Produce Stands

Weather: Promised rain did not arrive; apparently cold air in the east stopped its advance. Last rain 9/5.

What’s blooming in the area: Hybrid roses, silver lace vine, trumpet creeper, rose of Sharon, datura, morning glories, bouncing Bess, sweet pea, Russian sage, zinnias from new seeds and reseeds, cultivated sunflowers.

Beyond the walls and fences: Pink and white bindweed, goat’s head, stickleaf, leatherleaf globemallow, yellow mullein, pigweed, ragweed, Hopi tea, snakeweed broom, broom senecio, native sunflowers, goldenrod, plains paper flowers, áñil del muerto, tahoka daisy, golden hairy and heath asters.

In my yard, looking east: Large-flowered soapwort, garlic chives, Jupiter’s beard, hollyhocks, winecup mallow, Maximilian sunflower.

Looking south: Betty Prior, Fairy, rugosa and miniature roses.

Looking west: Caryopteris, catmint, calamintha, David phlox, ladybells, Mönch aster, purple coneflower.

Looking north: Yellow potentilla, hosta, golden spur columbine, Mexican hat, black-eyed Susan, chocolate flower, blanket flower, anthemis, coreopsis, chrysanthemum.

In the open, along the drive: Buddleia, white yarrow.

Bedding plants: Sweet alyssum, blue salvia, moss rose, gazania.

Seeds: Larkspur, reseeded Sensation cosmos from last year’s plants, yellow cosmos.

Animal sightings: Geckos, humming birds, other small birds, bees, cabbage butterfly, grasshoppers, large and small black ants.

Weekly update: Last week one of the local produce stands had signs advertising peaches and yellow chicos.

I couldn’t find the signs this week, but when I went looking I discovered the produce stands have changed since I moved here in 1991.

The largest, Arlo’s Produce, was closed. Its owner, Arlo Martinez, died in 2009 at age 52. His family has deep roots in La Puebla, but probably no members were interested in continuing the business.

Another of the older stands is still operating with long tables under a metal roof. It may have been the one with chicos. This week it had a small sign advertising squash and displayed strings of drying red chiles. Bushel baskets of green ones were under the tables.

Perhaps these permanent stands no longer can compete with farmers’ markets. I always had the impression many of their customers were people driving north. The market in Santa Fé is closer, and guarantees its produce with a jury that determines who may sell. The fees for a vendor are high. $100 a year plus $25 for each week and a valid city business license.

Farmers’ markets forbid reselling products, which Arlo’s had done. He was a carpenter by trade. His mother’s sister, Rita, was the cook at La Cocina. His late brother, Zacarias, a jack-of-all trades. They were not farmers.

Martinez bought his produce from growers and wholesalers. Boxes often were piled beneath the yellow truck emblazoned with his name and two red peppers. A story in a 2003 issue of Sunset listed his fall produce as green chiles, potatoes, dried beans, sweet piñon brittle, honey, squash and apples. Only the last three could have been local, and the apples probably were from Velarde.

The alternative has always been roadside vendors. These generally are pickup trucks offering piñon seeds or Rocky Ford melons. Fire wood is often available. This week someone was selling hay.

I talked with a man in 2012 who bought potatoes in Colorado for resale. He rotated between locations here and in Santa Fé.

He was professional pedlar, I think originally from a farm. He’d worked odd jobs his whole life. I wouldn’t have been surprised if he spent many nights in his truck. But, when he had a good day I got the impression he spent his evening in a place with people like himself interested in relaxing together.

He and the other resellers serve a useful purpose. Local grocery stores have raw fruit and vegetable sections, but their produce is rarely fresh. The pedlars provide a link between people tired of potatoes that have sprouted inside and farmers too remote to use local outlets.

Trade links between Colorado and the Española valley were exploited by the Rio Grande railroad, and strengthened when cars became available. In the depression, when Martinez’s parents were young, Puebla had a poor irrigation ditch. Families were beginning to lose their land to the Bonds because they couldn’t pay the tax accessed for the irrigation dam. Men grew wheat for food, corn for their animals and themselves, and peppers for cash. They sold their surpluses in Santa Fé and the San Luis Valley of southern Colorado.

Colorado closed its borders to non-resident farm workers in 1936. The legislature passed laws that required truckers to have state licenses and pay a per ton fee on whatever they carried. They eliminated traditional trade with New Mexico.

