My 22nd fairy crown is a celebration of the ornamental grasses I grow at the cottage on Lake Muskoka. The little seeds are from switch grass (Panicum virgatum); my “bangs” are big bluestem (Andropogon gerardii); and there’s also some pollen-laden Indian grass (Sorghastrum nutans) there as well. The pale lavender flowers are a little aster that grows wild on our property, sky-blue aster (Symphyotrichum oolentangiense). The pink flowers are the New England aster ‘Harrington’s Pink’ (Symphyotrichum novae-angliae).
In fact, #22 was the most unruly of all my crowns to make, given that the grasses had long flowering spikes that were difficult to attach to the wire frame. Here’s a little inside look at the nuts-and-bolts of fairy crown creation.
Many of my prairie grasses grow in the west meadow. In the photo below, you can see big bluestem (Andropogon gerardii) mixed with heliopsis, lanceleaf aster and various goldenrods.
When native switch grass (Panicum virgatum) is in flower and the sun shines behind it, it adds a beautiful sense of lightness to the meadow. I planted a few nursery pots of various cultivars of switch grass in the naturalistic garden beds on the property, but I also sowed seed of the species throughout the meadows and it is gradually filling in in many places….
….. including the lake shore.
It has a swishing, kinetic quality that makes sitting beside it in late summer a sensory experience.
And in autumn, switch grass turns colour, with some taking on red hues and others golden-yellow.
Big bluestem (Andropogon gerardii) is sometimes called turkeyfoot grass because the flower spikes branch into three segments that resemble a turkey’s foot. It is native to southern Ontario.
By the time it blooms in early September alongside big bluestem, grey-headed coneflower (Ratibida pinnata) is usually showing off its oblong black seedheads.
Indian grass (Sorghastrum nutans) is a stealth grass; one minute it’s in a tidy clump in a garden bed, the next minute it’s popping up in cracks between flagstones. But it’s one of the native grasses I’ve encouraged to grow in the shallow, sandy soil of the west meadow. I assume its deep, searching roots find cracks in the Precambrian bedrock that somehow approximate the deep soil of the tallgrass prairie that once covered millions and millions of acres of North America. That little aster peeking out from the Indian grass is sky-blue aster (Symphyotrichum oolentangiense).
I see it all over the countryside in Muskoka, but I adore the way it pops up amidst native species that I sowed in the meadows here, like wild beebalm (Monarda fistulosa), below, showing its late summer seedheads.
It’s one of those plants that is unassumingly charming – and new plants emerge in different spots each September.
But bees are sure to find it, including the orange-belted bumble bee (Bombus ternarius), below.
In my east meadow, September features another plant I received from the gardeners at Toronto’s Spadina House Museum – only this time, I purchased at their plant sale (unlike my cup plants, which were gifted to me by Spadina’s gardeners with a warning about their rambling ways.) Meet Symphyotrichum novae-angliae ‘Harrington’s Pink’, below, partnering with sweet blackeyed susan (Rudbeckia subtomentosa).
Bumble bees are fond of ‘Harrington’s Pink’…. even if the flowers sometimes don’t fully open in my dry meadows and tend to look a little wonky…..
….. unlike the spectacular display this plant makes at Spadina House in early autumn, along with other cultivars of New England aster.
The goldenrod in my crown is not one you see in nurseries; in fact, it took me a while to identify it, but I think I have. It is hairy goldenrod (Solidago hispida), native to dry, rocky places in a large swath of the northeast.
I’ll leave you with a bouquet I made many years ago that celebrates the big grasses, asters, seedheads and goldenrods that shine in my meadows at this time of year. The cowboy boot? Well, it just seemed fitting for this celebration of the prairie on Lake Muskoka!
*********
Here are the blogs on my previous 21 fairy crowns!
My 16th Fairy Crown for August 1st is a simple affair featuring just one plant: Rudbeckia fulgida var. sullivantii ‘Goldsturm’. If it looks a little lonely, it’s because its normal garden partners had either already been fairy crown ingredients (hello, purple coneflower) or weren’t quite in flower yet (liatris and perovskia). But I think it gives a rather regal impression, as if a fairy queen had landed near a midwest cornfield and tried on the local wildflowers for size.
