The Phytophactor

Friday Fabulous Flower - Bottle brush buckeye

2023-07-15T12:27:00.000-05:00

Not too many plants blossom in the middle of summer. But the bottle brush buckeye is reliable shade tolerating plant. Not only that but once established it manages with minimal watering. If you have enough room this is a great plant. Our gardens have two clusters of this shrub and it looks wonderful.

Once you see the brushy white spikes of flowers you'll understand where the common name bottle brush buckeye comes from. Aesculus parviflora is one of several buckeye species including red buckeye and Ohio buckeye in our gardens.

Relief - Late, June rain makes Friday Fabulous Flowers bloom

2023-07-04T13:48:00.000-05:00

The weather pattern seems to have changed to a hotter, wetter July. At least for now the almost 3" of rain has spelled recovery for most of our gardens. About the only plant that did not suffer was the native prickly pear cactus. It produced a hundred or so bright glossy yellow flowers, a good candidate for the Friday Fabulous flower, although today is the 4th of July, a Tuesday. There are some sand prairies over by the Rivers, and this cactus can be quite abundant in many of those.

dry, dry, dry, and more dry

2023-06-21T15:11:00.000-05:00

Any way you want to slice it our gardens are suffering through a drought. Areas that would be called "lawn" are brown and crispy, and they would burn should anyone drop a match. Our lily/fish pond is down some 6-10 inches. Some trees must be watered or else they would die. A Kousa dogwood is struggling, but not much else is newly planted. So TPP is dragging hoses around to give the most sensitive plants water. And you can hardly blame bun-buns for eating plants that are best at keeping themselves alive. The bird bath and garden fountain are very popular with our avian residents. The native Prickly pear did flower very nicely.

Friday Fabulous flower

2023-06-14T15:25:00.000-05:00

As many of TPP's reader know Magnolia's and nagnoliid flowers are a great favorite. The collection includes two species of big-leafed magnolia, M. tripetala and M. megaphylla (var. aschii). Both have leaves that are routinely more than 20 inches long. The Asche magnolia also has really big flowers 9-10 inches across and it flowers when quite small and young if polar vortexes stay away.

Here's the flower some 9" across and it was about 4' above the ground. This one gets some protection by growing fairly close to our house. It is the Ashe variety (native to the FL pan handle) which should not get so big, although we saw a full-sized one at an arboretum in Kansas City. Enjoy.

Firday Fabulous Flower - It's a beauty "bush"!

2023-05-17T14:01:00.003-05:00

A very large, very old shrub blooms every year about this time no matter what the winter weather has been like. It's covered by pinkish flowers and is quite striking! However the bush is rather course when not in flower. As you can see it has flowers rather like honeysuckles and it is in the Carifoliaceae. TPP thinks it's more of a specimen plant that is pretty in flower, easy to grow, and reliable. Kolkwitzia amabilis, the beauty bush, introduced around 1900 from central China belongs in most largish gardens, but is a rather old-fashioned plant. Our gardens came with this plant and it is clearly decades old, decades ago.

Friday Fabulous Flower- woodland peony

2023-05-02T11:47:00.002-05:00

Here is a woodland spring ephemeral that you probably have not seen before. It is not a native, but since our gardens are so shady this quiet addition seemed logical. It is about the size of and grows rather like a Trillium. Several ivory-colored perianth parts surround numerous stamens and a small number of pistils. This is Peonia japonica. In general it does not like being moved or crowded. Several plants are scattered around our wilder gardens. The seeds take two years to germinate, and several years to flower, so it is not at all common. Except among us (rare) peony enthusiasts.

Friday Fabulous Flower - Yellow Ginger

2023-04-22T11:13:00.006-05:00

OK but first a shout out to Earth Day. TTP remembers the first Earth Day, but mostly because of all the other struff that was going on, mostly anti war things and the Kent State shootings, deciding to try out grad school to study botany, and other things. Sorry, Earth.

