So, today I started back in indoor display. And well, I'm going to try to keep up to date on these blogs! I was actually meant to be working with the arborists this month. But well, I wanted to come back indoors as I wanted to work with both Joyce (who looks after the palm house, cascade garden and tropical terrace) and Marie (who looks after the orchids). Orchid extravaganza is going on at the moment with orchids scattered throughout the conservatories. Both Joyce and Marie are very knowledgeable (Marie is super passionate about orchids) and I'm looking forward to working with them and asking them questions.
But this week at least I am working with Karls team. Though today, it was with Andrew Hemme. I have worked with Andrew before and really enjoyed it. He looks after the fruit houses and the childrens garden. Working with Andrew is always interesting because he has a very good plant knowledge and keeps me on my feet asking questions.Today's main project was replacing a bunch of daffodils in both the childrens garden and the fruit house containers. The fruit house containers looked good when finished as we also used some pussy willow canes in the larger containers and a Viola variety in the smaller containers. The childrens garden daffodils are planted with a bright blue hydangea, very cheerful. I am unsure of the cultivars we planted but will try to find out tomorrow.
Monday, January 31, 2011
Thursday, January 27, 2011
Curatorial Summary
Woah, so its been awhile since I have done a blog entry... Oops. So a summary is in order. Well it is now 2011, and nearly the end of January already! I left the IPM department the week before Christmas and went up to my friend Davids house in the Pocono mountains. It was a great break, learnt to snowboard, ate plenty of food and generally lazed. Much needed. The week after Christmas I drove up to Wochester Massachusetts (Pronounced woo-sta in New England speak. It's not too far from Boston) for a Phish show with my friend John. Great time, and I made it into Boston one day as well. New years was spent riding into into Philadelphia on a yellow school bus and going to a Lotus show.
So back at work again in the New Year and I started in the Curatorial department. Its been a busy month, not only with work but also with a whole bunch of job applications! Yes its that time... I have only four months left at Longwood, and I have suspicion its going to fly by.
Curatorial has been fun. I am working with Kristina Aguilar, an intern named Josh and a new PG, Jeanelle. Tomasz Anisko is the curator of plants, but is away for half the month as he is going to Brazil to research Victoria amazonica, on which he is currently writing a book.
The curatorial department is responsible for the recording, mapping and labeling of plants, both existing and new. Plants are recorded using accession numbers, which are always 8 digits and a "qualifier". The first 4 digits are the year it was received at Longwood. It is important to recognise that it is its received date, not its age. The next 4 digits is its number in that year. Accession numbers can, and are, given to groups of plants received. The qualifier is unique to a plant, and is always one or more letters, starting with A. Therefore an example of an accession number would be 1999-0236*A, which for the record was a Corylopsis glabrescens.
The primary tool of the trade is the database known as Botanic Gardens-Base, or BG-base. BG-base is a database that was designed specifically to manage plant records. It is a large application that has been under development since 1985, and originally was written in DOS. Partly because of this it is not exactly "flashy" or particularly user friendly. There are codes left over from DOS, for example F7=start new record, and the s/list (a search function that really makes BG-Base) requires typing like "select plants with acc_num "1999-0236" ". So there is a lot to learn with BG-Base. Despite its looks, BG-Base has the capability to store and organise a huge range of data, from plants accession numbers to images, mapping, plant conservation statuses, bibliographies, contacts, DNA sequences etc... As the manual puts it, "no one institution uses all of BG-Bases functionality". Information is stored in different 'Tables', for example the 'Names' and 'Images' tables. Tables can be thought of as being like different drawers on a filing cabinet. The advantage of a database such as BG-base over other spreadsheets such as Excel is that you can search and consolidate information stored in different tables and fields.
In my first week Kristina set me two tasks, one learning how to enter data onto BG-Base. For this I picked a group of plants (a mixture of herbaceous perennials from the perennial garden) and entered data on flower color, culture requirements, and hardiness. The other task was learning how to upload photos. For this picked an area (the silver garden) and took photos of all the plants that didn't yet have photos and attached them to the plants accession number in the images table.
