Heady Scents and the Gilded Age

This past weekend I was whisked away to a bygone era while touring two opulent, historic mansions, archetypes of the ‘Gilded Age’, in Newport, RI. The first was the former summer home of Cornelius Vanderbilt II, fondly known as ‘The Breakers’. The 5 story (65,000 sq. ft. of living space!!!) was built between 1893 and 1895. The interior is filled with cold, smooth marbles from Italy and Africa, and warm, often rare, woods from around the world.

The Breakers in Newport, RI

Being November, the colorful bedding plants that filled the parterre beds were gone but photographs had them beaming with blue ageratums, white alyssum (laid out in a shape that looked like a dolphin) and a pink annual that is listed on one website as pink alyssum. I have never seen pink alyssum look as vivid as portrayed in the pictures and think it might be a pink petunia or begonia. This mystery plant deserves closer inspection so another trip to Newport during the growing season would seem to be in order.

I found the clipped hedges to be of interest because they were so perfectly squared. I’m more of a follow the plant’s natural shape pruner. While I can’t imagine a hedge the shape of Sponge Bob Square Pants surrounding my more informal dwelling, these rigid, rectangular forms were quite well matched for their upscale, delineation purposes. As one’s gaze drifted seaward, the landscape became more informal and I bet I would find myself among the majority of visitors wishing that they could experience this view at the end of each perfect summer’s day.

Straight edges of yews along balustrade rail

Marble House was built a few years before The Breakers by the same architect, Richard Morris Hunt. It was built for William Kissam Vanderbilt who gave this phenomenal, museum quality dwelling to his wife, Alva, as a 39^th birthday gift. She divorced him not too long after that, remarried and moved down the street only to return after her ex-husband’s death. A Chinese tea house was added at cliff’s edge and Marble House served as a site for women’s suffrage rallies.

What a view!

 Both mansions were exquisitely but tastefully decorated for the holidays. The poinsettias, delightfully decorated trees and other holiday items were engaging to the eye but what I noticed the most was the heady perfume of Oriental lilies and paperwhite narcissus wafting through the rooms and hallways as we made our way through the mansion rooms following cues from the audio tour. Lofty arrangements made with the lilies adorned various mantels and furniture. Occasional pots of forced paperwhites were set where their scent could be appreciated.  In a small home the scent of so many lilies and paperwhites would have been overwhelming but in these large, cavernous rooms it added a light, romantic touch.

Can you smell the paperwhites?

 Potting up paperwhites for forcing into bloom is an annual holiday tradition. Sometimes I give them as gifts; sometimes I just keep their pervasive perfume all to myself. A small pot with 3 to 5 bulbs is sufficient to fill most rooms with fragrance. They are extremely easy to grow. Simply pot up the bulbs using regular potting mix or set them in colored gravel, marble chips or other small decorative particles in a water tight container. There should be an inch or two between the bottom of the container and the bottom of the bulbs to allow for root growth. Those growing in regular pots can be watered just like any other houseplant. For bulbs growing in gravel, keep the water level just touching the bottom of the bulbs.   

At first I place the pots in a cool, dimly lit location for a couple of weeks until root growth is evident. Then they can be brought into a brighter spot but, if at all possible, keep them on the cool side (55 degrees F). Normally they will bloom 4 to 6 weeks after planting. Too little light and/or too high temperatures will cause the plants to become long and leggy and the foliage and flower stalks could flop over. You can tie them upright using yarn or ribbon, or cut the stems and enjoy them in a vase. Either you’ll love the smell of these flowers or loathe it. There doesn’t seem to be a middle ground in this case.

Dawn

 

UConn Eco Gardeners 2009

This year I had the opportunity to work in a beautiful garden space with a great group of UConn students, members of the Eco Garden Club.  The garden is located at the top of the hill in the Mansfield Community Garden plots just off route 195.

The Eco Garden Club was established in 2005 by a small group of students with the philosophy of working together and establishing nurturing practices in their relationship with each other, the community and the land that they cultivate.

Garden in Spring

Spring Greens

   Filled with great ideas and lots of energy, the Eco Gardeners started the 2009 gardening season with a new project.  They researched local CSAs (community-supported agriculture) and decided that they would offer shares in their organic garden production for the 2009 season. They advertised CSA shares to the UConn community and got wonderful response.  Some shares sold were work shares where the individuals in addition to buying a partial share worked a few hours each week with the students in planting, weeding and harvesting and the non-work shares were for produce provided to the member on a weekly basis.

