Thursday, April 19, 2012

Odd One Out

or Harmless Eccentrics

Mormon tea (Ephedra viridis)  has only the tiniest of leaves, useless little scales that you'd hardly recognize as leaves at all.  It keeps its chlorophyll in its stems instead, which is unusual behavior in a shrub but an ingenious response to the desert, as Ephedra has no broad surfaces to be robbed of moisture by the wind and sun.  Even in its first year after planting, it doesn't want much watering, and after that it's quite content with rainfall.  It seems to be a unique cross—or a link—between conifers and flowering plants and is a little odd-looking.  But then, the climate it's adapted to is an odd one, too.  In the hottest corner of the garden between the south and west-facing walls, I don't know what would do better.

Ephedra viridis

Years ago I was visiting with a friend at his house back in rural New York state.  He was a grad student in Renaissance literature, and we got ourselves lost in a discussion of Shakespeare.  We had come to a knotty point about Henry V when a squirrel in the garden made its way over the baffle that should have stopped it but mostly didn't, and scampered on up the bird feeder.  My friend excused himself mid-sentence, opened the living room window, picked up a BB gun lying on the sill, fired a few shots at the roof of the feeder, frightened off the squirrel, put down the gun, closed the window, and resumed discussing Henry as if nothing had happened.  "This," I thought, "is how eccentrics are born."*

For many people, I do think eccentricity proceeds that way:  You're off on your own somewhere, in circumstances that call for an intense kind of focus, and don't stop to wonder whether your actions are quirky or strange.  You just do what needs done with the resources you have, without looking up and around at the wider world, and the next thing you know, that focus, that set of responses, has turned into habit.  Shakespeare and BB guns have merged into one harmonious world in your head.  You've shed your leaves, the chlorophyll has moved into your stems, and the neighbors have started to look at you funny.  You may have adapted well to the circumstances, but that doesn't mean you're not a little...odd. 

The micro-garden, showing two colors of orach, along with pepper cress and garlic.

One of my current neighbors and I take turns peeking over our shared garden wall to see what the other is growing.  We have completely different approaches and interests, which is half the fun, of course.  He's particularly fascinated by the micro-garden, the divided, 2' x 4' raised bed where I grow vegetables.  "What's that on the end?" he'll ask, and we'll start working our way around the bed.  Orach, amaranth, arugula, sweet potato vine, pepper cress.  "Don't you ever just grow, you know, lettuce?"


I don't—it doesn't thrive, as my non-vegetable growing neighbor hasn't had to discover.  I find myself going farther afield from lettuce and spinach every year, not in the quest for something new and different, just for something that will get past its first set of true leaves before bolting.  The hunt for leafy vegetables that will do well in strong southern sun a mile above sea level, with single-digit relative humidity, 25-30°F differences between day and night-time temperatures, strong winds, and plagues of leafhoppers, is unending it seems.  The time between last frost and scorching heat, on the other hand, is short.  Lettuce is not adapted.  Anyone wanting greens would be smarter just to break off a twig of Mormon tea and start gnawing.

Failing that, however, I'm growing orach (Atriplex hortensis), as it bolts without turning bitter.  Orach wouldn't be an unusual garden plant if we were in France, say, and it's not an odd plant in itself at all—it's perfectly lovely, in fact, in entirely normal ways.  It keeps its chlorophyll in its leaves and everything.  Its only oddity lies in being rare in a world of grocery stores, where salad means lettuce.  I say all this to my neighbor.


He gives me the humoring look reserved for harmless eccentrics.

________________________
* Squirrels have a lot to answer for.

20 comments:

  1. Poor squirrel. I was wondering how lettuce and spinach would do here, but not well from the sound of things.

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    1. GirlSprout, it's great to have you come up for air! Hope your class is going well.

      A little fear couldn't possibly have hurt that particular squirrel--it was a more than ordinarily wicked one. I do know people who have done well here with lettuce and spinach using row cover/shade cloth, but to me it sounds like more fuss than it's worth when there are easier alternatives.

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  2. If I were you, I would stop struggling with the vegetables and start making tequila.

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    1. Vegetables really are over-rated, now that you mention it...

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  3. Is your Ephedra related at all to Equisetum? It looks as if it belongs with reeds.

