Botany Buddy

Whenever I start talking about landscaping with nature people start to get all squeamish and think “Oh no…another weedy looking woodland garden.  Don’t get me wrong, I love a good woodland garden.  Real ones hardly even require planting.  What I am talking about is using nature as your guide in design.  I have been designing landscapes for over 20 years now, and the last five I have been blessed to do most of my work in the nature of the Southern Appalachians.  However, before that I spent fifteen years designing several hundred gardens in the heart of the city and the heat and cold of the Midwest.  Even in the most unnatural of places I learned that the more you emulate nature, the more beautiful things will be and the easier they will be to take care of.  After all, nature is beautiful and it does a good job of taking care of itself if we don’t screw it up.

There are some key things that nature does itself that when you look at the greatest of landscapes you will always find.  I could never squeeze everything into one post, but there are some key things that if approached from the outset will make the rest fall in place.  If we take nature’s lead on how it designs and plants its gardens we are bound to succeed and it is bound to be beautiful.  What I will explore are the main aspects of landscapes, how nature creates them and how we can emulate them.

The first thing that nature lays out in a landscape is the flow.  To understand this we have to understand that in nature and in the landscape it is the water that determines flow.  Where the water goes in nature so does the wildlife.  The migratory patterns of the birds and the animals are all tied to the water and their need to get to it.  In the garden it is people that flow, as well as the birds and animals that visit…including our dogs.  I like to make my paths and walking areas follow the drainage in the garden.  In high traffic areas I will make stone paths or place stepping stones inter-planted with “steppable” plants or ground covers.  In open areas, if I have grass at all, I will take water across it as well.  As water creates the valleys and flat areas in nature, doing this in the garden serves the aesthetic need of making the garden look like it was meant to be there.

As for the animals in the landscape people tend to take the easiest possible path, and so does water.  From a practical standpoint, the water won’t washout your beds or puddle and breed mosquitoes.  It will create moisture along the paths were smaller plants that require more water go, and it will dry out other areas for evergreens and shrubs that are more sensitive to water.  Animal migration can also create flow in nature and the garden.  The two most prominent animals in your landscape are dogs and mailmen.  Dogs are like the deer and other animals in the landscape that create migration paths that don’t follow the water.  If  I have a dog in a landscape, I will always leave a little maintenance path behind shrubs along a fence.  This allows them to patrol their landscape and creates airflow behind the shrubs so they don’t die out on one side.  With a privacy fence I also like to leave a small strip of lattice along the bottom to let them see out and increase air flow.  As for mailmen, I can’t remember the last time I did an urban landscape that didn’t have a path for them to go door to door.  Not only does it keep them from trampling the plants, but it gives an excuse to pull down the height of a house with the plantings without adding so many plants it looks unnatural.

Nature has two main types of scenery that you encounter, and so does any good landscape.  Olmstead called these the pastoral and the picturesque.  The pastoral are the wide open sceneries that allow you to get lost in the sunset and your mind to escape.  It brings out the grandness of the landscape.  In urban setting everything is usually boxed in and strictly defined by property lines.  These pastoral scenes don’t often occur naturally so you have to lead the eye to them.  The easiest way to do this is use tall things closer to your gathering areas to screen the neighbors beside you and taper down your heights to the corner where you can see the furthest.  Always make sure that what is in that corner is shorter than what is just behind it outside of your yard and this will lift your eye back up and create that escape.  The tapering of heights to the furthest point will also create a sense of perspective making your space seem larger than it is.

The picturesque are those scenes where your eye gets stuck and you are looking at a space like a framed picture that creates a scene.  In nature this may be a giant boulder you walk up to on a hike.  You get stopped in your tracks then totally engrossed in the lichens, ferns and wild flowers growing from its cracks.  Its becomes like an entirely different world to explore inside of another.  The same can happen in your garden by planting in the cracks of a wall or having a collections of planters or a piece of art on a fence.  Even a planter next to your door where that gutter makes it hard to grow anything else can have the same effect.  One thing to be sure of is to repeat the elements in that planter in the landscape around it.  By splashing a few of the impatiens in the pot on the ground around it, it will tie it into the rest of the landscape.  It will be just like the ferns that grow on that rock that also grow on the ground around it and lead you down the trail and on into the forest.

Plant diversity is crucial to any healthy natural environment and also any good garden or landscape.  Diversity comes in many forms.  What I am going to focus on here is the layers of a landscape and how they are dispersed.  Nature creates this diversity and uses the plants to care for the space and the animals in it.  So should you.  I like to relate the levels of the landscape to music.  Good music has always found its roots in the rhythms of nature and so does any good art, especially a natural one like landscape.

These rhythms come it two forms.  The first rhythm can be found in the layers.  Nature, good gardens and great music all have an upper, middle and lower range.   In nature this is made up of the trees, shrubs, and herbaceous plants.  Neither nature nor a garden is in its complete form without all of these.  The trees provide the canopy and determine the amount of light and moisture hitting the ground, soil type and everything that will grow below it.  The trees create the homes for the animals and the home for everything below it.  Think of them as the ceiling and walls of a room.  Just like nature does, when designing plantings you should always start with the trees because they determine everything else.

The mid range is the shrub layer, and can also include smaller flowering trees.  They provide food for most of the wildlife. They also also create the depth of the landscape, just like midrange creates depth in music.  The shrub layer will do the most to take care of space for you just like it does in nature.  When you come across an thicket of huckleberry in the woods, it always looks perfectly groomed and placed as though it has been meticulously pruned even though man has never touched it.  Besides creating depth in terms of space and layers they also create new spaces to discover behind and around them providing for a sense of discovery and surprise.  This layer is not only rich in space creation.  It is rich in performance as well because these plants provide elaborate flower, berry , fall color and bark shows that create a tapestry of their own.  Not only do they provide the most fodder aesthetically, they also do the most to feed the birds and other wildlife.

The low range is the final layer.  In music it is the base that rolls along, providing the rhythm for everything else and fills the voids of the down times.  In plantings it is the herbaceous layer.  I would hardly consider a tuba or tympani to be similar to a Hosta or Astilbe, but they are.  If played properly they both are a delicate presence in the back ground that emerge and steal the show when everything else is down.  In the garden and nature the perennials quietly hold the ground while the mid range shows off all spring, then they tactfully take their turns showing off their color as the flowers of spring fade away.  Then they roll into a crescendo heading into fall only to step aside for the finale of the trees with fall color.  They are the fabric that holds the ground in place and takes care of the space for you.  Then they give you that little extra right when you need it.

Along with the layers all good music, nature , and gardens have rhythm.   The patterns in all great music, art and gardens can all be traced to those of nature.  The arts and particularly music really exploded in the last century when people stopped trying to create things just for the sake of creating them and started looking for inner meaning.  The rhythms of  jazz embody this and the greatest artistic nod to nature of all has to be syncopation.  When gardeners realize that everything doesn’t have to spaced in 4/4 (formally and perfectly symmetrical) that is when their lives get easier, and much richer.  Trying to make a garden embody a rigid structure is like trying to make a marching band embody dance.  It is next to impossible and everything has to be completely lined up all the time.  It is even worse in a garden because  it is even harder to make a plant do what you want than a teenager.

Plants need to be spaced to move you through the garden like the rhythm in music.  Then they will move you through the garden like music moves your feet.  Syncopate it…Put the weight of plants in one place to provide structure where you need it, but then repeat it tapering off in the direction you want the eye to move.  If you plant five in one place, plant three a little bit over from there and maybe more even a little further over.  This is how nature does it and it will intrinsically add depth to the aesthetics of your garden, and the movement to keep it interesting.

Nature doesn’t plant in intertwining plant sausages so why should be.  Think of the sausage method like the landscape at McDonald’s, it may be showy, but it has about as much depth as the food they are trying to sell.  I would much rather sit down to four hours of French cuisine with depth and rhythm that feeds my soul as well as my body.  Nature doesn’t plant its flowers in blocks of 300 only to be ripped out and replaced three times a year.  It plants them where the weeds would grow to take care of the space so they can dance with one other and the other plants in the forest to provide the richest show possible.  Out of the symbiotic relationships the ecosystem creates to grow emerges an equally complex combination of  outright beauty.

I could go into many other areas where nature is the best guide.  You could use materials that are native to your region.  Be it plant or rocks this always provides a sense of cohesiveness.  There are all kinds of great cues to follow when using water in the garden.  However, what I wanted to do here was help you learn to take your cues from the world around you.  Draw from not only from what makes nature beautiful, but what makes it work, and let it guide you in your own garden or artistic endeavors.  We have to quit creating gardens for the sake for feeding them, and start creating them to feed our souls and the world around us.  Most importantly when nature has created them for us, we need to quit screwing them up.

