BACKYARD BOTANY

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22712, 26 October 1935, Page 26

BACKYARD BOTANY

POETRY IN THE KITCHENGARDEN By Andrew Southland. Whether it was an association of ideas—Thoreau and his weeds in the bean-patch at Walden; myself with the scuffle-hoe in a parallelogram of 25-for-sixpcncc George street cabbages —the fact emerged, warm and heartening as a ray of sunshine after a bleak three days’ southerly. Still pandering to the allusive mood, responding to the promise of sun-wilted leaves stiffening in the grateful coolness of the evening, I matched the rhyme of my hoe with such tags as: There Is a pleasure In the garden patch. There Is a rapture where the turnips grow. Then, of course, that twilight symphony, worthy of a radio broadcast, of birds in the billowy drapery of muhlenbeckia on the fuchsia-clad slopes that overlook the garden, exalting the precincts of a commonplace backyard to the dignity of a sunlit sylvan glade. The luscious, leisurely recitative of a fullthroated blackbird, leading a hidden choir of lesser artists from the topmost spar of a macrocarpa, dominated the medley of music. The piping of a dozen thrushes, chiding, plaintive or imperious as the whims of their several natures dictated, formed the body of the concert, punctuated here and there like the enlivening clash of cymbals, or the mellower tones of the triangle, by the roost-ing-calls, chink! chink! of chaffinches, settling for the night among the brownlimbed fuchsias. Here and there, too, but defying location, the sharp mousesqueaks of restless hedge-accentors. The delicate tinkling notes- of a grey warbler were lost in the louder performance of more powerful songsters, and there have been no bellbirds since the “ blackies ” tuned their flutes for their all too brief season. Nothing, indeed, to redress the preponderance of English bird-song in this far southern setting! The “ mockies ” have migrated upstream to more secluded breedinggrounds, where fantails and tomtits flit and chatter in the alternating gloom and glare of bush-mantled gullies, where the water threads its way through sunless crevices, to slip like transparent quicksilver over hangings of greenest moss. But I prefer to think that the bellbirds, like most aristocrats of the wilds, still retain sufficient native pride to insist on a modicum of privacy in the more important affairs of life. In this respect both thrush and blackbird are flagrant offenders, as though aware that, in spite of exposing their eggs and brood to every casual eye, their numbers are bound to increase. The annual loss in both species must he incredibly great. DISCRIMINATIONS. So what with the glamour of the evening hour and the singing of birds as I hoed prosaic and sun-stricken cabbages, it occurred to me that these humble cruciferous plants, together with the “ snowball ” turnips, and farther along the serried rows of shallots and other garden-stuff, may have had a poetical origin or ancestry. Yet how seldom have poets and painters adverted to the higher qualities of these most worthy members of the botanical kingdom! With the exception of Fluellen’s Welsh leek I cannot recall a single allusion to garden truck that is not in some way derogatory to the whole vegetable tribe. Who has ever read an “ Ode to the Carrot,” or “ On a Prospect of Vegetable Marrows in Bloom,” or a string of sonnets to the aristocratic asparagus? It is probable that the leek was well established as a national emblem long before Shako speare immortalised it in riotous dialogue; but had he done as much, sav, for carrots, parsnips, salsify or cucumbers, there is no doubt that vegetable growing would have received thereby a measure of what the Americans call “ uplift ” —not to say respectability—far surpassing in value all manner of manuring, mulching and cultivation whatsoever. It is true that the seed merchants strive to exalt the merits of their wares to an ideal degree of size and beauty by designing colourful names and representations on the packets retailed to confiding suburban gardeners; but the miracle of matching those lithographic masterpieces with their allegedly latent counterparts lias still to be consummated. Those violently blushing scarlet and white radishes, all of a size, with brilliant green tops spreading as symmetrically as the crown of a tropical palmetto; those perfectly spherical, tailless beets and taper carrots, those butterbeans —a cluster of lemon-tinted pods concealing a few spear-shaped leaves —who has ever beheld them in the flesh? There is something altogether unwarranted — sinister, almost —about the world-wide obloquy pervading the vegetable garden and its products. Can it be that because they minister merely to our physical but vital wants they are therefore the less deserving of universal esteem? If so, the authority for such a belief is sadly awry, for the only mention of our bodily welfare in the best-known portion of Holy Writ relates to ‘‘our daily bread,” and presumably, the source of it. Wheat, however, and, indeed, all cereals in the abstract, as fields of golden corn, and so forth, have long been admitted to a higher plane of poetic and artistic appreciation. It now behoves some biblical scholar of gardening propensities (a not uncommon being, by the wav) to compile and publish a list _ of all references in the Scriptures relating to vegetable foods. Fiat! HORTICULTURAL PEDIGREES. With the exception of certain edible plants from America —including, according to “ Babbitt,” plug tobacco- the origin of many quite common vegetables is remarkably obscure. The cabbage is to-day found wild around the shores of several European countries —a fact that would seem to indicate some affinity with sea air. The name itself derives from “ caput,” Latin for “ head.” and the source of sundry exalted terms. The present designation, however, was grossly debased through such Middle English variants as “ cabache ” and “ caboche,” and latterly was in danger of suffering a further distortion, in company with “carrots,” as a feature in a popular song. From the originaal plant have been evolved a number of kindred vegetables, including Brussels sproutts and cauliflowers. The radish may lie described as the etymological antithesis of the cabbage; —from “radix,” a root. The genesis of this plant is obscure, and is not likely to receive the attention of a Committee of Fifteen, though some thoughtful gardeners concur in the belief that that adequate research by such a body into tiie origin of the radish would do more to promote international goodwill .than is i}t present likely. Passnips are distinguished by a fairly long and sturdy pedigree. The Romans used them, presumably without the regulation garnishing of butter. How many dairy farmers are aware that “butter” is an alien word, and a Latin-Gieek at that? The wild parsnip lias a wide distribution, and is amenable to rapid development through proper selection and treatment. Few school-book historians would be able to answer offhand the question of what was Sir Francis Drake’s most notable contribution to the greatness of his country. It was not his spoiling of the Spaniard off Panama and Peru, hut literally the capture, on the high seas, of the potato, in 1580, on a homewardbound enemy galleon. Next to cereals, the homely “ spud ” has played a fateful part in the countries of its adoption. The famine of the forties drove thousands of Irish and European emigrants across the Atlantic. Horticulture was far enough advanced in 1708 to warrant

