The stories of plants

Posted on by andy.winfield

Breadfruit
At the Botanic Garden we have educational visits from all age ranges and all subjects. Primary school children come to learn about the very basics of plants, what they need to grow and what they do to survive; secondary schools come to learn about plants and what it is to run a business like this; sixth form art students can often be seen sitting around the Garden. The University brings a diverse selection of faculties to  the Garden;  the Biologists come and have complex tours based on evolution and adaptation; the School of Medicine will be using the Garden more in the future with the angle of plant’s role in medicine; the Philosophy students visit each year and have a tour before sitting next to a favoured plant and writing their thoughts.
This week we have a visit from the School of Geography who would like a tour in the context of plants and colonialism, so I’ve been doing some reading. This is a fascinating subject and laced with repercussions that we still feel today; the early Botanic Gardens have a lot to answer for. I’ve read about cotton which was one of the main industries that funded British colonialism, to sugar, rubber, quinine and tea which all were utilised from the plants of distant lands and usually involved great human tragedy. One of the most compelling stories is that of Captain Bligh and his ship The Bounty. The 229th anniversary of the famous mutiny is just around the corner, April 28th; so its worth retelling the tale.

Captain Bligh was under instructions from Sir Joseph Banks, a renowned botanist and plant hunter who took part in James Cook’s voyage to Australia and named Botany Bay. Banks had the idea that a cheap and nutritious food he had come across in Tahiti could be used to feed slaves working on the sugar plantations of the Caribbean. This plant was called the bread fruit (Artocarpus altilis) due to the high carbohydrate and fibre content; it is also easy to grow and high yielding. Bligh set off with over a thousand plants and headed for a colonial Botanic Garden on the Island of St Vincent. His crew mutinied, and he was set adrift on a lifeboat with 18 of his crew and little provisions before making an astounding 3,618-mile voyage to Timor and safety. His reward, another go at the breadfruit mission. In his second attempt he made it through storms and 27,000 miles to the Caribbean with over 600 of seedlings which were grown on in the Botanic Garden.
Captain Bligh
In the end, the slaves on the plantations made a stand against being made to eat the bland breadfruit for every meal, so it was fed to pigs for the next 40 years. Today it is a staple of the Jamaican diet and is beginning to be viewed as a super food. The St Vincent Botanic Garden still exists, and the cruel echoes of slavery and colonialism are still reverberating in the 21stcentury.
Finding the stories in plants is one of the pleasures of working in a Botanic Garden, and being able to use plants to illustrate history, medicine, philosophy to students and young people is what we’re all about now; that and conserving rare and threatened species while communicating our rich and varied relationship with plants.

Andy Winfield

St Vincent Botanic Garden in 1825

The Botanic Garden community

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Pink wire flamingos on site
for this year’s event.

Easter sees one of our biggest events of the year, the Sculpture Festival, come around again. This is a lot of work to put on but an occasion that we all enjoy very much; the Garden lends itself well to sculpture and has such diverse displays that there is a perfect place for any piece of work. Dinosaurs in the evolution dell, a barn owl under the old oaks and metal flowers among the story of flowering plants; it’s good fun helping the artists place each work.
Over the weekend we have a large number of visitors enjoying the Garden, and this is what working in a place like this is all about. I get a bit misty eyed when I see people walking amongst the Mediterranean flora with classic stone sculptures placed amongst the foliage because I remember barrowing the soil to create the slope; crowbarring the huge stones up the bank; digging in sand and chippings to create the Mediterranean soil and planting the olives, rosemary, lavender that soaks
Me when the Garden was mud!

up the south facing sunshine. Seeing the people of Bristol and beyond pointing, smelling the plants and taking selfies amongst the statues makes all the development years worthwhile because this Garden is for people to get something out of, whether its mind nourishment, peacefulness, somewhere to take the kids or they just like gardens.

