Wednesday, January 13, 2021

Wednesday Vignette, plants on plants

For this Wednesday Vignette we go back to my 2019 visit to the Ruth Bancroft Garden...

I am somewhat obsessed with plants growing on other plants, and so I was thrilled to find this example of a cactus growing on the trunk of a palm. Did the RBG gardeners plant the cactus? 

I emailed Brian Kemble, curator at the RBG to ask. His reply: "The palm is Butia capitata (also known as the jelly palm because its edible fruit is used to make jelly). The cacti growing on the trunk are Cereus hildmannianus, and they were not planted there by us. It would seem evident that birds perched up in the palm after having eaten cactus fruit, and they sprouted and grew. This is obviously not a good long-term choice of a growing spot, since the cactus gets to be several tons in time. . ."

So, not a long term planting, but still fun while it lasts.

Weather Diary, Jan 12: Hi 61, Low 46/ Precip 1.77" (yes, that is the 24 hour rain total, not the week, or the month but the day. High winds too, lots of power outages, ours was out for at least 6 hours).

Wednesday Vignettes are hosted by Anna at Flutter & Hum. All material © 2009-2021 by Loree Bohl for danger garden. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited and just plain rude.

20 comments:

  1. Wow. Speechless. Nature is amazing.

    BTW: Congratulations on your new book release!

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  2. I *love* that this isn't a man-made installation but something that just happened.

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    1. Right? So cool. I am glad they left it to get big enough that we could enjoy them.

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  3. From a distance they look like big green worms!

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  4. There's an Opuntia growing in a silk floss tree in my local botanic garden and I always pointed it out to kids (back when I was doing school tours - we've been furloughed since March). The kids loved it, at least during the part of the year when the Opuntia was readily visible. The garden also has a "strangler fig" growing in a palm tree - the fig gets cut back annually so it hasn't yet succeeded in killing the palm.

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    1. Someday maybe I'll get to visit this garden!

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  5. Isn't that amazing? It looks wicked weird.

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  6. It's fascinating. It would be nice to check in periodically to see how those "volunteers" develop. Will they eventually drop to the ground? Or be removed before it happens? And for those who are obsessed and try to create this plant hosting phenomenon it can probably be done with specimens that have smaller growth potential. And share the experience, of course.

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    1. I'm sure the staff is watching and will remove them when the time is right.

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  7. When visiting my brother in law in Placentia, CA they had a large palm in their small yard an it had a tomato plant in it. I thought it was hilarious. I took a picture but hard to see since it was so high up. I think maybe squirrels on the telephone wires.

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    1. A tomato! That is hilarious. Did they get any ripe fruit?

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  8. Believe it or not , when I visited RBG a couple weeks ago I noticed those for the first time.How did I miss them ? I guess I'm always looking down.It made me think I need to be more mindful of the more obscure features in the garden. Sadly that A. ovatifolia down the path bloomed in 2020 and is no more.

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    1. But isn't that wonderful, that even after all of your visits there is still something new to discover?

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  9. Mmmhmm. I'm with you. Fascinating stuff.

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  10. I saw another shot of that same epiphyte wannabe in your book - which I'm thoroughly enjoying, by the way. Would it be too fan-girly to ask you to sign my copy some time? Nature never ceases to amaze me.

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    1. Of course, I would love to! And ya, too good not to include in the book.

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