The Heirloom Orchardist

The (Un)Common Milkweed Plant

There's a native perennial that grows at the fringe of the orchard, out there with the wild raspberries and goldenrod. It intrigued me as a child.  I'd search its leaves for a plump black and yellow caterpillar, that I'd raise (in a mayonnaise jar) to an adult monarch butterfly.  My  fingers became sticky from the plant's opaque white sap.

As an adult, I appreciate its waxy rose-pink blossoms in July.  These give way to big puffy seed pods.   Split one of those pods open.  This month,  you'll reveal a dense packet of tan seeds, arranged like fish-scales.  Each seed is attached to a cluster of moist silky threads.  Next month, the pods will crack open, the threads will dry, and carry the seeds away in a breeze.

Sounds pretty magical, doesn't it?  Well, it is.  But the Heirloom Orchardist was a practical sort.  When he came upon the Common Milkweed, he tried to find uses for this interesting plant.  Consider the account given by General Henry Dearborn, who died in 1829, while residing in Roxbury, Massachusetts. His comments were published in the Massachusetts Horticultural Register sometime during the late 1820's, and reprinted in 1835 in the Yankee Farmer:

"The silk, when taken from the pods, and being freed from the seed, is hung up in thin bags in the sun, and when perfectly dry may be used without any further preparation, instead of feathers, horse hair, wool or cotton, for cushions, bolsters, pillows, mattresses; and coverlets.  From eight to nine pounds is sufficient for a bed, bolster, and two pillows.  It is lighter and warmer, when used in forming coverlets comforters than cotton, or wool, and nearly equal to eider down."

The problem, I suppose, was gathering the stuff.  One could put a lot of work into growing and harvesting milkweed silk, and end up with only a handful of sticky fluff.  So, I go back to the aesthetics.  This curious little drawing entitled "Milkweed in the Garden" shows up in my 1936 issue of the "New Garden Encylopedia".   It displays the caption: "This common roadside plant can be brought into the wild garden or border to create striking mass effects."

So there you have it.  When practicality cannot be found, there's always beauty.  And milkweed, a perennial, is very easy to grow.  Consider these two varieties for the sunny, moist areas of your "wild garden" or perennial border:

Cinderella Milkweed  (Asclepias incarnata 'cinderella')   This leafy perennial matures at about 3-4 feet.  It has an upright spreading habit.  The beautiful pink flowers are fragrant, and reminiscent of vanilla.  They're excellent for cutting.  It's good to combine this plant in the garden near another having a finer texture.  It is native to moist soils, but like its cousin (the common milkweed described above) it'll adapt to average garden soil moisture conditions.

Usually growing 18"-24" high, Butterfly Milkweed (Asclepias tuberosa interior) attracts numerous butterfly species for nectaring.  In late June through July you’ll find bright clusters of orange flowers adorning this plant.  Unlike Cinderella Milkweed, Butterfly Milkweed must be planted in a soil that provides excellent drainage.  Also be aware of its taproot.  Where you plant it, is where it should stay.  Deer resistant.  It’s also known also as “Pleurisy Root.”

Plant Patents Enrich the World

Seventy-nine years ago, President Herbert Hoover signed into law a legal mechanism that allowed anyone to lay claim on a new type of "invention": the US Plant Patent Act of 1930.

What was the purpose of the law?  Those of you that recall a post I wrote last year already have a good idea on the answer (See The "Honey Heart" Cherry Tree of 1851, and Plant Patents, March 31, 2008). The law was (is) intended to protect proprietary rights of the developer of a new plant.  A plant patent allows only one person to grow that new patented plant: the person who holds the patent.

Why did the federal government think this was important?  Well, just as conventional patents on new inventions (coupled with our capitalistic economy) encourage the development of new helpful gizmos, plant patents encourage the development of new beneficial and enriching plants.  These plants could be improved food crops with a new disease resistance, or a trait that eased the work for a grower.  For example, on March 9, 1943, inventor M. B. Crane received a plant patent on his new thornless long-bearing blackberry plant (Plant Patent #571), which made harvesting the fruit a lot easier.  Plant patents were determined to be good for society, good for the economy, and good for the nursery industry.