On the weekend of the event there is just one paid member of staff on site and a multitude of volunteers. Volunteers for car parking, stewarding, refreshments, guiding, taking payment on the gate and volunteers for overseeing volunteers. Considering that last year we had over 4000 people at the event this is remarkable. Without volunteers this Botanic Garden would still be the pile of mud that I was barrowing ten years ago to create the
Sculpture in the Med.

Mediterranean display. They are brilliant, from a range of backgrounds and different areas of Bristol all brought together because they love plants. Working in an environment like this during an event like the Easter Sculpture festival gives me an appreciation of the best of humanity. There is a lot to bring us down on the news and in papers, but a trip to the Garden over Easter will show what can be achieved with a bit of passion and goodwill; a Botanic Garden community thriving next to a creative skill with ceramics, wood, metal, willow and glass.

The event runs from Good Friday until Easter Monday, check our website for full details.

by Andy Winfield

The Beast from the East

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It’s colder here in the UK than its been for a number of years, but probably not as cold as the rest of Europe as the so called ‘Beast from the East’ whips across the land. Only last week I was thinking that we’d made it through winter and the only way was spring now; primulas were flowering, blossom buds were swelling and the garden birds were flirting. Now they’re all in a frozen stasis waiting for this period of cold to end, and it will.
One thing that I have learnt in my years as a gardener is to try and enjoy this unpredictability. We often have volunteers who come from warmer countries and I’ll always remember our Columbian volunteer, Bertha. During a long cold, dark and wet spell she told me that she loved the climate here. She came from an equatorial region of Columbia and said that the sun rose at six, went down at six and the weather was either hot or hot and raining; she thought this was boring compared to here. I also remember Tom who worked here a number of years ago and had spent years travelling every continent in many different climates. I used to ask him where his favourite place was and he always replied, Somerset. He said its never extremely hot or extremely cold, there are no nasty poisonous beasts or dangers of fire, earthquakes, tropical storms or ten feet of snow. I think he’s right. We are never happier than lamenting our unpredictable weather in the UK, but I’ve learnt from the Australian who loves the balmy 10pm sunsets to the Brazilian who enjoys the cold dark winters that there is a special quality to this variation. 

This cold spell will end, the blossom will come out and the birds will start singing again. Spring is still coming.

 by Andy Winfield

The wacky, wonderful world of orchids.

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By Susan Stephens

According to a report by the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew in 2016, there are around 391,000 species of plants in the world and around 94% of these are flowering plants. Plants are grouped in families based on their physical and genetic characteristics. One of the largest flowering plant families is the Orchidaceae, or Orchid family with around 28,000 species, so around 10% of all flowering plant species. Recent DNA research shows that at over 90 million years old, orchids are amongst the most ancient of the flowering plant families.

Orchids can be found throughout the world in every type of habitat and climatic zone apart from the

Coelygene cristata

very driest deserts and glaciers, and on every continent except Antarctica. The majority of orchids are found in the tropics of Asia, South America and Central America and new species are constantly being discovered, particularly in these areas. Their tiny, dust like seed that has enables orchids to disperse and travel great distances, carried on the wind across oceans and continents to colonise the world. The majority of these tropical and sub tropical orchids are epiphytes and grow anchored to trees. They are not parasitic and so do not feed upon the tree but absorb water and nutrients from the rain, air and other debris that collects nearby with the aid of their aerial roots; the tree to enables them to reach higher elevations and so have more access to sun and air. An example of epiphytes you can see in the Garden is the Dendrobium; Dendrobium, derives from the Greek dendron meaning tree and bios meaning life. It literally means “one who lives on trees” or essentially epiphyte.

Dactylorhiza fuchsii

Terrestrial orchids grow on the ground and can be found in places as diverse as the hot, dry Australian deserts to the shade of temperate woodlands. They are found in areas of Russia extending to the very edge of the Arctic Circle. All of the 52 or so species of orchid found in the UK are terrestrial orchids including Ophrys apifera (the bee orchid) and Dactylorhiza fuchsii (the common spotted orchid).

