Hello Gardeners
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| Star of Bethlehem |
What odd weather we had over the holidays here in
Michigan. On Christmas day it was sunny,
and 52 degrees and I sat outside on the deck for a good while. Most of December
was mild and snowless. On New Years Eve
we had 2 inches of snow, but it melted in just a few days. We had some spit snow and flurries Sunday
that gave us a dusting of snow, but today is sunny and in the 40’s and it’s
gone.
We have one cold day coming tomorrow and then the
temperature climbs again. Every mild day
is one less day of awful winter weather and I’ll take it. Last year the temps
were mild in the first week of January too but by the third week we were below
zero as a low for a few days.
I would like to think we are morphing into a higher
planting zone, but I am really wary about making that assumption. The problem
with climate warming/change is that it isn’t even. One month we could be having zone 7 weather
and the next zone 4. An earlier spring and less snow would be appreciated
though.
People are asking me about trees budding and bulbs
sprouting. There is really nothing we can do. The bulbs will probably be fine.
If trees break dormancy early and buds are killed it’s not great, but they will
probably be able to produce new buds. Flower buds on things like magnolias and
fruit trees may be lost, but it depends on what’s ahead weather wise still. I
am only noticing bud swelling on a few tree species here, willows and poplars,
so far. Chickweed and other weeds are growing though, and the grass remains
green.
Cruising through the catalogs
I don’t know about you, but I have been getting lots
of garden catalogs in the mail. It’s
nice to look at all the beautiful pictures and plan for spring. My spring orders haven’t been made yet, but I
usually do it before the end of January, so the selection is still good. This month in my blog I will be commenting on
things I’ve noticed, new plants, plants new to me, plants I love, good deals
and so on.
I have also been adding new listings to my garden
catalog page. If you don’t have enough
catalogs or want to see some different catalogs take a look at the page. There are links you can click on to go right
to a catalog. I haven’t tested all the
links this year yet, although I will be working on that too, but if you find a
link that doesn’t work or the company is gone let me know kimwillis151@gmail.com
and I’ll get it removed. You can find
the page here;
Special offers
Totally tomatoes is offering two free sample seed
packets of tomatoes with any $5 or more order.
With a $50 order you’ll get a tomato growers test kit. Orders must be placed by March 15, 2020.
Seeds and Such is offering free packages of new basil
and tomato seed with orders received by March 31st, 2020.
Gurneys almost always has $25 off your $50 purchase
and $50 off your $100 purchase. You can pretty much take half off the cost of
each item if you get close to those purchase amounts.
Burpee’s has 20% off orders of $60 dollars or more if
you enter code BSC20 before June 30, 2020.
Prairie and wildflower gardens
If you are into the prairie garden style, with lots
of grasses, why not add some complementary flowers to the look? These plants look well with grasses and bring
some color to the prairie.
Golden Lace Patrinia
scabiosifolia
This plant has strong stems up to 6 feet high that
are covered with clusters of bright yellow flowers from mid to late summer.
They attract butterflies and bees and are deer resistant. They are a short-lived perennial that will
also self-seed. Golden Lace is suitable
for sunny areas in zones 5-8.
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| Golden Lace Select seeds photo |
Carthusian Pink Dianthus
carthusianorum
This plant has been grown in European gardens for a
long time but isn’t common here. It
could bring a pop of pink to your prairie or wildflower patch. It has 2 feet tall, wiry stems with airy
flower heads of rose to magenta pink at the top. It blooms for a long period in summer and is
a perennial. It’s suitable for zones
4-8. It needs full sun and prefers
neutral to slightly alkaline soil that is well drained.
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| Carthusian Pink Photo Select Seed |
Berkheya 'Zulu Warrior' Berkheya
purpurea
This unusual plant from South Africa is an excellent
plant to mix with lower grasses or at the front of the prairie patch. It has
sturdy, prickly winged stems with dark green rosettes of pointed leaves covered
with white webbing. Plants get about 2 ½ feet high and wide. The plants are an architectural statement on
their own. But add clusters of pretty daisy-like lavender flowers with a deep
purple center and you have it all. It’s drought tolerant and attracts
butterflies. Makes a good cut flower or dried flower and seed pods are
attractive too. Full sun. While it is a perennial plant it is not winter hardy
below zone 6. Grows easily from seed and
may reseed.
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| Zulu Warrior Photo by Select Seeds |
Want a rose to liven up your wildflower or cottage
garden? Try TOTTERING-BY-GENTLY, a
new David Austin Rose. This shrub rose
has lovely pale yellow, single, wild-looking flowers that would look wonderful
among blue flowers. The shrub grows to 4
feet high by wide. It’s a repeat bloomer so you’ll get roses several times a
season. It has a soft musky scent too. Its hardy in zones 5-11 and has good
disease resistance.
