With spring fast approaching, let’s look at  two popular plant-related spring events, especially at what one prominent authority on sustainable gardening has to say about them.   She’s horticulturist Linda Chalker-Scott with Washington State University and her website features "Horticultural Myths."  There happens to be one of those on point, from 2001:

The Myth of Arbor Day/Earth Day Planting in the West: "Arbor Day/Earth Day is an ideal time to install trees."

According to the good professor, Arbor Day began in Nebraska back in 1872 as a way to encourage the planting of trees on what was basically grassland, and the official date was set for the first Friday of April.  She applauds the moves taken here in the East to move the date up in the hotter regions and back for the colder, for obvious reasons.

Earth Day, officially April 22, is more recent but still, notice, in the spring, and has been used as an event for "revegetating human-altered landscapes," including the planting of trees, which she thinks that’s a bad idea - in the West.  In the West they average from 2 to 10 inches of rain per month through the summer, with Seattle at the 2-inch level.  Besides the problem that plants need more water during the heat of summer, late spring and summer are when they’re devoting all their resources to new above-ground growth and can’t develop the kind of root structure necessary to survive in the long run. 

What Will Survive?

According to Chalker-Scott, the only plants that can survive dry summers are: well established native or Mediterranean climate plants grown under optimal conditions.  Notice the plants not ONLY have to be naturally drought-tolerant but they have to be grown under their ideal conditions and have already survived a year or two.  And how many of our suburban and urban gardens offer optimal conditions?  Thanks to the nature of development itself, very few.  So what chance does a sapling stuck in the ground in April have, especially in the hell strip between the street and the sidewalk -  a less than tree-friendly place if there ever was one.

Back East    

So what’s the situation here in the supposedly wet East?  Not so different, as it turns out.  Our average rainfall (in DC) is only about 4 inches per month for the summer months but man, those wet days may be over.  In 2007 we averaged about half that per month, but it’s even worse than that sounds.  Because so so much of that rainfall occurred during downpours, droughts were longer than the 2-inch number would indicate.  With our less-than-normal rainwater coming in more extreme amounts – either none or too much at once – it was a terrible situation for not just plants but also runoff into our waterways.  Hello, Global Weirding.

All this explains why the city garden manager in my town spends Earth Day and Arbor Day FUMING about the utter waste of saplings.  Move it to fall, he says to anyone who will listen.  It’s happening in enlightened communities across the country and sounds like a change whose time has come.

But What About Those Fun Spring Events?

But-but-but spring is when HUMANS are ready to start planting.  People are in the MOOD.  That is, if they ever are, and let’s face it – most people never are.  But in my town anybody who gives a damn about trees and the environment in general turns out in droves for both events.  They’re So happy about the new trees the city gives away on Arbor Day.  But I’ve seen the results by late summer and I don’t know who I feel sorrier for – the trees or the discouraged treehuggers, who see their efforts come to nothing, year after year.  Some succeed, I’m sure, but they’gardeners, not your average homeowner, tree-lovers though they may be.

Ann Whitted – Fotolia.com

I think I just wrote my first newspaper column that's pure rant.  I haven't heard from the editor yet but meanwhile, whadaya think?

Everywhere we look this fall we're seeing dead or doomed plants that didn't make it through the drought. Why? Not because they did anything wrong.Plants behave in pretty predictable ways. No, what's to blame is this worst-case scenario – the climate changing and humans having to adapt. Starting with our government, there's plenty of evidence that we humans don't DO adaptation to nature very well, but it's obvious that too many homeowners think the drought doesn't affect them. It's just those farmers out in the hinterlands that have to pay attention, right? For us suburbanites this summer has meant great beach weather and no bothersome rains to spoil our parties and baseball games.It hasn't even been intolerably hot, so to most Americans, the summer was just grand.

But there's this question I'm hearing almost daily: What's wrong with my (Name the Plant)?" Then after I bring up the topic of, you know, no rain, they follow up with: "I'm supposed to be doing something about it?" And the body language conveys annoyance or resignation at the sight of their landscaping investment going up in crispy brown leaves, never to be green again.

What accounts for this lack of attention to the plants growing just outside the front door? It's all part of the disconnect that folks in urban areas have with nature, a problem that's in the news a lot lately thanks to Richard Louv's best-selling Last Child in the Woods and the many schools that are creating gardens and natural areas for the kids to tend. (North Carolinians are campaigning for designation of an official "Take You Child Outside Week," the very need for which reveals our sorry condition as a species.) And when kids grow up totally indoors or on sports fields, without experiences like camping or growing plants or just digging in the dirt, they grow up to be nature-ignorant as adults. Unlike the 4-H kids I see at the Montgomery County Fair, who I can't imagine letting their new trees and shrubs burn up and die before their eyes.