Rio Arriba County did not reciprocate. Older marketing patterns were maintained by men like Martinez. At most, police and landowners harass venders today.

Now there are men with a little more capital than the pedlars. They set up small tables under patio umbrellas or frame canopies. There usually are two vehicles parked at the stands; at least one is a pickup. I suspect the teams of men sell a combination of their own produce, produce from neighbors and goods purchased in the south. They’re more like the village entrepreneurs familiar to newer residents in the valley than farmers.

I saw three this week. None had signs listing what it offered, though one had a sign announcing its name.

One was probably selling sweet corn. Several times, the men had corn stalks tied to their frame posts. Another had bags of peppers hanging from the canopy frame, bottles of honey, and packaged goods on the table. The third had large melon samples and half-peck baskets of green peppers on their table.

These men cater to local workers. They’re never set up before two in the afternoon.

When I worked in Los Alamos, the local farmer’s market was closed hours before the end of the day shift at the laboratory. The only people who could shop were those without jobs - retirees and housewives - or those who could leave their offices for some time without penalty.

The one time I tried the Española market, most of the vendors were gone by the time I got there after work. They had sold out. Soon after its site near the old post office was coopted. It’s reopened on a side road.

The main farmers’ market in Santa Fé closes at noon on Saturdays and 1 pm on Tuesdays, with parking fees. The organization does sponsor an afternoon market at one of the malls on Tuesday.

These little weekday stands are open on the main arteries when women who work as maids or cleaners are getting home. They’re still open when men, even construction workers, are driving though.

They’d all left by Saturday, perhaps to return to their families, perhaps to find more stock. The one with melons only had peppers left on Wednesday.

Instead on teams of men, women were sitting behind tables on Saturday. Their husbands hovered in the background. They may be people who work during the week and maintain market gardens on weekends.

One, selling tomatoes and green peppers, had a sign saying Velarde. Another, selling green squash had no sign.

On Sunday (today), the women were gone, and some of the men were back. The one with melons returned with green apples, green peppers, and sweet corn. The wooden roadside stand was closed.

Notes:
Calkins, Hugh G. "Handling of a Cash Crop (Chili)," USDA Soil Conservation Bulletin, 1937, reprinted in Marta Weigle, Hispanic Villages of Northern New Mexico, 1975. Discusses the effects of Colorado law on local farmers. Villages also contains the Tewa Basin Study, 1935, with says people in Puebla relied on chicos when they had a good corn crop. It was described as white corn that was "boiled, then dried."

Cobos, Rubén. A Dictionary of New Mexico and Southern Colorado Spanish, 1983. He says chicos is "specially prepared dehydrated corn used in flavoring beans, pork and other dishes."

Niederman, Sharon. "Taos Harvest Drive: Sample New Mexico's Autumn Bounty," Sunset, October 2003. She used the word chilis.

Photographs:
1. Weekday produce stand, Chama Highway, 5 September 2014. Angostura is a settlement northwest of Española on the Río Chama noted for its fertile land.

2. Saturday produce stand, Chama Highway, 13 September 2014. It had a sign on the ground saying Velarde. The village at the end of the Española valley on the road to Taos is noted for its fruits.  Faces have been obscured.

3. Remains of Arlo’s Produce, Riverside Drive, 12 September 2014. His truck (below) usually was parked on the left side.

4. Sun Valley Produce, Riverside Drive, 12 September 2014. The box of yellow squash is under the table.

5. Potato vender, Riverside Drive, 12 September 2014. This is not the same person discussed above.

6. Weekday produce stand, Riverside Drive, 7 September 2014.

7. Sign in place pedlars gather, Riverside Drive, 11 September 2014. You could buy blue-nosed pit bull puppies there Saturday.

8. Corn stalks on stand in #1, 10 September 2014.

9. Weekday produce stand, Riverside Drive, 8 September 2014. Green peppers in hanging bag.

10. Saturday produce stand, Griego Bridge Road near Riverside, 13 September 2014.

Red Amaranth

Weather: Hurricane Norbert off the southwest of Baja brought rain Friday.

What’s blooming in the area: Hybrid roses, silver lace vine, trumpet creeper, rose of Sharon, datura, morning glories, bouncing Bess, purple garden phlox, sweet pea, Russian sage, zinnias from new seeds and reseeds, cultivated sunflowers.

