Last summer, we stopped to camp in a state park just north of the Blue Ridge Mountains. It had been a long day’s drive, so we were ready to stretch our legs and see a bit of the natural world in an ecoregion different from our own. In one way, though, we felt right at […] Continue reading "Japanese Barberry (Berberis thunbergii)"
Most of us believe we know certain things about plants. One of those indisputable facts is that the roots of plants are the organs that take up water and nutrients from the soil. We’re not entirely sure where we came by this wisdom, but there it is. Continue reading "A Mystery Explored: Thinking About Mycorrhizae"
The Northeast is renowned for its fall color – the reds and golds of maples, the yellows of clethra and spicebush, the ruby glow of blueberry and chokeberry bushes. And, since its introduction to the United States, from Asia in the 1860s, the gaudy red of burning bush (Euonymus alata), also known as winged euonymus, […] Continue reading "Burning Bush (Euonymus alata)"
Sustaining Life According to the new book, Sustaining Life: How Human Health Depends upon Biodiversity, we need birds, bugs, and bacteria a lot more than they need us. Dr. Eric Chivian, sharer of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1985, and Founder and Director of Harvard Medical School’s Center for Health and the Global Environment, was […] Continue reading "The Grapevine (Sept 2008)"
Nothing draws people’s ire as quickly as suggesting that they not plant buddleia in a butterfly garden. It’s understandable that people plant buddleias (Buddleia davidii or B. alternifolia; sometimes spelled Buddleja). After all, most garden books and websites include them in their lists of butterfly garden plants. And it’s easy to see why people like […] Continue reading "Nipped In The Buddleia (Buddleia davidii)"
It’s All One Piece: We continue to explore man’s traditional treatment of the soil, the results of this treatment, and the benefits that accrue through the planting and tending of natural landscapes, using nativeplants. Continue reading "A Mystery Explored: Nitrogen, Phosphorus, Potassium, Oh My!"
Project Budburst You may have read about Project Budburst in a recent Wild Ones Journal. It’s a nationwide volunteer effort to observe buds, leaves and blossoms on trees as part of tracking climatic variation over time. Herbaceous and non-native plants are also targets. You can learn more, and sign up at windows.ucar.edu/citizen_ science/budburst/. “As a […] Continue reading "The Grapevine (July 2008)"
Last summer at the edge of my yard, I spotted a vine with an unusual purplish-black, starshaped flower. In the past, I might not have noticed it. But courtesy of the hours we Habitat Gardening in Central New York (NY) Chapter members spent in intimate contact with that plant, I immediately recognized the villain: black […] Continue reading "Black Swallowwort (Cynanchum nigrum)"
In the previous article, we discussed what it is about native plants that makes them unique. We concluded that their long lives, with the resultant massive root structures, and millennia of adapting to their life space, while also co-evolving with other living organisms in their life space, were all relevant factors. Continue reading "Further Mysteries Explored"
Welcome to the Anthropocene The classic presentation of the biomes of the Earth, as seen in all our current ecology texts, has been based on abiotic environmental conditions, like climate, and the productivity of the dominant vegetation. The eight major biomes have been: Tropical Rainforest, Tropical Savanna, Desert, Chaparral, Grassland, Temperate Deciduous Forest, Temperate Boreal […] Continue reading "The Grapevine (May 2008)"