Eco gardeners and hoop house

Garden shed with rain barrels

Spring planting at the garden – a variety of hardy greens over-wintered in cold frames and a hoop house.  The gardeners planted lots more greens. 

Then came the- not soon to be forgotten 2009 growing season, the garden received lots of rain, invasion by a woodchuck, and of course the dreaded tomato blight.    The greens grew plentifully, but many of the other vegetables struggled.  The gardeners persevered.

Wood chuck damage

Tomatoes in raised beds surrounded by water

 

 

 

 

 

The CSA members got an education on the joys and sorrows of gardening, leaned new ways of cooking the abundant crop of healthy greens and although sometimes frustrated they were pleased with their experience. Working members had an education in gardening; they learned how to identify and pull many weeds, when to replant, how to harvest and save seed, how to use mulch, what to compost why and how.  Moreover, they learned the joys of growing their own food, working with a wonderful group of like-minded people and looking forward to the next growing season.

CSA members choosing vegetables

 

The club meets on Thursdays at 6:00 PM in the W.B.Young Building. They are currently working on installing a solar panel in one of their hoop-greenhouses.  New members and mentors are always welcome.

For more information on the Eco Garden Club attend a meeting or email them at uconnecogardenclub@gmail.com

Leslie  Alexander

 

Insects Inside the Home

 

 

This fall has brought a few new residents to my home, and not the invited kind. I have been carefully removing Leaf Footed Bugs and Asian Lady Beetles from the interior of my home as well as my breezeway and garage. Both of these insects spend the winter in their adult stage in a dormant state. In the insect world, it is called diapause, equal to hibernation in animals. No eating or drinking, mating or reproduction happens. Their body functions slow way down.  Both insects are just using our homes for the secure, warm environment providing shelter during the winter. The do not do any damage to our homes, beyond the nuisance of their presence. Although the Asian Lady Beetle will defend itself by emitting a liquid from its leg joints if threatened. This liquid has an unpleasant odor to deter predators from eating them. The Leaf Footed Bug gives off an odor when crushed. All insects in this stink bug family, (Hempitera) lay claim to this offense quality.

Control measures are sealing up cracks and crevices to keep the insects from entering the home. One place they often enter is through attic and ridge vents. These should be covered with window screening. The insects enter the attic then work their way down to the living areas via wall voids, following pipes and wires. Minor infestations can be hand caught. Neither feeds on humans or will bite. They may pinch slightly if touched with the bare hand. Use a tissue or paper towel to pick them up and release outside. Vacuuming is another solution. Empty the vacuum to eliminate rotting and odors inside the vacuum bag.

Asian Lady Beetles feed on soft-bodied insects outside during the spring, summer and fall. Our native lady beetles overwinter in the adult stage also, but prefer to do so in leaf litter or  under rocky outcroppings and loose tree bark. The Leaf Footed Bugs have a piercing sucking mouth part used to feed on the plant juices of leaves. Neither insect will find anything to eat inside our homes unless you have aphids on houseplants or large leafy trees indoors. By November, the feeding phase has stopped for both insects.

I do have another type of creature in my house this fall, earthworms! I recently took the Master Composter class offered through UConn Garden Master program. It was informative and exciting. I know have made my own worm farm for composting indoors during the winter. Four weeks of kitchen scraps and no smell from the bin means the system is working well. Moistened strips of newspaper serve as the bedding. The type of worms best suited to worm bins are commonly called red wigglers. The Latin name is Eisenia foetida. This worm is not native to New England nor will it live over through our cold winters outside unless given added heat. Eisenia foetida specifically likes to live in the top two inches of soil, feeding voraciously on decomposing plant matter. It is not the normal worm found in our back yards. Eisenia foetida can be purchased online at various worm farming sites and sometimes at fishing bait stores. Be specific if purchasing worms for your own bin. Night crawlers (Lumbricus terrestris)  are not the same species, nor do have the same habits. Night crawlers prefer to create undisturbed burrows two feet deep, living a solitary existence, except to mate. Night crawlers will not live long in captivity.

