Last week was the Rhode Island Spring Flower Show, Thursday through Sunday.  I was hired to do two talks, Thursday and Saturday.  Both the Terrace Talk, both fine, both fun.

That said, I was struck yet again that the real benefit of lecturing is not so much the actual lectures themselves.  Yes people come, yes they laugh at the jokes, ooh and aah over the slides, enjoy the information, whatever.  And yes I get paid.  But the true value is that I get to use the lectures as a marketing vehicle, via the terraces mailer itself.  By being in touch about the talks with friends, design colleagues, fans who've heard me do other lectures other places, and of course clients and leads.

It's much less important that any of them actually come hear the talk.  (It's not as if I'm auditioning for a television series or something.)  Of course, it's important that the people who do come—and in a flowershow, people just wander in (or wander out); it's a fluid forum—are glad they did.  Which they were.  It would be bad karma and just plain counter-productive to have someone out there grousing that they heard that Louis Raymond dude and he didn't have anything worthwhile to say, he was a bore with the mike, his slides were dull and moved slowly.  Far as I can tell, no one need ever worry about that at one of my lectures.  So the appeal of the lecture is a given.  Whew.

But beyond the enjoyment and the money, the real benefit is usually elsewhere.  Sure, people ask afterwards if I lecture for garden clubs.  (Yes.)  If I do consulting for landscape design.  (Yes.)  And they all happily accept the handouts (the terrace mailer on the way in, and the Garden Shorts announcement as they leave; I hired a friend to do the handing-out.)  But I've never sensed (or better, experienced) that someone important would come to the lecture and then, on that basis alone, be in touch with some juicy project.

Actually, that's not true:  I got on the cover of House & Garden magazine because their New England scout just happened to live near Westerly, RI, and came to hear a talk I did at the Westerly Library for some garden club or other.  She introduced herself afterwards, asked to see pictures of more projects, and one of them—"Summer Home" is the marketing name we use on RGardening—wound up being photographed for H & G, and put in the cover too.

But that was, so far, a singular dividend from lecturing. And that cover was in 2002.  So the lecture couldn't have been much later than 2001 either.  It's 2010, getting close to ten years and scores of lectures later.  No one has come up after a lecture since with as good an offer.

I don't think that this means that my lectures are lousy, or that that lecture and those projects and those slides were better than anything since.  (That's certainly not the case!)  On the contrary, it's typical (truly) that people say that my lectures are the best they've ever heard.  I blush to say that, but truly, it's true.

The lesson, I think, is that lectures themselves are not "about" big breakthroughs.  They are stepping stones, building blocks, to incremental progress.  OK fine.  And golly are they fun for me, not just the audience.  I have a great time, and I'm never nervous or questioning if I'm worthwhile enough, cool enough, for this or that crowd.  I'm at home on stage, happy with a mike.  I'm grateful for the opportunity, and I'm never worried that I'm worthy of it.

There's enough challenges and stress with the economy, with getting a good flow of business.  At least I can be calm and comfortable with the talks.  Whew again.

See for yourself:  The next Terrace Talk is the Boston Flowershow, March 24, 1:30 PM.  Here's the FB page.

What a shock it has been to slowly realize that the Erythinas I had for years been tossing off as E. crista-galli were actually E. x bidwillii. (Cries of disgust are heard from the back of the audience. Oh yes, I hear you.) Tonight I set the record straight, regardless of the embarassment.

Here is one of my Bidwill's erythrinas in bloom (in July and then September), with long spikes of narrow intense-red flowers, at the tips of branches that sprout each Spring from an ever-more-deliciously-convoluted base—a caudex—that results, who knows why?, from cutting the plant back severely each Spring.

Bidwill's erythrina is a hybrid of two Erythrina species. E. crista-galli is a medium-sized tree (about the size of a cherry tree or a Korean dogwood), native to subtropical South America.

The flowers are also in spikes, but unlike Bidwill's, each blossom opens wide, with a very showy lower petal like a hot landing pad.
























The other parent is Erythrina herbacea, which is a shrub at best, more often a perennial that grows from a woody base. It's native to the American Southeast.























Happily the two erythrina species were crossable, and so they were mated to make Bidwill's. It has the flower shape of herbacea, but the flower color and tree-like habit of crista-galli.
This is an untidy Bidwill's in bloom at the University of Arizona.

