Garden Notes, Summer 2020

notes SUMMER 2020 GARDEN Society Horticultural Northwest Photo by Richie by Steffen Photo Lilium martagon Lilium Northwest Horticultural Society GARDENnotes SUMMER 2020 Bellevue Botanical Garden Bloedel Reserve Dunn Gardens (Wikimedia Commons) Puget Sound Gardens by Rick Peterson Images by Richie Steffen unless otherwise noted The Puget Sound region is home to many exemplary botanical this month. Currently, the following gardens are on the website: gardens, arboreta, and conservatories and a new website was recently launched to promote many of them. This new website is Bellevue Botanical Garden the inspiration of Sue Nevler who has long championed public Bloedel Reserve gardens, particularly in and near her Seattle home. Sue worked Chihuly Garden and Glass tirelessly to see the idea of a central resource for information on Dunn Gardens local horticultural institutions and her concept came to fruition Elisabeth C. Miller Botanical Garden Elisabeth C. Miller Botanical Garden University of Washington Botanic Gardens 2 GARDENnotes SUMMER 2020 Bloedel Reserve Dunn Gardens (Wikimedia Commons) University of Washington Botanic Gardens Heronswood Foundation and she is also is on the advisory councils of Kruckeberg Botanical Garden Heronswood, the Northwest Horticultural Society, and Bloedel Old Goat Farm Reserve. In 2017 she established a Puget Sound garden director’s PowellsWood Garden roundtable where leading garden staff meet several times a year Rhododendron Species Botanical Garden to share ideas, especially for the promotion of gardens to the Seattle Chinese Garden public. The Spheres University of Washington Botanic Gardens Working with Brian Creamer and Myrna Ouglund of Spiderlily Waterfront Seattle Web Design, based in Poulsbo, Washington, Sue gathered information and beautiful images for the new Puget Sound Gardens Sue’s passion and support for gardens, horticulture, and plants website. Go to https://pugetsoundgardens.org/ to discover the is an enduring aspect of her life. Early on she was involved many and varied gardens in our area, truly places of respite in with agriculture and running a historical landmark farm. More our turbulent world. m recently she was a long-time volunteer and then first executive director of the Dunn Gardens in 2008. Currently, Sue is a board Rick Peterson is the Education and Events Manager at the member of the Pendleton and Elisabeth Carey Miller Charitable Elisabeth Miller Botanical Garden. Elisabeth C. Miller Botanical Garden University of Washington Botanic Gardens 3 Northwest Horticultural Society GARDENnotes SUMMER 2020 WHAT’S IN A NAME? Words by Daniel Mount I have a few friends who are named after plants. to the New World and settled in Philadelphia where he worked I know three Hollys, an Iris and a Lily. I know two men who as a printer—his family’s trade. He became intrigued by the named themselves Sequoia. I wonder, sometimes, why more of plants in his new home and began pestering the botanists at the us don’t have plant names: Oak, Orchid, or Potato. University of Pennsylvania with questions. They quickly saw in him a natural talent for under- Yet, so many plants are named standing plants. after us. By 1810, he was making expedi- Last winter, before the tions deep into the interior of the quarantine, I went to the continent—off to the scarcely Rhododendron Species settled Great Lakes region, down Botanical Garden. It was a the Missouri and Mississippi frigid day and there wasn’t a Rivers. On one trip in 1816, visitor in the garden but me. he travelled alone and by foot After dashing here and there to through Kentucky, Tennessee get out of the rain, I ended up and the Carolinas. He discovered in the conservatory. many new plants and was integral in the early understanding of New growth was emerging on Rhododendron nuttallii (Wikimedia Commons) America’s flora. the tender rhododendrons. I was captivated by one, In 1835, he headed to the Pacific Nuttall’s rhododendron, or Northwest. Leaving his teaching Rhododendron nuttallii. position at Harvard, he joined the Wyeth Expedition to explore the Now, I know the specific Columbia Basin. He had a restless epithet nuttallii from my curiosity, it is said, and the num- botanical meanderings around bers of new plants he added to the Washington. But, I had no idea flora was tremendous. who Nuttall was. This won him great respect and Thomas Nuttall was an English a place in the annals of botany. It botanist and zoologist who also earned him many honorific lived and worked in North plant and animal names. There is America from 1800-1841. As a genus of clams called Nuttallia, Rhododendron nuttallii (Wikimedia Commons) a Yorkshire lad he immigrated and a Nuttall’s Woodpecker 4 GARDENnotes SUMMER 2020 Rhododendron nuttallii – from Flora of Greenhouses and Gardens of Europe, 1845 (Wikimedia Commons) (Dryobates