>>the merryweathers pass it along

Every so often, the Merryweathers get together and pass along a few plants--herbs, mostly, but they definitely don't limit themselves. You'll find just about every kind of trade going on in the garden of the Merryweather House (which, as you may remember, was given to the Merryweathers by their esteemed founder, many years ago.)

Let me give you an example. Dolly Sanders had extra daylilies this year (so many, she was putting them into salads and soups), but her butterfly weed had disappeared and she desperately needed more. Miss King's butterfly weed had not only survived the winter, but had prospered--what she hungered for was a dozen dayliles to control the erosion on the slope at the rear of her yard. (She also coveted Dolly's recipe for daylily bud saute.) It didn't take a video dating service to put these two needy people together. They found one another at the passalong.

Or say you're in the market for perennials. Somebody's bound to have too much of exactly what you're lacking: a pot of yarrow, a fat clump of echinacea, or sage, rosemary, or Mexican marigold mint (the South's substitute for tarragon--plus, it has a perky yellow blossom). And lots of people bring seeds to trade: coreopsis, cypress vine, sunflower. Whatever you've got, somebody wants, and vice versa.

But nobody wants a bully. For instance, one year Pansy Pride got some horsetail from an unidentified passalonger. She put it in the corner beside her goldfish pond and the next week, the entire pond was hip-deep in horsetail and her goldfish had flapped on over to her neighbor's pool. And even nicely-mannered plants have latent bully tendencies. Liberate that pretty little clump of mint under the hose connection in the back yard and you've got trouble. Sink it in a pot into the ground, and it will behave itself. (This doesn't mean you can't bring horsetail or mint to the plant passalong--just label it "bully," and put everyone on notice.)

The Merryweathers have been trading plants for long enough to know all the ins and outs, so they've come up with five important rules for a civil Passalong.

1. Your plant must come in a proper container. Do not bring it in a paper bag, a shoe box, a paper napkin, or a bucket with a rusted-out bottom. Cowboy boots are okay.
2. If you put it in a pot and call it a plant, it has to have roots. If it doesn't have roots, put it in a glass, add water, and call it a cutting.
3. Leave your aphids home alone. Nobody needs 'em. (You can bring your ladybugs, though.)
4. It is not okay to bring 10 dinky garlic cloves and take home 5 pots of basil and 5 rosemary plants.
5. Bring fresh seeds, not seeds you got from your mother-in-law summer before last. The fair exchange is 25 seeds for one plant, not 5. (You know who you are.)
6. Label everything. Put your name on it. Your real name.

A Killer Passalong Plant. Passalong plants are wonderful fun, even when you somehow lose the label. Here's a photo of a great passalong plant that our friend Chelsie Vandaveer, of Killerplants.com, passed along to us earlier this spring. It came as a tuber, about the size of a cup and with a texture like a loofa, sort of. It's growing up to be a Texas-sized plant.

Unfortunately, one of us (we won't point any fingers, but her initials are RW) lost the label. So we had to email Chelsie for the plant's name, which turns out to be Amorphophallus konjac (easier names: snake palm, devil's tongue, elephant-foot yam). Here's Chelsie's page about this plant, which grows in her garden.

Chelsie reports that our plant is the daughter of her plant (isn't that cool?) and that our plant's grandmother lives in the Selby Botanical Garden in Sarasota FL. Three generations of passalong snake palms! And if you want to solve the mystery behind the name Amorphophallus (clue: it's a visual thing), just click on the link at the bottom of Chelsie's page and study the photos. Closely. You'll get it.

And oh, yes, it's an herb. The vegetable fiber of the tuber (which can swell up to 17 times its original volume when it's soaked in water)is being studied as a possible treatment for obesity, diabetes, and high cholesterol. Here's the low-down.

What's your favorite passalong plant tale? What passalong plant still makes you smile when you remember it? A rose bush from your great-grandmother? Hollyhock seeds from your college roommate who now lives in Nova Scotia? A "slip" stuck into in a soda-pop bottle? Plants have stories. Please share yours!

