Fun things to read (and listen to) until spring arrives. If it ever does...

This and that from around the web:
Spring is STILL refusing to show up here in Michigan. Since I can't get out into the garden, I'm bumming around on-line. Here's some stuff I've been finding:

Cityscapes and Garden Gates
If you've read my blog for a while, you know I'm passionate about communicating scientific knowledge about plants and gardening for every day gardeners. Which is why I'm excited that my friend Rachel has started a blog. She's a plant pathologist by training (along with other things...) and she's blogging good solid information on understanding and controlling diseases in your garden. Which is awesome. There is a LOT of scientific knowledge about how plant diseases work, but rarely is it presented for the home gardener. Until now.

Radiolab: Colors
This isn't really gardening or plant related, but it is amazing and mind bending and spectacular. Radiolab is flat out brilliant, and this episode, talking about colors is one of their best. You'll come away thinking differently about the colors you see in your garden each year. And it features a mantis shrimp hallelujah chorus. How can you resist THAT? You can't. So go listen and be happy.

Tomatoville
This is a crazy cool site I stumbled on a couple years ago, I think... It is all tomatoes, all the time, and it is amazing. If you are into this most popular of vegetables you'll find everything from advice on growing them to massive collaborative breeding projects to create a whole new class of tomatoes perfect for the home gardener.

Wintersown.org
The concept of winter sowing -- starting seeds in containers outside in the winter so they'll graduate in the spring -- has been floating around the internet for quite a while, I first heard about it 10 years ago. It is an incredibly simple technique, and I think the perfect way for most home gardeners to start the vast majority of their seeds. Forgot fussing with lights and damping off and hardening off... just start things outside and let nature do most of the work. It is a great concept, that, as so many things end up doing on the web, has been floating around mostly with attribution. But attribution is due, and as far as I've been able to figure out, it is due to a woman named Trudi Davidoff who coined the term "winter sow" and first articulated the technique. So, this is her website. Check it out, give her the credit for terrific idea, and look through the great information she's got there.

Black Walnut Dispatch
I think I've recommended Mary's blog before, but I was reading it today and couldn't get over just how FREAKING AWESOME it is. I mean... in her latest post she imagines James Joyce as a landscape contractor in the very first paragraph and then goes on to compare (poorly drawn) illustrations of crape myrtles to medieval maces or possible unexploded mines. Erudite, silly, plant humor. Is there anything better?

Quick link: Plant breeding ain't hard

I'm always going on about plant breeding. I love it. It is a blast. I'm writing a book about it. It is also sometimes incredibly easy, as easy as letting violas self sow and picking out your favorites as they bloom. To see how much fun (and how lovely) that can be, go check out Faire Garden's gorgeous (and amusing) Viola Beauty Pageant. Anything with some variability that self-sows in your garden -- be they violas, columbine, or even lettuce -- can be treated the same way to create your very own strain. Collect some up, let them get down and dirty together, and pick out your favorites!

Yet another reason to GROW your dinner.

This article in Wired caught my eye a while ago, and I'm just now getting around to blogging about it. It talks about some studies which indicate that the more we work for our food, the better it tastes, the more we enjoy it. Most interestingly, this isn't just a higher level psychological feeling of satisfaction -- the same apparently holds true for mice, indicating this may be a pretty fundamental part of how brains work.

That's interesting, but it gets more interesting. Work with brain scanning indicates that obese people get less pleasure from food than people with a healthy weight -- implying that they may be overweight because they have to eat more to get the same level of satisfaction.

In this article, they put that together to say that taking time to cook dinner will make it taste better, and therefore help you eat less and be healthier.

I'm inclined to take it a step further: A home cooked, home GROWN meal is quite the peak of deliciousness, leaving one so flushed with pleasure the thought of an oreo orgy can hardly come to mind and McDonalds sounds simply repulsive.
 As if I needed another reason to keep vegetable gardening...

