November 15, 2025 • 45 mins
Conifers, often mistaken for Pine trees, are and have been landscape staples throughout history. Not to mention a classic choice for the Christmas tree! We dive into what makes a conifer, a conifer, and talk about the wide variety of conifers in the world. Fun facts, care tips, and how to deal with Juglone (the chemical produced by Black Walnut trees) are just a few of the things you’ll hear in this episode. Featured shrub: Stonehenge yew.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Broadcasting from Studio A here at Proven Winters, Color Joy Shrubs.
It's the Gardening Simplified Show with Stacy Hervella, me Rick Weist,
and our engineer and producer Adrianna Robinson. Well, today we
talk about conifers. Conifers make excellent specimens standalone trees and
accents in our landscapes. Conifers are a broad family of
(00:26):
plants described as coniferous, meaning they produce cones. I call
them woody cones so to speak, that contain their seeds.
But I'm sure in Plants on Trial Stacy will give
us a hed education on that issue. Conifers are typically,
not always, but typically evergreen trees with needle like foliage.
(00:51):
I think some of the most spectacular large trees in
the landscape that are conifers are not necessarily evergreen. And Stacey,
I think about the bald cypress that I've seen at
places like Arnold, Arborretam and the unusual root system, the
(01:12):
roots growing out of the ground to have a picture
for you on YouTube, or down redwood or larch. So
not necessarily evergreen trees.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Yeah, and you know, I think that a lot of
people when they hear that, for the first time. Their
mind is kind of blown because they so closely associate
being a conifer with being an evergreen. And yeah, there
are all of those native, they're not all native, but
of course bald cypress famously is very is native to
the south, and you can't go anywhere down south without
(01:43):
seeing it. And then we have larch up here, which
we'll be turning color just about any moment now if
it's not already out there. You know, even out here
in lower West Michigan, we have an abundance of larch.
And it's one of those plants that you think is
just an evergreen until you see it blaze bright yellowil
and you're just like what. And that is a cool
thing about them is that their fall color does rival
(02:06):
a regular standard deciduous flowering tree because it's like, especially
on the Don redwood turns out beautiful salmon color. Just
a really cool ornamental feature in.
Speaker 1 (02:15):
The garden center industry. If I had a dime for
every time someone has come up to me and said,
I'm having a problem with my pine tree.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:23):
People refer to conifers as pine trees, and it may
be a fur or a spruce or a bald cypress,
whatever it may be for me. I fell in love
with conifers in the Pacific Northwest when I've spent time
in the Pacific Northwest, specifically Oregon and suppliers up there
(02:45):
of evergreen specimen trees, boy wow, or British Columbia taking
rides through their western red cedar, Noble and Grand Fur
some of the biggest Douglas fur trees you'll ever see
in your life up there in the Pacific Northwest. As
a matter of fact, I remember walking the Capilano suspension bridge.
(03:09):
If you ever get a chance to do that, way
up in these trees gorgeous and you really develop a
love for conifers. My most familiar connection, of course, with
conifers is again coming from the garden center industry. I
would like to know how many Christmas trees I have
(03:32):
lugged unloaded off trucks tied to the tops of cars. Unbelievable.
So I have a real connection to Christmas trees. And
as a matter of fact, some people are not familiar
with the Rus Simmons, which is the Christmas tree ship
(03:52):
that sunk on Lake Michigan in nineteen twelve. Every Christmas
Eve I go out there on the lake shore regardless
of the weather, looking for the Rus Simmons, because legend
and lore has it, you can see that three masted
schooner just struggling in the water. It was a ship
(04:14):
that they would load with Christmas trees, uh sail at
across Lake Michigan to Chicago and tie up at the
wharf there. Unfortunately, in nineteen twelve, they overloaded this old.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
Ship with trees, yes, with tear me.
Speaker 1 (04:29):
And there was a rain, ice storm. The trees got
way too heavy. The tree sunk.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
Oh my gosh. And now it's a ghost ship. It's
a ghost ship and it specifically comes out on Christmas Eve.
Speaker 1 (04:39):
Well that's when legend and lore says you can see
the ship. I personally have not ever.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
Run okay, but if you did, would you tell.
Speaker 1 (04:47):
Us absolutely, I'd be shooting video. I have my video camera.
Speaker 2 (04:52):
Well, there is the surest way to know you're never
going to actually see it is are out there with
your camera.
Speaker 1 (04:58):
But it's never worked. Are so interesting three hundred and
sixty five days out of the year, and Stacy, that's
why I think they're so just so popular. I mentioned
the bald cypress roots or don Redwood or larch or
you know the spruce furs, douglas fur. Just amazing. Three
(05:19):
characteristics of conifers. There's many different types of conifers, most
share a few common traits. Stacy. Number one, they have
cones right, yes, correct, that's right. Number two usually spiny
foliage right ye, would be fair to.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
Say, point in their life cycle, if not permanently during
their life cycle, yes, yes.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
And then number three size and shape, in other words, magnificent,
huge conifers. But you can also find low growing or
shorter conifers.
Speaker 2 (05:52):
You can find tiny, signy conifers that grow it like
a quarter inch a year, if you are so inclined.
Speaker 1 (05:59):
Exactly, and if you want to add conifers to your landscape.
I believe personally that conifer care starts with selection and
two things that people often do not think about. Number One,
if you're going to be planting a conifer, accessibility to
supplemental watering at least for the first couple years in
(06:24):
order to get the plant established. Secondly, staking how many
evergreens have I seen in landscapes that are growing askew
so to speak, Because the plant is again evergreen foliage,
it can become a sail during windy parts of the
year and prior to it rooting, it's probably a good
(06:46):
idea to stake a conifer tree. So I think that
those are important things to look at and when you're
shopping for conifers, and really it holds true in my
opinion for any woody plants in general. You need to
pay attention to structure, roots, and overall health. Get a
(07:06):
good start by choosing a well grown specimen. That's the
first step in conifer care.
