World's smallest dogwood

(MN edition)

At the end of every summer, I take some much-needed R&R at a family cabin in the Chippewa National Forest. One of the advantages of this relocation — in addition to relaxing in an incredibly beautiful natural setting — is the chance to meet new plants in a far-away place. Of my many new acquaintances, a personal favorite is bunchberry (Cornus canadensis) because it's both beautiful and such an interesting anomoly.

Bunchberry looked oddly familiar when I first admired it in the forest, but its radically diminutive size compared to others in its family threw me off, so I had to look at a guidebook to make the connection. Of course, ...it's a dogwood!  How could I not see that? Just look how those leaves resemble the foliage of the more-common flowering dogwood tree (Cornus florida), and the fruit is strikingly similar too. 

The specific epithet is a clue to its range — I doubt you'll find this cold-loving plant far south of the Canadian border — and while its listed as  USDA cold-hardiness zone 2 - 7, I expect it would need a whole lot of shade and very consistent moisture to survive in zones 6 or 7. 

A patch of bunchberry in the Chippewa National Forest

Arboreal fireworks

What a great year for Chinese scholar trees (Styphnolobium japonicum) — formerly (Sophora japonica) — also called Japanese pagoda tree. In spite of that second common name, and its specific epithet, this tree is native to China and Korea, not Japan.

The flower clusters always remind me of firecrackers exploding. This specimen in Long Island City is really cracklin'!

Battle of the roots

Both culver's root (Veronicastrum virginicum) and black snakeroot (Actaea racemosa) are blooming now. Culver's root is more bush-like with flowers born closer to whorled foliage that seems to emanate from the stalk; while black snakeroot — also called bugbane, fairy candles, or black cohosh — bears its flowers on long, mostly bare, stalks high above a mass of compound tripinnate leaves. The flowers look similar, but both the foliage and habit are quite different. Also different are their light requirements: culver's root prefers more sun, while black snakeroot prefers more shade.

Both are native to the eastern United States. 

Culver's root on the left and black snakeroot on the right. Both specimens were photographed near the Hudson River Greenway, above the clay tennis courts at 97th Street.

Exemplary native combo

Here's a great combination from native guru Darrel Morrison at NYBG's new native plant garden. I'm not sure what to think of the garden's hard-edged layout, but the plantings are fantastic. Too bad you probably need an engineered virgin soil, free of invasive seeds, to pull this off at scale — unless you have a big budget and an army of weeders.

Magenta Bush's poppy mallow (Callirhoe bushii) plays nicely with yellow black-eyed Susan (probably Rudbeckia hirta) , and white wild quinine (Parthenium integrifolium). Throw in a common milkweed (Asclepias syriaca) and prairie dropseed (sporabolis heterolopsis) for course and fine texture, and you have a very compelling arrangement.

A small slice of the meadow planting in the new native garden at the NYBG. 

Zombie trees

I've noticed several trees that I thought were killed by Hurricane Sandy now pushing foliage in unusual places. They clearly have some life left in them, but their normal growth pattern — on stem tips — seems to have failed. They are now activating latent buds along their trunks and inner branches.

What's going on and how will this play out? 

As I understand it, the hormone cytokinin which initiates spring bud break is made in the root tips, so if saltwater saturated the root zone and desicated these tips through osmosis, the resulting lack of hormone production would leave in-tact buds waiting for a silenced starter's pistol. Are those buds now dead, or still set and waiting to spring forth? As new root growth picks up speed — and produces more cytokinin — will they eventually get their signal and push new leaves? The branches don't seem brittle or dead,  and they clearly want to live, so I'm not sure.

WIll these trees eventually recover, die a slow death, or just end up deformed and weak? Your guess may be as good as mine.

Storm damaged willows in the Long Island City flood zone pushing inner foliage.

Speedy samaras

How quickly plants can change! Walking along in Long Island City, I was shocked to see this Ailanthus fruit. My post on June 13 — a little less than 3 weeks ago — showed the small flowers that preceded this bunch of samaras. Flower to fruit in 2 weeks? No wonder this tree succeeds where others fail.

Ailanthus fruit in LIC