The Garden of Live Flowers

November: Picture This Photo Contest Entry

2009-11-11T22:01:00.001-06:00

My entry for this month's Picture This photo contest at Gardening Gone Wild. The theme is "The End of the Line," interpreted in any number of ways.

I took this picture at University of Illinois at Chicago today. The row of honey locust trees and shadows against the wall suggested prisoners grimly facing a firing line, and with a cold and windy winter coming, that isn't too far from the truth.

November: Campus goes to sleep

2009-11-11T21:38:00.000-06:00

UIC's leaves have mostly fallen and the grounds (and the students) are getting ready for a long winter, but under today's autumn sunshine the campus was putting on a show.

When the leaves fall, hidden secrets within the trees are revealed

November: The Money Pit, part 6

2009-11-10T08:24:00.000-06:00

Almost finished!

November: The Money Pit, part 5

2009-11-08T18:26:00.002-06:00

After a full weekend of work, all of the carpentry is finished.

Saturday afternoon:

A tiny issue with the roof: it was visibly not level. It appeared that the back of the roof was level to the siding and the front was level to the ground, and since the house is not level, the roof looked a bit twisted. This morning's task was to make the roof the same degree of unlevel as the house, which they did successfully. Of course, first there was much shrugging of shoulders and muttering amongst themselves in Serbian. We don't speak Serbian but "Give the client what they want, even if it makes no sense to me" sounds about the same in every language. Too bad!

Today:

Pay no attention to the woman behind the tree; Foley does not like the camera flash and bolted for the door as soon as this was taken

November: The Money Pit, part 4

2009-11-07T09:43:00.001-06:00

Concrete: done. Porch: done enough to be useable, so we no longer have to use a block and tackle to let the dog out (kidding!). Roof framing: being done even as I type. Things are progressing quickly!

Replacement post is firmly tied to original post and bolted into the concrete.

I think they cemented the coachlight a little crooked. Oh well! It won't be noticeable once the clematis covers it again (assuming the clematis survives all this ruckus).

November: Oh yeah, plants

2009-11-03T21:09:00.000-06:00

In the midst of the excitement of tearing off parts of our house and grading a genetics exam, I haven't been reporting on the plants. The garden has been put to bed, McHouse-style, meaning hubby mowed the leaves up and dumped them onto the prairie garden, and I cut back the perennials that were in the way of the concrete guys.

Viburnum opulus, fall color

Calycanthus floridus, Carolina allspice, one of my favorite shrubs, has wonderful fall color. It has developed its first and only fruit, a fig-like capsule that should persist all winter. I'll cut it open in the spring and see what's inside.

My witch hazel, Hamamelis virginiana, is blooming. American witch hazels have such cool flowers but I usually forget to look for them since they bloom at an odd time of year. They tend to have low seed set, something like 1%. I haven't found any capsules from last year's flowers.

I have two strawberry plants running wild in the lawn. I'm told that this is a bad thing but we have such a hard time keeping grass back there, any successful green plant is okay in my book! Until I start smooshing red berries onto my clothes, that is. We'll see if they survive the winter.

Foley dozes in the November sunshine. She's definitely an autumn; the earth tones suit her.

November: The Money Pit, part 3

2009-11-03T20:42:00.000-06:00

In one day, we went from this:

to this:

Don't you just long to go rollerskating on it?

The house is still supported by magic and good intentions but at least the groundwork has been laid. Now we have to let the concrete cure for a few days.

November: The Money Pit, part 2

2009-11-02T21:40:00.005-06:00

It sure doesn't take long for Murphy's Law to kick in, does it?

The pathetic excuse for a load-bearing post that I pointed out yesterday? Not load bearing. Not really touching anything at all. What is keeping this entire corner of the house from falling? The downspout? I feel like I'm living in a Simpsons episode.

Bart Simpson: Ah, I wouldn't take it down if I were you.  It's a load-bearing poster.

Maybe this explains why the back bedroom floor noticeably slants, and the walls have decorative features like this?

