Tag: horticulture

January 15, 2012 Flowers & Nursery, Gardening, General Ag News and Notes Post a Comment

All about Palms with William Merwin and Leland Miyano

MALP Educational Meeting—Free to the public

Date: Tuesday January 24, 2012
Place: Maui Community Service Bldg next to CTHAR Extension Services (Map) on the UH Maui campus.
Time: Pupus will be served at 6:30 pm and the talk will begin at 7:00.

On January 24th MALP is proud to host guest speakers: William Merwin and Leland Miyano as they share with us their vast combined knowledge about palms. Their talk will include information on Hawaii’s palms, palm growth habits and conservation efforts.

William Merwin, who has twice won the Pulitzer Prize for poetry and is the recent US Poet Laureate, has lived and gardened on Maui for over 30 years. Most of his focus has been on cultivating palms from around the world. He has gathered approximately 800 different species of palms, creating a truly unique palm jungle within the rainforest of Maui’s north shore. His enduring gardening passion along with his legacy of being a successful poet will be preserved with the recently created “The Merwin Conservancy“.

Leland Miyano, a good friend of Merwin, is an artist, landscape designer and author from Oahu. Leland has years of experience working with native palms throughout Hawaii and has worked extensively with many highly respected people in the field of horticulture and design. Leland’s numerous books include: Hawaii’s Beautiful Tree’s and Hawaii, A Floral Paradise. Leland’s own 1-acre garden in Kahalu’u is renown for its design and features numerous palms.

CLICK HERE for full information on this truly notable event.

January 2, 2012 General Ag News and Notes Post a Comment

The bright sparks of electro-horticulture

Ever since Benjamin Franklin got his knuckles burned when flying a kite in a thunderstorm, many scientists — and even more quacks — have been curious about the possibilities of what has been called electro-horticulture.

The logic is inescapable — most things react in some way to an electric current. Why shouldn’t plants react too, and perhaps grow better/faster/bigger?

While I’m not prepared to speak authoritatively on this subject in general, I have had a bit of experience with one aspect of electro-horticulture: the use of electric lights — fluorescent lights to be precise — in a contraption intended to start seedlings indoors. It had three shelves illuminated by bulbs casting a special kind of light (I’m not sure how special it really was) and provided space for a couple of dozen seed trays. At the time I was working on the 29th floor of an office building, and inevitably the contraption ended up in the corridor outside the ladies’ room, which was the only place I could find to put it.

The plants didn’t seem to mind. In fact, under the benevolent rays of the Gro-Lux, watered from time to time and admired by most of my fellow office workers as they passed by, the infant courgettes, tomatoes, snapdragons and the rest thrived. If they resented the low status of their situation, they could at least look forward to being transplanted.

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May 4, 2011 General Ag News and Notes Post a Comment

Claude Monet’s garden at Giverny hires English gardener

An English gardener has landed one of the most prestigious jobs in French horticulture. James Priest, 53, has been appointed head gardener at Giverny in Normandy, the former home of the Impressionist artist Claude Monet, who painted his waterlilies series there.

The appointment means that Priest, from Maghull, Merseyside, becomes a direct successor to Monet, who looked after every aspect of the garden until his death in 1926.

Priest, who qualified at the Royal Botanical Gardens in Kew, said: “Monet is the factor that brings everyone here. It’s an Alice in Wonderland Monet world and you have to capture the imagination of all these nationalities who visit. Monet would paint in layers and I think he made his garden in the same way.”

Mr Priest takes over from Gilbert Vahe, the head gardener who was largely responsible for restoring the garden in the late 1970s from an overgrown wilderness to its former glory.

Priest was hired initially for three years but has ended up staying for 17. He will take over on 1 June. He first saw the work of the Impressionists when he visited Paris as an 18-year-old student “I like art with emotion. I work a lot on emotions; my gardens must speak to people of all nationalities.”

Monet started to create his flower-filled garden when he moved to Giverny in 1883, refining it over 43 years.

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