Eristalis transversa, Transverse Flower Fly

Posted on 2009-08-16 by admin

This beautiful creature is not a bee. It’s a fly of the Syrphidae, a family of flies renowned for bee mimics. This is Eristalis transversa, Transverse Flower Fly. I had noticed it in my garden for the first time this summer. yesterday was the first chance I had to capture some photos of it. Consider this a belated Garden Blogging Bloom Day post, but with a native pollinator as the focal point.

Eristalis transversa, Transverse Flower Fly

The flower it’s visiting is Aster novae-angliae ‘Chilly Winds’, a selection of the native New England Aster from Seneca Hills Perennials in upstate New York. This plant has been a pollinator magnet in my backyard native plant garden for weeks. It’s massive and overgrown and poorly placed, crowding out everything else around it. I’ll have to find it another place for next year.

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Links

BugGuide page
Seneca Hills Perennials

Monobia quadridens, Mason Wasp

Posted on 2009-07-12 by admin

Monobia quadridens, Mason Wasp, male (I think), on Aster novae-angliae ‘Chilly Winds’ in my backyard native plant garden this afternoon.

Today was my first full day home since last Monday, and I was sick for nearly a week leading up to that. So I took advantage of the beautiful weather in NYC and got out into the garden. The weeds had gotten away from me, and I spent most of my time dealing with them, at least a little bit.

I then turned my attention to the center of activity in the backyard: the massive specimen of New England Aster that just started to bloom in my absence. It’s a selection of the species I ordered from Seneca Hill Perennials, which specializes in New York native plants, a couple years back. It didn’t do much at first. In the full sun it’s enjoyed since I had to take down the last of the weedy maples last year, it has grown to shrublike proportions – 5′ wide and high – mocking the meager 1-2′ spacing I provided between it and the plants around it. Today’s pollinator activity concentrated on just the handful of open flowers. It has hundreds of buds. When it’s in full bloom, the activity will be audible.

I was watching for bees, and there were a lot of different species visiting. This wasp was the most striking visitor. It’s Monobia quadridens, the Mason Wasp. From the antennae, I think it’s a male. Thanks to tangledbranches for the ID!

Judging from the photos on its BugGuide page alone, this is a common species with a wide distribution. It’s native to eastern North America. From a gardener’s perspective, this is a beneficial insect. It provisions its young with caterpillars in nests burrowed into the ground or bored into wood; it’s also known as a Carpenter Wasp. I’ve never noticed it before. I hope to see more of it as the Aster comes into full bloom.

[http://bit.ly/imbbO]

Links

BugGuide page

Native Plant Garden, Chicago Botanic Garden

Posted on 2009-06-10 by admin

At the Chicago Botanic Garden, our first garden stop for Chicago Spring Fling 2009, I made a pilgrimage to the Native Plant Garden. I was surprised that most of the plants were familiar to me as Northeastern natives. However, I had never before encountered Geum triflorum, Prairie Smoke. I saw a lot more of over that weekend, but I saw it here first.

Even close up, it reminds me of trails of smoke rising from a candle wick that’s just been extinguished. I bumped into the staff photographer who took the group shot of us just outside the visitor’s center. I asked her what she liked in this garden; she said this was one of her favorite flowers.

Most of the Baptisia were not yet fully open here as they were at the Lurie Garden we visited later in the day. They looked like grass eels rising from the lake bed.

On closer inspection they looked slightly less reptilian.

I did find one handsome stand of Baptisia australis.

Another sinuous plant was this beautiful Carpinus caroliniana, Hornbeam. Another common name is Musclewood. It’s easy to see why.

I find beauty in the green things, whose forms gain prominence.

Carex grayi, Bur Sedge

Parthenocissus quinquefolia, Virginia Creeper

A grass I neglected to identify.