Read about: Passalong Plants, by Steve Bender and Felder Rushing

Comments

[Marti]

Growing up in the central valley of California, passalongs were taken for granted in our little farming town. I lived in town not on a farm but my motherr and father grew herbs, roses, sweet peas, you name it, they grew it. Our town had many Italians and Portuguese as well as a few immigrants from Spain, i.e. my parents and aunt and uncle. They formed their own version of The Merryweathers and once every three months, a day was chosen to share slips,cuttings,recipes and good food.

Passalongs are so worthwhile but difficult to do when you have purposefully chosen to be "rootless" for the next several years. Since I have chosen to live in different parts of the USA over the next several years,the only passalongs I have are macadamia nuts brought with me to Texas from Maui by way of Washington. Darn it; I should have done my homework and I bet the Merryweathers could have helped me. Did a little research on the web and found that planting seeds (the nuts) is not the best way to grow a macadamia. "Macadamias are easily grown from seed, but the seedlings may take 8 to 12 years to bear a crop and the quality of the nuts is unpredictable." Now when we just about have decided that the hill country of Texas is really starting to suit us and we may be here for quite a long spell, I learn that my macadamia nuts probably will make lousy trees...oh well, I hear tell that Pecans are the state tree...maybe the Merryweathes can tell me how to go about starting my very own orchard!

Digging in the dirt, Marti

[Pam]

A few years ago China offered some of her Love Lies Bleeding seeds to go along with her book "Love Lies Bleeding." I planted those little seeds, and for years Love Lies Bleeding plants would pop up anywhere they wanted to in my garden - and I would let the plants stay where they grew. I still have the seed package with some of the seeds.

My Mom and I passalong plants to each other, but my favorite passalong story is when I gave my Mom some chives from my garden this spring. These chives were originally from part of a plant that was in her garden. So part of a part of her chives have made it "home" again! That made her really happy!

CHINA REPLIES: What a treat to hear about those seeds, Pam! When Susan and I were making up those little seed envelopes way back in 1997, we wondered where the plants would find homes. Glad they've flourished in your garden--and aren't they fun to grow? And dried, they make really interesting wreath and swag accents.

[Dani G.]

I would kill for some Canadian Bloodroot. ;) I have pounds of Cosmos seed in exchange. I got my first seeds from a community garden plot some years ago, have sent them to all my friends (put them in little painted film canisters with a loop glued to the top and called them Christmas ornamanets), and I'm quite sure they'll be declared an invasive weed after I leave this little High Plains town where bluegrass and organophosphates rule! I love them, though, and have even had a Queen of Cosmos Coronation ceremony as the Little Folk buzzed around the blossoms. Who needs television? ;D

[Linda Mandeville]

My favorite passalong story comes from many years ago when my children were little. The topic of cotton came up, and like most city kids they had no idea where cotton came from. Knowing I was determined to show them, my step-father found some bolls of cotton out in the country and gave them to me. About the same time, a man in our church heard about my cotton growing adventure and gave me seeds for "brown cotton" which we also planted. Because of the great black clay dirt and hot Texas sun, I had the prettiest cotton I bet anyone ever had growing in their flower bed!

[Marti]

China,

I just had to share a very nice thing from this morning; I received a passalong from a neighbor... This neighbor has four grand rosemary bushes in her front yard that I have so admired on my morning walks. Well, this morning she was in her yard and I stopped and chatted with her. Yup, before I knew it she had given me about a dozen cuttings and I will plant them out in my front yard later in the cool of this evening. I have a big pot of rosemary, the trailing kind growing by my front door but these passalongs are the upright kind. Now when my neighbor takes her walks, she likes to walk in the evenings,she will be able to see her gift of rosemary growing in my garden.

Marti

CHINA REPLIES:
Marti, Susan and I have a suggestion for those cuttings. Take a 3-liter soft drink bottle, and punch 5-6 holes in the bottom with a hot ice-pick. (We heat ours in the burner of our gas stove.) Slice the bottle in half across the middle with a sharp knife, and fill the bottom half with a light-weight rooting medium: Perlite or something of the sort. Dampen the medium and punch enough holes for your cuttings (we use a chopstick). Strip the lower leaves off the cuttings, dip them in a rooting compound, and stick them into the holes. Tamp down the medium. Put the top half on (sometimes we have to cut 1" slits in the bottom edge, to make it easy to slip on)--now you have a mini-greenhouse!