After learning how to do this, I was set the task of creating a tour for Longwoods website "Plant Explorer" (Plantexplorer). Plant explorer is a website that takes information from BG-Base and a mapping program designed specifically for Longwood, BG-Map. The site allows the public to find information on what plants are at Longwood, or to design a tour relating to what the want to see. I decided to do my tour on plant species at Longwood that are rare or threatened (Threatened sp tour, click on plant names for more information). Writing the tour first required finding the plants (using s/list), then narrowing the list to those that were practical to include, were in public areas, weren't seasonal etc. It started out as a large list but was quickly narrowed down. One issue I encountered was whether or not to include plants that are common in cultivation yet threatened in the wild, eg Metasequoia glypstrboides. Longwood is primarily a display garden, and while there is a huge diversity of plants at the gardens, there are not a lot of truly rare and and endangered species here. Although from talking to Tomasz, its sounds like conservation and collections are becoming more important to Longwood (as it is to gardens around the world). After compiling a list it was a matter of researching and gathering information, writing and taking any photos that were needed.
All in all it was a fun exercise to do on a subject I am very interested in.
Oh and a weather update. Before I left for Christmas we were getting snow flurries that werent sticking. Now its defineatly sticking! We got about 20 inches last night, so there was a fair amount of shovelling to do in the morning.
So back at work again in the New Year and I started in the Curatorial department. Its been a busy month, not only with work but also with a whole bunch of job applications! Yes its that time... I have only four months left at Longwood, and I have suspicion its going to fly by.
Curatorial has been fun. I am working with Kristina Aguilar, an intern named Josh and a new PG, Jeanelle. Tomasz Anisko is the curator of plants, but is away for half the month as he is going to Brazil to research Victoria amazonica, on which he is currently writing a book.
The curatorial department is responsible for the recording, mapping and labeling of plants, both existing and new. Plants are recorded using accession numbers, which are always 8 digits and a "qualifier". The first 4 digits are the year it was received at Longwood. It is important to recognise that it is its received date, not its age. The next 4 digits is its number in that year. Accession numbers can, and are, given to groups of plants received. The qualifier is unique to a plant, and is always one or more letters, starting with A. Therefore an example of an accession number would be 1999-0236*A, which for the record was a Corylopsis glabrescens.
The primary tool of the trade is the database known as Botanic Gardens-Base, or BG-base. BG-base is a database that was designed specifically to manage plant records. It is a large application that has been under development since 1985, and originally was written in DOS. Partly because of this it is not exactly "flashy" or particularly user friendly. There are codes left over from DOS, for example F7=start new record, and the s/list (a search function that really makes BG-Base) requires typing like "select plants with acc_num "1999-0236" ". So there is a lot to learn with BG-Base. Despite its looks, BG-Base has the capability to store and organise a huge range of data, from plants accession numbers to images, mapping, plant conservation statuses, bibliographies, contacts, DNA sequences etc... As the manual puts it, "no one institution uses all of BG-Bases functionality". Information is stored in different 'Tables', for example the 'Names' and 'Images' tables. Tables can be thought of as being like different drawers on a filing cabinet. The advantage of a database such as BG-base over other spreadsheets such as Excel is that you can search and consolidate information stored in different tables and fields.
In my first week Kristina set me two tasks, one learning how to enter data onto BG-Base. For this I picked a group of plants (a mixture of herbaceous perennials from the perennial garden) and entered data on flower color, culture requirements, and hardiness. The other task was learning how to upload photos. For this picked an area (the silver garden) and took photos of all the plants that didn't yet have photos and attached them to the plants accession number in the images table.
After learning how to do this, I was set the task of creating a tour for Longwoods website "Plant Explorer" (Plantexplorer). Plant explorer is a website that takes information from BG-Base and a mapping program designed specifically for Longwood, BG-Map. The site allows the public to find information on what plants are at Longwood, or to design a tour relating to what the want to see. I decided to do my tour on plant species at Longwood that are rare or threatened (Threatened sp tour, click on plant names for more information). Writing the tour first required finding the plants (using s/list), then narrowing the list to those that were practical to include, were in public areas, weren't seasonal etc. It started out as a large list but was quickly narrowed down. One issue I encountered was whether or not to include plants that are common in cultivation yet threatened in the wild, eg Metasequoia glypstrboides. Longwood is primarily a display garden, and while there is a huge diversity of plants at the gardens, there are not a lot of truly rare and and endangered species here. Although from talking to Tomasz, its sounds like conservation and collections are becoming more important to Longwood (as it is to gardens around the world). After compiling a list it was a matter of researching and gathering information, writing and taking any photos that were needed.