Anyway, the demolition is finished after one day, including the removal of the concrete. Plans have been made to properly shore up the corner of the house, and the project has suddenly become more expensive and kind of scary. However, the prospect of not fixing this problem is even scarier.

November: The Money Pit, part 1

2009-11-01T22:18:00.000-06:00

It's been a while since we've had any work done on the house, but rotting porch steps, a roof letting water into the house, and oceans of standing water on the patio have forced us to take action. We met with our Guy on Saturday and tomorrow some burly men will start tearing off parts of our house. Eep!

BEFORE

Porch steps on their last legs; back of the house, including porch and roof and crawlspace to be rebuilt and patio to be replaced (it's not really that crooked, it's just the photo angle)

Another view of the porch; a hodgepodge of concrete forms our patio

The patio, which a tree root has broken into four pieces

Roof pulling away from the house; the post that supports the entire corner of a two-story house looks like this? and we never noticed??

Outer wall of crawlspace, exposed for the first time after we removed some overgrown shrubs this summer; shingles on the roof disintegrating

Inside the crawl space (yes, the paneling is held on with duct tape, and no, we didn't do that, but we didn't try to fix it, either); another part of the patio, including a sidewalk that doesn't go anywhere

Fingers crossed that nothing goes wrong!

October: North Park Village

2009-10-08T10:40:00.001-05:00

On the advice of Mr. McGregor's Daughter, I made time in between Home Depot and Bears game last Sunday to go see some fall color at my favorite neighborhood place, the North Park Village Nature Center. Located in Chicago at Pulaski and Peterson, it is a lovely place to unwind and experience forest, wetland, and prairie all at once. I always promise myself that I'll go more often and so far this year I've done a little better. This time, I took my camera...

This praying mantis reminds visitors that smoking is bad for your health (unless you're a male mantis and your long-term health isn't really an issue); "hands" sculpture that used to be buried in the undergrowth but is now a prominent feature in the next section of woods to be restored

American basswood trees; basswood sapling in a cage (they can be vicious, you know!)

View across the wetland; more basswoods

Buck snacking on savanna grasses, I'm sure to the irritation of the habitat restorers; the female of a pair of twin fawns that were nursing until mom got nervous and walked away, leaving both fawns looking rather bereft

Again with the basswoods! Basswood leaves, just starting to turn (basswoods turn a lovely bright yellow in fall); red oak leaves

Bur oak and big bluestem - a classic Midwestern savanna

October: In a hurry

2009-10-07T16:37:00.005-05:00

What happened to my sunny, crisp October? We seem to have zipped from balmy September straight to blustery November. There is even a touch of snow in this weekend's forecast. Snow!! I try not to be a weather whiner but this is just silly. Last weekend, I had just one day to purchase and install some late-season bargain plants (and to watch the Bears game; very important). My spring fantasies of transforming my yard into a carefully planned drift of purple salvia a la the Lurie Garden by October were distilled to their most basic essence: "Home Depot has cheap salvias. Let's buy some and stick them somewhere!" This is how most of my gardening is done so I guess it's not all that noteworthy. Plan? What plan?

No, but seriously, where to put all these salvias? With daylight waning and a lot of busy weekends ahead of me, I didn't have the luxury of pondering the decision for long. I had decided this summer that I'm tired of the overgrown spireas in front of my garage, so I took action:

Instant garden space! In a flurry of activity that lasted two hours, I transformed the garage garden from this:

into, well, this mess:

But somewhere in there is the groundwork for future success: four salvias, two snowcap daisies, veronica, amsonia, and a daylily that appealed to me. Pretty much everything else was also dug up, moved, divided, or otherwise manhandled so it wouldn't feel left out. Then the sun set and the rest of the garden was spared. For now. Mwah-ha-ha.

Next year should be very interesting.

Assorted pretties from the McGarden:

Obedient plant, Physostegia virginiana - a surprise bloom, hidden under the baptisia; aster NOID

Another aster NOID, possibly ericoides; Chelone lyonii 'Hot Lips' turtlehead, still blooming happily next to the brown-eyed Susans

My one surviving mum, demonstrating just how obnoxious the spireas were getting. This knockout shade of orange makes me so happy every time I see it.