Speaking of American wildflowers, this particular blackeyed susan – or shining coneflower, as it is also known – is possibly the most widely-grown species of any North American taxon, given that it made its way back to our shores via the kind of circuitous route that features botanical discoveries, far-flung horticultural relationships, European plant propagation and the success of the American public relations machine.
I don’t always look at nomenclature, but since my fairy crown only has one ingredient, let’s explore this one. Rudbeckia. Even though it is a North American genus in the Asteraceae family, Carl Linnaeus – who in 1753 in his Species Plantarum assigned binomial names to all known plants — knew of it from the earliest plant explorers to leave Europe and gather new world seeds, cuttings and herbarium specimens. He named the genus after his Swedish mentor and patron, Olof Rudbeck the Younger (1860-1740), professor of botany at Uppsala University whose children he had also tutored.
In his dedication, Linnaeus wrote: “So long as the earth shall survive and as each spring shall see it covered with flowers, the Rudbeckia will preserve your glorious name. I have chosen a noble plant in order to recall your merits and the services you have rendered, a tall one to give an idea of your stature, and I wanted it to be one which branched and which flowered and fruited freely, to show that you cultivated not only the sciences but also the humanities. Its rayed flowers will bear witness that you shone among savants like the sun among the stars; its perennial roots will remind us that each year sees you live again through new works. Pride of our gardens, the Rudbeckia will be cultivated throughout Europe and in distant lands where your revered name must long have been known. Accept this plant, not for what it is but for what it will become when it bears your name.” The “type species” representing the genus is biennial blackeyed susan (Rudbeckia hirta), below, which I wrote about in my “songscape” blog Brown Eyed Girl(s), honouring Van Morrison. The other two species named by Linnaeus are Rudbeckia laciniata and R. triloba. The remaining 22 species had other authors, with R. fulgida, i.e. orange coneflower being described by the Kew-based English botanist William Aiton (1731-1793).
But back to my crown now; the correct Latin name of the species is Rudbeckia fulgida var. sullivantii. Sullivant’s coneflower, native from New Jersey west to Illinois and south to North Carolina and Missouri. The taxon rank “var.” indicates a variation of orange coneflower that was either described by or honoured Ohio-based botanist William S. Sullivant (1803-73), below. He later became a renowned bryologist, or moss expert. Another popular native variant of orange coneflower is R. fulgida var. deamii.
At some point, seed of Sullivant’s coneflower made its way to Europe and the botanical garden of Austria’s University Graz. From there, it was distributed to Gebrueder Schütz who grew the plants at his nursery in the Czech Republic. In 1937, Heinrich Hagemann saw the “a glorious stand of the plants” there and brought them back to his boss, Karl Foerster, below, at his nursery in Potsdam, Germany. Foerster was so impressed with the plant’s floriferous nature that he gave it the cultivar name ‘Goldsturm’ (German for “gold storm”). World War II delayed its introduction to commerce until 1949 and by the 1970s it was being grown widely in Europe and North America.
Erich Braun – Scan von einem Mittelformat-Negativ 6 x 6 Karl Foerster in his garden 28. September 1967
By the late 1970s, the German-born landscape architect Wolfgang Oehme and his partner James Van Sweden would use ‘Goldsturm’ along with ornamental grasses in large masses for their renowned “new American landscapes” inspired by the Great Plains. It was pictured with them on the cover of their 1997 book, ‘Gardening with Nature’.
Its popularity with American garden centres would result in it being named the 1999 Perennial Plant of the Year by the Perennial Plant Association (PPA). And many gardeners did what I have done, which is to mix it with purple coneflowers (Echinacea purpurea).
It is prominent in my front yard pollinator garden in Toronto…
…. where it is only moderately successful at attracting bees, including honey bees, because when echinacea is in flower, it plays second fiddle in the pollinator department.
Unlike biennial blackeyed susans (R. hirta) which flowers on single stems (and is in my next fairy crown!) the stems of ‘Goldsturm’ clump together and function as a mass of flowers 36 inches (90 cm) in height and 24 inches (60 cm) in width. It also likes richer soil and more moisture than than R. hirta.
In my garden it starts flowering soon after the echinacea begings to bloom and when the sedum ‘Autumn Joy’ is still green….
…… and continues flowering along with blue perovskia and other plants until the sedum turns red.
