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  • … it to produce male flowers the next time around. Basically, Japanese cobra lilies change sex for a period of time to save energy and allow themselves time to recover.  Like all species of  … with a pair of giant, polished, trifoliate leaves, creating an almost tropical appearance for a midwestern garden. It reaches 2 feet tall, and female plants can produce bright … China, Japan, and Korea. It is one of the easiest to grow, and perhaps the best garden subject for the Chicago area. They are pricey to buy, but the flying saucer-shaped tubers bulk up quickly …
    Type: Blog
  • … to complete the look you are trying to create. Create a miniature landscape or theme.   Caring for your terrarium Watering : Water until moistened after planting, being careful not to let … terrarium uncovered until the foliage has dried. A closed terrarium may not need to be watered for four to six months—look for condensation to form on the inside of the container to check the moisture level. Open …
    Type: Blog
  • … flower reflects onto the shadowed water below. Doctoral student Lynnaun Johnson wades over for a closer look. Habitat is shrinking for this reclusive orchid, and he is using a unique approach to better understand the species’ … Taxodium distichum) . He plans to conduct more fieldwork this spring before examining the bark for fungi. The number of ghost orchids in Florida has dwindled as more and more swamps have been …
    Type: Blog
  • … David Murray is the horticulturist for the Shida Evaluation Garden. Our new Shida Evaluation Garden allows us to expand our … landscape plan by Wirtz International Landscape Architects includes specialty evaluation areas for perennials, roses, and vines. This new garden features crabapple tunnels, deciduous hedges, …
    Type: Staff bio
  • … I kept one seed growing in the bag all winter, adding water as needed.   The bean plant grew for five months, leaning toward the window in my office. The plant produced a white flower about … The red fruit was hidden under the leaves. So if you try this activity, and you stick with it for six months, you, too, may be rewarded with a little treasure! …
    Type: Blog
  • … purchasing them—the sphagnum moss in which they are sold provides too much constant moisture for the plant, and can damage the delicate, epiphytic root system. Anne Nies, a master’s degree … to maintain a healthy growing environment. Our second video details step-by-step instructions for repotting a  Paphiopedilum  orchid, which has different watering and culture needs from a  …
    Type: Blog
  • … and violets of the dominant fall asters, many of them blooming throughout October. Look for bottle and cream gentians in the Garden’s Dixon Prairie or elsewhere. Buried beneath the riot … to locate. Another, more common gentian of wet prairie is also worth a mention. Not so much for its brilliant color, although it is blue and fairly showy, but for the fact that its flower petals remain closed. This is the closed or bottle gentian ​ …
    Type: Blog
  • … juice from the stem of jewelweed and applied it to poison ivy rashes and other skin ailments for a very soothing treatment. It is ironic that “touch-me-not” is a cure for “leaves of three—let it be,” don’t you think? Folklore tells us that wherever you find a … ivy growing near jewelweed, so use caution and be careful not to touch when you are searching for this plant. …
    Type: Blog
  • … sunflower ( Helianthus annuus  ‘Panache’) With that in mind, here are five simple secrets for seed-starting success 1. Quality seed starter.  Give your seeds a healthy jump start by … before filling with starting mix. 4. The right light.  A strong light source is crucial for stimulating plant growth. Without it, plants turn leggy, making them weak and more … in years past, only to have them dry out and wither before you know it? You may be a candidate for a simple capillary mat/self-watering system. After filling pots with seed starting mix, set …
    Type: Blog
  • … to make use of advanced DNA sequencing technologies in biodiversity research. “We have known for quite some time that all plants on land share a common ancestor with green algae, but there … fine level of detail, looking deeply at each plant’s transcriptome (the type of data generated for this study), which represents those pieces of DNA that are responsible for essential biological functions at the cellular level. In all, they selected 852 genes to …
    Type: Blog