This is called yellow ginger and it is not real ginger but a member of the Aristolochia or birthwort family. Our wild Ginger is almost a weed in our shade lawns and TPP first saw this plant at Brooklyn botanical garden back when it was still a botanical garden. It is a smallish herbaceous perennial witth upright stems. Our native wild ginger is Asarum canadense, a creeping plant with purple flowers along the prostrate stem often hidden from view by the heart shaped leaves. This plant has 3-parted flowers although a dicot, and is quite fuzzy. And it is the genus Saruma, and if you are quick with word games, you'll notice that Saruma is Asarum spelled backwards with the a moved to the end. A botanical joke? Enjoy.

peak blue

2023-03-31T15:06:00.003-05:00

Sometime every spring right around the first of April, our garden's "lawn" turns blue. This is caused by several thousand Scilla siberica bulbs. It's a pretty remarkable sight. It just takes a few decades to multiple. You can't walk with out stepping on them. New neighbors are quite surprised at how blue the "lawn" becomes.

early flowering -Snow Trillium

2023-03-08T15:05:00.000-06:00

It's the first week of March and a few things do flower this early, but not very many native plants. One of the cutest is the snow Trillium, T. nivale. Flowering early is quite usual, and so it pokes up through the leaf litter. This is also the smallest Trillium at about 3 inches tall and each whorl about as wide. it is easy to overlook, which TTP did for years until an early scouting trip surprised this botanist. Now it grows in our native plant gardens so its easy to watch for. This is one plant with 3 aerial shoots, a whorl of three leaves and a flower on each, and it took several years to get this big. OK this should have been a Friday Fabulous Flower, but I'm a couple of days early.

What happened to winter?

2023-02-22T13:53:00.001-06:00

It's the third week of February, the high temperature will be in the 40s and the weather is presently a thunder storm. Very much unlike usual winter weather, so no surprise that snowdrops and winter aconite are in flower, along with early crocus and witch hazel. Never even touched our little snow thrower and that's good because Mrs. Phactor has her new electric vehicle plugged in there now. Snowdrops usually flower near the end Feb or the first week of March. The whole yard turns Scillla blue by the second week of March. But except for a couple of artic blasts, the winter of 2022-23 has been quite mild. But the Artic blasts may have killed a couple of TPP's plants. A dwarf Tsuga is clearly dead (TPP has had great trouble trying to grow this plant over the years). Too hot, too dry, and maybe too cold in the wrong time of year. So even though the winter has almost been a no-show, lingering drought and brief sudden cold can be a bad combination.

New Year GReetings

2023-01-05T15:25:00.007-06:00

Wow! 2023! Who would have thunk it? TTP's family is not known for their longevity, so it is quite a surprise to find myself still around and still fairly healthy. Wealthy and wise were out for quite a while now. Very cold weather came early (-11F) and it will be interesting to see what plants found that too cold, maybe the Ashe magnolia or the plum yews. But we will always hope for the best. Indoor plants are doing well, an azalea, a mistletoe cactus (Hatoria), and the queen's tears (Billbergia nutans), have been the subject of blogs before.

TPP is a hopeless liberal, and he was very glad to see that our bastion of blueness (Illinois) remained so. I do not think TPP can stand another round MAGAness, so much stupidity in just one grifter. Somehow things just don't seem to be falling into place the way they did last time. But I don't like the guy running FL very much either. People do not seem to mind that the phoney covid cures and failure to encourage masks and vaccination have killed a lot of people.

Lots of new neighbors in our little'hood. Covid has prevented many possible social events, so have to wait for better weather to get to know them.

Hopefully the blogging will come along and TPP gets back in the swing of things.

Friday Fabulous Fruits - a native holly

2022-12-02T13:46:00.002-06:00

Sorry for TTP's absence; stuff happens and my attention has been elsewhere. Now that the considerable leaf fall is done a couple of patchess of small shrubs catch your eye. Fruits are flowers at the stage of seed dispersal. The bright red berries are not only pretty, but they are adored by fruit eating birds. Often the berries end up heading south with flock of cedar waxwings. These are called winter berry, a native holly, Ilex decidua, deciduous holly, which means they shed their leaves. The species is also dioecious meaning you have to have a few naked male bushes to pollinate the female bushes or no berries. If you have room these are nice plants for winter color and wildlife.