In my previous blog, ‘Garden in the Woods – Part 1’, I left you poised to walk around the lily pond of this fabulous native plant garden in Framingham, Massachusetts, outside Boston. I love a garden that features good interpretive signage, so here’s the sign for the pond. Because it’s just May 14th, these marginal plants and aquatics are not yet in flower, but there are still interesting plants to see.
A native plant that is in bloom is golden ragwort, Packera aurea. In my photo below, I show a close-up of the flowers and also a view from the far side of the lily pond of the colony at the base of the slope, illustrating the topography it prefers: moist – but not wet – acidic soil.
In the wet soil near the pond is marsh marigold (Caltha palustris).
I note the ‘Mount Airy’ witch alder (Fothergilla) near the pond and realize why my own fothergilla shrubs aren’t exactly thrilled to be in my unirrigated front garden in Toronto.
The pond edge is wild and natural-looking, with ferns, highbush blueberry and winterberry competing for space.
Royal fern (Osmunda regalis) on the left and cinnamon fern (Osmandastrum cinnamomeum) on the right also grow in the woods near our cottage north of Toronto.
Early-blooming eastern leatherwood (Dirca palustris) is already bearing fruit in the moist soil adjacent to the pond.
I’ve never seen drooping laurel, aka doghobble (Leucothea fontesiana) before, another denizen of damp soil – but normally native further southeast.
As I leave the pond area to continue along the main path, I admire a lovely rustic post and railing. Simple and beautiful.
On the predominately alkaline slope, yellow ladyslippers (Cypripedium parviflorum) are in flower.
There are loads of wild leeks or “ramps” in the valley (Allium tricoccum), a native edible onion that is common in Ontario as well.
Appalachian barren strawberry (Geum fragarioides) grows in the dappled shade down here, too.
Throughout the garden, flowering dogwood’s (Cornus florida) white flowers light up the shadows in May.
A violet I know well with a large native range, common blue violet (V. sororia).
In the Habitat Display area in the valley, there are a few bogs where eastern skunk cabbage (Symplocarpus foetidus) is plentiful, but its wine-red flowers are long gone…..
….. though the lovely pink flowers of pink-shell azalea are making up for it.
Thanks to the excellent habitat tour on the Native Plant Trust’s website, I’m able to understand a little more about the ecology of some of the areas. Signage is educational, too. This one explains how regional pH determines which ferns require which kind of soil.
This custom limestone habitat was lovely with tall, white-flowered two-leaf miterwort or bishop’s cap (Mitella diphylla) combined with northern maidenhair fern (Adiantum pedatum).
Eastern columbine (Aquilegia canadensis) is familiar to me, since it grows on our cottage property on the Canadian Shield.
I love these vignettes – here is maidenhair fern with rue anemone (Thalictrum thalictroides), a plant that does like acidic soil.
A closeup of rue anemone. Isn’t it lovely?
Nearby is starflower. It also grows in acidic soil in the forest near us though it has a new name, not Trientalis any more but Lysimachia borealis.
Walking on, I come upon box huckleberry (Gaylussacia brachycera). Native to the Atlantic coastal plain and points south, it is a self-sterile shrub that spreads clonally. According to Wikipedia, it is “a relict species nearly exterminated by the last ice age”.
Here and there I spot little pools of pale blue, lovely Quaker ladies or bluets (Houstonia caerulea), another denizen of moist, acidic soil.
The path leads on through rhododendrons not yet in flower.
The Calla Pool has a colony of native wild calla or water arums (Calla palustris) thriving in the muck and sharing the same rhizome, but not in flower quite yet. I am very familiar with this one from our acidic woods on Lake Muskoka north of Toronto.
As the forest clears we come to sunnier areas and a sign describing a meadow ecosystem, which is not much in evidence in mid-May. As the Native Plant Trust says in its video tour: “This meadow provides an example of succession, the gradual change from one ecological community to another. In the colorful foreground you may notice favorite native plants such as partridge sensitive-pea, little bluestem, gray goldenrod, and northern blazing star. Behind the flowers are woody pioneer species such as gray birch, eastern red cedar, and sassafras. Landscapes are constantly changing due to ecological succession, climate change, and disturbances such as natural disasters. These changes allow invasive plants to move in and crowd out native species. Our conservation work includes controlling invasive species, banking native seeds, and augmenting populations of rare plants to ensure their survival.”
