Vol. 46 No. 2 Spring 1986 Page 2 The Great Catalpa Craze Peter Del Tredici

111 maackm, the Friends’s Dividend for 1986 Gregory J. Waters Arnoldia (ISSN 0004-2633) is published quarterly m winter, spring, summer, and fall by the Arnold 13 Notes and Quotes on the History and Arboretum of Harvard University. Origins of the Amur Chokecherry (Prunus

. Subscriptions are $12.00 per calendar year domestic, maackm) $15.00 per calendar year foreign, payable m advance. 25 Prunus maackm Single copies are $3.50. All remittances must be m Propagatmg U S dollars, by check drawn on a U S bank or by Alfred f. Fordham mternational money order. Send subscnptions, remittances, change-of-address notices, and all other 27 Japanese Honeysuckle: From "One of the subscription-related commumcations to Arnoldia, best" to Ruthless Pest The Arnold Arboretum, The Arborway, Jamaica Plain, Richard A. Hardt MA 02130.

Postmaster: Send address changes to: 35 Botamcal Gold: Exploring the Treasures of Arnoldia the Harvard University Herbaria The Arnold Arboretum Carolme J. Swartz The Arborway Jamaica Plain, MA 02130 39 A + AAH + AMES + ECON + FH + GH + NEBC = "HUH": Systematic at Copyright © 1986, The President and Fellows of Harvard Harvard College.

Edmund A. Schofield, Editor 42 BOTANY: THE STATE OF THE ART Peter Del Tredici, Associate Editor Listening to Thirsty Jan Brink, Design Consultant (Volunteer) John W Emset Marion D. Cahan, Editorial Assistant (Volunteer) Elise Sigal, Calendar Editor (Volunteer) 46 BOOKS

Front cover Inflorescence and of Catalpa spe- ciosa, the western, or hardy, catalpa. (See page 2.) Water- color pamring by Esther Hems. Courtesy of the artist. (See page 2). Opposite~ Inflorescence of the Japanese honeysuckle (Lomcera japonica L.). From Curtis’s Botamcal Magazine for 1834 (See page 27.) This page: A tiger swallowtail (Papiho glaucus (L // approachmg a hop (Ptelea tnfohata L.), one of the plants on which its larvae feed. From Mark Catesby’s Natural History of Carolina, Flonda, and the Bahama Islands (London, 1754). (See "Books," page 46.) Inside back cover: The elegant bark of the Amur chokecherry (Prunus maackii Rupr.). The conspicuous horizontal structures are len- ticels, pores through which gasses enter and leave the interior of the trunk Photograph by Albert W Bus- sewitz.Courtesy of the photographer (See page 11.) Out- side back cover An inflorescence of Prunus maackii. Photograph by Albert W. Bussewitz. Courtesy of the photographer. (See page 11.)

The Great Catalpa Craze Peter Del Tredici

Zealous promoters once made claims about the value of the hardy, or western, catalpa that far exceeded the tree’s true economic potential, obscuring its real worth

Horticulturists, who make it their business In short, the catalpa has too many black to pass judgments on plants, generally con- marks against it to win favor with modern sider the catalpa tree a disaster. Although horticulturists. Yet, this was not always the very beautiful, its large, heart-shaped leaves case. There was a time, in the late 1800s, create a major litter problem when they fall. when planting catalpa was the thing to do, And during the growing season, their lovely, and people up and down the East Coast, soft-green tints are generally masked by across the Great Plains, and as far as Cali- infestations of powdery mildew. The catalpa fornia were madly planting the tree every- tree is among the last to out in the where. The movement to plant catalpa was spring, and in the autumn its foliage turns a fad not dissimilar to the one of planting brown and shrivels in response to the first Paulownia in the middle Atlantic states touch of frost. today or Ailanthus in urban areas, from the The catalpa is sparsely branched; conse- early to mid-1800s. quently, for six months of the year it presents While the active planting of catalpa has by a very stark, almost gawky, appearance. Its and large ceased, the tree has managed to long pods, which provide the reason for the increase its range on its own, as spontaneous plant’s common name, the Indian bean tree, seedlings sprout up along highway embank- add a note of interest to the winter silhou- ments, roadsides, and stream banks ette, but in the spring, when they fall, they throughout the East Coast. In some towns, provide the home owner with yet another spontaneous catalpa is so well established reason to curse the tree. To top off this bleak that one is tempted to look upon it as part of situation, catalpa wood is quite brittle, and the native vegetation. small branches regularly break off during storms. The Two Species Without a doubt the are the pri- There are two distinct species involved in mary ornamental feature of the catalpa. the parentage of these escaped catalpas. Both They are produced in early summer and rival are native to the eastern United States and, those of the common horse-chestnut (Aes- while very similar, occupy culus hippocastanum) in showiness, being nonoverlapping ranges in their wild state and have quite dis- quite large, pure white, and lightly speckled tinctive growth habits. The first, the southern with purple and yellow spots arranged in par- allel bands. Unfortunately, this bloom period catalpa, Catalpa bignonioides, occupied a rather limited range before the European set- lasts only about a week or so, depending on river banks from cen- the weather. tlement, growing along tral Alabama and Mississippi to western Florida. Because of its showy flowers, catalpa Opposite~ Leaf, shoot, , seeds, and ovule of Catalpa was and speciosa From The Silva of , by Charles very quickly widely planted Sprague Sargent Drawmg by Charles E. Faxon. throughout the south, so that even the early 4

botanists could not determine its original time when botany, horticulture, and forestry range with certainty. were not seen as separate specialties; it con- The second species, the western, or hardy, tains, therefore, everything that was known catalpa, Catalpa speciosa, is geographically about through 1894. separated from its southern cousin, growing in a small area encompassing southern Apostles for Catalpa western Ken- Indiana, Illinois, Missouri, to E. E. and and northeastern According Sargent, two men, Barney tucky Tennessee, of and Robert of Wau- Arkansas. This disjunct population of catalpa Dayton, Ohio, Douglas kegan, Illinois, became apostles for the was not as distinct until 1853, recognized western the the former when Dr. John A. Warder of Cincinnati, catalpa during 1870s, and a book about the vir- Ohio, first described it. While it is difficult writing publishing tures of Catalpa speciosa, while the latter if not impossible to distinguish the two spe- was the principal contractor for the actual cies in the herbarium, they are fairly easy to planting of catalpa on large tracts of prairie separate in the field. For one thing, Catalpa owned by various railroad his speciosa blooms in late May or early June in companies. By own reckoning, Douglas had planted over New England, a good two weeks before two and a half million Catalpa bignonioides does. For another thing, seedlings throughout Kansas and Missouri in less than six years. Catalpa speciosa usually is a tall, narrow Barney’s pamphlet of 1878, Facts and Infor- tree, upwards of 80 feet in height, with a straight trunk, while Catalpa bignonioides is considerably smaller, usually around 40 feet, with a contorted or low-branched trunk and a wide spreading crown. In areas where the two species are planted together, there is often an overlap in the end of the Catalpa speciosa bloom and the start of the Catalpa bignonioides bloom. This raises the distinct possibility of hybridiza- tion, which, if it occurred, would give rise to trees intermediate between the parents in stature and in time of bloom. It is quite pos- sible that some of the spontaneous plants one sees along the roadsides are of hybrid origin, in contrast to the cultivated plants, which are usually identifiable as one species or the other. The question remains as to why and how these two species of catalpa came to be so widely planted that they became part of the spontaneous flora of the East. The answer eluded me for many years, until I consulted the fountainhead of information on trees, The Silva of North America, by Professor Charles This Sprague Sargent. many-volume Several fruits of Catalpa speciosa Photograph from the work is special because it was produced at a Archives of the Arnold Arboretum 1 5

mation in Relation to the Catalpa Tree, An Experimental Planting offers a clear of the of picture catalpa gospel A after the second edition of the day. year Barney’s pamphlet appeared, the most famous planting A railroad man, Barney saw the catalpa as of western was undertaken Hor- solving the specific problem of obtaining catalpa by atio Hollis Hunnewell, Charles Sar- railroad ties for the construction of new lines Sprague gent’s friend and relation. Hunnewell was across the treeless Great Plains. Barney felt first and foremost a businessman who served that catalpa wood was the ideal solution to either as director or of some this because it was president thirty- problem extremely four different railroads between 1852 and resistant to decay. Catalpa was further suited 1901. He was also deeply interested m plants. to the task since it grew incredibly fast and In 1880, at the age of sixty-five, he managed was not about what type of soil it particular to these two interests commis- required. Barney predicted that seedlings merge by sioning Robert Douglas to plant four hundred planted in good soil would produce four to acres of Catalpa speclosa and one hundred eight ties each after twenty-five to thirty acres of Ailanthus altissima on a tract of years of growth. prairie near Farlington, Kansas. The trees In addition, Barney advocated its use for were planted on four-foot centers, which poles, fence posts, and, because of its beau- a of two thousand acre. The tiful flowers, general civic beautification. He gave density per grew very at also stressed the fact that while there were seedlings rapidly first, reaching an average height of twenty-two feet, three two distinct varieties of catalpa, only the inches in diameter after only nine years. This hardy, or western, variety grew fast enough growth rate was sufficient to have the exper- and straight enough to have any economic iment hailed as a success by all those who potential. The southern variety, while it was saw it (and some who didn’t), and led to the equally beautiful in , was a much planting of many more plantations by other smaller, less straight tree that was useless for railroad companies. railroad ties or poles. In the second edition of his pamphlet, published in 1879, Barney included articles by both C.S. Sargent and J.A. Warder, which made it much more sci- entific than the earlier work. Barney did much more than attempt to convince people to plant the tree; he actually offered them seeds of Catalpa speciosa: "I will send by mail, postage paid, to anyone wishing the seed, enough to plant one acre four feet each way (2500 seeds), and a copy of this pamphlet, upon receipt of fifty cents." There can be little doubt that this early, at- cost distribution of seed played a key role in helping Catalpa speciosa to get established throughout the country. Catalpa seeds have no dormancy requirements; they germinate immediately upon sowing. No doubt this Horauo Holhs Hunnewell (left) and Charles Sprague ease of cultivation also contributed to its suc- Sargent in Horticultural Hall, Boston Photograph from cessful establishment. the Archives of the Arnold Arboretum. 6

Unfortunately, the growth rate of the trees species seems to have attained a momentum in the Hunnewell plantation slowed down all its own. The fact that the plantations pro- considerably after the first nine years as duced fence posts rather than railroad ties overcrowding became an inhibiting factor. after twenty-five years was not, of course, When the trees were last measured in 1898, fully appreciated when the seedlings were set at eighteen years of age, the average height out. was only thirty feet and the average diameter slightly less than four inches. In other words, A Practical Experiment after an increase of showing average height Even before the harsh economic realities of 2.4 feet per year during the first nine years, planting catalpa were fully appreciated by the trees slumped to an average height people, Hunnewell’s cousin, the indefatig- increase of 0.9 foot per year the only during able Charles raised serious second nine Sprague Sargent, years. about the In 1902, William L. Hall, superintendent questions widespread assumption that catalpa timber made good railroad ties. of tree planting for the U.S. Department of In the results of an Agriculture’s Bureau of Forestry, estimated 1886, Sargent published experiment that had been set up eight years the average value of the Hunnewell planta- earlier to test the practicality and longevity tion to be about $400 per acre. When the of catalpa ties: trees were finally cut in 1905, the actual The Boston and gross profit was near $500 per acre. Hall cal- Providence Railway Corpo- ration culated the expense of establishing and began in 1878, at my suggestion, an experiment for the purpose of maintaining the plantation at about $115 per determining the value of different woods for cross ties. acre. Subtracting this figure from the $500 Fifty-two ties were laid on the 12th and 13th leaves a net of $385 acre after gross profit per of December, under the direction of Mr. twenty-five years. George F. Folsom, master carpenter of the cor- Interestingly, almost all of the harvested poration, who has had, from the beginning, trees were made into fence posts, while a few the entire charge of the experiment, in the of the tallest and straightest trees were made mam outward track, at a pomt begmning 775 into telephone poles. According to A. E. feet west of the Tremont Street crossing m Oman, writing in 1911, none of the planta- Boston. The traffic at this point is very heavy, tion trees ever grew big enough to make rail- an average of sixty-five trains passing over road ties. On three other Kansas plantations this track daily. The following ties were laid :- that Oman looked at, totalling approxi- one thousand the was mately acres, story Nos. 1 to 3, American Larch. repeated - plenty of fence posts, a few poles, Nos. 4 to 12, White Oak. and no railroad ties. Nos. 13 to 18, European Larch. While fence posts were not exactly what Nos. 19 to 24, Western Catalpa. had been envisioned when the catalpa plan- Nos. 25 to 30, Ailanthus. tations were set out, they did make a reason- Nos. 31 to 36, Black Spruce. Nos. 37 to Southern able profit for their owners. Unfortunately, 38, Hard Pme. Nos. 39 to White Elm. the twenty to twenty-five years that one had 40, Nos. 41 to 46, Hemlock. to wait for it was too long for most farmers Nos. 47 to 52, Canoe Birch. (and businessmen) to wait. And so corn and wheat were instead of planted catalpa. The catalpa ties were furnished by the late E. Once the mitial publicity blitz for western E. Barney, of Dayton, Ohio, who for many catalpa was started by Barney, planting of the years before his death was zealously engaged 7

m making known the value of the catalpa whole mass of wood under the rail is reduced tree, and the remarkable durability of its nearly to pulp by the separation of the layers wood. of annual growth and the breaking of the fibre. This has so Upon completion of the experiment, Sar- dismtegration penetrated deeply that if the ties, otherwise perfectly gent found that western catalpa had failed to sound, were turned over, the wood which live to its releases: up press would then come under the rail would not The behavior of the catalpa is one of the most have sufficient thickness to hold the spikes. mterestmg features in the experiment.... The pressure, however, to which these ties The catalpa is a soft, light wood, with a spe- have been subjected has been unusually severe, cific gravity of only 0.4165; and it has not and there is nothing m the behavior of these shown its ability to resist the heavy and con- catalpa ties to show that they would not, m stant traffic of the Providence Railroad as well a road with lighter traffic, have stood for a as white oak and other heavier and harder number of years, and resisted as well and woods. The two catalpa ties taken from the probably better than ties made from any other track in October, 1885, that is, after four years equally soft and less durable wood. and eight months’ service, are perfectly sound except under the direct bearing of the rails. Sargent concluded that white oak made These had cut down mto the wood to the the best ties of any of the species included in depth of five-eighths of an mch, while the his experiment. He noted, however, that

