Posts

Native groundcovers

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Margaret Fisher, Plant NOVA Natives

Are you seeking a groundcover that is both beautiful and friendly to the ecosystem? Try looking beyond the old standbys to the new trend in gardening circles: native Virginia plants.

Bare ground in a garden is an invitation to weeds and erosion. The conventional landscaping solutions are either to pile on wood mulch or to plant an aggressive plant – such as English ivy, Japanese pachysandra, Vinca, spreading Liriope, or Yellow Archangel – then let it take over. The problem with those plants is that they take over more than just our gardens: they spread where they are not wanted by inexorably creeping along and by producing seeds that allow them to leap into our few remaining natural areas, where they crowd out the native plants and ruin the local ecosystem.

To prevent these unintended consequences, landscapers are now turning to plants that evolved locally, of which there are numerous examples that provide the “look” we are used to: a dense, low-growing monoculture for shade or part shade areas. Some are evergreen, others deciduous. A few have the additional feature of colorful spring flowers. Some can tolerate the bone-dry conditions under a tree; others prefer constant moisture. With the exception of Golden Ragwort (Packera aurea) and Common Violet (Viola sororia), none would be accused of being aggressive. Isn’t it nicer to have a beautiful groundcover that supports the ecosystem than to have a bare mulch garden? Details and photos can be found on the Plant NOVA Natives website.

Earth Sangha spring open house & native plant sale

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When: Sunday May 5, 9:45 am – 2 pm

What: Earth Sangha is hosting their Spring Open House & Native Plant Sale on Sunday, May 5th from 10AM to 2 PM. They need student volunteers to help customers carry plants and move wheelbarrows, and experienced adult volunteers to tally orders and direct customers. Please email Katherine at [email protected] if you’re interested in volunteering.

Where: The Nursery is in Springfield, Virginia, in Franconia Park, which lies just south of the Beltway, and just east of the Beltway’s intersection with Routes 95 and 395.  Access is from Franconia Road (644). From Franconia, turn north on Thomas Drive, less than half a mile east of the 395/95 intersection. There is a traffic light at Thomas. From Thomas, turn right onto Meriwether Lane. Turn left onto Cloud Drive. Please park in the parking lot at the bottom of the entrance road, then walk down the dirt road along the community gardens. Our nursery lies beyond the community gardens. View the nursery’s location on Google Maps. (The Google pointer is set to Cloud Drive, not directly on our nursery, which has no street address. From Cloud Drive, follow the directions above.)

Contact: Katherine Isaacson ([email protected])

Earth Day: Marie Butler Leven Preserve Workday

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When: Saturday, April 20, 10 am-1 pm

What: Join Earth Sangha for an Earth Day planting at the Marie Butler Leven Preserve! We’ll be planting almost 1,000 native grasses and wildflowers in the front meadow. We’ll meet at the parking lot and walk into the park from there.  For MBLP events, sturdy shoes and long pants are recommended. We will provide gloves and all necessary tools. Please bring your own water. If you arrive late, call or text Matt on his cell at 703 859 2951.

Where: View the Preserve’s location on Google Maps. The Marie Butler Leven Preserve is in McLean, Virginia. The street address is 1501 Kirby Road. If you’re coming from the Beltway, exit on Route 66 East; from 66, take the first exit, to Leesburg Pike (Route 7); turn left on Leesburg Pike, then almost immediately after the underpass, turn right onto Idylwood Road. Just stay on Idylwood, which becomes Kirby Road after the intersection with Great Falls Street. Stay on Kirby; once you have passed the stop sign at Chesterbrook Road, the Preserve is about half a mile up on the right.

Contact: Matt Bright ([email protected] or 703-859-2951)

Picking up paw paws and putting them in…delicious desserts

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Bill Hafker

They’ve been called the American Custard Apple and the West Virginia banana, but Paw Paws  (Asimina trilob) are native to much of the eastern United States, typically growing in groups along streams and rivers. They have a large simple leaf and produce the largest fruit indigenous to the U.S. They also feature an unusual deep purple flower that gives off a fetid odor to attract beetles and carrion flies for pollination (the trees predate bees and butterflies as pollinators).

Paw paw trees. Photo: Bill Hafker

Fortunately, the fruit itself is very tasty to humans, too, and is the star ingredient in a dessert bread and pudding. Its flavor is often described as a cross between a banana and a mango. What follows is some useful lore for collecting paw paws and preparing these local treats.

When, where, and how to collect paw paws

In northern Virginia, paw paws ripen during late August and September. Because they spoil as quickly as they ripen, you will want to investigate their ripeness at the site from which you intend to collect them. Be sure that you have permission to collect them on the sites where you find them. Rules vary in the national, state, and county parks.

Collecting paw paws. Photo: Bill Hafker

Ripe paw paws will typically fall from the tree, and are best collected from the ground. Gently shaking a tree will also cause ripe fruit to fall to the ground. If you opt for fallen produce, check to make sure it is neither rotten nor full of scavenging ants. 

You can also buy them online at Integration Acres or Earthy Delights, and in some stores or farmers markets.