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| Tottering by Gently rose Photo by David Austin Roses |
Other flowers
How about an interesting foliage plant? We all know foliage texture and color are
important in a well-planned garden.
Feverfew 'Golden Moss' Tanacetum
parthenium aureum
This is another heirloom that deserves a look. It has golden fernlike foliage in a compact
form about a foot high. It’s excellent for color spots among other perennials,
in containers or as an edging to beds.
Its perennial, easy to grow, deer resistant, and will grow in partial
shade. Feverfew has a spicy, earthy scent when brushed. It has small white
daisy like flowers in summer. Hardy in
zones 4-8.
Buy at Select Seeds
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| Golden Moss Photo by Select Seeds |
Chilean Glory Flower 'Tresco Mix' Eccremocarpus
scaber
Want a different vine this summer, one that attracts
hummingbirds? Try Chilean Glory flower.
This vine has finely textured foliage and clusters of tubular flowers in
shades of red, orange and yellow from mid-summer to frost. It can grow up to 12 feet long in a warm,
long season. Full sun preferred. Flowers can be cut and used in arrangements.
Chilean Glory flower is a tender perennial. It’s not hardy below zone 10 but it can be
overwintered if potted and brought in before frost.
Buy at Select seeds
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| Chilean Glory Flower Photo by Select Seeds |
‘Amazing Grey’ Shirley Poppy Papaver
rhoeas
I love the colors of this new poppy; they are shades
of gray, silver, and smoky purple. Some
have gold or white edges or rosy throats. Two- three inch semi-double or single
blooms with crinkly petals appear on 2-3 feet tall plants in mid-summer.
This is an annual poppy, usually grown from seed. It
can be sown outside a few weeks before the last frost and will begin blooming
in late spring. It would look beautiful mixed with either deep reds or pastel
pinks and blues. The seed pods look good in dried arrangements.
You can buy it here
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| Amazing Grays Poppy Photo by Swallowtail Garden Seeds |
Now for some edibles of note.
‘Bodacious hybrid’ is a new tomato being
offered by Burpee’s. This tomato has
large 10-12 oz deep red fruits. Its
crack and disease resistant fruits grow on compact vines. 80-85 days.
Potato Huckleberry Gold
A new potato on the scene this year is Huckleberry
Gold. One of it’s claims to fame is that
it is a low glycemic index potato, (lower sugar), making it better for
diabetics to eat than regular potatoes. Its also tasty, good for mashing like
Yukon Gold, and pretty. The skin is deep
purple and the flesh golden yellow. It was developed by Michigan State
University. It is not a GMO
variety.
Huckleberry Gold has medium sized round tubers. It’s
not quite as productive as Yukon Gold but is more resistant to scab, cracks and
hollow heart. I see that many catalogs
are carrying Huckleberry Gold but supplies are somewhat limited I understand,
so if you want it, order early. Some
places carrying it are R. H Shumways, Carter Seed Potato Farm, Renee’s Garden,
Irish Eyes Potato Farm, plus more.
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| Huckleberry Gold Photo Renees garden |
Perpetual potatoes
If you want to try some different potatoes and are
interested in perennial food plants, you may want to try these potatoes. These are heirloom potatoes and they come in
a variety of colors, red, pink, purple, white, blue. They are small and odd shaped, somewhat like
fingerling potatoes, but have a great potato flavor.
If you want them to be perennial you will have to
leave some in the ground through the winter of course. They will increase over time. Or you could save tubers for replanting in
the spring like regular potatoes. If you
are in an area where potatoes are a commercial crop you may not want to try
keeping these as a perennial. They could
be a reservoir for over wintering late blight spores if left in the
ground. Late blight is deadly for
potatoes.
Find these at Oikos Tree crops www.oikostreecrops.com/
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| Perpetual Potato Picture by Oikos Tree Crops |
A tuber of another sort Ullucus tuberosus
If you like really unusual edible plants and are
willing to do a little experimenting ulluco may interest you. Ulluco, also known as ulluma, chungua or ruba
is an impotant crop in the Peruvian Andes and roadside markets are heaped with
colorful piles of them. They have waxy
skinned tubers that look like potatoes in colorful shades of red, purple and
yellow. The taste is said to be like potato
with a touch of beet and they are starchy.
The tubers are eaten like potatoes, boiled, baked and fried and are also
dried.
Ulluco has thick leaves like spinach or beets, and
the leaves are also edible, unlike those of potatoes. The leaves are high in vitamins and minerals
and are boiled or eaten fresh. The
plants form a sprawling vine about a foot high.
