November 5, 2013 - Kim’s Weekly Garden Newsletter
These weekly garden notes are
written by Kim Willis, unless another author is noted, and the opinions
expressed in these notes are her opinions and do not represent any other
individual, group or organizations opinions.
November comes and November goes,
With the last
red berries and the first white snows.
With night
coming early and dawn coming late,
And ice in
the bucket and frost by the gate.
The fires
burn and the kettles sing,
And earth
sinks to rest until next spring."
- Elizabeth
Coatsworth
Hi Gardeners
I think of
November as the month of no’s, no sun, no warmth, no leaves, no flowers, no
butterflies, no bees, no beauty and no fun.
It’s a blah month much like February and one of my least favorites. And this November is certainly starting out
with no sun. At least we have had some
good moisture for the plants going into winter.
I will admit
I still have some flowers blooming outside.
There are snapdragons, violas, verbenas, garden mums and even a few
blooms on the landscape roses. And the
geraniums are blooming their heads off inside.
I even have a few blooms on the kangaroo paws I brought inside and on
the streptocarpus.
I still have
to dig some glads and dahlias, although I have gotten some of the bulbs inside,
the ones I left in pots. And I still
have apples to pick and Jerusalem artichokes to harvest. If any of you want some Jerusalem artichokes
let me know.
I’m not much
for cutting everything down in the perennial beds in the fall although there is
some cleanup I would still like to do. I
like to hold off the major cleanup for those nice days in spring when it’s too
early to plant but you really want to do something in the garden. There’s debate among gardeners about garden
cleanup. It probably does help with
disease and insect control to some extent but leaving stems and leaves also
helps insulate plant crowns and trap snow.
Leaving flower heads with seeds is good for the birds and can provide
some winter interest. I guess each gardener
has to decide on their own about fall cleanup.
You should clean up apples and other fallen fruit to deter insects and
diseases overwintering though.
Do get those young
deciduous trees protected from varmints before snow falls. Surround trunks with wire cages or tree tubes
up to at least 3 feet high. Deer,
rabbits and voles call kill trees and shrubs by gnawing on the trunks in
winter.
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| Viola |
Remember to
slow down on watering houseplants this time of year or at least check them
before watering. As the days get shorter
they use less water- unless they are right over a furnace vent. And don’t fertilize them at this time of
year, they don’t need it and it contributes to salt build up in the potting
soil.
November almanac
November's full
moon on November 17, is called
the Beaver Moon, or the Full Frost Moon by Native Americans. In Europe November is known as the 'wind
month' and the 'blood month'. It was the
traditional month for butchering, hence the blood moon. Unfortunately the full moon will spoil the
viewing of the Leonids meteor shower at its peak.
November is
named for the Latin word for nine as it was the ninth month of the Roman calendar. In ancient times it was also called the month
of the dead. The flower for this month
is the chrysanthemum and the birthstone is topaz. Good days for harvesting above ground crops
are the 15th and 16th, and for harvesting below ground
crops the best days are the 25th through 27th.
In England November
5- today- is known as Guy Fawkes Day, or Bonfire night. It originally celebrated to commemorate what
was known as the gunpowder revolution but has become known as a day to burn
effigies or pictures of hated people and things. If you have an anger issue tonight may be
your chance to burn some anger.
It’s Native
American Heritage month. November 11 is
Veterans day- November 13 is National
Indian Pudding Day and Sadie Hawkins day, November 17 is World Peace day
and Homemade bread day, November
23 is National Cashew Day, the Great American Smokeout is the 21st and the 28th is Thanksgiving
.
Native shrubs
Native plants
are a hot trend in gardens and in landscaping.
They are ecologically sound choices and often require less care than
other landscape and garden plants. The
problem is that they are often hard to find as some are hard to propagate in
nurseries or to hold for sale. Some species
that might do well in the landscape are just not well known enough for people
to seek them out. Researchers Julia Cartabiano and
Jessica Lubell from the Department of Plant Science and Landscape Architecture
at the University of Connecticut have been searching for native shrubs that are
good candidates for landscape material and that can be profitably grown by
nurseries.