For the record, plants I installed on October 4 or 5:
HOME DEPOT
Leucanthemum superbum Snowcap Shasta daisy (1, divided)
Salvia nemorosa East friesland
Salvia nemorosa May Night (x2)
Salvia nemorosa Marcus
Veronica 'Goodness Grows'
Hemerocallis Pardon Me
Asclepias tuberosa butterfly weed (in wayback)
PRAIRIE NURSERY (wayback garden)
Eryngium yuccifolium, rattlesnake master
Amsonia hubrichtii (garage)
Ruellia humilis
Ex-aster novae-angliae
AMERICAN MEADOWS (front garden)
Hepatica
Bloodroot
Bluebells
Asarum/wild ginger
FROM GRANDMA'S GARDEN:
white irises (foundation garden)
FARMER'S MARKET (late september sometime)
Tricyrtis 'Empress' (south edge border)

September: Ch-ch-ch-chia!

2009-09-24T21:47:00.002-05:00

There are two shipments of plants making their way to my house right now. I don't remember what I ordered and I'm not going to look it up. It's fun to be surprised! In the meantime, I'd like you all to meet my birthday present to myself:

Chia Obama!

I knew I had to have it the moment I saw it. Some people say it's disrespectful, or racist, or just plain silly. It's none of these things. It's awesome.

I'd barely pulled it from the box and I was already giggling with happiness. I chose "Determined" Obama rather than the "Happy" Obama. "Determined" still looks pretty pleased with himself.

Check out those cornrows!

I added water to the seed to create a seed-laden goo that looked something like frog eggs. (Chia incidentally is the common name of Salvia hispanica. The oily seeds were a staple food of the Aztecs and are still commonly eaten in Central and South America. The first Chia pet was a ram. My first Chia pet was a pig.) I had a ton of seeds left over and dribbled them into various houseplant pots. Meanwhile, Mr. President went for a relaxing soak at the spa.

Next time, I will use fewer seeds and less water! The seedy goo was too wet and I had a terrible time keeping seeds from sliding down his face and neck. He ended up with seeds in his eyes, ears, and nose, but I carefully wiped them away and fixed his bald patches. Don't say I never did nothin' for you, Mr. President.

After refilling his head with water, Mr. Obama is ready to grow his snazzy new hair! Let me tell you, planting seeds on my president's head has definitely made me feel more hopeful.

Chia Mt. Rushmore? Yes, please!

Divertissement: September songs

2009-09-04T16:03:00.006-05:00

September is my favorite month (not coincidentally it is also my birth month) and for a few years I've been collecting songs about September. Every year I revise and bump the list, with updated YouTube links where I can find them, on my personal blog. Unfortunately the personal blog is taking an extended, possibly permanent, vacation, now that Twitter and Facebook have given me more efficient ways to gripe about the morons on the L and the fact that I frequently need coffee. So, I'm publicizing the list here instead.

September songfest!

Celebrate September with someone you love. I suggest this cuddly katydid:

September: A googol of goldfinches, and a determined squirrel

2009-09-02T21:24:00.002-05:00

I have never seen (or heard!) so many goldfinches in my life. Multiple nests have fledged and my thistle feeder is the place to eat and get the latest goldfinch gossip. There were around 12 on the feeder this morning, but of course by the time I got the camera most had retreated, peeping squeakily from every tree and bush and flower in the area. It was most adorable!

Dad and some of the kiddies

Meanwhile, the gray squirrels have rediscovered the feeders and are making nuisances of themselves.

Thistle! Bah, hardly worth the effort.

Sunflowers! That's more like it. Now how do I get in?

*chew*

*grunt*

*gnaw* Aw, forget it. I'll bury some horse chestnuts in her garden instead.