I recently stumbled on a 1948 issue of National Geographic with an article that gives an interesting glimpse on how the "new" plant patent law was being received, only 18 years after it was adopted.  "The only way a grower could make a profit on a new (plant) before 1930 was to build up, as secretly as possible, all the stock his capital permitted, then throw it all on the market at the top prices people would pay"  the article explains.  "In a year or so, competitors would be building up their own stocks, grown from the no-longer-secret variety, now widely distributed."  To make matters worse, in the days of the Heirloom Orchardist many growers would simply rename the new plant, call it their own, and introduce it again as another "new" introduction.  That's one lousy way to run an industry.

Perhaps it's needless to say, the 1948 article praises the new law.  It ushered in the start of a real honest, and economically viable plant breeding industry. So let me ask you a couple interesting questions:  First, by 1948 how many plant patents do you think had been issued?  The answer is 750.  That's a remarkably low number compared to what is received by the patent office today on just an annual basis.

The second question is: What type of plant had been issued the most patents by 1948?  Was it corn?  Apples?  An important disease resistant potato?  Nope....It was the rose.  By 1948, "about half" of the 750 plant patents issued had been on roses.  Hmm...it seems the heart may be more important than the stomach.

The Simplest Rain Gauge

Wow. This has been a very rainy season in New England.  Soon after I returned from vacation last weekend, I heard reports on yet another incredible downpour received while I was away.  How much rain did we get?  The reports vary, so I don't really know.  What I need is a rain gauge.

So, I turned to my 1869 issue of Rural Affairs and found this:

"The simplest rain gauge is a square or cylindrical vessel, open at (the) top, with a scale marked inside to show the depth of the water as the rain falls.  The depth of rains may be nearly measured by simply placing out, on an open piece of ground, a tin pail with parallel sides, and then measuring the depth with a small, thin rule."

Yup.  That's gotta be the simplest rain gauge ever created.  One would think (I'm sure you do) that one doesn't need The Heirloom Orchardist to tell you to stick a tin pail in your back yard and measure the depth of rainwater collected to determine how much rain fell...But there you go, I've done it.

The key of course, is that the tin pail (the vessel) must be "square or cylindrical."  It must have "parallel sides." Otherwise, you won't get an accurate reading. Quite simply, a rain gauge measures the amount of water that falls from the sky onto a defined area of ground.  That area can be any size; one square inch, one square foot, or an acre. No matter how big your vessel is, as long as the sides of it are parallel, and the same distance apart as its opening, you should get the same water depth reading for any area.

But The Heirloom Orchardist can't leave well-enough alone.  He continues to perfect his rain gauge:

"It is more common, as well as convenient and accurate, however, to make the top of the gauge somewhat in the form of a hopper, throwing the rain together down a graduated tube.  The depth being thus multiplied, the amount fallen can be more perfectly measured.  If, for example, the tube is one tenth the area of the hopper, a fall of one inch will show ten inches in depth; or if the tube is a hundred times smaller than the hopper, a tenth of an inch of rain will give a ten inch column."  (Yeah, Yeah...we get it).  "In all gauges of this kind, which multiply the depth, it is safest to have a small cylindrical vessel attached to the side of the instrument to show the fall in case of a great storm, which might more than fill the narrow tube."

  "There are various modifications of rain gauges.  One is made by using a funnel placed in the mouth of a jug or bottle, into which all the water immediately runs.  It is then poured into a graduated tube and accurately measured.  If the quantity will more than fill the tube, it may be measured by successive portions.  The most convenient way of placing this gauge, is first to sink a small barrel into the ground (sink a barrel into the ground?!  You're kidding, right?),  cover it with a wooden board so made as to throw the rain from the centre, where a hole is made just large enough to receive the funnel.  The bottle or jug for holding the water is placed in the barrel below the funnel.  (Wait.  I'm confused.  You got a diagram of that?)   In the accompanying figure 1, “a” represents the barrel, “b” the board cover, “c” the funnel, “d” the bottle, and “e” the graduated glass tube, which may be kept when not in use within the barrel."

"Fig. 2 represents a modification of the gauge already spoken of, having the tube “a” attached to the funnel “b,” both of which may be made of brass or tin plate."  (Hmm, well if I'm gonna put this much work into it, I'm going with brass).  "A convenient mode for setting this gauge is to set a short, wooden post into the ground, projecting a few inches above it, and then bore a hole on the post the size of the funnel, an inch or two downward to receive it, and then another hole, a little smaller, deep enough to….."

Hold it.  Stop.  I’ve had enough.  I’m just gonna put a tin pail in my backyard.  Or maybe I’ll just get a fancy-shmancy frog rain gauge from MasterGardening.com . 