A view from beneath of the coarse branch structure of Catalpa speciosa. Photograph by Peter Del Tredici 8

The two Catalpa speciosa trees received as plants m 1886 from Robert Douglas of Waukegan, Illmois. The trees are now about fifty-five feet tall. Photograph by Peter Del Tredici. 9

American chestnut, which unfortunately scape plant in the proper location. It is not was not tested, was to be preferred because a good shade or street tree because of all the it allowed the spikes to be removed more litter it drops. But m a parkland situation, easily than did white oak, when the time where the tree can develop as a specimen, its came to move or change the rails. showy flowers, distinctive foliage, and unique Yet even this clear statement of the facts growth habit can add considerable interest to seems to have gone unheeded, as John P. the landscape. In addition, its tolerance of Brown of Chicago, editor of Arbonculture, poor, sandy soils, as well as of soils that are continued to advocate in his journal the periodically inundated with water, makes planting of catalpa for railroad ties well into the tree ideal for planting in habitats that the 1900s. A very high percentage of the early have been badly disturbed or where spring numbers of Arboriculture were devoted flooding is a problem. exclusively to the "wonders" of hardy catalpa. Catalpa also does well in cities. In down- Brown’s efforts, like Barney’s twenty years town London, for example, Catalpa bignon- earlier, no doubt greatly stimulated the ioides is widely planted and seems to grow planting of the tree. quite well. When I asked an English horti- culturist why this was so, given that I hadn’t Legitmate Uses for Catalpa seen it anywhere in the countryside, he replied that downtown London was the only All of this is not to say that the widespread place in England hot enough in summer for planting of Catalpa speciosa was a mistake catalpa to grow. It’s an odd twist of fate that to be regretted. To the contrary, the plant a tree considered a weed by many in the contributes sigmficantly to the beauty and United States should be a in of the whether in pampered prize diversity countryside, England. flower or m leaf. Belongmg to a family of plants that is primarily tropical, the Bignon- wceae, it adds an exotic appearance to eastern Bibliography and midwestern roadsides. Two stately speci- mens of at the Arnold Catalpa speciosa Barney, E. E. Facts and Information m Relation to the Arboretum (2776-A and 2776-B) show just Catalpa ’ll~ee (Catalpa bignonioides) Its Value, how spectacular the tree can be when grown and Importance of Its Extensive Cultivation m as a specimen. They were received in 1886, Groves. Dayton, Ohio: Privately printed, 1878 26 one hundred as from pages exactly years ago, plants Addmonal Facts and in Relation the of Information "Johnny Appleseed" hardy catalpa, to the Catalpa Catalpa bignonioides) and Its Robert Douglas of Waukegan, Illinois. Tow- Vanety? Speciosa. Dayton, Ohio Pnvately pnnted, ering above the lilac collection, they are both 1879. 36 pages. about fifty-five feet tall with very straight Brown, John P The hardy American forest tree. Arbor- trunks thirty-two and thirty-five inches in iculture, Volume 2, Number 1, pages 97-133 (Jan- with uary 1903). diameter, respectively. Dripping long Douglas, Robert. The new hardy catalpa. Woods and pods agamst the wmter sky, they make a par- Forests, Volume 1, Number 40, page 566 (Sep- ticularly dramatic impression. Nearby is a tember 3, 1884/. specimen of Catalpa bignonioides (12926-A) Elwes, Henry J., and Augusrine Henry The ’Ilees of Great Bntam c’~J Ireland. Seven volumes. Edm- planted m 1891, that is forty-three feet tall, burgh. Privately printed, 1906-1913. 1,933 pages. with a broad crown and a short trunk twenty (Volume 6, pages 1483-1485./( mches in diameter. Hall, William L., and Herman von Schrenk. The Hardy The hardy catalpa can be a superb land- Catalpa. I The Hardy Catalpa m Commercial 10

Plantations. Bulletin 37, Bureau of Forestry, U.S. Department of Agriculture. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1902. 58 pages. Hunnewell, Hollis Horatio. Life, Letters, and Diary of Horauo Hollis Hunnewell. Three volumes. Boston: Privately printed, 1906. Oman, A. E. Hardy catalpa: A study of conditions m Kansas plantations. Proceedmgs of the Society of Amencan Foresters, Volume 6, Number 1, pages 42-52 / 1911~. Sargent, Charles Sprague. Some Additional Notes Upon ~ees and ’ll~ee Planting m Massachusetts. Boston: Wnght & Potter, 1886. 21 pages. -. The Silva of North America. Fourteen volumes. Boston and New York: Houghton and Mifflin, 1891-1902. (Volume 6: Ebenaceae-Polygona- ceae, pages 83-91.)

Peter Del Tredici, assistant plant propagator for the Arnold Arboretum, wntes often on horticultural sub- jects for Arnoldia and Horticulture magazmes. Not long ago, published his book, St George and the Pygmies, a study of Tsuga canadensis ‘Mmuta’.

A Word about the Cover Artist and Her Work

Amoldia is privileged to have for the cover of this issue an elegant watercolor painting of Catalpa speciosa by the distinguished botamcal artist, Esther Hems of Marblehead, Massachusetts. Together with some sixty-seven other equally superb watercolors, this painting will be published during the spring of 1987 by Harry N. Abrams, Inc., of New York City under the title, Flowenng Tl~ees and Shrubs. Educated at the Massachusetts College of Art and the School of Vision, Salzburg, Austria, Esther Heins studied painting with Ernest L. Major and Oskar Kokoshka. Her work has been displayed m many exhibitions, mcluding three one-woman exhibitions. Paintings by her are part of the permanent collections of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, the Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation, Pittsburgh; and the Boston Public Library. Previously, her work has been published by Horticulture, Arnoldia, JAMA (the ~oumal of the Amencan Medical Association/, and the Hunt Institute, among others. Arnoldia is pleased agam to share Mrs. Hems’s work with its readers.

Corrections

Because of an editor’s error, the captions for Daphne odora ’Ringmaster’ and D. odora ’Zmko Nishiki’ (Amoldia, Volume 45, Number 2, Spring 1985, page 14) were transposed. Amoldia regrets the error.

Through an oversight, Theodore R. Dudley’s name was absent from the list of Amencan members of the 1980 Smo-Amencan Botanical Expedition given on page 13 of Arnoldia, Volume 45, Number 4, Fall 1985. Dr. Dudley, Research Botanist at the U. S. National Arboretum, who was especially mterested m Chinese species of Ilex and Viburnum during the Expedition, informs Amoldia that the painting printed on page 16 of that issue and attnbuted to "an unknown artist" was m fact done by Xm Ke-~mg of the Creation Group of the Bureau of Culture, En-shi Xian ("County"), Hubei provmce. Arnoldia thanks Dr. Dudley for havmg passed this mformanon along. Prunus maackii, the Friends’s Plant Dividend for 1986 Gregory j. Waters Friends of the Arnold Arboretum receive the exceptionally cold-hardy Amur chokecherry as a benefit of membership All members of the Friends of the Arnold garden in St. Petersburg (now called Lenin- Arboretum will be receiving ready-to-plant grad). This was the first recorded introduc- seedlings of Prunus maackii in late April or tion of the species into the United States. early May, as this year’s plant dividend. In Prunus maackii was not introduced into mid-April, staff members and volunteers Britain until 1910. working in the Dana Greenhouses shipped Though the Amur chokecherry produces the six- to twelve-inch seedlings by U.S. small racemes of white flowers (see the back mail. Recipients who live farther north than cover of this issue of Arnoldia) and pea-size Boston will be pleased to learn that the spe- dark-purple , the main ornamental cies is hardy to at least minus 35 degrees attraction is its bark. Golden brown and Fahrenheit. Unfortunately, Prunus maackii glossy, it peels off in thin strips when mature. does not perform well south of Zone 6 owing Lit by afternoon sun or seen against a back- to the stresses of summer heat. drop of snow, the beautiful bark of Prunus The common name, Amur chokecherry, maackii is an unforgettable sight. refers to the species’s native habitat along Few Friends of the Arboretum can have the Amur River in northeastern China (Man- missed the prominent pondside planting of churia) and southeastern Soviet Union. Prunus the species adjacent to the new Bradley Rose maackii is native to parts of as well. The Flora of the U.S.S.R. states that Prunus maackii occurs in the "[t]aiga, mixed forests, rare in conifer forests and even more rare in purely broad-leaved forests, often on moun- tain slopes, in illuminated sites, along streams, forest edges and clearings, and coarse rock taluses." Its history at the Arnold Arboretum goes back 108 years, to 1878, when the Arboretum was in its infancy. During the summer of that year, the Arboretum’s first director, Charles Sprague Sargent, and were actively consulting with Frederick Law Olmsted on the preliminary plans for incor- porating the Arboretum mto the City of A close-up ghmpse of the shmy bark of Prunus maackn, showing how it charactensucally peels away m thin Boston’s park system. That year, plants of sheets. Photograph by Hamson L. Flint. From the Prunus maackii arrived from the botanic Archives of the Arnold Arboretum. 12

Ttvo snow-covered specimens of Prunus maackn m the Arnold Arboretum Photograph by Albert W. Bussemtz. From the Archives of the Arnold Arboretum.

Garden. These trees are descendants of seeds of equal parts of sand and perlite, and kept in collected by the Russian botanist B. V. the humid atmosphere of a mist bench or Skvortzov from a forest east of Harbin, Man- enclosed m a plastic bag, the cuttings should churia, on September 19, 1939. Skvortzov have roots within ten to twelve weeks. sent the seed to the United States Plant Intro- Seedlings should be kept cool until they duction Station at Glenn Dale, Maryland, in are planted outdoors, preferably in mid-May. January 1940, where they were assigned They should be planted in sites with mod- Plant Introduction Number 135617 and erate to full sun, m well drained soil. Young planted. In 1961, scion material from the trees should be staked for the first two or Plant Introduction Station trees was sent to three years so that their shallow roots can the Arnold Arboretum, where it was grafted become firmly established. onto Prunus serrulata rootstalk and given Pruning and controlling insects and dis- Accession Number 388-61. Vegetative cut- eases should be easy with the Amur choke- tings from these grafted trees yielded the . During the early years, structural trees we have today. Because of their distinc- pruning performed in late winter corrects the tive glossy bark, which can be viewed year tree’s naturally small branching angles and round, they are among the most commented- improves its overall shape. Proper care and upon trees in the Arboretum. maintenance keep insect and disease prob- The Arboretum’s records indicate that lems to a minimum. Prunus maackii can be propagated by seeds, cuttings, and grafts. (See Alfred J. Fordham’s detailed article on the propagation of Prunus maackii below.) Perhaps the easiest method Gregory J. Waters has worked as a horticulturist m Hol- of propagation for the general gardener would land, England, and Pennsylvama, and at the Arnold where he has been an mtern m both be to take semi-hardwood stem cuttings in Arboretum, plant propagation and horticulture. Currently a graduate stu- and to treat them with an 0.8 per- mid-July dent m ornamental horticulture at Cornell University, cent indolebutyric acid dip or with an equally he has previously wntten for Horticulture and Amencan strong powder. Placed in a rooting medium Nurseryman, as well as for Amoldia Notes and Quotes on the History and Origins of the Amur Chokecherry (Prunus maackii)

Maackii, amurensis, ussuriensis-these and many yards away. A very happy and mstruc- certain other specific epithets, or variants of tive combination is obtained by the planting of P P. and the natme P. sero- them, appear m the scientific names of many maackm, padus same the specimens in the Living Collections of the tma in the group, thus having Russian, and Amencan Bird Arnold Arboretum. There is even a genus European, , no two of which flower together. Maackia, the type species of which is Maackia When asked as to seeds, Mr Egan said it was amurensis. All are linked a that by story very hard to get as the birds carried them all combines with the inter- plant exploration off. There is compensation m this, however, national intrigue and politics of a century for we noticed the young trees coming up and a quarter ago, intrigue and politics that spontaneously m the vicinity presumably led to the discovery, and eventually to the from seed carned by birds. cultivation, of Prunus maackm, the Amur It would appear from other cultivated chokecherry. How? Perhaps the comments trees of P maackm, that it does not bloom made in Horticulture magazine in 1912 by for at least twelve years from seed; we find the Midwestern horticulturist, E. O. Orpet, that this is so with specimens here in Lake Forest and in Lake Geneva, but after they do give us the best excuse to explore the issues begin, it is a contmual May Day feast, and surrounding the origins of Prunus maackii. we doubt not that in the future, when better wrote as follows: Orpet known, Prunus maackii will figure in the landscape to a marked degree. The writer is Prunus maackii free to confess personally that not in ten years has any tree or shrub made as great an Surprises come to all of us who have eyes to impression at first sight, hence the present see, and the other day when visiting Mr. note. William Constantme Egan at "Egandale," The first week m November last, Mr. his estate m Highland Park, Illinois, by Dunbar pointed out in Highland Park, Roch- invitation to see his "Russian May Day" ester, N. Y., Lomcera maackm in fruit, trees m full bloom, it was a revelation bearing as profuse as we see it in L. mor- indeed, and yet a puzzle to explam how it is rows, m August. There are few shrubs that so good a thmg, with all the help Mr. fruiting in November, and this had a very Egan has given it m the way of publicity, distinct decorative value. We have young should be practically unknown m cultiva- plants now raised from a few seeds gathered tion, certainly unhsted m catalogues, and at that time, but this again is a plant we do given only scant notice m Bailey’s Cyclo- not find in catalogues; m other words it pedia. can’t be bought. The trees with Mr. Egan are rapid m It appears that there was once a Maackia growth, with perfect pendulous habit for a amurensis, now reduced to Cladrastis. The specimen or lawn tree, and they are m full three plants under note are from Mand- bloom with the shad-bush, which most of schuna, and were described by Ruprecht. We us regard as the harbmger of the flowering are wondering who Maack was. Perhaps trees. The whole tree was covered with the some one from the Arboretum can tell us. spikes of bloom, these bemg as large as and In this particular year when we are all much more abundant than our Prunus sero- talking about hardmess or otherwise of all tina, and the sweet fragrance can be noticed outdoor thmgs, it is good to be able to report 14 15