"JUST MAKE IT LOW-MAINTENANCE"
So everyone and their cousin wants a low-maintenance garden and by that they mean no-maintenance and what a bummer it is to be told by yours truly that no such thing exists. Even patios and decks require maintenance; it's just the nature of anything being outdoors. Granted, most people have time limitations, but I'm also seeing signs of a strong aversion to physical labor. I get looks of horror at the suggestion that a plant can be moved if it isn't in the right place."You do that yourself?" I'm asked. Oh, yes, repeatedly; that's what gardeners do.

But there's something else going on here. There's a certain leftie, go-with-the-flow attitude that's very appealing (to me, too) and when it comes to imperfectly gleaming kitchen floors, I'm fine with it. But it can also lead to this mistaken notion – that you can just leave a garden alone and it'll eventually look like a painting by Rousseau, not the weedy mess it will actually become. Chores like fertilizing the lawn are dismissed as out-dated, but turfgrass is not a sustainable plant and when it's not fed it becomes spotty and weed-filled, well on its way to reverting to forest. So people, maintenance must be done – either by you or, if you can afford it, by someone else.

But worse than patchy lawns, the real heart-breaker is to see the trees and shrubs that have been neglected to death this summer. That's a crazy waste of not just money but of the time those plants have spent in the ground growing for you. Oh, I forgot. Reputable nurseries guarantee their plants. But PLEASE don't take your dead plants back to a struggling independent nursery, swear to them that you watered them enough, and ask for a free replacement. Because you probably did NOT water them enough; the nursery people know that and you may not yet but probably will after you've killed a few more. Give the nurseries a break and just assume that YOU killed it, and learn from your mistake.

DROUGHT-TOLERANT PLANTS FOR BUSY HOMEOWNERS
And the next time you're choosing plants for your garden, do yourself and your nursery a favor and choose ONLY those that are drought-tolerant.  That way, even if you're unwilling to coddle your plants during our increasingly perilous summers, they have a good chance of surviving. Google "drought-tolerant shrubs" or whatever you're looking for, or the word "xeriscaping" to get plant suggestions, and then stick to them. (The NC State sites on the subject are excellent.) Local recommendations are great, too, like Takoma's horticultural Yahoo list or garden center staff. Or check out High Country Gardens.com, everyone's favorite supplier of drought-tolerant plants, in Santa Fe.

My own personal drought-tolerant favorites are:
     -Perennials like sedum, aster, purple coneflower, rudbeckia (black-eyed susan), daylilies, hostas, lamb's ear, salvia, Russian sage, yarrow and ornamental grasses
    -Shrubs and small trees like aucuba, nandina, spirea, weigela, beautybush (kolkwitzia), lespedeza, butterfly bush, juniper, English laurel, rugosa rose, oakleaf and Tardiva hydrangeas, caryopteris, forsythia, crapemyrtle, Asian and hybrid dogwoods, sumac, and hybrid boxwoods.

DON'T FORGET DRAINAGE
While all these plants are doing fine, none are sitting in low, wet spots. Many drought-tolerant plants are from mountainous areas or the Mediterranean region and will die if left to wallow in wet soil, especially during winter. And climate change is causing more extremes of precipitation, so don't forget that Maryland really ISN'T New Mexico and our garden plants need to survive the occasional wet period, too. Make sure to give them good drainage, by using raised beds or mixing organic material or coarse sand into the soil, or even placing the plant slightly above grade.

ASK YOURSELF SOME QUESTIONS
Before buying a plant, find out what it'll take to keep it alive and thriving. Is it thirsty, buggy, disease-prone?  Does it flop without staking or spread to kingdom come and back? Then only buy that plant if you're willing to give it the attention it needs – honestly.

And it's a good time to ask yourself the same question about the plants that are already in your garden: Are you willing to coddle the weaker, less drought-tolerant ones? Maybe not. This year I resigned to let two rhododendrons meet their maker, and sadly, accept the same fate for three American dogwoods too far from a water source to easily save. We're making some sad choices nowadays.

For more information about coping with drought, see Joel Lerner's excellent article on the subject: "Strategies to Beat the Heat."