When crossing two species of the same genera—E. crista-galli with E. herbacea—the progeny are shown with an "x" followed by a hybrid name of the originator's choosing. In this case, John Bidwill who
(I now know) took this new hybrid from Australia to England back in 1843. (Who knew people were already mixing it up with their erythrinas back when Chopin was around?)

So it's Erythrina x bidwillii, not Erythrina bidwillii. Glad we've got that all cleared up.

Given how easy and exciting my Bidwills are, why not try out the parents too, herbacea and crista-galli? Well I already have an herbacea, in a pot (it's not hardy north of Texas). It's a little pokey, and still hasn't flowered after growing two years. Maybe 2010 will be a scorcher and it will favor us with bloom?

But crist-galli would be brand new for me. The tree is described as "a die-back shrub" where it isn't hardy as a tree (England, say), and a "returning perennial" where it isn't hardy as a die-back shrub (North Carolina, say). So it loves to sprout from the base, no matter how far down that is, even right to ground level or below it. Perfect, then, for in a potted specimen here in New England, where it wouldn't be hardy in the ground no matter how well I mulched and coddled. Not a problem: I'll handle it just like my bidwills, leaving it out late enough in October to get a little frost to hustle it into dormancy, then cutting all the branches back to stubs so the potted stump is easier to lug into the basement before a more serious frost would kill it entirely.

Bidwill, you're a great son. Herbie and Crista? It's time to welcome you both to the family too. And for you to do the same: Get Bidwills at Plant Delights. Herbacea too. Or even herbacea with pink flowers instead of red. Get crista-galli at Woodlander's. Now get shopping!

I'm in NYC for a few days, seeing clients and going to dinner parties. Yes, it's a tough life I lead: Even when I'm working my ass off to get new business, it can still look like I'm just hanging out, going to parties. More on Parties: The New Job another time.

Today's post was inspired by what I saw in the subway station:
a rat.
No big: I'm a live-and-let-live believer.

"Rats" in Manhattan means Norway rats. Truly, a species of rat that jumped onto ships leaving Norway in the 1800's, and jumped off when those same ships landed here. Thank you Norway. And what does it say about your country that even rats are interested in leaving?

Here are two other Norway natives we can all only wish had never left the land-o-fiords:

Norway spruces.
I've blogged on these earlier. Their best use, really, is for...
...mulch and lumber.

That they are often what's used for the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree is the exception that proves the rule that...
...even the rare attractive Norway spruce is best when cut down.


Norway maples.
Like the Norway spruce, this maple is a curse on any landscape.

It self-seeds everywhere, and can out-compete everything, growing into a huge greedy tree with black-dense shade and shallow roots so greedy that almost nothing will grow under then. A tree for the old country or the forest. Or, after a refreshing trip to the sawmill, for new floors in your house.

With the Terrace mailer updated for the February & March flowershow talks, it's time to let you know about our big project, both in terms of marketing production and the actual scope and content of the project itself. It's a "webisode" site. A what? Well, it's a web site devoted to videos (on anything horticultural, hosted by me) that will be viewed on computers, phones, or iPads instead of being broadcast for viewing on TV.

Richard, as I recall, had the big inspiration that the videos would all be just one minute long. Short, really short. Grab-and-go. And either he or I then had the happy flash to call the site Garden Shorts.

And then to have the logo be me in shorts.

After the logo firmed up, we found that snappy, catchy, phrases that could be used in the marketing just popped up almost by themselves. Which is a sign of a concept with, so to speak, legs not just shorts.

To wit, this family—this bouquet— of sibling sentences, all beginning with "G":

"Got a minute?"
"Got a garden?"
"Get into our Shorts!"
(Oh my: A naughty pun. Too naughty? What do you think?)


Or these:

"Louis, minute by minute."
"Louis, in a minute."

All promising material for some promotional literature. Specifically and first, an announcement card. This will be handed out at the flowershow lectures, and, second, will be part of the invitation to a couple of launch parties in April. (God I love that term, "launch parties". And in the plural no less.)

Take a look. Here's the front of the card:




And here's the back:



All the enticing as well as aphoristic words and pictures you need to get interested in visiting www.GardenShort.com itself. Go ahead: click here and try it. (Wait: "Go ahead and try it!" Another "G" sentence. Oh my.) The site won't be up until March 1, so we're using the announcement as the front "curtain", so we can continue to work on the site back-stage, as it were, in privacy.

