|
What’s Blooming Now - July 9, 2009
Patience, Patience
You don’t think of patience or voluntary movement as attributes of plants. Just wait and see! A close watch on some of the plants in the Gardens this year will show you both.
 In the urns around the Symmetry Garden you’ll find a bog. Growing there you will find moneywort (Lysimachia nummularia) and corkscrew rush (Juncus effusus). You will also find a very patient plant – Sarracenia or pitcher plant.
The Sarracenia are carnivorous plants native mainly to the southeast United States. One species, Sarracenia purpurea, is found in the bogs of northern Indiana. It is the very picture of patience, waiting all day, every day for an insect to be lured into its pitcher-shaped leaves. This does not bode well for the insect. The nectar of some pitcher plants contains an insect poison. The downward-pointing, slick, nectar-covered hairs inside the pitcher of other plants keep insects from climbing out. Our native pitcher simply collects water, then waits for the insect to drown. In all cases, the decaying insect releases nutrients which nourish the plant.
You can grow carnivorous plants, too, but it can be tricky. You need to mimic their native habitat – acidic, nutrient- and salt-poor soil, high in organic matter that never dries out; water that contains no salt; full sun. You can use sphagnum peat moss mixed 1:1 with sand for the soil. Don’t use soil from your garden and be careful about using commercial soilless potting mix. This mix often contains lime to increase the pH and fertilizer that adds nutrients and salt to the soil, two things that are death to carnivorous plants. You will need to keep the soil wet, but use only rain water. Tap water contains salts and chemicals that can damage the plants. If you want to learn more about growing carnivorous plants, The Savage Garden by Peter D’Amato (Ten Speed Press, ISBN 0-89815-915-6) is an excellent resource. You can see a tropical pitcher plant, Nepenthes, in the Hilbert Conservatory.
  Two plants in our Gardens are showing some unexpected movement, especially with the frequent rainy, dark days. Both are annuals and do well in full sun and well-drained soil. Strawflower (Helichrysum bracteatum) (left) comes in many colors, with flowers that feel like straw. They don’t like rain! The flowers will close when they get wet (right). You can make them close simply by spraying them with water (a neat parlor trick!).
 .jpg) Portulaca, also called moss rose or purslane (left), is know for flowers that close when the sun goes down and remain closed on cloudy days. New cultivars have been partially cured of this habit, especially those with double flowers like ‘Fairy Tales Cinderella’. But, on particularly dark days, even these flowers will close (right).
Both strawflower and moss rose are great plants – if the summer is dry and sunny.
Want to buy local? You can find a farmers’ market near you by going to Indiana MarketMaker at http://in.marketmaker.uiuc.edu/.
Mary Welch-Keesey
Consumer Horticulture Specialist
Purdue University
Dick Crum Resource Center
|