Lithophytes are somewhere between the epiphytes and terrestrials in that they make their homes on rocky cliff faces. They obtain their nutrients and water in a similar way to epiphytes relying upon regular mists and rain for moisture. Extra moisture is obtained from roots that meander and penetrate into the crevices in the rocks. Some species of Paphiopedilum and Pleiones are lithophytes.

Orchids use a wide range of inventive methods to attract pollinators. Most orchids rely on specific

Ophrys apifera, the
bee orchid

pollinators and in most cases orchid and pollinator have evolved together. Nectar is the main reward to entice pollinators but also use of colour, shape, fragrance and sometimes mimicry is applied. Orchids attracting butterflies and hummingbirds are brightly coloured but not necessarily fragrant while orchids which wish to attract moths and night flying insects are usually white or green and very fragrant at night. The Bulbophyllum species of orchid are brown or fleshy red and are foul smelling to attract the flies which pollinate them. Some orchids deceive their pollinators by mimicking the appearance and scents produced by female insects. The male insect will attempt to mate with the false female and in the process, the orchid deposits pollen on the insects head which he carries to the next flower.

The orchid family is probably one of the most important plant families from a horticultural point of view and are grown for the amazing variety

and beauty of their flowers. Enthusiasts will pay thousands of pounds for a rare specimen. Otherwise, considering the size of the family, orchids have very few commercial uses. The only commercially important product

Vanilla planifolia

derived from orchids is vanilla which is used for flavouring foods, drinks and cosmetics. Most vanilla is produced from one species, Vanilla planifolia. The plant is a climbing vine form of orchid native to Central and South America. Vanilla production today is mainly in Madagascar which is the largest producer of vanilla beans. However the island lacks the plant’s pollinating bee species so the flowers must be hand pollinated.
The underground tubers of a terrestrial orchid, usually Orchis mascula (early purple orchid) are ground to a powder and used for cooking, such as in the hot beverage salep or in the Turkish frozen treat dondurma. Traditional Chinese medicine uses orchids extensively for combating various different ailments. Of the thousands of species of orchids known to us, about 50 orchid species are used in Chinese herbal medications.

Pleione formosiana

Here at the garden we have a large display of around 75 different species of orchids mainly in the sub tropical and tropical glasshouse. These include epiphytes such as Coelogyne and Dendrobiumspecies many of which are displayed on our fake but very realistic trees in an effort to replicate their natural habitats. There are also many terrestial orchids displayed in pots in the sub tropical glasshouse

including Stenoglottis longifolia with it’s spikes of many small, lilac, speckled flowers and Paphiopedilumspecies often known as slipper orchids because of it’s pouch like lip. The amazing twining vines of Vanilla planifolium can be found in the tropical glasshouse. Outside in the Chinese Herb Garden, terrestial orchid Pleione are displayed in the summer and the Dactylorhiza fuchsii can be seen growing beside the lake. Whatever time of year you visit the garden you will always find orchids in flower in the tropical and sub tropical glasshouses. Right now Coelogyne cristata, an epiphytic orchid from the cool monsoon forests of the Himalayas, is covered in cascades of brilliant white flowers with a bright yellow centre and wavy petals. It has rounded pseudobulbs and the light scent of jasmine. Another Coelogyne flowering in the sub tropical glasshouse at the moment is Coelogyne flaccida with it’s long racemes of creamy white flowers with yellow and brown markings. It has a sweet, light scent and cone shaped pseudobulbs which resemble bananas. The Dendrochilum glumaceum which is native to the Phillipines, is putting on a fantastic display with masses of long feathery pendulous spikes containing two rows of small pure white flowers with a yellow lip and smelling of sweet hay.

Dendrochilum glumaceum

Why the complicated plant names? Here’s why…

Posted on by andy.winfield
By Nicola ‘Froggie’ Rathbone

I studied Latin at Secondary school. Not because I wanted to but because I had to at the time. Bam bas bat bamus batis bant. For some reason this has stuck in my head, as has ego sum (I am ) and salve magistra (greetings teacher). I never thought it would be of use to me until I became a gardener. It has been of great help in learning and more about plants and I am going to try and explain why and how you too can discover more about plants.


