Saving Rare Plant Species

This image from Tucson Botanical Garden connects to an interesting plant story I heard this morning on our NPR station (yes, I listen to NPR, although it has generally become too corporate for me and yes, I do eat meat, mostly rare).

The program, Living On Earth (broadcast locally way too early on Sat. so that most people are not awake enough to hear it while "Market Place" plays during very prominent time slots) played a rebroadcast and update of interviews with Diana Beresford Kroger. She is a gardener & botanist (with large knowledge of medicinal plants) in Ontario, Canada who made heroic efforts to save some rare tree species during an ice storm ten years ago. Check out LOE's website and click on the story, "Ice Lady Commeth" (linking to that title, I will now probably get more porn comments on this blog, ugh!). I was especially intrigued to hear her comments on reforesting given my work with Earthways and AFOPADI in Guatemala. Earthways website is being updated as we speak (figuratively) and I will post URL as soon as new text and 2008 Annual Report are updated.

Aesculus pavia

Like an Edward Gorey ballerina, its foliage emerges with an awkward, but compelling grace. This small under story tree provides interesting form, hummingbird nectar, zowie bloom (red) and soothing bark.

Nests & Hats

Which is which?

Fab window installation courtesy of Jules, who (along with Suzanne)
runs the amazing Antique Resale Shoppe on Harlem just North of
Touhy in Chicago. A fertile spot for planters, vases and all kinds of
funky objects to add a little kick to your garden if you think outside
the box.

Milwaukee Museum FOTO

Through blinding rain & slushy sleet, up to the Milwaukee Art Museum to see the amazing FOTO show. Photographic shades of the past: my dad's mentor was Moholy-Nagy and I am still a Bauhaus baby. To quote from the brochure: it's all about light, shadow and space...which pretty much sums up landscape too.

Couldn't take pics inside the show so an exterior building shot and an interior Eva Hesse will have to do.

Devil's Claw

Visited this great community garden, Dunbar Spring, in Tucson. Near the visionary house & garden of Brad Lancaster whose inspiring book, Rainwater Harvesting (Volume 1) is my current lunchtime companion.

Below I captured the Devil's Claw (Proboscidea parviflora) in two different moods...and not when it's hitchhiking. Don't let its vinelike qualities fool you as it did me. Long known to the Tohono O'odam, it is a summer blooming wildflower that they use to create their fine basketry.



Definitely evidence to back up our Millennium Park hero, Piet Oudolf's, category of Plants That Look Good Dying...or maybe best laid-out. Maybe this could illustrate the theme song of the recently concluded, fabulous HBO series: The Wire. "When you walk through the garden...gotta keep the devil way down in a hole..." We will miss much more than the song: Thanks!

Chicago's 2nd Season: Construction

The good news is that my first scilla bloomed yesterday! A welcome sight given our late winter and recent snow. The rub is that the tuckpointers constructed their scaffolding the same day.

So, I am posting more Arizona images...here we have red "flowers" against contrasting backgrounds...photographed them at the San Xavier del Bac Mission, called "The White Dove of the Desert," a wonderful spot. Much history. Well worth visiting, it's located on the Tohono O'odham reservation SW of Tucson.

Taking Design Cues From Nature

Our friend, Scott Calhoun of Zona Gardens, gave a wonderful talk at a recent Chicago Botanic Garden Symposium entitled: "Earning a Sense of Place, Garden Design Approaches Inspired by Nature." A few days before when we were hiking in Ironwood National Monument (we avoided the hazards of poisonous snakes and africanized bees, but unfortunately got to witness our few remaining tax-dollars at work in the form of a noisy & intrusive helicopter patrolling for "illegal aliens"), we saw some instructive design examples. Above catch Scott photographing lupine amidst grasses. The purple pops so much more given the grasses' textural contrast.



Here you can see how different the Mexican Poppy looks against gravel and the darker volcanic rock. The combo of the hot color and the cool foliage rocks!



Finally, one of Scott's pet peeves: a fine example in nature of what he believes most landscapers do poorly in clients' yards. Notice how artistically the rocks have arranged themselves via the forces of nature & time.

I agree. Wish more of us working outside could let ourselves be better schooled by observing what isn't man-made. Mostly, I believe it is this predominant American aesthetic of neatness and symmetry that doesn't work. And I haven't even begun to rant & rave about sustainability, or a lack thereof. The positive news is that some people in Tucson are practicing really progressive moves regarding water use & native plants. More about that and what we Midwesterners by the big lake can learn from our desert friends later...