Cleaning paw paws and preparing the pulp 

Many recipes call for paw paw pulp in 1-cup units, so it is convenient to freeze it in one cup quantities that you can thaw and use as you wish. One cup of paw paw pulp equals approximately 3 medium mashed overripe bananas. 

To get started, remove the skin in any way that you find convenient (e.g., peel them with a knife or vegetable peeler, cut them open with a knife and scoop them with a spoon). Pulp adheres to the seeds, which are large enough to suck on, though you’ll want to avoid swallowing them. 

Using a spinner to process pulp off the seeds. Photo: Bill Hafker

It is time-consuming to prepare the pulp in bulk by trying to clean one paw paw at a time. I’ve found that the best way to process the pulp is to peel several fruits at one time and place them in the internal spinning part of a salad spinner that has been taken out of the rest of the spinner. Aggressively rubbing the fruit against the ribs of the spinner presses the pulp through the openings and into a bowl. You’ll want to make sure that you press the seeds firmly against the ribs to scrape off all of the pulp. When only relatively clean seeds remain, discard them and repeat the process with pulp-laden ones. 

Ready to bake?

Paw Paw Bread

You can replace bananas with paw paw pulp in your favorite banana bread recipe. Our family recipe calls for 1 cup of mashed paw paws, 1 cup of sugar, 1 egg, 1 ½ cups flour, ¼ cup melted butter, 1 tsp baking soda, and 1 tsp salt. You’ll want to mix all the ingredients until the batter is smooth, without over stirring. Pour the batter into a Teflon or buttered loaf pan. Bake 1 hour in a preheated oven at 325 degrees.

Paw Paw Pudding

This recipe from the New York Times is in the style of a bread pudding or English pudding (not Jello pudding).

Enjoy!

Your Camera as Eco-Warrior

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Photo (c) Barbara J. Saffir

Margaret Fisher

We are surrounded by the ecosystem, even in our urban/suburban areas, but most of us never notice it. If we do see a plant, an insect or a bird, we lack the background to recognize it. Our experience of life is becoming more and more virtual as we live in a world of technology. Paradoxically, that very technology is now making it easy to find and identify the small residents of our yards. Getting to know our fellow beings makes us more likely to value and protect them.

The tool you need for this experience is a camera, even a basic cell phone camera. If you take a photo of an insect and enlarge it on your screen, you will be in for some big surprises. What you took to be a drab brown bug may turn out to be a wildly colorful and patterned creature, living its life and paying attention to your doings, even while you were unaware of it. The same discoveries are there to be made about birds, frogs, and all our other neighbors.

Better yet, if you upload photos of wild plants and animals to the free iNaturalist website or app, the artificial intelligence will suggest possible identifications, and then two actual human beings will review them to make the final determination. All this data is automatically entered into a worldwide global biodiversity database that is populated by contributions from citizen scientists such as yourself. All your observations will be saved and labelled in one place for your amusement. You can even create a project that collates all the observations from one location, such as your homeowners association, park, school, or faith community. Once you get hooked, you may find yourself trying to document all the life in your neighborhood. Here is an example from Huntley Meadows Park.

From April 26-29, iNaturalist invites everyone to join City Nature Challenge 2019, in which metropolitan areas participate in a friendly competition to see who can make the most observations. Events will be held all around the region, but you can also just take your camera outside and start documenting on your own. All observations made during that four day period will count.

What will become clear to you as you do this is that the more native plants you have, the more butterflies, bees, birds, and other wildlife you will find. You will see how preserving natural resources even in our built-up areas is critical to the survival of wildlife, and how the landscaping in your own yard can contribute to or degrade biodiversity, depending on your landscaping choices.

Watch Plant NOVA Native’s lovely one-minute video about iNaturalist and City Nature Challenge.

Learn about Audubon at Home, May 9th

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Photo by Barbara J. Saffir (c)

Green Spring Gardens
4603 Green Spring Road, Alexandria, VA
Thursday, 9 May 2019
7:30 – 9 pm
Program and talk with Betsy Martin & Alda Krinsman

The Audubon at Home program was created to make a difference by supporting the efforts of property owners and managers to become better stewards of nature in their own outdoor spaces. It embraces the principles of the National Audubon Society’s Bird-Friendly Communities and promotes citizen participation in conserving and restoring local natural habitat and biodiversity.

The Wildlife Sanctuary Program brings trained naturalists together with property owners and managers on a mission to restore natural habitat. The program offers information, on-site consultation and recommendations to help you establish and nurture sustainable natural habitat in your backyard, neighborhood, school, church, park or business in spaces that range from a small corner of your yard to many acres. Results-based sanctuary certification depends on the success of the habitat to attract and support wildlife. The program seeks to expand wildlife habitat in the area and fosters appreciation for the value of native plants and all the wildlife that depend on them.

