Plant of the Week for July 19th-26th 2009: Aruncus dioicus
Hey! Look who's back! Yes, it's Mark's Tree of the Week posts - now delightfully modified into Plant of the Week posts, so as to give me more stuff to type about. Aren't you excited, o my invisible and probably nonexistent audience? I'll bet you are!
So, anyway, it's a little late to post this entry, since its subject, Aruncus dioicus, stopped blooming a few weeks ago. But, goddammit, I've got photographs, I've done some research, and I'm a-gonna write about this plant! SO, without further ado, I present to you...
Goatsbeard, Aruncus dioicus
Synonyms: "Bride's Feathers", Spiræa aruncus, Spiræa paniculata, Aruncus sylvester.
Range and Habitat: A. dioicus is a relatively common but quite spectacular garden plant in temperate gardens. And so this author was delighted to find out that the species is native to our eastern woodlands, growing as an understory shrub in deciduous forests and wooded savannas. However, its introduction to human horticulture was not achieved by the American Indians, nor by the early European invaders; no, it was known, at least casually, to Homo sapiens long before there were any members of our species on this side of the Bering Strait. For goatsbeard is an extremely wide-ranging species, native to American forests on both sides of the Great Plains, and also to temperate forests right across Eurasia.
Native? Y/N: Y, although horticultural varieties may be from eurasian or western subspecies, and likely hybridize freely with wild eastern plants.
Plant ID: The plant may be most readily known by its flowers, dainty cream-colored things arranged in long, foamy spikes. These spectacular flowers come into blossom, 'round these parts, beginning in mid-June and continuing 'till around the end of that month. Goat's beard is dioecious, meaning that it produces male and female flowers on different plants. The two sexes look very similar, save that the male plants have many, many long stamens per flower, whereas the female flowers produce only three pistils each. This makes the male blooms somewhat more feathery in profile, which is considered desirable by gardeners.
When its flashy flowers are absent, goatsbeard may best be known by its leaves. These are similar to those of a rose, but larger, with deeper teeth, and are doubly compound rather than merely singly compound. These leaves can be rather large, extending up to 3 feet from the plant's short woody stem.
Ecology: A. dioicus is a native inhabitant of moist, temperate woodlands nearly worldwide, and it is excellently adapted to the conditions found in such ecosystems. It is very tolerant of the shade put forth whatever trees overhang its fronds, and its roots love the rich humus accumulated over thousands of autumns and mixed by millions of worms. In winter, its hardened buds can withstand the harshest of conditions, and it is rated as hardy to temperatures as low as -40º C (-40º F). In order to ensure its spread over the widest possible range, goatsbeard has designed its flowers to be appealing to all variety of pollinators. Pollinator.org claims that it is visited by bees, beetles, and butterflies alike, and I frequently observed soldier beetles sunbathing on its bright flowers. Soldier beetles are common garden predators who devour aphids and other small arthropod pests, making their presence a sight to be greeted with joy by the savvy gardener or conservationist. They also, according to Wikipedia, supplement their protein diet with small sips of nectar and pollen, and so pull double duty as minor pollinators of their hosts. Goatsbeard is also, according to my sources, relatively resistant to the attentions of deer and other herbivores, bound to be an advantage in the overbrowsed and predator free forests of the modern world.
Uses and Horticulture: Goatsbeard has significant decorative and ecological importance. In the former role, it is frequently planted in decorative borders and in naturalistic woodland gardens. In the latter role, it provides food and habitat for a wide variety of generally beneficial insect species, who are important parts of the ecosystems on which our society's wealth still depends.
The cultivation of goatsbeard is relatively easy, so long as it is given a rich soil and sufficient water, the lack of which will predispose the plant to sun scorching, especially when it is planted in sunnier spots. The plant can also be damaged by too much water, though, as its roots are intolerant of long periods of soil saturation. But given these limitations, goatsbeard will grow into a lush shrub with but little attention.
According to what lore I've been able to find, the root of A. dioicus, when ground, may be used to soothe bee stings, and its leaves may be made into an infusion that supposedly relieves aching limbs. But these herbalist prescriptions should be taken with a grain of salt; certainly, I have found no peer-reviewed studies investigating their efficacy. What should not be taken with a grain of salt - or at all, really - are the seeds of goatsbeard. As a mother bear will defend her cubs with tooth and claw, so does a mother goatsbeard protect her ripe seed capsules with disagreeable and toxic chemicals.
Taxonomy: Though it might seem hard to connect the ivory spikes of Goatsbeard with the carnal convolutions of a Rose petal, in truth the two flowers are in the same family, the mighty Rosaceae. This seems less strange when one remembers the beautiful inflorescent racemes of the mighty black cherry, Prunus serotina, also in the Rosaceae. Prunus and Aruncus are also, incidentally, both in the same subfamily, the Spiraeoideae, which also includes meadowsweet, Arizona rosewood, and, if recent molecular analyses are to be believed, such ubiquities as the apple tree, the hawthorn, and the sacred Rowan tree.