The Morality of Sustainability

I have to admit I have had this one in the hopper for some time now.  I have been preparing and wanting to write this post for a long time, but it was a commenter on Sustaining Sustainability that finally prompting me to flush it out.  We all hear people talk about what they can do to live sustainably almost every single day.  There are no shortages of arguments and evidence for how it can save us all money, and there are plenty of people learning how to make money at it.  Finding empirical evidence as to the benefits of living sustainably is as easy as finding options in the cereal aisle at the local grocery.  I constantly hear people profess all the ways we can benefit personally from helping the Earth.  What I do not hear are cogent moral arguments for why this is the right thing to do, and why as inhabitants of this earth we have a moral obligation to protect and respect everything that is a part of it.

Unfortunately the only moral arguments I hear about sustainability are actually against it.  Time and again I hear that as part of this planet we (humans) are nature too, and that our consumption of any resource on it is a natural act.  I recently even heard a Senator say that he would not support any climate change legislation until we have used every ounce of coal and drop of oil that “God has given us to use”.  I am not going to make this a discussion about the theology of predetermination vs. systematic theology (living in Christ’s image), but I do find it hard to believe that if God created us in his image he would want us to plunder and destroy the earth.  After all he doesn’t.  Beyond being part of nature as a species we have things inherit in our nature that make environmental responsibility a moral obligation.  Consider what I am about to layout to be “An Ontological Argument for a Morality of Sustainability”

An Ontological Argument For a Morality of Sustainability

Everything on this planet has an inner essence. Even physical “non living” being, such as coal, has an inner essence that allows us to identify it even if it changes form.  I can look at five pieces of coal and know that they are coal.  I can crush that coal to the point that those five pieces are no longer identifiable, but still look at that pile and know that it is coal.  The inner presence of a being is that allows others to identify it for what it is through many phases and forms of its life is the essence.

Every living being on this planet has a soul. Living beings have an essence just like physical ones, but they also have a presence beyond that which exudes their liveliness on other beings even though the physiological actions that carryout this life cannot be seen.  When I see an Oak I know that it is alive.  When I see an Oak that is alive, I can sense its life even though I cannot see the photosynthesis occurring or the transpiration from the leaves.  It exudes something beyond that essence which is its soul.  The soul also projects its presence in various forms of instincts or consciousness that beings carry out in living to ensure their survival.  The final evidence of the soul is the continued presence of essence after the soul has left and life has ceased.  Once that Oak is dead, I still know it as an Oak, and even as a specific Oak, but I can also sense that the life (or soul) is gone, and the evidence of its absence and remaining essence is further proof of the soul’s previous existence.

Everything with a soul has varying levels of consciousness and self-consciousness. Every living being has an awareness of what it has to do to survive and reacts to its surroundings.  This may be instinctual, but also may progress to various levels of will.  In any form it implies a sense of self being.   I do not believe my grass can feel it when I mow, but it does have natural instincts to guide its reaction to my mowing, and has natural instincts to seek out water for its survival.  I believe full well my dogs are capable of feeling remorse, loneliness, fear, pain and love.  I also believe they can sense it in others, particularly myself.  I do not however believe they can empathize it.  However, though my dog can sense my remorse and feel pain itself, it cannot feel my pain.

When a being’s soul progresses from being conscious of itself and surroundings to empathizing with another it develops conscience. We as a species empirically know that we can extend our consciousness to the point of feeling what other people feel, and actively seek to do so.  When the ones that we love hurt, we hurt.  When ones that we do not even know hurt and we see the cause as unjust, we hurt.  This is the ability to empathize.  There has been speculation that other primates may have this ability, but as far as we can know for sure, we are the only species whose soul progresses from the point of consciousness to conscience.

With conscience comes responsibility. As human beings our ability to empathize combined with our free will gives us a moral awareness that requires us to take responsibility for our actions.  We have an inherit sense of right and wrong. We can rationalize our way around it, but in the end right and wrong and our ability to discern it remains.  This is the foundation of morality, and with this ability comes the responsibility act within those parameters.

The morality of sustainability is rooted in our ability to empathize with other beings. Morality is not possible unless you can make that leap into another’s heart.  This ability to empathize gives us a unique ability and responsibility to act in ways that protect and respect the essence and souls of other beings.  Sustainability is rooted not in how to get the most from our resources, but our moral responsibility to protect and respect the essences of every being, their role in our ecosystem, and the ecosystem itself as a living being.  If we can empathize we have responsibility inherit in our ability to sense morality.

As beings of conscience not only do we have the ability to sense and empathize with the essence and souls of other beings, but it also gives us the ability to make decisions that knowingly destroy and harm them and in turn the environment as a whole.  No matter how much we try to rationalize it, this wrong.  Being moral beings we need to be able to own that awareness and take responsibility for it.  As moral beings we have a responsibility to recognize and protect the essence of the earth and its beings in everything that we do.

To make the claim that it part of nature to exploit the Earth and its resources without protecting its essence is morally wrong.  We may have the right in the legal sense within the laws of man.  But it is not right in the moral order of our being.  Our nature as moral beings requires us to make morally responsible decisions not just ones that we can rationalize.  The ability to rationalize allows us to make moral decisions, but it also allows for immoral ones as well for you can not know one without the other.

In the end living sustainably is not about how protecting the earth benefits us as a species, but that it is in our nature as moral beings, and a failure to live this way is not only immoral, but unnatural.

When people ask me how to water their plants I usually turn right around ask them for instructions on how to raise kids.  The point being you can’t know what to do for a plant until you get to know it like a person.  Raising plants is a lot like raising kids, and once you learn what works best for both of you the better off you both will be.  Too often people think that plants are like hardwood floors, that they need to be waxed at certain intervals, need to be kept perfectly clean, and that given the perfect routine treatment will always look shiny and new and age perfectly.  What they need to learn is that plants are like people and they need nourishment, security, and love; sometimes even tough love.

The overall goal of watering should always be to help plants get established quickly, and develop a healthy deep seated root system to deal with the trials and tribulations that lie ahead.  While you want to be diligent at giving your plants what they need to get established, you also want them to start to take less and less care from you.  If you have the right plant in the right spot, they should eventually be able to care of themselves.  That journey begins with security.  The best security a plant can have is not knowing that you will run out and water it at the drop of a leaf, but rather that it has plenty of water in the soil around it, not just in the hole that you put it in.

During the average growing season, most established plants can use no more than one inch of water per week.  To be able to stick to this you need to make sure that all of the soil in and around the planting area has a deep base of adequate moisture.  If it does, as the soil dries out immediately around a newly planted plant moisture will move from the surrounding soil to the soil in the hole through osmosis.  If you plant a plant into to an area where all of the surrounding soil is dry, when you water all of the moisture will move the other way and you won’t be able to retain moisture around the plant.  Whenever you are going to be planting an area, you should always water the entire area thoroughly.  Think of it as getting the nursery ready for that newborn you are about to bring home.  In the end it save you several trips to the store (or in this case hose).

The key to establishing healthy plants is the same as for kids.  You want to love them, but you don’t want to spoil them. Plants that are watered too frequently will not achieve the necessary root growth they need.  Instead, they will develop a shallow root system that you have to constantly water, and the roots will never get out on their own.  Nature very rarely waters more than once a week and manages to sustain itself and withstand times of extreme stress.  Even in those times of extreme stress nature will usually adapt and turn out stronger in the long run.  By having thoroughly watered soil, not only will moisture move toward the plant as it is needed, but the roots will move out to it in search of what they need. Watering too frequent and not deep enough will train the roots never to leave home.  Beyond just water needs deep watering will also help retain the nutrients in the soil by not washing them out of the soil because watering all of the time.

Anyone who knows what it is like to love a child should be well prepared to give a plant the love it needs.  Just like you want to make sure your child has everything they need to succeed in life you want to do the same for your plants.  The worst thing you can do for either of you is constantly react to circumstances.  In the end sometimes plants and children both need a little tough love.  Even if your plants have everything they need in the subsoil on the hottest of days they are going to wilt.  The last thing you want to do is run out there an water them.  That wilting action is triggering an natural response from the plant to dig in and grow the roots they need.  As long as that soil has the water the plant needs it will find a way to get it.  Just like your kids sometimes need to work through things, your plants need to do the same.

For those who need a little more specific information, these guidelines should help you be sure your plants to get established and encourage the  root growth they eventually need to make it without you.

