Firebush: Native or Not? The Burning Question of Plant Miscegenation

A native (I hope) Firebush, Hamelia patens

Adam was but human--this explains it all. He did not want the apple for the apple's sake; he wanted it only because it was forbidden. The mistake was in not forbidding the serpent; then he would have eaten the serpent.  (Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar, Mark Twain's Pudd'nhead Wilson)

Gardening seems to be the net that captures much of my attention and folly, often at the same time for some reason. Since laying the blame at someone else's feet seems to be the fashion these days, in politics and elsewhere, why shouldn't I play along and try to fit in?

So, it all started years ago when I helped my parents with their vegetable garden. It was never complicated then. Plant seeds or seedlings, tend the plants to adulthood, eat them or their progeny. Consume, consume, consume! The carnage continued in later years but on a more sophisticated level within the slick pages of plant catalogues. See that beautiful plant pictured here in all of its impeccably air-brushed glory? Buy it, buy it, buy it! The more exotic the name, the better. Especially if it ended in sinensis. If the Chinese were having smashing success in their country with a certain plant, why not give it a go here in the good ol' U.S. of A.? If they can make it grow, we can make it flourish. Then I started hearing cries--very faint at first and gradually getting louder--DON'T BUY IMPORTED PLANTS! USE NATIVE PLANTS! Would I succumb to my hedonistic, Adam-ant, consumerist instincts or listen to reason?

I bought the plant pictured above at a Master Gardener plant sale earlier this year. As far as I can tell, based on this UF/IFAS article about firebush, it has orange-red flowers and hairy leaves. It must be a native firebush. Hooray! For once, I had chosen well and listened to reason. But wait...There's more.

Hamelia patens, var. glabra?

Three additional shrubs purchased a few months later at one of the big box stores and also labelled Hamelia patens joined their sister (brother? cousin?) in the garden. Only now do I discover that the blooms start out red but turn into trumpets of yellow. And--worst of all!--I finally notice that the leaves are hairless. Could it be the dreaded Hamelia patens var. glabra?

So, what's the harm in putting native and non-native firebushes together in the landscape? Could there be a possibility of plant miscegenation beginning its insidious work here, gradually corrupting the native population and confusing a bunch of pollinators? Read the article and decide for yourself. Don't believe me. I'm just a gardening fool, and I like reading, especially Pudd'nhead Wilson. Don't read it! I forbid it! You might end up liking it too.

Isaac, What's So Funny?

Isaac, You'd Better Behave, Or Else!

If hurricanes or tropical storms weren't so destructive, observing the human reaction to them could cause a chuckle. I've been watching (and participating in) the mad rush to stock up on necessary supplies since Friday--gasoline, canned food, bottled water, batteries...wine, party favors, balloons, birthday cake.Yes, someone turned 30 this past weekend, and it wasn't me, as you can plainly see.

Anyway, back to the mad rush. Some famous and not-so-famous meteorologists have been racing each other to the Gulf Coast to report on the threat that Isaac ("he who will laugh") poses to our beautiful beaches and laid-back way of life. SAM watched The Weather Channel today and heard one of those brilliant prognosticators say that he was reporting live from Mobile Bay in Mississippi. What??!! Maybe that weatherman is lost in the Cone of Uncertainty--at least he is about geography. Mobile Bay is some distance from Mississippi, buddy. Try Alabama.

Even the Windy City's famous newspaper wants to get in on the action, providing us with a great article about the immediate political response to yet another crisis. Throw some money at it, and maybe some of it will stick this time. Who knows what happened to the billions spent in the aftermath of Katrina? Not I, said the politician asking for money before this storm even makes landfall on the Gulf Coast.

I was talking to someone at work today, and he was fairly disgusted with all of the frenzied activity taking place around here in NW Florida. Many schools and public offices were already closed on Monday. Medical clinics are shuttered, leaving some patients without critical treatment. Isn't it better to be safe than sorry? I remember what a mess Ivan left us with back in 2004. He (the guy at work) seems to think it's a big, fat, wet blanket response. One size does not fit all here. Our fate is (or should be) determined by choices we make on our own. Imagine that! Live in a flood-prone area or move to higher ground? You mean we're not all in the same boat, all of us in this together? Nope. You mean we should strive to make rational choices and take responsibility for our own actions, not expecting Uncle Sam to pick up the tab or decide things for us when we make stupid choices? Wow, what a novel idea! Seriously, a novel idea. It sounds too much like fiction to me.

Make the Most of the Least Bee: Celebrate NHBD

Least Bee that brew--
A Honey's Weight
The Summer multiply--
Content Her smallest fraction help
The Amber Quantity--

(Emily Dickinson, c. 1863)

Today is National Honey Bee Day. Celebrate it...

Miasma has you moping. Summertime heat has you sweating the small stuff, not to mention the bigger problems plaguing you and the rest of the world. It magnifies the tiniest of irritations. Tempers flare like the sun, lashing out whips of fire.

Take a deep breath and cool your thoughts for a moment. Park your worries on the petals of a flower and imagine yourself fanned by 200 wing beats per second. Now then, "bee" content. It only takes the smallest fraction of hope...love...prayer, multiplied by Powers of Ten, to change perspective. To help the amber quantity?