so favorably on a seemingly new tree, origi- foliage and young branches, while those of nally distributed by Prof. J. L. Budd of Ames, this plant are quite glabrous and show no Iowa, and said to be the hardiest farthest north trace of the glandular dots which cover the of all Chemes with a very marked horticul- under surface of the leaves of that species. tural value as a decorative tree. While they might have failed to see the by -Excerpted from Horticulture, then decades-old Garden and Forest article, Volume 15, Number 21 (May Orpet and Egan no doubt did see a much later 25, 1912), page 755. one-which may also have been written by the Bulletin A Case of Misplaced Enthusiasm? Sargent-in of Popular Infor- mation (now called Arnoldia~, in 1917, though Messrs. Orpet and Egan, among others, chances are they already knew the unhappy would have been chagrined to read the fol- truth it revealed. In the later article, an anon- lowing information in an article by Charles ymous author confesses, m describing a spec- Sprague Sargent that was published in Garden imen of Prunus padus var. commutata in the and Forest in 1888. Discussmg a very-early- Arboretum’s collections, that flowering variety of Prunus padus (like Prunus The seed from which this was raised maackii a bird cherry from ), Sar- plant was sent from the Botamc Garden at Petro- gent reported that a specimen m the Arbo- retum’s collections grad [Leningrad] m 1878, mcorrectly as Prunus Maackm, under which name the was raised from seed sent many years ago to young plants were distributed from the the Arnold Arboretum from the St. Peters- Arboretum, and as Prunus Maackii it is still burg [Leningrad] garden as Prunus Maackii, cultivated and much esteemed m some Illi- a Manchurian Bird Cherry, with pubescent nois gardens.

Maackia amurensis var. buergen m the Arnold Arboretum. Left: habit, nght: close-up of leaves and an mflorescence. Maackia is one of the many plant taxa named after Richard K Maak. Photograph by Herbert W. Gleason From the Archives of the Arnold Arboretum.

Opposite. Drawing of the leaves and an mflorescence of Prunus maackm From Flora Sylvatica Koreana, by Takenoshm Nakai (Part 5, 1916). 16

The Arboretum’s records on the seeds sent Richard Karlovich Maak from Leningrad seem to be lost. In 1915, how- The Great Soviet Encyclopaedia states that ever, it did receive "Seed" of Prunus padus Richard Karlovich Maak was "Born Aug. 23 var. commutata from none other than E. O. 1825, in Arensburg, present-day Orpet of Lake Forest, Illinois. No doubt there (Sept. 9), Kingissepp, Estonian SSR; died Nov. 13 (25), had been an interesting exchange of letters 1886, in St. Petersburg." He was, the Ency- between him and Sargent in the three years clopaedla continues, a "Russian naturalist since his piece on "Prunus maackii" had and explorer of Siberia and the Far East." (In appeared in Horticulture. The Arnold Arbo- English translation, the Encyclopaedia ren- retum did receive three authentic plants of ders the surname "Maak," not "Maack" as Prunus maackii from Leningrad in 1878, most other sources do.)( however, one of which survived until 1946, "In 1853, Maak took part in the expedition when it had to be removed because it was in which first described the condition. orography, geology, poor and of the basin of the Viliui, the two taxa can be dis- population Fortunately, easily and Chona rivers" the work tinguished from each other. The following Olekma, great continues. "He studied the valleys of the chart should help expose any specimens of Amur (1855-56) and Ussun (1859) rivers." An Prunus padus var. commutata still masquer- account of Maak’s work in the Amur valley, ading as Prunus maackii:

Puteshestvie na Amur, sovershennoe po ras- poriazheniiu Sibirskogo otdela Russkogo geograficheskogo obshcheskogo obshchestva v 1855 godu, was published m St. Petersburg in 1859. The title is usually given in English as Journey to Amur in 1855. Here, at least in brief outline, is an answer to E. O. Orpet’s query. Emil Bretshneider, the Russian biographer, tells us more. Maak, he says, studied natural sciences at the St. Peters- burg University, took his degree of Candi- date, m 1849, and m 1852 was appomted Professor of Natural Sciences at the Gym- nasmm of Irkutsk. Subsequently he became Director of that Gymnasium, and from 1868 The leaves of Prunus maackm Photograph from the to 1879, he was Supenntendent of all schools Archives of the Arnold Arboretum. m Eastern Siberia. He died at St. Petersburg, 17

November 13, 1886. Russians began to colonize the area again in Maak described his first expedition down the Nineteenth Century. Richard Maak, the the Amur and back m a book entitled: botanist, was part of that second wave. IOURNEY ON THE AMUR, IN 1855 (in Rus- sian), published in 1859, accompamed with Enter Perry McDonough Collins an Atlas containing maps, views and draw- ings of plants. Only a few months after Richard Maak The expedition left Irkutsk in April 1855, explored the Amur River, an American, Perry and proceeded by the ordmary way to Ner- McDonough Colhns, having travelled the chmsk. Here, at the discharging of the length of eastward from Moscow, Nercha into the Shilka, they found a great drifted down the Amur on a barge provided raft prepared for them, on which they by Siberian officials, the first American to embarked on the 5th of May. Albazin, May navigate the Amur from its source to its 26, stay till 31st.-On August 8, the expe- mouth. A businessman and Col- dition arrived at the post Marinsk, near the promoter, Kidzi Lake and remained there till August lins had managed to get himself appointed 14. Then back up the Amur River, reached the official "American Commercial Agent to Aigun October 11, spent a month there. On the Amoor River." Attracted by the poten- November 12, started on horse back, for the tialities he saw for American trade in the Amur was frozen, following the river valley. Amur region, he went there to see for him- Ust December Irkutsk Strelka, 30, January self, and on behalf of the United States gov- 16, 1856. ernment. Like other Americans of the time, As on this river journey frequent stops Collins was afflicted with "Russian fever." were made, sometimes for several days, Eventually, the era of good feeling between Maak had a favourable opportumty for the United States and Russia would be making botamcal and zoological collec- the sale of "Russian America" tions. The plants gathered by him m the capped by to the United States in 1867. Amur valley, in 1855, were determmed and (Alaska) In an described by Maximowicz m his Pnmitiae account of his travels, prepared for Florae Amurensis. the United States Congress (A Voyage Down the Amoor, origmally published in 1857, and The Amur River reprinted by the University of Wisconsin Press in 1962 under the title, Siberian Journey: The Amur River (Hei-lung Chiang in Chinese) Down the Amur to the Pacific, 1856-1857), is a river of eastern Asia that forms the Collins captured a moment of change in ’present border between the Soviet Union and czarist Russia’s eastward expansion and China or (Manchuria, Heilongjiang). Flowing development of Siberia. Fresh from the devel- generally southeastward, the Amur is nearly opmg frontier of his own country, Collins 1,800 miles in length. (Counting thee saw Russian activities in the Amur region Shilka-Onon system, the Amur would be through approving eyes. "Siberia is compara- 2,700 miles in length.) It did not always form tively a free country," he wrote. the frontier between the two countries, how- There are no landed no serfdom. ever. Before 1858, when China ceded all lands proprietors, The land to the and is north of the Amur and east of the Ussuri belongs Crown, given to the settlements or m the rivers to Russia the of the villages country by Treaty Aigun, or to individuals in cities. Public sentiment Chinese claimed both of its banks. Russians and speech are quite free also; in fact, the had first reached the Amur area in the Sev- rems of government seem to set lightly on enteenth but the Ner- Century, by Treaty of her people. The people are hardy and robust, chinsk (1689) had yielded it to the Chinese. accustomed, like our own frontiersmen, to 18

a rough and active life, have the rifle and Maackia was among the new taxa, as was the use it well, as the mountains of furs and species Prunus maackii. It was the year after skins seen in the cities and market-towns Maak’s first expedition to "Amur-land" that fully attest. China, in the city of Aigun, relinquished all Collins described the mighty Amur in claim to territory north of the Amur and east terms any American could have understood: of the Ussuri. Two years later (1860), Russia established the town of Vladivostok at the The river is truly a grand one, and since we southeasternmost of its passed the Zea, more and more resembling extremity newly the Mississippi, and since we passed the Son- secured territory. gahree, and now the Ousuree [Ussuri], in many places with its cut and crumbling Professor Sargent & Son in Amur-land and the muddiness shores, falhng-in timber, Professor Charles of its waters, and its huge sandbars, the Forty-three years later, resemblance has become almost perfect. Sprague Sargent, the first director of the From the Songahree the Amoor is certainly Arnold Arboretum-accompanied by his son, a more considerable river in breadth than the A. Robeson Sargent, and the naturalist-writer, Mississippi below the mouth of the Ohio. John Muir of California-travelled to the The expanse of water, the numerous islands, Amur region in search of plants. They left and the many navigable chutes, some of them the United States on May 29, 1903, on a six- thirty miles in extent, must give it more month around-the-world tour, arriving in breadth than the As for Mississippi. distance, Russia on August 1st and the Amur region a above the Ousuree the river is divided into dozen days later. The journey went well for two parts, one-the right-usually navigated, the most until the travellers arrived in into which falls the Ousuree, deep, and about part Manchuria and Siberia. had to the size of the Ohio; the other, broad and There, they filled with islands, bars, and chutes, certainly spend days at a time on hot, crowded trains, unable even to their clothes. The as large as the Mississippi above Memphis, change food and looking very like it. was abominable; at Harbin, Manchuria, Muir developed a severe case of food poisoning. Charles who edited the 1962 Vevier, These hardships, plus a profound difference of Collins’s summarized the reprinting book, of temperament between Muir and the elder political situation of the Amur region during Sargent that intensified during the trip, the 1850s in the clear terms: "Eco- following prompted Muir to strike out alone once the nomic in this unknown opportunity region party had escaped Siberia and Manchuria. A ... was in a Russian fist which grasped now, newspaper interview with Robeson Sargent after some two hundred of years negotiation, and private accounts of the trip by Muir had unclenched, spreading its fingers over follow. the Amur region, the Ussuri River area east to the Pacific coast, Northern China, Sak- Prof. Sargent Garners Rare Specimens of halin, and Japan." There was at least one Eastern Flora benign result of Russia’s thrust into eastern Asia, a flood of plant material new to botany His Recent Expedition to Russia, and and horticulture. Richard Maak alone dis- Through Siberia, Will Be of Vast Benefit to Plant Collection at Arnold Arboretum covered forty-two new taxa in the Amur and Ussuri river valleys on the two expeditions Prof. Sargent, of the Arnold Arboretum, he made to the region during the 1850s, the has just retumed from a 6 mos.’ tour of first in 1855, the second in 1859. The genus Russia and Siberia. 19

The journey was undertaken by Prof. The party left New York May 29, and Sargent for the purpose of securing an entered the land of the czar Aug. 1. exhaustive collection of tree and plant spec- Several weeks were devoted to the Cnmea, imens, and m this arduous task he was where the younger Sargent was charmed assisted by his son, A. R[obeson]. Sargent, with the landscape effects of the gardens the landscape architect. attached to the imperial palace, pron- More than 8000 bulbs, seeds and roots ouncing them surpassed only by the craft of were the result of the expedition, and while the Italian landscape gardener. it will require many months for develop- "The most superb thing m nature that ment to reveal the exact value of the collec- Russia had to offer," said he, tion, the professor is sure that many rare was the voluptuous floral display of Mt Kasbek, of eastern flora have been specimens gath- a spur of the Caucasus range, where 10,000 ft ered and the success of this mission is a above the sea level the luxurious profusion of question beyond cavil. wild flowers was astoundmg.

