As the Fern Turns

Posted in Around the Garden on October 18 2012, by Matt Newman

So I took the plunge. I buckled down, clambered over my fear of commitment, and dove headfirst into a relationship that’s been a long time coming. My barren desktop was beginning to look a bit suspicious to my colleagues here in the Plant Talk office, so without further ado, I introduce you to the newest addition to our window sill and my first desk plant: the as-yet-unnamed Mahogany fern.

You’re not misreading that; I’ve been here at the NYBG for a sliver under a year, and it’s only now that I’m making the choice to green up my desk. But before you jump to judgment, finger waggles, and well-deserved “tsk tsks,” my procrastination was out of respect for the plant’s well-being. All plants’ well-being, really. I may work at a botanical garden, and I may know my way around a watering can when push comes to shove, but I’ve still got a black thumb to make industrial weed killer blush.

I made my “adoption” a little over a week ago. Ann and I shuffled out to the Shop in the Garden under a nagging drizzle to peruse the shelves, and the suggestion came up that I stop waffling and do something to make my desk look a little less like an Alcatraz broom closet. I couldn’t really disagree on that point; I subscribe to the idea of living light, and spartan decor is part and parcel to that mindset, but my workspace is an eyesore of austerity. So I hit the potted plant displays with the hope of finding something that could tough it out in the office and still muster enough hardiness to forgive my misguided efforts.

What I came away with? Well, I’ll say we’re hopeful. I considered English ivy, but seeing as I could kill a river rock with as much as a lapse of judgment, adding in a plant with a penchant for crawling was too much. Ann looked at me as if to say, “Three weeks of your obliviousness and we’ll have that thing garroting interns.” So I moved on. I putzed past the cacti and stared at the orchids. I considered pot sizes, wondered what I could handle if, dare I dream, the plant actually thrived. If you couldn’t tell by now, decisiveness isn’t a trait I was born with. None of what I found fit my specific bill, at least up until the helpful staffers at the shop pointed me toward the ferns.

Frilly ones, gossamer ones, spiky and fuzzy ones–there was an entire catalog of ferns on hand. But I still couldn’t decide. So I bit the bullet and fished out the most unassuming four-inch pot that I could reach. What I pulled up was a spindly, nervous spritz of green and brown fronds looking too small for its home. The tag read “Didymochlaena truncatula,” or mahogany fern, so named for the new growth that first appears a deep, woody brown before maturing into its everyday green. It was simple, not altogether striking, and middling enough with its care requirements that even a hamfisted horticulturist like myself could have a go at raising it. It was just what I came for.

I’ve since figured out that this nerdy smidgen of a fern will blossom into a strapping hulk of a plant (at least by potted fern standards). Three feet tall by three feet around is not uncommon, and because Didymochlaena truncatula needs a bit more light than your average fern, I’ve scheduled it for play dates with Ann’s plants on the window sill. Here’s hoping it won’t bully the others as it grows.

In the meantime, if you have any ideas for what I should name this runt of a plant, leave them in the comments and I’ll saddle my new ward with the best one! The nicknames being tossed around the office are pretty embarrassing thus far, so maybe you can do my teammates one better. Stay tuned for more from the office plant saga as we grow, live, and scramble to revive depressing parsley here at the Garden offices.

Center image courtesy of Online Plant Guide.