Beyond the walls and fences: Yellow evening primrose, purple mat flower, pink and white bindweed, goat’s head, stickleaf, leatherleaf globemallow, pigweed, ragweed, horseweed, Hopi tea, snakeweed broom, broom senecio, native sunflowers, goldenrod, plains paper flowers, áñil del muerto, tahoka daisy, golden hairy asters, black and side oats grama grasses.

In my yard, looking east: Large-flowered soapwort, garlic chives, Jupiter’s beard, hollyhocks, winecup mallow, cut leaf coneflower, Maximilian sunflower heads beginning to bend from weight of seeds.

Looking south: Betty Prior, Fairy, rugosa and miniature roses.

Looking west: Caryopteris, catmint, calamintha, David phlox, ladybells, Mönch aster, purple coneflower.

Looking north: Yellow potentilla, hosta, golden spur columbine, Mexican hat, black-eyed Susan, chocolate flower, blanket flower, anthemis, coreopsis.

In the open, along the drive: Buddleia, white yarrow.

Bedding plants: Snapdragon, sweet alyssum, blue salvia, moss rose, gazania.

Seeds: Larkspur, reseeded Sensation cosmos from last year’s plants, yellow cosmos.

Animal sightings: Rabbit, geckos, small birds, bees, grasshoppers, large and small black ants.

Weekly update: Some mysteries are never solved.

A few years ago a woman down the road planted some bulbs that erupted after the monsoons came in July of 2010. They reached four feet by the first of August with maroon, begonia-like leaves. I thought she’d ordered something from some mass market catalog that featured South African novelties.

The next year, someone two miles away planted something with similar red leaves between rows of African marigolds in a cutting garden. By the end of September I decided the red heads must be some type of giant celosia instead.

The celosia I know, the plumed variety of Amaranthus argentea sold as a bedding plant, might get a foot high. These were six-feet tall, with spikes like Amaranthus caudatus. However, they didn’t have the hanging habit of love-lies-bleeding.

This year I decided the burgundy-leaved, maroon-flowered giants were a form of the red amaranth grown by the Hopi and Zuñi. They extract a beet-like pigment from the plumes to dye the thin wafer bread distributed by kachina dancers.

The real mystery isn’t the identity of the plant, but how Amaranthus cruentus got into Española area gardens in 2011.

When I was in Santa Fé this week I saw them growing in two yards. I’m told one of the gardeners had purchased it as bedding plant from Agua Fria Nursery in 2012. It naturalized and since has come back from its own seeds.

The seeds themselves are not offered by Lake Valley, the company whose seed is most available here and in Santa Fé. One has to order packets from some small company that specializes in native or heritage plants.

One such company, Seeds of Change, has offered Amaranthus cruentus x Amaranthus powelli as the Hopi Dye Plant. The company was founded in 1989 in Gila, New Mexico, by Gabriel Howearth. The research farm was moved to El Guique, northwest of Española on the road to Ojo Caliente in 1996.

The following year, the company was bought by Mars, Inc. The corporate owner closed local operations in 2010 amid chaos that could have scattered inventories. Employees were abruptly dismissed. Seed crops were abandoned. Headquarters originally were in Santa Fé. They’re now located in Rancho Dominguez, California.

The people with the cutting garden might buy plants from Agua Fria. They maintain their yard and put bedding plants in a whiskey half barrel laid on its side. However, they usually grow petunias that are available everywhere.

It’s more likely they planted seeds. The companion African marigolds usually are grown that way. I wondered for a while if they were cropping the amaranth, perhaps drying the heads and selling them in the Santa Fé farmers’ market as everlastings. They could also have been harvesting the grain or leaves for sale to gourmet cooks.

However, they seem to leave the plants to be killed by the frost. It takes three to five months for the seeds to mature after plants die.

I saw red-topped plants in three other places last year. All were in yards of single-wides in settled locations, not mobile home parks. The one also has a few rose bushes, perhaps selected from the ones imported in mass by the local hardware. Another has morning glories grown from seeds and iris that may have been passed along. While all three trailer dwellers appreciate flowers, none look like they would frequent stores that sold unusual annuals or seeds.

It’s possible one person’s plants came from a neighbor who bought bedding plants or whose ATV, snowmobile or hauling trailer tires picked up seeds around El Guique. Those plants could have gone to seed over the fence. Individuals then might have traded seedlings among themselves last year. Friendship and kinship ties spread over miles in the valley.

No one seems to have planted the amaranth this year. Instead the plants look like they reseeded in dense patches. One even came up on the shoulder opposite one of the trailers.