All in all it was a fun exercise to do on a subject I am very interested in.
Oh and a weather update. Before I left for Christmas we were getting snow flurries that werent sticking. Now its defineatly sticking! We got about 20 inches last night, so there was a fair amount of shovelling to do in the morning.
Friday, December 17, 2010
Thursday, December 16, 2010
Field trip to Brandywine Valley Museum
Weather: Snow flurries
Well, the morning was more scouting. The highlight of the day was a trip to the Brandywine Valley Museum. Well, it doesnt sound particularly thrilling, but turns out they have an excellent collection of paintings by both N.C Wyeth and his son Andrew Wyeth. N.C Wyeth is well known for his illustrations for Treasure Island, a book I love. I was completely surprised when I walked around a corner and saw them. So all in all a good trip.
Thats Alex Giwi and Woon Sung, both internationals braving the snow. And bad ass Captain Bill Bones
Well, the morning was more scouting. The highlight of the day was a trip to the Brandywine Valley Museum. Well, it doesnt sound particularly thrilling, but turns out they have an excellent collection of paintings by both N.C Wyeth and his son Andrew Wyeth. N.C Wyeth is well known for his illustrations for Treasure Island, a book I love. I was completely surprised when I walked around a corner and saw them. So all in all a good trip.
Monday, December 13, 2010
Rose pruning
Weather: High of 41oF. Snow in the morning, but none of it really accumulated.
First thing in the morning we watered the Poinsettias and collected some cottony cushion scale from the infected Artemisia to feed to the Vadelia beetles. After that, we went to the nursery to start pruning roses. IPM has a plot at the nursery where they are conducting trials for blackspot resistance. I've done plenty of rose pruning at the Wellington BGs rose garden so it was familiar. Though I must say Ive never pruned in the snow before!
The roses are fairly young as the trial is only a year or two old. And for that reason the pruning was fairly easy, plenty of fresh healthy canes to work with. I pruned with the principles I learnt in Wellington; first pruning out dead diseased and dying (pruning 101), crossing and obviously weak or old canes; then pruning (ideally) the remaining 3-6 into a open vase form with buds facing outwards; then clearing out leaves and debris from around the crowns. In Wellington we would take the extra step to brush the crowns lightly with a stiff wire brush in order to clean them up and encourage budding. But we didn't have a wire brush so we skipped this step. Not crucial, and anyway, as noted the roses are relatively young and vigorous. And well, they're an IPM trial. Dare I say it, they're not meant to be well treated. I
Apart from being a tad cold, it was fun. I enjoy rose pruning. Especially when its not the 300 or so beds that Wellington has (Wellington does do a very good rose garden). The trial beds are much smaller and we got more than half done before lunch. We will finish the rest tomorrow morning.
In the arvo me and Carolyn collected samples from some fungus that are growing on one of the large copper beech on oak knoll. I had admired the tree before from a distance, but getting close you quickly realise that there is a lot of damage on the trunk, including a lot of carved graffitti... Its a shame because it is a beautiful speciman.
We also collected some samples from the main conservatory Poinsettia beds to send off and then did a bit more scouting for the arvo.
First thing in the morning we watered the Poinsettias and collected some cottony cushion scale from the infected Artemisia to feed to the Vadelia beetles. After that, we went to the nursery to start pruning roses. IPM has a plot at the nursery where they are conducting trials for blackspot resistance. I've done plenty of rose pruning at the Wellington BGs rose garden so it was familiar. Though I must say Ive never pruned in the snow before!