Speaker 2 (07:11):
That is one hundred percent true. You know, it's you're
going to be You're going to have what you start with.
And that could mean sort of that perfect iconic triangular
you know tree with a straight up and down leader
Christmas Christmas tree shaped, or it could mean something that's
a little bit more funky and poetic. I mean, really
that is how Boneses Eye, which were initially mostly conifers
(07:35):
pines started, is these monks and thinkers and philosophers would
go out into the mountains and collect these very very
stressed trees that were trying to grow in this rock
and they would bring them back and they would repot them,
and so bonce I really started as a way to
bring that you know, in into your space to enjoy
(07:56):
every day. And I think that there is a salute
validity in conifers that maybe don't have that perfect profile.
They can be very interesting and unique, and I have
seen people do some very very cool and creative things
with different conifers, just having that vision.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Yeah, and I'm glad you mentioned that, because speaking of
stress with conifers, a conifer most being evergreen, not all,
as we've noted, but with them being evergreen, they can
grow in some pretty tough areas like mountainous regions stacy
(08:35):
because they're photosynthesizing. Whenever you think about a deciduous tree,
it can't photosynthesize if the foliage has dropped off, but
an evergreen tree is always waiting at the ready to photosynthesize.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
Yeah, and because their foliage is so dramatically reduced to
again mostly just those needles or those compressed scales like
in the case of a arborvide or something like that,
very minimal leaves means very minimal water loss, and that's
why they're able to be so adapted to those mountainous
areas where the soil's frozen and they're growing in very
(09:13):
little actual soil because they're growing in rock. And you know,
of course, when you go down to the desert you
see all sorts of different various conifers, bristle cone pines
and all of that kind of stuff. So they're really
really adapted to some of the most stressful conditions that
we can throw at them.
Speaker 1 (09:30):
You bet. So. For forty six years I unloaded Christmas
trees and then tied them to the tops of cars,
thousands and thousands of trees. Adriana has a picture to
put on YouTube for you of me unloading a tree truck.
We would unload fur trees out of North Carolina. They
would come in an enclosed box because they didn't want
(09:51):
the exhaust of the truck as opposed to a steak truck,
to cause the trees to smell poorly when you bring
them in doors. So I'm going to give you an
old fashioned Christmas limb a rick because I have so
many memories of Christmas trees. Oh Tom and Baum, did
I mention you pined for my attention? We put you
(10:14):
inside at Christmas, wide eyed and hope for needle retention.
With boughs and branches proliferous. We celebrate all coniferous with
lights from my bin. I plugged you in. Now you're luminiferous,
and I don't know if that is a word, but
I'm sitting next to a linguistics major, so I'm taking
(10:34):
the liberty of doing.
Speaker 2 (10:36):
I will call that pure poetic license.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
Rick, Thank you. Old fashioned lights made you dry. When
your limbs we would electrify. Incandescent bulbs make you fizzle.
We're watching your needles sizzle from the corner eating pumpkin pie.
Oh conifer. It may sound sappy, but your branches make
me happy. We spruce the place up, sipping eggnog from
(10:59):
a cup, then curl up and take a nappy. I
made that word up too. Plans on trial coming up
next here on the Gardening Simplified.
Speaker 2 (11:09):
Show, Beautify your home and community with proven Winner's Color
Choice Shrubs. With over three hundred and twenty five unique
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(11:30):
at proven Winner's Color Choice dot com. Greetings gardening friends,
and welcome back to the Gardening Simplified Show, where it
is time to stuff your heads full of knowledge. There's
so many things I want to say about conifers, which
is our topic today. I mean, I just there. This
(11:50):
goes back to something that happened to me in my
previous job. I was a garden editor at Martha Stewart
Living and we once did an article on state flowers. Okay,
very nice thing to do an article on. Well, the
state quote unquote flower of Maine is pine and I
wrote for its description that it was not really a flower,
(12:13):
which is true botanically speaking. And I got a letter
from a very angry person and they said, how dare
you it is a flower? Just because it's not conventionally
pretty doesn't mean it's not a flower. But they were wrong,
because no conifers flower. Conifers are not flowering plants. All
(12:35):
flowering plants are in the division of angiosperms, and conifers
are what is known as a gymnosperm, and gymnosperm what
that actually translates to in Greek is naked seed. And
what that actually means is that if you think about
(12:55):
flowering plants in the actual fruit a true you're gonna
have to all forgive me for being trying to be
pedantic while also using like really wrong terms because sometimes
it's just necessary. So, no conifers actually produce fruit because
for a fruit from botanical from a botanical perspective, fruit
(13:18):
only comes from a flower, and since gymnosperms do not flower,
they therefore do not fruit. All of those seed bearing
portions of the actual conifers are indeed cones, even if
they look like a berry, like a juniper. So no,
(13:38):
the pine blossom or whatever you want to call it
is not technically a flower, and therefore it's a pine
cone is not technically a fruit, so you know, no,
it's it has nothing to do with whether or not
I think it's pretty enough to be a flower. It
has only to do with the botanical definition of a flower,
(14:00):
and that means that it has an ovary, So like
if you think about a tomato or an apple and
that fleshy ovary. Now, of course not all antiosperms have
something quite so fleshy, but that's what differentiates it. What
makes a gymnosperm a naked seed is it just has
what's known as an arrowl or a very minimal coating
on that seed, and so it's not it's actually not
(14:25):
a fruit. So it's very hard to talk about these
things and not use terms that are like correct but
just also more common, and also talk about today's plant
on trial, which I am getting to. I promise I'm
all about the fruit. See I said, I did it again,
so you're gonna have to bear with me. I'm all
about the cones today.