The cutting garden still has its plants in rows, but it looks like someone may have dug the furrows after the plants emerged. Everywhere, this year, the plants are variable heights and colors.

As for the first plant that had red leaves and plumes, the woman continued to plant it for several years, then stopped. I still have no idea what it was.

[I have since been told this is the castor bean plant, Ricinus communis. It’s in the spurge family.]

Photographs:
1. Red amaranth head, trailer on south side of village, 17 August 2012.

2. Red amaranth plants growing outside fence by road to post office, 5 September 2014. The plant grew here last year, and apparently reseeded. I would guess the sprouts inside the fence were weeded out, but the ones outside left to fend for themselves. With irregular watering, they became deep red and short.

3. Unknown red-leaved plant growing on the main road, 11 September 2010.

4. Red amaranth growing in rows with African marigolds, double-wide on north side of village, 12 October 2013.

5. Plants in the cutting garden shown in #4 killed by frost, 26 November 2011.

6. Morning glories blooming with plants in #1, 17 August 2012.

7. Plant growing on shoulder across the road from south trailer, 4 September 2014.

8. Cutting garden plants from #4 growing this year, 4 September 2014.

9. The red-leaved plants that first piqued my interest, 11 September 2010; same as #3. The fence is about three-feet high.

Fields of Flowers

Weather: Weekend rain dropped water from hurricane Marie off the west coast of México; it coincided with a storm center off the south coast of Louisiana.

What’s blooming in the area: Hybrid roses, silver lace vine, trumpet creeper, rose of Sharon, datura, rose purple morning glory, bouncing Bess, purple garden phlox, sweet pea, Russian sage, zinnias from seeds, cultivated sunflowers.

Beyond the walls and fences: Velvetweed, yellow evening primrose, purple mat flower, pink and white bindweed, Queen Anne’s lace, goat’s head, stickleaf, leatherleaf globemallow, pigweed, ragweed, horseweed, wild lettuce, Hopi tea, golden rod, plains paper flowers, áñil del muerto, tahoka daisy, golden hairy asters, black and side oats grama grasses.

In my yard, looking east: Large-flowered soapwort, garlic chives, Jupiter’s beard, hollyhocks, winecup mallow, pink evening primrose, Maximilian sunflowers, cut leaf coneflower.

Looking south: Betty Prior, Fairy, rugosa and miniature roses.

Looking west: Caryopteris, Johnson’s Blue geranium, catmint, calamintha, David phlox, ladybells, Mönch aster, purple coneflower.

Looking north: Yellow potentilla, hosta, golden spur columbine, Mexican hat, black-eyed Susan, chocolate flower, blanket flower, anthemis, coreopsis.

In the open, along the drive: Buddleia, white yarrow.

Bedding plants: Snapdragon, sweet alyssum, blue salvia, moss rose, gazania.

Seeds: Heavenly Blue morning glories, larkspur, reseeded Sensation cosmos from last year’s plants, yellow cosmos, bachelor buttons.

Animal sightings: Rabbit, squirrel, geckos, small birds, bees, grasshoppers, large and small black ants.

Weekly update: Fields of flowers appear in advertisements and movie backgrounds. They’re less common in real life.

The only time you usually see a field of flowers here is late summer when the yellow-flowered áñil del muerto bloom.

This year is different. Fields are covered with Tahoka daisies that resemble heather from a distance. The lavender flowers rise in waves across fields that usually sprout prickly pear or Russian thistles this time of year.

I wonder where all that seed came from. We had a lot of wind this spring which would have redistributed the parachuted seed, but I’ve never seen the plants growing densely anywhere in the area. I’ve seen no reports of the composite’s seed lasting in the soil.

Perhaps this year’s inflorescence may be attributed to the early monsoon which dumped water in the middle of July, when the sun’s rays were strong. The one’s growing downhill from irrigation canals may have gotten extra water when ditches overflowed the night it rained so long.

It may be the relatively constant moisture since has nourished seedlings. Rains have come every couple of weeks, not the usual couple of months.

It also may be the result of last fall’s heavy rains when plants were going to seed that produced the seed for this year’s flowers.

One other plant is enjoying a similar blooming period this year, but in more limited conditions. Stickleafs cover the area near one of the arroyos. There the flowers dominate the wettest area, the ones in the flood plain. Away from that area, the white flowers merge with those of Tahoka daisies and paper flowers. Along the road, golden hairy asters replace the paper flowers.

