Gardening Ecologically

I've always been fascinated by ledges and the unique plant communities found in their rocky niches.  A favorite haunt from my childhood is the Schoodic peninsula of Acadia National Park in Maine.   This ruggedly beautiful landscape's fire and ice metamorphosis is evident in the glacial scoured granite and basalt ledges that meet the pounding ocean waves.   However, this extreme environment is also a luxuriant, magical garden of 'giant bonsai.'

Growing in scarce inches of lean gravely soil and organic duff are jack pine (Pinus banksiana), creeping juniper (Juniperus horizontalis 'Bar Harbor'), wine leaf cinquefoil (Potentilla tridentata), Sweetfern (Comptonia peregrina), bayberry (Myrica pensylvanica) cowberry (Vaccinium vitis idaea minus) aster, goldenrod and more.  Granite pockets also pool water that flourish into bogs of cranberry, rush and blueflag iris. 

At Tranquil lake Nursery we have created our own magical miniature landscapes, planted in elevated hypertufa troughs, inspired by the Maine coast.  One is planted with a dwarf Jack pine selected by the Arnold Arboretum, Pinus banksiana 'Schoodic."

Plants have adapted and evolved ways to prevent water loss and survive in dry shallow soils and even on rock surfaces.   conifers, like the Jack pine, have leaves transformed into narrow needles with a waxy coating.  Plants with fuzzy grey or silver leaves, such as Salvia argentea, reflect the sun's heat and the fine hairs also cut evaporation and transpiration by slowing the air movement across the leaf surface.

Succulents, such as sedum and sempervivums, have a thick, waxy cuticle on their leaf surface and are also able to close their leaf pores (stomata) during the heat of the day to conserve water.  One of our newest landscape features capitalizes on this water conserving evolution; a pavilion with a roof planted with sedum and hens and chicks.  This green roof not only provides a perch for these sun loving plants but also casts cool shadow for extending a shady border as well as a comfortable place to sit in the garden.

Observing and being in tune with your landscape's site, soil and climatic conditions is one of the essential starting points in developing a successful garden.  It is also invaluable for a gardener to know and understand the culture of plants and their native habitats.  Let's have no more floppy Sedum 'Autumn Joy' due to overwatering.

The soils at the nursery are a sandy loam and rock free.  Even though the gardens are amended with organic matter and mulched, they are prone to drought conditions.  We have designed and planted accordingly, with plants tolerant and even demanding of well-drained conditions.  Accompanying daylilies are many plants native to the drier, western plains or Eurasian steppes: Amorpha, Baptisia, Callirhoe, Echinacea, Oenothera, Penstemon, Perovskia, Yucca and many more.

Explore our display gardens and discover the many cultural niches as well as colorful plant combinations.

Warren Leach

Plants for Drying: Pussy Toes, Cat Tails, Honesty and More

Now-a-days, when we can buy fresh flowers year round while shopping for groceries, using dried plant material for home decorating might seem a thing of the past.  But to me dried flowers say autumn, bountiful harvest and the end of the growing season.

Of the many methods used for drying plants, the simplest is to stand the plants upright on their stems in a container.  Any container will do; a can, jar or vase.  No work is required on your part.

First let's consider some things that are partially dried when you pick them, such as seed pods and seeds heads.  After false indigo's blue flowers are gone, beautiful dark grey - almost black - pods form.  Left on the plants they become rattles when autumn winds blow.  Cut and dried, they become an unusual color and form for arrangements

The teasel plant makes a tall, bold, and prickly statement in the garden. Cut and dried, the cone-like seed heads make a similar statement in arrangements.  Picked soon after the flowering is over, they dry to pale tan.

Siberian iris seed pods are dark brown and have a sheen.  They appear to have been carved from mahogany.  Pick them after they have opened but before they begin to weather and fade.

The roadside weed known as dock is plentiful and it can be cut over a long season.   Picked in early summer, it will dry to tan.  Cut it as the season progresses and it will dry darker until it is finally a rich dark brown.

Other good seed pods to pick late in the season are poppy, St. John's wort and cone flower centers.  Cat tails add an autumnale feel to arrangements, but if you wait until autumn, you will be disappointed.  When you bring them inside, they are apt to burst and scatter fuzzy down all over.  They need to be picked after they turn brown, but before the seeds develop, usually in mid-to-late June.   When dried they can be sprayed with clear lacquer or hair spray for added insurance.  Be sure to cut some with the foliage left on the stem.  It dies in interesting shapes and adds an oriental appearance to arrangements.

Don't forget wild and ornamental grasses.  Pick them when they have matured, but before they are ready to shatter.

Up to this point the material being discussed is in the tan to dark brown color range, but more vivid colors are possible.  Bright orange Chinese lanterns may be a pest in a neat garden, but try to find a place for them and you will be rewarded with an old fashioned plant that says autumn's bounty like no other.  Strawflowers are almost as colorful.  These flowers are borne in clusters with individual flowers developing over time.  Pick each flower with a half inch stem and impale the flowers on a wire.  The flower should be picked before it is fully opened.  It will continue to open as the flower dries and the central button will remain attractive.   The wire can be covered with florist tape before arranging.

Money plant, also known as silver dollars or honesty, is an nice plant under any name!   It 's a biennial.  During its first year it will form an innocuous clump of leaves, six inches tall or so.  The following spring, the money plant will produce 18 to 24 panicles of attractive purple flowers.  Each flower will each grow into a seed pod in the form of a disk. Cut the stems when the disc turns from green to tan.  Let them dry completely.  Remove the husks by rubbing them between the fingers.  The iridescent dollars, that are so popular, will be revealed.  Save the seeds, you find inside the husks and scatter them where you want new plants next year. 

The velvety red seed heads of sumac make a bold statement.  (No, they are not poisonous.  Poison Sumac is an entirely different species.)  Pick them When they are fully developed and remove any leaves.  They can be arranged immediately or they can be dried for arranging later.

Baby's breath (either annual or perennial) and German statice are good airy fillers.  Pick them in the advanced bud stage and dry them upright.  Don't cut wild sea lavender.  It's a protected plant and in Rhode Island you can get fined for picking it!

Bayberry and box wood are woody plants which produce useful materials.  Simply cut bayberry after the leaves have fallen.  Cut boxwood and stand it in a little water, so that the water is gradually absorbed.  As the leaves dry they will lose their sheen but retain their form and color.

Peegee Hydrangeas are in a class of their own as a dried plant, and can be easily dried.   They are prolific, so you can dry a lot of them.  They will dry to different colors, from pink-to tan-to brown, depending upon when you cut them.  Even if picked late in the season, when they are not very attractive, they can be sprayed with metallic paint to make very attractive Christmas decorations.

Although all of the plants dry easily standing upright, they can also be dried by other methods.  One plant, that must be dried upright is chives.  Don't laugh, these dry to little pink and lavender balls that are easy to use in arrangements.  They don't smell of onions either.  Pick them, when they are just fully developed and stand them in a container.   As the individual florets dry, they turn upright and stay upright.  If they are dried upside down, the florets still turn upright, so that when they are turned upright in the arrangement -- they look wilted.

Start collecting and drying now.  Preserve a colorful and bountiful harvest to remember your garden as the days grow short.

Gilbert Moore

Suggested Plants That Dry Easily

 Flower Heads to Hang