The Hospitable Garden: Welcoming beautiful butterflies, moths, and other critters, Mar. 16th

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Photo by Barbara J. Saffir (c)

Long Branch Nature Center, Arlington VA
Saturday, 16 March 2019
10 am-12 pm

Long Branch Nature Center and the Washington Area Butterfly Club are pleased to present this talk by Tyler Ormsby and Alyssa Ford-Morel. They will talk about how to choose and cultivate plants to better create ecosystems in our yards. Tyler is a certified Master Gardener and his yard is an Audubon at Home Wildlife Sanctuary. Alyssa is an Audubon at Home Ambassador and a Certified Master Gardener and Master Naturalist. Free program.

Gardening and landscaping made easy

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Everyone enjoys a beautiful yard. Not everyone enjoys working in it. For those who would like to attract birds and butterflies with as little effort as possible, there are some simple solutions.

It is a lot less work to plant a few larger plants than a whole lot of small ones. Adding a few native shrubs or trees to your landscaping is easily accomplished, and weeding will be a straightforward affair. Make sure that your plant choices are native, because plants that evolved here are adapted for survival and require no fertilizers, pesticides, or additional watering once established. (They are also the plants that most benefit the ecosystem.) Avoid the need for pruning by choosing shrubs that naturally grow to the right size. Leave fallen leaves in place to create a natural mulch.

Flower gardens will typically require more weeding, but there are ways to minimize work there as well. Almost all of our native garden plants are perennial, meaning you only need to plant them once to achieve years of seasonal blooms. It is much easier to decide what is a weed and what is not if you plant just a few species in well-defined blocks, using plants that have strong and distinctive architecture. Find details and more tips on the Plant NOVA Natives website.

Of course, the ultimate way to save yourself work is to get someone else to do it for you! A landscape design company with expertise in native plants can accomplish in a day what might take you years to get around to on your own. In addition, many landscape designers have been through the Chesapeake Bay Professional Landscaping training program and can help you with erosion and stormwater control. Now is a good time to get on their schedule for a spring planting. You can find a list here.

Seedling giveaways and native plant sales

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Seedling sales and giveaways are going on now, and native plant sales start at the end of March.  Plan ahead and thank Plant NOVA Natives for the terrific lists!

Permaculture Design Courses, June and August

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Master Permaculture Design Course
June 5-9th, 2019 – Fairfax, VA – Suters Glen Permaculture Farm
with Wayne Weiseman of the Permaculture Project LLC

Already have your PDC and want to take the next step? This course is designed to help you dive deeper into permaculture principles and methodologies.Students will walk away with a completed master design of their property. Class will be 8am-6pm each day with breakfast and lunch included. Early bird tuition until 4/1/19.

Questions? Please contact Christine Harris, [email protected], (804) 502-4655.
More info & registration: https://bit.ly/2t7Hlap

72-Hour Permaculture Design Certification Course
August 31-September 8th, 2019 – Louisa, VA – Heartwood Farm with Wayne Weiseman of the Permaculture Project

LLC  Topics include: Permaculture design principles and methodologies; Soil fertility; Organic vegetable production; Native, edible, medicinal and functional plants in the landscape; Climates and microclimates; Alternative energy and natural building; aquaculture, mushrooms, fermentation, herbalism and so much more! Course will be held at Heartwood Farm. Class will be 8am-5pm each day with breakfast and lunch included and some additional evening activities with served dinner. Camping available or accommodations close by. Early bird tuition until 5/31/19.

Questions? Please contact Christine Harris, [email protected], (804) 502-4655.

More info & registration: https://bit.ly/2Gv2SSD

Permaculture breaks down to “perennial” “agriculture.” It’s a way of looking at the landscape, and designing for both ecological and economical viability. For example, when permaculturists look at ways to grow food in their yards, on a farm or elsewhere, they look to the ways that a forest is naturally structured and mimic that to create an “edible food forest” that is comprised of a similar layering structure that a forest has (top canopy, lower canopy, shrubs, herbaceous plants, groundcover, fungi and vines). Not only are they planting edible or native plants just because they like them, but they are planting in ways that allow the system to support itself (ie., incorporating nitrogen-fixing plants, beneficial insect plants, dynamic accumulators like comfrey or stinging nettle which grab important minerals from the soil which they can then use as a mulch and feed the system, etc.) In doing so, they are creating a sustainable agriculture system that is self-sufficient and requires very little work to maintain.

Permaculture is an observation-based system of design, that requires the designer to observe what is happening on their landscape at a deeper level (where is the water, sun and wind moving? how can I direct the water to slow it down and disperse it across my landscape? what microclimates are present? what animals are visiting and where are they going? what are the underlying patterns in the landscape? what plants are already here?) It is a system of sustainable agriculture but also a way of living, of stewarding our Earth and sharing with the community – it has 3 basic principles that the design work is based on 1) Earth Care 2) People Care and 3) Fair Share.

The word “Permaculture” was coined by Bill Mollison in the 1970’s who went on to write the book Permaculture: A Designer’s Manual.  In his words:
“Permaculture is about designing sustainable human settlements. It is a philosophy and an approach to land use which weaves together microclimate, annual and perennial plants, animals, soil, water management, and human needs into intricately connected, productive communities.”