Jul 23, 2020
Today we remember a gardener who became a saint.
We'll also learn about the woman remembered forever in the name of
one of the world's most popular hostas.
We celebrate the Scottish botanist who was the first to describe
the Prairie Buttercup.
We'll also hear some wonderful words about simply being in the
garden.
We Grow That Garden Library™ with a book about gardening and
friendship in a heartwarming book from 2015.
And then we'll wrap things up with a wonderful pesto recipe.
But first, let's catch up on some Greetings from Gardeners around
the world and today's curated news.
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Gardener Greetings
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pics, stories, birthday wishes and so forth to
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Curated News
My Relationship With My Garden Hose | May Dreams
Gardens
"In the spring, we optimistically buy that big heavy hose that
is guaranteed to last a lifetime and never kink. And when we see
that hose all wrapped up on the store shelf, we believe those
claims.
Then we get it home and discover what bad manners it has. Kink?
Of course, it will kink the minute you look at it and even think
about watering. Heavy? So heavy you can barely stand the thought of
pulling it around the garden to water."
Plant of the Week: Mukdenia rossii' Crimson
Fans' ("muck-DEEN-ee-uh")
"In 2007, I bought Mukdenia rossii 'Crimson Fans' after
somewhere seeing--I forget now--photos of the pretty
leaves.
It grew. It's an easy plant with no fussy requirements at all
except moist soil. (But wait.)
...Eventually, if the conditions are right, the green leaves
develop a pretty crimson margin--the 'Crimson Fans'. Yes, I'm a fan
of the crimson fans.
And this, my friends, is where things get tricky--"if the
conditions are right" being the operative phrase. Too much sun and
the leaves will burn by turning brown. Not enough sun and the
leaves will stay green.
The challenge has been finding just the right balance between
sun and shade. I've had this plant both in the ground and in a pot,
as the trial and error experiment went on, year after year, trying
one location after another to meet--but not exceed--the sunlight
requirements."
Alright, that's it for today's gardening news.
Now, if you'd like to check out my curated news articles
and blog posts for yourself, you're in luck, because
I share all of it with the Listener Community in the
Free Facebook Group - The Daily Gardener
Community.
There's no need to take notes or search for links - the next time
you're on Facebook, search for Daily Gardener Community and request
to join. I'd love to meet you in the group.
Important Events
300 Today, Catholics honor St. Phocas the
Gardener who lived in Turkey during the third century.
A protector of persecuted Christians, Phocas grew crops in his
garden to help feed the poor.
Phocas is remembered for his hospitality and generosity; his garden
played an essential part in living both of those virtues.
When Roman soldiers were sent to kill him, they could not find
shelter for the night.
Naturally, when Phocas encountered them, he not only offered them
lodging but a meal made from the bounty of his garden. During the
meal, Phocas realized they had come for him. While the soldiers
slept that night, he dug his own grave and prayed for the soldiers.
In the morning, Phocas told the soldiers who he was, and the
soldiers, who could conceive of no other option, reluctantly killed
him and buried him in the grave he had dug for himself.
Although gardening can be a solitary activity, Phocas, the
gardener, paved the way, showing us how to use our gardens to
connect us to others through generosity and hospitality.
1883 Today is the birthday of the woman who
is remembered for one of the most popular hostas in American
gardens: Frances Ropes Williams.
Frances had a shady garden in Winchester, Massachusetts. And, what
is the most-used plant by shade gardeners? Hostas. That's
right.
And Frances had an appreciation for hostas before they became
widely used in American gardens. A graduate of MIT, Williams was
lucky enough to get the chance to work with Warren H. Manning, the
famous Boston landscape architect, for a little over two years.
Frances stopped working to marry Stillman Williams. But sadly, he
died after almost twenty years of marriage, leaving Frances with
four young children - two boys and two girls.
Frances and her family loved the outdoors. When the kids were
little, Frances made them one of the very first playsets.
When the children were grown, Frances found purpose in her garden,
and she zeroed in on her hostas. She became known for hybridizing
them, and she even wrote about them for various botanical
magazines.
Frances discovered the hosta that would be named for her honor
quite by happenstance. She had visited her daughter in college in
New York, and she stopped by Bristol Nurseries in Connecticut on
her way home. Nestled in a row of Hosta sieboldiana, was a hosta
that had a yellow edge. Frances bought it and continued to grow it
in her garden.
Years later, Frances hosta ended up in the hands of Professor
George Robinson at Oxford. Frances had labeled the plant FRW 383.
When the professor couldn't remember what Frances had labeled the
plant, he simply called it hosta Frances Williams.
Frances's work with hosta helped the newly-formed American Hosta
Society. After she died in 1969, a hosta garden was planted in her
memory at MIT.
1886 Today is the anniversary of the
death of the Scottish-born botanist and author John Goldie. He led
an extraordinary life.
He started as an apprentice at the Glasgow Botanic Garden. As a
young man, another botanist bumped him off what was to be his first
plant exploration. However, the botanical gods were smiling on him.
The expedition was doomed when most of the party died from coast
fever along the Congo River.
Two years later, William Hooker encouraged John to travel to North
America. He started in Montreal and made his way down the Hudson
River to New York. He wrote that he carried as many botanical
specimens "as his back would carry."
