Making It Grow Minutes

There are a zillion different amaryllis cultivars out there – a plethora of colors and flower shapes – singles or doubles, extra large or some smaller options. They make the best show in a garden if grouped and need about a foot of space between each large-sized bulb.

In mid-spring when all danger of frost is over, you can move your potted amaryllis plants outside to a partly shaded area.

In most parts of South Carolina, holiday amaryllis bulbs can be added to your garden or the front of shrub beds when all chance of frost is over. For successful transplanting, keep the indoor plant healthy and growing after it flowers to replenish or build back that bulb.

If you have amaryllis bulbs (actually the genus is Hippeastrum but we’re never going to call them that) blooming in your house over the holidays, you can take some steps to keep them healthy.

The magnificent flowering plants we call amaryllis, so popular as indoor plants during the holidays, really aren’t in the genus Amaryllis but rather Hippeastrum.

Black cottonwood, Populas balsamifera, is a species variation of cottonwood that grows from the western tip of Canada down to Montana and through part of Texas.

Cottonwoods, Populus deltoides, are dioecious, male flowers and female flowers are found on separate trees. The common name comes from the incredible mass of fluff that the female seed pods produce when they open. The seeds are tiny and the cottony material containing them is a great dispersal method.

I personally have never seen a cottonwood in any other setting but they can grow in a myriad of conditions, making them good trees for reclamation sites.

The Friends of the Congaree Swamp is a conservation organization that plans trail cleanups, makes recommendations to South Carolina DHEC when appropriate, and is dedicated to the conservation of this treasured part of South Carolina’s ecology; the newsletters they share keep us abreast of current affairs and upcoming opportunities.

Our state has lost a remarkable citizen, Charleston gardener and hostess Patti McGee. Her love of gardening originated under her mother’s tutelage in Marion, South Carolina. Her husband Peter was supportive of constant tweaking and additions to their Anson Street property. McGee’s inquisitive mind and love of new people as well as plants, made her beloved by both the artistic and gardening community.

The recently deceased Patti McGee was known as a gracious hostess and accomplished gardener not only in South Carolina.

This plant's unusual leaves, similar in texture and appearance to yucca, are thick and stringy and deer and rabbits tend to avoid it – remember nothing is absolutely deer proof, but you certainly couldn’t go wrong trying it in your pollinator garden.

Rattlesnake master's slender flower stalks, topped with inch-wide inflorescences, makes a great contrast to other flowers in an arrangement and can be left tall and still be graceful.

Another of its pollinators are the predatory wasps who capture insects to line soil cavities or stems as paralyzed, but living , food for their young. Most are solitary wasps who are not especially aggressive to us.

Many people get most excited about butterflies on their pollinator plants, but Eryngium yuccafolium, flowering late summer, perhaps attracts a larger diversity of visitors than almost any other insect magnet. According to the Xerces society website --bumble bees, yellow-faced bees, sweet bees, multiple beetles and dozens of fly species.

By collecting the plant leaves' tough long fibrous veins, indigenous people could weave them to make moccasins and baskets, a better use than relying on the sap or root concoctions to treat snake bites.

This common name comes from the belief that the roots could cure rattlesnake bites - don’t try it!

The dried wood of osage orange is prized for firewood as it has the highest BTU on charts that rank that property among native trees.

The spread of Maclura pomifera, aka osage orange or bodark tree, from the relatively small Red River drainage system to 48 states was due not just it’s importance to native Americans.

Common names can be fascinating and puzzling.