Speaker 1 (14:45):
Yeah, I pine for your plant on trial. Let's hear it.
Speaker 2 (14:48):
So within the uh okay, I'm sorry, I'm gona have
to buy a little more time on this to just
go back to the botany real quick. All conifers are gymnosperms,
but not all gymnosperms are conifers. The conifers make up
the majority of the gemnosperm group, but there are also ginkgos,
which are in a little class by themselves. They are
(15:10):
cone bearing, even though again that's something that we very
much think of as a fleshy berry or a fruit
or a nut, but they're not even a nut because
they're a cone. And then the cycads, so cycads are gemnosperms.
Definitely our warm climate listeners are well familiar with with cycads.
And then a plant that probably most of our listeners
(15:32):
are not necessarily familiar with is need them g n
E t u M also a little odd bowl in
the gymnosperms. Edible mostly grows in tropical and subtropical climates,
so we don't really have it here. You can look
it up. It's very cool. I can't really recall. Maybe
it's some botanical gardens. I've seen one, but they're not
(15:54):
really that common. But they do eat them in Indonesian food,
and you can buy them as crack and I would
like to try the needum crackers at some point, so
I will be looking out for the needum crackers next
time I met some sort of grocery store with a
good diversity of food. Okay, so it's a very complex
and interesting group of plants, but we tend to think
(16:18):
of them again as a monolith. And it's like you
were talking about pine cones, right, Everybody is like, oh,
it's a pine cone. Well fine, it could be a
spruce cone. It could be a fur cone. It could
be an arborvidy cone, it could be a camisiperous cone.
All of these are cone bearing plants. And sometimes we
talk about some plants that are conifers as having berries,
(16:38):
Like if you now that we're coming into the cozy
cooking season. You may be making something that calls for
juniper berries. Well, I got news for you. Juniper berries
are cones, even though they look like berries.
Speaker 1 (16:50):
And now you can see why I sidestepped this issue
and segment one all together. And can handle it. I can't.
Speaker 2 (16:57):
I mean, I know, I'm saying all this crazy stuff
all over the place. It's so fascinating. It's really just
it's so fascinating. And I wanted to bring up today's
plan on trial, which I'm finally getting to five minutes
into it. Stonehenge you or taxis, because if you want
to talk about a plant that people say has berries,
that's it. Why Because if you grew up as I did,
(17:20):
with taxis around your house, which you know, I'd say
probably everybody who grew up in the seventies and eighties
did it, really had a moment back then. Possibly the
first time you were ever aware of a plant is
your parents putting the fear of God into you about
eating the cones, berries, fruits, whatever you want to call them,
(17:42):
off of the taxes because every part of taxis is
extremely toxic to humans and pets. So of course you
know you listen to these you read these story books
about you know, girl, little girls going out into the
woods and gathering berries, and you're like, oh, baby, I'm
gonna be that. I'm gonna get berries right here in
my front yard. Oh no, surprise, they're super toxic. You
(18:04):
are definitely not gathering the cones or berries of a Texas.
But they are conifers, so they are related in that
way to pines and spruces, and all of these are
in a slightly different family within that. Here's a fun
fact as well, not specific to Stonehenge, but to taxes
(18:25):
in general. In England, they call those cones or fruits
Snottyggs's appetizing and I think that again, anyone who has
grown up with these, and even though you were, of
course terrified of them because you knew that they were
going to send you to dogs snottyggs g ogs if
(18:47):
you did squish and the red part, that red fleshy
part is actually the only part of the taxes that
is not toxic, but you still should not eat it.
But if you have ever squished it, it is really
like viscous and gross. But they know what they're talking
about it England because they are all about taxis in England,
and I urge you if you have time right now
to look up use and look up specifically ancient US
(19:10):
in the UK, and you will think about this plant
in a totally different way. You know. Here in the
US it's just this kind of like, oh, no brainer,
front yard ever green, and it's kind of boring. And
in England there are the most magnificence, magnificent specimens that
you can possibly imagine, and that is of course how
(19:31):
we were inspired to name our Stonehenge U Stonehenge after
the famous site in England. It is also very tall
and narrow, so it's a great space safer and it
has darker foliage. There are plenty of other tall and
narrow us on the market, but it has very very dark,
deep green foliage which gives it a very nice dramatic
(19:53):
look in the landscape. It's also a little faster growing
than your average taxis. Now this is primarily go to
make a difference for the growers who produce taxes, then
it will for most people who are growing them at home.
But it is amazing to me how taxes has gotten
so popular despite the fact that it is extremely toxic
(20:15):
and that it's so slow growing. But it has a
superpower and that is it is extremely shade tolerant, and
that is why it is as popular as it is.
And Stonehenge is no exception. It can grow in deep shade.
It can also grow in sun, so it's a good
option for you if you have a situation like I do,
(20:37):
where one half of your front yard is very very
sunny and one half is very very shady, but you
want to impose some symmetry and have the same plant.
So it's it's very versatile in that way. It can
also be pruned if you want to a lot of
people will prune them into you know, yep. I do
want to warn you if you have a taxis and
(21:00):
you prune it or trim it, to not leave any
trimmings around. I do have a friend who had to
go to an emergency vet with her dog because he
picked up the branch they have been pruning it and
was playing with it. So do be careful if you
do have it. Don't leave those lying around. Get something
like Stonehems dark druid, which is going to stay real
small and tidy, and you don't have to worry about
(21:23):
pruning it at all. Now, one thing I will say
for our warm climate friends, Taxes is not heat tolerant,
and maybe you know, the fact that it is native
to England should hopefully tip you off to that that
it prefers the cooler weather. It is hardy down to
USDA Zone four and only heat tolerant through about USDA
Zone seven. However, if you live in a warmer climate,
(21:45):
you can grow its close cousin Cephalotaxis, which is very
similar in just about every way. Bolder, kind of more
interesting foliage, but similarly tolerant of shade and to grow
and versatile. So Taxes has its place. And certainly again
(22:06):
if you're if you if you're just like taxes is boring,
do take a look at what it looks like in
England and maybe you can find some love for the plant.
