A Study Describing the Availability of Penstemon Plants from Twelve Commercial Nurseries
This study reports that the 12 nurseries listed on the APS website offer 135 species of penstemons. That number compares to 203 seeds available for puchase. A scale rating plant availability is presented.
Click on the links below to read the article or view photos of some of the most frequently offered penstemon plants.
A Study Describing the Availability of Penstemons at Twelve Nurseries.
Barbara Lewis
Digging Deeper: Focus for January-March 2009 P. canescens
Digging Deeper: A different penstemon is featured every three months.
Penstemon canescens - January, February, March 2009
It’s February in Colorado and time to select this issue’s featured penstemon species. It was a less than inspiring task this morning as the wind howled and the clouds gathered for the next snow storm. Seeking inspiration, I wandered over to my seedling bed, filled to the brim with seedlings from my 2008 germination efforts. Canescens immediately caught my eye with its dazzling other-worldly purple-red leaves. The decision was made; P. canescens had won the winter beauty contest. I took several photos of their extraordinary foliage. As I left the garden, however, several other penstemons caught my eye; I snapped them too. I glanced around another nearby bed, and click, more photos. It’s impossible to have a favorite penstemon, even for a moment. All these pictures are included at the end of this article
Perceptions of Ease or Difficulty of Germinating Penstemon Species: A Study on Ratings by Members of the American Penstemon Society
Purpose An earlier study this year[1] determined that seed for 203 of the 274 species of Penstemon were offered for sale between 2005 and 2009. Using ratings by members of the American Penstemon Society (APS), this current study reports the degree of ease or difficulty gardeners experience when germinating those penstemon species.
Isophyllus
Penstemon Hybridization – what little I know!
This article by Ginny Maffitt is both informative and provocative. Informative, because all of us need to know specifics about our beloved penstemons’ promiscuous habits to avoid hybridization if we so desire. Provocative becuase of our Seed Exchange and the need for quality control — can we rely on seed collected in a garden being a true species? Ginny and I would love to hear your thoughts.
Ginny’s Article:
Penstemon Seed Availability
Ever wonder about your chances of finding seeds for your favorite penstemons? Here’s a study that may help you. Availability of Penstemon Seeds for Germination.doc
This study also reports which species’ seed is offered most frequently down to least frequently.
Family Plantaginaceae, no long Scrophulariaceae
Scrophulariaceae to Plantaginaceae. With such a major shift, acceptance will be gradual,
but it is surely happening.
Read the rest of this entry »
A Long Story about a Short Plant
A Long Story about a Short Plant
by Bob Pennington
Last spring, April of ’08, I think, at a local chapter meeting of the New Mexico Native Plant Society, the speaker, Bob Sivinski, one of New Mexico’s preeminent taxonomists, presented a talk about “The Importance of Vouchering New Mexico Plant Specimens”. The gist of the talk was that there were still plants out there to be discovered, as well as new locations to be found for older discoveries, and that not only was it important for many reasons to document these discoveries, but that each of us could help in this adventure. With this message still embedded in our minds, in September of ’08, we sent Dr. Noel Holmgren photos and pressed specimens of a Penstemon we had “discovered” in Lincoln County, Nevada. The plant is one that I had first (mis)identified, collected seeds from, and subsequently grown for as much as 10 or 12 years. Upon our first discovery, I had decided that the plants in question were Penstemon dolius, because it seemed to best fit the descriptions and drawings at hand. Beware careless and lazy taxonomy!