Perry McDonough Collms’s map of Amur River basin as it was when he made his tnp through the area m 1857 An Amencan, Collins floated down the 1,800-mile waterway on a barge a year or two after the Russian botamst Richard K. Maak made the same tnp on a raft, discovenng, among other plants, Prunus maackn. (Amur is spelled ‘Amoor" on Collms’s map. The Amur reminded Collins of the Mississippi, and its tnbutary the Ussun ("Ousuree" on Collms’s map), of the Ohio. China, by the Treaty of Aigun ("Igoon" here), ceded all lands north of the Amur and east of the Ussun to Russia m 1858 (An "X" has been added to mdicate the location of Haerbm, Manchuna, from which B. V. Skvortzov sent seeds of Prunus maackn to the U.S. Plant Introduction Station m 1940 Map courtesy of the Boston Athenaeum. 20

Every conceivable color was there to be found, Everybody smokes, the women usmg the cig- and yet the blendmg was m such perfect har- arette and, though I am admsed that universal mony that It consdtuted a color scheme well discontent prevails, the people present an air of worth cultrvaung m landscape gardemng, and silent sausfacuon one scarcely credW able to accident alone The edyces are mostly block houses cvWh My one ambruon is to reproduce the effect m thatched roofs America Lmmg is expensme, though rmlway fares are We entered Siberia by way of the Chita branch ndiculously cheap of the railway and spent 28 mghts upon the tram, The better class of Russian women are the dunng 10 of which we did not remove our handsomest m the world, but the military offl- clothmg, ocvmg to the miserable sleepmg car cers do not present so fine an appearance as do accommodauons those of the German and Austnan armies In Russia every traveler takes his bed clothmg Aside from the novelty and pleasure which the cvW him, and through ignorance of this custom tnp afforded, I feel that the benefit which will we found ourselves m a sorry phght Often wheze thereby accrue to the study of trees and plants beddmg could not be hired, we were compelled is of mcalculable value to dnve the streets all mght -Boston Evening Record, I was impressed with the vast forests and December 29, 1903. broad steppes of Srbena. and as we sped over the Armor R R., the ongmal one of the country, we Muir’s accounts consist of a letter to passed many trams filled with Russian convicts John They were crowded into small box cars, hghted his wife, Louisa ("Louie"), which he wrote in with tmy barred and grated windows Vladivostok, and hastily scribbled entries in At Harbm, rn Manchuna, we found the Rus- his These a vivid and sran government was secretly mobihzmg her diary. give decidedly troops, and everybody professed behef m the per- more candid picture of the unhappy condi- manent occupancy of that country by the czar’s tions under which the party travelled than mmions Harbm is a new town and tenanted by did the account. Both the letter soldiers and Russian offic~als exclusively The newspaper most mteresung town m Manchuna is Kabavosk and diary excerpts are presented below with [r.e., Khabarovsk], a place of 5000 mhab~tants only minor editing. and delrghtfully situated at the ~unctuze of the Armor and Usan nvers Letter We expected to return from here to Harbm, where the Eastern Chma R R commences, but while en route thrther a bndge went down with Vladivostok Aug. 19, 1903 40 passengers and we were compelled to retrace our steps Dear Louie After many short stops here & Farmmg is quite pnmW ve m Srbena and agn- there we are at last on the Pacific having cultural implements are most crude Wooden crossed the whole vast breadth of Asia, & plows are used and drawn by 12 yokes of oxen now you don’t seem so dreadfully far. We I was pleased to see, however, that Amencan arrived tired implements of agnculture are begmnmg to be yesterday morning very having mtroduced mto the country slept in our clothes the last 8 mghts & the The soil ~s fertile and with proper culuvat~on heat has been trying 80 to 90° in the cars. would the world with wheat supply & miserable uneatable food at the stations Uehicles with 2 wheels are employed exclu- most of Here it is cool- sively and the ox is ubiquitous as a draught the[m]. delightfully beast but the food is very poor. I’m resting today We had ample opportumty to study the people, while the Sargents are out botanizing. I sup- the Russian trader reaches the for usually depot pose we will be here a few days longer. Then several days m advance of the departure of his Sargent wants to [see] the Amour for a day tram and there he sleeps and eats m the depot, or thence back to thence to carrymg his food and beddmg cmth him They two, Harbin, are all disgustedly dirty and wear shoes made of Muken & thence to Pekmg which will pelts and tcmsted tcnnne The beverage is mvan- require 8 to 10 days more of rail riding of ably tea, which is drunk with block bread The most wearisome sort, but with views of nauonal mtoxicant is which is sold by voyaka, wonderful their rocks flora the bottle, the law prohrbrUng its sale by the regions scenery glass, and the purchaser gets glonously drunk people etc by way of compensation. I had thereon. It seems to be made of pure alcohol made up my mind to leave the Sargents here 21

& go to Japan Shanghai, etc as I long for the streets for holes basins pits ridges & peaks cool sea. But Sargent advises very strongly made chiefly of mud. Harbin on its large flat agamst my going off alone & raises all sorts rain again and dark. Left Harbm at 2.30 for of objections, difficulty of arrangmg money Mukden. Ram at 2.45 in rich rolling treeless matters etc. promises not to stay but a day prame like country planted mostly to millet. or two in Pekm or hot, dusty Mukden (suggestive name) So I suppose III go on with 4:30 Bar 700. Same prairie sunflrs millet, him as far as Pekin or Shanghai-where I melons etc. Still dark, ramy, extremly rich hope to hear from you once more. The whole soils gl[acial] mud silt reformed in slow trip has been exceedmgly interesting far water-few clumps of trees on horizon mud more so than anythmg I had read lead me to adobe houses thatch roofs mud corall walls, expect. And now dear wife & babes Heaven some corn. bless you. How glad Ill be to get home. Love 6 P M universal ram Bar 850 Dripping to all. John Muir Chmamen herdmg cattle & horses here and there some with umbrellas. Nearly all cul- Muir’s is even more than diary revealing tivated or m pasture The country is flatter his letter. than 2 hrs ago. All looks like Illinois

Diary 29 aug. Bar 650, cldy. The same prairie & crops. All Chmese horses poor & sore.

12 ... Mr & Son have decided Aug Sargent Groves & smgle trees here & there Willow to the down the Amour on give up voyage poplar tillia [Tiha] or elm mostly not a stone acct of missing todays boat, tho another to be seen Houses mud framework wood. sails m 4 or 5 Would on alone but days. go The whole country beautiful m features of can’t separate.... low swells & ravines with hills dotted with trees m dist. seems to have been cultivated Aug 19. Sargents out while I botamzmg every mch of it time immemorial No mldflrs read & work & rest. Would hke to leave for in it only weeds by waysides & m pastures Japan etc but Sargent wishes to go with him rose colored polygonum the showiest. to on the Amour & thence to Mukden pomt Chmese here keep hogs wh they herd. The Pekm & Shanghai. 2 weeks more of miser- largest ever saw have enormous ears look able rail travel m enfeebled condition very like baby elephants. but I suppose I’ll get thro somehow & I will see more of Manchuria. We are running back to [Kungchuhng]. 3 said to be washed out Aug 20. In house all day resting. bridges ahead.-gomg back all the way to Harbm. Dont know how have to in Aug 21. The sea air reviving. Hope to leave long may wait that filthy place. this eve 9. PM for Kabarovsk.... Sargent seems pleased.

Aug 28. 6 A.M. In broad flat mostly cul- 30 Aug. Still damp and cloudy & running tivated. At Harbm 7 a.m. Bar[ometer] 600 wearily back thru millet fields to Karbm rainy Harbm is situated on river. Flat & will probably get there this P.M. arrived at muddy streets. When dry fill in ruts & smk- 10 a.m Stay here until 3 P M when we again holes the story of sea of mud. Large Govermt go back 200 ms or so mto first mtns to N of bmldings-mtended for large town. like here to botanize. A day or so while wairing many others along the R.R. but Yankee repairs on lme to Port Arthur None knows enterprise sadly wantmg or adventurous when they will be completed. builders of homes. The whole country seems a Government camp. Drive to so-called Start at 3.40 PM ram hazy muggy weather. garden restaurant 5 ms of the most hornble Bar 650 has stood so from when we turned 22

back. At 6 P.M Bar 800 Many on train going The Sargent-Muir Trip in Context this way via Vladivostok to Pt. Arthur, wish Manchuria and the we were but of course Sargent wont & he Siberia, separated by Ussuri became has me in his power Amur and rivers, increasingly the scene of international rivalries between Arive Aug. 31 at station m the mtns 1600 ft the time Maak and Collins, on the one hand, El at daybreak & in pouring rain, Crouch for and the Sargents and Muir, on the other, trav- a while back of brick wall then go to porch elled there. They also became the scene of of restaurant where I lie on bench all day in intense botanical collecting. Frank N. Meyer, terrible after 3 mos of pain. indigestion for instance, was in Siberia and Manchuria cooked food. Start back to abommably in late 1906 and early 1907. He was there horrid Harbin at 4 or 5 P M. Arrive at Sep 1, in late 1912 and 1913. On both 6 AM. After dreadful of I told S. again early night pam. occasions he Harbin and that we wld probably be compelled to go via passed through the of those Vladivostok & Japan after all thus passing Mukden. During first trips also travelled in northern Korea. On 5 times ovr part of road on acct of the broken Meyer bridges. He never seemed to think of me August 21, 1903, he collected a pyramidal sick or well or of my studies only of his own. wild cherry with bright-green foliage that until he feared I might die on his hands and Alfred Rehder of the Arnold Arboretum thus bother him-He was planning another much later named Prunus x meyeri in his botanical trip to some point on the Sungari, honor. (Two days after Meyer made the col- Stmr & me alone at some going by leaving lection, he recorded a killing frost.) Meyer hotel or lodging house. But fortunately reported seeing "Only two or three trees ... learned the R R not be for a might opened the whole northern Korea Mo & that a stmr wld leave Vladivostock on during trip through and two had a few seeds." the 3d or 4th. So back N we went again this only Eve Sept 1. When he described Prunus x meyeri, Rehder had suggested that it might actually Sep 2. Still alive. Morphin to stupify pain be a hybrid. "Prunus Meyeri seems in all its & brandy to hold life. characters intermediate between P. Maackii Rupr. and P. Maximowiczii Rupr.," he wrote Sep 3 arrived at old quarters in Vladivos- in the journal of the Arnold Arboretum in tock at 7 AM. after most of all painful days 1920, "and is probably a hybrid between in this 0 Learn the steamer my experience these species, both of which grow in northern sails at 3 PM. today. Robeson [Sargent] loses Korea and in the same regions, as specimens his passport, & cant buy ticket or leave collected by Mr. [E. H.] Wilson on the country. After big fuss went to Am consul Tumen-Yalu divide on two & under his direction got out papers ena- subsequent days show." bling him to leave-got off at 6 P.M. & now hope to get well. In 1928, the Russian botanist B. V. Skvortzov Ate a little supper & suffer no pain. reported two forms of Prunus maackii, Prunus maackii forma rotunda and Prunus maackii Sep 4 glorious to be free from pain. Arrive forma oblonga, from northern Manchuria, in at San Won [Wonsan] beautiful harbor on the Lingnam Science Journal. In 1939, from Korean coast leave at night ... a forest near Hsiaoling, Manchuria (a town on the Trans-Siberian Railroad through which From Korea, the party went to Japan and the Sargents and John Muir must have passed thence to China. At Shanghai, Muir and the several times in their wanderings), Skvortzov Sargents went their separate ways. collected seeds of Prunus maackii, which he 23

sent to the U. S. Department of Agriculture Summer Monsoons and Prunus maackii and from which came the scions that pro- The Sargent-Muir party chose a very poor duced the trees now in the Arnold growing time of to travel in the Amur River Arboretum. year of Siberia and at least The and Muir travelled in Man- region Manchuria, Sargents from John Muir’s point of view. While they churia during a period of intense rivalry were there (mid-August through early Sep- between Russia and Japan through which tember), the summer monsoon was at its China was drawn to Russia (and Russia to height. On average, ten to sixty times more China) in an alliance against Japan. As part precipitation falls during the summer in the of this Russia had to build the process, begun Amur region than during the winter. In the Trans-Siberian Railroad in 1891, to forge a peak monsoon months of July, August, and link between Vladivostok and Russia proper; September, 70 to 90 percent of a month’s Russia was able to exact from China a total may fall in only five or six days-up to concession that part of the line run through 9.5 inches of it in a single day. A. A. Borisov, Manchuria in order to the Amur protect in Climates of the U. S. S. R., reports that, River frontier. The alliance between Russia "At Vladivostok 386 mm [ 15.3 inches] of pre- and China was vic- strengthened by Japan’s cipitation, 65% of the annual total, fall from tory over China in the Sino-Japanese War in June to September, but only 28 mm (5%) fall 1895. Harbin (or Haerbin) owed its origin to in winter." Summer floods, some of them the construction of the Manchurian section very destructive, are common. During the of the Trans-Siberian Railroad, the "Chinese ripening and harvesting of grain crops, the Eastern over which the Railway," Sargents excessive moisture affects the harvest and Muir travelled. Before 1896, Harbin had adversely. Muir’s "universal rain" seems an been a minor village and market fishing apt description. In the vicinity of Vladi- town; thereafter, it became the construction vostok, a coastal city, the summer monsoon center for the Chinese Eastern Railway. lasts for four to four and one-half Another railroad which the and usually (on Sargents months, inland and northward for shorter Muir also travelled) was built southward periods of time. Contributing also to Muir’s from Harbin to connect it with the Russian- misery was the high humidity, which aver- developed city of Port Arthur (Lushun) on the ages 88 percent during the summer. Winters, Liaotung Peninsula in southern Manchuria. on the other hand, are sunny and dry in the Largely Russian-built, Harbin became a base Amur region; snow cover is thin and persists for Russian military operations in Man- only in the northermost parts of the region. churia during the Russo-Japanese War of Autumns are warm and dry. which broke out soon after the Sar- 1904-05, The climate of Harbin, which is only forty and Muir were in the area. After the gents or so miles northwest of Russian Revolution of Harbin became Xiaoling (Hsiaoling),), 1917, the town where B. V. Skvortzov collected the a haven for Russian refugees; for a time, it seeds he sent to the U. S. Department of was the largest Russian city outside the Agriculture in 1940, is similar to that of Win- Soviet Union. Most likely B. V. Skvortzov nipeg, Canada, as the following table shows: was one of those refugees. 24

While Harbin and Winnipeg receive similar Orpet, E. O. Prunus Maackii. Horticulture, Volume 15, Number 755 amounts of precipitation (577.4 mm [about 21, page (May 25, 1912). [Like Egan, Orpet seems to be referring to Prunus padus var. 23 and 516.9 mm 20 inches] [about inches] commutata.] per year, respectively), the precipitation is Sergeev, L. I., and K. A. Sergeeva. Characteristics of the more evenly distributed from month to annual cycle and the frost resistance of woody month in Winnipeg than it is in Harbin. Win- plants. Proceedings of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR (Botanical Sciences Volume nipeg receives eight times more snow than Secrion), 119, Numbers 1-6, pages 98-100 (1958). [Prunus does Harbin in an winter inches average (50 maackii, Prunus padus, and other trees and versus 6.7 inches). shrubs.]] Prunus maackii does best in moist, well Skvortzow, B. W. [Skvortzov, B. V.I. New plants from drained soil-perhaps reflecting the soaking north Manchuna, Chma. Lmgnam Science Journal, Volume 6, Number 3, pages 205-228 (1928). summer conditions of its native range. And, [Prunus maackm, page 211.] while it seems to be less very cold-hardy, Vanstone, D. E., and W. G. Ronald. Comparison of bare- frost resistant than Prunus padus, another root versus tree spade transplantmg of boulevard early-blooming species. Also, it may not take trees. joumal of Arbonculture, Volume 7, Number to transplanting as well as some other spe- 10, pages 271-274. [Prunus maackii and three other taxa of street cies of tree, at least under certain conditions. trees.] Waters, Gregory J. The Amur chokecherry. Horticulture, Volume 61, Number 2, pages 14-16 (January Acknowledgment 1983). The text of the John Muir letter and of the quotations from John Muir’s journal are pub- lished with the permission of the Muir-Hanna Trust, Holt-Atherton Center for Western Studies, University of the Pacific, Stockton, California. Copyright © 1984 Muir-Hanna Trust.

