Alliums: Take a walk on the wild side

Economics. Pure Economics.


(long sigh...)


As garden design can be a costly passion, it is essential to make financially sound, rational plant-buying decisions.  The initial investment must be equal to or less than the accumulative outcome. Hence, at the nursery, tortuous decisions face the overwhelmed gardener at every turn. With the current trend towards the fanciful, extravagantly short-lived and zonally denied, gardening has become a game of chance. The biggest loser? Our piggy banks.


                                 

Let me introduce the allium......

Literally, rising high above the near-misses and maybes, the allium satisfies the most discerning soil-shufflers. Long valued for it's culinary attributes(garlic, onions, chives, shallots), the allium is now spreading its ornamental wings over the horticultural word. And why not?

A visually-striking form. Intense, Vibrant colours. Titillating flower structures. A presence that persists long after tiny petals have long disappeared. It is the bulb that keeps on giving.

Place your bet on the allium this fall.....and take a walk on the wild side!

A few of my favourites:

Allium shubertii

Allium christophii

Allium 'Purple sensation'

Allium caeruleum

Allium moly luteum

Allium 'Hair'

Allium sphaercephalon

Don't leave me out

Game on!

                                                                                                      

If formal annual garden design was a game of hockey, foliage would be the first line of  offence: a reliable performer always ready to put the puck into the net. Unlike the unbearable anticipation required by the over-rated slow-to-develop flower, the leaf enters early in the game, exhibiting an immediate show of colour and texture. Vibrant hues, light-capturing indumentum, radiant vein-work, the luminance of stained-glass -- the attributes are endless. 

      
(Bettina's Gardening Rule number 2: Always look at the big picture)

(Iresine, Coleus, Alternanthera, Taro, Duranta, Sedum, Echevaria

Red Banana, Canna, Secretia, Strobilanthes, Perilla.....) 

For a gardener, creating visual interest throughout the season is a formidable task. Immune to the flower-pickers and never with a dead-head to remove, foliage is a key component of the medium that perpetually challenges and engages. 

No colour, no texture? 

Five minutes in the penalty box!

Dew drops on a Black Calocasia leaf. 

Fresh drops on a fallen Ginkgo leaf

Underneath a Canna leaf in the rain.

Lost in the weeds

Charles M.  Schulz, the creator of the beloved 'Peanuts,' must have been a gardener for only a gardener could have so accurately illustrated the anxiety Snoopy felt when suddenly found in a patch of grassy weeds. There is nothing more terrifying to round the corner of a forgotten area of the garden only to witness the sudden dispersal of hundreds of winged weed-seeds at the mere suggestion of wind.

(Buttercup's Gardening Rule Number One: No Weed Shall Go to Seed.)






Weeding is to gardening what vacuuming is to housecleaning: it is only noticed when not done. And, just as there are those who embrace vacuuming and those who are averse to it, gardeners are divided into weeders and non-weeders. I am, and have always been, a weeder.  Similar to an archaeologist uncovering a ruin, I enthusiastically liberate shrubs from the strangle-hold of morning glory, roll up carpets of chickweed, don eye-protection for snap-weed removal and suit-up for Heracleum eradication. Time is sucked into a void as piles of homeless plantain accumulate on the lawn.

Weeds are an impressive and visually striking group of plants. Just as I respect the ingenuity of the crows that pull out my laboriously planted annuals, I respect the plant mechanisms which have allowed the thistles, dandelions, etc. to evolve and persevere and claim their title as weeds.

....... and isn't respect the cornerstone of any successful relationship?

Crisp and glistening, the fresh greens were marched quickly past our watering mouths. I could barely catch a glimpse of the velvety smoothness of the goat cheese before the plate was purposefully placed on the table by Chef Kathy Jerrits. Although we were all at Tria Culinary Studio to take Jackie Connelly's Food Photography 101 course, our minds slammed a collective brake when told "this food is not to be eaten, only to be photographed."


Excuse me?  Not to be eaten?


With the goal of a post-class lunch of smoked salmon crepes to lead my empty and protesting stomach on, one excruciating click led slowly to the next. 

Always having believed that art is the greatest illusion, I was nonetheless astounded by the level of creative trickery employed by food stylists and photographers. Stabilizers, special powders, glycerin and blow-torches...anything to create an image worthy of the real thing.
  

Tree Frog- Mayne Island, 2010

Patience. Patience and determination.


Experience has proven to me that the 'big picture' often appears after the fact; perspective adding the greater dimension. Through my lens, this tree frog seemed uncharacteristically sedate. I realized only hours later that he was after a greater prize.