-Carol

Finished worm castings in a friends worm bin.

 

A Lizard for Connecticut

When you think of lizards (Everyone does, right?), you probably think of the desert, or at least a more tropical, warmer location than Connecticut.  Most lizards do prefer warmer climates.  Lizards are reptiles and are cold-blooded, meaning their body temperature is determined by their surroundings and is not internally regulated.  Maybe not everyone knows that we do have a lizard native to Connecticut and it’s a very beautiful lizard too! 

The lizard that calls Connecticut home (well, it doesn’t, we do) is the five-lined skink (Eumeces fasciatus).  Skinks are smooth and shiny and very alert and active.  They are hard to catch and their tails break off easily (it will grow back).  Some skinks will try to bite if caught.  The range of the five-lined skink extends south from the lower peninsula of Michigan, southern Ontario, and eastern New York to northern Florida, and west to Wisconsin, part of Michigan’s upper penninsula, Missouri, and eastern regions of Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas (Harding 1997).  Connecticut is on the northern edge of the range, so the skink is less abundant in interior areas than in the more southern parts of the state.  During the 1990s, it was thought that the five-lined skink was extinct in central Connecticut because it hadn’t been spotted for a long time, even when surveys were conducted.  Then in the late 90s, we saw a juvenile, like the one pictured below, inside our neighbor’s house.  The juveniles are brilliantly colored, with five white or yellowish stripes on a black background on their bodies and their tails are bright blue.  As they mature, these colors fade, until the adults have only faintly visible stripes and are mostly brown or olive in color.  Males have a bright orange jaw.  Adults are 5 – 8.5” long and new hatchlings are 2 – 2.5” long.  

Juvenile (www.herpcenter.ipfw.edu)

Adult male (www.wildherps.com)

 

Where should you look for this elusive lizard?  The preferred habitat is a moist but not wet, wooded or partly wooded area that gets at least some sun for basking.  The five-lined skink is often found on disturbed sites such as the edges of woods, brush piles, logs, rocky areas, etc.   They seek cover in various sheltered areas including buildings and are inactive during the winter.  The little fellow we found led us to do a search outside for it’s family.  We do live on the edge of a rocky wooded area, and sure enough, we found more juveniles sunning on fallen trees and an adult female as well.  This was an exciting confirmation that the five-lined skink was still alive and well in central Connecticut (Hartford County).   I have been disappointed though, that we have not seen any more five-lined skinks for a few years now.  If you have seen them, please post a comment to let me know! 

Five-lined skinks lay fertilized eggs in early summer, at least a month after mating.  Fifteen to eighteen eggs are laid in a cavity in a sheltered area such as under a rotting log or in an abandoned rodent burrow.  The eggs incubate for 24-55 days depending on temperature.  The females protect the eggs and also the new hatchlings for a day or two.  The life span of five-lined skinks is up to six years. 

Females with eggs (S. Hecnar, Lakehead Univ., Ontario)

 

 

 

 

 

 

The diet of five-lined skinks consists primarily of insects and other arthropods.  At times, they may also eat baby mice, tiny frogs, and snails.  Wouldn’t it be great if they would help out with those slugs in your garden? 

The information for this blog is in part from two references: 

Conant, R. and J. T. Collins.  1991. Reptiles and Amphibians Eastern/Central North America.  Peterson Field Guides.  Houghton Mifflin Company, New York, NY.

Vanwormer, E.  2002. “Eumeces fasciatus” (On-line), Animal Diversity Web. Accessed November 3, 2009 at http://animaldiversity.ummz.umich.edu/site/accounts/information/Eumeces_fasciatus.html.

 J. A.

 

Overwintering Tender Bulbs and My Favorite New Rudbeckia

The past two weekends haven’t been that conducive for outside work what with enough snow to build a little snowman two Sundays ago, and off and on downpours this past Saturday I have been hard pressed to find a good time for digging up my dahlias, cannas, gladioli, pineapple lilies, galtonias, Gloriosa lilies, begonias and a few other tender bulbs. Mostly I have been doing it in bits and pieces whenever I get a couple of hours of sunlight and free time.

Pineapple lily

Overwintering many species of tender bulbs is not difficult if you have the right storage conditions. Many like to be kept somewhere between 40 and 50 degrees F with moderate levels of humidity. This type of environment is sometimes more difficult to find in newer, energy efficient homes but it is not a problem in my old 1840’s cape with a dirt basement. I have several different microclimates there which I found by experimenting and use of a thermometer.