The shrubs Ceanothus
americanus,( New Jersey Tea) Corylus cornuta,( Beaked Hazelnut) Lonicera
canadensis,( American Fly Honeysuckle) and Viburnum acerifolium( Maple leaf
viburnum) were the choices the
researchers reported on in the August issue of HortScience. The researchers
thought all four species would be good landscape plants but that the Beaked
Hazelnut and Mapleleaf viburnum would be the easiest to propagate.
The Beaked
Hazelnut is a rounded large shrub, 12-25 feet in height. The leaves are thick ovals with toothed edges
and a hairy underside. The plant
produces catkins in the fall that persist through winter and are pollinated in
the spring. Each seed is a small nut
enclosed in a tough husk with a point, the beak. The nuts are edible and were eaten by Native
Americans but the husk is covered with fine hairs that can irritate the skin of
those who are removing them to get the nut.
There is also a hard shell around the nut which must be removed.
Squirrels and
some birds like Jays eat the nuts.
Native Americans used the stems of Beaked Hazelnut for basket
weaving. The plant prefers sandy loam,
well- drained soil and does not do well in clay soil or wet areas. It prefers full sun to light shade. It can be propagated by planting the nuts or
rooting cuttings.
Mapleleaf
viburnum is an attractive smaller shrub 3-6 feet in height. The leaves are lobed like a maple leaf with
serrated edges. In spring small clusters
of pretty white flowers turn into attractive red or purple berries that can
persist through winter if not eaten.
Birds eat the berries as well as some small animals. The flowers attract butterflies and the
plant is a larval host to the Spring Azure butterfly.
The Mapleleaf
viburnum berries are not considered edible for humans but Native Americans used
the berries to make several medicinal concoctions for cramps and colic and as a
diuretic. The plant is useful in the
landscape because it will tolerate dry shade but it does best in well drained
but moist soil in partial shade. It does
not propagate well from seed; it is usually started from rhizomes as it does
sucker, or by rooting cuttings.
Fly
Honeysuckle is one of our native honeysuckles and is not considered
invasive. It forms a slowly spreading bush
up to about 8 feet tall with attractive leaves.
In late April it has sweet smelling yellow-white flowers that become
reddish fruits in late summer. The
fruits are eagerly sought by robins and cardinals.
Fly
honeysuckle is tolerant of most soil and moisture conditions and will grow in
full sun to partial shade. It is
propagated by seed or cuttings quite easily although plants may be a little
slow to establish.
New Jersey
Tea may be the best known of these four native shrubs and does appear for sale
in native plant catalogs and herbal catalogs.
It has a long history of ethno-botanical uses in North America. Other common names are red root, mountain
sweet and wild snowball. It is a small wiry stemmed shrub to about 3
feet tall. It has long oval leaves that
smell like wintergreen when crushed and that have white hairs on the back. Stems are green when young but turn woody
with age. The roots are reddish in
color.
New Jersey
Tea flowers are fragrant clusters of tiny white flowers that attract a lot of
bees and butterflies. They bloom for as long as a month in early summer. The plant is the larval host for the
butterflies Spring Azure,
Summer Azure, Mottled Duskywing and the Dreamy Duskywing. The flowers turn into papery 3 lobed capsules
with hard brown seeds inside. The seeds
are eaten by many birds including wild turkeys and grouse. Beware- deer love to browse on this plant
and will seek it out.
New Jersey
tea is named because early settlers used its dry leaves as a tea substitute. It
has no caffeine but may give an energy boost.
Native Americans had several medicinal uses for the plant. It was used for bowel problems and the roots
were eaten to give people energy on long trips.
It lowers blood pressure and the roots were used to stop bleeding- they
have blood clotting properties. The
roots are also used to make a red dye.
New Jersey
Tea likes well drained soil and will survive droughty conditions. It prefers full sun. It is slow growing but will gradually spread
by suckering. It can be propagated by
seed or cuttings but the biggest problem is protecting it from deer and rabbits
which are unusually fond of the plant (maybe that energy thing again?). In the garden it is also prone to powdery
mildew, especially in irrigated conditions. This is a plant however, with some selective breeding,
which could produce several nice garden varieties.
Why cold may be more important than
warmth in climate change
Scientists
and ordinary people both have noticed that the normal schedule of spring has
been altered in temperate areas and that plants aren’t leafing out, flowering
or fruiting at the right times. This
leads to complications for other species on earth, including humans, who depend
on plants to feed and shelter them. As
the climate warms the degree of change becomes greater. Since light doesn’t change, the days lengthen
and wane just as they did before the world got warmer, temperature has to be
involved.
