… For Earth Day this year, take some time to appreciate the rich soil that covers our planet and supports plant life. Try this soil seed-bank test to discover the magic of topsoil. The soil seed-bank test is used by farmers, scientists, and …
Type: Blog
… as in life, patience is a virtue. Twelve years ago, the Garden embarked on a mission to bring a rock star of the plant world to the Chicago Botanic Garden. The titan arum ( Amorphophallus titanum ), also known as the … size, odd shape, and terrible stench (hence its common name, corpse flower). Plants bloom for a single day every seven to ten years, and it is nearly impossible to predict the day it will …
Type: Blog
… A striking century plant is putting on a show in the final stages of its life—it’s blooming for the first and only time in 27 years. The succulent sends up a tall stalk of blossoms right … at the Chicago Botanic Garden, Agave ocahui is known as the century plant because people used to think it flowered only once every 100 years. A more accurate estimate is that it blooms once after 25 to 30 years of growth. The Garden’s century plant came from The Huntington Library, Art …
Type: Blog
… a fair bit of brewing myself. Despite seemingly endless beer varieties, beer making boils down to just a few basic ingredients. So what’s really happening during the major steps in the brewing … is converted from starch into smaller carbohydrates. This conversion process is important for the brewer, since those carbohydrates will feed the yeasts during fermentation. The brewer doesn’t want the grain seed to completely germinate, though—if it did, the embryo would “eat” all of the food reserves, …
Type: Blog
… We commonly think of floral scent for its role in attracting pollinators, but it can also be a cue for floral and seed predators. … and Moths Across Western North America, integrates chemical ecology and comparative genomics to explore the impact of past selective pressures on current patterns of diversity in nonmodel … same floral characteristics (color, shape, scent) that attract pollinators are also suspected to attract floral antagonists to host plants. Mompha is one such moth genus that specializes on …
Type: Research
… An exotic, tall-dark-and-handsome visitor has returned to the Chicago Botanic Garden this spring. Its bold blooms draw pollinators in as well as Garden … What is it, you ask? Some of the most unusual plants our Production Greenhouse team grow for our display gardens are six species of Echium, a biennial plant that produces giant spikes of flowers—but not right away. Echium take two years of growth to become the epic plants you see throughout the Garden. You won’t find these Dr. Seussian plants …
Type: Blog
… Some vegetables are more satisfying than others when it comes to harvest. Parsnips are in that category. The sun was out, the air was crisp, and the nights were frosty: parsnip weather. Cold weather is actually a good thing for parsnips—in fact, they need it to convert the starch in their roots to sugar, transforming them from lowly, nose-turned-up roots …
Type: Blog
… solutions or top-dress with well-rotted manure in midwinter, and mulch it with leaf mold to keep the soil from drying too quickly during the growing season. Roses, including this one, …
Type: Garden Guide Plant
… markings and dark marginal teeth. The inflorescence appears in the summer and fall and is up to three feet tall with as many nine branches. The flowers are clustered toward the top of each …
Type: Garden Guide Plant
… The genus name is derived from the Greek kleros (lot or chance) and dendron (tree), referring to the variable medical properties of some of the species. Like other members of the verbena …
Type: Garden Guide Plant