For me, the most interesting low-lying habitat in this valley bottom is the ‘Coastal Sand Plain’, which mimics the lean soil of the Atlantic Coastal Pine Barrens ecoregions of Cape Cod and the coastal islands off New England. Two plants of the sand plain grasslands threatened by development are the sundial or perennial lupine (Lupine perennis), below….
…. and prairie dropseed grass (Sporobolus heterolepis).
Another plant of the coastal pine barrens is American holly (Ilex opaca). It prefers moist, acidic soil and, like all hollies, it is dioecious, having male and female flowers on different trees. Thus, if you want those lovely red fruits, you need a male holly to pollinate the female flowers.
Canada rosebay or rhodora (Rhododendron canadense) is showing off its pretty flowers in this habitat, too. Though somewhat scrawny, it is an iconic shrub and lends its name and image to the 120-year-old journal of the New England Botanical Club, fittingly titled Rhodora.
It was so interesting to see this xeric community of the Coastal Sand Plain with prairie dropseed, shooting stars and prairie thistle growing near New England’s (and Ontario’s) only native cactus, eastern prickly pear, Opuntia humifusa.
I’m not sure why I thought of shooting stars (Primula meadia, formerly Dodecatheon) as woodlanders, but these were clearly happy in the sand plain habitat….
…. and included a stunning, dark-pink form.
I’m sure most gardeners would be itching to weed out this thistle, but it is the native pasture thistle (Cirsium pumilum) which is found from Maine to South Carolina. A biennial or monocarpic perennial, it bears scented flowers (its other common name is fragrant thistle) that attract pollinators and its seed provides food for many birds. (But it might not be appropriate for a small garden of natives.)
I am happy to see wavy hair grass (Deschampsia flexuosa) here, a familiar grass in my own rocky, red oak-white pine woodland edge ecosystem at our Lake Muskoka cottage north of Toronto.
And I make the acquaintance of two sand plain violets, coast violet (Viola brittoniana)…..
…… and bird-foot violet (Viola pedata) with its distinctive leaves, whose seed is spread by ants.
There is a different wetland habitat as part of this sandplain and it features Atlantic white cedar (Chamaecypaaris thyoides).
I have never seen swamp pink (Helonias bullata) before, an endangered coastal plain species whose habitat is freshwater swamps and seepage areas. A rhizomatous perennial, its pink flowers with blue stamens are very showy!
Golden club (Orontium aquaticum) is the only extant species in its genus, but there are several identified fossil species from the west coast. It grows in streams, ponds and shallow lakes with acidic soil.
Highbush blueberry (Vaccinium corymbosum) grows in the moist soil edging the pond here.
Heading onto drier ground, I find familiar little Canada mayflower (Maianthemum canadense)…
…. and wild sarsaparilla (Aralia nudicaulis) hiding under a skunk cabbage leaf.
Pitcher plant (Sarracenia purpurea) has found boggy soil and is patiently awaiting an unsuspecting fly.
Evergreen Christmas fern (Polystichum acrostichoides) is an old favourite of mine, perhaps because it stays in one place, unlike ostrich fern.
Circling around to head back to the entrance, we walk through the Beech Forest. As the Native Plant Trust’s virtual tour says: “Maple-beech-birch forests are a classic northern hardwood forest type, representing about one-fifth of forested land in southern New England. Nearly half of beech trees in southern New England have been affected by beech bark disease since the mid-20th century. Despite this insect-fungus complex, the resilient northern hardwood forest thrives in a spectrum of soil and moisture conditions and is home for a diversity of plant and animal species”.
I love this rustic arch leading into the Family Activity Area.
There are no red and yellow plastic slides and swings here – it’s all au naturel and wrought from the forest.
No matter where you travel in North America, if you tour public gardens you’re likely to come upon one of my friend Gary Smith’s magical environmental art creations. This one, part of “Art Goes Wild” completed in 2007 to celebrate the 75th anniversary of Garden in the Woods, is called “Hidden Valley” and it was crafted from fallen logs and branches arranged in a serpentine line.
As we climb out of the beech woods and circle up the hill towards the Visitor Center, I spot sweet white violet (Viola blanda)….
…. and the curved inflorescence of red baneberry (Actaea rubra)….