If Heirloom Flowers Could Think and Feel and Talk

Indulge me for a moment.  Read over this passage taken from the July 9, 1853 issue of the New England Farmer:

"All things have their uses.  The flowers not only please the eye but improve the thoughts, making them more gentle and better.  The full blown rose, expanded to its utmost limits, and shedding its fragrance on all within its reach, seems emblematic of a good heart, beaming forth its kind influences on all around.  If the flowers could think, and feel, and talk, what lessons of gentleness and love would they teach us.  All children love them; the old man leaning on his staff, pauses by the wayside and contemplates them with delight.  A vase of fresh flowers in the sick room stands as an emblem of the new life that will come when the tried spirit shall bloom with perennial lustre in the skies."

Wow.  That's some heavy stuff, even for this flower lovin' Heirloom Orchardist.  We could pick the passage apart, and question whether flowers actually do make our thoughts "more gentle and better."  But that's missing the point.  Beauty and sentimentality have their places, even for the practical Heirloom Orchardist.

    Let it go.  Enjoy.  The above images come from my small collection of antique nursery catalogs.  I've included links with each image to appropriate pages of the Nature Hills Nursery web site.  Since July and August are typically slow months for plant sales, Now is a great time to get some good deals.  Indulge yourself.  It could make your thoughts "more gentle and better."  

My Rotten Potatoes and Howatt's One-Eye System

  "Something stinks in here" said my wife, peering into the cupboard.  She removed a bag of soft, partially rotten (but sprouting) potatoes.  Carefully cupping her hand beneath the the bag to be sure nothing dripped on the floor, she passed it to me and suggested that I  "Please bring these to the compost heap right now."

There's something very humble about a potato. Very simple and unassuming.  Very practical.  The Heirloom Orchardist likes that.  So, as I walked toward the compost heap, I inspected those little sprouts emerging from the potato "eyes," and detoured to the garden. Hmm...look at my rotten potatoes now:

In the days of the Heirloom Orchardist, crop yield was very important.  The Heirloom Orchardist wanted to grow as many potatoes as possible, with the least amount of effort.  And after harvest, the Heirloom Orchardist wanted to use or sell most of the potatoes he grew.  That's why potato "eyes" were important to him.  Potato eyes?  Yes, those little buds on the tuber, where the new growth originates.  In the early 19th century, it was common for entire potatoes to be planted to start the new season's crop.  But then it was found that one needs to plant only a single eye, carefully cut from the potato, to get a new plant to grow.  From then on, the Heirloom Orchardist could sell or use the vast majority of his crop, and still have plenty "seed potatoes" for next year.

Those who grow potatoes today, may be surprised by this.  It may seem intuitive that one needs to plant only a portion of a potato in order to get a new plant; providing that portion includes at least one eye.  Hmmm...certainly anyone who saw my partially rotten potatoes (before they went in the ground), would realize this.  But to the Heirloom Orchardist, this was not intuitive. A Mr. Jonathan Talcott of Rome, New York  made specific reference to the novel "one-eye system" in his letter to the editors of the The Cultivator and Country Gentleman, published on January 17, 1884:

"I believe it is 26 years this coming spring that I sent my first order for seed potatoes, and that was to Gerald Howatt, for Prince Albert.  Ever since that time I have been an admirer of Mr. Howatt's writings on the subject of potato culture.  When Mr. Howatt says he originated the one-eye system, I have no doubt he is sincerely honest in his belief.  I also know that the system was practiced by my grandfather in 1783, in the town of Glastonbury, Connecticut."

But all this may make the process of growing potatoes sound much more technical than it is.  Believe me, potatoes are easy.  Particularly if you're not very concerned about getting the maximum yield.  This is how you can grow them:  Just stick a few in some loosened soil and stand back.

The Enriching Properties of Clover in Your Lawn

Do you consider clover a nuisance weed?  The Heirloom Orchardist didn’t.  Although the nitrogen-fixing property of legumes (clover is a legume) was not understood by early orchardists, the benefit it brought to soil fertility was well known:

“The ordinary rotation in most parts of the Union is corn, oats, rye or wheat with clover.  In order to secure the enriching properties of clover, even in this rotation, it is said to be profitable to sow the clover with a view of turning it under for rye, or wheat, in the fall.  The expense of seed is but trifling when compared with the benefits resulting from the pasture thus afforded.”  The Yankee Farmer, July 6, 1835.

