Arceuthobium- Part 1

This post will be brief, and it is late.  this has been a crazy summer, and I've had limited internet access.

A couple of weeks ago, my boyfriend and I drove down through forests on the east slopes of the Cascade mountains into Eastern Oregon toward the desert.  As we went through the transition from wet to dry forests, we drove through stands of Douglas Fir and Ponderosa Pine.

Having a bit of a timber background, I'm always mindful of the health of the trees around me.  The Douglas Firs were heavily infected with Arceuthobium douglasii, a parasite that I've mentioned before.  It forces trees to grow brooms, some of which can look a bit like the mutations that I'm looking for.  Usually, you don't see these brooms in isolation.  Arceuthobium species are small parasitic plants that spread through stands of trees aggressively.

I've always thought that it would be unfortunate if a good mutation were hidden among such infections-  you'd never see it.

I happened to spot this tree by the side of the highway.  The Douglas Firs all around it were filled with mistletoe infections, so this one is most likely congested because of that.  It sure looks like a handsome and compact specimen- with the exception of one normal branch.

Is this tree the good mutation in the forest of disease?  I may have to graft it up and observe it in order to find out...

Susan's Polyandry

I was an idiot and left my gas can (the one I use for my lawn mower gas) out in front of my house for a long time.  I came home one day to find it gone.  In its place was a scrawled note that read, "Hi, my name is Suzi.  I borrowed your gas can and I'll bring it right back."  That was about a month ago- and I haven't seen my gas can.

That actually has nothing to do with this post.  I'm just bitching about my own foolishness, and the weirdly justified stealing by some woman named Suzi.

I did, however, find a broom that I named Susan's Polyandry.  I don't know anyone who is polyandrous- it is just a random name.

I ended up climbing the tree a couple of years ago to take several scions for grafting.  Not a single graft took, which seems to be typical of my experience with this species.  This is a lodgepole pine-  Pinus contorta var latifolia.  I did, however, collect numerous cones from the broom, and I was able to start a number of seedlings.  Of course, the slugs ate half of the seedlings.  Probably the plant of a century was in with the ones that were eaten, knowing my luck.  Ah well.  I hope the slug enjoyed it.  It died shortly thereafter.

Roughly half of the resulting seedlings are showing dwarfism, so I am very interested in watching them mature.  It will be interesting to see if there is much diversity in terms of morphology- we shall see.

The Mother of All Brooms

 This weekend, my friend Janet and I went to a plant sale at the fairgrounds in Canby, OR.  We bought a few plants, and visited with nursery owners that we knew.  On the way out, we found the mother of all Douglas fir brooms.  It has to be about 50 feet across.

Here's a view from underneath.  The trunk of the broom is probably 18 inches in diameter where it comes out of the main stem of the tree.

As I've said before, Doug fir brooms are a dime a dozen.  This one is kind of handsome, though.  I will have to ask around and see if someone has already propagated it.  If they haven't, I'm not sure how I'm going to get to it.  I would have to get permission to climb it, most likely.

As always- the moral of the story is that mutations are all around us.  You just have to remember to keep your eyes open!

A Contortion in Waiting

I'm supposed to be grading math tests right now.

Sometimes, the idea of looking at 6th graders' forays into the world of coordinate planes is just not all that compelling, however.

Last week, I visited my dad for spring break.  We spent the week planting seedlings of Douglas fir, grand fir, western larch, and western white pine on our property.  The place had been burned by a catastrophic fire in 1915, and we've been speeding up the recovery process by planting in the open areas.  Even without our help, the forest seems to be reclaiming the mountain on an exponential curve...  It won't be long before it is once again covered in conifers.

The cool thing about planting seedlings is that I get the chance to look at thousands of young plants one by one.  Last year, Dad found an Engelmann spruce that I'm still evaluating- so I was hoping that something cool would show up in the batch of 2300 trees that we bought.

This doug fir may turn out to be nothing special- it is hard to say.  It was obviously different from the other ones in its plastic bag.  I noticed the slightly curled needles first as I planted 20 or 30 other seedlings in my bucket.  Finally, I got curious and pulled it out.  It looks to me like it may be contorted.  The needles are all hooked, and the stem and twigs look like they have a little bit of a squiggle to them.

As with so many things in life...  the true nature of this tree will only be revealed in time.  I'm not always a patient person, I guess.  I think that maybe this is one of the great lessons I get from these plants.  I may have just discovered something exquisite- a treasure that will grow into a thing of rare beauty- but I won't know for some time.