Sources

Borisov, A. A. Chmates of the U.S S R. Edited by Cyril A. Halstead. Translated by R. A. Ledward. Chi- cago : Aldme, 1985. Bretschneider, E. History of European Botanical Dis- covenes m China. London: Sampson Low, Mar- ston, 1898. Collins, Perry McDonough. Sibenan fourney Down the Amur to the Pacific, 1856-1857 A new edW on of A Voyage down the Amoor. Edited by Charles Vemer. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1962. Egan, William C. Prunus maackn. Gardening, Volume 6, Number 137, page 259 (May 15, 1898). [Egan seems to be referring to Prunus padus var. com- mutata.] Lydolph, Paul E. Climates of the Soviet Union. In ~ World Survey of Chmatology, Volume 7. Amsterdam, Oxford, and New York. Elsevier Scientific, 1977. Propagation of Prunus maackii Alfred j. Fordham The records of the Arnold Arboretum reveal that Prunus maackii is easily propagated by any one of four routine methods

Prunus maackii can be propagated readily by uniform size. To accomplish grafting, the top seeds, cuttings, grafting, or budding. The rec- of the seedling was removed, leaving about ords of the Arnold Arboretum show that two inches of stem above the root system. early in 1961 we received fifteen scions of Scions were about four inches long and con- that species from the United States Plant tained three or four buds. Introduction Service, Glenn Dale, Maryland. The stock and scion were joined by a whip- At the time of year they arrived, grafting and-tongue grafting technique, making cer- would have been the most appropriate method tain the cambial layers of each had as much of propagating them. Prunus avium, com- contact as possible. The two components monly known as mazzard cherry, was listed were then bound with rubber budding strips, as being a suitable rootstock for grafting P. which held them together with relentless maackii but was not available. We were able tension. to get seedlings of P serrulata (Oriental Care after Grafting. When completed on cherry), however; they proved to be excellent March 29th, the grafts were placed in a rootstocks. medium of damp peatmoss on a greenhouse To preserve the scions until we needed bench, making certain that the unions were them, we placed them is a sealed polyethyl- well covered with peatmoss. Bottom heat of ene bag and stored them at 40 degrees Fahr- 70 degrees Fahrenheit was provided. This enheit in a refrigerator. When it is handled m relatively high level of bottom heat leads to this way, woody-plant propagating material rapid callusing and growth. remains viable for many months. It should By May 26th all grafts had succeeded, and be inspected occasionally, however, to make the plants were in excellent growth. They certain it is not too wet or too dry, for either next were transferred to one-gallon cans and condition can cause it to deteriorate. placed on a greenhouse bench where they could be forced, to provide cutting wood for Whip-and-Tongue Grafting with Whole further propagation. Rootstocks Propagation by Cuttings As the name implies, a whole rootstock is the entire root system of a seedling. In By June 22nd, the growth had developed to a autumn, before the ground freezes, seedlings stage where it was ready to provide softwood are dug and placed in a deep frame, refriger- cuttings. Twenty-six cuttings were taken, ator, or cold-storage unit that is cold enough treated with a root-inducing substance con- to keep them dormant, yet warm enough to taining eight milligrams of indolebutyric prevent them from freezmg, so that they will acid m a gram of talc. The cuttings were then be available when they are needed. placed under intermittent mist. By July 14th, In preparation for grafting, roots of the twenty-one of them had developed excellent rootstocks were washed and trimmed to a root systems and were potted. In the Boston 26

area, softwood cuttings taken during about Propagating Prunus maackii by seed the third week of June and placed under mist requires two stages, warm stratification and should root in high percentages. Hardwood refrigeration. Warm stratification is provided cuttings do not root. by placing the container in a warm location, such as a windowsill, for four months. Full Propagation by Seeds sun should be avoided as it could result in overheating. The container is then moved to The natural dispersal of cherry seeds is a 40 degree Fahrenheit refrigerator for three largely accomplished by birds. As fruits of months. Thus prepared, the seeds should ger- Prunus maackii soften, ripen, they becoming minate rapidly. shiny black and attractive to birds. Since birds have no teeth, their food; they gulp Propagation by Budding therefore, the hard-coated seeds pass un- harmed throught their digestive systems and Budding is an inexpensive way to propagate are scattered about the countryside in drop- Prunus maackii, requiring neither the facili- pings. Prunus maackii fruits ripen around ties nor skill, nor the meticulous aftercare, July 1st and must be watched carefully and that grafting does. It is economical of propa- collected before birds can get to them. gating material, since only one bud is needed Nursery practice when dealing with Prunus to produce a propagant. maackii follows the chain of events as they To prepare for budding, line seedlings out occur in nature: the fruits are collected, their in spring, spacing them about four inches pulps removed, and the cleaned seeds then apart in rows about twenty inches apart. sown out-of-doors in prepared beds, where They are ready for budding in the summer of they are protected from rodents. The seeds their second growing season, when buds are of Prunus maackii, like those of many Tem- inserted. The buds remam inserted until the perate Zone woody plants, have dorman- next spring, when, before growth com- cies-protective "barriers" that prevent them mences, the stocks are cut off just above the from germinating at times that would be buds. unfavorable to the survival of the resulting seedlings. When the seeds are collected, cleaned, and sown without delay, seasonal Alfred J Fordham was affiliated with the Arnold Arbor- overcome the barriers and changes germina- etum for forty-eight years, retiring m 1977 as research tion occurs in spring. horticulturist. A member of many professional socie- An alternative, and simple, method of ties, he has received numerous awards for his research overcoming dormancy is to provide artificial on plant propagation. "seasons." A polyethylene bag makes an ideal container for this purpose. The seeds are combined with a dampened medium of sand, peat moss, or such. The volume of the medium should not be more than three to four times that of the seeds. Keeping the bulk small is important, for at sowing time the entire content of the bag is sown. Twisting the top of the bag and binding it with a rubber band makes it vapor-proof for the full pre- treatment period. Japanese Honeysuckle: From "One of the best" to Ruthless Pest

Richard A. Hardt

Slow to escape from cultivation when introduced, Japanese honeysuckle has become an aggressive and tenacious weed that should be used only with great caution

Lonicera japonica-flowers white changing to yellow, dehclously fragrant, borne in great profusion m the summer and occasionally m autumn. Grand for trelhses and ground cover. One of the best. -Biltmore Nursery Catalog, Biltmore, North Carolina (1912), page 99.

Lonicera japonica ... a pernicious and dangerous weed, often overwhelmmg and strangling the native flora. -Common Weeds of the Umted States, by the Agncultural Research Sermce, U.S. Department of Agnculture (1971), page 358.

[A] network of tangled cords that covers the ground wherever this ruthless mvader gets a foot hold.

-"The ~apanese honeysuckle m the eastern United States," by E. F Andrews, Torreya, Volume 19, Number 3 (March 1919J, page 39

I was born and raised in the southern Pied- setts, Connecticut, southern New York, and mont of Maryland, where Japanese honey- Ohio. In the northern part of its range it is suckle (Lonicera japonica Thunb.) is not the vigorous pest it is elsewhere because ’ubiquitous. At an early age I despised it for its early growth is killed by late spring frosts. smothering my woodland clearings and have Long Island and Cape Cod, where it is locally killed countless of its vines with a deter- dominant, seem to be its northern limits as rmned hatred. Yet I have always been delighted a pest. It is a serious pest as far west as by the smell of its flowers on summer eve- Indiana and southern Illinois, however, nings and the taste of its nectar licked off a becoming rarer westward and disappearing pulled stamen. altogether m central Kansas. Japanese honey- Introduced into the United States in 1806 suckle ranges southward to central Florida, as an ornamental, Lonicera japonica escaped being absent from the subtropical part of that from cultivation and eventually became nat- state. uralized throughout the eastern part of the The commonly planted (and escaped) plant country, where it is now an important com- is Lonicera japonica ’Halliana; Hall’s honey- ponent of the flora as far north as Massachu- suckle. Introduced by George Hall to Par- 28

sons’s Nursery of Flushing, New York, in early part of the century. After the Civil War, 1862, it differs from the species only in its many farmers in the East abandoned their more vigorous growth. In the eighth edition land. Abandoned fields, as they pass into the of Gray’s Manual of Botany, Merritt Lyndon shrub stages of ecological succession, are Fernald does not recognize it as a legitimate ideal habitat for Japanese honeysuckle. A botanical variety. A common item in turn- combination of these factors, and others, of-the-century nursery catalogs, Hall’s may best explain the long delay between the honeysuckle is still very much available in date of the species’s introduction and the the trade. first reports of its escape. A ban on honeysuckle at an early stage, Slow To Escape from Cultivation coupled with a campaign to eradicate it, might have kept it within bounds, though It is difficult to pinpoint when Lonicera there seems to be no precedent for success japonica began to escape from cultivation, with this sort of effort. In any event, it is now but it apparently did so in the 1890s, becoming too late to do anything about it. Japanese naturalized over most of its present range is a naturalized member of our within It have honeysuckle thirty years. may escaped flora. before 1890, however, but was uncommon and not recognized when encountered. Alvan Chapman did not list it in his Flora of the Southern United States (1884), nor did Asa Gray in the sixth edition of his Manual of Botany (1889). and Addison Brown gave the first evidence for its escape, in 1898, reporting Lonicera japonica as freely escaped from southern New York and Pennsylvania to North Carolina and West Virginia in their Illustrated Flora of thee Northern United States and Canada (1896-1898). By 1903, it was reported from Florida and, in 1918, from Texas. Why did it take more than eighty years for Japanese honeysuckle to escape? Birds disseminate its seeds. Perhaps it took them some time to recognize honeysuckle berries as a source of food. The birds may even have had to develop a taste for the ber- ries. Even today, when the berries are widely and dependably available, birds eat them sparmgly. On the other hand, Japanese honeysuckle may have spread slowly because there was little suitable habitat for it until the latter part of the Nineteenth Century. Cultivated land is not suitable for and honeysuckle, Flowers of Lomcera japonica. Photograph by Albert W. most mesic sites were under the plow in the Bussewitz. 29

A "most pernicious and dangerous weed" idly. The usually dry and objective Gray’s Manual of Botany (eighth edition/, describes of when it did, in fact, escape, Regardless it as Japanese honeysuckle quickly exhibited its darker side. By 1919, it had locally become a a most pernicious and dangerous weed, over- pest. E. F. Andrews, writing in the March whelming and strangling the native flora 1919 issue of Torreya, reported that "it is no and most difficult to eradicate, extensively uncommon thing to see acres upon acres planted and encouraged by those who do not value the ... buried under the rank growth of this rapidly destroyed indigenous veg- aggressive invader." Government documents etation.... (Unfortunately natzd. from Asia). tell the same story: The Eradication of Wild U. S. of Honeysuckle, by L. W. Kephart (1939); Meanwhile, Department Agricul- ture were recommending its use Honeysuckle Is a Serious Problem, by T. C. publications Nelson (1953); and the ominously titled, and suggesting planting methods. Nursery catalogs contained glowing accounts of it. Honeysuckle or Treesl, by E. V. Brender and But the most note came C. S. Hodges (1957). Ammosity towards Jap- perhaps disturbing from Ernest H. Wilson’s classic, Aristocrats anese honeysuckle apparently developed rap- of the Garden (page 67):

Hall’s semi-evergreen Japan Honeysuckle (Lomcera japonica, var. Halhana) needs no comment....

On the contrary, "Japan Honeysuckle" requires considerable comment, discussion, and consideration. Why is Japanese honeysuckle so vigorous and aggressive in the eastern United States? Let us consider these traits separately, definuig "vigor" as a high growth rate and "aggres- sion" as domination of other plants by direct competition. (Honeysuckle’s aggression is, of course, dependent upon its vigor. Only a vigorous plant can be aggressive. But other botanical characteristics besides vigor make honeysuckle troublesome.) Honeysuckle’s growth rates are indeed high. One researcher has reported fifteen meters of growth on one plant in a single year. Such extensive vegetative growth is supported by an appropriately extensive root system. On an established Japanese honey- suckle plant, the roots may reach three meters across and one meter deep. Honeysuckle is semi-evergreen, losing its leaves in cold winters. It new Leaves of Lonicera japonica Aureo-reuculata’ Photo- only produces graph by Albert W. Bussemtz. leaves very early in the spring. As a result, it 30