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    1. Diana, I actually chose Ephedra as a dry-land substitute for Equisetum because they look so similar. (I'd seen a combination I liked w/ Equisetum at the Botanic Gardens.) They're not related, though--in the classification schemes, they're in separate divisions.

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  4. Thank you for your kind comments. I think I will listen to a jazz concert tonight.

    I have encountered quite a few Epheda plants in Colorado and Texas. Very interesting and bold.

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    1. The jazz concert sounds just as enjoyable as the orchestra.

      The ephedra in my garden is still young enough to be timid and gangly, but we're working toward interesting and bold.

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  5. Oh, my goodness! I laughed out loud a couple of times - when you realized how eccentrics were born while visiting your friend, and the second when you stated "you've shed your leaves" and "your neighbors have started to look at you funny". I think all gardeners are perceived as a bit eccentric, but to each other, we are perfectly normal. And the fact that you grow orach instead of lettuce makes perfect sense to me. And it's pretty, too! Now, where did I put my BB gun....

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    1. I'm glad you enjoyed this one, Holley! Thank goodness for garden blogging, where we can all hang out and be eccentric together. If all we did was go to Home Depot for a couple of pelargoniums once a year, we'd be perfectly normal. (Oops--as long as we called them geraniums!)

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  6. Oh dear, now I shall truly worry about how eccentric I might have become. Working alone, there’s no-one to look askance at my choice of clothes, wince at my singing or to question why on earth I don't simply, obviously do this THIS rather than THAT. I shall break off a twig, go in a shady corner and gnaw and worry. Yes, some gnawing is the answer. I have orach seed for the first time; they grow them at Great Dixter in the flower beds. If it's good enough for them … Dave p.s. And squirrel baffles don't work; they don't baffle squirrels at all. Not in the slightest.

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    1. Dave, yes, in those circumstances it does sound like you could be at risk. In fact, to an outsider, the ghosts you keep in willow cages might indicate...well, never mind. Of course, the flip side of eccentricity is ingenuity. It's all in the spin you put on it. (Political season here--sorry.) Great Dixter--that is quite the seal of approval, and I can imagine orach looking stunning in a flower bed. I'd love to hear how your seeds turn out.

      Squirrel baffles just seem to make the squirrels fitter, leaner, and more cunning.

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  7. Oh Stacy how I loved this post! We also have squirrels and they have foiled every attempt we have made to keep the out of the bird feeders here:) Our big dog loves to chase them, but we really don't want him eating them..... so we don't allow for that:)

    I'm not going to try to garden this year. We will "help" with our kids's gardens:)

    You have such a wonderful way of saying things! Thanks for that! What a blessing!

    Elaine

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    1. I'm so glad you enjoyed it, Elaine! Squirrels are such ornery little cusses. I think they get into bird feeders just to provoke a reaction from us sometimes. When I had a dog, he'd chase them, too, but he never had much chance of catching one. He had fun running them up a tree and barking at them, though.

      A garden sounds like it would be extra-challenging this year, Elaine. Enjoy your kids' gardens--especially at harvest time...!

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  8. Love it - still laughing at your neighbors question about whether you just grow....lettuce!

    We are mid vegetable plot renovation which is proving to be a larger project than anticipated because of all the bells and whistles I deem necessary. It is also not a cheap construction - again my fault. Hence the great comment from one of my favorite clients "you can BUY vegetables you know". Actually she has a point...

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    1. Karen, your garden sounds like the $64 Tomato to the life! As you know, it will all be worth it in the end. Just not cheaper...

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  9. That Mormon tea reminds me of the state tree of AZ, Palo Verde. No real leaves but the bark is green...I know my neighbors view me as an eccentric these days definitely an oddball...

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    1. Donna, I would love to see a palo verde in the flesh sometime--the pictures in books are always captivating. It's a good thing there don't seem to be any Neighbors of Gardeners bloggers out there, or we'd be providing them with raw material all the time...

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  10. Stacy, I suspect that both academia and gardening breed eccentricity -- which probably means that I should just go with it! Tonight, at dinner with students and colleagues to celebrate the honors presentation of one of my students, the students were trying to describe a house near campus. "Oh, I think I know the one you mean," I said, "the one with all the wisteria?" Students and colleagues alike all gave me that amused, but indulgent look. -Jean

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    1. Jean, I would tell you that you sound entirely normal to me, but then, I'm suspect, too... I can just picture the look. But really, what better feature to identify a house than its wisteria?

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