Ulluco can be a bit difficult to grow in North
America. It likes a cool, (temperatures
below 80 F), but long growing period, although it is somewhat frost tolerant.
It needs 10-13 hours of daylight to form tubers. It will grow in poorer soils and will
survive moderate drought but does best in loamy soil with consistent moisture. Ulluco must have full sun.
There are several domestic varieties of ulluco being
cultivated that withstand North American conditions better than those varieties
growing in the Andes region. If you like experimenting and breeding plants
developing ulluco for temperate climates could be a project. It can be grown from seed, stem cuttings or
dividing tubers like seed potatoes.
Buy ulluco at
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| Ulluco Photo Cultivariable |
I’ll have more catalog finds next week.
What is OSSI seed?
You may see this term mentioned in seed catalogs this
season- OSSI seed. In May of 2012 the Open Source Seed Initiative was
formed. People who belong to the
organization are plant breeders, researchers and others who are either breeding
new varieties of plants or preserving heirloom plants. They have pledged to keep their seed patent
free, allowing anyone to grow them, and save seed from them and sell the seeds
without paying a fee to the original breeder or restricting who can grow them.
Many seeds and plants today
are patented and the original breeders force people who want to sell the seeds
to pay a patent fee. People are
prohibited from saving seeds to grow the next year without paying a fee. And if they want to produce the seed for
sale, they must ask permission from the patent holder and pay a fee. This used to be primarily done with crop seed
like wheat and soy, but the practice had begun to seep into garden vegetables
and flowers. OSSI members want to curb
this practice.
That does not mean OSSI
seeds are free. People can and mostly
do, charge for the seeds. After all it takes money to develop a new variety and
grow a crop of seeds to sell. But if you
save the seeds from this new variety to grow next year, and even grow more of
the seeds to sell, you do not need to pay a fee to the original breeder. And if you sell the OSSI seeds yourself, you
cannot restrict the people who buy them from you from saving the seed or
growing it to sell themselves.
OSSI seeds can be open
pollinated or hybrids. They cannot
include cannabis seeds yet, except for some hemp varieties. No GMO seeds are
included. The organization mostly
operates in the US and Australia because the European Union has other standards
seed sellers must follow.
A seed that is OSSI
certified is not necessarily organic. The
label has nothing to do with the quality of the seed, some OSSI seeds may be
better or worse than seeds that are not OSSI varieties. It means that you are
free to grow the seeds any way you want, save seeds for next year, use them to
make new varieties of the plant, or grow them to sell.
More information:
Does Elderberry syrup work to prevent
flu?
The flu season is hard upon
us now and the big news spreading across social media is the false idea that by
drinking lots of elderberry syrup you can avoid getting the flu. I was pretty
sure I knew the right answer to the question posed above, but I did some
research anyway. Here’s what I found.
Short answer; there is no
evidence that elderberry extract can prevent flu. If you get the flu, there is some evidence
that certain elderberry extracts may help ease your symptoms and make you feel
better faster. There is also some evidence that elderberry syrups and extracts
produced by home methods do not work well, and that for there to be substantial
benefits, the elderberry extract needs to be a highly refined and filtered, lab
produced product.
Now for the deeper
explanation. First there is some evidence that taking elderberry extract, not a
homemade sugar filled syrup, may help ease the symptoms of flu. There have only
been two small studies that involve actual humans with the flu taking a
commercial elderberry product, but both found that taking elderberry shortened
the time that people suffered flu symptoms compared to a control group. These
studies were very small and in both cases the researchers said that more and
larger studies were needed to confirm the results. There were also studies
using home made elderberry products and in these no benefits were found.
In a few research studies
elderberry extracts, (commercial brands with stringent, highly refined
production methods), could inhibit the growth of the flu virus in cells in lab
cultures. As people trained to interpret science studies will tell you this
does not mean the results will transfer to living animals or people. What kills
or inhibits cells in the lab very often does not work in living subjects,
especially with viruses.
And so far, no studies have
been done on giving people elderberry extract and then exposing them to the flu
virus vs a control group not given extract and exposed. Since the flu can be
deadly, this type of study is probably not going to be done. Studies could be
done on people who refuse the flu vaccine and take daily elderberry extract and
then go about their daily lives vs a control group who did not take the extract
or a vaccine or who just got a flu vaccine and also were just allowed to go
about their daily lives.
Since flu viruses that
become prevalent each year vary, people who were previously exposed to a virus
type circulating in the present will have immunity. Also, people’s immune
systems vary and something as small as how often people wash their hands could
alter any studies done. However very large well controlled studies could give
us some indication of whether elderberry extracts would prevent the flu. Those
studies have not been done.