nuttallii). an uncle with the stipulation he stay there 9 months a year. Nuttall longed for the stunning landscapes and fascinating But, plant names are where we see him honored most. There are flora of America, and made several shorter trips here before he upwards of 165 plants worldwide that carry the specific epithet became too old to travel. I wonder if he grew any of his beloved nuttallii, or a variation thereof. Twenty-one of them are listed in American plants in his garden. Was there a towering Pacific the revised Flora of the Pacific Northwest. dogwood over his door? There certainly wasn’t his namesake rhododendron, too tender for gardens even in the warmest parts Most of those are weedy-looking little things. But there is a of England, or here. lovely bittercress, Cardamine nuttallii, and a showy tall lark- spur, Delphinium nuttallianum. There is also a rare aquatic fern, I planned to revisit the RSBG conservatory in spring to see this Nuttall’s quillwort, Isoetes nuttallii, which he discovered. rhododendron’s showy fragrant flowers, said to be the largest in the genus and often compared to lilies. Alas, conditions did not The only plant you might find in your garden from this list is the allow it. Pacific dogwood, sometimes called Nuttall’s dogwood,Cornus nuttallii. I don’t think anyone plants them anymore, they are ter- There is always next spring.m ribly vulnerable to anthracnose. The closest you can probably get is the Great Plant Pick ‘Eddies White Wonder’, a cross between Daniel Mount is a former NHS board member and a frequent it and Cornus florida. contributor to GardenNotes and other publications. You can read his blog at mountgardens.com. Nuttall spent his last years on an estate bequeathed to him by 5 Northwest Horticultural Society GARDENnotes SUMMER 2020 GARDEN DESIGN WITH EDIBLES Words and Images by Sue Goetz unless otherwise noted Vaccinium ‘Sunshine Blue’ for an informal hedge – image by Richie Steffen Recent events in our country have brought a surge in a prim and proper vegetable garden. They are planted as orna- of interest in food and flavor gardening. Edibles are a hot com- mentals that are nutritionally and environmentally beneficial as modity in garden stores, and the term Victory Garden is back in well. our vocabulary. It takes us back in history to gardens that were motivated by the function of food production and less about Growing edibles is not just about where to put the tomatoes and ornamentation and aesthetics of a “designed” garden. how far will that squash vine spread out. A garden designed with edible plants has benefits that go beyond only a harvest of some- In this surge of interest comes the questions of longevity and how thing to eat as it forces more interaction with the garden. Edibles edibles really fit into our garden lifestyle. Most common edibles, teach how to nurture and care for healthy soil for productive such as tomatoes, peas, and beans, do not fall into the “landscape” crops and a need for non-toxic gardening practices. Deeper learn- plant category. Good garden design relies on structure and plants ing about plants comes from knowing what part of the plant you that give the permanence of hedges, trees, perennials, along with eat, as well as how to harvest, cook, and preserve it. It also makes striking colors or textures. A different perspective of adding us look at plants that have a relationship with other ornamental edibles to a garden is to look for plants that can both add perma- plants in the garden, like water requirements and cultural condi- nence and give something back for flavor and food. It is a more tions. Plus, it is a win-win for pollinator habitats. Many edible in-depth discovery, beyond annuals, to explore berries, fruits, and plants also are highly attractive to pollinators because they need perennial herbs. Plants don’t have to be in rows or closely guarded pollinators to produce their fruit. 6 GARDENnotes SUMMER 2020 Chive border Parsley for low edging Espaliered pear for vertical wall planting Edible landscape plants produce a part of the plant that can be Chives: Allium schoenoprasum is 12” – 20” tall – the stems and used for food or flavoring. The next step in design is how they flowers of chives create a linear grass-like informal edging that add permeance, color, texture, or something aesthetic to a land- stays evergreen in mild winters. scape. Think blueberry hedges for a hedgerow along a property border or lingonberries and highbush cranberries in damp areas. Curly leaf parsley: Petroselinum crispum Crispum Group at 8” to Play up design texture with artichokes, rhubarb, and vining 12” tall, makes a frilly low edging along a cutting garden or in a golden hops and give container gardens a theme with colorful container garden. leaves like purple basil and a tidy growing patio tomato.

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