Because I certainly have uh in doing that research. So wow,
that was a lot. It was all over the place.
But I'm just so excited about conifers, and uh, you know,
as they become the prominent feature in our landscape in
(22:27):
these cooler months, uh, it's time that we uh give
them the love. And the best way to give them
the love is to to know what they're all about.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
So I'm glad and I could just sit here.
Speaker 2 (22:38):
With that's because I didn't give you a chance to
say anything. Rix, Sorry about that, No, you handled it well.
We're gonna take a little break and when we come back,
we'll have the mail bag and maybe have a little
bit more equal conversation. And Winner's Color Choice Shrubs, we
(23:01):
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Our team of experts tests and evaluates all of our
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(23:22):
at your local garden center, or learn more at Proven
Winner's Color Choice dot com. Greeting's gardening friends, and welcome
back to the Gardening Simplified Show, where the order of
the day is all about the conifers. Especially as our
landscapes the deciduous stuff goes dormant and falls into the background,
those conifers become very central to our enjoyment of our
(23:42):
gardens and our landscapes. And you know we're going to
get to your gardening questions, but I forgot something very
crucial in my long winded and convoluted discussion of conifers
and cones and taxes. So taxes, like I said, the
berries are very showy, the cones are very showy and visible.
(24:04):
But taxes is a dioecious plant, which means that male
and female plants are separate. So if you're concerned about
having those very appealing looking red berries in your landscape,
concerned that they will appeal to children or pets or whatever,
all you have to do is get a male Taxes. Now,
this isn't typically indicated on the plant tag. So Stonehenge you,
(24:27):
which was today's plant on trial, is a female that
will get fruit. But Stonehenge Dark Druid, which is that smaller,
more rounded one that needs relatively little or no pruning,
is a male. So it will not set any of
those fruits. It just sets pollen to pollinate those female
flowers on the female plants. So a good option if
(24:48):
you are very concerned about those berries, they are out there,
So that would be Stonehenge Dark Druid instead of the
much taller female stonehenge you so, and.
Speaker 1 (24:59):
For people keeping score at home, as we've talked about
this Texas ta x US not the state of Texas
and use ye.
Speaker 2 (25:09):
W s oh yeah, thank you, not use guys.
Speaker 1 (25:12):
We're not talking about me, you right.
Speaker 2 (25:15):
Oh. I have one more fun fact about the taxes
that I have to share because I was talking about
its toxicity and uh it turns out that they have
discovered that a compound in taxis is extremely useful in
treating a number of different cancers. Oh wow, so.
Speaker 1 (25:33):
Uh yeah, I did read that.
Speaker 2 (25:35):
So even though it's uh, you know, it's just it's
funny that we all just have this very different idea
of what taxes is. It's not noble at all. In
the US, it's just like humdrum. In the UK, it's
super noble, but here it is saving lives. In the background. Well,
we all do our work, so.
Speaker 1 (25:49):
It is exciting.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
That is exciting, you bet all right? What do we
got in the mail bag?
Speaker 1 (25:53):
Finally, in the mail bag after our backdrops, fences and
Screens episode Back in September, listener Carol wrote us you
wanted to know about Barb Edwyer. I went to school
at Northern Illinois University and visited this museum many years ago.
Enjoy and Carol sent us information on the Elwood House
(26:14):
that's based on Isaac Elwood, the guy who invented barbed boys.
Speaker 2 (26:20):
Yes, so it's into Calb, Illinois, which happens to be
where Proven Winners is also headquartered. Yep, if you can
believe that. And so you know Carol's response. I loved
what she was saying about this because I didn't know
really about the history of barbed wire, hadn't really given
it much thought. But I'm always willing to learn some
fun facts, as you just saw. But yeah, so these
(26:41):
three guys into Calb were sitting around trying to come
up with a way to limit livestock and discovered barbed
wire made a small fortune and you can actually visit
the house that he was able to build. Well it
is it. Yeah, it's really quite interesting. But while I
was looking at this Elwood House website, which will of
(27:02):
course link in the YouTube version, they talked about the
antique the Antique barbed Wire Society website, and it turns
out that there is this community of collectors of antique
barbed wire. This is a whole thing and it's and
I understand, because really, barbed wire is what quote unquote
(27:24):
tamed the West, you know, it really changed how people
managed land.
Speaker 1 (27:30):
Served a purpose without restricting the view.
Speaker 2 (27:33):
Yeah, and so it played this huge role. So I
get I can get why people, you know, collected as
part of that history. The Kansas Barbed Wire Museum and Lacrosse,
Kansas boasts that they display over two thousand varieties of
barbed wire and each one is unique.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
Yeah, and it's true. You go back to Isaac Elwood.
His claim to fame was the two strand twisted barbed wire.
That was his thing. And this guy was what I
would call a real entremneur, so to speak. He started
out in business sauer Kraut, selling sauer kraut. Then he
(28:13):
went on the California gold Rush, comes back, starts a
hardware store, and then in the back of the hardware
store they start making barbed wire.
Speaker 2 (28:23):
Oh. I was afraid you're going to say making sauer
kraut because I would not get the customers into the
into the hardware store.
Speaker 1 (28:30):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
So a fascinating history here, and I really had no
idea that there were all of this community of barbed
wire collectors. So thank you so much Carol for that
fun diversion. I learned a.
