False Indigo

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Gardening | Plant ID

Baptisia

Baptisia 'Purple Smoke'
is a distinctive perennial that produces enchanting smoky violet flowers with a purple eye on strongly upright, charcoal-grey stems up to 1 1/2 feet long. They are held just above the dense, bushy mounds of grey-green foliage from mid to late spring.

       Baptisia Seed Pod         

Baptisias, also known as false or wild indigos, are a group of large, long-lived perennials. They provide an extended season of interest from flowers and foliage. 

Blue wild indigo (Baptisia australis) and yellow wild indigo (Baptisia tinctoria) were used to produce a blue dye by Native Americans. The True indigo (Indigofera tinctoria) produces a better quality blue dye. 

In a large expanse of the Eastern United States, the Baptisias were known to repopulate burned areas. It was an important plant for honey production. The Baptisia tinctoria, are the most attractive Baptisia to honeybees.
The botanical name Baptisia originates from the Greek word bapto, meaning, to dye or to dip.

Baptisia 'Purple Smoke'

As the summer moves on, the seeds of the Baptisia form in an upright pod and add an interesting form and color to the landscape. The pods form a vivid green color and mature into a dark blue shade as the warm August summer reminds us of the coming harvest season.The false indigo to the left has been passed down for four generations.

Landscape design in full sun, using wild indigo in a raised mound with other perennials or groundcover. I was pleased to see Miranda Brooks, using Baptisia in Anna Wintour's, wild butterfly garden.

ROSID, FABALES ORDER, FABACEAE FAMILY, FABOIDEAE,  SOPHOREAE,  BAPTISIA

Resources:

• Mt. Cuba Center 
• Coombs, George. Baptisia for the Mid-Atlantic Region. , 2016. Print.

All material © 2020 by Hyden Photography 

for

 Grassroots Horticulture

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Fava Beans | Vicia faba

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Plant ID | broad beans

Broad beans are generally eaten while still young and tender, enabling harvesting to begin as early as the middle of spring for plants started under glass or overwintered in a protected location, but even the main crop sown in early spring will be ready from mid to late summer. Broad beans were a major food of old Mediterranean civilizations, particularly for the Romans and Greeks.

Beans and peas are jam packed with nutrition. Sometimes referred to as pulses (meaning thick soup), dried beans are a good source of protein. Introduce yourself to pulse recipes for wholesome winter goodness at this link.

 

Fava beans, mature seeds, raw

Nutritional value per 100 g (3.5 oz)
Energy	1,425 kJ (341 kcal)
Carbohydrates	58.29 g
Dietary fiber	25 g
Fat	1.53 g
Protein	26.12 g
Vitamins	Quantity%DV†
Thiamine (B1)	48% 0.555 mg
Riboflavin (B2)	28% 0.333 mg
Niacin (B3)	19% 2.832 mg
Vitamin B6	28% 0.366 mg
Folate (B9)	106% 423 μg
Vitamin C	2% 1.4 mg
Vitamin K	9% 9 μg
Minerals	Quantity%DV†
Calcium	10% 103 mg
Copper	41% 0.824 mg
Iron	52% 6.7 mg
Magnesium	54% 192 mg
Manganese	77% 1.626 mg
Phosphorus	60% 421 mg
Potassium	23% 1062 mg
Selenium	12% 8.2 μg
Sodium	1% 13 mg
Zinc	33% 3.14 mg

USDA nutritional information

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See more Fabaceae cousins

Bibliography______________________________________________________________

Siddiq, Muhammad. Dry Beans and Pulses: Production, Processing and Nutrition. Ames, Iowa: Wiley-Blackwell, 2013. Print.

Red Oaks

Quercus rubra

Quercus rubra, the northern red oak, is an oak tree in the red oak group (Quercus section Lobatae). It is a native of North America, in the eastern and central United States and southeast and south-central Canada. It grows from the north end of the Great Lakes, east to Nova Scotia, south as far as Georgia, Mississippi, Alabama, and Louisiana, and west to Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, and Minnesota. It has been introduced to small areas in Western Europe, where it can frequently be seen cultivated in gardens and parks. It prefers good soil that is slightly acidic. Often simply called red oak, northern red oak is so named to distinguish it from southern red oak (Q. falcata), also known as the Spanish oak. Northern Red Oak is sometimes called champion oak. It is also the state tree of New Jersey and the provincial tree of Prince Edward Island.