can begin active photosynthesis before com- Honeysuckle seedlings must have open peting trees and shrubs. Also, evergreen conditions to succeed. Its small seeds con- leaves can take advantage of warm, sunny tain little stored food and seedlings must winter days. The entire plant can make as begin photosynthesis soon after germinating. much as two months of growth before most Dense grasslands are poor habitats for honey- plants begin to grow. In Maryland, suckle, however, because the honeysuckle honeysuckle usually leafs out by March vine cannot climb the grass blades to reach 15th, while the predominantly oak forests the full sunlight. If the seeds were to be are leafless until May. deposited in a mature forest or in a grassland, Another element of Japanese honey- the new honeysuckle vine would not be able suckle’s aggression is its ability to reproduce to complete with its neighbors. rapidly by both vegetative and sexual means. Honeysuckle occupies a special position The lateral branches that spread along the in eastern landscapes not occupied by native ground, root at the nodes in moist soil. Once vines. Its twining habit is well suited for this happens, the rooted branch is a new climbing shrubs and saplings, a different plant in a colony, able to survive if the orig- "strategy" from those of native vines. Grapes inal root crown is damaged or the branch cut. (Vitis spp.) climb by tendrils, which are effec- When a vigorous honeysuckle vine is cut, the tive for holdmg onto tree branches, while root crown will respond with rapid Virginia-creeper (Parthenocissus quinque- resprouting. Lateral roots also can sprout, folia) climbs by adhesive discs on tendrils, creating individuals independent of the orig- which allow it to climb tree trunks that inal plant. would be too large to twine around. Poison- ivy (Rhus radicans) climbs in the same manner as Virginia-creeper, but does so with Ecological Relationships modified aerial roots. The Japanese honeysuckle’s fruit is a firm, These vines have climbing strategies well black berry with few seeds. Birds dissemi- suited for forest environments: they are nate the seeds, eating the berry and excreting adapted for climbing the branches and trunks the seeds. There is an ecologically self-rein- of mature trees. Bittersweet (Celastrus scan- forcing aspect to this manner of seed distri- dens) is more like honeysuckle in that it, too, bution : the bird ingests the berry and flies climbs by twining, but it does so much more some distance before excreting the seeds. "lazily" than honeysuckle, making fewer cir- Chances are that the bird will deposit the cuits per length of stem than the honey- seeds in an environment similar to that in suckle. As a result, bittersweet cannot support which it found the berry, increasing the prob- as much weight and does not climb as high ability that the resulting seedlings will suc- as honeysuckle does. Nor can it produce a ceed. The consumers of honeysuckle berries- dense, sunlight-blocking canopy above a bluebirds, purple finches, white-throated sapling, since it does not hold tightly enough sparrows, juncoes, robins, bobwhite quails- to support the weight. are birds of brushy areas, thickets, and forest Honeysuckle can climb any object that is openings. Birds of forest openings usually fly thin enough. It cannot twine around mature directly from one opening to another. Thus, tree trunks, but it wraps itself around saplings while roosting, a bird will deposit seeds at with ease. It grows up and past a sapling, the base of a tree that, if all goes well for one blocking the sunlight to its host. Deprived of seed, will be climbed by a new honeysuckle light, the sapling dies, and the weight of the vine. vine causes the dead stem to collapse, leaving 31

only a hummock of honeysuckle. Its twining uncontrollable impact on its environment. is equally effective on shrubs. In mature for- It should be used only after careful and thor- ests, honeysuckle may twine upon other ough consideration. vines such as grape, Virginia-creeper, and In the South, foresters generally practice posion-ivy, that have successfully climbed even-age management on pines ~i.e., cutting mature trees. and restocking large, continuous blocks of Forest openings contain herbs, shrubs, and forest at the same time), which opens an area saplings, many of which are attractive to to direct sunlight and reduces competition both man and wildlife. Vigorous growths of for moisture, allowing honeysuckle to take honeysuckle can smother them, replacing a over and making effective restocking with diverse flora with a monotonous one. In the trees impossible. If honeysuckle is not present, Piedmont of Maryland, flowering dogwood the trees may have a chance to become suf- (Cornus florida), black cherry (Prunus sero- ficiently established to shade the ground, tina/, tulip-poplar (Liriodendron tulipifera), making the site less attractive to honey- and brambles (Rubus spp.) are very common suckle. However, if honeysuckle is present in constituents of forest openings and edges and a forest stand when the trees are cut, the have much higher wildlife value than honey- honeysuckle may grow rapidly, preventing suckle. the return of the forest. Often, foresters will All of the regions in which Japanese honey- not cut certain forests for fear that honey- suckle has become naturalized were once suckle will take over. forested. Honeysuckle can block the return While a luxuriant growth of honeysuckle of forest to landscapes that originally were in a woodland is visually unpleasant, a forested, producing what ecologists call a dis- tended and pruned vine of honeysuckle climax or disturbance climax. Plant succes- clothing an arbor or fence can be very attrac- sion can be "frozen" at the honeysuckle tive. The sweetly fragant flowers open pure disclimax. white and fade to a soft yellow. In full sun, with regular pruning, honeysuckle is far more floriferous than in the Costs and Benefits woodlands, where most honeysuckle vines are devoid of In human terms, Japanese honeysuckle has flowers. It is very easy to transplant and is a both costs and benefits. The costs are due to vigorous and carefree flowerer. This, of course, its vigor, aggressiveness, rapid dispersal, and is one of the reasons it is such a pest outside tenacity. A pest in forest management because of the garden. of its impact on forest regeneration, honey- Honeysuckle can provide a dense mat of suckle prevents both the natural and artifi- vines that will climb over banks and thus is cial regeneration of forest lands. useful for stabilizing roadbanks, controlling Professionals tend to see only one side of erosion, and revegetating terrain. Rooted cut- the plant-either its virtues or its vices. tings grow readily and quickly produce a Nurserymen and landscapers cultivate and cover, completely arresting soil erosion. The plant it, foresters try to eradicate it. Land- same qualities that make it a pest under one scaping professionals must understand the set of circumstances make it a valued plant character and potential problems of this under another set of circumstances. plant before using it. Planted in the right sit- Honeysuckle’s value to wildlife must be uation it does no harm, but very few situa- carefully evaluated since it suppresses many tions are right. Under most conditions, of the plants that have the highest food value honeysuckle will have a damaging and to wildlife. It holds its berries through the 32

winter, usually well above the ground, pro- thetically pleasing landscape. Instead of a viding a dependable food source during a crit- thicket or young forest, it produces a tangle ical period. Songbirds and gamebirds do eat of amorphous vegetation. Forest openings small quantities of its berries. Deer eat its and edges usually are characterized by a rich- leaves. The tangled vines do provide super- ness of plant elements and structures, but lative cover for birds, mice, and, particularly, Japanese honeysuckle succeeds in creating a cottontail rabbits. Honeysuckle has been landscape of only one element. suggested for use as a managed source of On balance the costs of Japanese honey- nutritious browse in the heavily manipu- suckle outweigh the benefits. Other, less lated southern pine plantations. invasive plants can be used to control erosion Japanese honeysuckle can also strongly and as ornamental vines. Of course, it would affect historic sites. One survey of historic be impossible to make Japanese honeysuckle sites around Washington, D. C., noted that disappear; it is a permanent part of our flora. honeysuckle had damaged wooden and It can only be controlled. masonry structures, forcing apart stonewalls and producing dry rot in wooden walls. More Controlling Honeysuckle importantly, it may produce an uncontroll- A number of measures are used routinely to able, historically inappropritate landscape. control weeds: mechanical cul- The found that the Potomac chemicals, study along tivation, hand labor, fire, biological control, Canal in D. C., Washmgton, honeysuckle and competition. Chemicals have been was threatening "visitors’ understanding and developed to kill honeysuckle. They usually appreciation of the site." kill broad-leaf plants on contact without affecting conifers. In southern pine planta- Design Considerations tions, these chemicals may be the most effec- A luxuriant growth of Japanese honeysuckle tive control measure. Unfortunately, is aesthetically objectionable for three rea- honeysuckle is also present in hardwood sons : it lacks discernible form, it creates no areas, in which the chemicals would also kill line, and it suppresses aesthetically pleasing desired saplings and shrubs. vegetation. "Form" can be defined as the Mechanical cultivation eliminates Japa- three-dimensional mass of an object. Japa- nese honeysuckle. As a result, the species is nese honeysuckle is loose and rangy, forming absent from cultivated cropland. In woods hummocks over strangled saplings and and thickets, mechanical cultivation is not reaching in all directions. It is impossible to possible because it kills the trees and shrubs perceive limits to its mass; it is amorphous. you want. Hand labor would eliminate the Its growth creates no visual points, no visual honeysuckle without destroying the trees line (for a line is a series of points). The most and shrubs, but its high cost makes this commonly perceived visual line of a plant method completely impractical. lies along its stem, from the root collar to the Fire often is used to control weeds in leaves. A dense growth of honeysuckle hides southern pine plantations and can also be its source, presenting a fa~ade of leaves or used to control honeysuckle m pine forests, tangled vine stem. It can establish no though the vine is likely to resprout from the "rhythm" without points, no pattern without roots. A light fire does not kill the pine trees lines. If a growth of honeysuckle were trans- but does kill seedlings, shrubs, and most lated into sound, it would be noise. As noise hardwood trees. Therefore, fire can be used disrupts music, honeysuckle disrupts an aes- before planting, to clear out honeysuckle and 33

Lonicera japonica ‘Halhana’ covenng a wall at Hener Castle, England Photograph by Donald Wyman From the Archives of the Arnold Arboretum. give seedlings a slight headstart. do anything more than nibble its leaves Biological control-the deliberate use of a occasionally. This freedom from diseases and disease or animal to control a weed-has insects is a major reason for honeysuckle’s been used successfully on several invasive high vigor. Nonetheless, biological control exotics. In Australia, the prickly-pear cactus represents the best potential for controlling has been controlled by an introduced moth Japanese honeysuckle and is deserving of (Cactoblastis cactorum) that feeds on the research. cactus. St. Johnswort (Hypericum perfor- Ecological competition is a natural phe- atum), a weed of rangelands in the western nomenon. Competition for light by trees Umted States, has been controlled by two reduces the vigor of honeysuckle. When its introduced beetles. Unfortunately, there vigor is sufficiently reduced, it is no longer appear to be no disease-producing organisms a pest. It is a lion without teeth. Unfortu- that have any serious effect on Japanese nately, human activity usually leads to the honeysuckle in the United States, nor are removal of trees, eliminating the competi- there any msects m the Umted States that tion for light. 34

Because it is such a problem, ought it not to be illegal to plant Japanese honeysuckle? Indeed, it is highly inadvisable to plant the species near woodlands if it cannot be con- trolled, but in the garden, tended and pruned around an arbor, it does no harm. There is already so much wild honeysuckle that garden plants could not significantly affect the overall seed supply. Japanese honeysuckle has some virtues and many vices. When I was a child in the woods of Maryland, it was rope and string, perfume and ambrosia to me. Though I have spent many a day ripping it out of the earth with my bare hands, I have never wished that Japanese honeysuckle had never been.

Richard A. Hardt is a student m the Graduate School of Design, Harvard University. Dunng the summer of 1985, he was a horticultural mtem with the Arnold Arbo- retum. Botanical Gold: Exploring the Treasures of the Harvard University Herbaria Caroline j. Swartz Faculty and staff of the combined Harvard herbaria invite Friends of the Arnold Arboretum and other special guests to an open house in May

On Thursday, May 8, 1986, from 5:30 to 8:30 tions are rich archival materials docu- p.m., the combined Harvard University Her- menting the work of past researchers and the baria (HUH) will offer a unique opportunity history of the collections. With over 4.5 mil- to visit behind the scenes of one of the lion specimens of plants, the Harvard Her- world’s richest botanical resources. Friends baria comprise the fifth-largest such collection of the Arnold Arboretum, Friends of the in the world and the largest university-asso- Farlow Herbarium, members of the New ciated collection of its kind anywhere; their England Botanical Club, and members of the associated libraries contain 224,000 items, Harvard community are cordially invited to constituting one of the world’s leading come and talk with Herbaria faculty and staff resources for systematic botany. Together, members about their research, botanical the specimens, books, and historical docu- exploration, and particular areas of study. ments form the foundation of modern botan- Guests will have a special opportunity to ical research and hold a wealth of information examine specimens of plants collected by about the whole . The botanists between the late 1700s and the accompanying article gives details on the present and to see records of historic plant various herbaria’s and libranes’s holdings. expeditions that date from the opemng of the The rich accumulation of matenal, par- American West and the United States’s first ticularly the herbarium sheets of pressed and ventures into world exploration, to recent dried plant specimens, document a signifi- expeditions to all parts of the globe. This cant portion of the world’s roughly 400,000 special evening will provide an opportumty kinds of plants and fungi. These collections to see why these rich collections are so were begun in 1842 by Asa Gray, the first important to researchers around the world in Fisher Professor of Natural History at Harvard the identification, classification, and study University. In the mid- to late 1800s, Gray of the evolution and distribution of plants. received specimens from many government- and privately-sponsored expeditions to little- known of the and to The Combined Herbaria parts expanding West, many other parts of the world. He described The HUH building houses the combined and identified these plants, accumulating a Arnold Arboretum-Gray herbaria and large number of specimens, now of great sci- libraries, the Farlow Herbarium and Library entific and historical interest. Gray’s per- of Cryptogamic Botany, the Oakes Ames sonal herbarium, containing over 200,000 Orchid Herbarium and Library, the Eco- plant specimens, and his collections of nomic Botany Herbarium and Library, and botamcal texts were bequeathed to Harvard; the New England Botanical Club Herbarium they form the basis of the herbaria’s rich col- and Library. Associated with these collec- lections. 36