Aristolochia macrophylla, Dutchman’s Pipevine

The big star when I visited was Dodecathon meadia, Eastern Shooting Star, an eastern woodland wildflower with which I am familiar. I grew it in Garden #1 in the East Village decades ago. During my Chicago visit, it appeared and reappeared in drifts, and in its full color range, from pristine white to pink to deep rose.

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Links

Chicago Botanic Garden

The Native Flora Garden

Posted on 2009-05-14 by admin

For the past four years I’ve been cultivating my backyard native plant garden. I’ve been adding compost and mulching with leaves and shredded Christmas trees, as much as I can get of all of it. I’m not yet able to grow The Precious (below), but I’m learning in Soil Management class that what I’ve been doing is just what’s needed to develop the humusy, woodland soil it requires. Someday, I’ll have some in my garden (obtained, of course, only from a conservation-oriented source such as the Vermont Ladyslipper Company). Meanwhile I can enjoy them in BBG’s Native Flora Garden.

Cypripedium calceolus var. pubescens, Yellow Lady-Slipper

I find the native Lady-Slipper orchids achingly beautiful. They seem more to float than to be held up by their slender stems. Maybe they would seem less fantastic if they were more common, spreading like dandelions, and less specialized in their environmental requirements. Maybe, but not by much.

There are other beauties in bloom right now. The early Spring wildflowers have been replaced by the regime of those which bloom in late Spring, and even early Summer. Geranium maculatum is one example of something I associate more with Summer than Spring. It is, in some settings I’ve seen, a common wildflower. But I covet it for my own garden nonetheless.

Geranium maculatum

Some of the Spring ephemerals are already entering senescence. Here’s Dicentra cucullaria Dutchman’s Breeches, as it appeared Tuesday afternoon in one part of the Garden. Contrast that with how it appeared just three weeks ago in a different location.

Dicentra cucullaria, Tuesday afternoon

Dicentra cucullaria, three weeks earlier

Spring ephemeral describes a life habit of perennial woodland wildflowers which develop aerial parts (i.e. stems, leaves, and flowers) of the plant early each spring and then quickly bloom, go to seed and then quickly die back to its underground parts (i.e. roots, rhizomes, and bulbs) for the remainder of the year. This strategy is very common in herbaceous communities of deciduous forests as it allows small herbaceous plants to take advantage of the high amount of sunlight reaching the forest floor prior to the leaf-out of woody plants.
– Wikipedia: Ephemeral plant

It’s interesting that Wikipedia lists Dicentra eximia among the Spring ephemerals. It’s still going strong at BBG. My experience is that it blooms for months, and lasts at least through the summer, barring drought. This is one of the things that makes it an excellent performer in the garden.

Tuesday afternoon, near the Bog habitat

Interspersed with Dodecathon meadia in the Serpentine Rock habitat

Three weeks ago

The march of the Rhododendron in the Osborne Garden continues into the Native Flora Garden, more evidence that early Summer is replacing late Spring.

Rhododendron prinophyllum, Rosebud Azalea

Rhododendron periclymenoides, Pinkster Azalea

Two purple beauties from the Pine Barrens habitat, something which I would only be able to recreate in container in my garden.

Viola brittoniana, Coast Violet

Lupinus perennis, Sundial Lupine

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Links

Native Flora Garden, Brooklyn Botanic Garden

Wildflowers in a Flatbush Backyard

Posted on 2009-05-11 by admin

Last week was NYC Wildflower Week. Appropriately, here are some wildflowers blooming over the past week in my backyard native plant garden.

Wildflowers blooming near the gardener’s nook in my backyard for last May’s Garden Blogging Bloom Day.

Aquilegia canadensis, Eastern Columbine
Chrysogonum virginianum ‘Allen Bush’, Green-and-Gold
Dicentra eximia ‘Aurora’, White-flowering Eastern Bleeding-Heart, Turkey Corn
Iris cristata, Crested Iris
Phlox stolonifera
Viola striata
Zizia aurea, Golden Alexanders
Brunnera macrophylla, Large-leaf Brunnera, Siberian Bugloss

Aquilegia canadensis, Eastern Red Columbine

Somehow, I have no photos of this from my garden in Flickr. Yet it’s been a favorite of mine for decades.