Whenever installing a new plant be sure and water all of the soil around the hole. It is imperative that the root mass of new plants always be kept moist, as well as the soil around the holes they are in until active root growth begins. Adequate moisture needs to be maintained until the roots actually leave the hole that was dug for installation and penetrate the surrounding soil.  The best way to accomplish this is to actually water the hole you dug for the plant before you put it in it.   Actually fill the hole you have dug for the plant entirely with water and let it seep into the surrounding soil.  You will want to do this repeatedly until water begins to hold in the hole or seep out very slowly.  When you are planting the plant, water the plant while it is still in the container or burlap before putting it in the hole.  It is much easier to make sure it is moist before it is underground and covered with soil.  Once the water you put in the hole has drained, place the plant at the proper level,  and back fill the hole with soil halfway up around the root ball.   Once you have lightly packed the soil to hold the plant in place, fill the rest of the hole with water again.  Be sure and let the water soak completely in before back filling it the rest of the way.  Not only will this ensure the soil is wet, it will also remove any air pockets in the hole that could later cause roots to dry out or the plant to settle and lean.  Once you have finished filling the hole with soil, water it one more time.  The most common shortcut you will see a professional landscaper make is not following this entire process.  After 25 years in the landscaping business I would not be exaggerating if I said that 80% of the times that plants needed replaced or replanted it was because the installer skipped these simple steps and it wasn’t properly watered during planting.

Watering new plants after planting may be required more than once in the first week.  You should check daily to see if the plant needs water, but don’t water daily.  Stick your finger into the root mass of the plant as well as the soil around it and see if they are both wet.  If you find the soil is dry give it a little water.  If it is wet whatever you do don’t water even if the plant is wilting or showing signs of stress.  The only thing that will help it is growing the roots it needs to make it on its own.  Watering when it is not needed will actually prevent this.  You may have to water new plants a couple times a week in the first two weeks as the stress of planting can cause them to use more water, but ideally by the third week you should never have to water more than once a week.

Watering of established plants should not be needed (or performed) more than once per week, and combined with what nature gives they should not need more than the equivalence of 1 inch of precipitation per week.  If your soil is adequately moist beneath the  surface and all you need to do is supplement that top inch.  Watering too frequently will only keep the plant’s roots from reaching out for the moisture that is there.  In reality if you are using native species in a place with the proper light exposure, and in the right zone in terms of hardiness range, you shouldn’t have to water a plant at all after the first season.  In times of extreme drought you may want to water established plants, but good winter watering (the step below) should prevent the need for any sort of frequent watering.

Winter Watering isn’t something people usually think about.  However a plant has more of a chance of dying in winter from a lack of water than it does in summer.  The water that fills the tissue of a plant’s trunk and branches is actually what protects it from extreme freezing temperatures.  When matter freezes it expands.  When the cells of a plant expand, the gases inside can expand more than the tissue itself and cause the cells to explode.  If the cells are filled with water it displaces those gases and keeps them from expanding too far.  If a plant freezes when it is dry, it can literally freeze-dry the plant, making it impossible for the cells to retain water again.  The best way to prevent this is to actually water in the fall or early winter before the ground freezes.

Once the leaves and perennials are down for the season and you have chopped them up for mulch, it is actually the easiest and most efficient time of year to get water in the soil.  The water doesn’t roll off the foliage of the plants and lands directly where it needs to go.  It also is less likely to evaporate when using a sprinkler because the temperatures are lower.  Best of all the plant isn’t using it to grow (other than roots), so even in winter a good saturation can last a couple of months.  If you happen to get a warm spell in January or February, I actually recommend watering deeply a a couple of times over winter to establish that deep ground moisture before spring arrives.  It is much easier to do it in January than in the spring or summer than when the water is actively being used by the plants and foliage is emerging that deflects it.

Wilting and watering do not always go hand in hand.  I alluded to this earlier.  When a plant wilts, not only does it reduce transpiration, it is a natural reaction to reduce the amount of energy going to the leaves, and to divert it to other activities such as blooming, fruit production or root growth.  All of those are crucial to the survival of the species, and the plant will instinctively focus on those things when it senses stress.  Wilting is also a natural response in extreme hot and cold temperatures to reduce the amount of wind or light reaching the foliage to prevent desiccation.  More often than not, wilting is sign of healthy developmental activity in stressful situations.  If a plant wilts and is wet do not water it, the plant is just doing what it needs to grow the roots to succeed in life.  Think of it as tough love.

Stunted and shedding leaves can be indications of both positive and negative conditions other than moisture issues.  In the first months and even years after planting, leaves may shed or remain stunted and small to offset the lack of roots lost during transplanting.  Usually after several months or even a year, the same branches with stunted leaves suddenly show what seem like over-sized leaves, often three or four times the size of others. This is an indication that the roots are finally leaving the planting pit, and the plant is beginning to get established.  Burnt edges on deciduous foliage may be the result of a fungus rather than drought, which water will only exasperate.  When evergreens yellow and drop needles in the fall it is often a result of alkaline soil, and they are trying to acidify their own soil.  Watering them if wet will only cause root rot.  Just because you see these things happen it does not mean a plant needs water.  If you see these symptoms and the soil is moist you may need to dig a little deeper to find our what’s wrong.  We’ll have another post about how to do that digging later.

The main thing to remember when watering is the more frequent and less deep you water the more often you will have to water.  The sooner you learn what your plants really the need, the less you will have to give them, and the less they will eventually need. To some extent, your plants can be taught to live with your schedule, and the sooner you teach them to the better off you both will be.  Think of that deep watering you give your plants a couple times this winter as that Sunday afternoon pot roast or chicken and dumplings you make for your family on a cold winter day.  It will keep their little cells warm on those cold winter days, and help built the muscles they need get through the summer ahead.  It is also like the hearty soup that allows them to pull in all those nutrients from the soil below to fight off disease and stress.  Think of watering you plants as caring for someone you love…and they’ll be sure and love you back.  Plants are like people, so don’t treat them like a hardwood floor.

When Americans think of endangered species we rarely think of trees.  We think of birds such as the Ivory-billed Woodpecker or Spotted Owl, or maybe some fragile flower, crustacean or reptile.  Even more familiar to most Americans are the animals that we have hunted and caused the demise of ourselves, such as buffalo, wolves and bears.  All three of those we have tried to right our wrongs and reintroduced into their native habitat.  Hopefully we have made those efforts because it was the right thing to do.  Maybe it is just because we were able to see the damage we had done by no longer being able to reap the rewards of what we were destroying.

As people look at non-hunted species, sometimes they don’t see personal responsibility because they don’t kill them with their own hands.  Sometimes people don’t realize that something else they are reaping may be what is causing the devastation to something that seems unrelated to them.  Groups got really upset when people tried to protect the spotted owl by protecting the forests they inhabit.  The argument what that individuals had a right to profit from the forests, and the trees that gave a home to the owls were needed to make a living.  However while everyone focused on man vs. owl, they missed the forest for the trees.  No one realized that before they were done arguing that debate the trees that provided that habitat would endangered as well, making both the man and the owl lose.  Sometimes we have to realize that just because we have right to do something it isn’t necessarily the right thing to do.

The following is a list of American trees that have lost over 95% of their native habitat and are now considered endangered.  These trees are actually being produced more in commercial production now than they are reproducing in their natural habitat.  I wanted to bring this list to light not just to highlight some amazing trees.  I wanted to highlight how they have gotten to the situation they are in, and the importance every being has to one another when it comes to sustainability.  

Castanaea dentata (American Chestnut):  This tree is one of the most known stories of  eco-catastrophe in our countries history.  The Chestnut was the most coveted of all lumbers in the early part of the 1900’s.  As a result was the clear-cutting of almost all of the Southern Appalachians.  The practices were horrid, and reminiscent of a scene from a slaughter house, but of trees.  Lumber that wasn’t seen as fit to mill was left in place leaving entire mountains looking like salvage yards.  Stumps were left in place, and all of the ground vegetation was smothered under the debris.  Erosion was rampant, and as a result these wastelands became a breeding ground for what would become the Chestnut blight.  Species such as the black bear were almost completely lost, deer populations dissipated, and without the nuts to forage or forest to find protection from hunters Elk eventually disappeared.

Today you can still find a few old growth American Chestnuts hiding away, but for the most part they have disappeared.  They are definitely no longer a force in an ecosystem they once ruled.  You can find sprouts coming up as under growth in poplar/oak forests, but the blight usually sets in once they reach about 2″ in caliper.  This tree was once a staple of the forest.  Its nuts fed almost every creature that roamed the forest floor, including humans.  Today it is just trying to regain a footing.  There are active breeding program at Universities throughout the Southeast trying to develop disease resistant varieties, but for now it remains on the brink. 

