How Plants are Like People

I was musing about how gardening parodies life when I realized that gardening IS life. It's all about the eternal cycle of death and rebirth which has been told in countless myths since the beginning of time. Think about it. A plant grows, blooms and dies, and its body is recycled into compost to provide food and life for other plants. Meanwhile, it is regenerating itself in the form of children, all created when it dropped seeds, or from bits of root that were left in the soil, or branches that drooped to the ground and layered themselves, like the alba meideland rose pictured here does.

Some plants are born to be mothers. Their entire mission in life is to set seed, reproduce themselves and then die. That's what happens to true annuals (as opposed to those that are annuals in our gardens because of the climate, but perennial elsewhere.)

Many plants are born mothers but more tenacious of life. That is why so many of them will keep on flowering if you cut off the old flowers. They are still trying to carry out their destiny - to create seed to make more plants.

And, like people, some are more prolific than others. Poppies can create hundreds and hundreds of seeds in a single pod. Plant one and if you let it seed you will always have poppies. The same goes for nicotiana as well as countless of the plants that we call weeds. This often happens when something reproduces too prolifically. They become suspect within the community, because they are playing fast and loose and so creating havoc.

Still, if they are very, very beautiful they can get away with it, and people will only shrug at their lack of restraint. If they are not great beauties we tend to frown or even sneer at them. They have cheapened themselves by their exuberance.

Sound familiar?

On the other hand some plants are nearly sterile - it's a rare year when my antique rose, 'Celsiana' sets hips - and many people are impressed that I get any at all. People tend to think of 'Celsiana' as an heirloom to be treasured. Not that it is impossible to create more. That can easily be done through cuttings. But seeds are a rarity which marks her as restrained and dignified. And of course, being a Damask rose, very beautiful and wonderfully fragrant.

Most roses behave somewhat like this, even if they do set seeds. Those seeds rarely seem to take hold in the soil; they seldom surprise us or behave with anything resembling unpredictability. Suitable behavior for the plant often referred to as the Queen of the Flowers.

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