Native range is eastern North America. Widespread in New York state. Native to all five boroughs of NYC.

Aquilegia canadensis, Eastern Red Columbine, 2006-05-31

MOBOT
PLANTS

Chrysogonum virginianum ‘Allen Bush’, Green-and-Gold

A great groundcover for partial shade. Several cultivars are available. To my eye, all vary only slightly from the species, though I haven’t grown them side-by-side.

Individual flowers look like shaggy sunflowers.

Native range is Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern United States. Native to only one New York upstate county. Not native to NYC.

MOBOT
PLANTS

Dicentra eximia ‘Aurora’, Eastern Bleeding-Heart, Turkey Corn

A white-flowering cultivar of the native Eastern Bleeding Heart. Not every white-flowering form of a plant is successful. This is one that is equally lovely as the species, bringing its own graces to the structure of the inflorescence and individual flowers. Also a good choice for the shady white garden.

This plant is maybe three years old now. Not only has the original plant spread in size each year, this Spring I’ve noticed little seedlings cropping up around the mother plant. I’ll be curious to see how these develop, and what the flower color wil be in the children.

Dicentra eximia, Bleeding-heart, 2006-05-22
Dicentra eximia, Eastern bleeding-heart (Flickr photo set)

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PLANTS

Iris cristata, Crested Iris

Really beautiful, if a bit of a finicky grower. It seems to be at its best when grown on a slight slope with ample mulch. The stems trail through the mulch, the fans oriented down-slope. Sulks during the summer. Needs consistent moisture during the hot summer months and good drainage during the winter or it will disappear. Where it’s happy, it makes a great groundcover.

Native to Mid-Atlantic and interior Eastern United States, but not New York.

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PLANTS

Phlox stolonifera, Creeping Phlox

One of the best wildflower ground covers you can grow in the garden. In the trade, you’re more likely to find cultivars selected for flower color – such as ‘Bruce’s White’ and ‘Sherwood Purple’ – rather than the unqualified species. They all seem equally fine to me. (Mine is also a cultivar, but its name escapes me at the moment.) The flowers are usually fragrant, reminiscent of grape jelly.

Native range is most of Eastern United States, but only found in two upstate New York counties, not NYC.

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PLANTS

Viola striata, Pale Violet, Striped Cream Violet

The “oldest” plant in this post, this population came from my second city garden on 5th Street in Park Slope. The original plants were given to me 8-10 years ago by a gay couple who lived across the street. They have a beautiful shady backyard garden growing many wildflowers collected from their home in upstate New York.

Native to Eastern North America. Native to several counties in New York, but not NYC.

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Zizia aurea, Golden Alexanders

This plant is a recent discovery for me. I had never heard of it before picking it up from Gowanus Nursery last Spring. Now I see it all over the place, and it’s a fine groundcover. You can’t see it in this photo, but the foliage is also handsome.

Native to NYC, but not Brooklyn.

MOBOT
PLANTS

Brunnera macrophylla, Large-leaf Brunnera, Siberian Bugloss

Okay, Brunnera is not a native wildflower on this continent – it’s native range is Eastern Europe – but it is blooming in the backyard and it’s so pretty I had to take a picture of it. This plant is a refugee from the sideyard of Frank, a neighbor, professional gardener and fellow garden blogger at New York City Garden.

MOBOT
PLANTS

[bit.ly]

Cellophane Bees Return

Posted on 2009-05-09 by admin

I’m no entomologist, but I think this is the same species, Colletes thoracicus (Colletidae), Cellophane Bees, that “bee guy” John Ascher identified from my photos last year. This is an individual from a colony that appeared this week in the same place it appeared last year about this time.