Ulmus americana (American Elm):  In the first half of the 1900’s this tree was the most common street tree in the United States.  It’s arching branches formed cathedral ceilings over almost every street in every city.  It become an icon of American urbanism and the America Beautiful movement.  It fell victim not to greed of harvesting, or destruction of its environment, because this tree grew anywhere.  Rather it fell victim to careless breeding and commercialization that weakened the species.  While Chinese and European varieties were being imported for breeding to create fancy bark or brighter fall color, no one realized that they were weakening the species and importing a deadly disease that would bring the native species to its knees. 

Today, on very rare occasions you will find an old native specimen, but almost always it will be diseased.  For the most part this species is kept going in nurseries where young shoots are maintained as seed stock only to be hybridized with other varieties.  Many of these hybridized varieties are wonderful and are contributing to the urban landscape in a positive way.  Still, long lost, or at least hiding like a hermit in the remote corners of woods, is the majestic tree that once symbolized the industrial revolution, and the America Beautiful movement.

Pinus palustris (Longleaf Pine / Southern Yellow Pine):  The Longleaf pine was on of the signature trees of Southeast coastal regions.  This tree is very unique in that for the first eight years of its life it grows like a fireproof grass with no trunk elongation.   Then it shoots up and it sensitive to burns, but once it reaches about 10′ it becomes fire proof again and soars to heights of up to 100′.  This burning process is crucial to its reproduction and the culling of healthy forests.  The lush wild look this process creates was the image that was burned into the minds of explorers when the new world was being discovered.  The unique habit created by the juvenile plants provide habitat to all sorts of foul and wildlife and as their habitat has become endangered so have some of them.  Red-cockaded woodpeckers and indigo snakes are most at risk, but tourtouses are in line right behind them.

The fate of this tree has been doomed by two demands.  First and foremost the lumber industry.  Only a small percentage of these trees make it from the grass stage, which is most prevalent, to the full grown tree form and mature species have been harvested at an unsustainable rate.  Secondly it has suffered from development.  Its native habitat starts at the first dry ground rising from coastal marshes and rises up to about 600′ in elevation.  These are the prime development lands in coastal areas and as a result the first habitat taken to build homes and resorts.  What is not built is often cleared for agriculture.   The development has also led to fire control, and disrupted the natural growth and reproductive cycles of the species.  One final negative effect on the ecosystem is that these habitats were the primary riparian buffer for water coming off of the Southern Appalachian and Ozark mountains.  Along with their removal came the disappearance of lower level cold water streams, the silting and swamping of what were once fast moving rivers, and a host of other problems.

Quercus virginiana (Southern Live Oak):  Yes, this tree is the one we have embedded in our heads from movies like Gone With the Wind, and every other great southern movie or novel.  As we see them in all the urban settings and plantation gardens you would not think something this majestic could be in any sort of danger.  The Spanish soss and fern growing on its branches make it look as thought this species is drooping from the weight or its virility.  However, in its native habitat it is almost gone.  The boggy soil and forests of the deltas where it thrived have mostly been drained for drilling, sugar cane, and development.  These trees made up the buffers that used to protect New Orleans from the onslaught of hurricanes.  There ability to be uprooted and fall apart but continue to grow in the loamy soil that was once its home was the constant stability that held the delta together.  Now their native habitat is down to a few remaining national and state controlled forests.  Of course other species have been impacted, but the most famous impact was the damage from Katrina that was exasperated without the natural buffers these trees created to protect it.

Tsuga hetrophylla (Western Hemlock) & Tsuga caroliniana (Carolina Hemlock):  Both of these trees have suffered similar fates.  Both are the victims of over logging.  Unfortunately both were thought to be invincible as they grew like the Red Cedars of the Midwest on either coast.  In the East the Carolina Hemlock was hardly ever used for lumber,  They were usually casualties of careless Chestnut and Oak harvest and turned into pulp or used for fuel.  By the time the species was decimated people had realized it was a beautiful lumber and turned to the bountiful west coast for the Western Hemlock in its place.  Neither were able to come back as fast as they were being harvested and as a result the faster growing Tsuga canadensis (Canadian Hemlock) and various Pines have taken their respective places.

This has greatly changed the ecosystem of the forests elimating wildflowers and other shade tolerant plants that don’t tolerate the heavier shade of the pines.  Also, these native varieties could fully develop as smaller sized trees in the shade of canopy trees.  Whereas the Canadian Hemlock can grow in the shade but is naturally inclined to become more of a canopy tree.  The Canadian version is also more prone to the woolly adelgid do to the flat placement of the needles compared to the rounder needle placement of the native varieties.  Now the adelgid has set in, the Canadian Hemlock is dying at rates comparable to those of the Chestnut blight casualties.  This has forever changed the ecosystem of all the warmer climate mountain forests where the adelgid thrives.  Since the Hemlock also likes moist soils its decline is also increasing the light on mountain streams destroying native trout and salmonid habitat. 

Picea sitchensis(Sitka Spruce):  Another victim of logging, this species is also succumbing to the woolly adelgid.  One of the more tragic consequences of this parable is that this tree is the home to the endangered Spotted Owl.  When the fight over protecting the owl versus the right to harvest came to a head the harvest rate increased dramatically as it turned into a race to see how much people could harvest as while they still could.  As timber containing adelgid infested lumber moves up and down the highways it just spreads it even more.   In the end both the owl and the loggers are losing out as they are losing the tree they both covet so much.

Thuja plicata Western Red Cedar:  This tree has been devastated in its native habitat due to logging for pulp.  However, it is thriving and making a surge in cultivation.  As the Hemlocks and Junipers used in landscapes have become  more problematic and disease prone, this tree grows with relative ease.  It struggles to outpace the pines that are moving into the native habitat because the Pines grow larger and shade them out.  While in the landscape people are finding this to be a great native alternative to give the feel of a Canadian Hemlock without the adelgids or chemicals to keep the bugs at bay.  However do to massive logging its natural disbursement patterns have been disrupted permanently and it may never be able to reestablish itself against the more aggressive species taking it’s place.

These trees are just a few that are becoming more and more endangered everyday.  These trees I have chosen mainly because they have been in some way symbolic of American culture, have been a crucial part of the fabric of our forests, and have helped to convey the essence of the places we call home.  The point of this article isn’t just to create awareness of a few trees, but also to make us realize that everything we do effects far more than us.  As humans we have a capability that other species don’t:  to make a conscious decision regarding an other’s fate.

The causes and the impacts I have discussed in this post are far from all that has contributed to or been a consequence of these changes.  However with the ability to determine another being’s fate also comes the moral responsibility to do what is right for everyone and everything, not just ourselves.  Also comes a responsibility to learn as much about the situations, plants, and creatures whose existence we can alter before we make an impact.  Everyone makes mistakes unknowingly, but what determines the greatness of society or individual is how they use their abilities to correct or make amends for those mistakes and how what they use what they have learned moving forward.  Hopefully this will create another ripple in that pool of awareness that we can all pass on.

Are you a Botany Buddy user that wants to share Botany Buddy contents with your clients or friends?  If they are users too, you can build and share all the collections you want, but what if they are not?  The answer is really very simple, share a screen shot!

The other day someone asked me if I could tell them about a tree on Twitter. I though to myself…”Is this guy freakin’ crazy?  Doesn’t he have my email?  I can’t do this in 140 characters ” Then it struck me! I opened my Botany Buddy app and started taking screen shots of the plant’s profile to send him.

It works like this: You can take a photo of any screen on you iPhone or iPod Touch by simply holding the home screen icon at the bottom of the device and clicking the power-down button on the top right of the device at the same time.  Your screen will flash like a camera and the image has been saved in your pictures on the device.  Apple will allow you to email up to five pics at a time directly from the Photos icon on the device which is perfect to capture one complete plant profile and one close-up photo.

It took less time to do this than write an email, conveyed more information than I every could, did it in one Tweet, and most importantly make me look great!

The problem was solved, and it just so turns out five shrunken pic links from Hoot Suite or Tweet Deck fit perfectly into a tweet with a little room to spare.  Take that Twitter and your 140 characters!  I have to admit it felt really cool to do and made me look pretty cool too.  I designed this app to do lots of things, but everyday it seems like I find a new use.  I’ll be sure and share them when I do, but in the mean time get out there and share some trees yourself!

Having grown up in Northwest Missouri, where the winter winds of the plains from Iowa, Nebraska and Kansas converge on the bluffs of the Missouri River like three tornadoes of ice converging into one, I learned to appreciate anything in the vegetation that glowed with warmth.  In the surrounding landscape it was the golden tones of the fields laying fallow, especially when they sparkled from the frost glistening in the sun.  In the sky it was the amazing sunsets as far as the eye can see even after a long day of nothing but cold blue skies that seemed as if you were peering into ice.  On the highways it was the oasis that always formed about a half mile ahead of you on the road and what appeared to be steam rising from the asphalt that was the only thing absorbing the sun since there wasn’t a tree in sight.  The warmest memories of all were of course inside, with the smell of what some would call “farm food”.  The pot roast on Sundays, fried chicken on Saturdays, and of course spaghetti on Wednesdays.