Jeff McKenney, MD: A Doctor Rich in Patients (Patience) and Wit But Poor in Dilatory Time

Slow...No Wake

How poor are they that have not patience!
What wound did ever heal but by degrees?
Thou knowest we work by wit, and not by witchcraft,
And wit depends on dilatory time...

(Shakespeare's Othello, II, iii, 376-379)

Some years ago, SAM and I attended a small country church near Paducah, Kentucky, and became acquainted with the sister of a missionary in Honduras. She--the sister--spoke of and presented a slideshow of the incredible work that her brother, Dr. Jeff McKenney, and his wife had begun some years earlier in a remote area on the northern coast of Honduras. It wasn't the impressive presentation or the engaging personality of the sister that convinced us to support the Cornerstone Foundation. I must admit it was reading Dr. McKenney's fascinating account of his tribulations and triumphs that convinced me (and then us) to help fund this medical mission. Dr. Jeff has a penchant (read here) for penetrating the mysteries (to me) of missionary work.

Oh, sure, I understand the basic concept. How can you expect people to understand and accept the Gospel unless you first minister to their most urgent needs? Kindness and good intentions are all fine and good, but when a belly is either empty or split open by bandits wielding machetes, critical attention must be paid to feeding or fixing the belly before the soul.

The main thing I don't understand about mission work is how missionaries like Dr. Jeff and his wife can so easily put aside their own lives to save other lives? Well, maybe not easily, but willingly. It must have something to do with dilatory time or the lack thereof. Such a thing does not exist in such a man's vocabulary or thought process. Time is of the essence there and here. Okay, so maybe I'm beginning to comprehend. I owe, I owe. It's off to work I go...

Then Jesus went with his disciples to a place called Gethsemane ["olive press"], and he said to them, "Sit here while I go over there and pray." He took Peter and the two sons of Zebedee along with him, and he began to be sorrowful and troubled. Then he said to them, "My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me..." 


Then he returned to the disciples [after how many times of waking them??!!] and said to them, "Are you still sleeping and resting? Look, the hour is near, and the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. Rise, let us go!"


(Matthew 26: 36-46)

Little Cabin in the (Southern Illinois) Woods

The Cabin at Mountain Glen in Cobden, Illinois

Little cabin in the woods
Little old man at the window stood

Saw a rabbit hopping by
Then knocking at his door

Meadow view from the Cabin 

"Help me! Help me, sir!" he said.
"Or the hunter shoot me dead!"

Passionflower vine in the meadow

"Come, little rabbit, come inside,
Safely to abide..."

Elderberry?

Yes, I really am off my rocker, just in case you were wondering--off my rocker on the cabin porch and back to work in Florida. Vacation in Southern Illinois is over. Or is it?

I am still savoring wild cherries and wondering what elderberries (if that's what those pink berries are) taste like...

Capturing deer emerging from thickets...

Taking a boat ride on Kinkaid Lake to a favorite jumping-off point...

Shooting wild turkeys--with the camera--just as the sun comes up...

Watching Grandson take his first hike in Giant City State Park...

Taking advantage of family photo opps...

Thinking that silliness abounds when Grandson's around.

I can't leave Southern Illinois without bringing home some of its summertime bounty. The peaches are from Rendleman Orchards in Alto Pass. Tomatoes are courtesy of a generous brother-in-law who loves to garden.

WFREC: Cheers! Here, Plants, Everybody Knows Your Name

I don't know why, but for me it's a pleasure to pull weeds--as long as they're in someone else's garden. Maybe it's because I get to learn something new every time I visit. Wouldn't you know this lovely shrub is a Clerodendron ugandense (maybe 'Blue Wings')? I didn't until I asked the real Master Gardener in charge of volunteers at WFREC. It (the WFREC Gardens in Milton) is one of those places where, if you're lucky enough to be a plant, everybody knows your name. Everybody except me. I'm still learning, and it takes a lot of repetition. One of these days those plants will be as familiar to me as the characters on Cheers! I credit years of television reruns for that phenomenon.

Bees visiting this shrub don't have blue wings or extraordinary power, but they do tend to transcend ordinary when captured on a flower.

Some beds, it may be noted, were designed in formal style. If not for outside heat and obligations, I would have stayed there quite a while.

Who can resist antique roses that invite you to sit a spell and enjoy their smell? Forget your venting and breathe in their scent(ing)?

I'm glad that there were signs to remind me of the names. If not for that small help, I would have to resort to games...

Like memory-jogging-hopscotch or pick-a-plant-by-number or jump-in-the-nearest-fountain. Or smell-the-rosemary or ask-the-master-gardener-again or climb-the-nearest-mountain.... Oh dear, I would not have you deluded. In Florida, you see, the mountains are not included.

If "cool" is what you're looking for, then take a walk among shaded caladiums galore.

Some weeds in other beds are left for next time 'round. You won't notice if you don't look closely--they never make a sound.

(Thanks to Mary, my friend from NFREC and Gardening Friends of the Big Bend, who gave me the idea for this post.)