We’ve had rain almost every day for a week. Yesterday I had the day off, and the weather also took a break, with sunny skies and temperatures in the 70s (F). Seems like perfect digging-in-the-ground conditions to me.

The area of activity is much larger this year than last. I wish I had a video camera. In the area of this photo, there were at least 30-40 bees flying around, but I can’t pick them out from the photo at this scale and resolution.

Links

Wikipedia: Colletidae

Wildflower Week in NYC, 5/1 through 5/9

Posted on 2009-04-29 by admin

Mertensia virginica, Virginia Bluebells blooming yesterday afternoon in the Native Flora Garden at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden.

This Friday, May 1, through next Saturday, May 9, is the Second Annual New York City Wildflower Week (WFW):

The 2nd annual NYC Wildflower Week celebrates all things green and wild in the Big Apple—the hundreds of native flowers, trees, shrubs and grasses that are found in the five boroughs. It gives New Yorkers numerous ways to connect with and be inspired by their local environment. Free activities throughout the city include: botanical walks, garden tours, ecology lectures, children’s events, planting opportunities, cooking classes, and food tastings at top restaurants. It is the largest celebration of National Wildflower Week, an initiative begun by Lady Bird Johnson.

Events are two numerous to list here. Please see the WFW calendar for a complete listing of and details on all events. They cover all five boroughs. See below for events in Brooklyn, which are also listed in the Flatbush Gardener calendar in the sidebar.

Aquilegia canadensis, Eastern Columbine blooming in the Union Square Native Plant Garden in May 2008.

Sunday, May 3, 11am: Native Plants of the Marsh of Marine Park

Guide: Ranger Allison McCarthy (allison.mccarthy@parks.nyc.gov)
Location: Meet outside Salt Marsh Nature Center, 3302 Avenue U
For more information, call 311 and ask for the Brooklyn Urban Park Rangers.
Description: Join the Urban Park Rangers for a hike through the salt marsh and learn about New York City’s beautiful native flora that flourish in the wetlands of Brooklyn. Dress for the weather, bring comfortable walking shoes and water, hat. You may also like to have a camera, hand lens, field guides, water, bug spray.

Sunday, May 3, 3:00pm: Prospect Park

Guide: Anne Wong, Director of Landscape Management (awong@prospectpark.org)
Location: Meet at Prospect Park Audubon Center
Description: Tour recent restorations in the woodlands and along the waterways in Prospect Park. The walk will focus on native plantings as well as invasive plant problems.

Dodecathon meadia, Eastern Shooting-Star, yesterday afternoon, Native Flora Garden, Brooklyn Botanic Garden.

Wednesday, May 6, 11am: Brooklyn Botanic Garden Native Flora Garden,

Location: Meet at the front entrance of the Native Flora Garden (by the wooden gates, across from the Lilac Collection)
Guide: Ulrich Lorimer, Curator of BBG’s Native Flora Garden
Description: Highlights will include many spring ephemerals such as trillium species (Trillium spp.), mayapple (Podophyllum peltatum) and violets (Viola spp.). Native azaleas will also be in bloom including the flame, pinxterbloom and sweet azaleas (Rhododendron spp.). A multitude of fern species will be emerging as well as aquatics such as golden club (Orontium aquaticum) and blue flag iris (Iris versicolor).

Lilium canadense, Canada Lily, July 2006, Native Flora Garden, Brooklyn Botanic Garden.

Thursday, May 7, 3:30-5:00pm: Brooklyn Bridge Park

Location: Meet at corner of Main Street and Plymouth Street in DUMBO
Description: This program is presented by the Brooklyn Bridge Park Conservancy with guest speaker and native plant specialist Sara Stopek. It features a guided tour of native plants and wildflowers in Brooklyn Bridge Park. The tour is followed by a native wildflower planting project by students from Science Skills High School.
To sign up please contact: Kara Gilmour, Education and Stewardship Coordinator, email: kgilmour@bbpc.net, or call 718-802-0603 x18

Berries of Phytolacca americana, Pokeweed, in my backyard native plant garden in Flatbush, Brooklyn, in October 2007.