To start with. It’s not just Latin you will come across but Greek and Arabic derived words too. I am asked regularly, why can we not just use the common names? Why, because it helps to avoid confusion. We need a universal name, one it will be known by, the world over and then anyone, anywhere will know just which plant is being referred to. Take for example, the bluebell. We all know what it looks like in England, right? The Greek/Latin name is Hyacinthoides-non-scripta (Gobbledeygook you may think!) Cross into Scotland and if you asked to see a bluebell you may be directed to a Campanula rotundifolia (which the English would call the harebell). Fly over to North America and the bluebell is now Mertensia virginiana and in Australia, bluebell has got to be Sollya heterophylla. That’s four different plants with the same common name. Now that’s confusing.

Back to the Latin/Greek/Arabic derived names.  Think of them as providing

Bluebells…

you with more information about the plant. Clues as to which country the plant came from or perhaps the first person to see it growing in the wild. The name often describes the appearance of the leaves and the flowers and the habitat you would need to replicate if you want to grow it in your garden. The names may feature characters and narrate stories from Greek mythology and honour people of note through history.  Many English words are derived from Latin, Greek and Arabic and you will be surprised at how much you can actually understand. Now, back to bluebell. The English one. Hyacinthoides non-scripta. Here’s your challenge if you have time and want to know more and here’s a clue. Hyacinthus was a tragic Spartan prince and ‘non scripta’ means no writing . The rest of the story and how the English bluebell got this name is on the internet or in the library. If you would rather not and do not have time then when you next explore the garden look out for the following used to describe plants in some way.


Victoria amazonica

Geographical speaking, these describe where the plant originated from.

amazonica-of the Amazon basin (Victoria amazonica) the  giant waterlily and in honour of Queen Victoria
arabica -of Arabia (Coffea arabica) coffee
bristoliensis-of Bristol (Sorbus bristoliensis) Bristolian whitebeam
The habitat where the plant was grow in the wild.
maritima -by the sea (Crambe maritima) sea kale
montana -of mountains (Hypericum montanum)
sylvatica-of woods (Fagus sylvatica) beech
The growth habit of the plant.
arboreum-tree like (Aeonium arboreum ‘Swartzkopf’)
fastigiata -fastigiate/erect (Taxus baccata ‘Fastigiata’) upright yew
procumbens -procumbent/creeping (Fuchsia procumbens)
The leaves of Acer palmatum on
Ophiopogon planiscapus ‘Nigrescens’

Describe the leaf shape and the edge of the leaf. Also the size, texture and colour. The Latin phylla(um)(us) and folia(ium)(ius) mean leaf.

microphylla-small leaved (Fuchsia microphylla)
palmatum-palm shaped (Acer palmatum)
trifoliata-3 parts to leaf (Menyanthes trifoliata) bogbean
Describe the flower shape, size, colour and flowering time. The Latin flora(um)(us) means flower.
grandiflora-large flowered (Magnolia grandiflora)
stellata-starry (Magnolia stellata)
vernus  -spring flowering (Lathyrus vernus) 
Describes the colour of  leaves, flowers, wood.
nigrescens-black (Opiopogon planiscapus ‘Nigrescens’) black lily turf
purpureus-purple (Salvia officinalis ‘Purpureus’) purple leaved sage
sanguineum-blood red (Geranium sanguineum) bloody cranesbill
Describe scent and aroma of leaves, flowers, bark:-
citriodora-lemon scented (Aloysia citriodora) lemon verbena
fragrantissima-most fragrant (Lonicera x fragrantissima) honeysuckle
odoratus-sweet smelling (Lathyrus odoratus) sweet pea
Describe plants that have flowers or leaves that look like those of other plants:-
liliiflora-lily flowered (Magnolia liliiflora)
pseudoplatanus  -false plane (Acer pseudoplatanus) sycamore tree
tulipifera-tulip like (Liriodendron  tulipifera) tulip tree
Commemorative:-Named after botanists, plant hunters and for others, such as family members.
hookeriana– after Sir Joseph Hooker (Sarcococca hookeriana)
whiteana – after James Walter white (Sorbus whiteana)
Banksia– after Sir Joseph Banks (Banksia marginata)
Helleborus x hybridus

