Bulb Log 2022

[Ian Y]

Click the link below to follow the links that weave Grasses, Buttercups, Woolly Mammoths, Albrecht Dürer, Bishops, Planning threats, Birds and Art into this week's Bulb Log.


https://www.srgc.org.uk/logs/logdir/2022Jul131657705256BULB_LOG_2822.pdf

[Robert]

Hi Ian,

I thoroughly enjoy reading your weekly Bulb Logs. I especially enjoyed your latest Bulb Log. Your Bulb Logs are so inspiring, ideas not to copy exactly but ideas to use as a spring board toward new approaches to gardening and highly regional applications.

Thank you for all your efforts throughout so many years. If I understand correctly, this may be your last season writing the Bulb Log. I support your decision 100% whether it is to quit or continue in some form. I support what is best for you! I can express my gratitude for your efforts by writing this message to you. I can also express my gratitude by posting and sharing my gardening experiences on this forum and supporting it financially.

I am not an artist, just a common, less than average farmer. Yes, I have recently returned home to farming. I am currently writing up my 10-year plan for our Sacramento garden as well as the property in Placerville. Integration of ornamental plants in our permaculture gardens is a primary goal. I have found inspiration and concepts in your Bulb Logs that are being incorporated into my 10-year plan.

I like the concept of regionalism as expressed by the American farmer Eliot Coleman. He wishes to build a community, so he sells all of his produce within 40 miles of his farm and tries to know personally as many of his customers as possible. In the past in Mexico hundreds of different and distinct varieties of maize were grown in a relatively small regions. Frequently each family had its own distinct variety of maize. I am applying this concept of regional diversity into all the plant I grow in our gardens, including ornamental plants. I wish to know all my plants in our gardens intimately. It is very exciting to see completely new and site-specific plants evolve and coming into being in our gardens.

I also like the ideas expressed by John Jeavons and the folks at Ecology Action in Willits, California. Their main research garden is out in the middle of nowhere in the interior coastal mountains of Northern California. It is has a beautiful permaculture design transitioning from densely spaced biointensive agriculture to mountainous wilderness. This concept is being incorporated in the design of the restored Placerville garden. My personal twist will be to incorporate ornamental species into this design. I hope folks that read the forum will like to read about this evolving process and learn about the new, highly regional plants varieties. My intent is to write about this as long as the SRGC Forum is up a running. The gardening process is slow. I like slow. However, there are always new and exciting plants popping up in our Sacramento and Placerville gardens, both from my own efforts as well as new forms of local California native species.

Anyway, enough of getting on by soap box. Ian, thank you again for all your efforts with the Bulb Log and Forum. With whatever direction you choose, may life go well for you, Maggi, and your garden.

[Ian Y]

Thank you Dear Robert for all your support and great contributions to the forum I greatly enjoy reading them and seeing plants in a very different environment to ours, I look forward to following your project.

I have not sure about the future of the Bulb Log but after 20 years I may run out of things to write about every week. I may reduce the frequency or stop I  will decide and make an announcement towards the end of the year but whatever happens the 20 years of logs will still be available.

Best wishes
Ian

[Ian Y]

Looking into the flowers, hedge cutting , continuing to learn from nature, coping with the heatwave are topics in this week's Bulb Log.


https://www.srgc.org.uk/logs/logdir/2022Jul201658312578BULB_LOG_2922.pdf

[Ian Y]

To read the confessions of a Tree Hugger  you have to click the link to the Bulb Log.


https://www.srgc.net/documents/bulb%20logs/220727101140BULB%20LOG%203022.pdf

[Yann]

inresting issue, it's still looking very green in Aberdeen while our gardens are more like the straw off the field

[Ian Y]

Yes Yann it is all relative we are much drier than the long term average and having been like this for the last three years it is becoming a pattern but from watching Le Tour on the TV I can see how we still look green to you.

Last night we had some heavy rain and for now the plants have some relief, no amount of me watering can have the same benefit as a few hours worth of rain.

[Ian Y]

This weeks Bulb Log looks into abstraction as well as flowers, thistles and foliage, click the link.


https://www.srgc.net/documents/bulb%20logs/220803103409BULB%20LOG%203122.pdf

[Ian Y]

This week's Bulb Log reports on the summer blues in the slab beds, troughs, moving ferns, shredding, repotting bulbs, some hidden flowering gems and the arrival of the sheep! Click the link to find out more.


https://www.srgc.net/documents/bulb%20logs/220810102846BULB%20LOG%203222.pdf

[Yann]

Another interesting issue,i like your green jungle.