They’re in the same field, but they don’t bloom at the same time. The lavender petals of Machaeranthera tanacetifolia are closed in the early morning, but open wide in late morning to show their yellow centers. At that time, the white petals of Mentzelia nuda are shut. They only open late in the day.

Scattered flowers appear on Tahoka daisies in mid-summer. This time of year, plants may be covered with flowers. Members of the Laosa family only open a few flowers at a time. Even in late day, the mass of gray-leaved, two-foot high plants resembles a light-colored field of grass or clover.

It’s possible these plants have flowered like this before. When you work, you only see things during commuting times. Early morning and late afternoon are not the best hours to see Tahoka daisies.

One thing I do know. They’ve never grown in the dry area of my yard before. That I would have noticed.

Photographs:

1. Tahoka daisies in field on main road, 29 August 2014. Trees line the main acequia at back.

2. Áñil del muerto in field on farm road, 31 August 2014. Tree in back is probably on a lateral.

3. Tahoka daisies in another field on main road, 29 August 2014.

4. Tahoka daisies in my yard, last fall, 15 October 2013.

5. Stickleaf blooming in field near an arroyo, 31 August 2014.

6. Fully open tahoka daisy and partly open stickleaf near arroyo, 31 August 2014; plains prairie flowers are in back.

7. Tahoka daisies blooming with winterfat on dry hill in my yard, 29 August 2014.

8. Plains paper flower blooming, 31 August 2014. They also are having a good year. The line the banks of the road, but only in this one area near the arroyo.

Rest In Peace

Weather: Rain Friday night.

What’s blooming in the area: Hybrid roses, silver lace vine, trumpet creeper, rose of Sharon, datura, rose purple morning glory, bouncing Bess, purple garden phlox, sweet pea, Russian sage, zinnia, cultivated sunflowers.

Beyond the walls and fences: Velvetweed, buffalo gourd, yellow evening primrose, purple mat flower, pink and white bindweed, Queen Anne’s lace, goat’s head, leatherleaf globemallow, pigweed, horseweed, wild lettuce, Hopi tea, golden rod, plains paper flowers, áñil del muerto, tahoka daisy, golden hairy asters, black grama grass.

In my yard, looking east: Black locust, large-flowered soapwort, garlic chives, Jupiter’s beard, winecup mallow, pink evening primrose, Maximilian sunflowers, cut leaf coneflower. Hollyhocks are so tall they can be seen from inside the house.

Looking south: Betty Prior, Fairy, rugosa and miniature roses.

Looking west: Caryopteris, Johnson’s Blue geranium, catmint, calamintha, David phlox, ladybells, Mönch aster, purple coneflower.

Looking north: Yellow potentilla, golden spur columbine, Mexican hat, black-eyed Susan, chocolate flower, blanket flower, anthemis, coreopsis.

In the open, along the drive: Buddleia, white yarrow.

Bedding plants: Snapdragon, sweet alyssum, blue salvia, moss rose, French marigold, gazania.

Seeds: Heavenly Blue morning glories, larkspur, reseeded Sensation cosmos from last year’s plants, yellow cosmos, bachelor buttons.

Animal sightings: Rabbit, geckos, small birds, bees, grasshoppers, large and small black ants.

Weekly update: One of my neighbors died this week, the one who built the berm that protects my place from flooding.

I only talked with Joe once, soon after I moved here. But even before, I knew something about him.

He had a large mound in front of his house where he raised dahlias. There also were yellow iris, which he said he took from a cemetery, and a tall shade tree.

We sometimes would speak when he was heading to the prairie for a walk. A few times we talked about plants, perhaps because I was working in the yard when we met this way.

I remember one time, probably 1995. The grasshoppers were especially bad. He said the only things they hadn’t eaten in his garden were the tomatoes and cucumbers.

I thought maybe the fact tomatoes were members of the nightshade family not only made them invulnerable but repellant. I immediately went into town and bought whatever plants remained in the local hardware stores to plant around the edges of my garden.

It didn’t work, of course, and the tomatoes never prospered. However, for years I planted them out of a superstitious hope.

Another time his wife was walking out to the prairie. It must have been 2008, the only year my peach bore fruit. She wondered what I was going to go with all the peaches.

Soon after hornets moved in and closed the path by the tree. I picked all the green fruit and threw it out. I’m sure she’d have found a better use if it had been allowed to ripen.