Miscellaneous descriptions:-

communis-common (Juniperus communis) juniper
hybrida-hybrid  (Helleborus x hybridus)
officinale-of the shop, herbal (Sachorum officinale) sugarcane
sativa-sown, planted or cultivated (Eruca sativa) rocket
vulgare-common  (Oreganum vulgare) common oregano or marjoram

Incidentally on your visit to the garden you will find that in the garden herbal displays, the plants tend to be also labelled with the common names, as they are known in their country of origin. Not all plants have a common name as we know it. Even in this text there are plants that do not have a common name and maybe you could suggest a few after visiting the garden!  If you are interested then search out a copy of the little black book, Plant Names Simplified, Botanical Latin by WT Stearn and the glossary of a copy of Hillier’s Manual of Trees and Shrubs. Or any of the other good books out there on plant names.
  
Hope to see you soon,

Froggie

Scent and spring promise

Posted on by andy.winfield
The garden has taken a battering over the last few weeks with high winds and the heavy soil saturating rain has made gardening difficult. Despite it all there is interest with flower, colour and scent now and the promise of it in the next few weeks.
One of my favourites and a true signpost of January/February is the winter aconite (Eranthis 

Eranthus hymalis

hymalis); in a few weeks it will dot the borders with tiny butter yellow flowers. Growing naturally in deciduous woodland, this plant flowers before the leaves on trees shade out the forest floor and as the sun strengthens as it gets higher in the sky.


In the phylogeny display a small plant with a big name, Scilla mischenkoana ‘tubergentana’, is flowering its little flowers. Native to Southern Russia and Iran this plant can grow in a variety of sites, shade or full sun, drought tolerant and very tough, just plant it where you’ll be able to see!


Daphne bholua ‘Jacqueline Postill’ is in full flower, you smell it before you see it as its heavy perfume drifts on the air a surprising distance. Native to Nepal you can imagine how the scent travels across the mountains to attract the elusive pollinators.
Daphne bholua ‘Jacqueline Postill’


In the Mediterranean display the Corsican hellebore (Helleborus argutifolius) is in full flower and the handsome foliage gives good structure to a winter border.  It grows all over Corsica and Sardinia but unusually has never made it onto the mainland of France or Italy.

Paphiopedalum
In the glasshouses orchids are flowering. Laelia anceps from Central America leans down from the corky trees and on the benches the hay scented orchid (Dendrobium glumaceum) and Venus slipper orchid (Paphiopedalum) are in full bloom.
As the weeks go by at this time of year more and more flower appears, the birds become excitable as do the bees and spring is around the corner and in our step.

by Andy Winfield

Hay scented orchid

Laelia anceps


Christmas and the Botanic Garden

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By
Andy Winfield
Being out and about in the Garden gives a sense of the changing of the seasons, a sense brought about by the combination of light, temperature, wildlife and, of course, plants. This is felt most keenly at this time when we are the furthest from the sun that we will be, until next year. I find mid-winter an uplifting time; leafless trees show their bones and wildlife is easier to spot. It’s amazing how much life is flitting around in an old oak tree when you take the time to look into its branches. The sky seems bigger in winter and the sunsets more vivid. This might just be that we don’t get to see them so much in midsummer, but at this time of year we see the sun rise in the Garden and set in the Garden.

From this moment the days get a little longer and we begin to see

Witch Hazel in early January 2017

movement in the soil, small signposts to spring that don’t occur before midwinter. Snowdrops and winter aconite emerge in January; tiny and fragrant flowers emerge on shrubs such as witch-hazel, Daphne, winter flowering honey suckle and Christmas box. These plants need to attract the few pollinators that may be around from long distances, hence using strong scent rather that the colourful showy flowers we see through summer.