Some bulbs like tuberous begonias and caladiums should be brought in before a hard frost hits. Mine were brought into the basement a few weeks ago. I positioned them near a window and have been reducing the water they get so they will die back. Eventually I will cut back the dead foliage when it yellows but I leave the begonia tubers in their pots and keep them around 50 degrees F. I check them every couple of weeks and moisten them slightly if they seem dry.

The caladiums have been rotting on me the last two winters and I have had to buy new bulbs. I was thinking maybe it was just too cold where I had them so I am storing them around 60 degrees F this year to see if it makes a difference. The two I like the most are ‘Aaron’ and ‘White Christmas’ and I grow them in a large ceramic container in my white garden. Perhaps I should try growing them as a houseplant during the winter but maybe not until next year as the foliage has already yellowed.

Dahlias grow from tuberous roots which look a bit like sweet potatoes. Actually I believe some species of dahlias have been grown for their edible tubers. I think I will grow my dahlias for their glorious blooms and not food. After a few frosts, the dahlia plants blackened and I give them a week or more so they can translocate carbohydrates back to the tuberous roots. Then, the tops are cut back to about 2 or 3 inches above ground and I gently lift them using a spade or garden fork. The soil is shaken off, any earthworms lodged between the tubers picked out and then I leave them in the sun for an hour or more to dry slightly. I simply put the tuberous roots in buckets or large pots and lightly pack some used potting medium around them. Label the varieties. These buckets are staked on shelves and watered sparingly every 2 to 3 weeks.

Tuberous roots of dahlias

The cannas are a bit more challenging to dig up because some of the tubers are huge and it is heavy digging in wet soil. These I just cut the foliage back, brush the soil off, store in large plastic crates around 40 to 50 degrees F. They are so large that they don’t dry up over the winter like some of the smaller bulbs.

Gladioli are also good storers but they are prepared for storing in two steps. First cut back the foliage to about 6 inches and dig up the corm. These I leave in a tray in the cellar for a few weeks until the foliage and any remaining soil dries. If you look at your corms you will see that last year’s corm has withered and died but is still attached to the bottom of the new corm. If your plants were happy you will also see lots of baby corms which are called cormels. When dry, simply twist off the old corm and send it to the compost pile. You could collect the cormels and start them indoors. They are so small you would need to plant them right after digging or they will dry out. After twisting off the old corm and then twisting off any remaining dead foliage, the corms are fine just stored in an old grapefruit mesh bag around 60 degrees F.

Because the weather was not that cooperative at the beginning of the growing season, many plants grown in our gardens got off to a slower start than normal. I love rudbeckias for their large, vibrant, strong-stemmed cut flowers. Each year I grow 2 or 3 varieties from seed and one new one I tried this year was ‘Cherry Brandy’. I admit I started the seeds a little late this past spring but the slugs and the rain didn’t help the little transplants much. Finally in September they came into their glory and I thought ‘Cherry Brandy’ was a real winner although I did notice some powdery mildew.

Cherry Brandy

Until next time – think green thoughts!

Dawn

 

Fall Fungi

 

At the Home and Garden Education Center, we receive phone calls and email inquiries about mushrooms and their identification.  Many people bring in some interesting looking specimens.  It is our policy that we do not identify mushrooms; we are not mycologists or mushroom experts. Our mantra is “it’s a mushroom it could be poisonous do not eat it!”

This summer and fall conditions for mushrooms (and most fungi) have been ideal. A few days ago, a person brought in three beautiful, huge mushrooms for identification.  I told him about our policy which he accepted.  I could tell he was interested in the specimens so I suggested that he contact the knowledgeable, friendly folks at CVMS- the Connecticut Valley Mycological Society.  I happened had a copy of their application on my desk and gave him their information.  He went away pleased.

The CVMS was founded in 1975 a “mushroom club” they invite all who are interested in mushrooms as food as well as those who find mushrooms and fungi fascinating and want to learn more about them.   

 When I first moved to Connecticut ten years ago, I joined the society and spent some beautiful fall weekends with this group of knowledgeable people on mushroom forays into several Connecticut State Parks.  These ventures gave me a chance to discover some new and interesting areas of the state and learn about mushrooms while in the company of wonderful folks who have a passion for fungi.