At the time she said their tree had been killed by gophers. Years later when I walked the prairie behind their house, I noticed the remains of a large tree. I wondered if it had been the peach, though it seemed too large.

A small callery pear grew in its stead. It, at least, would never overshadow the house.

The tree in front was a catalpa, which Joe cut back severely. He also kept his apricots topped off.

I lost touch with his garden after he surrounded his land with a fence. I’m told the bark board came from a sawmill run by this daughter-in-law’s brother. A few years back, they added solar lights to the fence.

The last time I saw the mound, it was bare dirt with some planters at the top nurturing marigolds.

It isn’t simply a perverse tunnel vision that limits my memories to his plants. The on-line obituary only mentioned his survivors. The only biographical detail it gave was his birth place in 1940.

He came from El Llano, a small settlement near the boundary between the Santa Cruz and San Juan land grants. The houses were clustered around a small church, all close to the Llano ditch that snaked along the base of the Santa Cruz badlands.

The obituary didn’t mention military service. He would have been 18 in 1958, before Vietnam. In those years, young men who didn’t go to college often enlisted to avoid being drafted.

The first thing I remember he said was that he worked for the ranch that once included the land where I lived. With the owner’s permission, he put his trailer on the edge of the ranch near an abandoned road bed.

It began as a simply double wide, but over the years the structure was hidden behind a brick façade.

He later drove a gravel hauler for the local quarry. Joe told me, he always said he would walk to Chimayó when he paid off his rig, which he did. He drove until his eyes got bad, then quit.

A life lived with family and plants, and a few animals. They protected the quail and fed hummingbirds. Their apricot is the only tree in the area to have nests.

He was buried yesterday by his church.

Photographs:
1. Joe’s apricot last spring, 30 March 2013.

2. Joe’s apricot, 7 November 2010. My intermediate neighbor built his own fence of the same bark board, which is in front of the tree in this view.

3. Joe’s front yard, early 1990s. The enclosed brown area under the tree is the mound garden.

4. Cherry tomatoes growing with Florence bachelor buttons in my yard, 1997. I planted the tomatoes because of Joe.

5. Callery pear behind Joe’s house with remains of larger tree, 28 March 2012. The berm is in front and at an angle to deflect water.

6. Catalpa in front of Joe’s house, 7 June 2012.

7. Marigolds in Joe’s mound bed, 17 August 2008.

8. Nests in Joe’s apricot, 5 December 2010.

9. Solar lights on Joe’s fence, 24 August 2014; shadows of the catalpa and an apricot are just visible in the shadows.

Late Locusts

Weather: Cloudy afternoons, sometimes windy; last rain 8/1.

What’s blooming in the area: Hybrid roses, silver lace vine, trumpet creeper, rose of Sharon, datura, rose purple morning glory, bouncing Bess, purple garden phlox, sweet pea, Russian sage, zinnia, cultivated sunflowers.

Those who carefully prune their shrubs were working this past week on forsythia and snowballs.

Beyond the walls and fences: Velvetweed, buffalo gourd, yellow evening primrose, purple mat flower, pink and white bindweed, Queen Anne’s lace, goat’s head, leatherleaf globemallow, pigweed, horseweed, wild lettuce, Hopi tea, golden rod, plains paper flowers, áñil del muerto, tahoka daisy, golden hairy asters, black grama grass.

In my yard, looking east: Large-flowered soapwort, garlic chives, Jupiter’s beard, hollyhocks, winecup mallow, pink evening primrose.

Looking south: Betty Prior, Fairy and miniature roses.

Looking west: Caryopteris, Johnson’s Blue geranium, catmint, calamintha, David phlox, ladybells, sea lavender, Mönch aster, purple coneflower.

Looking north: Yellow potentilla, golden spur columbine, Mexican hat, black-eyed Susan, chocolate flower, blanket flower.

In the open, along the drive: Buddleia, white yarrow.

Bedding plants: Snapdragon, sweet alyssum, blue salvia, moss rose, French marigold, gazania.

Seeds: Larkspur, reseeded Sensation cosmos from last year’s plants, yellow cosmos, bachelor buttons.

Animal sightings: Rabbit, geckos, small birds, bees, grasshoppers, large and small black ants.

Weekly update: The early, wet monsoons have brought lushness. I’ve seen velvetweeds reaching the middle of traffic signs and pigweeds rising above five foot walls.