Moving

If you haven't heard it yet, you should go check out the new pod cast, RadioGarden from Horticulture magazine. I'm quite struck by it. It very different, and very cool. Sort of like This American Life meets gardening.
I particularly like this first episode, because the topic is one I know all too much about: Moving as a gardener. I've been seriously gardening for about a decade. In that time, I have live no fewer than 9 different places in three states and two countries, leaving a trail of plants everywhere I go, and loading up an ever-increasing collection of plants I can't possibly leave behind. I've had two years at my current address, but another move is looming... At the end of next summer, if all goes well, I'll be graduating with my PhD, selling my house, and heading off somewhere new (where, exactly, is yet to be determined. Suggestions are welcome!). Another move... But I am really hoping, and planning, on this being my last. I'm ready be somewhere, settle in, and start planting trees.

Happy Blogaversary!

My blog is one year old today! Happy blogaversary!

"But!" you ask, "What do you mean? Your archive clearly shows that the first post on this blog was in January 2009, not August!"

Okay, so technically my blog is more than a year old. But though my first post went up in February, I posted all of 5 more times in March, and the nothing until August, when I started posting regularly. So I have decided that August 11th is my blogavesary. If you don't like that, tough.

To mark this special occasion, I have decided to put together a little list of the blogs greatest hits for the year just ended. And by greatest hits, I simply mean posts that I happen to like.

Cartoons: My favorite of my garden drawings/cartoons so far is this one. Probably because I totally stole the idea was inspired by the wonderful Carol of May Dreams Gardens.

Garden design stuff: Last winter, I got all excited about houseplants for the first time in my life (thank you, Mr. S.), and staged make overs of not just one but two of my window sills. A vast improvement. This summer, I've been collecting more interesting plants to enjoy indoors over the winter, so I'll probably be talking more about it come snow season.

Sciency things:
I like science. I really enjoyed writing my bit on hummingbirds and the color red. I also liked my post on where dwarf conifers come from (witches!!)
And, still in science, but a little more seriously, since I do study plant breeding and genetics, I think and hear a lot about genetic engineering. I think the debate about it currently raging ignores a lot of both the real problems, and potential positives of the technology. I hope you'll take a moment to read -- and respond to -- my thoughts, if you haven't already. This is an important issue we need a more informed debate about.

And that's it! Happy Blogaversary! Looking forward to another year of writing random nonsensical wonderful blog posts!

Wednesday links: Mostly about bugs (and other stuff)

This week, we're starting with some links about the beauties of are arthropod friends:

Pam has some lovely shots of a just emerged adult cicada. The wings are so delicate, and so beautiful.

Frances does an outstanding photo essay on the beauties of spider webs. And even one (I think) exceptionally attractive spider.

Keeping with the entomological theme, I am indebted to Allen Becker for finding out about this fascinating study. The actual study is a lot of chemistry that is way over my head, but the take home message is pretty simple: air pollution, especially ozone, can destroy the fragrance of flowers. This is sad for the gardener, but very sad for pollinators like bees who use floral scents to find their food. Yet another reason to bike to work!

Moving on to less pretty matters, there is a legal battle underway in Europe over patenting of genes in broccoli and tomato. An interesting and very complex issue. If you are really into this stuff, this is a clear (if not particularly exciting) explanation of the various forms of intellectual property protection available for plant varieties -- specifically in Europe. The US patent system is a little different -- I think. I get confused about it all, which is mostly why I'm reading and linking to these things.

Wednesday Links

By way of The Scientist Gardener, the NY Times had a great article on green washing -- by individuals. We're used to hearing corporations criticized for pretending to be green, but there is a wider trend of justifying excessive, and ecologically damaging, consumption in the name of being "green."

I admit I'm drawn to the next subject partly because it is sort of giggle inducing (in a sophmoric way), but it actually is an important thing to think about. So, I bring you the Garden Professors talking about urine as a fertilizer. Jeff emphasizes nitrogen, but this article from Slate focuses recapturing the nutrients in urine from the prospective of the potential future phosphorus shortage -- including a discussion of special urine separating toilets, which solve the whole "yes, but how do you do it PRACTICALLY" side of the matter.