Connected to the HUH building is the collections of the HUH, the orchid her- Farlow Reference Library and Herbarium of barium owes its existence to the early efforts Cryptogamic Botany. William Gilson Farlow, of a smgle person, in this case, Professor a one-time assistant to Gray and first pro- Oakes Ames. fessor of cryptogamic botany (the study of lower in North in plants) America, appointed An Invitation To Attend 1874, endowed his personal collections at his death in 1919. His collections contained Come visit us, then, and follow an "explorer’s mosses, fungi, lichens, and algae. map" through the HUH buildmg. On display The Arnold Arboretum, established in will be records from the early days of botani- 1872 by its first director, Charles Sprague cal exploration in the American West and in Sargent, supports a substantial herbarium in other parts of the world; specimens prepared addition to its Living Collections. Sargent by Henry David Thoreau in his treks around donated his personal plant collection and New England; herbarium specimens col- library to the Arboretum, but during his lected by Ernest ("Chinese") Wilson and years as its director he made every effort to Joseph Rock in remote areas of China; early support field expeditions, pnmarily to eastern accounts and checks signed by Asa Gray; and Asia, where such collectors as E. H. Wilson material relating to more recent botanical were strongly encouraged to collect her- expeditions to distant parts of the earth. Staff barium specimens in addition to living plants members will reveal how plant specimens and seeds. Sargent’s training under Gray are prepared, from the time they are collected helped him to understand the great value an m the field, through the mounting process, herbarium would have in the Arboretum’s up to the time they are added to the collec- pursuit of botanical knowledge. tion and made available for scientific research. To this day, botanists at the Harvard Uni- Herbaria staff members, faculty, and versity Herbaria still travel to distant lands graduate students will be on hand to describe to carry out fieldwork and bnng back thou- the plants and documents on display and to sands of plants specimens and seeds for the convey through slide shows, photographs, herbaria and for the Living Collections of the and exhibits the kinds of research that are Arboretum. It is through the integrated use based on these collections. We encourage you of the herbanum, library, and Living Collec- to take advantage of this unique behind-the- tions that botanical knowledge will continue scenes opportumty to visit one of the world’s to be advanced. Says Peter Stevens, Professor richest botanical treasures and to learn about of Biology and Curator of the combined another aspect of botany at Harvard Univer- Arnold-Gray Herbaria, "By studying all the sity. species in one family, how they are classified, Discover what plants are used for food and how they relate to one another, or, in some medicine in other parts of the world. Learn cases, do not relate to one another, one how plants make food, through demonstra- begms to understand that correct classifica- tions of photosynthesis. Explore the fasci- tion is the basis for all sound evolutionary nating beauty and biological importance of ideas." Only in the herbarium can one study fern spores through fantastic photographs simultaneously all the species of a family, or taken with the scanmng electron micro- of a genus. scope. Gather insights on the difficulties that The Oakes Ames Orchid Herbarium is the explorers faced in the early American West, world’s largest herbarium devoted to a single and on some of the difficulties they faced in plant family. As with so many of the other dealing with a famous Harvard professor! 37

Hosts for the Evening ~ David E. Boufford, Curatorial Taxonom- ist : current botanical exploration m the The are some of the staff members following People’s Republic of China. who will be present during the open house, A. of the and their areas of interest and expertise: D Michael Canoso, Manager Sys- tematic and Walter T. D L. Curator of the New Collections, Kittredge, Raymond Angelo, Curatorial Assistant: function, Botanical Club (NEBC) Herbarium: organization, England and of a research herbarium. Thoreau’s botanical contributions and the workings major role of the NEBC Herbarium. 0 Zepur Elmayan and Edith Hollender, Preparators: mounting of herbarium speci- ~ Peter S. Ashton, Professor and Director of the Arnold Arboretum: tropical forests of mens. southeast Asia. D Leslie A. Garay, Curator of the Oakes Ames Orchid Herbarium, and Herman R. R. Research 0 Jean Boise, Bibliographer: Research Associate: orchids of the the Sweet, Loculoascomycetes. world. D Allan Postdoctoral Her- J. Bornstein, D Ida Hay, Curatorial Associate, and Emily barium Intern: the Piperaceae (pepper family).

TWo herbanum sheets from the Herbanum of the Arnold Arboretum. The sheet on the left is a specimen of Cornus kousa, a dogwood native to Japan and Korea, that on the nght a specimen of a related species, Cornus flonda, the flowenng dogwood of eastern North Amenca. Visitors at the Herbana open house on May 8th mll be able to discuss such interesting similanties between the eastern Asian and eastern North Amencan floras ~nnth faculty and staff, as well as other botanical topics. Photograph by Joseph Wnnn. Courtesy of The Harvard University Gazette. 38

W. Wood, Curatorial Assistant: pressing and To Attend herbarium in the field. drying specimens Friends of the Arboretum will find free ~ Richard A. Howard, Professor and former parking in the Andover lot, which is located Director of the Arnold Arboretum: West behind the HUH building. They should enter Indian floras and exploration in the Carib- from Oxford Street. (See the accompanying bean. map.)/ 0 Hsiu-Ying Hu, Botanist: food and Complimentary hors d’oeuvres will be medicinal plants of China. served. ~ Geraldine C. Kaye, Librarian: fungi and other cryptogams in the Farlow Herbarium. ~ David C. Michener, Research Taxono- mist and Curatorial Administrator: the Wood Laboratory; sectioning wood for microscopic study. ~ Donald H. Pfister, Professor, Curator of the Farlow Library and Herbarium, and Director of the Harvard University Herbaria: Discomycetes, early mycological literature. 0 Bernice G. Schubert, Lecturer and Curator: Dioscorea (the yam) and Desmo- dium (beggar’s ticks; legume family). ~ Elizabeth A. Shaw, Bibliographer and Research Taxonomist: botanical exploration in the early American West. ~ Otto T. Solbrig, Mangelsdorf Professor of Natural Science and past Director of the Gray Herbarium: photosynthesis. ~ Stephen A. Spongberg, Horticultural Taxonomist: the early botanical exploration of China. ~ Peter F. Stevens, Professor and Curator, and Barbara A. Callahan, Librarian: the development of systematic botany as dis- played through botanical illustrations. ~ Rolla M. ’Ilyon, Jr., Professor and Curator, and Alice F. Tryon, Associate Curator: the world of ferns and fern spores, scanning elec- tron micrographs. El Carroll E. Wood, Jr., Professor and Caroline Swartz is coordmator of the and Ihsan A. Research J. membership Curator, AI-Shehbaz, Friends of the Arnold Arboretum. A graduate of Con- Associate: the flora of the southeastern necticut College, she has a special interest in Chinese United States. language and culture. A+AAH+AMES+ECON+FH+GH+NEBC= "HUH": Systematic Botany at Harvard

Harvard’s diverse herbaria and their associated libraries make up one of the world’s greatest centers for research in systematic botany The rich and diverse botanical collections The Libraries. Comparable in depth and housed in the Harvard University Herbaria comprehensiveness to the collections of the building at 22 Divinity Avenue and in the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, and the Komarov adjacent Farlow Herbarium are world- Botanical Institute, Leningrad, the combined renowned. Botanists working at the cutting libraries of the Arnold Arboretum, the Gray edge of plant systematics converge from Herbarium, the Farlow Herbarium, the Eco- around the world to consult specimens of nomic Botany Herbarium, and the Oakes vascular plants, mosses, liverworts, algae, Ames Orchid Herbarium are particularly fungi, and lichens maintained in Harvard’s rich in early botanical literature. These col- half-dozen specialized herbaria. Designated lections greatly facilitate research in system- "HUH" among systematic botanists at atic and evolutionary botany. All have grown Harvard, the combined Harvard University from the research collections of their found- Herbaria consist of the Herbarium of the er-scientists. This fact is easily sensed when Arnold Arboretum (designated "A"), the Oakes one uses a volume that was originally owned Ames Orchid Herbarium ("AMES"), the Eco- and annotated by Charles Sprague Sargent, nomic Herbarium of Oakes Ames ("ECON"),(, Oakes Ames, William Gilson Farlow, or Asa the Gray Herbarium ("GH"), the Farlow Her- Gray. barium of Cryptogamic Botany ("FH") The Arnold Arboretum’s library now has (actually housed in an adjacent, connected over 90,000 books and pamphlets and some building), the Gray Herbarium ("GH"), and 11,000 microforms, the Gray library over the Herbarium of the New England Botamcal 62,000 books and pamphlets and an archive Club ("NEBC"~. collection of many thousands of items. Together, the archives of the two institutions are basic source material critical to the The Herbaria study Harvard University (HUH) of the development of evolutionary philoso- , Building phy and the plant sciences in North America. The Harvard University Herbaria building, ~ The Arnold Arboretum Herbarium (A). completed in 1954, is located at the end of The Arnold Arboretum Herbarium was Divinity Avenue in Cambridge, in the center established by Charles Sprague Sargent in of the Harvard complex devoted to the nat- 1879, when he resigned his directorship of ural sciences. It houses the Oakes Ames the Harvard Botanic Garden in order to Orchid Herbarium, the herbarium and library devote full time to the Arboretum. It con- of the Gray Herbarium (formerly maintained tains important collections from all over the at the "old Gray" on the Botanic Garden site globe and complements the Gray Herbarium on Garden Street), part of the library and her- (see below), inasmuch as it is especially rich barium of the Arnold Arboretum, and, since in materials from eastern Asia, particularly 1985, the Economic Botany Herbarium. The China, the Philippines, western Malesia, and library and herbarium of the New England Papuasia. The large and important contri- Botanical Club are also located in the building. butions of E. H. Wilson, J. F. Rock, G. Forest, 40

and the New Guinea collections of contains some 10,000 type specimens or type L. J. Brass are prominent among the Arbor- collections of species. One of its unique hold- etum’s 1,154,000 specimens housed in ings is a set of life-size drawings of types, Cambridge. Its herbarium of cultivated plants together with drawings of floral details of in Jamaica Plain ( "AAH"~ includes over types of orchids described by Rudolf Schlech- 174,200 sheets and is the largest collection ter, which were prepared under his personal of its kind in the world. supervision. The actual type specimens from To supplement its herbarium collections, which these were made were destroyed in the Arboretum maintains an extensive Berlin during World War II. AMES is excep- vouchered wood collection of some 30,000 tionally complete in material from the Phil- specimens and 45,000 prepared microscope ippines, Malesia, Mexico, Central America, slides of wood, pollen, seeds, etc., and an South America, and China. important fruit and seed collection. ~ The Economic Herbarium (ECON). The ~ The Orchid Herbarium of Oakes Ames Economic Herbarium of Oakes Ames, housed (AMES). The Orchid Herbarium of Oakes until recently in the Botanical Museum, con- Ames was founded in 1899 by Professor sists of 45,000 specimens of economically Oakes Ames, the Harvard Botanical important plants, especially from South Museum’s second director. It is the largest America, and includes extensive collections herbarium in the world devoted to a single of such genera as Zea (maize), Hevea (rubber), family. Originally a private institution, it was and Cinchona (quinine). intended to be a working tool to facilitate the O The Farlow Library and Herbarium (FH). identification of orchid species and the The Farlow Reference Library and Her- preparation of orchid floras. In developing his barium of Cryptogamic Botany is housed in herbarium, Ames emphasized from the very the former Divinity School Library, built in beginning the accumulation of scientific 1886; it is connected to the HUH building information in every conceivable manner, on the west and the Biological Laboratories rather than solely the storing of dried speci- on the east. Stemming from the extensive mens. Consequently, the collection of nearly herbarium and library of William Gilson 130,000 sheets is very rich not only in type Farlow, who joined the Harvard faculty in specimens, but also in records and tran- 1874 and endowed the collections at his scripts of holotypes from institutions located death in 1919, the herbarium now includes throughout the world. There are also a spint 1,125,000 accessions of bryophytes, fungi, collection of 3,000 plants and flowers and lichens, and algae; the library has holdings of 25,000 slides of dissected orchid flowers. Its over 60,000 items. Included within the col- specimens, drawings of floral details, color lections are the M. A. Curtis collection of plates, paintings, and descriptions make fungi and William Starling Sullivant’s her- AMES a umque and indispensable tool in tax- barium of mosses, both of which Farlow onomy. In 1939, Ames formally presented his brought to Harvard. The nearly quarter of a Orchid Herbarium, together with his orchid million specimens of types and authentic library, which now consists of 5,000 books specimens m FH indicate the richness and and pamphlets, to the Botanical Museum. In importance of the collection for systematic 1957, all of the orchid specimens of the Gray and evolutionary studies. Herbarium and of the Arnold Arboretum’s 0 The Gray Herbarium (GH). The collec- herbarium were integrated with those of tions of the Gray Herbarium date from 1842, AMES for an indefinite duration. when Asa Gray was appointed Director of Housed in the Herbaria building, AMES the Harvard Botanic Garden and Fisher Pro- 41

Two preserved specimens of manne algae from the Farlow Herbanum On the left is Padrna pavonica, a brown alga that hves m warm manne waters worldHnde On the nght is Heterosiphonia coccmea, a yellow-green, or yellow- golden, manne alga. These are only two of the one and a quarter milhon specimens of mosses, algae, fungi, and hchens m the Farlow’s world-renowned collections. Courtesy Farlow Library and Herbanum. fessor of Natural History. Although system- endangered species. In concentrating on such atic botanical studies were initiated in 1807, a small area, NEBC makes it possible to when the Botanic Garden was established by study genetic variability from one popula- W. D. Peck, the Herbarium was established tion of a species to another. by Asa Gray and grew steadily because of his research and that of his colleagues and suc- The Botanical Museum cessors. the Herbarium numbers Today, Gray founded in 1888 when The collections of the Although officially 1,823,300 specimens. the named Professor Lin- are Worldwide in University George early explorers promment. coln Goodale its first the collections GH is rich in North director, scope, especially of the Botanical Museum dated from American materials and mcludes early col- 1858, when Asa to assemble a collec- lections from western North America and Gray began tion of "vegetable products, etc." that were Mexico and the types and collections of Gray, augmented materials of economic Sereno Watson, B. L. Robinson, and M. L. by plant sent to him his Wil- Fernald. importance by friend, liam Jackson Hooker. The Economic Her- ~ Herbarium of the New England Botani- barium (ECON) is now housed in the HUH cal Club (NEBC). The 250,000 specimens in building (see above). The Botanical Museum’s the Herbarium of the New England Botanical library has a notable collection of some Club were collected within New totally titles that has from the Harvard 32,000 grown largely England by knowledgeable amateurs, research collections of Oakes Ames and and others. Serving to document professors, George Lincoln Goodale. the flora of the region, its specimens are also a rich resource for research on rare and BOTANY: THE STATE OF THE ART

Listening to Thirsty Plants John W Einset

The ingenious application of acoustic devices enables botanists to study the water economy of woody plants