[bit.ly]

Links

New York City Wildflower Week (WFW)
Native Flora Garden, Brooklyn Botanic Garden
Brooklyn Bridge Park Conservancy

Native Flora Garden, Brooklyn Botanic Garden

Posted on 2009-04-27 by admin

Last Friday, I had the opportunity to visit the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. The Native Flora Garden was how I hoped it would be. Some of my favorite native woodland wildflowers were in bloom.

That was before our weekend heat wave and record high temperatures. Starting this week, I’ll be returning on Tuesday afternoons, when I take my Soil Management course toward my Certificate in Horticulture at BBG. The instructor is Uli Lorimer, who is also the curator of the Native Flora Garden.

Slideshow

Selected Photos

The view just inside the southern entrance to the garden.

There is a large drift of Viola sororia forma priceana, Confederate Violet, just inside the southern entrance to this garden. I would not mind this growing as a “weed” in my garden in place of the common purple violets I’m constantly digging out.

Dicentra eximia, Eastern Bleeding-Heart, grows inside and outside the entrance, and throughout the garden. I have a white-flowering form in my backyard garden which is just starting to bloom.

D. cucullaria, Dutchman’s Breeches, blooms nearby with similar wands of dangling flowers and lovely ferny foliage.

Erythronium americanum, Trout-Lily (yellow) and Trillium grandiflorum (white). When I visited, the Trout-Lily were blooming in fields of thousands all over the Native Flora Garden.

T. erectum, Purple Trillium, was bashful despite its specific epithet.

From repeated visits, I’m coming to appreciate the subtle charms of Uvularia sessilifolia, Wild Oats. This is one of the few upright flowers I found, just emerging from the bud; as the flowers mature, the peduncle extends, and the flowers dangle below like narrow bells.

Caltha palustris, Marsh Marigold, growing in the Bog habitat.

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Viburnum dentatum, Arrowwood

Posted on 2009-04-20 by admin

When we moved to our new home in Flatbush four years ago, my garden moved with me. Rather, the plants from my garden. All were planted hurriedly, with the intent of moving them “later in the season.” In some cases, “later” has become four years later. Case in point: Viburnum dentatum, Southern Arrowwood. (Some botanists recognize a separate species, V. recognitum, Northern Arrowwood, for variants with smooth twigs.)

Very handsome, but not what I thought I had acquired. This individual was supposed to be V. dentatum ‘Christom’ (Blue Muffin®), a dwarf cultivar reaching 4-5 feet in height and 3-4 feet in breadth. (The species is highly variable, height can range from 3 feet up to a maximum of 15 feet.) It’s now over 6-1/2 feet high and has extended across the narrow concrete path at its feet. So I can be forgiven some poor planning on my part that the plant has far exceeded its expected bounds.

I needed to move it from this location because it was blocking the path. However, in this location it was doing an excellent job of screening some “necessaries”: cans and bins for garbage, recycling, and composting. And that suggested I could solve two problems at once by transplanting it to the backyard to screen the gardener’s nook from the street.

Folks walking by on the sidewalk get a straight view into this corner of the backyard. I want this to be an intimate, sheltered location.

When I did the garden design for my backyard, I doubled the depth of the bed along the north edge of the property, visible on the left of the photo above and the plan below.

Earlier this season, I executed that part of the plan. On the right, the gardener’s nook is located where the deck will extend to accommodate a bench, as shown on the upper left of the plan above.

I transplanted the Viburnum to roughly the location indicated by the shrub marked “L” in the plan. I had specified Lindera benzoin, which I don’t have, for that location, but the Arrowwood should do as well there. You can see that it does a great job of screening the view, even though it hasn’t fully leafed out yet. During the summer, the nook will now be completely shielded from the street.