Oak gall

Quercus buckleyi Nixon & Dorr

This species was named for Samuel B. Buckley, botanist and state geologist of Texas. Buckley oak leaves are similar to the Texas red oak,Q. texana, but the two species do not overlap in their distributions. This species should be considered a conservation concern. The largest known Buckley oak grows in Travis County, Texas.

Quercus rubra

Source and Reference.                           

Tekiela, Stan. Trees of Texas: Field Guide. Cambridge, Minn: Adventure Publications, 2009. Print.

Wrede, Jan. Trees, Shrubs, and Vines of the Texas Hill Country: A Field Guide. College Station: Texas A & M University Press, 2010. Internet resource.

Summer Chocolate Mimosa Tree | Albizia julibrissin 'Summer Chocolate'

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The Mimosa Tree has a beautiful lacy appearance with pink fluffy flowers. Mimosa, especially the 'Summer Chocolate' has beautiful color, texture, and flowers.

I pulled out colors from the photographs to exhibit shades that this tree provides in a garden setting.

If you like the form and texture of the Mimosa tree but would like alternative choices look toward Chilopsis linearis (desert willow) or Prosopis glandulosa (honey mesquite).

Many other small to medium-sized trees that make excellent understory alternatives, include:

• Calliandra eriophylla (fairyduster)
• Calliandra conferta (Rio Grande stickpea)
• Amelanchier arborea (common serviceberry)
• Cercis canadensis (eastern redbud)
• Cornus florida (flowering dogwood)
• Betula nigra (river birch)
• Chionanthus virginicus (white fringetree) 

©  Grassroots Horticulture

2000-2019

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Sensitive Plant | Mimosa pudica

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Mimosa is derived from the Greek meaning a mimic, alluding to the fact the leaves of some species are sensitive, and pudica from the Latin: meaning "Pure, chaste, modest, retiring, shy, bashful or shrinking." Liberty Hyde Bailey wrote about this in The Standard Cyclopedia of American Horticulture.

The globose to ovoid purple flower heads on sensitive plant (Mimosa pudica),  are 8–10 mm (0.3–0.4 in) in diameter, making this photograph a 10x enlargement.

Leaves on the Sensitive Plant (Mimosa pudica)

"Don't touch me or I will fold my leaves!"

Plant movements similar to animal movements 

A fascinating phenomenon, Nyctinastic movement is exhibited with the setting sun and decreasing light, the leaflets fold together and the whole leaf droops downward. Prayer plants come to mind.  Seismonastic movement, (from Greek, seismos, shaking), touching the leaves, or shaking the plant, or slight warming of the leaves, or chemical and electrical stimuli, or subjecting the plant to a lack of water, will cause the leaflets to fold together and the whole leaf to droop downwards temporarily. This movement is believed to arise from an enigmatic drop in cell pressure. The sensitive plant is believed to originate from South America. 



Bibliography

1. Hill, John, and Carl . Linné. The Sleep of Plants, and Cause of Motion in the Sensitive Plant: Explain'd ... in a Letter to C. Linnaeus. London: R. Baldwin, 1757. 
2. Lim T.K. (2014) Mimosa pudica. In: Edible Medicinal And Non-Medicinal Plants. Springer, Dordrecht
3. Mancuso, Stefano, The Revolutionary Genius of Plants, 2019.

Grassroots Horticulture 

2008-2019

Evergreen Wisteria Vine | Millettia

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Millettia reticulata, Callerya reticulata 

Evergreen wisteria vine

Native To / Origin: S China, Taiwan

Millettia is named for Dr. Millet of Canton, China.⁴

The Evergreen wisteria is native to tropical and subtopical regions.

The evergreen wisteria grows to a height of 15 feet.

 The plant requires six hours of direct sunlight.

References___________________________________________________

1. PlantIllustrations, Millettia.
2. Dunn, Stephen T. A Revision of the Genus Millettia, Wight Et Arn. , 1912. Print.  _____________________________________________________________

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©  Grassroots Horticulture

2015

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