City Gardener Sandbox

Again I was able to cycle, being careful to avoid the extra traffic going to the Fair. I’m beginning to favor the route up Cleveland Avenue rather than taking the busway over the railroad bridge. The ride up Cleveland is much more gradual and pleasant. B, Curator J, and students R and T were all there. I began by helping Curator J... clean the soot from two small Hibiscus clayi plants (native to Hawaii), see photo. Next, I set up stainless steel cables over the vine bench in room C3 (see photos). The six cables will hang down to viney plants, allowing them to grow up the cables. I had to find a ladder long enough to reach the overhead support cable - I found the ladder down the hall next to the maintenance department (there was nobody there to ask for permission so I borrowed it anyway). I used the big metal crimper tool to fasten grommets onto the loops of cable. We used up all three of the remaining carabiner hooks, more will have to be ordered to complete the project (see photo). Fi...

  Cycled, first day of Minnesota State Fair for 2023 Cleaning tank pump filters, particularly the tank with the carnivorous pitcher plants I also cleaned the soot from carnivorous pitcher plants (see photo) Next to the tank, the Asian tree Glyptostrobus pensilis (in the cypress family), had to be swapped out with one of the cycad trees. This effort took 3 of us to perform. The cycad was doing poorly next to the tank resulting in large yellow spots on the fronds. The G. pensilis will probably do better in the position next to the tank.  A year ago I had moved the G. pensilis to its former location, and adjusted the stakes to help keep it upright. It has grown well in the meantime. Next to the G. pensilis tree I noticed the pot of stone plants in flower. The plant is from Africa: Conophytum lithopsoides. Another cool aquatic carnivorous plant: Drosera regia (a rare form of sundew plant, from a single valley in  Africa)

  It was a pleasure to once again cycle to the GH. The weather was cool and dry after a night of clouds, high winds, and threatening storms. At the GH, B... allowed me to water the plants in room C1. I had to accommodate an electrician who was working in the room to install wiring for overhead lights to be used during evening hours. Apparently, the original strip grow-lighting was intended for this purpose, but proved to be complicated and impractical given all the automation already controlling their operation. So the solution was to now install simple overhead lights independent of the grow-lights. While watering, the room felt cold. This is the “cloud forest” room. The temperature is set to be in the 50s and 60s F, with high humidity and a breeze through the room. In these conditions I found it chilly to work, so I put on my cycle jacket which kept me warm enough. Minnesota's winter-hardy opuntia cactus Later, I joined B..., Curator J..., and student R.... in their effort to tra...

Curator J...hosted an outdoor tea party to thank volunteers. The party was located in the outdoor Botanical Garden, across the street from the GH. It was fairly well attended, but only one other volunteer was able to attend, volunteer K, who has been assisting with IT data management and cataloging. A few others attended the tea including undergrad and grad students. Curator J made scones (herbs and cheese I think), B... brought fruit, and someone made poppy seed shortbread wafers. For the final hour after the tea I did the following activities: v ine maintenance, and s crubbing soot and scale from a small plant (?name) in 3c, on bench 2E Here is a term I learned from Curator J...: “Fabaceous ,” referring to the plant family Fabaceae or Leguminosae plants (bean or legume plants). In room 3c, bench 1E, with a very sooty fabaceous plant: Glycyrrhiza glabra.

Again I was able to cycle to the GH. The weather was a bit steamy with high humidity. There were broken clouds threatening to coalesce into thunderheads at some point - they didn’t. The sky on the return trip was sunny and hot. My first task was to help B wash dirt plastic and terracotta pots that had been emptied. The plastic pots were going to be dipped and rinsed in an antiseptic solution of some sort - located in the pot cleaning room. The terracotta pots were to be sterilized by heat after we had rinsed out the dirt chunks. B had set up the hose outside in the courtyard next to the workroom. The pots she had selected took about 45 minutes to clean. She brought the pots to the cleaning room to finish the process. The pots will be reused, cleaning them helps to prevent the spread of pathogenic organisms:  bacteria, fungi, and viruses. The next chore was helping Curator J and B clean the sooty mold and scale from a couple of podocarp (family) trees in the gymnosperm clade. They w...

The temperature outside was 94F degrees, and very muggy, as I cycled home from the GH. But, while riding a bicycle there is a natural, built-in breeze which made me feel cooler. The mugginess was  notable at the GH too, where the rainforest rooms were especially warm and muggy. Surprisingly, the desert rooms felt cooler and drier than the outside air!  My first task was to repot a climbing clematis vine in room C1, it had become completely root-bound in its small 9-inch pot. I replaced the pot with a 12-inch deep pot to give the expanding roots extra room. We used arid soil mix to provide good drainage. The vine had been growing up one of the I-beams which support the roof of the GH. I couldn’t take down the vine, so I had to repot the plant in situ. To complete the task, B found an eight-foot ladder from the maintenance crew, which I used to train the vine along a stainless steel cable - which had been installed for that purpose.  Since I had the ladder already, I also t...

Again I was able to cycle to the GH today, as the weather was lovely: partly cloudy, 66 degrees, with a fair breeze at my back. On the ride to the GH, I passed the Huntington Bank stadium on the east bank campus. I was amazed to see 25 private coaches all lining the streets around the stadium. The near-by parking lot was full of a similar number of large semi trailers. Clearly something big was about to happen at the stadium, but what? On the ride home I recalled the singer Beyonce (Queen Bey) and her husband JayZ are in town for a couple of concerts. I had no idea they required such a large entourage of people and equipment. I strongly suspect, Beyonce and JayZ do not travel on the roads with the whole convoy. They’ll be jetting around in their private plane(s),  On arriving at the greenhouse, B... was there to assign my first tasks: to repot some of the small bushy plants in C1 and C2. These particular plants had plastic pots which were bursting open at the bottom indicating the ...