Of course, many of us don’t grow fields of corn, oats, rye or wheat.  So how can we take advantage of clover’s enriching properties?  Well, it’s easy: we can allow it to grow amongst the grasses in our lawn.  But first, we need to change our perception of clover, back to the way we perceived it several decades ago; as a valuable component to any healthy lawn.  Back to before the successful marketing efforts of the Scotts Company turned clover into a noxious weed.

Yup, that's right.  The primary reason that clover is generally considered a lawn weed today is simply because we were told it was a lawn weed…by the Scotts Company.

Would you like some supportive documentation?  Here’s a passage from my 1875 edition of Gardening for Pleasure:

“When the lawn is too extensive to be sodded, the following mixture of grass seed may be used, which we have found to make an excellent lawn:
     8 quarts Rhode Island Bent Grass
     3 quarts Creeping Bent Grass
     10 quarts Red Top Grass
     10 quarts Kentucky Blue Grass
     1 quart White Clover"

Or, you may consider this statement from a 1906 USDA Farmers’ Bulletin (No. 248), appropriately entitled “The Lawn”:

“Upon soils of a lighter character…, in localities where precipitation is greater, such grasses as redtop,  Rhode Island bent-grass, and white clover are more to be relied upon for lawn making than bluegrass.”

So what does Scotts have to do with changing clover from a desirable component of turfgrass, into a weed?

In the 1950’s, having known that the weed killer known as 2,4-D (2,4-Dichlorophenoxyacetic acid) was affective against broadleaf “weeds” (such as dandelions) but not against grasses, Scotts accurately predicted the stuff could be a very profitable product to sell to suburban lawn enthusiasts.  The trouble was that it killed clover too.  So rather than going back to the laboratory, they went to their marketing department.  They changed public opinion.  Presto.  Clover is a weed.

But I'm not beating up on Scotts here.  They've got a good product.  I use their "Super Turf Builder with Plus 2 Weed Control" product on my own lawn.  I just don't broadcast it everywhere, the way they prescribe on the back of the package.  I walk about my lawn, judiciously sprinkling the stuff by hand on the target areas, mostly where dandelions may have taken hold.  It's an Integrated Pest Management (IPM) approach.  This Heirloom Orchardist doesn't have many weeds in his lawn.  But I've got lots of enriching white clover.

When seeding your lawn, either with or without clover, consider a hand-held seeder spreader from MasterGardening.com.

The Heirloom Orchardist’s Lilacs

Each spring, travelers on a main roadway in my town are greeted with a pleasant surprise as they cross over a busy Interstate Highway.  Growing in the state-owned land is a healthy colony of white lilacs.  Right now, in May, these unattended shrubs are blooming gloriously.  Why would this familiar landscape plant be growing within the cloverleaf interior of a major highway?  Is this a subtle bit of pleasantry given by an aesthetically minded highway engineer?  Nope...not likely.

Lilac - Beauty of Moscow

Lilacs have a long history in New England’s domestic landscape. This provides insight toward the origin of these lilacs.  In turn, we receive a strong reminder that the landscape of my town is constantly changing, as is the landscape of most New England communities.

Native to the Southeast region of Europe, the Common Lilac (Syringa vulgaris) has been in human cultivation since the 1500's.  We can only suspect it to have been introduced to the New World during the colonial period, but we have conclusive evidence (Jefferson's copious notes) that lilacs were growing in the gardens of Monticello during the late 1700’s.  Today, there are few of us without a childhood memory of the family’s legendary fragrant lilac.

Lilac - Ludwig Spaeth

Lilacs are hardy plants.  They are not considered invasive, but they are tenacious.  Lilacs will often survive when those who planted them are long gone.  Since its introduction in the New World, the lilac has always been a domestic plant, never delegated to the field, always cultivated for pleasure in The Heirloom Orchardists’ house gardens throughout old New England.  As a result, when we find lilacs growing in "vacant land" (a term the Heirloom Orchardist would never understand) there are likely the remains of an old home site nearby.

So this spring, I went to visit these highway lilacs on foot.  I left my car in the parking lot of a mostly vacant strip retail building, then walked across four busy lanes of traffic into the state highway property.  There, I found our lilacs growing at the top of a ledge outcrop.  It is a large colony of plants, with multiple stems.  But most of these plants do not appear old.  In some of today's delegated “historic districts” we can be sure to find lilacs that are known to be over one hundred years old, with trunks having four to five inches of width.  Amongst these highway lilacs, I can find only one plant with a trunk exceeding three inches.

