Pollinator Plants for the Southeast

Header image: Tokyo Bekana Chinese cabbage leaves prior to harvest aboard the International Space Station. Photo credit: NASA

Move over, Mark Watney, there’s a new space botanist heading for Mars! Ryan and I have just finished watching the new Netflix series Away, which follows (over 10 episodes) the quest of five international astronauts to be the first people to set foot on the red planet.

In previous years, my garden plan has revolved around what I want to grow. There are a lot of unusual plants that grow, or might grow, in our climate, and I enjoy trying them out. With my experimental impulses mainly focused on the Hydroponicum, I have been thinking about what we would like to eat from the garden.

The lotus is a remarkable plant. I’m referring to Nelumbo nucifera, which is native to Asia and sacred to both buddhists and Hindus. (It’s related to the American lotus, N. lutea, but not to the lotus that appears in ancient Egyptian images – that’s Nymphaea lotus. Plants in the Nymphaea genus are more commonly referred to as waterlillies in the UK.)

The political weather has been stormy of late, and as the sun has come out to play at last, the garden seems the safest place to be. There’s a lot to be done to get it ready for the growing season, so time spent outside is never wasted. A lot of what I’m doing at the moment could best be termed ungardening, clearing out the contents from last year’s containers, and reusing the potting compost in the bottom of new pots, or as a soil improving mulch.

Last weekend, as the temperatures soared, I found a certain amount of solace in learning more about how plants are being grown in Antarctica – the coldest place on Earth. 

As I mentioned last month, for the time being I have decided to use my low-level trough planter for flowers, rather than the mini pond I had originally intended it for. Still, at some point in the future I would like a garden with a water feature. A natural swimming pool would be my first choice, but that seems unlikely. A fish pond would be lovely – as long as I was also blessed with hours to while away next to it, watching the fishes do their thing.

A year ago, the first seeds sprouted on the Moon. China’s Chang’e-4 mission was the first to land on the far side of the Moon, which faces away from Earth. The lander carried a sealed container filled with soil, cotton, rapeseed, Arabidopsis (rock cress) and potato seeds, yeast and fruit fly eggs. The aim of the experiment was to form an artificial, self-sustaining environment – a mini biosphere. The six components were chosen to act “producers, consumers and decomposers”, with the plants producing oxygen and food to sustain the fruit flies. The yeast was to process waste from the flies the dead plants to create more insect food. 

Header image: Rendering of Tiangong Space Station in late July 2022, along with June 2022 with Tianhe core module in the middle, Wentian lab module on the left, Tianzhou cargo spacecrafts on right, and Shenzhou-14 crewed spacecraft at nadir. Image credit Shujianyang via Wikipedia.

What kind of traveller are you? Do you prefer to lie in a hammock slung between two palm trees, reading the latest blockbuster novel? Or would I find you soaking up the local culture along with the sun? I’m more of the latter, and it helps to know a smattering of the local language if you go off the beaten track!

Header image credit: China Manned Space Engineering Office

The elm zigzag sawfly (Aproceros leucopoda, SLF) is one of the latest non-native species to take hold in the U.S. It was first found in Virginia in 2021, and active infestations are now established in Maryland, New York, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania. EZS has not been detected in South Carolina, but it is an insect for which we need to be on the lookout.