Given what we know about
viruses, researchers doubt that elderberry extract will actually prove to be an
effective preventative for flu. There’s always hope of course, but for now we
do know that vaccines are pretty effective (effectiveness does vary by the viruses
circulating) and that everyone should get them before flu season begins. And we
know for certain that vaccines do not cause autism.
If you get the flu, there
is evidence that some elderberry products may help you feel better faster. This
is probably because the antioxidants in the elderberry products boost your
immune system. Other concentrated plant-based products with high antioxidant
levels could also help boost the immune system. But even people with highly functioning
immune systems can get viral diseases, including the flu.
Homemade elderberry
concoctions might help a little if you get the flu and if prepared in a safe
manner, they won’t hurt you. But most researchers say a refined, concentrated
elderberry extract from a reputable lab is your best bet to achieving any
symptomatic relief. They recommend 600-900 milligrams per day of a product like
‘Sambucol’®. It should be started immediately when you start feeling
symptoms. You can take it all the time; it
won’t hurt you but remember it probably won’t prevent the flu.
And on another note: those
people who knock the flu treatment ‘Tami Flu’ and say elderberry is better
should know that Tami Flu is made with a large amount of another plant product,
star anise. It’s probably as “natural”
as many commercial elderberry products.
Flu can be deadly, it’s not
something to take chances with. Even if you have a flu shot or take elderberry
extract or do both, you could still get the flu. If you do and you don’t improve in a few days,
please contact a medical professional, don’t rely on herbal remedies. And
please get that flu shot. It really is
your best bet to stay healthy.
If you would like to do
your own reading; there are some science-based links below. Be wary of natural
remedy sites and general news sites that state elderberry prevents or cures flu
(easing symptoms is not a cure) even if they give some references. That’s because
they don’t expect you to read or understand the studies. Often, they don’t
really understand the very articles they reference. When it comes to health
topics everyone should learn what is scientific information and how to
interpret it.
January
Almanac
January’s full moon, which happens on the 10th
is called the Wolf Moon or Old Moon. On that day a penumbral eclipse of the
moon occurs, but it will be barely visible in the US.
Moon perigee is the 20th. Moon
apogee was the 1st and will occur again on the 29th. I track the perigee and apogee of the moon
because my weather keeping records for the last few years tell me the chances
of precipitation around the perigee are high for me. For other areas this might
not prove to be true. Try tracking the moon perigee and apogee events with your
weather and see what you discover.
The perigee is when the moon is closest to earth in a
monthly orbit cycle. There is a slight
increase in the moons gravitational pull at this time. Apogee is the farthest point the moon is in
its orbit from the earth. Research has
proven that there can be slight influences on earth’s weather near these moon
events. When either a new moon or a full
moon occurs near perigee the chances for seismic activity, (earthquakes or
volcano eruptions), increase. Eclipses
or other planetary alignments occurring near this time increase the chances of
earthquakes and volcanoes even more. The full moon also looks slightly larger
when it occurs close to perigee.
The January birth flower is the carnation. In the language of flowers, the carnation is
supposed to portray love, fascination and distinction. If you send a striped
carnation to someone it means your regret that the love isn’t shared. A white
carnation means pure love, a red carnation “carnal” love. A pink carnation means friendship and a
yellow one means rejection. An alternative birth flower is the snowdrop. It has a lot less colors to worry about. The
birthstone is the garnet.
January is National Blood Donor month, National Hot
Tea month, National Oatmeal Month, and National Soup Month to name a few. The 10th is Houseplant
Appreciation day, the 13th is International Skeptics day, the 15th
is National Hat day, as well as Penguin Awareness day and National Buttercrunch
Day, the 18th is Winnie the Pooh Day, the 19th is
National Popcorn day, the 21st is Martin Luther King Day, the 22nd
is National Blond Brownie day and the 23rd is National Pie day. Chinese
New Year is the 25th. The 27th is National Chocolate Cake
Day and the 28th is Fun at Work Day. The 31st is Backward
day and Inspire Your Heart with Art day.
"There are two seasonal diversions
that can ease the bite of any winter. One is the January thaw. The
other is the seed catalogues."
- Hal Borland
- Hal Borland
Kim Willis
All parts of this blog are copyrighted and may not be used without
permission.
And So On….
Find Michigan garden events/classes
here:
(This
is the Lapeer County Gardeners facebook page)
Newsletter/blog information
If you have a comment or opinion you’d like to share, send it to
me or you can comment directly on the blog. Please state that you want to have
the item published in my weekly blog if you email me. You must give your full
name and what you say must be polite and not attack any individual. I am very
open to ideas and opinions that don’t match mine, but I do reserve the right to
publish what I want. Contact me at KimWillis151@gmail.com
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