the issue of a gardener’s calendar. In one such publication the potato was damned with ambiguous praise as follows: —“Not so good as Jerusalem artichokes, but it may prove good for swine.” Asparagus, onions and garlic, like the Zealand cabbage tree, claim botanical relationship with Madonnas and other exquisites of the lilies. The patrician strain that still distinguishes “ sparrowgrass ” from the hoi polloi of the truck-patch is of very ancient derivation. Reputedly the Romans grew sprouts that went three to the pound. The name itself originates from a remote Persian source. The greatest tragedy of house shifting is ones inability to grow asparagus. JUNGLE LAW IN THE GARDEN. Meanwhile the garden is flourishing. Hosts of small, two-lobed seedlings of several sorts are feeling the urge of earth and sun and are crowding out the rows of usurpers—the pampered, cultivated vegetables which at one time were weeds themselves, and as such had to fight their own battles. Even to-day the prototype of the asparagus grows wild on Russian steppes and holds its own against foraging live stock and competitive vegetation. The hoe sweeps down the rows and ridges, murdering the weeds in their myriads and leaving unscathed the feathery-topped carrots, the doublenotched turnip seedlings and the hair-thin onions looped like pigmy carriage whips. To-morrow some of the loops will have straightened half way at right angles to the stem, with the black husk of seed still adhering to the tip. Growing like this, in rows, and later transplanted with due regard for spacing, they will survive to a plant. Packed irregularly in a seed bed, many would be lost in the process of weeding, and others would suffer from the encroachment of their own kind in the grim struggle for life. System and methodical treatment are essential in the garden if the plants are to be saved from their enemies—and, broadly speaking, every plant is the enemy of its nearest neighbour, regardless of species. We are apt to consider the exceptions to this rule as instances of benevolent tolerance till ;ve discover that the process is simply part of a cruel game of beggar-my-neighbour. The rugged forest tree shelters the sapl.ng that will one day arise and overwhelm It and be overwhelmed in turn by new generations of proteges. The law of tin jungle is inexorable, and it is pleasant to think that the same conditions arc not carried to a like extreme of call'usness in the animal world, except in the most primitive forms. The tigress fights for her cubs; she trains and admonishes them for their ultimate good during their apprenticeship to life. There is no con scious altruism about it. of course: but one feels that, unlike the trees, she is not yet a cannibal. Nowhere else is rim waste and appalling cruelty of Nature so impressively evident as in a tropical forest. It is a relief once more to tread the open lanes and glades of the temperate woodlands; to feel that although the struggle is still going on around ns, it is being waged on terms at least compatible with our acquired and conventional estimates of decency—and our love of compromise. It is not till we have finished our afternoon’s hosing, and have complacently surveyed the wilting rows of duckweed and shepherd's purse that wc realise bow slight arc our pretensions to superiority over the wanton deity that rules the jungle. “But,” we argue, “necessity knows no, law ” —our necessity, of course. And as we put up the hoe and lock the shed for the night, somewhat in the manner of Adam of old, we mitigate our sense of guilt with prospects of home-grown peas and early potatoes. And so indoors.