Deep in the Woods

My friend David is a good guy.  He has listened to me freak out endlessly over my recently broken heart, and he is willing to go along on crazy outings.  This past weekend, he waded deep into the Taxus thickets to retrieve scions from this broom.

David and I had spent the morning pressing cider (we make hard cider every fall), and we were undecided as to how to spend the afternoon.  A few days before, my neighbor had given me a box of 12 gauge shot gun shells, so I thought that we should head up to the woods to use them on this broom.  

It is in a Picea engelmannii- the Engelmann Spruce.  One year, a few years back, I found several brooms or unusual trees of this species.  This one is located in the cascade mountains, a stone's throw from where I found Taxus brevifolia 'Guthrie'.  In fact, I would not have found this broom if I hadn't been exploring the extensive thickets of Taxus in the area.  There is an over-story of mature Douglas fir, western larch, and western hemlock trees.  There were a few Engelmann spruce and Pacific silver fir mixed in as well.

You can't see this broom from the road.  In fact, it is hard to see even when you are close to it, because the canopy is so dense.  I had David go out to the tree and hide behind it while I shot the broom.  That way he would be close enough to see where the pieces landed.   I had to be about 30 yards away to get a clear shot at it.  I shot it repeatedly, but I was only able to get two small twigs to come down.  One of those twigs was too damaged to use, so I only have one grafted up!  I really hope it takes.  If it doesn't, I will be climbing that tree next year.  

Sometimes, I'm tempted to just cut down the tree to get the broom.  I think you'd have to be an asshole to do something like that, though.   Plus, if the grafts didn't take, I wouldn't be able to try grafting it again in the future.  So I'm stuck with my shotgun and my tree-climbing gear.

In a Strange Land

This summer, I visited the Boston area.  I was struck by how beautiful the forests are there.  They are shorter and more tangled-looking than our Western forests, but they have their own distinct beauty.

Pinus strobus, the Eastern White Pine, was the dominant conifer in the area.  I did happen to find a broom very close to the Boston metro area, but I doubt that I will ever make it back there to collection scions.  Plus, it was in a suburban area where I doubt that I could use a gun to retrieve them.

Nonetheless, it was fun to find this broom in an unfamiliar place.  It just goes to show that mutations are ubiquitous :)

A Giant Cluster of Grapes

I haven't had a chance to do a single day of plant hunting this year.  This makes me grumpy.

I did find this broom by chance, though.  It is in a Ponderosa Pine in eastern Washington.  It looks like a giant cluster of grapes hanging from a single branch.  I wonder how long it will be before it just breaks off and falls to the ground.

Of interest in this broom are loads of female cones.  I will try to collect seeds later in the month- as well as grafts in the winter.

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 :)