Speaker 1 (28:42):
Lot same here. Yolanda writes, I want to create a
new bed at the foothill foot of a hill in
a full sun area. Problem is there are black walnut
trees on the hill and it's not my property. I
had that same problem at a home that I owned.
I do have hosta's still be hellibor brunera, and a
(29:03):
hydrangea on the shaded depart shade side of the bed
which appeared to be doing okay. Any suggestions. I want
to plant a flowering dogwood tree which would be next
to some pine trees which would provide some protection, or
a red bud, as well as other shrubs and perennials.
Speaker 2 (29:20):
Well, you know, one of the reasons I thought that
it was a great time to answer Yolanda's question is
because if you have a black walnuts in your vicinity,
the nuts are a fallen like crazy. The squirrels are
going bananas burying those things and breaking them up. I
know every day I come home to find a squirrel,
you know, sat on some chair and busted it all up,
and there's walnut bits all over. So a lot of
(29:44):
people when it comes to jugglon, the chemical that walnuts
can secrete that can impair the growth of neighboring pints
in a phenomenon known as alellapathy. It is primarily from
the fallen leaves, fruit and branches more so than the roots.
Speaker 1 (30:02):
I agree, and that's what I was going to say.
When I own this property, you have to be out
there cleaning.
Speaker 2 (30:07):
Yeah, you got to clean it up. People tend to
think it's just emanating out of the roots, and that
is true for some very sensitive plants like tomatoes. A
tomato cannot grow anywhere near a walnut. But for the
most part, if you just have a walnut that is
dropping foliage and fruit especially that's one of the worst
and branches on your garden, if you are able to
(30:29):
clean that up, you will greatly mitigate the negative potential
effects of growing a walnut. So, Yolanda, I did want
to bring that up because I think that a lot
of people, you know, just kind of assume that a
walnut is a death sentence and is really going to
narrow down your options where it really can be, you know,
solved with some sanitation. Now that's easier so than done,
(30:51):
because of course, picking up a ton of walnuts is
not a fun.
Speaker 1 (30:54):
Trip for anybody with the lawnmower.
Speaker 2 (30:56):
Just nuts and of course that you know nasty hull
husk thing that they have even if you pick them up,
that's still you know, left behind or and you smell. Yeah,
it's used as a dye. Fascinating stuff, but so and
it also helps a lot if you can give the
(31:17):
area enough water because that if they're drought stress, that
is another factor that will really influence it. Now, we
will share some links on YouTube of some resources out
there from universities of plants that are believed to be
resistant to jug loan. But I will tell you that
my frustration with them is that they are often contradictory.
(31:38):
You know, you will look at one university's website and
that will say this is resistant and another one will
say it's susceptible. Because there are just so many factors
that go into a plant's ability to tolerate jug loans.
So it's not a scientific thing necessarily where we can
say these work and these don't, because it does depend
so much on what part of the wall that you're
(31:59):
exposed to and how much water it gets, what your
soil is like, all of those factors. So there's definitely
some very very sensitive plants you can avoid or you
should avoid. But like, for example, you know, Yolanda mentions
that she has a hydrangea. Now I would say hydrangea
appears on almost every list of sensitive plants, but she
seems to be growing one without any problem whatsoever.
Speaker 1 (32:20):
So I think your point is well taken. Clean up
the debris, and that is much easier said than done.
They are messy trees, especially if you have a windstorm.
Come oh yeah, but I agree with you on those
university sites. For my purpose, I had success with service
berry or juneberry, river birch, sweet gum and dogwood did work.
Speaker 2 (32:46):
Oh by black walnuts, that's good to know. That's good
to know. I think mulch will also help you a
lot from you know, having that stuff directly contact the plant.
The way to know if your plant is being influenced
negatively by jug loan is that they will typically wilt
or turn black. So it's not really And when I
(33:07):
say turn black, I'm not like saying, you know, it
turns brown. I'm saying like it will go black black
and look immediately very sick. And that happened to some
friends of mine with their tomatoes. So again, when you
have those sensitive plants, they're going to go black and
they're going to die, and there is no recovery. Whereas
a plant that's maybe somewhat sensitive, or as only sensitive
because maybe it's too dry, you might actually be able
(33:29):
to see it wilt and be able to move that
to a walnut free area in time to save its life.
But it's a complicated issue, and I wish there were
simple answers, but there really are not. But again, we'll
provide the resources resources that we do have and try
to help you make good decisions about your planting project.
We're going to take a little break and when we
(33:50):
come back, we are continuing our conversation about conifers, So
stay tuned. Thanks for listening to the Gardening Simplified Podcast,
brought to you by Proven Winners Color Choice Shrubs. Our
award winning flowering shrubs and evergreens are trialed and tested
by experts with your success in mind. Learn more at
(34:13):
Proven Winners color Choice dot com.
Speaker 1 (34:17):
Welcome back to the Gardening Simplified Show and Stacy, as
I said, my primary nostalgic attachment to conifers is selling
Christmas trees over forty six years in a garden center.
You come home at night and you're clothing, your hair,
everything just full of needles. You get into the shower,
(34:37):
there's needles all over the bathroom floor. But the one
thing that I learned about selling these Christmas trees is
that as families with young kids come to pick out
the family Christmas tree, like Clark w Griswold, their ability
to pick out a tree and agree on it is
completely contingent on the weather conditions makes sense. It's cold
(35:00):
and snowy and windy. They can decide on a tree
in thirty seconds flat if it's beautiful outside. Sometimes I've
seen families take two three hours out the family Christmas tree.