The roses are fairly young as the trial is only a year or two old. And for that reason the pruning was fairly easy, plenty of fresh healthy canes to work with. I pruned with the principles I learnt in Wellington; first pruning out dead diseased and dying (pruning 101), crossing and obviously weak or old canes; then pruning (ideally) the remaining 3-6 into a open vase form with buds facing outwards; then clearing out leaves and debris from around the crowns. In Wellington we would take the extra step to brush the crowns lightly with a stiff wire brush in order to clean them up and encourage budding. But we didn't have a wire brush so we skipped this step. Not crucial, and anyway, as noted the roses are relatively young and vigorous. And well, they're an IPM trial. Dare I say it, they're not meant to be well treated. I
Apart from being a tad cold, it was fun. I enjoy rose pruning. Especially when its not the 300 or so beds that Wellington has (Wellington does do a very good rose garden). The trial beds are much smaller and we got more than half done before lunch. We will finish the rest tomorrow morning.
In the arvo me and Carolyn collected samples from some fungus that are growing on one of the large copper beech on oak knoll. I had admired the tree before from a distance, but getting close you quickly realise that there is a lot of damage on the trunk, including a lot of carved graffitti... Its a shame because it is a beautiful speciman.
Friday, December 10, 2010
Snow! And finding new unidentified bugs...
Weather: High of 35oF. Snow flurries in the afternoon, but none of it stuck.
In the morning Carolyn and I picked up the compost tea buckets and checked the mouse traps in B1. Nothing caught... After that we scouted the other 14 house, which consists of five smaller houses containing a mixture of Tims ferns and Kats succulents in different climates. The main pests we found were soft brown scale and mealy bug. Keely also found two more unknown mealys... And I found a scale on the ferns that I wasn't sure about. I couldn't tell if it was alive or dead, and the male casings looked similar to bois duvel scale except no females were present. So add them to the list of unknown bugs. Ha.
After lunch I got a chance to look under the microscope at the unknowns. The scale on the fern turned out to be alive, and with a little research in "Scale insects of Pennsylvania greenhouses" (an old and rare book according to Mike), figured out that it is most likely Fern Scale, or Pinnaspis aspidistrae. http://www.entomology.umn.edu/cues/inter/inmine/Scalef.html
http://ipm.ncsu.edu/AG136/scale3.html
http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/ch195
The two unknown mealybugs are, well, still unknown. I couldn't find any likely candidates in any books, and haven't come across a key that I would be able to follow (they get very technical...). So theyll go in the fridge and Ill ask Mike when I next see him. I will try to get photos up of them.
In the morning Carolyn and I picked up the compost tea buckets and checked the mouse traps in B1. Nothing caught... After that we scouted the other 14 house, which consists of five smaller houses containing a mixture of Tims ferns and Kats succulents in different climates. The main pests we found were soft brown scale and mealy bug. Keely also found two more unknown mealys... And I found a scale on the ferns that I wasn't sure about. I couldn't tell if it was alive or dead, and the male casings looked similar to bois duvel scale except no females were present. So add them to the list of unknown bugs. Ha.
After lunch I got a chance to look under the microscope at the unknowns. The scale on the fern turned out to be alive, and with a little research in "Scale insects of Pennsylvania greenhouses" (an old and rare book according to Mike), figured out that it is most likely Fern Scale, or Pinnaspis aspidistrae. http://www.entomology.umn.edu/cues/inter/inmine/Scalef.html
http://ipm.ncsu.edu/AG136/scale3.html
http://edis.ifas.ufl.edu/ch195
The two unknown mealybugs are, well, still unknown. I couldn't find any likely candidates in any books, and haven't come across a key that I would be able to follow (they get very technical...). So theyll go in the fridge and Ill ask Mike when I next see him. I will try to get photos up of them.
Thursday, December 9, 2010
Tying wreaths and mulberry whitefly
Weather: high of 32oF, or 0oC! The first day Ive noticed where the expected high is 0.
In the morning me and Carolyn delivered compost tea to Mark at the Pierce Dupont house and also Mary in the potting shed. We didn't have to prepare anymore as none is needed tomorrow.
At 9 we went to a wreath making class with Mary Allinson. I hadnt made a wreath before, so it was fun to do a learning session about them. Wreaths, and for that matter all christmas decorations, seem to be a very northern hemisphere tradition. I cant really remember too many people making them in NZ. But well, Christmas in NZ is in the summer, and wreaths and evergreen decorations do fit more brightening up a winter landscape.