I saw this link on Margaret Roach's blog and was very intrigued: Right here in Michigan, researchers are having a field day to distribute Japanese beetles! Show up and get your free baggy of the little vermin! Japanese beetles, that is, infected with Ovavesicula popilliae, a pathogen which it is hoped will suppress beetle populations to low levels once established, and won't infect any other organisms. I really want to go and get some, but... it is on a Wednesday morning, an hour from where I live. Who thought of that timing? I'd have to take the day off work to go! If it was on a weekend I would absolutely be there.

Mr. Subjunctive writes about plant theft and the odd fact that many people somehow feel it is okay to pocket cuttings and even whole plants without permission. My take -- not okay.

Diana of Gardening on the Edge has a cool post about a shrew apparently infected with toxoplasma -- which is one of my favorite pathogens. It is a little organism that changes the behavior of rodents in order to get into the stomach of cats -- the only place it can reproduce.

Wednesday Links

The Scientist gardener post about "Hybrid Heirloom" tomatoes -- tomato varieties bred to combine the vigor and disease resistance of modern hybrid tomatoes with the flavor and quirkiness of heirlooms.
Also check out his post on a possible new short cut in apple breeding.

The New York Times does a story on Tony Avent of Plant Delights Nursery. Not an amazing article, but I'm always happy to see any gardening news in the NYT.

1 in 10 Britons have been injured while gardening. I'm willing to bet less than 1 in 10 Americans have gardened period.

The Galloping Gardener asks: "Where would we garden lovers be without the NGS?" To which I answer: America. We need a good national gardening scheme for this nation.

Wednesday Links

This is just weird, but: This product monitors soil moisture, light, and temperature in your garden and relays the information to your iphone. Really? To an iphone? So you can garden without living the comfort of your house, or what?

Highly recommended: An AP piece on gardens made by soldiers at war -- from WWI, Vietnam, to Iraq and Afghanistan. A fascinating read.

Guest post on biofortified by a actual hands-in-the-dirt corn and soybeans farmer on why he loves biotech, and considers it greener than conventional varieties. (the short story: more efficient use of fertilizer, less irrigation, less pesticide)

Mat Kinase reviews Stewart Brand's new book -- which I am itching to read. I should buy a copy already. This is something like the third time I've linked to things related to it.

Ben's Garden blog posts about the power of plants to prevent crime -- he cites really cool research, and the goes on to muse how Dicken's novels might be different if the characters had more plants in their lives! Terrific stuff.

Bad science reporting over at the LA Times: The headline and first paragraph imply spinach from the supermarket may be more nutritious than spinach from your garden or a farmers market. The actual study, however, simply shows that spinach stored  for 9 days in light is more nutritious than spinach stored in the dark. The actual take home: Eat stuff when it is fresh and minimize the time it is sitting in your fridge. Best way I know to do that: Grow your own, and harvest right before you eat.

From the NYTimes, a biodegradable bag called the "PeePoo" which you put... well, feces in. The bag breaksdown, AND kills disease causing organisms in the poop. It is designed for toilet less third world slums, and is a fantastic idea -- reduce disease, and create fertilizer. Am I weird for wishing they sold them here?

Wednesday Links

Loree, of Danger Garden, is growing an agave. In her car. Yes, as in INSIDE her car. Proof, finally, that I am NOT the biggest plant nerd in the world.

The always excellent Jeff Gillman muses about the relative toxicity of caffeine and 2,4-D herbicide.

Seeds in the City bids goodbye to their dead bee hive... They've had a sad series of posts about the death of the hive, and it is keeping me on the fence about getting a hive for myself. But if clearly, they have no regrets... should I? Shouldn't I? Bees? No bees? Maybe next year? I can't decide.

Biofortified shares a terrific comic about the dreadful inaccuracy with which the term "organic" is used. For science nerds only.

Gardening Asylum posts about the excellent and very under-appreciated Corydalis lutea.

Wednesday Links:

Biofortified has an excellent review of a new book by Stewart Brand (of Whole Earth Catalog fame) in which he advocates a new, pragmatic, science-based, environmentalism -- they include this quote from the book: “Cities are green. Nuclear energy is Green. Genetic engineering is Green."

Following up on that, here is an article by the fore mentioned Stewart Brand on why cities, even slums (perhaps especially slums)  may be the greenest way to live.