In the low sun and with the soundtrack of robins, crows and the odd fidgety group of goldfinches, we spend the winter tidying and weeding the borders knowing that they’ll stay tidy and weed free until spring. Structural work takes place on trees, landscaping of areas that need developing and of course repotting of collections inside. Winter can be hard work, but it keeps us warm and is always good to keep projects moving while we can.

A goldfinch eating the seeds
from a teasel plant.
Throughout the Christmas period someone must come into the Garden to water the glasshouses, check the boiler is working and eat the chocolates. So even on Christmas Day there is a member of staff working in the Garden for a few hours. In some ways it’s a nice to escape the Christmas mayhem for a while in the tranquillity of a warm glasshouse, unless of course there’s a small flood, snow or an electrical trip to deal with. Whatever happens on our Christmas duty there are many gifts brought in by our volunteers in the form of chocolate, cake, biscuits and pies, it is difficult not to pop a chocolate in our mouths when passing; sometimes the work means we pass quite a lot…

Our efforts on the left, Oaxaca market stall on right.
(right photo by Alejandro LinaresGarcia)
There is one Christmas tradition that we’ve been interested in for the last few years. Did you know that in the Mexican city of Oaxaca the 23rdDecember is the Noche de Los Rábanos, the Night of the Radishes. Since 1897 displays of ornately carved radishes have been a prominent part of the Oaxaca Christmas market; and here, many miles away, we’ve had a go on the 23rdfor the last four years. Maybe not as extravagant as the Mexican markets, but a good try.

Enjoy this midwinter break whatever you’re doing, and from the Botanic Garden we wish you all much laughter and warmth to take you into 2018.

Winter and the sacred lotus

Posted on by andy.winfield
By Matt Philpott, Botanic Garden
trainee
Late summer seems like a lifetime ago now the days are short and we’ve seen the first frosts of the season. But, if I cast my mind back to the first time I stepped into our tropical glasshouse this summer, as a shiny new trainee….I wiped clean my foggy glasses and was immediately blown away by the stunning Sacred Lotus (Nelumbo nucifera), in full flower in the pool. The vibrant colours and sheer height of the flowers looked stunning against the backdrop of green foliage in the glasshouse.


The Sacred Lotus is a fascinating plant that’s been cultivated in China for over 3,000 years. It’s now grown around the world, not just for the gorgeous flowers, but for deep cultural and religious significance to Hindus and Buddhists, as well as a source of medicine and food.


Nelumbo nucifera
It didn’t occur to me on that first day quite how much work goes on behind the scenes to keep this beautiful plant at its best every year. Over the last few months I’m very privileged to have found out how to grow the lotus first hand.


The Sacred Lotus is an aquatic perennial, which due to the short and cold UK winter days, slows down and enters a dormant period here in Bristol. While our tropical glasshouse is still pretty toasty in the winter, the pool isn’t heated. (A cold pool in a plus 20 degree room never fails to surprise me when I hop in!) During the winter, to ensure the best possible display when the lotus returns to growth in the next spring, we take the plants out of the pool to rest in cooler and drier conditions.


The lotus started to slow down and stopped flowering in our glasshouse in October and over a couple of weeks we gradually pruned back all of the remaining leaves. The lotus are potted up in containers to prevent them from completely taking over the tropical pool. Which means it’s possible to dig about in their muddy home and lift the pots out of the water. Having said that, it was still a three man job to lift the water logged lotus out of the water! They sat on the sides of the pool (releasing a pungent smell of decomposition) before we tidied them up and moved them to a cooler glasshouse where they’ll recuperate over winter, ready for a burst of growth in spring.


Having spent a day pulling the plants out of a muddy pool I can certainly understand why Buddhists see the lotus as a symbol of beauty and purity – when contrasted with the dark mud they grow out of.