Readers, it can now be revealed that I’ve been meeting privately behind your backs with two other gardening bloggers -  by email, by telephone and even in person! – to plan and implement our scheme for world domination.  In fact, the introductory feeler Amy Stewart sent to Michele Owens and me was entitled "World Domination," which got our attention.  That’s Amy – a trim wisp of a woman who thinks BIG.  And all that scheming has paid off because Garden Rant is already more than I’d hoped for – good-looking, funny and provocative as hell.  And isn’t that provocative element exactly what the online world has added to the gardening conversation?  Damn right, and long overdue.

So meet me over at Garden Rant for rants and raves and the kind of smart-aleck behavior my mother tried so hard to discourage.  But Mom, this is so much more fun.

Wikipedia tells us that witch-hunting is the persecution of a perceived enemy with extreme prejudice and disregard of actual guilt or innocence; it’s a type of "moral panic."  Okay, I think I have the right term, but you be the judge.

I saw this item on a garden writers Yahoo group.  The Columbus Dispatch published a story about "Invasives and their Alternatives."  Unfortunately, it included "day lilies" (sic) in the list of bad guys and even showed a photo of a lovely red one above the caption: "New aliens climbing out of the bed, into the wild."  Trouble is, only the species daylily – the orange "ditch lily" – is a problem, not the untold thousands of hybrids that are available – you know, the ones we might actually buy and put in our gardens, like the lovely and falsely charged red one in the story.

Well, of all the places to malign daylilies unfairly, Columbus has gotta be the worst.  Not only is it the home of prominent daylily hybridizers and nurseries, but the site of this year’s American Hemerocallis Society Convention, for god’s sake, so you could say that notice was taken of this article and its misdirected accusations.  The Society jumped on the case immediately, seeking a retraction from the Dispatch, but you know how effective that will be.  Damage has been done. 

My second example is from a talk I heard recently by a plant expert from the University of Maryland.  When asked if ornamental grasses are invasive she declared that Miscanthus sinensis is, yesiree.  At which point I jumped into the fray to ask, "Isn’t it just the species, not varieties like ‘Morning Light’"?  And to my surprise she responded that yes, in our area it’s just the species that’s a problem.  So why the hell didn’t she say that in the first place? 

So like the listserv member who raised this interesting item and suggested that perhaps the Columbus Dispatch writer could learn to "pay more attention to her research," I wish everyone who uses the dreaded "i" word would at least try to get their facts right. Like exactly what plant, where, and under what growing conditions.  After all, when that label is directed to gardeners and the plants we grow, isn’t the purpose to induce us to rip them out and toss ‘em?  And I may be going out on a limb here but in my experience, we’d rather not.

[Photos:  I promise this is the last of the tulip shots, both from the Tulip Library on the Mall.]

Well, the most amazing gardening shows are running all week on WETA, the local PBS affiliate – Jerry Baker’s how-to videos.  He not only calls himself “America’s Master Gardener,” he’s actually trademarked the term.  Takes cajones, don’t ya think?  Well, that’s just for starters (though I can’t help wondering if “Maryland’s Master Gardener” is still available.  Hmm.)

Anyway, his advice for a “spring clean-up” is to spray everything with a mixture of antiseptic  mouthwash, dishsoap, the juice of chewing tobacco, and any “medication” that we think is needed.  And by “everything” he means lawn and all your “trees, shrubs and evergreens.”  He used that nonsensical term so often during his show on the subject, I almost forgot how stupid mistaken it is.  This homemade formula is supposed to start our gardens out “clean, green and mean” and is to be followed by spraying everything with dormant hort oil, followed by a combination of “any old fertilizer” to which is added sugar and epsom salts.  This is not only to be sprayed on everything but also inserted into holes drilled around every tree.

After all these applications you’d think you’d be set for the season, right?  No, it’s just the beginning because Jerry next instructs us to spray with his “green-up tonic” every 3 weeks throughout the season and his “clean-up tonic” every 2 weeks.  Oh, and don’t forget the anti-dessicant spray in spring and fall.  Also in the fall we’re supposed to spray with his “jump start” formula of beer, dish soap, ammonia and epsom salts.  And you’re still not done. His recommended program for feeding and “cleaning,” by which he means killing insects, should be continued throughout the winter, even on top of snow.  And after pruning in late winter, the cuts should be sealed with latex paint.   As hard as it is to stop relating this parade of horrors, I think I’ve conveyed the essence of Jerry Baker, conveyer of “natural remedies and environmental products for your health,” according to his own promotions.