Martin H. Zimmermann, the late Charles water from within it. Eventually, dehydra- Bullard Professor at Harvard University and tion of the stem results in cavitation within Director of the Harvard Forest from 1970 to individual vessels (water-conducting "pipe- 1984, was a recognized expert on the water lines") of the xylem as air bubbles replace economy of plants, especially trees. Among water. At this stage, flow within the plant his many contributions to science was the ceases because cavitated vessels can no longer introduction of the term hydraulic architec- transport water. Some plants, in fact, are ture, a term that describes the way in which damaged beyond recovery by cavitation since plants use their structures to regulate water they are incapable of refilling air-plugged flow. In fact, a major goal of Professor Zim- xylem even when water again becomes plen- mermann’s research involved detailed tiful. descriptions of hydraulic architecture in a task he with plants, approached mgenuity, Sabotage by Bubbles of Air often using techniques he had developed himself. According to a widely held theory, elaborated As so often happens in scientific research, in large part by Martin Zimmermann, cavi- one of the best ways of understanding a pro- tation is initiated when a tiny bubble of air cess is to study what happens when it is dis- penetrates a water-containing xylem vessel rupted. For example, if one is interested in from an adjacent, dry vessel element-a pro- how water moves through a plant, one can cess known as air seeding. Negative hydro- ask what happens when water is no longer static pressure within the vessel then causes supplied. The immediate consequence, of the bubble to expand quickly and fill the con- course, is that the overall water content of tents of the cell. While the air-seeding the plant begins to decrease as a result of hypothesis has not been proven conclusively, continued evaporation (transpiration) from it is generally considered to be the best cur- leaves in the absence of a corresponding rent explanation for cavitation. At the very uptake of water by its roots. As further drying least, Zimmermann’s theory focusses interest occurs, the pores (stomates) on leaves usu- on this important phenomenon and stimu- ally close, thus minimizing additional water lates research that could lead to new tech- loss. Then the stem begms to contract under nology. If cavitation can be better understood, the tension caused by the evaporation of perhaps it can be avoided by breeding plants 43

Dr Marun H Zimmermann, the late Director of the Harvard Forest m Petersham, Massachusetts. Photograph by Regula Zimmermann Courtesy of the Harvard Forest

with more effective mechanisms for pre- ments. An illustration of the principle venting it. Or, improved procedures might be involved can be obtained by trying to plunge developed to reverse cavitation once it has a fresh tea bag directly mto hot water. The occurred. low permeability of the wet, cellulosic paper If the crucial event that sparks cavitation causes the tea bag initially to float on the actually is the appearance of an air bubble, surface of the water until air has diffused out the obvious strategy for stopping cavitation of the bag. The same phenomenon is exploited is to prevent air from moving between cells. in life-saving when a shirt or pillow case is In plants suffering a moderate degree of water used to improvise an emergency flotation stress, this normally is accomplished by the device. In these cases, wet fabric impedes the cellulosic cell walls between adjacent ele- diffusion of the entrapped air. 44

The relative permeability to air, of a plant Acoustic Emission: The Sound of Cavitation cell wall or of other wet barrier for that any Using microscopic techniques coupled with matter, can be calculated from physical laws cinematography, Ann M. Lewis (a student at based on the size of the it contains: the pores the Harvard Forest) has determined that the smaller the pore size, the greater the pressure of time from the first appearance of an difference to air it. lapse required push through air bubble in a vessel until the end of the Given an average pore diameter of about 0.2 cavitation event is less than 1/124 second. micrometer (approximately one ten mil- The rapidity of this process probably accounts lionth of an inch) in plant cell walls, the pres- for one of the most important aspects of cavi- sure differential necessary for air to move tation-namely, the production of a weak from one cell to another is about 10 to 1. In but detectable noise as vessel walls vibrate other words, one can expect air seeding to in response to the air bubble’s explosive occur in trees as soon as vessel tensions reach expansion. values of minus 10 atmospheres and less. Studies of the "acoustic emissions" (AEs) accompanying cavitations have recently become an especially active area for scien- tific investigation. At the University of Toronto in Canada, for example, Professor Melvm Tyree has adapted the sensitive acoustic devices used in mechanical engi- neering to the study of AEs in white cedar ~Thuja occidentalis) and hemlock (Tsuga canadensis) trees. Tyree clamps a noise detector onto the stem of a tree and then monitors AEs as the tree becomes more and more dehydrated. Each signal the detector picks up is processed with the aid of a com- puter, which analyzes harmonic frequency, duration, and intensity. By doing this, Tyree can exclude interfering signals caused by extraneous (i.e., noncavitation) noises. This sophisticated instrumentation has already made it possible to prove that indi- vidual AEs correspond to single cavitations occurring in the wood of trees; thus, a small (4-mm-diameter, 10-mm-length) block of hemlock wood, for example, contains about one million tracheids (tracheids, rather than vessel elements, are the water-conducting cells of gymnosperms) and produces approxi- that number of AEs A scanning electron microscope picture, highly mag- mately upon complete nified, of poplar (Populus grandidentataJ wood showing dehydration. The technology also makes it the three-dimensional structure tissue and of xylem possible to measure the potential of different individual vessels (the large columnar cells with con- to recover from spicuous pores on their lateral walls) making up the water-transporting systems wa ter- transporting system Courtesyof Spnnger-Uerlag. cavitation. This can be accomplished by 45

monitoring AEs during the dehydration of a and thus "diffuse-porous" trees such as wood sample, then rewetting the sample to maples. its maximum extent and determining the total number of AEs obtained during a second Practical Applications treatment. the dif- dehydration Presumably, Of the value of to ference in AE totals is the number of cells course, greatest listening thirsty plants ultimately will be improved that cavitated beyond recovery during the understanding of water flow and the mecha- initial dehydration. Alternatively, AE tech- nisms by which plants prevent damage asso- nolgy can be used to determine the types of ciated with dehydration. When one considers cells that are most prone to cavitation, inas- that water utilization is one of the major fac- much as the harmonic frequency of an AE is tors determming plant growth and survival related to a cell’s dimensions. apparently as well as distribution in the environ- Evidence to date confirms Zimmermann’s plant ment, it is easy to appreciate how even small theory that vessels, and thus "ring- large advances in scientific knowledge about the porous" trees such as oaks and elms, are water economy of plants can have profound more likely to cavitate than small vessels, practical consequences. Martin Zimmermann’s book Xylem Struc- ture and the Ascent of Sap was dedicated to the memory of Godfrey Lowell Cabot, who in 1937 established the Maria Moors Cabot Foundation for Botanical Research at Harvard University. In the dedication of the book, Professor Zimmermann describes his first meeting with Cabot in the mid-1950s, an occasion that he took advantage of to explain his latest scientific findings in great detail: When I had fimshed, he surprised me with the sudden question, "How can you improve the growth of trees?" This caught me com- pletely unprepared, because I had never thought about practical applications. After what seemed to me a rather painful silence I ventured that it would be useful to learn more about how trees function and grow. He seemed to be quite satisfied with this answer. Little did I guess that trees would be holding me under their spell for so many years! M H Zimmermann’s diagram of the stages mvolved m cavitation by air seeding Each panel indicates the status of an air-filled vessel or tracheid (outside) and an adjacent vessel or tracheid (inside) undergoing camta- John W. Emset, associate professor of biology in Harvard tion A through C show the effect of progressively nega- University, directs the Arnold Arboretum’s Laboratory tme xylem pressures m causing air movement through of Comparative Physiology. In May, he will teach a small m the cell wall. In D, an am bubble has pore "Tissue-Culture Propagation Methods’ An Introduction appeared within the water-containing cell, while E and to a New Branch of Plant a class limited F indicate the explosive expansion of this bubble that Science," special to Friends of the Arnold Arboretum. results m cavitation and, sigmficantly, m the acoustic emission. Courtesy of Spnnger- Verlag, BOOKS

The Butterfly Garden, by Mathew Tekulsky. The trick to successful butterfly gar- Harvard and Boston, Massachusetts: The dening, it seems, is to realize that ( 1 ) butter- Harvard Common Press, 1985. vi + 144 flies come from caterpillars, (2) most pages. $8.95 (paper), $16.95 ~cloth~. caterpillars are quite particular about what species of plants they will feed upon, and (3) How To Attract Butterflies to Your Garden, female butterflies will seek out the nght spe- by Nick Rossi. Saddle River, New Jersey: The cies of plants on which to lay their eggs, Butterfly Garden, undated. 16 pages. $14.95 ensuring thereby that the caterpillars will (paper). [Part of the "Home Garden Butterfly have food. Good butterfly gardens provide Kit," which includes also ten packets of sacrificial food plants for the caterpillars as seeds.]] well as flowering plants for the adults. How

~ t~~ To Attract Butterflies to Your Garden, by Butterflies East of the Great Plains: An Illus- Nick Rossi, does not address this central trated Natural History, by Paul A. Opler and issue. Instead, $14.95 gets you ten packets of George O. Krizek. Baltimore and London: seeds (an $8.90 value at my local hardware The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1984. store) and a sixteen-page booklet that is long 294 pages; 324 color photographs. $49.50. on enthusiasm for butterflies but short on information about plants and gardening. The DAVID C. MICHENER three sections on attracting adult butterflies account for only thirty-three lines of text. I For over fifteen years I have been striving to recommend that you buy your own seeds turn a wooded city lot into a haven for but- after spending $8.95 on Mathew Tekulsky’s terflies, birds, and salamanders. Fifty dump- The Butterfly Garden. Here is a straightfor- truck loads of wood chips, untold bags of ward and well organized introductory book. leaves, numerous rotting logs, and a rerouting It has already helped me understand what of the storm drains have delighted the sala- makes a garden "work" from the perspective manders, extirpated whatever remained of of a butterfly. the rear lawn, and started the final phase of Tekulsky’s fourth chapter, "Getting controlling the already successful "butterfly Started," cuts to the core of the issue-the meadow." I confess that I didn’t know a thing need to get the butterfly’s entire life cycle to about butterflies before starting; everything occur in your garden. Subsequent chapters, I learned I learned by making mistakes. But on larval food plants and nectar sources, and there is an easier way. If you are interested the various appendixes form the "gardening" in butterfly gardening, preferably without core of the book. Here are lists of plants to making the kinds of mistakes I did and use, notes on how to attract the fifty most- without needing fifty loads of wood chips, common species of butterfly in North you might consider reading a book. There are America, nursery and seed sources of the three possibilities that I know of, and a plants, and the addresses of both butterfly- fourth on its way. fancier and gardening organizations. 47

Since The Butterfly Garden is intended for garden dictionary to find out about the use by gardeners throughout continental plants. North America, much of the region-specific Butterflies East of the Great Plains is the information has to be extracted from the text only tome I know of that provides the essen- and appendixes; but the information is there. tial information on the butterflies of a given I found the author’s familiarity with Califor- area, listing their critical food and nectar nian butterflies and plants helpful in illus- plants. If I have any qualms about recom- trating several points, though the specifics mending this book to the reader, it is that the were not always germane to butterfly gar- binding may not be up to the long-term use dening in New England. Chapters on but- the book will receive. terfly biology, the rearing of butterflies, and All three of the titles reviewed here will be conservation round the book out. If you are available for inspection at the "Sky Gar- thinking about attracting butterflies to your dening" symposium scheduled for May 31st. garden, start with this book and then use Among the attractions of the symposium your imagination. will be an annotated list of the butterflies Compulsive butterfly gardeners (mea culpa)( native to eastern Massachusetts and their will pay the small ransom needed to pur- larvae’s food plants. The complete program chase Butterflies East of the Great Plains, for the symposium is given on page 48. whereas others may prefer to wine and dine their local librarians until the book is pur- David C. Michener, a research taxonomist at the Arnold chased. East the Great Plains Butterflies of Arboretum, is responsible for the Living Collections is a stunning tour de force and is destined to Verification Project. Before commg to the Arboretum he be the classic reference for decades to come. was a graduate student in botany at the Rancho Santa Every species of butterfly known to occur or Ana Botamc Garden in Claremont, California. He has long been interested in for birds and butter- to stray into the eastern United States is pre- gardemng flies. On May 31st, he will speak at "Sky Gardening: A sented. is The text is (Canada excluded.) Symposmm on Butterflies, Birds, and the Horticultural accented by 324 color photographs of the but- Habitat." For details about the symposium, see the cur- terflies in nature. For every butterfly species, rent issue of Arnoldia’s "New England Horticultural the etymology of the Latin name, the geo- Calendar." graphic range (usually shown through exquisite maps), the habitat, the life history, and the adult and larval food plants are pre- sented and discussed. The last subjects are a gold mine for butterfly gardeners. Enjoyable hours can be spent scanning the maps for your home area and then reading the text to find out what plants you will need to attract the flying lovelies. If the illustrations make you realize that you simply cannot live without pipe vine swallowtails gracing your yard, the text will inform you that you must have Aristolochia in the garden, while the range maps tell you whether the species lives in your area. If the plant material is some- times unfamiliar to you (both Latin and common names are provided), use any good From The Butterfly Garden. Saturday May 31,1986 8:30 am -3 ~00 pm Program

8:30 - 9:00 Registration 9:00 - 9.10 Welcome and Introduction. Nan Smton & David Michener 9:10 - 9:50 Understanding New England Butterflies. Jo Brewer

9:50 - 10:15 Moths in Your Garden. David Winter

10: I S - 10:55 Birds on the Blossom: :,. attracting birds with plants. Al Bussewitz ~~J~l’C~GG~70~i7~ ~‘ ~ 10:55 - I 1:10 Coffee Break 11 :10 - 11:50 The Horticultural Habitat. Michael Dathe

11:50 - 12:30 Food Plants for our Region: Birds, caterpillar cuisine and berries for birds. ’~~~ Dav~d Michener 12:30 - 12:45 Summary Butterf lies~~ David Michener and the 12:45 - 1:30 Box lunch with the speakers. Horticultural 1:30 - 3:00 Observational Walks. The Observational Walks of plant material in the Arboretum will follow unpaved paths and will climb Habitat a hill - come comfortably dressed for the weather

Birds, butterflies, and moths ammate the garden They choose seasonal territones based on the presence of certain plants. The selection of trees, shrubs, and perennials attractive to specific fauna and the effec- tive juxtaposition of these plants in the garden is the focus of this Spring Symposium. Speakers will address the habitat needs of birds, butterflies, and moths, and how these needs can be met through the selection of garden matenal ; annotated lists of plants will be presented. Field observation on the grounds of the Arnold Arboretum will allow participants to see mature specimens of selected plants. Sky Gardening is designed for advanced amateur gardeners; bird, butterfly, and moth enthusiasts; landscape designers; and garden center professionals.