For all the feminists who read my blog (Redhead, Anna): The Inelegant Gardener links to a news reel from the 60s about a "lady gardener" including this priceless comment about one of her tools, described as being  "as easy to operate as pushing a pram - another pursuit at which the ladies excel". Also follow her link to a side-splitting youtube video titled "Women: Know your Limits."

The Galloping Gardener (who surely produces the best garden porn on the internet) does a post on a garden at... a dump. Of course, she, being British, calls it a "rubbish" rather than "trash" or "garbage" which makes it sound ever so much more appealing.

On the Gardening Gone Wild blog, a post on TINY flower arrangements caught my eye. I tend to make arrangements with amounts of flowers measured in fist fulls, but these dramatically downsized arrangements are delightful -- they marvelously highlight the tiny gems in the garden that are too easy to over look.

By way of Studio G, comes this Lifehacker post on making solar-powered lights out of jars - I'm not personally nuts about the jars themselves, but the basic idea is really exciting to me: buy cheap solar lights, take them apart, and rework them into lights of your own creation! I've been wanting to incorporate more non-plant items in my garden this year -- maybe I'll start with this...

Another story on Dave Clark's studies on the genetics on flower fragrance -- in this one, he claims it is a breakthrough to developing genetically engineered fragrant flowers. I have my doubts: They have identified a DOZEN different genes that together create the petunia fragrance. Genetic engineering could easily stick in one or two of those into a new plant -- resulting in something which would be far from a complex or interesting scent. At best, the result would be something like cheap, artificially flavored processed food, but nothing like the complexity and depth of nature.

 My back 40 Feet posts about a terrific guerrilla garden -- it is really quite lovely. Seeing it is convincing me that I AM going to do some guerrilla gardening this year. There is a pitiful, weed-infested island in the middle of a traffic circle up the street that I AM going to do something with this year.

Wednesday Links

A brief story about some University of Florida researchers and the potential to genetically engineer fragrance into flowers which I mostly pass on because I can't resist news stories about people I know (Dave Clark, one of the researchers in the article, is a collaborator with my advisor on the petunia project I'm doing) but also because it is an interesting note in the whole GMO debate. Though really, it would be easier to add fragrance to florist roses with traditional breeding. The genetic engineering approach would only really make sense with something like gerbera daisies with no scent whatsoever. And wouldn't a fragrant gerb be kinda weird?

Studio G does a post on living willow structures. Which I totally want to do. When I eventually graduate, and can move out of the blasted city, to somewhere with SPACE, I'm building one. Probably several.
Do check out this news story of a debate over genetic engineering somewhere in the UK (okay, I looked it up: Birmingham. Don't know where that is, but maybe you do.) It starts of all civilized with people saying they can respect and learn from each other, and ends with one farmer calling the others "miserable gits." Which just makes me giggle.

A good post on the evils of topping trees. I remember a professor explaining this to my class, and saying that topping does have one useful purpose: It can help you pick a good arborist! As in, if they offer to top your trees, don't hire them.

This report of a new repeat blooming cherry tree gets it all back to front. The variety was created via mutation breeding -- which is simply exposing the plant to some mutagen (chemicals, radiation) to create random changes in genes, most of which will be damaging, some of which might be useful. The strange thing about this story is that they act as if mutation breeding is some shiny new alternative to genetic engineering. Fact is, it is OLD news. Mutation breeding has been used in wheat breeding, to create rex begonias and in many other ornamental plants -- it is also a fundamental technique for doing basic research on genetics -- there are thousands and thousands of mutated lines of arabidopsis, corn, etc, in use in genetics labs around the world.

An interesting story in The Atlantic (by way of the essential Give Me Something to Read) about Wal-Mart's movement into local produce -- including a blind taste test comparing produce from Wal-Mart and Whole Food's, where Wal-Mart actually wins in several categories. A very interesting counter-point to the typical knee-jerk "Wal-Mart = bad" thinking.

Wednesday Links

Make that Wednesday link. It was a busy week people -- all I've got is this one link, but it is a good one!

From KeeWee -- planted boxes of flowers on the bumper of a pickup truck! I want some!