So conifers. Let's talk about conifers a little more, and
speaking of garden centers, one of the things to look
(35:24):
for is whether or not the tree is root bound
when you purchase it. And again years ago in the
seventies and eighties, most of these conifers we were selling
Stacey were bald and burlap, and in a bald and
burlap situation, it's usually heavy clay soil that you would
find and heavy to move around. Now most grown in
(35:51):
pots and containers, but it's important to take a look
at take a look at that. An important thing also
if you're playing in conifers in your landscape is and
I want to make sure to point this out because
I see this mistake made often, and that is how
deeply buried is the root flare. The root flare is
(36:12):
at the base of the plant. It's where the trunk
flares out, and it's critical that that be visible at
the soil's surface. So if you just as is the
case with many woody plants that we put in the ground, Stacey,
we are planting them, we're not burying them. And so
(36:34):
if you get this thing too deep and water becomes
a problem, too much water, that's when we really start
to see conifers struggle for sure.
Speaker 2 (36:45):
Yeah, you're no tree that you plant, whether conifer or
anything else, should look like a phone pole. You should
have that. You should have it to be straight and
then that gentle flare, And I would say buy and large.
Well drained soil is very crucial for most conifers. But
of course boltzypress grows in standing water, so there's always
an exception. And that's a really cool thing. Because you
(37:06):
can use that to find the perfect conifer for just
about any spot. You know, we really can't just say
conifers need these conditions. Like I said that Taxes one
of the most shade tolerant evergreens, if not the most
shade tolerant evergreen, Whereas there's plenty of conifers that if
you try to put them in the shade, you're not
going to get much at all. But there is one
(37:27):
for every kind of different scenario because they are so diverse,
and they occur just about everywhere, I think, on every continent.
Speaker 1 (37:36):
Sure, sure now, And speaking of that, I'm glad you
brought that up. I think it's important to know where
a conifer is native too, In other words, what is
the environment that it likes to grow in. Now, people
love frasier furs, so do I. They make a great
Christmas tree, straight trunks, very fragrant, beautiful, But they're growing
(37:58):
up in the mountainous regions of let's say North Carolina.
And if you don't have that humidity, basically, if you're
unable to replicate where they're native too, you're going to
have difficulty growing it in your landscape.
Speaker 2 (38:12):
Right. Well, look what happened with blue spruce. You know,
blue spruce got so so popular. It was everywhere. Blue
spruce grows in the rocky mountains in Colorado, not in
you know, the suburbs of Detroit, where you know, summers
are hot and winters are cold and wet and not arid.
And yet it was such a popular tree. And now
(38:33):
they're all dying because they got stressed, because they are
not in the right conditions for how they want to grow.
Speaker 1 (38:39):
Yeah, and you watch them decline out there, and there's
thousands of them. That's true. Back in the seventies and eighties, boy,
we sold a lot of those oh it shows and
it shows exactly. So make sure to make sure to
do that. Also, one very popular thing in the garden
(38:59):
center industry for years has been to bring a live
conifer indoors for Christmas and decorate it so that you
can plant it and then you have the memory of
that tree for years and years. But make sure you
prepare the whole before Christmas.
Speaker 2 (39:16):
Like now would be a great time, and.
Speaker 1 (39:17):
Now would be a great time. And then also make
sure that that tree is not inside for long a
week or two tops keep it away from a fireplace,
heat register that sort of thing, you're going to have
better success.
Speaker 2 (39:31):
I mean, I think it's a great idea that people
do that as long as they have the space, because
of course, too many years of doing that, you're gonna
you are going to run out of space. But it
is pretty simple to do as long as you you know, again,
prepare the hole for it now. I would even recommend
that you put the excavated soil into the garage or
basement or someplace that that isn't going to freeze. Here
(39:52):
in Michigan we aren't usually super frozen by Christmas time,
but you know better to have it available for you
to actually plant. And then you know you're still going
to want to water that in to settle the soil
around it, and ye do keep it as cool as possible.
And you know, I would say, if you're going to
do that, you're doing that as a labor of love. Yes,
(40:13):
it's not a cost savings. A Christmas tree is going
to be far less expensive than a growing plant, but
it is still a really nice thing to do. Whether
it's your first Christmas as a couple, or you know,
in commemoration of your first Christmas with your child, or
something like that it can be really special, but it's
done for the love of the tree, not as a
(40:33):
money saving I think you know.
Speaker 1 (40:36):
You mentioned that, and one of the primary memories I
have of Christmas trees as a kid was my dad
bought a Christmas tree a pine Christmas. It was Scotch pine.
Bought the tree from a kmart for seventy five cents.
Oh wow, and boy did it look like it.
Speaker 2 (40:57):
I think pretty much all Scotch pines looked like the
costs of ay five cents. It came heart, just my opinion.
Speaker 1 (41:02):
And it fell over numerous times until my dad finally
got sick of it, dragged it out of the house
and stuck it in a neighbor's landscape in the dead
of winter. The neighbor, of course, did not recognize that
until the following summer when the needles started falling a
(41:23):
lot turn brown. So many memories like that, you know.
I also have memories when my kids were growing up,
or in the seventies again, in the garden center, we
would sell these incandescent bulbs on strings called C nine
or C seven lights, and they were painted incandescent bulbs.
(41:44):
The paint would flake off them. They were hot I'm
outside putting them on the house like Clark w. Griswold
on an aluminum ladder, stepping on the bulbs. It was horrid.
In today's day and age, the led Christmas lights that
are available are unbelievable.
Speaker 2 (42:03):
Yeah, and you pair them with the little clips that
they have to put on your house, you get that
nice tidy line. Oh, it's a different world we're living in.
Speaker 1 (42:10):
It is indestructible. I mean, just yeah, unreal. Anyhow, all
these memories come back. Let's run down the list real
quickly a minute. So we're talking conifers. We've got to
start with the pine tree, right, so pine trees, then cypress.