Buddha on a lotus throne.
The loss of the lotus has left the pool looking just a little bit bare at this time of year. That is apart from the ever-present Duckweed, which never fails to impress me with how quickly it jumps back after a day of netting! The pool might be sparse right now, but it will all be worth it when our visitors enjoy the majesty of the complex and beautiful flowers of the Sacred Lotus next year.


So, here’s looking forward to longer days. I now know what it takes to put on that amazing summer lotus show and feel I’ve earnt the joy of looking at them next year just that little bit more.

Native American foods

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By Claire Cope

Having worked as a trainee at the Botanic Garden for nearly two years I am now coming to the end of my time with the garden. I have learned more than I thought possible to learn in just two years, have gained my RHS qualifications, have had the opportunity to work with an amazing range of plants and have acquired a huge amount of practical horticultural experience. Best of all, I have had the opportunity to work alongside some very wonderful people who have shared their knowledge and passion with me and have made me feel very welcomed into this beautiful community. 


In terms of my horticultural work here at the garden, my favourite part of this last year has been my project to work on the Native American Vegetable display. This included everything from designing the planting lay out, propagating and maintaining the plants, through to harvesting the food and collecting the seeds. Therefore, for this article I want to share with you some of the fascinating information I’ve learnt about this amazing group of plants.

Firstly, I had no idea that so much of our food originated in South America and has

Squash originated in South America and was one
of the ‘three sisters’.

been being cultivated for so many years. Many plants that today we consider as staples such as tomatoes, potatoes, beans, corn, squash, and peppers were originally cultivated thousands of years ago by native civilisations such as the Inca, Maya and Aztec peoples.


In North and Central America, prior to the European invasions, it was the three crops – Sweetcorn, Beans and Squash that formed the foundation of sustainable subsistence agriculture.  These crops became known as ‘The Three Sisters’ and were grown as companion plants where the tall stems of the sweetcorn support the climbing beans, the beans fix nitrogen into the soil to feed the hungry squash which in turn provides a living mulch to suppress weeds and shade the ground for the corn. Unfortunately, due to the differences in climate and the need to protect the corn from the badgers, we weren’t able to replicate this exactly but I made these three plants the centre of the display in order to tell the story of the three sisters and to show how these ancient cultures had devised methods to work with the plants and with natural systems to increase productivity …. Unfortunately, the pesky squirrels feasted on all of our tasty corn kernels but we did get some lovely large squash and lots of purple beans!

Quinoa
The next thing that I found exciting to grow was the more unusual range of plants that were grown in cultivation so long ago but are only just coming into popularity now such as Quinoa. This plant is grown for its grain which is high in protein and was originally domesticated by the Andean people over 3000 years ago! The Incas held this crop as sacred and referred to it as chisoya mama meaning ‘mother of all grains’. We grew two different cultivars of Chenopodium quinoa – The first ’Quinoa’ was the more common form and the second ‘Huauzontle’ is the lesser known and is primarily grown for the immature seed-heads which can be eaten as a vegetable like broccoli. This form grew extremely tall and bushy and by October it was looking very beautiful with its pink- burgundy seed heads.   

There were also plants in this display that were more unusual and some I hadn’t heard

Cyclanthera pedata

of before which have the potential to be incorporated into western food production in the future. For instance – I really enjoyed growing the Cyclanthera pedata ‘Fat Baby’ and ‘Bolivian Giant’. These were vigorous climbers which produced very strange spikey green fruits which tasted just like a cucumber!


Then there were plants that I had always considered as ornamentals which I can now look at in a new light – such as the Dahlias with their edible tubers, Lupins with their edible beans and Nasturtium with edible leaves and flowers.

Some of the cultivars chosen for the display had really interesting stories – for example the beans we grew, Phaseolus vulgaris ’Cherokee trail of tears’, were originally from the native American Cherokee people who were driven out of their homelands by European settlers – a forced march know as ‘Trail of Tears’. This bean was one of their heirlooms which has been passed from generation to generation ever since.