SO: On March 1, the Shorts will be up. Go get 'em!

I've been having bodacious success with my Bidwill erythrinas. For a plant that's a big tree in the tropics when left to its own choices, Bidwills are surprisingly easy to handle here in pots, by being cut down to the stump each Fall, in chilly New England. And even if they were pain-in-the-ass difficult, what wouldn't you do—moral or not, legal or not, expensive or not—to have their lengthy spikes of bloom, as colorful as they are unique, right in your own gardens?
Yes indeedy, this here is one of my bidwills, doing what it loves to do each July.

And then there are those weird swollen trunks — "weird" and "swollen" both being good things in this case.

Wow are these erythrinas fun, quirky, reliable, incredible.

And, oh yes, heart-stoppingly beautiful.


More, please.

And so it was with a quickening pulse that, last year, I saw at Seneca Hill Perennials an erythrina I'd never heard of, Erythrina zeyheri.

What? Bidwills aren't enough? (And I have four of them, remember.) Is there truly more joy, amazement, beauty, even shock that's possible in a garden? Let me know after you've been introduced to Zeyheri.

Let's start off easy. Too much excitement can be a shock to the system. Zeyheri is a perennial, not, like Bidwill, a tree. So on that score alone, ho-hum. Another perennial? I've got hundreds already. But take a look at this colony of Zeyheri in its native South Africa.
A real show, isn't it. Even moreso as a new citizen of my New England gardens, where vertical spikes are always welcome.

And in close-up, the flowers seem more like kniphofias.

Fine by me: I'm working up to a "knip" collection of, oh, a modest dozen.

















Here's another Zeyheri plant entirely. The color of the flowers can vary from intense red through orange and salmon clear to pinkish. Reds and oranges predominate. So then: Vertical red spikes? Oh yes, am I interested!
When you can tear you eyes from the flowers, notice the huge leaves.

This potted youngster's leaves completely dwarf the plant itself.
I'm guessing in a more established plant that they are a weed-smothering mound of foliage three or four feet across. Heavens. One reference commented that "the leaves are long-stalked and increase in size as the summer progresses." I know just how that feels.

More on the "perennial" thing: It leads to the real kicker. Zeyheri is a "normal" perennial in that it's a committed leaf-shedder, fully expecting and even relying on a long cold-season dormancy. It retreates to a massive, woody, swollen base for the Winter.


But that base is, oh my gawd, just the tip of the iceberg.

With such leg-sized woody roots, it's no wonder that Zeyheri is "What, me worry?" about getting through several months of off-season cold and drought. I'm hoping it's the reason that the Zeyheri will also be content to snooze in my basement for six months each Winter. The low above-ground profile of the massive roots gives no warning that the plant is nearby: No wonder that one common name is "plowbreaker."

(I can't make sense of why another name is "Prickly cardinal", though. Yes, the foliage is prickly, but the cardinal thing? I leave that mystery to those with a more direct connection to the Church.)

That, then, is the list of Zeyheri's charms: Rare, prickly, big of leaf, glorious of bloom, funny of name, an easy keeper in a pot, and with what looks like the potential to be my biggest and most alarming swollen roots ever. And just like with my Bidwills, each Spring before the growth starts up I'd scrape away another inch or two of soil from the top of the pot, and, in effect, put it at the bottom of the rootball. Then those limb-like roots would arise out of the soil year by year, inch by inch, foot by foot. Ta da! Another shamelessly-manipulated caudex for my collection.

Cearly, I was, and am, in plowbreaker lust. I had to have it. But now that I was good and ready for a Zeyheri to call my own, Seneca no longer lists it. Drat!

Back to Google, where—huzzah!—Penroc Seeds & Plants popped up at the top of the page. But Zeyheri's caudexs quickly get too big to ship. A relief actually: Penroc is in South Africa. Thank goodness, the plant is (they say) easy from seed.

So I e-mailed for the seed list. (Still waiting to hear from them; perhaps they're out on the veldt discovering even more wild stuff. I would be.) Meanwhile, there's time on my hands (and, I'm hoping, on yours) for some further Zeyheri research.

1. A Zeyheri reference page (with very washed-out pictures; don't be discouraged).

2. And what I think is the ne plus ultra reference site for plants with swollen trunks. (I can here you sigh of relief, "Finally!")