Wednesday Links

I'm giving this top billing this week, because I think it is pretty important (normally these links are simply on the order I find them during the week): Do go check out the blog biofortified. It is written by a team of graduate students (and their mascot: Fank N. Foodie) studying genetic engineering. They're also environmentalists, advocates of local food, and generally all-around-cool. If you are looking to move past the silly and pointless debate over if GMOs are good or bad, and on to reading real, thoughtful discussion of what we should and shouldn't be doing with the technology, start here. It is high on my Must Read list from now on.

By way of the always excellent Scientist Gardener, plans for what is being billed as the world's largest urban farm in Detroit.Which is cool. I was in Detroit recently, and the city is spectacular -- spectacularly depressing, that is. We drove through entire neighborhoods of lovely victorian homes where only one or two houses WEREN'T boarded up. So I'm super excited about the growing urban agriculture movement in Detroit these days.

This was posted, like, 6 months ago, but I just found it, and feel like linking to it: James and the Giant Corn explains why pineapples are awesome.

Carol provides translation for what house plants are really saying. I hope she's not right... her plants sound pretty demanding. And do they really WANT to be deadheaded? I always thought having your half-developed offspring chopped off would be pretty traumatic. Though not as bad as what the poor hyacinths have waiting for them.

Apparently, in New Zealand they are seeing a shift in gardening trends: A move away from grasses and foliage and back to a more traditional flower centric look. I'm not sure if this is true in the US (here it seem to be all about vegetables at the moment), and if it is, I'm not sure what I think about it. I love growing all of the above, but I do think flowers are more fun to breed, and plant breeding is my favorite part of gardening.

Garden Rant has a great piece on native and non-native plants -- a great summing up of what sounds like a spectacularly sane chapter on the same topic by Linda Chalker-Scott of The Garden Professors.

Germi goes gaga for Aloes. Well, she's BEEN gaga for aloes, but seriously, she's taking it to another level. I should warn you, this post induced SEVERE zone envy, and anyone else in a cold climate might want to wait until spring to view it.


One scientist finds trees growing two to four times faster than usual, apparently due to the increase in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. I'm not surprised that it increases growth rate -- CO2 supplementation has been showed to do that before -- I AM surprised at the numbers. Two to four TIMES faster? I'll have to track down the actual paper and read it in detail. (I'll pretend this is part of studying for my up-coming comprehensive exams...)

Wednesday Links

Linda Chalker-Scott at The Garden Professors rips to shreds the recently talked about (including, I'm a little embarrassed to admit, right here on my blog) paper about water droplets on sunny days causing leaf burn. The take home message is that watering on sunny days almost certainly doesn't harm anything. But go read it! Watching a good scientist tear apart lousy research is one of the best spectator sports ever! (Oh, sorry -- is my nerd showing?)


Another episode of: Plant breeders making plants uglier! This week: Proliferated roses as a cut flower. Ugh. I found this link on a comment thread over on the Rose hybridizers Association forum where people made comments like: "Very reminiscent of some hideous parasite or tumorous growth." and (my favorite): "Nothing says, "I just gave you scabies, dear," like a proliferated rose on a date."

I can't resist being all meta and fractal-like, so: Here is a link to another list of gardening links from the sunset fresh dirt blog!

From a trashy advice column in the UK, this complaint: "My cold, control freak husband loves his garden more than me." Uh oh. Wonder if my partner wrote that letter?

If you are interested in genetics, biotechnology and just what plant breeders do these days, check out this post from The Scientist Gardener.  It is a good introduction to some of the cool tools breeders use these days.

I'm becoming kind of addicted to Deborah Silver's blog, Dirt Simple. For example, this post which is nothing but incredibly lovely flower arrangements in colors that make me drool... (And: Check out this!)

Wednesday Links

Another great post from Deborah Silver over at Dirt Simple -- about container gardening. The post includes a series of photographs of a dizzying array of different designed in the very same set of containers. If you are looking for inspiration for your containers this year, start with this post!

Kinda off topic, but: I'm proud to be writing this on blogger now that google as finally taken a stand against censorship in China! Now we just need Yahoo, Microsoft, and all the rest to join them.

