Friday, August 12, 2016

Creative Spot by Indra Anandasabapathy


 The blue patch in spring has pink cone flowers & black eyed susans now.
 
Morning glory- this is the commonest color. ( family convolvulacea).  There is a white & a beautiful light blue. The seeds seem to survive the winter & grow again next spring.

10 comments:

  1. Razaque, the fellow gardner.August 12, 2016 at 1:06 PM

    Lovely Morning Glory, Indra.
    In one of my Posts Rohini Ana had mistaken a Trailing Petunia for a M.G. I have a pink variety that almost took over my garden!! Had to drastically prune & give it the "weed-killer treatment" to control it. I recently read that the Pink variety is very rare and highly prized in Japan .... and NOW THEY TEL ME!!!.
    Anyway all is not lost, I think I can still resurrect it.

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  2. Indra,Thank you for your timely photo of the purple Morning Glory which also shows the foliage well.
    Razaque, Iam sorry I misidentified your pretty blue Petunias(P) as Morning Glory(MG)-
    As you know, MG and P have similar flowers though they belong to different Families-
    MG being in Convolvulaceae (sweet Potato family) and P being in Solanaceae-(Potato family)-
    Sometimes they can only be differentiated by seeing the foliage and the plant itself, as MG is a climber with heart shaped leaves while P is a shrub with mostly oval leaves.
    I did go back to your photo and enlarged it to see the leaves
    were different to that of the heart shaped leaves of MG -
    I should have been alert to avoid this mistake, having known that even the NY Times got it wrong with a photo of a purple MG labelled as a blue Petunia, which they withdrew subsequently-(see website on "Botanical Accuracy") which has many other interesting facts.
    It is also interesting that some varieties of both Petunias and MG have mind altering chemicals-like many other common garden plants we least suspect !-too long to discuss now!
    Your Petunias are very pretty-thank you-

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    Replies
    1. Rohini,
      That was a good description between M.G. & P.
      It con be very easily confused and your comments were educational -- like that of Joshua & Pulimood in the bygone days!!.
      I am awfully sorry if any of my my comments were in any way meant to be 'taking a dig at you'. No not at all Rohini, it was as a matter of course. These days the only 'digging' I do is in the garden and the only 'potting' I do is potting any new plants!!
      My apologies once again.
      There are a 'few' more Lillies, Roses & Poppies in the 'Pipeline' and would like to hear your Botanical views on them!!
      Kindest regards.

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    2. Rohini
      Welcome to the Blog again. Good to have an expert botanist to comment. My botany has gone down the drain like the rain in Spain.

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    3. Razaque,Iam sorry I'm late getting back on this.
      I didnt imagine there was any ill intent in your comment, and there was certainly no need for an apology-though I enjoyed your usual humour in it!
      Have fun with your gardening!

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  3. Your knowledge absolutely astounds me Rohini!

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  4. Mahen,Google is always round the corner !
    My husband has not yet got round to saying "I dont need Google
    as my wife knows everything" as I have heard said!!!
    cheers

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    Replies
    1. Impressive botanical knowledge, Rohini.

      ia

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  5. For an armchair gardener like me who gets his kicks from the BBC “Gardeners World” such keen interest in the colourful pigments of flavanoids, anthocyanins, cholorophyll and carotenoids fascinates me. Thanks to you guys when I do my daily walks between the well manicured lawns and the flower beds of Regents Park I have learnt to see them in a different light. All this without getting my hands dirty and worrying who will look after them when I am on holiday. In my previous house in the country my wife looked after and managed a beautiful garden. Then gardening was to me synonymous with mowing the lawn a chore that I hated beyond belief. What I enjoyed most about the garden was to sit outside on a summers evening and sip a glass of wine watching the long trails of smoke made by a myriad of jet engines that filled the sky. The alcohol certainly lubricated the emotions to reminisce and reflect on times past.
    My thanks to all the contributions and comments on this colourful topic. Gardening has merged into the science of botany to enlighten us all on an aspect I never knew existed when I studied the subject in the 6th form.

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  6. Razaque, Rohini, Nihal and Mahendra, It's good to realise that one can be a Constant Gardener by walking through Regent's Park, watching Gardener's World, actually getting ones hands dirty by doing the gardening yourself, and even by reading the Blog about all of your great doings. The last lazy category is where I belong!
    Zita

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