We are now coming to the end of the season and soon the bed will be nearly empty again and ready for the next trainee to start all over again! What a great project to have been given, I have learnt so much and hope that those of you who saw it enjoyed the display!

The Garden blog

Posted on by andy.winfield
By Andy Winfield
Here at the Botanic Garden we’ve decided to take a slight change of direction on the blog; while there will still be science based items, there will be much more about the day to day running of the Garden and various experiences of the small team who work here. There may be items from volunteers or staff and the subject matter will be diverse, you will be surprised at the areas of life plants take us.
First, an introduction; I’m Andy, a career change, I’d done this and that, warehouse work to office
Before and after, marking out the Phylogeny display in
February 2006; below, as it is today.

work ending as a Costs Draftsman for a Bristol Law firm. It was at this point I considered my future working life stretching ahead and didn’t like it; and so I shifted direction and embarked on a career in horticulture. This was a good move! After a two-year course I landed a job at the University of Bristol Botanic Garden, this was 2001 and the little-known Garden was tucked away in woods beyond Bristol’s famous suspension bridge spanning the Avon Gorge. The gardening was good and the range of plants we dealt with inspiring; we held large plant sales that kept the Garden afloat and paid my wages.

After a few years the University began a process which considered its outlying properties and decided to sell the site of the Botanic Garden and move the whole lot to a new location. Without going into too much depth about how to firstly move a 5,000 species plant collection and secondly simultaneously design, landscape and create a new Botanic Garden using these plants, trust me when I say it was quite an experience. I feel very privileged to have been a part of the process and one of a small dynamic team that is still together today driving the Garden onto the next phase and the next. The team is buoyed by many incredible volunteers bringing a multitude of skills with them; they are a very inspiring bunch! We’re a small staff team and so must diversify into many different areas; I’m still primarily a gardener but I also manage our website and social media, organise a few events and influence our events theme. This year all our events were based around bees and pollinators due to interest from followers and likers of our social media.
The new cone of the cycad
Encephartos ferox emerging.
While it was difficult to leave the old site, the Botanic Garden a decade later is a vibrant hub of horticulture and science with each week bringing something new, and it is these things we’ll be telling you about in the blog.
Musa basjoo, the Japanese banana
wrapped up for six months of winter
This week in the Garden has been all about protecting plants from the impending winter. Our reserve glasshouse space fills up quickly as we bring in pots and dig up plants more used to a warmer latitude. The biggest of these are cycads, plants with a long fossil history, a weighty woody crown and argumentative spines. They always lash out when we take them in and leave their mark, but they’re wonderful plants and they’ve been in the family for a long time and on the planet much longer than us, so we let them off; this year two plants are producing magnificent orange cones which will become a great feature for visitors next year.
Plants that can’t be moved inside are wrapped up and protected with bark, straw and constructions that will protect them from cold, wet and wind that we’ll all experience. It’s a poignant time when we say goodbye to them for the season, the beginning of the darker days of winter. While dark, the winter days are far from being a chore, I enjoy them as much as summer. Plants are structural and still, where there is flower it is fragrant and small, and, while the maintenance is less, we’re able to get on with more landscaping jobs which make big changes in the Garden. This winter a South African mud hut or Rondavel will be built in the South African display, and a peony garden constructed in the Traditional Chinese medicinal display, more on that another time.
21st century pruning…
Also, this week we’ve launched ourselves into the 21stcentury and are trying out a MEWP (Mobile Elevated Work Platform), also known as a cherry picker. Our Wisteria, Magnolia and Roses which grow on the wall of the 18thcentury house are getting harder to prune from a ladder, so we felt it was time for machinery. It all worked very well (although quite high up!) and will do for us until someone invents a jet pack, which as gardeners, we’re all looking forward to.

All of this work is worth it when you hear and see the enjoyment from visitors. Our aim is for a visitor to leave the Garden with a greater understanding of the role plants play in their lives and ultimately, as a result of this, a greater respect for the planet. Lofty aims, but every little bit helps.