We mention the bald cypress. That's a conifer. Cedar trees right,
evergreen conifers native.
Speaker 2 (42:31):
Many Yeah, you know, cedars in cypress are definitely two
very confusing terms. They're common names, so they don't benefit
from that strict botanical definition. Like when I was going
between fruit and cone and berry and all of that,
those all have strict botanical definitions. These do not, So
it can be a little bit confusing, but that's where
scientific names come in.
Speaker 1 (42:51):
Large trees, love them deciduous. You mentioned the beautiful color
in fall use or taxes. We've all he covered that. Junipers, hemlock.
I love hemlock trees, and it breaks my heart here
in West Michigan with what's happening with the wooly adelgied insect,
(43:12):
an invasive insect that's just wiping them out. And hemlocks
are so beautiful, especially if you're taking a walk in
the wintertime. Spruce trees spruces here there and everywhere around
the United States, but spruce trees, they were not my
favorite Christmas tree, and the needle retention was not good.
(43:33):
And boy, they're real poky on your arms. Fur trees.
I love fur trees, balsam fur, frasier fur, but my
favorite's got to be Douglas fir. And again going back
to Christmas time, which is in a fir exactly, you're correct,
it is not a fur, but we call them Douglas fir.
And of course at Christmas time, that citrusy type smelled
(43:55):
to the foliage. Whenever we'd get the Christmas trees in
at the garden center, that was one of the first
things I did, just stick my face right into one
of those trees and take a big sniff.
Speaker 2 (44:06):
Well that must be why you had needles everywhere. Yes,
it's true, but you're right. If you want that classic
conifercent in your house for is the way to go,
no question about it.
Speaker 1 (44:17):
Would I be correct Stacy and saying arguably the biggest
conifer in the world are Redwood's, like.
Speaker 2 (44:24):
Just from size Redwood tree, Yeah, most likely, but I'm
sure we've I'm sure someone could prove us wrong. Yeah, exactly,
but I've seen them and they are amazing. This giant Sequoias, yeah,
I mean yeah, I guess it depends on if you're
talking with or height, but both of them are just incredible,
incredible trees that everyone should should go see because well breathtaking.
Speaker 1 (44:42):
Well I think we both agree. We love connif love
them absolutely. Thanks Stacy, thanks Rick, Thanks Adriana, and thanks
most of all to you for watching us on YouTube,
listening to the radio, or looking for us where you
get your favorite podcast. Have a great week.
Broadcasting from Studio A here at Proven Winters, Color Joy Shrubs.
It's the Gardening Simplified Show with Stacy Hervella, me Rick Weist,
and our engineer and producer Adrianna Robinson. Well, today we
talk about conifers. Conifers make excellent specimens standalone trees and
accents in our landscapes. Conifers are a broad family of
(00:26):
plants described as coniferous, meaning they produce cones. I call
them woody cones so to speak, that contain their seeds.
But I'm sure in Plants on Trial Stacy will give
us a hed education on that issue. Conifers are typically,
not always, but typically evergreen trees with needle like foliage.
(00:51):
I think some of the most spectacular large trees in
the landscape that are conifers are not necessarily evergreen. And Stacey,
I think about the bald cypress that I've seen at
places like Arnold, Arborretam and the unusual root system, the
(01:12):
roots growing out of the ground to have a picture
for you on YouTube, or down redwood or larch. So
not necessarily evergreen trees.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Yeah, and you know, I think that a lot of
people when they hear that, for the first time. Their
mind is kind of blown because they so closely associate
being a conifer with being an evergreen. And yeah, there
are all of those native, they're not all native, but
of course bald cypress famously is very is native to
the south, and you can't go anywhere down south without
(01:43):
seeing it. And then we have larch up here, which
we'll be turning color just about any moment now if
it's not already out there. You know, even out here
in lower West Michigan, we have an abundance of larch.
And it's one of those plants that you think is
just an evergreen until you see it blaze bright yellowil
and you're just like what. And that is a cool
thing about them is that their fall color does rival
(02:06):
a regular standard deciduous flowering tree because it's like, especially
on the Don redwood turns out beautiful salmon color. Just
a really cool ornamental feature in.
Speaker 1 (02:15):
The garden center industry. If I had a dime for
every time someone has come up to me and said,
I'm having a problem with my pine tree.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:23):
People refer to conifers as pine trees, and it may
be a fur or a spruce or a bald cypress,
whatever it may be for me. I fell in love
with conifers in the Pacific Northwest when I've spent time
in the Pacific Northwest, specifically Oregon and suppliers up there
(02:45):
of evergreen specimen trees, boy wow, or British Columbia taking
rides through their western red cedar, Noble and Grand Fur
some of the biggest Douglas fur trees you'll ever see
in your life up there in the Pacific Northwest. As
a matter of fact, I remember walking the Capilano suspension bridge.
(03:09):
If you ever get a chance to do that, way
up in these trees gorgeous and you really develop a
love for conifers. My most familiar connection, of course, with
conifers is again coming from the garden center industry. I
would like to know how many Christmas trees I have
(03:32):
lugged unloaded off trucks tied to the tops of cars. Unbelievable.
So I have a real connection to Christmas trees. And
as a matter of fact, some people are not familiar
with the Rus Simmons, which is the Christmas tree ship
(03:52):
that sunk on Lake Michigan in nineteen twelve. Every Christmas
Eve I go out there on the lake shore regardless
of the weather, looking for the Rus Simmons, because legend
and lore has it, you can see that three masted
schooner just struggling in the water. It was a ship
(04:14):
that they would load with Christmas trees, uh sail at
across Lake Michigan to Chicago and tie up at the
wharf there. Unfortunately, in nineteen twelve, they overloaded this old.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
Ship with trees, yes, with tear me.