August: Waning interest

2009-08-29T22:41:00.004-05:00

Am I the only one who starts to lose interest in the garden by the end of the summer? It's too bad because the plants desperately need work. Many need to be relocated, others need to be cut down (hello, powdery mildew! What did you do to my asters?), and oh my goodness the weeds. There are still several plants that look great, including Rudbeckia triloba, brown-eyed Susan; Rudbeckia subtomentosa, sweet black-eyed Susan; volunteer Ageratina altissima, white snakeroot; and Helianthus mollis, downy sunflowers (plus a cool bee that has been terrorizing my bumblebees by smacking into them; it finally settled down in today's cool temps so I could get a picture).

brown-eyed Susan; downy sunflower avec bee

But now is when I need to turn my attention to the indoor plants and get them ready for winter. And what do I discover on my precious, lovely Stromanthe sanguinea 'Tricolor'? Mealybugs. ARGH. I relocated the plant and have treated with rubbing alcohol. Fingers crossed... I'd really hate to lose this one. The evil hell-spawn of a Walmart philodendron that is the likely source got a one-way ticket to the dumpster, do not pass Go, do not infest anyone else on your way out the door. Yet another reason not to shop at Walmart, as if I needed any more.

August: Bloom Day!

2009-08-15T10:30:00.004-05:00

The August garden looks like I feel: faded, tired, and ready for fall to hurry up and get here. I've been very neglectful of the garden this summer because I've been out of town so much, and it certainly doesn't help that it hasn't rained in ages. Huge fissures are opening up in the lawn and even the black-eyed Susans are droopy. Remember last spring when the back yard was under water? Mother Nature is hilarious, isn't she?

The newly-installed butterfly garden, a tangle of ageratum, rudbeckia, lantana, and gaura. The coneflowers are totally lying down on the job. The heat must make them sleepy.

Viburnum opulus berries; Heuchera micrantha 'Palace Purple' flowers; my brand-new Viola 'Heartthrob' -- isn't it cute?

A gallery of Asteraceaes: Silphium terebinthinaceum, prairie dock; Helianthus mollis, downy sunflower; Aster macrophyllus, big-leafed aster, tangled with Heuchera micrantha

Commelina communis, Asian dayflower (one of my favorite weeds!); Hibiscus; Rudbeckia hirta, black-eyed Susan

Rudbeckia subtomentosa, sweet black-eyed Susan, and Agastache scrophulariaefolia, giant purple hyssop (purple? really?!); Agastache again; Chelone lyonii 'Hotlips'

Rose of Sharon

Beans!! My first edible crop!

Thanks as always to Carol of May Dreams Gardens for hosting Bloom Day!

August: Utah photos

2009-08-07T09:41:00.002-05:00

I spent the last week of July in Salt Lake City and the Wasatch Mountains. First was the Botany & Mycology Conference at Snowbird where I did my first conference talk, a terrifying and humbling experience that went more or less well. :/ It was gratifying to know that there are other people out there who think Tilia phylogeography is worth learning about!

After the conference, my husband met me there for a few days of hiking and sightseeing. He knows the area well but only as it appears in winter, so seeing it in summer was a new experience for him, and I had never been there before. The mountains were gorgeous, with hidden lakes, amusing native Wasatch squirrels ("potguts"), and stunning vistas of alpine flowers around every corner.

overlooking Alta, Utah

First up: Little Cottonwood Canyon, including Alta and Snowbird ski areas and hikes to Germania Pass and Lake Catherine.

Next: Big Cottonwood Canyon, the next canyon to the north, where we stayed at Silverfork Lodge and hiked to Donut Falls and Twin Lakes Reservoir.

Then: Salt Lake City's Temple Square, home of the Mormon Church

And: Antelope Island State Park, a desert island in the Great Salt Lake

Finally: Red Butte Garden, the botanical garden of the University of Utah

Salt Lake City and the university as seen from Red Butte Garden

In about an hour I head out the door to what is hopefully my final collecting trip for the ol' dissertation. I will be gathering basswood samples in upstate New York, then visiting the Harvard Herbaria to photograph and observe samples from North America and worldwide. The travels have been fun but I'm kind of looking forward to staying home for a good long while.