All of which sent me scrambling to Google to find out more about this guy and among the marketing sites for his products and his 40 books, I found this good article fleshing out my own concerns. There I learned that he’s been universally condemned by plant scientists, who say his advice “ranges from the wacky to the downright dangerous.”  For example, the nicotine in chewing tobacco juice is a lethal pesticide, far more dangerous than what most of us buy in the stores.  State and federal agricultural agents have objected to his use of the name “America’s Master Gardener” – well, I should hope so.

Apparently every scientific group there is has complained to PBS but hey, when Jerry’s videos are shown, PBS rakes in their third largest fund-raising hauls.  So their VP of fund-raising says they “haven’t seen convincing evidence his advice is harmful” and that “most of the criticism has come from people with vested interests, who are the traditional experts.”  Wow, what a concept, that if you’re a “traditional expert,” presumably  meaning one with a degree in the field, you’re somehow suspect because you have a vested interest. Sometimes it’s hard to distinguish PBS’s attitude toward science from that of our president, but I’ll spare you my tirade on that subject. (Last week’s New Yorker had an excellent article that I recommend if you have the stomach for it.)

Now for my questions.  First, why is this guy so popular?  See, his 15-year-old national radio show airs on 217 stations, he’s been Kmart’s gardening spokesman for 27 years, and he’s considered one of America’s foremost gardening authorities.  Despite his folksiness, I’m surprised that his shows aren’t sending viewers running in terror from the overwhelming burden of continual spraying.  I thought the public was looking for low-maintenance advice, so you see why I’m confused.

But more importantly, if this guy were a medical quack, would he be allowed on, much less promoted by, public television? Hell, no.  But I suppose nobody takes gardening seriously enough to dare suggest a little proof and heck, it’s only the environment at stake, anyway.  Bottom line, why hasn’t this guy been totally discredited and run off PBS long ago?  Apparently only a couple of stations have been persuaded to drop Jerry’s programming; is that because gardeners, even master gardeners, are happily zoned out in their gardens?  Guys, it doesn’t have to be that way, especially now that gardeners and environmentalists are often one and the same.

If I’ve failed miserably and you’re not pissed off about all this, here’s my last shot. One of the pro-Jerry sites I found has the heading, “Get the latest scoop straight from the bloggers,” followed by a listing of various commercial sites with not a blogger in the bunch.  But you see how bloggers are being cited as legitimate grassroots voices?  Now that’s a challenge I can’t let pass, despite my life-long love of public television.  Sorry, guys.

[Photos:  My neighbors' gardens on the 2005 House and Garden Tour, by Julie Wyatt, Takoma/Silver Spring Voice. Notice the roof garden looking great in its first year.]

John Peter Thompson grew up in the nursery business and is now president and chairman of Behnke’s, a large Maryland nursery, so when he talks about the history of gardening, I’m listening. But he’s also an ex-hippie and the title of his recent talk at the nursery was "The Culture of Invasive Plants," so gardeners, beware!

During Thompson’s fascinating one-hour talk I learned that the history of gardening in Western culture is all about dominating nature and creating an enclosed space that’s safe from the evils of the wild.  From the tightly wound knot gardens of Medieval monks to Suliman the Turk’s walled gardens to Versailles, the slides on the screen were a parade of horrors and any viewer would have to admit that gardeners through the ages have been a pretty tight-assed bunch.  And it only gets worse.  Another feature of gardening history has been its purpose of flaunting wealth and power, as evidenced by English estate gardens.  Who else but the superrich could maintain those parterres, fountains and great lawns?  Even on a smaller scale, English cottage gardens are a helluva lot of work to keep up. (And though not mentioned, Japanese gardens are also extremely high maintenance, so shouldn’t these criticisms be leveled equally against all gardening cultures and not restricted to those in the West? Just a thought.)

Next let’s add good ‘ole capitalism to the mix.  Thompson asserts that most landscaping, such as it is, is installed to increase the value of our homes, so no wonder it consists mainly of lining up green things along the foundation and spreading a toxic greensward across the front. Then gardeners are encouraged by the industry to lust after newness – the latest exotic discovery, the latest horticultural product.  And Thompson described that lust as "me, me, me, and my, my, my."  So by the time that some famously bad actors in the plant world were exhibited on the screen, even the ones brought to this country for purposes other than gardening, (erosion control in the case of kudzu), we nature-lover/gardeners in the audience were starting to feel pretty bad about ourselves.  The term "self-hating gardener" might even apply.