However, when you arrived at someone’s home, it was usually one of the coldest sites of all.  In the midst of the pastures would be the perfectly green lawn.  The houses would always be white, to not show the dirt blowing off the fields and gravel roads, and they would be perfectly adorned with a straight row of yews, or junipers tortuously pruned into a shape they were obviously not supposed to be.  Green it would be, even in the evergreens with hedgerows of White Pine, Junipers, or Arborvitae perfectly marking the borders of the lawn.  Someone might occasionally get crazy and throw in a prized Blue Spruce (assured to have lights at Christmas), but when you needed that blue the most, it always seemed to look green if not brown from the burn of the winter winds. 

Quickly in my career as a designer I had to overcome this hurdle.  Being a plantsman first this wasn’t hard.  I grew up in nurseries, so my challenge as a designer wasn’t finding plants to use, it was learning how to restrain my pallet.  One thing I learned early on was that it was hardest to make a landscape look great in winter.  However, if you could accomplish that, making it interesting the rest of the year was a piece of cake.  I am not talking about using all kinds of colorful evergreens that look like they came out of a crayon box.  I love interesting conifers, but not when the color overpowers the essence of the plant.  So in this post I thought I would focus on plants with interesting barks.  Conifers are too easy.  The following plants are some of my favorites, but by no means all that I use.  They are also a mix of native and non-native varieties, but none should be invasive.  What they do have in common is a sense of warmth and life they can invoke in the dead of winter.

Betula (Birch):  Betula nigra (River Birch) is probably the most common.  There are several varieties of the species including ‘heritage’.  All have the indicative papery tan exfoliating bark.  They also are usually multi-trunked with a few large leaders reaching for the warmth of the sun and small horizontal branches wisping out from the sides . The vertical structure of the trunk makes it move in the wind and provides a nice contrast to the broad, heavy and  horizontal branching of  Spruce and Pine.  My favorite Birch is actually Betula populfolia ‘Whitespire” (Japanese Whitespire Birch).  It is a white or “paper” barked variety that has proven to be borer resistant.  The parent plant is now almost seventy-years old and remains borer free.

Cornus sericea (Red Twig Dogwood):  This is one of the few shrubs with colorful bark in the winter.  It is also native to much of the United States.  This plant has a bright red twig in winter that can be seen from a distance but isn’t overpowering.  The vertical branching habit makes it feel more like a grass or thicket plant than a shrub, but the fullness makes it work well for a border or foundation plant.  The plants are a lush green in summer with a nice white flower and prolific white berries birds love.  Along with this you must include Cornus alba (Variegated Red Twig Dogwood).  It is very similar to Conus sericea, except it has a variegated leaf.  This species can be prone to anthracnose but the variety Cornus alba “Ivory Halo” seems to be disease resistant, and keeps a more compact form than other varieties.

Hydrangea quercifolia (Oakleaf Hydrangea), and Hydrangea anomala var. petiolaris (Climbing Hydrangea):  Both of these plants have a birch like bark that is exquisite in winter.  The Oakleaf Hydrangea looks great against evergreens or lawns, and another interesting feature is that if you leave the flowers on they will dry in place all winter.  This almost makes it look like it is in bloom.  Climbing Hydrangea is wonderful on a fence, and especially brick walls.  The bark really pops out against brick.  It also has a very fibrous attaching root that give it an almost Gothic feel compared to other vines.  It is also a self attaching vine with makes it even nicer.

Physocarpus opulifolius (Ninebark):  There are two predominate varieties of this plant ‘Diablo’, a purple leaved variety, and ‘Dart’s Gold’a yellowish leaved variety.  Both have a Birch like texture in winter.  If left alone they grow very vertical and develop a thick trunk like structure.  They seem to max out around six feet in height and four feet in width.  This makes them great to tuck behind low growing evergreens and if left natural will look almost like a very small Birch.  Ninebarks are extremely hardy, fairly fast growing, and drought tolerant.

Acer palmatum ‘Sangu Kaku’ (Coral Bark Maple):  This plant his a vivid pinkish coral bark in winter.  It can almost take on an orangish tone.  The tree itself is very delicate and rarely exceeds twelve feet in height.  It has a ferny maple leaf and wispy texture.  It does not develop the distinguished branching habit that other Japanese Maples do, so it does look good as a stand alone specimen.  However, it is fantastic tucked into evergreens or against a foundation.  The only downfall to this plant is that it is prone to winter kill.  Winter watering will cut down on this, but expect it to develop some dead wood in winter that will need to be removed in the spring.

Lagerstoemia indica (Crepe Myrtle):  There are dozens of varieties of this plant in production.  It comes in all sorts of colors and sizes.  The trunks are usually clumped and have a blotchy exfoliating bark, rather than papery bark like a birch.  Many people think of them as trashy because they drop flowers and seed pods constantly and sucker which makes them require pruning to keep nice trunks.  Regardless, with all of that, it sure looks good most of the time and especially with its late summer bloom and winter bark.  Both features shine at times when other plants are lackluster.  On top of that it can survive the abuse of just about any parking lot in the south.

Acer griseum (Paper Bark Maple):  This is a very underused and overlooked tree.  It averages about 25-30 feet in height, so it can be used for shade on a patio, a specimen in the lawn without killing out the grass, or as an ornamental in a foundation planting.  It is not overly showy.  It doesn’t have an amazing flower or incredible fall color, but it is classy.  The fall color is nice, and the foliage is very clean and green in the summer, but this plant is sought for the bark.  It is a favorite of collectors.  Sometimes I compare plant collectors to book collectors.  If I were to compare it to a book you just had to have on your shelf it would be Catcher in The Rye.  It is not a huge tree, but does she rextremely well written, reliable as a recommendation, full of inspiration and bound to create memories.

Platanus x acerifolia (London Plane Tree) and Platanus occidentalis (American Sycamore):  These are two of the great majestic trees of urban parks everywhere.  They are messy, and drop limbs, leaves, and seeds all of the time, but the mess is worth it.  They are extremely hardy, pollution and drought tolerant, and capable of living in swamps.  There is not much this plant can’t take, but what it gives is irreplaceable.  The bark of the London Planetree exfoliates on the lower portions of the trunk.  The American Sycamore is reversed and exfoliates on the upper trunk and branches.  Both create very tall and open canopies making them ideal for street trees.  As their branches cross the road they create the feeling of a nave.  Given the space of a park, where they can be 100 feet from the next tree, they can form a cathedral unto themselves with branches hanging all the way to the ground 60-80′ wide.  When it comes to habit, they can rival the grandest of any Oak, but what makes them stand our is that glorious white of the bark exploding in winter.

I am sure I have left out plenty of others, like some of the Poplars, Tree Lilac, Ironwood, and countless others.  After all, I need to leave something for later.  I am already craving the cold walks amongst the Sycamores in the valley through the thick fog of winter, and winter isn’t even here yet.  I need to leave something for January when we are really sick of winter and dreaming of spring.  Hopefully these will just give you some motivation and help you think outside of the box of the evergreen hedge.  There are lots of options for winter interest when it comes to evergreens and even grasses, but when it comes to design, working with bark requires a subtlety the invokes class.  Most importantly since barks encase the heart of the tree they also exude the warmth of their essence, something we are all about to need.

Of course, all of the trees and shrubs profiled in this post may be found in Botany Buddy’s Tree and Shrub Finder for the iPhone and iPod Touch.

It’s that time of year again.  I’ve cleaned out the tube bird feeders, hung a couple new suet feeders, and I have already had on ripped down by the bear.  I always like to wait until winter is really coming to start feeding.  Primarily because I like to let the birds “Free Range” on wild flower seeds and the summer fruits and berries in the garden.  I like the thought of them helping with the natural cycle of scarifying and dispersing the seeds the way nature intended.  I also like not having the bears visit everyday, especially with my daughter playing outside by herself all summer.  This is a luxury we have living on a rural mountainside that we didn’t have on an urban street corner.  Not that the bears are the threat that some of our neighbors were.  They are more akin to urban raccoons that scavenge their way around on garbage day and pilfer your bird feeders.

Being in a natural setting is a blessing in so many ways, but one of the greatest is the flora for the fauna that already exists naturally. There are hoards of native shrubs that adorn our woods and one of the reasons is that the birds love them so much and help to spread their seed.  This time of year really makes me appreciate where we are, but it also reminds me of our urban garden where we worked to bring native varieties into the garden to bring the birds with them.  One of our prouder moments was when are daughter chose “peepepper” as one of her first words.  He was the first neighbor we got to know on the mountain.  He lived in the four story highrise in the woods next door that largely resembles a dead white pine.  Of course his name eventually evolved to woodpecker, and now she boast a better knowledge of the neighbirds than myself.  Of course this started with books, but my wife’s iBird app has helped as well.