On June 25, 1819, John was in Toronto. When he reached the east
side of the Rouge River, John wrote in his journal of the
wildflowers and especially the Penstemon hirsutus ("her-SUE-tis")
that was growing on the east slope of the riverbank. John was
astounded by the beauty and of seeing so much Penstemon in
"such a quantity of which I never expected to see in one
place."
During John's incredible walking tour of Canada, he discovered a
yellow variety of pitcher plant as well as a rare orchid named
Calypso bulbosa. He also encountered the Prairie buttercup. John
was the first person to describe Prairie buttercup.
The name for the buttercup family, Ranunculaceae, is from the Latin
term Ranunculus which means "little frog." The name was first
bestowed on the plant family by the Roman naturalist Pliny the
Elder. The name Ranunculus, which I like to call the Ranunculaceae,
is in reference to these mostly aquatic plants that tend to grow in
natural frog habitat.
After his North American tour, John returned to the Glasgow Botanic
Gardens, and for five years, he trained an eager young apprentice
and fellow Scottsman named David Douglas. When Douglas met an early
death, John planted a Douglas-Fir next to his house to remember his
young friend.
After John discovered the giant wood fern, Hooker called it
Dryopteris goldieana in his honor, and it earned the name Goldie's
woodfern.
John worked tirelessly, and he recorded a total of fourteen plant
species previously unknown to science. In 1844, John ended up
settling with his family in Canada. He brought them to Ontario - a
place he had especially enjoyed during his botanical
expeditions.
Unearthed Words
Here are some wonderful thoughts about simply being in the
garden.
I love my garden, and I love working in it. To potter with green
growing things, watching each day to see the dear, new sprouts come
up, is like taking a hand in creation, I think. Just now, my garden
is like faith - the substance of things hoped for.
― Lucy Maud Montgomery, Canadian author, Anne's House of Dreams
Gardens are not made by singing 'Oh, how beautiful!' and sitting in
the shade.
― Rudyard Kipling, English journalist and poet
It takes a while to grasp that not all failures are self-imposed,
the result of ignorance, carelessness, or inexperience. It takes a
while to grasp that a garden isn't a testing ground for character
and to stop asking, what did I do wrong? Maybe nothing.
— Eleanor Perenyi, gardener and author
She keeps walking, so I keep following, making our way down a stone
path that leads to a set of tiered gardens. It is magical back
here, garden after garden, the first filled with herbs like Mama
grows, rosemary and lavender and mint and sage. Beyond that is a
rose garden. There must be fifty rose bushes in it, all with
different-colored blooms. We keep walking, down to the third tier,
where there are tended beds like Daddy's vegetable patch in our
backyard.
"Look at this," Keisha says.
She stands beside row upon row of little green plants with thick
green leaves. She kneels beside one of them and pulls back a leaf.
There are small red strawberries growing underneath. She picks one
and hands it to me. I've never eaten a strawberry that tastes like
this before. It's so rich, with juice like honey. It's nothing like
the ones Mama buys at Kroger.
― Susan Rebecca White, author, A Place at the Table
Grow That Garden Library
Mister Owita's Guide to Gardening by Carol
Wall
This book came out in 2015, and the subtitle is: How I
Learned the Unexpected Joy of a Green Thumb and an Open
Heart.
People Magazine said,
"In this profoundly moving memoir, Owita teaches Wall how to
find grace amid heartbreak and to accept that beauty exists because
it is fleeting—as in her garden, as in life."
Oprah.com said,
"With her children grown and out of the house, Carol Wall is
obsessed—perhaps overly so—with ripping out her azaleas. That is
until she meets a certain Giles Owita, Kenyan gardener, supermarket
bagger, general-life philosopher, and perhaps one of the most
refined and gracious characters to ever hit the page (except that
he's real)… A warning for the shy: The basic goodness of Owita's
attitude may cause you to beam spontaneously as you read, leading
to off looks from strangers at the coffee shop."
This book is 320 pages of gardening goodness - growing both plants
and lovely friendship.
You can get a copy of Mister Owita's Guide to Gardening by
Carol Wall and support the show, using the Amazon Link in today's
Show Notes for around $20.
Today's Botanic Spark
Since we are in full-on pesto-making mode, I wanted to share a
recipe that I discovered called Radish, Salmon, and Radish Green
Salsa Verde Toasts by Amy Scattergood.
Radish-Green Salsa Verde
2 cups radish greens, from approximately 2 bunches, chopped
1 cup cilantro
1/ 2 cup extra virgin olive oil
3 garlic cloves
Salt
Zest and juice from 1 lemon
Zest and juice from 1 orange
In a food processor or blender, combine the radish greens,
cilantro, oil, garlic, a pinch of salt (or to taste), lemon zest
and juice, and orange zest and juice. Blend until smooth. This
makes about 1 1 / 2 cups salsa verde.
Assembly
4 ounces crème fraîche
4 slices whole wheat or country white bread, toasted
4 ounces smoked salmon, more if desired
1 cup thinly sliced radishes
Prepared salsa verde
Divide the crème fraîche among the toasted bread slices, spreading
it evenly over each piece. Top with the salmon, followed by the
radish slices. Drizzle or spoon over the salsa verde and serve
immediately.