In addition to their fantastic forays, the club hosts workshops, lectures, field identification sessions, annual regional conferences, banquets, and picnics and produces the “Spore Print” an educational newsletter. They are a friendly welcoming group full of knowledgeable people and incredible cooks. Their tailgate picnics are not to be missed and they share their recipes.

 

You can find more information on CVMS and other Mycological Societies in neighboring states at:   

http://www.nemf.org/files/clubs.htm

The second annual Connecticut Valley Mycological Society/COMA Ed Bosman Memorial walk, took place on Sunday, Oct. 4th at Kettletown State Park, Southbury CT.  The mushrooms pictured  below are just some of the many marvelous specimens found during that outing. 

All pictures are from the CVMS webste.

Lactarius indigo

 

 

 

Amanita polypyramis with Suillus salmonicolor

 

Leratiomyces squamosus var. thraustus

LA

 

Growing Garlic

October is in its  second week, bringing the first hard frost to the middle of Connecticut. This seasonal mile stone is my cue to plant garlic. I know, planting anything in mid October seems like the wrong thing to do and a bit backward, but now is the correct time to plant the strong scented bulbs. There are about six weeks left before the ground freezes, giving the garlic ample time to develop a good root system without producing any top growth that will be killed with the freezing weather.

Pick the right spot.

Garlic needs a full sun spot with well drained soil rich in organic matter. Full sun is 6 to 8 hours of sun a day. Add a one inch layer of well rotted manure or compost and mix in with existing soil. Loosen soil to about a foot deep. Have a soil test done to determine pH and nutrient level after compost or manure has been added. Garlic grows best in a soil pH of 6.5 to 7.0. Add lime and any amendments as soil test results recommend.

Break the head of garlic into individual cloves. Leave the papery skins on the cloves. Plant with the root end down and the pointed tip up, three inches into the soil, with each clove spaced six inches apart. A fluffy mulch of straw covering the bed for the winter will provide protection from heaving during the freezing weather. The goal is the encourage root growth this fall, not top green growth until spring.  Once warm spring weather initiates green growth next spring, side dress with a little 5-10-10 fertilizer at a rate of 1/2 pound for 50 garlic plants.

Pick the right garlic.

There are three different types of garlic:   softneck,   hardneck   and elephant. Choosing the correct type to grow for your area will bring the most success.

Soft neck garlic is not well suited to grow through our cold New England winters. It has a soft neck, papery neck of a stem good for braiding. Soft neck garlic is most often the type seen for sale in the grocery stores, shipped in from California where it is grown. Do not plant this in Connecticut.

Hardneck garlic is best suited for New England gardens. It has a hard, almost woody center stem with six to 12 cloves surrounding the central stalk. This type will produce an edible scape that if left on the plant, will produce a flower. The flower will sap strength from the bulb making the cloves smaller. Cut off the scapes before they bloom in May or June. Common hard neck varieties include ‘German White’,  ‘Music’, and ‘Spanish Roja’. Hard neck garlic can be purchased through seed catalogs and most commonly available at farmers’ market during September and October. They are sold to eat, and these can be used as seed stock for planting.

Elephant garlic are very large heads the size of tennis balls with a mild taste.  It is not actually a garlic but closer to the leek family. I have not had much luck getting elephant garlic to live though the winter successfully. Stick with the hard neck varieties!

Harvest and Storage.

During the month of May, the each plant will put up a tall scape with a bud at the tip containing a future flower. As stated earlier, don’t let it flower. Cut the scapes off of the plant about two feet above the ground. The scapes are the first harvest provided from the plants. Garlic scapes are sharp in taste, considered a spring delicacy in stir fries or made into a pesto.

The real harvest of the bulbs comes when the greenery begins to turn yellow and papery. Each above ground leaf is a layer of papery sheath for the cloves below. Handle the plant carefully without damaging the protective paper covering of the head of cloves. When about half of the leaves have turned yellow to brown, harvest the bulbs. Gently dig the heads and lay them in the shade  to dry for two or three days. Protect from night dew to promote the drying. Good airflow is essential. Leave the roots, stalk and leaves on the plant for a month. Set out of the sun, in a covered airy location to cure the garlic. The curing develops the taste and keeping quality.   Do not wash with water. After curing and drying, cut the roots to half inch and bush off any dirt.Garlic can be stored in mesh bags or braided by the stems.