So as I see the return of the flocks, I have been wanting to spread the joy of the season and share a list of plants that would help bring some good neighbirds to you.  I am going to limit this list to natives that transfer well to an urban setting.  However, there are plenty of hybrids and commercial varieties that do the job too.  I thought I would start here because I like to save those varieties for places where natives just won’t grow.  Going native first is one of the first rules of sustainability.  What I have chosen are the five palnt families (Genus) with the widest selection of bird friendly varieties I could find.  This is by no means an exhaustive list, but it should give you a great place to start with your plant and bird searches. 

Pinus (Pine):  There are dozens of native pines that make great trees for birds.  Pinus Strobus (Eastern White Pine) is the most commonly planted in the United States, but for smaller varieties in residential gardens some other native options include Pinus aristata (Bristlecone Pine), Pinus banksiana (Jack Pine),  Pinus Bugeana (Lacebark Pine), Pinus Resinosa (Red Pine), and Pinus monophylla (Pinyon Pine).  These pines are all more moderate in size than the White Pine, but still maintain a natural feel in a formal landscape.  This makes them ideal for urban or residential situations. 

Pines provide food for birds  in a variety of ways.  The cones of pines open to release as many as 12,000 seeds per pound, usually in winter when the other smaller seeds of wildflowers have been eaten.  The bark also harbors lots of insects that make it a favorite for woodpeckers. As the interior branches shed they provide copious amounts of small twigs and needles to build nests, and their evergreen needles provide protections from the cold winter winds.

Juniperus (Juniper):  Juniperus communis (Common Juniper), Juniperus monosperma (Oneseed Juniper), Juniperus occidentalis (Western Juniper), Juniperus scopularum (Rocky Mountain Juniper) and Juniperus virginiana (Eastern Red Cedar) are the most common native varieties in the continental United States.  Between these five you can find a native Juniper almost anywhere in North America.  All of these varieties have been cultivated into varieties for landscape use that can be safely used without worrying about reseeding invasive offspring.  If seed stock does emerge it will come out as one of the native varieties.  There are some hybridized varieties that could revert to something else, so if trying to stay native stick to cultivated or native varieties only.  

Junipers produce berries throughout summer, winter, and fall that provide a great source of food.  They also have a nice evergreen shell that provides protection from the wind.  Junipers provide great cover from prey. As the growth on the interior of the plant sheds it dries and stays in place becoming extremely prickly.  This makes it less desirable for thin furred animals such opossum and weasels to come after the nests.

Viburnums:  Viburnums are a favorite of landscape designers because they are extremely hardy  They also produce nice flowers, foliage and berries and provide some great fall color.  Some are even evergreen, and the flowers are often extremely fragrant.  However, they are usually somewhat of an unknown to beginning gardeners or casual retail nursery shoppers.  Native species include Viburnum dentatum (Chicago Luster Viburnum), Viburnum prunifolium (Blackhaw Viburnum), Viburnum rufidulum (Rusty Blackhaw Viburnum), and Viburnum trilobum (American Cranberry Viburnum),  All of these plants have abundant flowers and berries and can be kept as large shrubs or small trees in any landscape.  The birds love them for the berries and their height is achieved with fairly small horizontal branches that are great for perching but don’t hold the weight of predators making them a nice place for birds to hang out.  There are also many cultivated and hybridized non-native varieties that are not invasive.  If for some reason a native option doesn’t work for you, I would not hesitate to explore those options.

Cornus (Dogwood):  Everyone thinks of Dogwoods as the spring flowering tree, however they also come in some naturalizing and shrub forms as well.  Cornus florida (Flowering Dogwood) is a sentimental favorite for gardeners with the pink and white flowers at Easterand red berries in the fall.  However Cornus racemosa (Gray Dogwood) makes a great naturalizing thicket of about 12-15 feet and produces a nice white flower in May and June and a waxy white berry birds love.  Other varieties include Cornus alternifolia (Pagoda Dogwood), Cornus drummundii (Rough-leaved Dogwood), Cornus nuttallii (Pacific Dogwood), and Cornus sericea (Red Twig Dogwood).  The Rough-leaved and Red Twig Dogwoods provide a shrub form and the red twigs provide great winter interest.  All of these plants have wonderful landscape value, as well as make great naturalizers.  They all have reliable berries for the birds, provide nesting habitat, and add aesthetic value to add to any garden.

Prunus (Cherry):  The Prunus (Cherry) family covers more than the cherries we eat or the flowering trees we see in spring.  There several shrub forms and not as showy trees that can add subtle accents to the landscape, as well as habitat and fodder for birds.  Prunus virginiana (Chokecherry) comes in several forms and varieties and is a great alternative to some of the hybrid and grafted tree-form varieties.  Prunus caroliniana (Carolina Cherrylaurel) and its Asian counterpart Prunus lauroceasus (Cherry Laurel) make great evergreen shrubs, providing both protection and berries as well as a nice evergreen foliage for the landscape.  Prunuis subhirtella (Weeping cherry) is a nice pink flowering native that drops small berries mid summer. Prunus besseyi (Sand Cherry) is a great naturalizing shrub with small white flowers and black berries that are low enough to provide fodder for foraging birds like pheasant and turkey.  Finally, Prunus americana (Wild Plum) is probably one of the most common fruit bearing trees and can be found in almost all states east of the Rockies.  Of course there are other varieties as well, but as a family, Prunus may provide more food for the birds this continent than any other plant family.

There are countless other plants and plant families that I could include in this list, and look for more to come.  For now, these families provide the most variety in terms of native trees and shrubs to bring in birds, and they adapt well to the urban and residential landscape.  All of these plants look great, when used in the right place at the right time.  But when it comes down to it nothing brings out the beauty of a plant better than when it gets to do what it was born to do….be a part of nature. 

Of course, all of the trees and shrubs profiled in this post may be found in Botany Buddy’s Tree and Shrub Finder for the iPhone and iPod Touch.

Such a big word sustainability is.  Everyone is trying to define it.  Everyone says they can provide it, and most think it is something you create or buy rather than something that you do indefinitely.  For the last five years I worked in sustainable development.  I raced everyday to repair the forest’s edge and to get the wild flowers to grow before some salesman decided “sustainability” didn’t sell.  I fought for the budgets and screamed on behalf of the trees and the workers who protected and cared for them.  Well for something to be sustainable it cannot be a race, or a competition it has to be a collaborative effort from the bottom up.  To use a dirty word, it is community organizing with nature as a full fledged participant.  Sustain is a verb and you can’t turn it into a noun by claiming to give it ability and using it as something to be sold or proffited from.  It is an effort, behavior, and way of life that for it to be successful requires participation of everone involved and recognition of everything involved.  It has to be adaptable and evolutionary just like nature, because if any part of the system changes it impacts the whole.

For the last five years I have spent my life designing landscapes, management plans, and financial plans for “sustainable developments” in the mountains of Western North Carolina, Virginia, and Northern Georgia.  Prior to that I spent fifteen years designing “sustainable” gardens in urban parts of Kansas City.  In both cases the trick was always to design a plan that met the needs and desires of the owners and invoked a management plant that was within their means.  Sustainability is always completely relative to those who have to do the sustaining.  For a plan to be sustainable it has to be so by the owner, because once we have interfered with nature, it can never be sustainable by itself.  By disrupting an environment we assume ownership and have to become stewards. It always felt good to see a plan reach the second and third year, and to see that maintenance drop off.  However, about five years ago I started to see the lifestyles of those clients drop off and what was once sustainable to them, was beginning to be so no more.

I have always said that the difference between a garden and a landscape is that the garden requires a gardener.  A landscape may not require a gardener, but it does require a steward.  This is the paradox of the sustainable landscape.  Once nature is disrupted it can no longer be sustainable (self-sustaining) in the truest sense.  It has to be sustained unless it can be returned to the natural state.  Once you have destroyed the natural cycles, nature can never completely return to what it was.  All we can do is create a new eco-system, and help it get to where it can thrive on its own.  Hopefully we can do it in a way that won’t disrupt the lifecycle of surrounding ecosystems and set it in another wrong course.  The bottom line in all of this is once we have broken it we own it.  We suddenly have to maintain it or repair it in a way that it can maintian itself.  Suddenly sustainability is no longer about sustaining the beauty around us, but rather a race to stop the damage we have done.  Once the decision is made and the damage is done all of the sudden sustainability or more precise, sustaining starts and the cycle set in motion may never end.