July: Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day

2009-07-15T06:00:00.000-05:00

Every day is Bloom Day these days at the McGarden. The Stellas are already finished (gee, that didn't last long!), the coneflowers are ramping up, and the prairie garden is teetering on the brink of floral explosion. Oh how hard it is to go to work in the morning when I could be spending my days gazing at these beauties instead...

Thanks as always to Carol @May Dreams Gardens for hosting GBBD!

July: Milkweed

2009-07-10T21:29:00.002-05:00

I've spent the last two days sitting at my computer at home, making numbers do my bidding. I even did some trigonometry! What a strange job I have. I went to the garden after dinner tonight hoping for some magic. The theme of the hour turned out to be milkweed...

Red milkweed beetle; close-up of common milkweed, Asclepias syriaca

I am VERY excited to have my first monarch caterpillar! I've had milkweed naturalized in my garden for many years and the monarchs are rampant, but this is the first caterpillar I've seen. He's so tiny! I named him Scooter and will be looking for him every day. Yes I know I could put him in a protected spot and feed him but I want to see him grow up on his own. Scooter is the reason I planted so many natives in my yard.

Those nasty earwigs had better leave my Scooter alone! I had to pull four of them out of that inflorescence with tweezers just to take the picture. *shudder*

Hey, Foley, move your big head! You're blocking the butterfly weed!

July: Procrastination begins at home

2009-07-09T09:39:00.004-05:00

Working at home is difficult. The garden, TV, and fridge beckon. I obey 2 of the 3 siren songs and wander outside with a cup of tea to find:

My first-ever balloon flower! Platycodon grandiflorus 'Sentimental Blue', planted last fall. SO cute!

My hibiscus thankfully turned out not to have ugly peach flowers. Instead it has foofy double flowers. I will learn to like it. It definitely makes a dramatic statement!

Okay, bintie, get back to work!!

July: GGW's July Photo Contest

2009-07-09T07:24:00.004-05:00

This month's Gardening Gone Wild photo contest is all about flowering trees. I have dug through my archive of American basswood photos and it is official: I have ZERO good pictures of a basswood in flower. How embarrassing! It's not entirely my fault; basswood flowers are kind of sloppy and mushy looking, and since they hang below the branches the photos must be taken pointed up, which gives no perspective on the rest of the tree. Plus, in all honesty, I prefer the trees for their foliage (and of course for their genetic and biogeographic mysteries, soon to be clarified by the Future Dr. Bintie!) and their nifty leafy bracts.

For example, here's a Carolina basswood in southeastern Alabama:

The flowers are just opening, already mobbed with bees. They look like they've been stepped on. (But aren't the leaves gorgeous?)

However, that is not my entry for the contest! Instead I will go conventional and show a magnolia on the campus of the University of Illinois at Chicago. UIC is an architecturally unfriendly place that only recently was partially deconstructed and made more lush and green, and I applaud the efforts to transform the campus into a more traditional American park-like setting. This particular tree is planted in the UIC Memorial Grove, an odd open space at the corner of campus that was designed by Walter Netsch, the campus architect, in the 1960s. It makes for a pleasant getaway when the lab and office feel too constraining, and the magnolias for their brief moment in a Chicago April are mesmerizing...

July: Recycling in the garden

2009-07-05T17:21:00.002-05:00

I finally planted my plants from the Native Seed Gardeners project. I put the Baptisia leucantha in the ground before I left on my field trip, but I didn't have time to plant the shade plants (Polygala senega and Oxalis violacea) until today. The difficulty was finding a way to mark plants that have already died back for the season or are very teensy. My haphazard gardening methods don't lend themselves to keeping track of four tiny, important plants! and plant markers are imprecise.

Here's my solution: rings made from margarine tubs. If something grows inside the ring, it's probably the important plant.

Now I just have to keep them alive until they produce seeds! Wish me luck!

July: Happy 4th!