-Carol

photo by Carol Quish

 

How did your grapes do this year?

How did your grapes do this year?  There are a number of diseases that are important on grapes in Connecticut.  The most common are black rot, powdery mildew, and downy mildew.  The best prevention and control are achieved using a combination of culture, sanitation, resistance and fungicide sprays.  This blog will take a closer look at black rot.

Cultural control methods include proper fertilization, pruning and care to minimize stress.  Sanitation consists of removal of dead and diseased plant material which provide a source of spores that cause new infections the following spring.  When selecting grape cultivars, select those that have resistance to one or more locally important diseases.  Fungicides applied with careful attention to timing, selection and application are also part of disease prevention and control.

Black rot is caused by the fungus Guignardia bidwellii and is a very serious grape disease in Connecticut.  All green parts of the vine including the berries are susceptible to infection.  The most serious damage is done to the berries.  Infection first appears as a small white spot.  These enlarge, become sunken and develop dark borders.  Later the berries become black and wrinkled.  These “mummies” are where the pathogen overwinters, and spores are produced during spring rains and cause new infections on developing tissues.  In addition to the berry symptoms, other vine tissues are affected. Leaf symptoms begin as small brown lesions.  Within a few days, tiny black spherical fruiting bodies appear.  Black lesions occur on leaf petioles causing the leaf to wilt.  Large black lesions can affect shoots.

Photos left to right: Univ. of Illinois, Purdue University, Missouri Botanical Garden.

 Sanitation is a key part of black rot control (removal of mummies) and is usually accompanied by a spray program.  If you had black rot this year, a thorough cleanup of infected berries, both on the vines and on the ground, will go a long way in reducing infection next year. There is wide variation in the susceptibility to black rot among American and hybrid cultivars and all common cultivars of Vitis vinifera are susceptible.  For those who are interested, a diagram of the life cycle of Guignardia bidwellii is included below. (Ohio State University).

 

Apple Picking, Quiet Birds and Fewer Butterflies

This past weekend began with a traditional New England autumn activity – apple picking. And what a glorious day for it with bright sunshine, blue skies, sugar maples turning fiery red, luminescent yellow and glowing orange, a slight breeze and moderate temperatures. Our property came with a large, old Yellow Delicious apple tree badly in need of renovation and a few, almost valiant, attempts were made to restore it to a moderate height and productivity. Now called, ‘the one that got away’, we pretty much leave it to its own devices all the while harvesting the really sweet, delicious fruit and using the wormless ones for pies, cakes and other baked goods.

Bright, sun ripened apples

 Although the Home & Garden Education Center got a fair amount of calls this past summer about backyard tree fruit growing, the orchard we visited was packed with many folks munching on the fruits of their labors. Truth be told, even if you were to plant an apple tree this year it would take a few years to begin bearing. Sweet crunchy MacIntosh, Cortlands and Empires are standard fare for many orchards but if your taste ranges to other delectable varieties like Mutsu, Wolf River, Pink Lady or Jonagolds, check out the orchards listed on the following website to see what they are growing:   

http://www.americantowns.com/ct/hartford/news/apple-picking-orchards-and-apple-farms-guide-for-connecticut-ct-3799.

 The Center received several inquiries last week from callers wondering where all the birds at their feeders had gone. I also noticed this reduction in activity because the window feeder in the kitchen was not picked clean like it usually is every third day or so. And, the usually boisterous morning chorus of bird song that greets me each morning had been muffled. (I’m not counting my cockatoo in this!) What was going on? One of the Center’s horticulturists had made some phone calls and found out this is a perfectly natural occurrence. It seems that native seeds, nuts, berries and other items provide a much desired alternative to our boring feeder fillers. Our native birds are having a veritable feast on locally grown produce! We should all be so lucky as to experience such abundant harvests in our gardens! Apparently their lack of birdsong is due to resting up for their big event – migration! Energy spent is energy wasted and they need every last drop to make their long journeys – especially in the wake of climate change, habitat destruction and other assaults on their migration routes and living quarters.   