Friday Fabulous Flower - a fall lily of sorts

2022-10-11T14:11:00.003-05:00

October is not a great month for flowering, but a few plants flower in the fall. This little perennial is generally hard to raise, at least for us (it keeps dying) but the right combination of shade and water seem to be keeping it happy. It's commonly called a toad lily (a species of Tricyrtis). The perianth is decorated with pinky-purplly spots as is the three branched style. It stands about 12" tall with about 1" diam flowers. It is not a native, but also is not invasive. It started flowering on the 5th of October.

Friday Fabulous Flower - a "rare" orchid?

2022-09-21T16:45:00.000-05:00

Orchids are funny, and a number of even botanists are obsessed by them. It is one of the largest families of flowering plants. Among the species of orchids found in here in Lincolnland they are described as "rare", "very rare", "uncommon", and one such plant has shown up in our gardens.

The upper image shows the whole plant, all seven inches or it from a small whorl of slender basal leaves its terminal spike of white flowers. The lower image show the flowers a bit bigger, all of 2-3 mm long. This a Ladie' tresses orchid, the genus Spiranthes probably S. ovalis. This orchid is "not common" and it found our gardens' on its own. However such plants flowering here in september are easily over-looked, so quite inconspicuous, if not actually rare. It woes make TPP happy just to know it's there; 4 or 5 plants in a patch some foot in diameter. Oh did TPP mention that most orchids have quite small flowers of rather small plants. Enjoy.

Salt potatoes

2022-09-02T09:19:00.000-05:00

TPP has been occupied, so sorry. Having technical problems with images. Here's part of the back log that doesn't need illustration. While looking for items for a together the Phactors hit on the idea of salt potatoes, a common item from our youth, so many decades ago. So how many if you have ever had salt potatoes? They used to come as a bag of New potatoes, which is to say small whole potatoes in a bag with a decent sized package of salt. Basically you boil them in a brine until tender then let them dry forming a crust of salt on the skin, then you serve them hot with melted butter. In those days we didn't use fancy stuff like parsley or chives. The recipe isa about 1 1/2 cups of salt for 4 lbs. of potatoes. When looking this up TPP was very surprised to find them referred to as Syracuse salt potatoes. Apparently, this is an upstate New York thing, and we all knew Syracuse (Mrs. Phactor's home town near enough) was famous for salt. Important that you understand the potatoes must be whole with the skin intact. So the Phactors had quite a laugh of this blast from the post.

Other up coming items: new cat, fall flowers, and more.

Last day for loyal lap cat

2022-08-01T11:46:00.001-05:00

The Phactors have two pet cats who own this house. The older one, a rescue cat, just turned 17 and it was like the meter had run out. She just gradually slid into a gradual decline and she just has given up living, so we will have her put wo sleep later today so as not to force her to continue a weakened existence. Her name was Magpie, Miss Maggie, she was a chocolate black with a little white, and a medium length thickish coat; she was my lap cat, and I miss her alreadys. From 7 pm to 10 om each night she would be in TPP's lap or crunched in beside my leg, until it was time to go to bed. Maggie was a housecat who did enjoy playing with the occasional house mouse. She remained playful at times her whole life. This picutre shows her plumpish physique in a favorite place, between two kitchen windows on a window high bench. Maggie had a big head and big forepaws, a broad chest, and slender hind quarters with small feet, as if put together out of spare parts, but she was quite agile, quite athletic. But she lived a long, healthy life and enjoyed being a housecat; she was quite a lover of petting and people who did not necessarily love cats.

Polio in New York

2022-07-22T13:57:00.000-05:00

This news item caught my eye because New York state is my childhood home and polio is a distinct memory. TPP had just started school in the mid-50s when it was announced that they had a vaccine for polio. My parents couldn't get us to the doctor soon enough to get the vaccination because polio scared people. Evey year there would be an outbreak somewhere and we all had classmates who wore leg or arm braces, and everyone knew someone who had died of polio. But it seems that people have forgotten or even with a million deaths, and covid just isn't scary enough. Science was a little too eager to pronounce polio's demise. It's back! And aided and abetted by anti-vaxxers polio will surely make a come back. TPP has yet to hear an anti-vax position that was convincing. Herd immunity makes sense biologically, but if the anti-vaxxers screw it up TPP hopes they get their much-deserved infection. Take away their passports and don't let these fools travel to places that still harbor diseases like polio (No idea if this case came from overseas or not).