Screw on the lid for now. Water just enough to keep the cuttings moist, and take off the lid when necessary to ventilate. We keep our mini-greenhouses on the kitchen windowsill. Sometimes we have five or six.

Let us know how it works. And how nice of your neighbor to pass along that rosemary!

[Marti]

Thanks China and Susan. I didn't check blogs until this morning so we had already planted our rosemary passalongs last night. Our neighbor came over and even brought us some perlite which we did have. I will wait until the rosemary takes hold and grows and next year, I will try your very good suggestion for making my own mini-greenhouses. As we got to chatting, she spotted the thyme that I have growing in my Kokopelli pot and I offered her some cuttings so the passalong tradition is alive and well in my little neck of the Texas woods.

For herbal sharing, Marti

[Robin]

China,

I wanted to tell about my passalong African violet from my grandmother. She had some miniature African violets and a larger plant with small purple blooms that she had had for many years. When she and my grandfather sold their house and moved to a retirement community she gave me the larger plant since they were downsizing. My grandparents passed away within 18 months of each other and have been gone now since 2000/2001, but that African violet lives on. I have started at least 8 other plants from the "momma". Some, including the momma,live in my office and the rest at home. My daughter got married earlier this year. She and her husband are working on their house and recently found out they are expecting a daughter, my first grandchild. When they get settled in their new home one of the first housewarming gifts from me will be one of the African violets that came from her great-grandma. Hopefully, one day, my granddaughter will have a passalong African violet in her home too. --Robin

SUSAN WRITES: Robin, what a wonderful story! My mother loved African Violets, too. When she was in the nursing home in her last years, she had her windowsill lined with the pots. I would rotate them, bringing the plants to my house for some R&R when they got a little stressed, and taking her those that had recuperated. They were a great source of joy for her.

I hope your daughter and granddaughter will inherit your love for plants, as well as that African violet!

[Michele Robarge]

I need good advice on cutting back lavender plants. I planted some 5 years ago in my rose garden to keep the afids(sp) away, it works. But now the lavenders are overtaking the roses. Help..I'm on the prairie in the Pacific NW. Thanks. MicheleR

[Meredith]

My aunt passed along two Veichenbleu rose bushes from her garden. They were so beautiful at my last house. When I met the new owners at the closing, I knew they would not appreciate them. Shhhh! I dug them up by the moonlight and put them in two Hefty bags to take to the new house, where they thrived all over again.

Good thing I did--last time I drove by, those people had mowed down ALL the perennial beds, too.

[Becky]

Just thought I'd share something I'd never heard until I married my husband. He says you should never say "Thank You" when given a plant. "I appreciate this" or "What a great gift" are fine, but "Thank You" guarantees you a dead plant! He says this was passed on by his Grandmother. I always appreciate my pass-along plants, but I have to find creative ways to express my gratitude!

SUSAN REPLIES: Mmmmm, interesting! Maybe this goes along with the old saying in England, "Stolen plants always fare better," the idea being that you should pinch a cutting or dig up a root when your neighbor wasn't looking. Beatrix Potter mentions this in one of her letters.

[Aileen]

What a very interesting article! The A. konjac plant is considered a health food in Japan. The roots are processed into konnyaku, a solid, jelly-like patty or thin capellini like noodles. It can be cut into various shapes and sizes and have very little flavor and no calories. It's often put into stews and soups in Japan. Recently, they've been incorporated into "Tofu Noodles" you might see in the grocery store. I never thought of growing it myself, but I have no clue how to process the roots to eat it anyway.

A friend of mine also told me about the "Thank you" being a death sentence to gift plants. The chocolate mint I gave him did indeed die, but I fault his black thumbs (he warned me about them) rather than the (lack of the) "thank you."

I have some coral bells in a pot right now that I did say thank you for this summer. A co-worker wanted to get rid of them because they were taking over her yard. They are only now producing flowers, but it's bright, lovely variegated foliage made up for that anyway.