Autumn ticktocks by, leaf by falling leaf. Each shorter day brings us closer to the quiet palette of winter. For now, though, it is a brilliant marvel, pierced by the solitary calls of tiny tree frogs, the calling of owls, and scents of woodsy, mushroomy decay taking place in the shade of hedges, stone walls, and fallen trees.
Praying mantises have been breeding; watch for lumpy egg cases attached to plants and structures. Avoid damaging them. Look for scraped trunks of young trees. Bucks have rubbed their antlers there; wrap in treeguards. Harvest leaves.
Mating season of white-tailed deer is underway; already counts of car/deer impacts are rising. Drive with care and caution, especially at dusk and dawn; use high beams when possible. Remember: One deer crossing is likely to be pursued by a couple more. Check for deer ticks; adults are prevalent.
Easy greens
Corn salad, lamb’s lettuce, mache — these are all common names for a cold-hardy, easily grown salad green, Valerianella locusta, that commands high prices at market. It was grown in the gardens of Louis XIV and Thomas Jefferson, and is highly nutritious, according to Wikipedia. As with many other greens, such as cilantro, brassicas, and lettuces, mache bolts quickly in warm weather. I turned this to advantage with my spring crop, leaving them undisturbed to flower and seed. Now I am harvesting delightful, nutty-tasting leaves and plants from a carpet of mache that were no effort to grow, except to avoid weeding them out.
Invasive? Prohibited?
The varying rates of color change, as autumn progresses, help one to see and differentiate among plants that line our roadsides and byways. As I wrote recently, color in the landscape thrills: it excites our eyes’ rods and cones. The crimson of sumac identifies its location unmistakably, just as sassafras’s rich yellow “mittens” show the extent of its stoloniferous colonies. The festoons of Oriental bittersweet color to a recognizable chartreuse, aiding in its removal; poison ivy signals its location by the contrast of its autumn color against the undergrowth where it is found.
Many plants possess excellent strategies for expanding their populations, including beauty and color. Why are some defined as invasive? Verbena bonariensis and Digitalis purpurea are welcomed, although we expend time and effort to rid gardens of excess seedlings. Oaks shed acorns copiously some years — those of white oaks are sprouting now — but we do not designate oaks as invaders, although that is what they are programmed to do in certain situations.
After the no-name storm that followed Hurricane Sandy, rockweed and eelgrass blanketed Island beaches for the taking, which many did. The following spring I was surprised, not unpleasantly, to find seedling yellow horned poppy plants (Glaucium flavum) among the vegetable rows where I had sheet-composted the seaweed.
Horned poppy is on the Massachusetts Prohibited Plant List (MPPL; see bit.ly/ProhibitedPlants). I do not let it flower now; I appreciate it merely for the Moorish-tile pattern of its symmetrical basal rosettes. I love having the biennial Hesperis matronalis turn up from time to time in my flowerbeds: early, fragrant, and never proliferating for me. Yup — on the MPPL!
So it is that the stretch of Edgartown–West Tisbury Road, where New Lane leaves it near the Cleaveland House, provides a great “see-for-yourself” example of an invasive plant. There you see an understory thickly studded with burning bush in all different sizes, shapes, and shades of turning red. These originate from plants down the road on the opposite side, where mature euonymus hedges and specimen plants stand, having been planted many years ago, before any of us had conceived of invasive plants and a Prohibited Plant List.
I was greatly surprised to see three large, recently planted shrubs of burning bush (Euonymus alatus) in a nice stretch of native woodland, by the side of a nearby road, along with some other plant material obviously intended as screening. A reputable local landscape company was apparently performing the work. What constituted the surprise is that burning bush, though very striking at this season, is also on the Massachusetts Prohibited Plant List and is illegal to import, propagate, or plant in the commonwealth. From the Prohibited Plant List FAQ page: “Q: Why are invasive plants a threat? A: Invasive plants typically have few (if any) natural enemies and a very high reproductive rate. These characteristics allow invasive plants to outcompete our native species of plants, which could lead to disruption of ecosystems.”
Let’s return to the MPPL for a moment; please take a look at the list’s contents. Many are out-and-out weeds, but there are quite a few surprises, although the reasons for landing on the list may vary. Familiar “plant friends” in addition to burning bush are now on it: common privet, Norway maple, and many grasses (Miscanthus and Pennisetums), porcelain berry.
Tom Clark, the curator at Polly Hill Arboretum (PHA) is in seeming agreement with the many lovers of burning bush: “Burning bush is so malleable, adaptable, easy to cultivate, trouble-free, and lovely this time of year that I completely understand why people bemoan its removal from our plant palette,” he said. However, PHA (whose grounds are looking particularly good just now — go visit!) has researched and mounted a feature on its website, the useful Plant Selection Guide, plantfinder.pollyhillarboretum.org. It helps gardeners, landscapers, property owners, and designers make choices based on sound knowledge of what to plant, and where, to achieve desired effects.
For example, three other shrubs with strong red color that could have been used instead of those roadside burning bushes, of similar size, site requirements, deer resistance, and shape are Enkianthus campanulatus, enkianthus; Vaccinium corymbosum, highbush blueberry; and Viburnum carlesii, Koreanspice viburnum.