Friday Fabulous Flower - Bottle brush

2022-07-17T14:30:00.001-05:00

This ia an aptly named plant, it does look like a bottle brush and even better is grows in the shade and flowers in midsummer. Actually this shrub looks good enough that the flowering is almost a bonus.

This is the bottle brush buckeye, Aesculus parviflora. It just now is flowering, and some of ours is growing in pretty deep shade. The only problem is that in bad Japanese beetle years the flowers can be totally eaten.

Rules of gardening & FFF

2022-07-01T14:13:00.001-05:00

OK TPP was the victim of a very busy week. What a relief to get that overwith. And it rained after two long weeks of hot dry weather. My rain gauge recorded 3.5" and every bit of it was needed.

Here is a Friday Fabulous Flower, but it is a violation of a TPP gardening rule. This is a very pretty plant, but one of our gardening rules, based on sad experience, is never plant a loosestrife. Every violation of this rule has ended badly. This is Lysimachia clethroides, the gooseneck loosestrife.

It flowers in July a plus, and it does OK in shade, but you can never control it. So says TPP.

Friday Fabulous Flower - Big leaf Magnolia

2022-06-02T10:26:00.000-05:00

Hello readers,

TPP is back! A combination of too many things to do, mild depression, and a lost password kept TPP off the intertudubes. A really sweet flower has helped with the depression, but really our country seems to be broken, and too many of the ignorant types seem to be winning. Of course getting the password fixed has helped. Near the front corner of the Pfactor's dwelling is a 4 foot tall big leaf Magnolia macrophylla var. ashei, and today it flowered! A very uplifting event, especially since it is a from Florida. It is much hardier than everyone thinks. Although the next polar vortex will probably do it in. Isn't it wonderful?

Blue lawn - phase two

2022-04-26T18:39:00.000-05:00

A good portion of our "lawn" becomes blue with thousands of Scilla blossom which we call peak blue; but our lawn is not done yet as there is a phase two. Yes, look at how many common blue violets compose the "lawn" in late April. It would be even bluer except for the white flowered variant. The violets grow pretty thickly.

sci

Friday Fabulous flower - Sweet Betsy

2022-04-23T15:47:00.000-05:00

This particular species I always called a sessile Trillium (T. cuneatum) because the flower sits right on the whorl of three leaves. The outer three tepals are maroon-colored on the inside surface. The inner three tepals remain erect and almost 2" tall. The leaves are rather nicely mottled, and a similar species was called toad shade.

Earth Day - 2022

2022-04-22T16:11:00.000-05:00

Hard to believe how the years have passed, 52 of them since the first Earth Day. I recall Earth Day was not a big event because the anti-war protest occupied our attention and TPP was a senior trying to graduate from college and start graduate studies. And it wasn't easy. You had to cross picket lines to go to class, if indeed you had to go to class. Now it seems that Earth Day is not enough; more change is needed than it seems can make in the short term especially in today's political atmosphere will allow, and it leaves TPP feeling rather defeated. I can't wait for the waves to start lapping at the door of Mar-a-lago. Keep the faith people, but I doubt religion is going to play any useful role. TPP needs a beverage to revive his attitude.

Two Tulips?

2022-04-13T14:10:00.001-05:00

Some time back Ms. Phactor planted a bag of mixed tulips, species tulips. One species has done quite well and it is very cheerful, it is either Tulipa tarda (the late tulip?) or T. urumiensis (and they might be taxonomic synonyms), but TPP doesn't know tulip taxonomy very well. The flowers only open when the sun is shining.

More pinky flowers

2022-04-11T15:00:00.000-05:00

OK we just celebrated peak blue, but some of the early flowering shrubs are making things pink. The earliest flowering Magnolia in my collection is a hybrid (M. x loebneri); it looks a lot like a star Magnolia and that is one the two parent species. The flowers are quite pink with fewer tepals and no smell at all. The plant grows like a star Magnolia too.