook the air. Down at sub-alpine levels, we slowed briefly. It was not possible for me to pass up cooing over a sweet little buttercup on the way.

Ranunculus sp.

It took no time at all to finish the descent. Looking back up the mountain we gave thanks for Boreas and his mountain. And we were glad to be down before the approaching storm.

Boreas Mountain

Arriving at the parking lot, we loitered a few minutes on the opposite side of the tracks, then drove off south. A very full specimen of Penstemon halli was mixed into yarrow around the bend. It certainly was more robust than what we saw at the pass. Maybe the ants do a better job tending at this lower elevation? What a great plant!

robust Penstemon hallii

Better yet, a very nice pea presented itself. Maybe an oxytropis? At any rate, it was a great plant to end this amazing day.

Oxytropis sericea

Colorado Day 10- Boreas page 2

Sedum integrifolium

We continued on our way treading lightly over fell fields and pockets of snow. After all the delicate ranunculaceae family, the  next to show itself was one of my favorite sedums. Oh yes there were plenty of pedicularis, trifoium and phacelia bedded into the small black shale-y kind of fill in these rock beds. Then I stopped in my tracks. A globe of white fuzz on green stems- wow - is it the bud rising from Gilia (or is it Ipomopsis now a days?) globularis? Even the stems were shaggy - a truly retro '60ies plant. Looking further up the hill, there was bloom.

Ipomopsis globularis

Bulbs were also showing - Lloydia serotina, which never seems to last long in my home garden was there in force. That is to say a plant was here, a plant there, not many together, but always within the field of vision.

Lloydia serotina

We stumbled through low brush at times - salix for the most part. Finally we reached a vista and looked back toward the Ten Mile Range. The sun was gone and storm clouds were rolling toward us.

Looking back at the gathering clouds

Caltha leptosepala

 My friend Anne had warned me plenty of times in the past to be off the mountain by mid afternoon. This was just lunch time. Time now to ramp up the walking speed. But of course there were the calls of still beckoning plants.The wet meadow where we slogged was filled with caltha and ranunculus. What a time! Boreas, ever with us, provided the cool breeze to wick away any heat we generated going upward ever faster. The mountain opened to us a look into the private lives of some of the most fascinating of alpine plants. Truly this was a home for gods... and we were not. Thoughts of wrathful thunderbolts drove us to increase speed.

Caltha leptosepala, Ranunculus sp and buds

As we continued along this moist meadow, the ever-so-sweet  and diminutive Saxifraga rhomboidea rose among the salix. Did I mention the ground was wet with a cold that the plants obviously enjoyed. It is impossible for me to imagine the inhabitants of that railroad town a hundred years prior, much less those miners, who lived here in quite primitive conditions.We came in the height of summer. What must winter have been like for them with Boreas?

Saxifraga rhomboidea

There was a sweetness in the air. Perhaps a thlaspi, there were a few underfoot? Soon we came to open buds of the ranunculaceae-looking foliage we passed earlier. Funny to think with the higher altitude and more northern exposure, Trollius laxus would be open here and not below. What a plant! Countless times I have tried this from seed without success. Must be another case of fresh-seed-only-please.

Trollius laxus with caltha

 Looking closely at the trollius, I saw the ants who tend them. Looks like they keep a buddy system in place to wait on the blossom with constant attention. With this bit of awe still mesmerizing us, we failed to note the sun had returned. Oh yes please, I will always take a helping of more time to meander blissfully.

Continued...