Bright green marks new growth on my black locust. Down the road, a copse of new sprouts has formed near the base of a towering tree near the road.

At the post office, new growth on the purple-flowered locust shrubs are pushing up in cracks where the pavement meets the curb.

Those Robinia neomexicana didn’t bloom this year. Last year they had flowers from the middle to the end of May. This year, we were still in drought conditions exacerbated by high winds. Now that conditions and sun angles have changed, some of those dormant buds are opening.

My Robinia pseudoacacia is undergoing its annual locust borer cycle. When the winds came in July one trunk collapsed onto another one. The heavy rains weighted them down until both reached into my drive.

In the past I’ve called someone to remove the trunk before the next generation of goldenrod-fed adults laid new eggs. The first year the company passed the job onto one of their employees who did a good job. I called him the next year. He showed up Saturday morning with no tools.

The following year I called a man who cut away the locust and a fallen branch on the cottonwood. However, he only cut the part that was in the drive, leaving the broken branches in the tree.

Last year I tried another company who finished trimming the cottonwood, or at least part of it, and removed the fallen locust. I believe they are also the ones who introduced the aphids which attacked the peach and flower bed in other areas where they worked.

This is northern New Mexico. I’ve run out of names in the phone book. I’m waiting until winter to call someone who can’t do too much damage.

Meantime, the two trees reach into the drive. The one started putting out white flowers this week.

More interesting, the trunk that lost all its leaves is reviving. It must still be connected to part of the vital cambium where the xylem and phloem flow. Most of its new buds aren’t leaves, but flower clusters.

I don’t know if the roots have redirected its efforts to producing seed or if it was this branch’s turn to be the one covered with flowers. Not every branch blooms every spring. This year, none bloomed in late May.

I’m not sure if it does any good to remove the diseased wood before it infects another trunk. I’m not convinced the locust borers even bother to leave the copse to feed before they lay their eggs and die.

All I’ve learned is, that despite the annual cost of a tree cutter and the constant need to remove thorny suckers, these legumes are worth the trouble. They can adapt.

Photographs:
1. Black locust flower on live trunk in my drive, 17 August 2014.
2. New Mexico locust flower at post office, 17 August 2014.
3. Black locust copse down the road, 17 August 2014.
4. New Mexico locust sucker at post office, 17 August 2014.
5. New Mexico locust at post office, 17 August 2014.
6. Two downed black locust trunks in my drive, 20 July 2014.
7. Black locust flower in my drive, 16 August 2014.
8. New growth on downed black locust trunk, 16 August 2014.
9. More of the black locust copse down the road, 17 August 2014.

10. Flower cluster of downed black locust in my drive, 16 August 2014.

Natural Selection

Weather: Cloudy afternoons, last rain 8/1; the rivers are still running brown.

What’s blooming in the area: Hybrid roses, silver lace vine, trumpet creeper, rose of Sharon, datura, bouncing Bess, purple garden phlox, alfalfa, sweet pea, Russian sage, yellow yarrow, zinnia, cultivated sunflowers.

Beyond the walls and fences: Tamarix, velvetweed, buffalo gourd, yellow evening primrose, purple mat flower, pink and white bindweed, Queen Anne’s lace, goat’s head, leatherleaf globemallow, horseweed, wild lettuce, Hopi tea, plains paper flowers, tahoka daisy, golden hairy asters, black grama grass.

In my yard, looking east: Large-flowered soapwort, Jupiter’s beard, hollyhocks, winecup mallow, sidalcea, pink evening primrose.

Looking south: Betty Prior, Fairy and miniature roses.

Looking west: Caryopteris, Johnson’s Blue geranium, catmint, calamintha, David phlox, ladybells, sea lavender, Mönch daisy, purple coneflower.

Looking north: Yellow potentilla, golden spur columbine, Mexican hat, black-eyed Susan, chocolate flower, blanket flower, coreopsis, anthemis.

In the open, along the drive: Fernbush, buddleia, larkspur, white yarrow, yellow cosmos.

Bedding plants: Snapdragon, sweet alyssum, blue salvia, moss rose, French marigold, gazania.

Seeds: Reseeded Sensation cosmos from last year’s plants, bachelor buttons.

Animal sightings: Rabbit, geckos, small birds, bees, grasshoppers, large and small black ants.

Weekly update: This has not been a great year for seeds. There was no rain in the spring or early summer. It was difficult to keep seeds wet with surface watering.

