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Plant Talk

Inside The New York Botanical Garden

Summer

This Weekend: Summer’s Green

Posted in Programs and Events on July 5 2013, by Matt Newman

The NYBG WeekendI hope everyone had a safe, colorful Independence Day! Our fireworks are still going, so to speak (these flowers last longer than your average bottle rocket). And we’re not wasting any time leaping into this “sort of” long weekend, either, with a packed schedule of Wild Medicine activities, music, dance, and gardening demos.

With Commedia dell’Arte lilting through the Renaissance in the Everett Children’s Adventure Garden and all things onions and garlic taking over the Ruth Rea Howell Family Garden for Sweet & Stinky, your kids won’t be at a loss for entertainment. Meanwhile, join us in the Home Gardening Center on Saturday or Sunday for Herbal Delights, our latest gardening demonstration highlighting the stack of appetizing ways you can make herbs the workhorse of your garden. You can even continue your edible education back in the Family Garden with one of our daily cooking demonstrations using fresh-picked ingredients.

We’ll be outside all weekend, enjoying the fruits of summer, so joining us wouldn’t be a bad idea! Check out the events below.

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Morning Eye Candy: Colorburst

Posted in Around the Garden, Photography on July 5 2013, by Matt Newman

It’s July 5 and the fireworks are done with. Hopefully your eyes have readjusted to things that aren’t bursting into rainbow-colored sparks, and all those hot dogs will work themselves off in the course of the day. Anyway, I figured you could use some daylilies—because who doesn’t want more things that go ‘boom,’ figuratively speaking?

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Morning Eye Candy: Rockets’ Red Glare

Posted in Around the Garden, Photography on July 4 2013, by Matt Newman

Francis Scott Key may never have penned “the rockets’ pink glare,” but if he had, he’d be covered on the imagery front. Happy Independence Day, everyone! The NYBG is open today, so don’t hesitate to join us for your pre-fireworks adventures.

Happy 4th!

Photo by Ivo M. Vermeulen

Botanical Fireworks

Posted in Gardens and Collections on July 3 2013, by Thomas Andres

Thomas Andres is an Honorary Research Associate with The New York Botanical Garden.

Tickseed or corepesis (Corepesis sp.) — Asteraceae
Tickseed or corepesis (Corepesis sp.) — Asteraceae

This Fourth of July, remember to look around you for pyrotechnics in the Garden. I don’t mean to suggest there will be literal fireworks at your feet, of course. Perhaps the closest a plant comes to that is the lowly clubmoss (Lycopodium sp.), which is actually a fern ally and not a true moss. In the fall, gathered spores from clubmoss are highly flammable and have been used for generations to make flash powder. Today you may only see it used by magicians, but it was once popular in early photography as a rudimentary flash for large format cameras, not to mention its use in actual fireworks.

The pyrotechnics I am talking about are the plants that bear a resemblance to our favorite fireworks in various ways. Some even have names that suggest this, such as ‘Giant Sunburst’, firecracker flower, flaming sword, and torch lily. They have the advantage over real fireworks by making a show in the daytime with a much longer-lasting display, making them much easier to photograph. They are also considerably more diverse, and I’d say more beautiful, albeit without the bang.

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This Week at the Greenmarket: July Harvests

Posted in Programs and Events on July 2 2013, by Matt Newman

GreenmarketPotatoes for mashing, strawberries for snacking, carrots for crunching, garlic for…well, anything you can feasibly put it in shy of ice cream. We’re into week three of the Greenmarket this Wednesday, and things are only ramping up (except the actual ramps—those oniony wonders are more of an April thing) as the summer matures. Last week saw a big focus on summer squash, and while we’re likely to see more of that this week, the start of July traditionally sounds the trumpet for a bunch of other harvests—whether they’re beginning or ending.

Cherries are commonly a July thing, but we’ve been seeing them for a couple of weeks now, so plan to pick up a few hefty handfuls while you’re here. This month also marks the beginning of the fresh potato harvest at large, and the tail end of outdoor-grown rhubarb in our area. Peppers and tomatoes will be coming into vogue from here on out, along with blueberries, peaches, plums, and raspberries, so err on the side of caution and think about bringing your big produce bag in the coming weeks. It’ll be one of your better decisions.

Oh, and keep in mind this is just a tentative schedule—with the weather as unpredictable as it’s been over the last year, the harvests rarely have a cut and dry beginning or end. We just do our best to predict. I’ve got another recipe from the Ruth Rea Howell Family Garden for you, so head below for that, and we’ll see you at the Greenmarket tomorrow!

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