…. and the white form of crested iris (I. cristata)….
…. and finally, a drift of Allegheny spurge (Pachysandra procumbens), which surely should be a widely-marketed alternative to invasive Japanese spurge (P. terminalis).
We arrive back at the gift shop and I take a quick look at the plants for sale. This one is intriguing taxonomically, because for a long time purple chokeberry was considered a hybrid of red and black chokeberry (A. arbutifolia x A. melanocarpa). But its range outside those species, its viable fruit and unique morphology have resulted in it being given its very own species name, Aronia floribunda.
And with that bit of botanical trivia, we depart Framingham’s beautiful Garden in the Woods, filled with respect for Will Curtis’s fulfilled dream and for the breadth of New England’s spring flora. If you want to learn more about what natives can be grown in New England and further afield in the northeast, consider the new book by Native Plant Trust director Uli Lorimer, “The Northeast Native Plant Primer – 235 Plants for an Earth-Friendly Garden”.
After finishing our breakfast at Ruby’s Inn the morning after our spectacular visit to Bryce Canyon National Park (my last blog), we headed southwest on Highway 89 to Zion National Park. I explained in my previous blog that we made a brief stop on the previous day’s journey from St. George, Utah to Bryce at the most westerly part of Zion, the Kolob Canyons Visitor’s Center, which is accessed from Highway 15. I’ve marked that with a #1 on the map below. Then we headed back on the highway to Bryce at #2. Our second day took us to Zion at #3, before heading back to St. George.
Kolob Canyons was interesting and gave us our first look at the Navajo Sandstone formation that comprises most of Zion. The sign says: This overlook reveals the cooler, more thickly forested world above the finger canyons. From this elevated viewpoint you can see the pattern of canyon-carving streams along cracks in the Colorado Plateau. Each finger canyon is like a miniature Zion Canyon showing similar erosion dynamics: broad at the mouth, it narrows to a deep slot in its upper reaches.
On the illustration below, you can see how widespread the two visitor areas of Zion are.
There were ponderosa pines in Kolob Canyon….
…. and Utah serviceberry (Amelanchier utahensis) was in full bloom on the 1st day of May.
But the main attraction on day #2 was the principal south entrance to Zion Canyon.
We walked across the pedestrian bridge into the park….
…. over the north fork of the Virgin River. It looks fairly tranquil below, but it has incredible power, especially in spring runoff, due to its steepness. In the 160 miles of its course, it drops 7,800 feet, i.e. 71 feet for every mile. That power has allowed it to carve the sandstone into canyons.
It’s tempting as you begin your walk or tram ride through Zion Canyon to look up at rugged peaks and think of them as mountains, but these are formations of early Jurassic (185-180 Ma) Navajo sandstone, in places 2,000 feet in depth, sculpted by erosion. Most were given names in the early 20th century; this one is the Watchman.
The graphic below, which I featured in my Bryce blog, shows the difference between the two parks. The Bryce amphitheatre with its thousands of hoodoos sits adjacent to the Paunsaugunt Plateau at around 8,300 feet, whereas Zion occupies a sandstone cleft in the earth surface.at 4,000 feet. I read that the youngest layer at Zion is the oldest layer at Bryce.
Because our time was fairly limited, we took a tram tour through the canyon. It passed various famous formations (and I’m thankful to Zion’s Brian Whitehead for helping me identify a few of them). The one at the top, below, is The Bee Hive, with The Sentinel at right, rear.
The colours of the Navajo sandstone are varied. representing millions of years of deposition of sand dunes from what was once the biggest desert in the world.
I’ve added ages to this NPS illustration, and you can see the variation in the colours of the large band of Navajo Sandstone. As the NPS says,“The range of colors of the Navajo Sandstone –red, brown, pink, salmon, gold, and even white—results from varying amounts and forms of iron oxide within the rock, and in the case of the white upper portion of the Navajo, the overall lack of iron. The processes behind the color variation are complex and took place in multiple phases over long periods of time. To start, the Navajo is made of grains of light-colored quartz sand, similar to those found in many modern dune or beach environments. Soon after being deposited in dunes, the sand grains were coated with a thin layer of reddish-brown iron oxide (the mineral hematite; a.k.a. rust). This was due to the chemical breakdown (oxidation) of very small amounts of iron-containing minerals within the sand, and made the earlier Navajo Sandstone a pinkish-red color overall.” (At the end of this blog, you’ll see a formation I passed outside Zion of the much older, therefore deeper, Moenkopi Formation.)
