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Plant identification
This archived discussion is "read only".
» dancooper - Naming the shrubbery Hi,I am attempting to recreate a mental picture of the place I grew up. I want to do this for my autobiography, which is in progress. Is there a book you can recommend that offers photographic identification of yard and garden plants, trees, bushes, etc? This would be a big help, as I can recall many plants but would, of course, like to name them. I can remember quite a few, and can name many of them. But the others I can visualize but cannot name are a problem. Some of them I probably never knew by name. Others I have simply forgotten (It was a LO-O-O-ONG time ago!). I checked the recommended books pages at your site, as well as that from the retired, “A Homeowner’s Guide to Landscaping.” Dan Cooper -- posted by dancooper
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Dan,
If you are interested in herbaceous plants (those without woody stems) I can recommend some others. Your project sounds fascinating. Let us know eitherthrough this discussion or the Forum on the Garden Community page if you need more help. Georgene -- posted by Georgene A. Bramlage » dancooper - Re: Re: Naming the shrubbery In response to Re: Naming the shrubbery posted by Cercis:Thank you so much. I'll keep you posted on any specific referencing problems. Dan Cooper -- posted by dancooper
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Someone of the 25 garden FWs will be able to help you...most of us like a challenge Did you grow up in Illinois or Texas? G. -- posted by Georgene A. Bramlage » Gay_Klok - Re: Re: Naming the shrubbery In response to Re: Naming the shrubbery posted by Cercis:I may have photos amongst the hundreds attached to my Suite articles, although those plants in your memory may not be growing in our climatic conditions. But between Georgene and myself we could come up with the answers Good luck! -- posted by Gay_Klok » dancooper - Re: Re: Naming the shrubbery In response to Re: Naming the shrubbery posted by Cercis:Hi Georgene, I grew up in Illinois. It was about an hour south of Chicago, a town of about 30,000 population, called by the Indian name, Kankakee. My folks were upper middle class (not that there is such a thing any more) and we lived on a partially wooded, four acre suburban plot. It was quite beautiful, an impressive property. Since I am muddling my way through an autobiography, I wanted to give that place its due in my early life. Some of the plants were very beautiful. I’ll paint you a verbal picture in a subsequent post. Or perhaps better yet, I think I’ll post a portion of the unfinished autobiography in the Writers’ Suite area, and if you are curious, you can view it there. Thank you for offering to help with the identification of these plants. It helps to know I can count on the assistance of people who actually know what they are talking about. I used to be more involved with plants and gardening, but only attempted a full-blown garden on one occasion. I got sick with a bad case of the flu that year, and the garden was lost. Not much of a track record in gardening… Dan Cooper -- posted by dancooper
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dan, First all, i think it would be great if could post your autobiographical writing at Writer's Suite as you went along...you'd get some good feedback. Secondly, why did I ask where you grew up? Here is a book which I can strongly recommend...Restoring American Gardens: An Encyclopedia of Heirloom Ornamental Plants, 1640-1940 by Denise Wiles Adams (Timber Press, 2004)...it does not cover much in the way of west coast gardens or FL gardens. It is a super book...expensive, so you might want to ask your local library to purchase a copy. But, it is a great reference. Even if your parents gardened past the 1940's, most oftheir plants would probably be included in this book...garden fashion for most folks moved slowly... A review of this book was going to be my April article at Landscapes for Homeowners before I picked up a very nasty and persistent virus last week. Kankakee...wasn;t that where General Mills (or was it General Foods)use to be headquartered? Good Luck to you! G. -- posted by Georgene A. Bramlage » dancooper - Re: Re: Naming the shrubbery In response to Re: Naming the shrubbery posted by Cercis:Hi Georgene, I am still thinking about the posting of material at the Writers’ Suite. If I don’t retain the right to delete it as I see fit, I certainly won’t be posting very much of it there. I have yet to determine if the “rules” are significantly different enough to guarantee my rights to the work. I certainly have no recourse in deleting any of my regular topic articles. If I do not retain that right at the Writers; Suite, there is really no advantage to posting there. But some descriptive sections about the place where I grew up certainly would be a small price to pay, and they likely won’t be worth anything alone and apart from the work as a whole, anyway. Thanks for the tip on the book title. I am now armed with several interlibrary loan requests, which will probably help considerably. Yes, you do remember Kankakee as a General Foods plant, although I don’t believe it ever graduated to the status of a corporate headquarters. It was the location of the Gains Division (dog food). I actually worked there in a summer job once. It was a humbling experience, among other things. I unloaded trucks of frozen chicken “glop,” that was unappetizingly displayed in open-top boxes. Apparently the stuff was poured into the boxes. There wasn’t much left that could be called a chicken by that time, but the obvious evidence was unmistakable, and somewhat sickening, too. Protruding from the frozen glop at different points were feathers, pieces of beak and claw… You get the picture. I was extremely glad the stuff was frozen solid. I also worked on a packaging line there, where I had to build a cardboard carton and then pack it full of smaller boxes of some sort of dog food (I don’t remember what it was). This had to be done very quickly, as the assembly line fed the little boxes out of the next room at a really rapid pace. I stepped in as the temporary lunch hour relief for the one of the women who worked in that spot the rest of the day. Working as fast as I could, I still could not match the speed of those women at that job. I learned perhaps my first lesson in humility related to gender-related capabilities. I was most impressed, and most humbled. Dan -- posted by dancooper
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Georgene A. Bramlage
