List of 23 Plants that are Called Lilies

Quick backstory: You may remember Charley, co-author of my most-used field guide “Tracks and Sign of Insects and Other Invertebrates,” from our recent interview about galls and leaf mines, two of his specialties.(I’m giving away two more copies; enter by commenting in the form way down at the bottom of this page, after reading the entry details in the tinted box just before that. The book can help you to know what you are seeing when you look closer, too—kind of like always having Charley by your side.)When that story ran, Charley had noticed a photo I used to accompany it–of a squiggly “leaf mine” I’d observed in my Asian-native big-leaved perennial called Petasites. He’d wondered if it was caused by the insect that feeds in a few different genera in the tribe Senecioneae (including some native American botanical cousins of Petasites).  Why don’t you come try to find out, I’d suggested—and while you’re here, why don’t we have a

On my radio show and podcast, we talked about why having extra-early and extra-later bloomers—from spicebush to Clethra to goldenrods and more—mean important insects and even birds will choose not just to stop by your garden, but call it home and raise a family.Read along as you listen to the May 11, 2015 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on iTunes or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts here).read/listen: choosing native plants,a q&a with broken arrow’s andy brandQ. I know that when the subject of native plants is raised, peopl

I knew my garlic mustard from lamb’s quarters or mugwort, wild grape from bittersweet or Ampelopsis, oxalis from everything else. But clearweed kept me in the dark longer than most. I could have guessed at its common name, since the stems are practically translucent, or clear. And no wonder I have so much of it: It favors moist soils such as mine generally is, and shady and semi-shady spots in or near woodlands such as the one I garden on the edge of.The USDA conservation map show the presence of Pilea pumila in 38 states, and parts of eastern Canada. The Flora of North America (efloras [dot] org) says that Native Americans used clearweed medicinally, “to alleviate itching, to cure sinus problems, and to treat excessive hunger.” The Illinois Wildflowers website notes that certain native insects use the plant, too. All these years, the only thing I thought it was useful for? To aggravate me.Turns out various caterpillars of moths and butterflies enjoy it as a host plant (they’re listed here and include the comma and the red admiral), and so my new policy is t

“The increase in our computing power today allows the research team to build into their algorithms things they knew were important factors in 1990, but couldn’t include,” said Catherine Woteki, Chief Scientist and Under Secretary for Research, Education and Economics for the USDA, in an interview yesterday. Factors such as elevation, the slope of land, or how close to a body of water a location is, can cause sharp variation despite close adjacencies.“Taking those into account now provides a lot more detail,” Woteki said, “and people will be able to see islands of heat, and also cool ones, on the new map. As a scientist and a home gardener, I love seeing this so much more clearly.” The new map is built using digital Geographic Information System technology and you’ll notice the sharper boundaries and better resolution right away when you visit its interactive website. To find out whether your zone has shifted, start here. Though I’ve always thought of myself as a Zone 5B, I’m now officially there, no longer in Zone

Karen Perkins has since 2009 owned Garden Visions Epimediums, a small retail mail-order nursery located in rural central Massachusetts, and founded in 1997 by Darrell Probst. She’s also open for visits and in-person shopping a couple of spectacular weeks each May during Epimedium peak season.Read along as you listen to the March 11, 2019 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on iTunes or Spotify or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts here).epimediums for shade gardens, with karen perkinsQ. I wish

FIRST: the “why” question: Why are birds’ sounds so different, species to species? I asked Ellen Blackstone, our tour guide in the continuing series with BirdNote (browse all past installments).As always, the answer is evolution: Songs evolved to match the bird’s habitat, she explained (learn more in this BirdNote segment). Each species adapted over time to succeed in communicating, despite the acoustical obstacles of its environment. Because high-pitched sounds have shorter wavelengths, they are more easily stopped by solid objects, and better sung from tree-tops. Explosive, low-pitched songs bounce better past solid obstacles.The canyon wren’s song, for exampl

Several recent reads might make good gifts for the likewise ever-curious reader on your list.“How to Be a Good Creature: A Memoir in 13 Animals,” by Sy Montgomery (2018)THIS BOOK simply made me happy. Knowing each of the 13 animals in it made Montgomery happy, too.“Knowing someone who belongs to another species can enlarge your soul in surprising wa

“Every day, the world is teaching me what I need to know to be in the world,” she writes.Margaret Renkl—gardener, lifelong student of nature, and writer—lives and gardens in Nashville, Tennessee. Each Monday, her opinion column appears in “The New York Times,” billed under the loose rubric “Flora, fauna, politics and c

Move over, red tomatoes. There’s a new tomato in town, and it’s promising to be even healthier than its already uber-healthy red counterpart: Meet the purple tomato.

Tanja Ivanova / Getty Images

When the North American Bat Conservation Alliance (NABCA) released its first ever State of Bats report this spring, it was intended as a baseline record of how bat species in North America were faring. NABCA is a trilateral network, with biologists and resource managers across Canada, the US and Mexico. With hundreds of bat species traveling throughout the continent, scientists wanted to assess how things were going. 

Iris ‘Benton Olive’ in Sarah Price's garden