Ubiquitous since 1986,
--mark
So, anyway, it's a little late to post this entry, since its subject, Aruncus dioicus, stopped blooming a few weeks ago. But, goddammit, I've got photographs, I've done some research, and I'm a-gonna write about this plant! SO, without further ado, I present to you...
Goatsbeard, Aruncus dioicus
Synonyms: "Bride's Feathers", Spiræa aruncus, Spiræa paniculata, Aruncus sylvester.
Range and Habitat: A. dioicus is a relatively common but quite spectacular garden plant in temperate gardens. And so this author was delighted to find out that the species is native to our eastern woodlands, growing as an understory shrub in deciduous forests and wooded savannas. However, its introduction to human horticulture was not achieved by the American Indians, nor by the early European invaders; no, it was known, at least casually, to Homo sapiens long before there were any members of our species on this side of the Bering Strait. For goatsbeard is an extremely wide-ranging species, native to American forests on both sides of the Great Plains, and also to temperate forests right across Eurasia.
Native? Y/N: Y, although horticultural varieties may be from eurasian or western subspecies, and likely hybridize freely with wild eastern plants.
Plant ID: The plant may be most readily known by its flowers, dainty cream-colored things arranged in long, foamy spikes. These spectacular flowers come into blossom, 'round these parts, beginning in mid-June and continuing 'till around the end of that month. Goat's beard is dioecious, meaning that it produces male and female flowers on different plants. The two sexes look very similar, save that the male plants have many, many long stamens per flower, whereas the female flowers produce only three pistils each. This makes the male blooms somewhat more feathery in profile, which is considered desirable by gardeners.
When its flashy flowers are absent, goatsbeard may best be known by its leaves. These are similar to those of a rose, but larger, with deeper teeth, and are doubly compound rather than merely singly compound. These leaves can be rather large, extending up to 3 feet from the plant's short woody stem.
Ecology: A. dioicus is a native inhabitant of moist, temperate woodlands nearly worldwide, and it is excellently adapted to the conditions found in such ecosystems. It is very tolerant of the shade put forth whatever trees overhang its fronds, and its roots love the rich humus accumulated over thousands of autumns and mixed by millions of worms. In winter, its hardened buds can withstand the harshest of conditions, and it is rated as hardy to temperatures as low as -40º C (-40º F). In order to ensure its spread over the widest possible range, goatsbeard has designed its flowers to be appealing to all variety of pollinators. Pollinator.org claims that it is visited by bees, beetles, and butterflies alike, and I frequently observed soldier beetles sunbathing on its bright flowers. Soldier beetles are common garden predators who devour aphids and other small arthropod pests, making their presence a sight to be greeted with joy by the savvy gardener or conservationist. They also, according to Wikipedia, supplement their protein diet with small sips of nectar and pollen, and so pull double duty as minor pollinators of their hosts. Goatsbeard is also, according to my sources, relatively resistant to the attentions of deer and other herbivores, bound to be an advantage in the overbrowsed and predator free forests of the modern world.
Uses and Horticulture: Goatsbeard has significant decorative and ecological importance. In the former role, it is frequently planted in decorative borders and in naturalistic woodland gardens. In the latter role, it provides food and habitat for a wide variety of generally beneficial insect species, who are important parts of the ecosystems on which our society's wealth still depends.
The cultivation of goatsbeard is relatively easy, so long as it is given a rich soil and sufficient water, the lack of which will predispose the plant to sun scorching, especially when it is planted in sunnier spots. The plant can also be damaged by too much water, though, as its roots are intolerant of long periods of soil saturation. But given these limitations, goatsbeard will grow into a lush shrub with but little attention.
According to what lore I've been able to find, the root of A. dioicus, when ground, may be used to soothe bee stings, and its leaves may be made into an infusion that supposedly relieves aching limbs. But these herbalist prescriptions should be taken with a grain of salt; certainly, I have found no peer-reviewed studies investigating their efficacy. What should not be taken with a grain of salt - or at all, really - are the seeds of goatsbeard. As a mother bear will defend her cubs with tooth and claw, so does a mother goatsbeard protect her ripe seed capsules with disagreeable and toxic chemicals.
Taxonomy: Though it might seem hard to connect the ivory spikes of Goatsbeard with the carnal convolutions of a Rose petal, in truth the two flowers are in the same family, the mighty Rosaceae. This seems less strange when one remembers the beautiful inflorescent racemes of the mighty black cherry, Prunus serotina, also in the Rosaceae. Prunus and Aruncus are also, incidentally, both in the same subfamily, the Spiraeoideae, which also includes meadowsweet, Arizona rosewood, and, if recent molecular analyses are to be believed, such ubiquities as the apple tree, the hawthorn, and the sacred Rowan tree.
Ubiquitous since 1986,
--mark