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Plant Talk

Inside The New York Botanical Garden

Spring

Morning Eye Candy: First Contact

Posted in Around the Garden, Photography on February 27 2013, by Matt Newman

They’re starting! That dainty vanguard of spring, in all its violet, white, and sunny yellow splendor–the crocuses are here! If there’s never been hope for the return of warmth and greenery before now, you can finally rest easy in the knowledge that these little harbingers are ringing in the new season.

Crocus

Photo by Ivo M. Vermeulen

Morning Eye Candy: Mary and Alister

Posted in Around the Garden, Photography on June 19 2012, by Matt Newman

I thought, “Guthrie? Like Woody Guthrie?” His first wife went by the name of Mary. But it wasn’t her. I dug a little further into the root of this hoop skirt of a rose and came up with another Mary, a world away, to whom the pink thing owed its name.

It was in 1929 that Alister Clark, renowned Australian rosarian, named this rose after his own Mary Guthrie, though what relationship Clark had with the Guthrie family is proving difficult to uncover. There’s a telling anecdote from a book titled The Rose Gardens of Australia that illustrates just how important the honor was to the namesake, which I’ve included below.

Polyantha rose – Rosa ‘Mary Guthrie’ — Photo by Ivo M. Vermeulen

“… We had some notable visitors to the garden. From Eve I had got a vivid pink, single bush rose which she had called ‘Ella Guthrie’. One morning a delightful, white-haired, sprightly old lady of well over eighty visited us and, without any preamble, demanded to see the Alister Clark roses. I walked down with her and, as we came through the gate, she gave a cry of delight and started to run across the grass. ‘That’s me!’ she cried. ‘That’s me!’ Then, as she read the label saying ‘Ella Guthrie’ she turned to me in disgust. ‘That’s not ‘Ella,’ she said emphatically. ‘She was my aunt, and a poor, washed-out thing, like her rose. This is me! Mary Guthrie! Alister said it looked like a wild rose, so he called it after me, because I was always the wild one of the family.’ Of course, I changed the label without delay.”

— Susan Irvine

Morning Eye Candy: Nature’s Petit Fours

Posted in Around the Garden, Photography on June 16 2012, by Matt Newman

Sometimes I’ll come across something that looks like a sorbet, a baked tart, or a platter of colorful petit fours, knowing full well that nature usually does a better job of making things look “good enough to eat” than the local confectioner. Not that the poison control hotline would humor me if I acted on all of these novel compulsions, but, hey, it’s just a thought.

Iris ensata ‘Gusto’ — Photo by Ivo M. Vermeulen

Morning Eye Candy: The Third Harmonic

Posted in Around the Garden, Photography on June 15 2012, by Matt Newman

A maroon-flecked princess lily may have the irises flush with envy in the Ladies’ Border. Not only does this Californian cultivar boast a name just as warm, sweet, and spirited as its color suggests, but in the right light, a group of them cuts a figure like an angelic brass section.

Alstroemeria ‘The Third Harmonic’ — Photo by Ivo M. Vermeulen

Morning Eye Candy: Miltonian

Posted in Around the Garden, Photography on June 13 2012, by Matt Newman

There’s Ladies’ Border beauty on deck this morning. While “Ithuriel’s Spear” (wonderfully pretentious Milton reference, pleasantly humble flower) is a triple lily native to California and parts of Oregon, it’s just as content to settle down in our little plot alongside the Conservatory. There’s so much expat elegance growing along the Border right about now.

Triteleia laxa ‘Koningin Fabiola’ — Photo by Ivo M. Vermeulen