April 2010 Archives

Have you heard someone say they don't plant peonies because of ants?

A colleague did several years ago. I didn't fully appreciate her comment until someone screamed shortly after I gave her a vase of fresh peonies out of my garden - there were ants all over her desk, hitchhikers in the pink petals I had picked that morning.

Peony buds produce a nectar that attracts ants. An Ozark farmer's wife who gave me my first peony said the plants produce honey to attract ants to help unfold their dense flowers. Another Ozark friend said peony buds produce a wax that ants eat so peony flowers can come out.

Horticulturalists say we're not quite sure why ants and peonies have a bond so I like the romance of the stories of my Ozark friends.

I don't mind ants. I once had an ant farm; ants have crashed a number of picnics and one yr a stream of them walked across an office wall. I didn't think about screaming once.

Warning. If you don't like ants, the following may contain images that are disturbing...

Mid spring in a Missouri garden means pink, yellow and blue pastels make way for the almost all white garden.

Now that more plants have sprung in my Missouri garden, I'm locating plants that have moved down hill and coaxing them back up into, hopefully, better living conditions but one never knows.

In the meantime, here's a little MO spring gardening quiz. Can you name these Missouri plants and trees featuring white spring blooms?
 

There are many lovely hybrid columbines in a variety of colors these days but my favorites are still the old-fashioned, native ones.

Missouri's Wild Columbines are delicate-looking, hardy and beautiful. They easily grow from seed to about 2 feet high, and love rocky slopes and ledges, which means they're very happy in my hillside garden.

I've found they self-seed so one of the things I enjoy doing in my Missouri garden is walking through in mid-spring to see where the wild columbines are popping up.

Unless they're going to be trampled on, I usually leave them wherever they move. I love seeing them growing out of rock edges along paths.

Blue Ajuga is fun to have in a Missouri spring garden.

The lady who first gave me a start called them "Johnny Jump Ups" because the plant grows low to the ground most of the year except for spring, when flowers pop up from the center. I don't know if that's a name unique to Missouri or not but the Johnny Jump Ups I knew were little violets.

Regardless of what they're called, besides being a hardy ground cover and bringing blue color to Missouri spring's pastel pink, yellow and white garden palette, these 6-inch perennials are favorites with bumble bees, hummingbird moths, and gardeners like me who appreciate plants that hug soil to the side of a hill.

"It gives one a sudden start in going down a barren, stony street, to see upon a narrow strip of grass, just within the iron fence, the radiant dandelion, shinning in the grass, like a spark dropped from the sun." -- Henry Ward Beecher

It's going to start an argument so I might as well confess: I like dandelions.  I'll grant you a few dandelions here and there may not necessarily be attractive but won't you agree, there's nothing quite like the beauty of a whole field of them??

I told you it was going to be a hot topic.

These unwanted flowers may now be considered weeds but they have noble roots.

These Europeans hitchhiked on the Mayflower and soon became diet and medicinal staples for early European North American settlers. The name is originally French and refers to the shape of their leaves, which look like big lions teeth. (Maybe they really should have been called dandy lion.) The young leaves are delicious in salads.

Dandelions are also among the first spring flowers bees and butterflies visit, and what Mom hasn't been greeted with a tight fist holding a bouquet of these bright, yellow flowers, or better yet, a bouquet of seed puff balls...

Hmm, maybe that's why I haven't heard from my sister-in-law.....








Charlotte
 
Gardening to Distraction on a MO Hill