Which certainly leads me to wonder what gives with this nurseryman who’s making me feel guilty about being his customer. Seriously, I know that Behnke’s almost went bankrupt two years ago and now I’m wondering if this anti-gardening campaign by its owner is a factor in its struggles. And even more interesting is his involvement on the Maryland Invasive Species Council representing the nursery industry and his membership on a similar federal body representing only himself.  I’m curious as hell about his relations with the rest of his industry, most of whom presumably want to stay in business, but I digress.

Thompson next turned to the commonly suggested alternative to destructive plants – natives – and once again I’m listening closely because he’s no wild-eyed environmental theorist; he’s a knowledgeable gardener.  And the disappointing reality is that very few natives do very well as garden plants. Why? For starters, very few of them tolerate being moved, much less the harsh treatment that plants receive in the nursery business. Soils in this area are no longer right for native plants, since the pH was altered for farming. Native plants are vulnerable nowadays to imported diseases. And big surprise here, he said that earthworms contribute to the problem, calling them invasive destroyers of native plants.  (Amy, weigh in here!)

Conversely, imported plants, especially those from Asia, like the amended soil and are immune to many pests and diseases. We use nonnatives because they’re cheap, drought-tolerant, tough, grow anywhere, and are easy to care for.  Apparently the term "they do well here" is often used to describe nonnatives, and Thompson invited his audience to share his disapproval of this attitude.  He described the "inherent conflict for gardeners" as the fact that plants that "do well" are more likely to do too well if they find their way into natural areas, out-competing native plants and changing ecosystems for the worse.  A photo very similar to this one was exhibited as the "ultimate noninvasive garden" and left on the screen throughout the Q&A session.  Was this meant as another slap on the wrist – bad gardener – or a bleak prediction of the future of gardening? I’m genuinely clueless.

So at the completion of this horrifying recitation of damage caused my gardening, Susie Sunshine here asked, "So, John Peter, your talk was so compelling; now what kind of plants do you suggest we grow?"  You know, very solution-oriented, seeking answers from the great environmentalist-gardener. There were two mumbled answers.  One, to cite a native plant installation in the Annapolis area which "the public doesn’t like."  Bad public!  And upon seeing my disappointment, he suggested that the garden writer Colston Burrell had some interesting thoughts on the subject, but offered no hints about what they are. 

Readers, help me out here because I’m genuinely bewildered by this man’s message.  I even scrutinized the hand-outs in search of answers and I thought I found some promising ideas in one called "Using Beneficial Plants" produced by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Chesapeake Bay Office. Beneficial plants are those that "require minimal maintenance because they’re well adapted to local climate and soil types."  They include native plants and the "many horticultural varieties and imported plants that are also deemed beneficial if they have few maintenance requirements and are not invasive.  Invasives are a small percentage of those introduced species that have become extremely aggressive.  Even some native plants can become undesireable because of their invasiveness."   So reasonable, so refreshingly nondoctrinaire.  However, the only beneficial plants actually named in the brochure were the usual very short list of native plants in this area.  So, still in my problem-solving mode, I asked Thompson in a follow-up conversation where I could find a list of nonnative beneficial plants and his reply was that nonnatives could be neutral but they were never beneficial, "although I shouldn’t say that because that’s what I sell."  I really admire the guy, but it sounds like he has trouble sleeping at night.

I remain confused as hell but unshaken in my belief that gardening can be not only unharmful but actually beneficial to the environment.  After all, most gardens are created on suburban and urban lots that were completely nature-less except for a swath of grass and a shrub or two.  Hardly a "natural" situation, which is in my opinion the primary reason that native plants don’t "do well" in our gardens. (Especially in my area, most native plants are woodland plants, so why we expect them to flourish around our homes is a mystery.)  Looking at the hundreds of varieties of plants in my garden and the abundant wildlife attracted to them, I feel certain that my garden is more helpful than harmful.

And my message to nurserymen who do want to stay in business is to get really good at producing beneficial plants for today’s environmentally conscious gardeners.  If they’re natives, well and good, but more likely they’ll be tough cultivars of natives and tough imports from climates and conditions similar to our gardens.  They may be sterile cousins of aggressive spreaders.  I sure don’t know all the answers but guys, it’s your business to lose so get to work.