This was the view into Heaps Canyon ( the park’s famous slot canyons) with the Emerald Pools beyond. Reading about it, the phrase “hanging rappel” is a good sign that I wouldn’t have had this one on my to-do list.
I used my telephoto lens to photograph the top of Castle Dome, which you can see in the previous photo. The white layer of sandstone reflects the deficit of iron in the rock, while the orange layer clearly illustrates the cross-bedding of the windswept dune formations.
The canyon was filled with Frémont’s cottonwood (Populus fremontii), native to riparian areas throughout the southwest.
With my telephoto lens, I could see beyond the Angel’s Landing trail up to the broad white expanse of Cathedral Mountain.
These formations across the Virgin River are called The Pulpit. Located in the Temple of Sinawava, they represent the end….
….. of the tram ride in the canyon.
Shun taking any oily, spicy or viagra buy germany cheesy meal in fact heavy meal too found threat in role of pills responding. Additionally, Sildenafil medications are linked with decreased blood pressure. sale generic tadalafil (Tadalafil) is much cheaper then branded viagra because pharmaceutical companies manufacturing viagra samples (Tadalafil) do not invest in marketing their product, which makes them more affordable, so now can now easily davidfraymusic.com at very cheap rates and take advantage of this miracle drug to treat your ED (erectile dysfunction) condition. Sometimes low best price for tadalafil is good, a goal to be accomplished in humans – although the jury is still out on the practice of calorie restriction and regular exercise. Young mango leaves are copper in color and matured canadian discount cialis ones have deep green color.
From there, it was all about the Virgin River, including its treed banks….
…. and its changes of elevation….
,,,, to understand its role in creating the canyon that comprises Zion National Park.
But I was interested to see all the native plants I knew that grow here – over 900 in total.
The Zion Narrows Riverside Walk Trail, aka the Gateway to the Narrows, hugs the canyon wall and allows visitors to feel the immense scale of the rock faces.
There were lovely little pools adjacent to the river…..
…. and I’m showing the portrait view here to include the vertical stripes called ‘desert varnish’. These striations are coatings on the outside of the rock face featuring bacteria-oxidized minerals from the atmosphere, mostly manganese (Mn), causing black stripes, and iron (Fe), causing shades of reddish-brown. These shiny coatings take thousands of years to form, so the rock walls featuring them are generally very stable and not easily eroded. Native Indians, including the Southern Paiutes who inhabited Zion – which they called Mukuntuweap – prior to the 1800s, used the rock faces with desert varnish as the canvases for their rock paintings or petroglyphs.
I was delighted to stand under the ‘hanging gardens’ of Zion.
Nearer the river, there were plants tucked in among river rocks, such as shooting star (Primula pulchellum, formerly Dodecatheon)….
….. with its lovely dark throat….
…. and western columbine (Aquilegia formosa).
The wetlands adjacent to the Virgin River contain many interesting plants, including watercress (Nasturtium officinale), a non-native that thrives in running water.
Visitors might be puzzled to see prickly-pear cacti (Opuntia spp.) along the river, but for much of the year, Zion has a desert climate.
It was time to say farewell to Zion, and as we headed back down the trail, I spotted a tiny canyon wren (Catherpes mexicanus). Wildlife! I was happy to have checked off a little symbol of the rich animal diversity found in the park.
It was a good time to have a photo of my husband Doug, left, and his kindergarten classmate Peter, right (with me in the middle). For many years, they were also business partners. Without Peter and his wife Lynne, who now live in St. George, we would not have had this wonderful opportunity to visit Bryce Canyon and Zion National Park.
While driving out of Zion past the town of Springdale on our way back to St. George, we passed an amazing multi-layered rock formation, which I snapped with my cellphone, before….