Lilac - Asessippi

 Lilacs have a tendency to "sucker".  That is, they annually sprout new twiggy growth from their base.  Those of us who are familiar with their care try to take advantage of this characteristic by annually pruning out the old woody stems, and allowing the young suckers to mature.  This ensures a crop of new growth each year, and keeps the height of the blossoms at a desirable low level.  (It also helps us to avoid having a lilac with a "leggy" habit.)  With successive generations of suckers, the unattended plant will colonize an area, and spread.  As the “parent plant” grows old, the expanding cluster of young lilacs will seek out, and move toward less crowded locations.  This is exactly what these highway lilacs have done.

Due to its larger stem size, it is easy to identify the parent plant within this cluster of lilacs.  But there are other obvious indicators of age: broken branches, a trunk scar, and a dramatic lean to one side.  This matriarch lilac has led a difficult life.  Adjacent to its large weathered trunk, I found what I’d come looking for: the remnants of a stone masonry wall; strong evidence that this lilac once graced the grounds of an Heirloom Orchardist’s home.

Lilac - Mme Lemoine

So, we are given a bittersweet vision.  This lilac once belonged to someone.  This lilac was once planted, nurtured and appreciated.  This lilac once gave blossoms, and brightened an heirloom orchardist's Sunday morning breakfast table.  Today, while the landscape of my town changes around it, this tired lilac endures, and her offspring flourish.

Change is inevitable, and when properly managed, change is often for the good.  But when we manage the historic landscape of any town, it is important to be reminded that history is not limited to particular structures or districts.  History is everywhere.  It's even in the Lilacs that we plant.  We only need to look

Hoe Time!

After having established what a weed is (my last post), it seems appropriate now to discuss that quintessential fruit and veggie garden implement, the hoe.  I think the hoe is a forgotten tool.  Or at least, the use of a hoe is a forgotten task.  But the Heirloom Orchardist knew his hoe quite well.  "Oh yeah," you say, "The hoe!  I know that tool.  I've even got one.  It has got a long handle, with a flat thing on the end that's bent.  It looks like this:"

Yup that's a common hoe. You've got one, I've got one.  And a few of us may even have a prong hoe:

Funny thing is many of us don't really use our hoe properly, or to its full advantage.  I think this is a factor of the busy lives we have nowadays, because to take advantage of this useful implement you've got to time it right.  You need to start when the weed seeds are just germinating; when they are showing green on the surface of the soil.  In my hardiness zone, that's now.  And once the hoe is out, it stays out.  You'll be hoein' all season (unless you mulch).  But if you don't start using it now, if you wait another few more weeks, forget it.  Leave your hoe in the shed.  Because then you're gonna be on your knees, pulling weeds.  And that takes a lot more effort than hoeing.

In the May 28, 1853 issue of the New England Farmer, we find this instruction:  "The clear hot days are the days for hoeing; leave the weeds on the surface a few hours at such a time, and they will trouble you no longer...No weeds should be allowed to grow among your hoed crops; and the ground ought to be stirred once in 10 or 12 days, if there are no weeds!"

What's the New England Farmer saying?  We should hoe if there are no weeds? What's that all about?  Well, I go back to my contention that hoeing is a lost art. I'll delve into my old book "Gardening for Pleasure: A Guide to the Amateur in the Fruit, Vegetable and Flower Garden"  (there is a reprint available) to figure this out:

The Common or Draw Hoe - Its principle (use is) to clean the surface of the ground from weeds...
The Prong Hoe - This is one of the most useful of garden tools for stirring and pulverizing soil.  It cannot, it is true, be used where weeds have been allowed to grow to any considerable height, but then we claim that in all well regulated gardens, weeds should never be allowed to grow so large that they cannot be destroyed by the prong hoe.

Ah...now we understand.  Hoeing is a method of getting weeds before they become established plants; before they become a problem.  By occasionally stirring the surface of the soil, we're disturbing those infant weed seedlings just enough to cause them to desiccate.  The New England Farmer is giving us a rule-of-thumb (of sorts).  It's telling us that if we can see the weeds, it may already be too late to affectively use a hoe.  And that would be our first sign of a not-so "well regulated garden."  Hoe wants that?