I guess the thing I like about trees is that they silently do their thing, giving you no option but to wait.  At least my garden is a pretty nice place in which to do the waiting :)

Urban Pagoda

Last year I spent a lot of time in this neighborhood after my job was destroyed.  I tutored a number of students who lived there, so it didn't take me long to notice this rather spectacular spire-like tree.  At first, I had thought it was a Colorado Blue Spruce- Picea pungens.

I mentioned it to a conifer friend of mine, Don Howse.  He was aware of the tree and has been watching it for a number of years.  It turns out that this is actually a Picea omorika- the Serbian Spruce. Perhaps 15-20 years ago, a storm broke the top off the tree.  What remains is the skirt-like base.  It has grown a new spire since then.

 Don says that the species often has narrow forms, so this may or may not be worth naming.  It is certainly worth propagating, though- I'd love to have one like this in my yard :)  It is in front of a doctor's office, so I'll have to stop in and ask permission to take a few scions one of these years.

I'm tempted to make a cheesy comparison to this tree's history and my career.  Even now, when I drive through this neighborhood, I remember how hurt I was last year over what happened to my job.  I spent countless evenings driving from one student's house to the next, working my ass off.  I was putting in all way more hours than I had in my old job, with no benefits and lower pay.  It was frustrating and demoralizing to be working so many hours and still have to borrow money from my dad to pay my bills.

It doesn't bother me as much this year- I'm still working lots of hours, but my substitute jobs are paying better and I don't have to borrow money to stay afloat.  Maybe (and I'm sorry for a slightly-cheesy metaphor) I will start to grow a new top after being broken so badly by that storm.  I can only hope that my comeback will be as good as this tree's.

I'd be interested in hearing from people who are very familiar with this species- particularly you Eastern Europeans who may have have seen it growing in the wild :)  Is this form unusual?

Twilight in the Ponderosa Pine

In November, when Dad and I almost got stuck in the mountains of North Idaho, I found a broom on the way out.  It was almost dark, so I'm not sure how I saw it.  It was a huge, round mass in a Pinus ponderosa.
As the name would suggest, ponderosa pines are very large trees.  The needles are very long- up to maybe 10 or 12 inches.  They are a highly fire-resistant species when they are older.  Though very old trees aren't very common these days, you can see them occasionally.  They tend to have no limbs on the lower part of the tree, so fires can burn under them without climbing into the canopy.  Their bark is thick, so they are well-protected from ground fires after they are mature.

This tree was a medium-sized tree, perhaps two to three feet in diameter at the base.  The broom was at the base of the canopy, perhaps 60 feet from the ground.  Since it was nearly dark, I couldn't tell if it would be safe to shoot pieces out of it.  I also don't have any Pinus ponderosa root stocks ready, so I'll have to wait until next year.

If this broom turns out to be a good one for propagation, the resulting plants will only be appropriate for very large gardens.  Who knows how fast it will grow, however.  This will definitely be one to observe over a couple of decades :)

Giant Broccoli Broom

Last summer, I was able to spend a few days in the mountains of eastern Washington.  My searches were generally disappointing- no spectacular variegations, gold boughs or dramatically weeping forms were to be seen.  My only comfort was the bounty of delicious wild fruit.  The genus Vaccinium is one of my very favorite groups of plants.  

Here in the Western US, we have a dozen or so species of Vaccinium.  The one in the picture below is Vaccinium membranaceum- though I personally think that this species forms a confusing complex with Vaccinium globulare.  Both are supposed to be common in the region- and they both look (and taste!) very similar to me.  I suspect that many of the plants we see are probably hybrids between the two.  If you've never tried them, they have a much more tart and intense flavor than blueberries (Vaccinium sp from eastern North America).  Locally, you can find them in ice cream, syrups and baked goods.  As a kid, many of my early childhood memories are trips up into the mountains to pick in the summer months.

After a long day of searching, I was heading back to Dad's house when I spotted a mass in a Douglas fir tree.  I got out and climbed up the bank to get a closer look at it. I thought it looked like a giant piece of broccoli.

As I've said before, brooms seem to occur much more frequently in this species than they do in other conifers.  I've seen a number of brooms that all look very similar.  This one is a bit more upright and robust than the others, so I think it is worth propagating and observing.  Fortunately, it is pretty close to a paved, plowed road.  I should be able to try grafting it this March.