Unfortunately the lack of butterflies in some of our yards and gardens this year is possibly more foreboding. Several of us at the Center had commented that our butterfly bushes, asters and sedums were practically devoid of butterflies. In previous years, dozens of hungry butterflies would vie for landing spots on these plants setting the garden in motion. This year I don’t even need a single hand to count them. While our last blogger had the good luck of spotting some Monarch butterfly larvae on her trip to Block Island, I didn’t find any on my milkweed plants this year. 

 

Butterfly on boneset

Most likely the weather played a major role in the low numbers of butterflies. The prolonged cool, wet spell that we experienced in June and July destroyed butterfly eggs, larvae and chrysalides, in part because of the unfavorable environmental conditions and in part because this type of weather promotes a fungus that attacks caterpillars. Those that did manage to hatch and develop into butterflies ran into further problems because the weather also delayed the blooming of native wildflowers that some butterflies depend on for nectar. Add to that habitat reduction, loss of nectar sources and larval host plants due to overgrazing by deer, exposure to garden and agricultural pesticides, and consumption by native and introduced predators and it’s actually amazing we haven’t noticed a precipitous decline before now.

 While we can’t control the weather, we can lend butterflies our support by leaving sections of our yard filled with plants butterflies need for nectar or as places to lay eggs and rear their young. Some of these plants such as goldenrod, milkweed, clovers, nettles and violets are thought of as weeds. If we want butterflies it is imperative to grow the plants that support them. Those interested in attracting butterflies to their yards may want to consider signing up for a ‘Gardening for the Butterfly Lifecycle’ class at the Litchfield, CT Extension Center on November 14^th from 10 am to 12 noon. Check out the listing at http://www.ladybug.uconn.edu/documents/AMGCatalogFall09_01rev2.pdf. Although this class is listed as an Advanced Master Gardener class, it is open to the public for a fee.

 Dawn

 

A Few of My Favorite Things

On a recent weekend at a friend’s house on Block Island R.I. (one of my favorite places to retreat), I took a walk through the yard to check on the progress of the young Scholar tree Sophora japonica tree that I had planted in May.   I was dismayed to find it totally overrun by black swallow- wort an invasive vine that made rapid progression into the yard in a number of areas.

 Black swallow-wort- Cynanchum louiseae is a, twinning, herbaceous perennial vine native to Europe. Its history is uncertain but it is thought that it was introduced to this country in Ipswich MA in 1854.  Within ten years, a collector in Essex County noted that the vine was “promising to become naturalized” and by 1867, it reportedly had “escaped” from a botanic garden in Cambridge and started spreading out of control.  An invasive it has no native predators or diseases to control it and even the voracious deer turn up their noses.  It is listed in the Invasive Plant Atlas of New England considered a threat- “Cynanchum louiseae is a vine that can grow rapidly and cover native vegetation. It also has the ability to dominate the understory of a woodland. Wind-dispersed seeds allow it to disperse over long distances. When it is cut, this plant resprouts vigorously, making control difficult.”

http://www.invasive.org/weedcd/pdfs/ipane/Cynanchumlouiseae.pdf

 

Black Swallow-wort

Leslie J. Mehrhoff, University of Connecticut, Bugwood.org

 A member of the milkweed family this vine poses problems for the Monarch butterflies too. The female Monarchs when searching for larval food on which to lay their eggs are attracted to this exotic host. The black swallow-wort vines have characteristics that mimic the native milkweeds but are not a food source for the hatched eggs and the larvae fail to mature when feeding on the invader. Therefore, not only does the swallow-wort invade the native milkweed habitat but also its mimicry of the native destroys Monarch larvae.

  Not all was doom and gloom that day. The yard had not been mowed for a few weeks and consequently many new shoots of our native milkweed Asclepias syriaca had a chance to sprout in the middle of the lawn.  I found several Monarch larvae, fat and happy munching on these new shoots.  Monarchs have 4-5 generations per year in the northeast.  It is this last hatch that will pupate and hatch into the adults who will migrate close to 2,500 miles to their mountain overwintering forest in the center of Mexico. 

Monarch larvae

This is a good reminder to us to keep a balance in our landscapes, leave some of our yards in a natural state, invite our native plants and enjoy our phenomenal butterflies, insects and creatures.

 

 

 

 

 

Larvae photos-L Alexander