It also dramatically changes the character of the space. Compare these before and after shots. The backyard now has a sense of enclosure it didn’t have before, even within the parts of the backyard that are not visible from the street. This validates a key strategy of the design: enclosing the space with shrubs to create the feeling of being in a woodland garden.

Before

After

Propagation of Sassafras albidum (Sassafras)

Posted on 2009-03-04 by admin

Propagation of Sassafras albidum (Sassafras)

General characteristics

Sassafras albidum, Sassafras, is a medium-sized deciduous tree in the Lauraceae, the Laurel family. This is a family of mostly pantropical, evergreen shrubs and trees; Sassafras has the most northern distribution of the Lauraceae.

Native range and habitat

Sassafras is widespread in eastern North America, from Maine to Ontario and Michigan, south to Florida and eastern Texas. It’s most common as a successional plant in disturbed areas.

Because of its wide natural range, select a local ecotype, or acquire from a local nursery, for best adaptation to your conditions.

Asexual/vegetative propagation

Sassafras can form pure stands through suckering. Specimens propagated by apparent transplantation from the field may actually be suckers separated from a parent plant or stand. These progeny are prone to suckering from lateral roots. To minimize this, do not transplant from the wild. Plant only container-grown seedlings. [Cullina, DIRR1997, Flint]

Propagation from root cuttings is possible.

Sexual propagation

Plants are dioecious.

Flowering and Pollination

Clusters of flowers with bright yellow sepals appear in early Spring, just before the leaf buds break. Flowers are pollinated by bees and flies.

Fruit

Fruit are produced every year or two after the plant reaches maturity at about ten years of age. Fruit matures in the Fall. The fruit is an oil-rich, oval, blue-black drupe held on a red stem. Sassafras fruits are eaten by many species of birds.

Seeds may be gathered when fruits turn dark blue. Cleaned seeds may be stored for up to two years at cool temperatures. 120 Stratification – prechilling – for 120 days is required for germination. [USDA]

References

Cullina, William. Native Trees, Shrubs and Vines. 2002. Houghton Mifflin. ISBN-13: 978-0-618-09858-3
[DIRR1997] Dirr, Michael. Dirr’s Hardy Trees and Shrubs. 1997. Timber Press. ISBN-13: 978-0-88192-404-6
[DIRR1998] Dirr, Michael. Manual of Woody Landscape Plants. Revised 1998. Stipes Publishing. ISBN-13: 978-0-87563-795-2
Flint, Harrison. Landscape Plants for Eastern North America. 1983. Wiley. ISBN: 0-471-86905-8
NPIN
Sullivan, Janet (1993). “Sassafras albidum“. Fire Effects Information System, [Online]. U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station, Fire Sciences Laboratory

Links

Floridata
Missouri Botanical Garden
Plants For A Future
PLANTS, USDA
University of Connecticut
Wikipedia
Wikibooks

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More on native plants

Links

Aquilegia canadensis, Eastern Red Columbine

Chrysogonum virginianum ‘Allen Bush’, Green-and-Gold

Dicentra eximia ‘Aurora’, Eastern Bleeding-Heart, Turkey Corn

Iris cristata, Crested Iris

Phlox stolonifera, Creeping Phlox

Viola striata, Pale Violet, Striped Cream Violet

Zizia aurea, Golden Alexanders

Brunnera macrophylla, Large-leaf Brunnera, Siberian Bugloss

Related Content

Related Content

Links

Sunday, May 3, 11am: Native Plants of the Marsh of Marine Park

Sunday, May 3, 3:00pm: Prospect Park

Wednesday, May 6, 11am: Brooklyn Botanic Garden Native Flora Garden,

Thursday, May 7, 3:30-5:00pm: Brooklyn Bridge Park

Related Content

Links

Slideshow

Selected Photos

Related Content

Related Content

Links

Viburnum dentatum

V. dentatum ‘Christom’

General characteristics

Native range and habitat

Asexual/vegetative propagation

Sexual propagation

Flowering and Pollination

Fruit

References

Links