2009-07-04T22:21:00.003-05:00

Hubby and I rebuilt the fence between yard and alley this weekend. It looks fabulous and solid and we are so proud of ourselves!

Just a handful of photos of what's in the garden right now. It really popped while I was on my trip and it's so much fun to explore!

An adorable green bee with yellow pollen leggings; red lilies

Lilies and butterfly weed; when did I plant an orange coneflower?! (ETA: Last August, apparently! It's an Echinacea 'Sunset'. Yay for blogs as searchable records!)

Foley felt left out during fence construction.

July: Field work

2009-07-04T21:30:00.004-05:00

I spent a week doing field collecting for my dissertation. If you haven't already heard a zillion times, I study American basswood, and I received some research funding to visit the herbarium at the University of North Carolina to ponder their extensive basswood collections. I also had plans to visit several natural populations and collect samples, but this is a typically hit-or-miss activity and I didn't have much success finding trees.

The short version:
Day 1: On the road; an ironic visit to the Creation Museum in Kentucky where I had a surprisingly nice time walking their gardens, which are free. Somehow I managed to escape the place with my rational mind intact. Phew!

A purple loosestrife cultivar. I hope they know what they're doing!

Day 2: Torrential downpour and hotel with damp carpet. Left my pillow at the hotel... grrr. Fruitless visit to a nature preserve on Pine Mountain with badly marked trails. Found one tree roadside. Very irritated. Got poison ivy. Gorgeous drive east from KY through VA, TN, and NC to the Blue Ridge Parkway, where I collected 7 or 8 trees. One of the prettiest places I've ever been; too late in the day for good photos, unfortunately.

Day 3: South Carolina, wandered Sumter National Forest, finding just about nothing. Grouchy. Visited Columbia, did not find trees an acquaintance swore would be there, but did like the city very much. 101 degrees. Got more poison ivy.

Detail from the beautiful and moving African American History Monument outside the State House, Columbia, SC; more here.

Day 4: Southern North Carolina Piedmont. Pretty. No basswoods. Attracted some concern from a pair of women in their Sunday best who were driving home from the Baptist church down the road.

Days 5 and 6: UNC campus in Chapel Hill. Many hours in the herbarium photographing hundreds of samples. Also collected in the Coker Arboretum and wandered campus a bit. Very nice place but I had a tendency to get lost. Hills and ravines don't lend themselves to a street grid.

Cool variegated redbud at the Arboretum; my herbarium workspace. Other NC pics here.

Day 7: West Virginia, Kanawah State Forest south of Charleston. Hey, actual trees! Woo! Then treated myself to lunch at Taco Bell (YUM), and headed home, getting back around 9. So good to be back with hubby, dog, house, garden, and bed! I miss my pillow though.

June: It's not a weed until I say it's a weed

2009-06-23T10:12:00.005-05:00

Anyone know what this is? It appears to be in Polygonaceae, maybe a Polygonum or Persicaria. I'm letting it stay in the butterfly garden until I have a good reason to pull it out. It's cute!

Also on this nasty, sticky, hot day...

Clematis 'Jackmanii', being amazing on the coachlight for over a decade

Lysimachia punctata, yellow loosestrife; and proof that the shade garden does get some sun, around solstice-time

Daffodil and tulip greens are cut back to give more sun to the butterfly garden. The new plants are all in: Salvia nemerosa 'May Night', and the annuals: lantana, portulaca, gazania, ageratum, cosmos. Keep looking out window, impatient for butterflies to show up. Couldn't find any daisies (Leucanthemum vulgaris) but will look again later. The mix of purple salvia and white daisy outside the Garfield Park conservatory is still on my mind.

I'm leaving soon for a few days in the field, collecting American basswood leaves and visiting the UNC herbarium in Chapel Hill. For anyone I might have promised to visit on the way, I'm sorry but I don't think I'm going to have much spare time, since I absolutely have to get back home by a certain day. These trips are anything but lazy and relaxing, and I am a monomaniacal crazywoman on the road. In a good way of course! I intend to post pictures from the road so watch this space. Soon you will be as sick of basswood as I am!