…. deciding to use my zoom lens to see it better. This is the Moenkopi formation, which appears near the bottom of the stratigraphic illustration I showed earlier in this blog. Its age is 250-240 Ma, or 70 million years older than the Navajo sandstone in Zion. Eager to discover a little more, I found a reference to it on the website of retired Colorado geologist Dr. Mike Nelson. He graciously answered my query: “You are looking at the Moenkopi with the Shinarump Member, the lower unit of the Chinle. The brick red bedded mudstone and siltstone prominent in the closeup represents tidal flat and coastal plain deposition. It is known as the lower red member (informal) of the Moenkopi. Below that is probably the shallow marine Timpoweap Member. Above the lower red member is the Virgin Limestone Member, the middle red member, the Shnakaib Membern and the upper red member. The formally named members represent transgressive shallow marine waters and are followed by regressive non marine rocks. During the Triassic the coastal area was a very gentle slope so the shoreline could fluctuate many miles with only a few feet of rise in sea level. There is a substantial amount of missing geological time (an unconformity, Tr3 in the geological jargon) between the Moenkopi and the Chinle.”
I might not be a geologist, but what a wonderful world we live in, where these secrets in rocks hundreds of millions of years old can be revealed so readily in a photo of a formation by the side of the road.
*******
If you enjoy reading about geology (from an amateur), you might like my blogs on
Exactly 10 years ago today, I had one of my best spring garden visits anywhere. Except it just happened to be right here in Toronto at one of our biggest ‘tourist attractions’, Casa Loma. But back on May 12, 2011, I didn’t bother staying inside the castle (which I had toured many times) and instead went right out to the garden. I passed by the Asian-themed garden with its pretty azaleas…..
….. and walked down the slope past the bright-magenta Rhododendron dauricum. For geology fans, this hillside is actually the ancient shoreline of Lake Ontario’s Ice Age predecessor, Lake Iroquois.
I slowed down completely as I came to the staircase near the bottom, where native Virginia bluebells (Mertensia virginica) were at their very peak.
Virginia bluebells might be one of the northeast’s most splendid springtime sights! Like many of our native spring wildflowers, they’re ‘ephemeral’, meaning after they flower and set seed, they just die back completely… until next spring.
I had a destination in mind, and it was the Woodland Garden with its beautiful paper birches and a spectacular underplanting of some of the best spring natives, as well as a few delicate Asian groundcovers that added their own charms. Here we have Virginia bluebells with lots of lovely ostrich ferns (Matteucia struthiopteris).
An ascending path made from grit and flagstone slabs takes you back up the Iroquois shoreline so you can enjoy all the shade-lovers. Here we have the three principal actors: Virginia bluebell (M. virginica), yellow wood poppy (Stylophorum diphyllum) and ostrich ferns. (Note how much bigger the wood poppy’s flowers are than that confusing, weedy, invasive doppelgänger with the small yellow flowers, greater celandine, Chelidonium majus.)
I love yellow-with-blue in the garden, and this is one of the finest duos!
Ontario’s provincial floral emblem, shimmering-white, showy trilliums (T. grandiflorum) add to the display.
Virginia bluebells are also lovely with yellow merrybells (Uvularia grandiflora).
Out of all those that exist, some of them include headache, facial flushing, upset stomach etc. these are some methods & techniques used by the doctor to study the existence of ED: Past medical history generic levitra 5mg of sufferer:- The doctor will study and check the past medical record of the person. Just two pills a day can help you improve your sexual health, then you need to be very conscious about your body. india cheap cialis These drugs are made up of the Chemical dopamine, which induces the feeling of desire and pleasure. tadalafil super active http://djpaulkom.tv/crakd-best-valentine-sex-ever/ It has got the component named buy viagra pills Sildenafil Citrate which engages in inhibiting the PDE enzyme in the body.
I’ve never identified the buckeye seedlings that were popping up in this planting, but given it’s mostly native, perhaps Ohio buckeye (Aesculus glabra)?
There were also epimediums in this garden, like the red-flowered E. x rubrum you can see at the bottom left, below,
… and here, with Virginia bluebells.
Yellow-flowered Epimedium x versicolor ‘Sulphureum’ was featured in the woodland as well……
…. and orange-flowered Epimedium x warleyense ‘Orange Queen’.
Finally, a pure-white trillium with E. x versicolor ‘Sulphureum’.
Whoever said it was terrible to garden in shade?
*****
If you want to read more about spring designs for shade, have a look at my blog on the Montreal Botanical Garden’s fabulous Jardin d’Ombre, A Shade Garden Master Class.