[Ian Y]

Another interesting issue,i like your green jungle.

Thank you Yann, so do we.

[Ian Y]

This Bulb Log looks at what nature can teach us about growing in hot dry conditions and adaptions we can make in the garden to help plants survive.


https://www.srgc.net/documents/bulb%20logs/220817101735BULB%20LOG%203322.pdf

[Robert]

Hi Ian,

Thank you for yet another thought provoking Bulb Log. It is impossible to thoroughly cover all aspects of a topic in a given Bulb Log; however I wish to add some comments about growing plants from seed, maintaining genetic diversity in our cultivated species, my observations in our own garden, and how this builds resiliency in our garden setting. This is a topic you have discussed repeatedly in your Bulb Logs; however I think that it is worth repeating.

In nature almost all plant populations are genetically diverse. Change is a part of nature, and plant species constantly change and adjust to variability in their environment. Growing genetically diverse populations of as many species as reasonably possible in our gardens is one of the best methods to maintain a robust and healthy plant community. Creating a genetic bottleneck within a species is one of the most effective ways to lose a treasured species in our garden. Highly inbred plants--especially single specimens of a highly inbred line-- lack genetic diversity and the ability to adjust to change. In nature, to maintain genetic diversity and flexibility, even inbreeding-type species out cross much more than we might realize.

In our garden, we grow large genetically diverse populations of as many species as possible. Not only does this look natural and good, but it can also maintain a high degree of genetic diversity within a given species population. In a small garden this is generally only possible with plants that stay relatively small, such as many annual and perennial species. I am constantly amazed at how quickly some of our plants adjust to adverse seasonal changes after just one season and one new generation of plants. As you have stated repeatedly in your Bulb Log, these plants become highly adapted to conditions in our individual gardens. In our garden plants become better adapted to both extreme high temperatures as well as low temperatures. Increased resiliency to drought, flooding, insect pests, plant diseases, soil type and many other adversities are just some of the benefits of growing plants from seed from a genetically diverse population from plants in our own garden. In addition, there are frequently mutations that take place, chance hybrids, as well as the recombination of genes that takes place leading to a completely new variety within the species. This is fun stuff for me.

Plant collectors would be wise to think about how they maintain their collection of plants and what exactly they are passing on when they trade seeds with friends. Wild collected seed is no guarantee that a new species will be maintained successfully in the long term. Some outbreeding species can be quickly lost if an adequate population is not maintained. Even inbreeding species can quickly lose genetic adaptability, especially when a single clone is selfed, the seed passed along, then selfed again, and again, and again as it is passed along to other gardeners. This sort of works for plants like beans and tomatoes; however we would be in big trouble with these species if only one selfed variety was available. Far too frequently many species grown from wild seed are ephemeral-- especially when only one or a few individual plants are selected and kept. Ignorance of, or disregard for, the proper maintenance of a genetic seed line is something we need to contend with if we wish to continue to enjoy a rich diversity of unusual plant species in our gardens. The consequences of repeatedly plundering nature for seed of “rare” species without the commitment to attempt to properly maintain the species has given gardeners, gardening, and aspects of ornamental horticulture a very bad reputation, at least here in our part of California.

This Forum has the potential to inform gardeners of proper seed saving techniques as well as the proper maintenance of a species seed line in cultivation. Taking advantage of this is a win-win proposition. Exciting new plant species can be successfully and, more or less, be permanently be introduced into cultivation, exciting new varieties of plants can be created, the quality of seed shared among plant friends can improve and the quality of seed offered in seed exchanges can improve. All of this will add resilience and a great deal of creative diversity to our gardens. With so many benefits for gardeners this seems a good plan for action.

[Ian Y]

Thank you for your post,Robert.   I completely agree with all you say so well the only way to keep plants long term is though seed lines where the genetic diversity is maintained. I always advise people when pricking out and selecting seedlings to grow on to not just pick the big attractive specimens as it may be the small ugly ones that carry resistance to disease and or tolerance of temperatures etc.
Growing only the selected cultivars we increasingly see in garden centres by the thousands is not a good long term policy.
You absolutely have the right way forward.

[MarcR]

Ian, Robert, and Yann,

With all the talk of drought and extreme heat, I realize how fortunate I am to be in western Oregon! This year we had one of the wettest Springs on record; and so far we have had only 3 days above 90F [32.2 C]. Using drip irigation, I am watering twice a day. Gardenias, Alstroemerias, and Cupheas, which are water intensive, are thriving. Some of my Aquilegias and Lupines are still flowering sporadically.