In reality if we weren’t doing things that weren’t sustainable, we wouldn’t have a need for sustainability.  So rather than start this vicious cycle, why don’t we start with conservation and protection.  If there is any lesson we should all know as people it is that we are not good at creating sustainable systems for ourselves.  Be it justice, economics, agriculture health care or common respect for each other as human beings, we don’t have a great track record at doing this.  So what makes us think we would be better at sustaining nature than it would itself.  I have been ranting a lot lately about having to know nature to love it.  That it because understanding is where sustainability starts.  Rather than everyone running around claiming to have the right answers, maybe we need to start with just trying to gain a better understanding of the world around us.  Maybe then we will stop creating environments that need sustained and start loving what we have been given for what it is.

It was another beautiful fall morning in the Southern Appalachians, and as I was driving my daughter to school I couldn’t help but be overwhelmed by the clouds in the valleys, the orange hue of fall on the mountains and the vivid colors that were taking over the roadsides.   Escaping in all of natures beauty was perfect for taking my mind off the Radio Disney that was poisoning my ears.  However, just as the Radio Disney was creeping in and squeezing my brain like a vice, those colors on the roadsides did as well.  All of the sudden I realized I was missing the beautiful tones of the White Oaks and Sourwoods against the Hemlocks for the bright red of the Burning Bush against the Honesuckle and Maiden Grass.  As for that beautiful American Holly, I couldn’t even tell what it was for the Wisteria and English Ivy that had taken it over.  By the time I was headed back to the house, what started out as a beautiful relaxing drive was grinding me just as much as that Radio Disney even though I had put on Abbey Road.

That brings me to this.  It always amazes me how as designers and gardeners we are always looking for the next best thing and failing to recognize and reveal the essence of the environment we are in.  In our desire to make our space more perfect, some of the greatest damage to our environment has been done by some of the greatest minds our industry has known.  Here is Asheville the Oriental Bittersweet, Japanese Wisteria, Tree of Heaven, and English Ivy that are taking over our national parks were all the gifts of Frederick Law Olmstead.  In Kansas City it was Arnold’s Red Honeysuckle that George Kessler brought us with America Beautifulc movement.  All of these people have good intentions, but in todays world we can find the information we need to plant responsibly and still have plenty of great options from a  design standpoint.

There are thousands of invasive plants out there, both exotic and native that when taken out of their native habitat can do incredible harm to the environment.  This list is limited to the ten that I see most commonly used and pushed by the horticulture industry.  These are plants that are known to be doing damage to our native habitat and continue to be sold every day.  Why do they do it?  Because of demand from customers (hobbiests and professionals) that don’t know better, existing inventories (that keep getting replenished) and the ease of growing these plant in production and in one’s yard.  When I set out to create Botany Buddy one of my goals was to get this information out, and not only make it accessible, but make available in your pocket at any time.  This list is a fraction of the information consumers need but these plants account for a huge amount of the damage being done.

Ten Commonly Planted Invasive Woody Plants

Burning Bush / Euonymous alatus  This is one of the most popular fall color shrubs in production.  It’s vivid red fall color gives it the name.  It is tolerant of drought, ignorant pruning with gas shears extreme cold and keeps on growing.  As a result it has become a favorite in commercial landscapes and roadside plantings.  In zones 6 and up, the little red berry it gets is extremely viable and is spread by the birds that eat it.  Typically a simple hedge planting in the wrong location can spread to a radius of one mile within ten years.  The native plants they displace include Mountain Laurel, Rhododendron, and Hydrangea.  Which would you rather have?

Bradford Pear / Pyrus calleryana  I can remember when this plant came out in the 80’s and was marketed as “America’s Most Poplular Tree” for the fall color, spring flower, nice tight shape, hardiness, and its fruitlessness.  Besides being prone to ice and wind damage due to that “desireable” branching habit, this tree turned out to be anything but fruitless.  The small crabapple sized berries are a favorite of birds and so is its branching habit.  As a result these can now be found in pastures and waterways throughout zones 6 and up.  Even worse in waterways they are replacing canopy producing trees and raising water temperatures which hurts species such as the Southern Appalachian Brook Trout.

Japanese Wisteria / Wisteria floribunda  Introduced as a favorite for Japanese gardens, its agreesive vining habit will take over anywhere zone 5 and below if left unattended.  It can reproduce by rooting if the brances touch the ground, and in zones 7 and up has vibable seeds.  It is commonly found in Eastern forests along the Blue Ridge  Parkway at elevations between 2500 and 4000 feet.  The populations are highest around cities and especially the Biltmore Estate.  While the flowers are beautiful with the Dogwoods they can girdle and kill any tree they wrap around.  There is a native variety that is finally making it into production.

Japanese Spirea / Spiraea japonica  ‘Norman’ or ‘Anthony Waterer’ is the variety that is the main culpret as it spreads by root as well as seed.  There are many varieties that are supposedly not invasive.  However, all of them have the ability to revert and spread by seed.  One positive is that it is not a favorite of birds becasue the seed is so small.  It has to fall and touch the ground to germinate so some of those parking lot plantings might not be doing as much damage as we think.  If it does escape.  One single stem of this plant can flower and germinate into a colony ten feet wide two years.  This plant is destroying our native wildflowers throughout the Southeast.

Japanese Barberry / Berberis thunbergii  This plant is most commonly planted at your local McDonalds due to its attractiveness with the golden arches.  It is just an invasive as the chain in zones five and up and is as bad for the environment as their food is for you.  The plant aesthetically is probably as numbing to your palet as their food is to your culinary sophistication.  The beautiful red berry entices the birds like a toy in a Happy Meal entices my child.  The red leaves hypnotize the plant’s buyers from a distance like the arches that can be seen from a mile away.  As a result this plant litters our forests like McDonalds’ wrappers do our cities.

Empress Tree / Paulownia tomentosa This plant is not commony found in nurseries, but it is pushed by many major seed catalogs for its ability to grow ten feet a year.  I would think that would tell you something in itself, but people want instant results and that pretty purple flower in May and June.  The tree has nice leaves and a habit like a Catalpa, but most of the year its appearance is cluttered by the seed pods that will spread anywhere they can find soil and light.  This is one of the few invasive trees that wasn’t brought here for planting.  Instead, before there were packing peanuts there were Paulownia!  Before there was styrofoam the seed pods of this plant were used in wooded crates from Asia as packing peanuts, and the trees can now be found along all of the railways throughout the United States.  Unfortunately one of the first places those rails went was our national parks.

English Ivy/ Hedera helix  What would a formal garden be without it?  It would be a lot more interesting and a lot more sustainable.  It is defnitely time to give this plant a rest.  It should really only be used in the concrete jungle and even then limited.  There are many more intersting alternatives live Pachysandra or an all out perennial bed.  This vine spreads by root and can climb in the forest greatly weakending larger trees if not contained.  When allowed to reach heights of 20 and 30 feet it will often start to seed and spread even more.  I haven’t used this plant in over five years, and to be honest with you, my designs, clients, and environment are far better off for it.

Butterfly Bush / Buddleia davidii  This plant is finally starting to make people’s radar as an invasive.  It is one of those that has exploded in variety and popularity over the last fifteen years.  It is still new enough the effects are just starting to take root.  However, in all zones, if these seed falls into a wetland or moist area and gets temperatures above seventy degrees for over a couple weeks, it will germiante and spread.  It is most commonly a problem in warmer mountain and piedmont areas thought the US where moisture running off the mountains provides just this environment.  The seed is a favorite of finches so they move the seed form the plant to summer wilflower patches that share ideal growing conditions.

Scotch Broom / Cytisus scoparius  This plant is to the West and coastal areas what Japanese Spirea is to the rest of the country.  It has naturalized throughout most of the West Coast.  The low growing bushy habit takes out everything in its way, and it has beautiful flowers and evergreen foliage to boot!  This makes it a favorite of growers.  There are hundreds of varieties in production, and the tollerance to drought and long bloom time make it a favorite of retailers.  As for all those little California and coastal wildflowers look out!  This one is eating them all up.

Norway Maple / Acer platanoides  This is probably the most planted invasive tree, but most unknown to be invasive.  This plant had been quietly taking over Poplar forests for the last hundred years.  Poplar being fast growing, straight  and light is now the most popular trim lumber.  It is often selectively harvested leaving just enough light for the seeds of the Norway Maple to germinate and establish quickly.  With yellow fall color like a Poplar’s, from a distance youwould never know the forest had changed, but the natural progression of the forest has.  As the Poplars get older, weaker ones are supposed to fall and thin over time allowing room for grand Oaks to establish along with the legacy surviors.  However, the  fast wide growing maples stunt the forest progression  making 100 year old forests look like they are only thirty years old.