Wreaths in concept are easy to make, simplytwiring evergreen foliage and decorations to a frame. But like any floral arrangment, there is a huge range of combinations, styles, and ways of making them. We made 12 inch diameter wreaths, which are quite small. the first step is to attach your wire to the frame, and then lay a bunch of greenery onto the frame and attach it to the frame by wrapping the wire around. It is then simply a matter of adding overlapping bunchs of greenery. I used a combination of white pine, blue spruce and douglas fir as my backing. After your done with the backing you can add accents and decorations such as bows. I used a variegated american holly and some winterberry holly as accents, and didn't add and bows or bells and whistles. I was pleases with the end result, with my only criticism being the the winterberry holly made it look a little similar to the boxes I made for Christmas which I'm sick of. Still, it was a fun to make. Other people made all sorts of combinations, and they all looked good. It is definitely a skill that I will take with me, I would love to do Christmas displays somewhere like the Wellington Botanic gardens.
Heres some photos
After lunch Keely and I went and scouted the Pierce Du Pont house. It hasn't been scouted in awhile! There was lots of two spotted spider mite, mealy bug and also a bunch of thrips on the Holly Fern. And we also found two new unidentified... scales? One lot on the underside of some Azalea leaves, Small (3mm), green, flat oval disks with a waxy fringe. And then another lot on the underside of a Chamaedorea, small (2mm), black with an white waxy coating.
When we got back we asked Mike about the bugs. His hint was, "its not a scale". After a bit of guess work we came to whitefly. And after we consulted a book we worked out that the black 'scale' was mulberry whitefly. Tetraleurodes mori, bugguide, Whitefly. As The first 'scale' remains unidentified, but it is most likely another species of whitefly. I will try to get photos, though it could be difficult.
In the morning me and Carolyn delivered compost tea to Mark at the Pierce Dupont house and also Mary in the potting shed. We didn't have to prepare anymore as none is needed tomorrow.
At 9 we went to a wreath making class with Mary Allinson. I hadnt made a wreath before, so it was fun to do a learning session about them. Wreaths, and for that matter all christmas decorations, seem to be a very northern hemisphere tradition. I cant really remember too many people making them in NZ. But well, Christmas in NZ is in the summer, and wreaths and evergreen decorations do fit more brightening up a winter landscape.
Wreaths in concept are easy to make, simplytwiring evergreen foliage and decorations to a frame. But like any floral arrangment, there is a huge range of combinations, styles, and ways of making them. We made 12 inch diameter wreaths, which are quite small. the first step is to attach your wire to the frame, and then lay a bunch of greenery onto the frame and attach it to the frame by wrapping the wire around. It is then simply a matter of adding overlapping bunchs of greenery. I used a combination of white pine, blue spruce and douglas fir as my backing. After your done with the backing you can add accents and decorations such as bows. I used a variegated american holly and some winterberry holly as accents, and didn't add and bows or bells and whistles. I was pleases with the end result, with my only criticism being the the winterberry holly made it look a little similar to the boxes I made for Christmas which I'm sick of. Still, it was a fun to make. Other people made all sorts of combinations, and they all looked good. It is definitely a skill that I will take with me, I would love to do Christmas displays somewhere like the Wellington Botanic gardens.
Heres some photos
After lunch Keely and I went and scouted the Pierce Du Pont house. It hasn't been scouted in awhile! There was lots of two spotted spider mite, mealy bug and also a bunch of thrips on the Holly Fern. And we also found two new unidentified... scales? One lot on the underside of some Azalea leaves, Small (3mm), green, flat oval disks with a waxy fringe. And then another lot on the underside of a Chamaedorea, small (2mm), black with an white waxy coating.
When we got back we asked Mike about the bugs. His hint was, "its not a scale". After a bit of guess work we came to whitefly. And after we consulted a book we worked out that the black 'scale' was mulberry whitefly. Tetraleurodes mori, bugguide, Whitefly. As The first 'scale' remains unidentified, but it is most likely another species of whitefly. I will try to get photos, though it could be difficult.
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