You might be
thinking that the plants will bloom and green up earlier when the climate
becomes milder and they do to some extent.
But plants that evolved in temperature zones also need a certain amount
of cold during their resting phase to function on schedule. In milder than normal winters the flowering
and fruiting of some species is actually delayed or prevented. Some plant species have begun to decline in some
areas and expand northward, where the amount of cold in the rest period is more
suited for that species.
While
gardeners may rejoice that they can grow species of plants that used to be not
winter hardy in their zone, they may also lose some old and dependable plants
from the garden. And the whole web of
life is affected by the loss of some plant species or even just a delay in
their fruiting or flowering. Birds and
pollinators for example, depend on certain plants to bloom or fruit at times
that are beneficial to them and when that doesn’t happen, it can cause great
losses in their populations. And when
there are no pollinators when flowers bloom, it can cause a decline in that
plant species.
Warmer
winters also have a tendency to keep plants from going into a deep enough
dormancy so that even short mild periods will start growth again, which is
often followed by colder temperatures that can do great damage to plant vigor
or actually kill the plant. In many
areas hosta are now be affected in this way- there is actually more winter kill
than when the winters were colder.
In the
journal Global Change Biology, researchers report that the worst time for warmer than
normal winter temperatures are mid- February to mid-March, when the lengthening
day also begins to signal plants to come out of dormancy but when there is
still a good chance for later cold weather.
Some plant species are able to adapt their life processes to changing
winters but some, including many tree species, may not be able to adjust.
Researchers
also warn farmers and gardeners not to rely so much on older signs to begin
planting- such as planting corn when the oak leaves are the size of mouse ears
or planting tomatoes when the lilacs bloom.
Even scientific “degree day” indications for planting may now be off
track. We may have to re-adjust our
knowledge of phenology- relating plant growth stages to other biological
processes, such as pest emergence.
Don’t overdo the fish oil, eat eggs
instead
We are
constantly being told that fish oil and other sources of Omega 3 fatty acids
should be generously consumed but new research suggests you can get too much of
a good thing. Research done at MSU and
published this month in Prostaglandins,
Leukotrienes & Essential Fatty Acids, suggests that too much Omega 3
fatty acid can alter the immune system and lower the body’s ability to fight
infections. It can also cause
colitis. Researchers don’t believe that
there is a problem with the amount of Omega 3 fatty acids that could be
consumed with foods; it is only where people take large regular supplements of
Omega 3 that problems can develop. So
ditch the fish oil tablets and eat fish.
However one
food that people were being warned not to eat too much of – eggs- is being
found to be extremely beneficial to our health.
Research has found that eggs actually contain more antioxidants than an
apple or cranberries, about twice as much in raw yolks. When cooked the antioxidants in egg yolks
still equals that of an apple or cranberries.
This is based on the hens eating a typical confinement diet of grains; eggs
from free range hens may contain even more antioxidants.
Even better
than antioxidants, researchers have found that the proteins in eggs are
converted to ACE inhibitors in the intestines and this can actually work to
lower blood pressure. Eggs have been given a bad rap in the last
few decades because it was thought that the yolks raised blood cholesterol and
people have taken to nasty habits like eating an egg white sandwich. However it has been proven that eggs raise
the cholesterol only in certain individuals with genetic idiosyncrasies and in
most people eggs don’t cause a rise in bad cholesterol. Eggs are high in protein, low in calories and
full of many needed vitamins, they are a perfect food that should be eaten whole
and frequently. ( I am a teeny bit prejudiced
toward eggs but the facts are there.)
Dog tail wagging
This may not
be about gardening but here’s a bit of interesting information that I have come
across in reading this week. According
to research dogs wag their tails to the right if they are happy or playful and
to the left if they are feeling sad, angry or otherwise in a bad mood. Other dogs respond to the tail wagging
direction in a way that indicates they understand what the tail wagging
signifies. The tail wagging corresponds
to areas of the brain “that light up” under observation which control
aggressive or fear feelings or happy, playful feelings. The problem is I can’t
tell which way my dogs are wagging their tails.
Make sure to
have an egg for breakfast!
Kim
Garden as though you will live forever. William Kent