This is just a start and I could go on forever, but these are the ones that I see go out on trucks every day and find hiking in nature every day.  Some people take it personally against invasives and think of the plants as “Evil” or “Bad”.  A wise 90 year old piano teacher once told me…”A weed is nothing more than a flower in the wrong place at the wrong time.”  What we have to remember is that the weed didn’t put itself there.  Either we did, or we created the conditions for it to get there.  There is no greater pervention to the spread of invasive plants than knowledge and education, and both of those are far cheaper than trying to repair the damage that they do.

All of the plants in this profile can be found in Botany Buddy’s Tree and Shrub Finder, along with more photos and information including the native habitats, native ranges, and  cutural information.  Botany Buddy currently profiles 1300 trees and shrubs and our library is constantly growing to bring you the valuable information like this that you need.

Get to the root of the issues!

There are two main things to consider when choosing a plant to purchase. First, choosing the right plant for the right spot, and second selecting a quality plant to buy. As for choosing the right plant for the spot, there’s an app for that!  Botany Buddy’s tree and shrub finder was designed specifically for this purpose. As for choosing a quality plant to purchase, this post for that.

Trees and shrubs come packaged for sale in three main forms: containerized, balled and burlapped and bare root.  The best of these to buy will depend on what you are using them for. Containerized trees and shrubs are ideal for planting in prepared beds, individual holes in the ground, or in pots. Balled and burlapped plants are best when planting in beds, or individual holes in the grounds, but do not do as well in containers.  Bare root plants do best in pots or directly in unprepared ground. Larger bare root plants (shrubs over 6″ tall or trees over 12″ tall) perform best if planted in pots in the spring and allowed to root out before planting into the ground later in the season.

There are several factors to look at when choosing a plant to purchase depending on the packaging.

1.) Bare root plants can never be allowed to have the roots dry out. Healthy bare root plants will have small white fibrous roots it they have been properly cared for. If they have dried out they may be brown but still be viable. This can be determined by scratching the root to see if it is green or white underneath. If it is, pruning them back by 20% and immediatelysoaking them in water and root stimulator (Vitamin B1) can cause the roots to sprout new growth. If the roots are dry and brittle or soft and smooshy don’t buy the plant.  The roots are probablydead.

It is also important that bare root plants have an equal or greater amount of root growth than plant growth.  Pruning back the top can solve this but it not done correctly may hurt the plant’s eventual shape and removes valuable nutrients stored in the bark that can be used for establishment.

2.) Container plants should never be allowed to dry out. Whenever purchasing a containerized plant, remove the pot and inspect the roots. The rules on healthy roots are the same as for bare roots. If the plants have small white fibrous roots they have been properly cared for. If they have dried out they may be brown but still be viable. Just scratch the root to see if it is green or white underneath.  If it is, score the roots and rough up the ball when planting.  With immediate watering they can be caused to resprout.  However it typically takes an entire growing season for the roots to get back to a really healthy state.  This can greatly affect survival and slow down growth.  The energy stored in the branches of a plant can keep it look completely healthy for an entire season even if the root system is dead.  This is why you should always inspect the roots.

There are also signs to look for that you should completely avoid. Some plants may have been left in a pot so long that the roots will have girdled themselves. They will have circled around the pot so many times that they are strangling themselves and will eventually cut off their own circulation.  Another symptom of being in a pot too long is that the plant may have used all the soil in the the pot and be nothing but a mass of roots.  They can still be kept alive in the pot with daily watering and regular fertilizing, but once planted it creates an air pocket that eventually causes the plant to dry and freeze out over winter.  If the pot is big but fells surprisingly light, or blows over in the nursery with just the slightest breeze this is probably the case.  This makes them easy to spot from a distance.  These roots are a little tight, but healthy!

Finally, the plant needs to have enough root mass to support the plant. A plant should have ten inches diameter of pot for every 12” of height on top. On trees, they should have 20” diameter of root for the first caliper inch of truck, and 10” for every inch of trunk after. If an evergreen is grown in a pot, the width of the foliage and branches should not be more than 50% wider than the width of the pot. It is acceptable for a plant to have been pruned back to stay in a pot and can be benefitial to the long term habit of the plant, as long as the roots have not out grown the pot.

3.) Balling and burlapping plants is typically reserved for very large shrubs, over 24” in evergreens and 36” in deciduous plants, or for trees. Very rarely are plants bug by hand in the field due to labor costs.  As mechanical digging has grown in popularity, so have the problems associated with it.  As a result it is recommended that if all possible you hire the person selling the plant to install it with a warranty on both the plant and the labor.  I would never buy balled and burlapped material from a mass retailer that doesn’t specialize in plants.

Healthy balled and burlapped plants will have been dug when the soil is moist but not soggy. They are typically grown in soil with a little clay to help hold the ball together, and will be wrapped in natural fiber and bound with biodegradable twine. Balled and Burlapped plants should always be shipped within 24 hours of being dug and immediately covered in mulch or gravel, and watered upon receiving. The roots or outer edge of soil should never be allowed to dry out. Once they have, it can take over a year for active root growth to resume. Any time roots can be seen emerging from the burlap into the surrounding mulch you can be assured the root system is healthy and has been well cared for.

These balls are actually a little small.

There are a few things to always look out for when selecting a balled and burlapped plant. Never buy a plant that has a mushy or crumbly ball.  Most likely the roots have been broken apart. Balls that are dry and hard with no sign of new root growth emerging from the fabric are probably not viable no matter how good the top looks. When the ball is lifted from the ground, if the bottom falls out or the burlap sags like a wet diaper, the plant has been sitting in water for a prolonged period of time and the bottom has rotted out.  At the top of the ball there should be a string encircling the trunk of the tree or base of the shrub. If this sting has cut into the bark, or the bark has grown around it, the plant has probably been girdled and will most likely suffer or die. Finally, many nurseries will rewrap the ball with fresh burlap if a plant has set on the lot too long. If the plant looks like it has been on the lot awhile, but the ball does not, don’t be afraid to look under the burlap to see what is underneath.

Sizing the root mass compared to the top.

There are a few standards that should be met regarding the size of the ball. The size of the ball needs to be proportionate to the top of the plant depending on what type of plant it is. Also when selecting a tree, it is best if the ball is large enough to support the top without need for staking.  Some good standard ratios for ball size are detailed below.  These numbers are based upon ANLA standards, and adjusted for the reality of current digging equipment and techniques.  The are also chosen to make sure you get the best stock, not the minimum standard.

Coniferous and Evergreen Trees 18″ of ball for the 1st 3′ of height and 10” of ball for each additional 1′ of height.

Coniferous or Evergreen Shrubs 10” of ball for the 1st 1′ of width, and 6” of ball for each additional 1′ of width.

Deciduous Trees 18” of ball for the 1st caliper inch of trunk and 10” of ball for each additional caliper inch of trunk.

Deciduous Shrubs 12” of ball for the 1st 1′ of height and 12” of ball for each additional 1′ of height.

Broadleaf Evergreen Trees 18” of ball for the 1st caliper inch of trunk and 10” of ball for each additional caliper inch of trunk.

Broadleaf Evergreen Shrubs 12” of ball for the 1st caliper inch of trunk and 6″ of ball for each additional foot of height.

Balled and burlapped plants are always best handled by experienced gardeners or professionals.

There are many more things to take into consideration when selecting plants such as the branching structure, disease, the shape, and variety, but the most important thing to the health of the plant is the roots.  We will bring you more on pruning and shape later, but when buying at tree or shrub they almost all have pruning issues.  Mainly becasue the are being pruned to grow roots, fit in a retail space, and sell…not Grow!  That topic needs its own post. 

As for disease and insects, those are common as well in nurseries.  However, on deciduous trees, as long as the damage is limited to leaves it won’t matter.  They will fall off in the fall, and you really don’t want much growth in the first year.  So if the plant has a nice shape and is green some spots on the leaves won’t hurt.  As for evergreens, if it has an orangish or brown cast avoid it.  There are probably mites in there!  Evergreens with a determinate growth rate cannot grow from old wood if it the loose branches, so be sure the plant is healthy.  However, if nurseries killed everything that got on their plants they would probably killing you too. So if you see a tree that doesn’t have scarred up bark, and broken branches everywhere, but has a few spots on the leaves, as long as it has the root system and has been handled as described above you should be successful.     

The bottom line is if you want to be successful you have to dig a little deeper and get to the root of things.  As long as you water a plant well and keep it wet until you get it in the ground you should be succesful if you start with a healthy plant.  Have you ever wondered why retailers guarantee plants?  It is because they know if you get it home, it has a better chance of  surviving than if it stays with them. 

Next Weeks Blogs…Planting and Watering: Learn how to keep things alive and make them thrive!