Friday, January 30, 2009

Doom & Gloom (& A Neat Plant)

How about some pink mulla mulla (Ptilotus exaltatus 'Joey') in your landscape? This plant, native to Australia, is one of the hot new annuals for this year. I took these pictures at the Ball Seed Display Garden (West Chicago, IL) this past summer and was impressed by the flower power of this mid-height (24"), drought tolerant plant. We saw this plant used in many ways, including in containers, and plan on using lots of it in our pink themes this year. The warning from the Ball Seed folks was not to over-irrigate it as it doesn't like overly damp soils (which makes sense I suppose as an Australian plant). Regardless, look for this in seed catalogs and perhaps at nurseries.

I read an article yesterday based on scientific studies that says that even if we stopped all carbon-based emissions today, we would still have increasing global temperatures for the next 1000 years. Many of the negative effects of this temperature increase are commonly known (rising ocean levels, habitat loss, etc.) but another interesting topic that is directly related to this "snowball effect" is the role that these increased global temperatures are having on the permafrost in far northern climates. See http://www.terranature.org/methaneSiberia.htm if you really want to be bummed out. Regardless of the various reasons and theories related to how this situation has developed, the reality will have immediate impact on future generations. I hope humans can get over their selfish differences and address this situation in short order. Weightlifting in WI below....


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