Mr. Subjunctive of PATSP writes forcefully of how EASY it is to have things blooming in the middle of winter. I feel humbled... My house plants generally consist of things I grew outside all winter and am trying to overwinter. I shall hereby go to www.glasshouseworks.com (my favorite wacked-out source for tropicals -- though I have to admit, the quality of plants from them can be pretty hit and miss) and order their winter blooming house plant collection -- because I really don't know diddly about house plants, and would rather let some crazy person in Ohio pick them out for me.

For all you Southern gardeners suffering through a harsh winter, The Patient Gardener makes a good point: Hard winters provide lots of valuable information about what is REALLY hardy. (I can say this with a smile on my face because here in Michigan we are having a remarkably mild winter, and I'm expecting all sorts of things to survive.)

Young people aren't going into horticulture -- at least in Southern Australia. I've not seen numbers for the US -- I wonder what the trend is here?

Bert Cregg, over at the Garden Professors (and just down the hall from me in real life) has a nice post suggesting alternatives to the over planted blue spruce. I've been thinking more about winter interest of late, so cool conifers on my list of things to get this spring.

You gotta go check it out

One of my favorite bloggers, The Germinatrix, has stumbled on a revolting lair of (in her words) "unnecessarily pornographic" of stinkhorn mushrooms! It is insane. Seriously, you've got to go look at her post. You won't believe it.

Wednesday Links

MAT Kinase posts about a rumor to certify the entire state of Maine as organic. In his words, "an absolutely terrible idea" and I have to agree with him.

Holly Scoggins on The Garden Professors gives timely advice on what to do with poinsettias after Christmas: Throw them away!  (She also has an amusing disclaimer relating to the fact that nothing will make you hate a plant as much as doing research on it. Something I well know... I used to be merely uninterested by petunias... now I loath the smelly, stinky, wretched things.)

A new hardy alstromeria cultivar from Cornel breeder Mark Bridgen is coming out this year! A fact I pass on because, a) alstromeria are cool, and b) I've met Mark Bridgen, and he is super cool.

Studio G passes along a link to lovely solar powered hanging lights for the garden... They look great -- perfect for trying to create that glowing Avatar-garden look I'm itching for this year!

Water droplets in the sun can burn plants Which is kinda cool, but who waters that way anyhow? Water on leaves is a no-no (promotes fungal diseases) and you should always water in the morning or evening to reduce loss by evaporation. But still: kinda cool -- theoretically, it could even start a fire!

Wednesday Links

After taking a week off for Christmas, Wednesday links is back!

First, a post from Dirt Simple with a really cool idea: Giant votive candle holders made from ice for an incredible fire-and-ice display outside. I'm going to have to try this one. Nothing is blooming outside, so might as well use the cold to make something beautiful!

The economist reports on the potential to use a species of dandelion to make rubber which I pass on only because it feels like a kind of validation for my recent excitement over dandelions.

Check out this cool time lapse photography of the garden over at Ellis Hollow. It is the entire year in 100 seconds. I think I have to add doing this to my list of garden resolutions for 2010.

Order your seeds early this year! The Baltimore Sun thinks there might be a seed shortage for 2010.

Another british newspaper makes me jealous by published a retrospective of the decade in gardening trends.  My hope for the coming decade is that gardening will catch on in the US to the point where we can discuss gardening celebrities and design trends the same way.

I want this.

Wednesday Links:

Studio G's blog had a piece on an amazing looking topiary garden in South Carolina. Well worth checking out.

Tired of the cold and snow? Consider a trip to the lovely gardens of New Zealand. Oh, I wish I could...

Garden Rant's Susan Harris makes the point that snow is a design opportunity in the garden.

If you aren't a sort of academic plant geek, you might not appreciate this but: Allan Armitage is going to be dancing the hustle at a fund raiser! I want to see a dance-off between him and Michael Dirr!

The Inelegant Gardener explains the reason that some vegetables (his example is parsnips, but the same applies to a number of things) are sweeter after cold weather

Linda Chalker-Scott on The Garden Professors does a spot-on debunking of the "chemicals are evil" mindset.