Then, there were the grasshoppers and, in my yard, the rabbit. One day I would see some seedlings, the next they were gone.

The Cosmos Bipinnatus that are blooming now are seeds from last year’s plants that reseeded themselves. Ones for the Dazzler variety emerged the end of May.

The rabbit left them alone. Perhaps the stems were too developed by the time the animal was grazing my yard. Or, maybe they were mature enough to have some defensive trait that discouraged nibbling.

Natural selection works in wondrous ways. The original seeds for these plants were sown in 2012 and were blooming by late August.

Last year a few seedlings emerged which began producing flowers the first of August. By late September, the four foot stems were covered with dark red flowers. I left the seeds for the winter.

This year the seeds that came up were next to the walk where they get water trapped by the blocks.

Back on September 17 of 2006 I wrote about the years of breeding it took to shorten the gestation period for flowers from a native of the valley of México so they would appear in northern gardens before frost. Sensation cosmos was introduced in 1930.

In 2003, the Royal Horticultural Society tested seeds. They reported their "trial of Cosmos bipinnatus was very disappointing and showed poor maintenance by the various seed companies and therefore previous awards could not be confirmed."

"Poor maintenance" didn’t mean letting weeds and rabbits take over. It meant seed companies weren’t producing the same quality seed that had earlier.

When Mary Keen complained that year, seed companies implied it was her fault. Chiltern Seeds said they only had had two negative letters in ten years. Its spokesman "stressed that all seed is variable and advised anyone pricking out seedlings to select different heights for the best results."

She didn’t accept that. She’d had good yields before. She knew how to grow Dazzler cosmos.

When she talked to friends, she discovered no one she knew in England could grow cosmos. One thought problems with day length at reappeared.

Companies have been growing seeds in Africa and Latin America to exploit the longer growing season and cheaper production costs. Within a few seasons, the plants may have reverted to the tropical ways that had so carefully been bred out. Seeds from those warm environs didn’t behave like the ones grown in colder climes.

It’s hard to know when the changes were made. Pan American, the owner of Burpee, began using central American sites after World War II. Thompson and Morgan gets most of its seeds from Africa. A representative finally told Keen "there was a problem with selected forms of C. bipinnatus."

Selected doesn’t mean a random few. It means varieties like Dazzler that develop from selecting the best of each generation to encourage the best form. Such strains aren’t the same as hybrids which attempt more fundamental changes to the germ plasm.

Seed origin information on seed packets is deceptive. For a while in the late 1990s, most seed companies included country of origin. They stopped around 2004. I assume the inclusion of the information was a function of rules of the European Common Market, and the omission occurred when rules were changed.

The only seed company which may have been providing honest information was Stokes. They reported their zinnia and Calendula seeds came from Zimbabwe in 1999. Others probably defined origin to mean where they acquired seeds, not where they grew. Holland, Germany and France may have been either the location of growers or wholesale markets.

The seed I planted in 2012 was described as coming from Holland. The Dazzler seed submitted to the RHS trials came from a Dutch company, K. Sahin, Zaden B. V. that had been established in 1982 by Kees and Elisabeth Sahin. Takii Seeds of Tokyo bought them out in 2008.

In 2003, Keen was told the way to guarantee she had good cosmos the next year was to save seeds from those that bloomed in July or take cuttings from good plants and try to winter them over. I let nature do the work by not cutting away seed heads.

In bad times, genes tell. Those paying attention realize Darwin was correct when he reported the workings of natural selection.

My seeds probably came from Africa in 2012 where many may have reverted to tropical habits. The ones that appeared in 2013, by definition, were those that had successfully set seed the year before. The ones now growing again were those that set seeds that dropped or rolled to the protected area by the block.

Notes: To find the posting from 2006, click on "Cosmos Sensation" in the index at the right.

Keen, Mary. "A Disappointing Year for the Cosmos," The Telegraph, 8 November 2003.

Royal Horticultural Society. "Trial of Cosmos from seed 2003: An Invited RHS Trial."

Photographs:
1. Dazzler cosmos flower, 10 August 2010.

2. Santa Cruz river upstream from dam that diverts water to the local ditches, 8 August 2014.

3. Dazzler cosmos flower, with fewer disk florets, 10 August 2014.

4. Cosmos plants growing near block walk, 29 June 2014.

5. Debris from high waters caught on the local Santa Cruz dam, 8 August 2014.

6. Closer few of the dam, 8 August 2014.