Speaker 1 (04:29):
And there was a rain, ice storm. The trees got
way too heavy. The tree sunk.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
Oh my gosh. And now it's a ghost ship. It's
a ghost ship and it specifically comes out on Christmas Eve.
Speaker 1 (04:39):
Well that's when legend and lore says you can see
the ship. I personally have not ever.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
Run okay, but if you did, would you tell.
Speaker 1 (04:47):
Us absolutely, I'd be shooting video. I have my video camera.
Speaker 2 (04:52):
Well, there is the surest way to know you're never
going to actually see it is are out there with
your camera.
Speaker 1 (04:58):
But it's never worked. Are so interesting three hundred and
sixty five days out of the year, and Stacy, that's
why I think they're so just so popular. I mentioned
the bald cypress roots or don Redwood or larch or
you know the spruce furs, douglas fur. Just amazing. Three
(05:19):
characteristics of conifers. There's many different types of conifers, most
share a few common traits. Stacy. Number one, they have
cones right, yes, correct, that's right. Number two usually spiny
foliage right ye, would be fair to.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
Say, point in their life cycle, if not permanently during
their life cycle, yes, yes.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
And then number three size and shape, in other words, magnificent,
huge conifers. But you can also find low growing or
shorter conifers.
Speaker 2 (05:52):
You can find tiny, signy conifers that grow it like
a quarter inch a year, if you are so inclined.
Speaker 1 (05:59):
Exactly, and if you want to add conifers to your landscape.
I believe personally that conifer care starts with selection and
two things that people often do not think about. Number One,
if you're going to be planting a conifer, accessibility to
supplemental watering at least for the first couple years in
(06:24):
order to get the plant established. Secondly, staking how many
evergreens have I seen in landscapes that are growing askew
so to speak, Because the plant is again evergreen foliage,
it can become a sail during windy parts of the
year and prior to it rooting, it's probably a good
(06:46):
idea to stake a conifer tree. So I think that
those are important things to look at and when you're
shopping for conifers, and really it holds true in my
opinion for any woody plants in general. You need to
pay attention to structure, roots, and overall health. Get a
(07:06):
good start by choosing a well grown specimen. That's the
first step in conifer care.
Speaker 2 (07:11):
That is one hundred percent true. You know, it's you're
going to be You're going to have what you start with.
And that could mean sort of that perfect iconic triangular
you know tree with a straight up and down leader
Christmas Christmas tree shaped, or it could mean something that's
a little bit more funky and poetic. I mean, really
that is how Boneses Eye, which were initially mostly conifers
(07:35):
pines started, is these monks and thinkers and philosophers would
go out into the mountains and collect these very very
stressed trees that were trying to grow in this rock
and they would bring them back and they would repot them,
and so bonce I really started as a way to
bring that you know, in into your space to enjoy
(07:56):
every day. And I think that there is a salute
validity in conifers that maybe don't have that perfect profile.
They can be very interesting and unique, and I have
seen people do some very very cool and creative things
with different conifers, just having that vision.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Yeah, and I'm glad you mentioned that, because speaking of
stress with conifers, a conifer most being evergreen, not all,
as we've noted, but with them being evergreen, they can
grow in some pretty tough areas like mountainous regions stacy
(08:35):
because they're photosynthesizing. Whenever you think about a deciduous tree,
it can't photosynthesize if the foliage has dropped off, but
an evergreen tree is always waiting at the ready to photosynthesize.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
Yeah, and because their foliage is so dramatically reduced to
again mostly just those needles or those compressed scales like
in the case of a arborvide or something like that,
very minimal leaves means very minimal water loss, and that's
why they're able to be so adapted to those mountainous
areas where the soil's frozen and they're growing in very
(09:13):
little actual soil because they're growing in rock. And you know,
of course, when you go down to the desert you
see all sorts of different various conifers, bristle cone pines
and all of that kind of stuff. So they're really
really adapted to some of the most stressful conditions that
we can throw at them.
Speaker 1 (09:30):
You bet. So. For forty six years I unloaded Christmas
trees and then tied them to the tops of cars,
thousands and thousands of trees. Adriana has a picture to
put on YouTube for you of me unloading a tree truck.
We would unload fur trees out of North Carolina. They
would come in an enclosed box because they didn't want
(09:51):
the exhaust of the truck as opposed to a steak truck,
to cause the trees to smell poorly when you bring
them in doors. So I'm going to give you an
old fashioned Christmas limb a rick because I have so
many memories of Christmas trees. Oh Tom and Baum, did
I mention you pined for my attention? We put you
(10:14):
inside at Christmas, wide eyed and hope for needle retention.
With boughs and branches proliferous. We celebrate all coniferous with
lights from my bin. I plugged you in. Now you're luminiferous,
and I don't know if that is a word, but
I'm sitting next to a linguistics major, so I'm taking
(10:34):
the liberty of doing.
Speaker 2 (10:36):
I will call that pure poetic license.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
Rick, Thank you. Old fashioned lights made you dry. When
your limbs we would electrify. Incandescent bulbs make you fizzle.
We're watching your needles sizzle from the corner eating pumpkin pie.
Oh conifer. It may sound sappy, but your branches make
me happy. We spruce the place up, sipping eggnog from
(10:59):
a cup, then curl up and take a nappy. I
made that word up too. Plans on trial coming up
next here on the Gardening Simplified.
Speaker 2 (11:09):
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(11:30):
at proven Winner's Color Choice dot com. Greetings gardening friends,
and welcome back to the Gardening Simplified Show, where it
is time to stuff your heads full of knowledge. There's
so many things I want to say about conifers, which
is our topic today. I mean, I just there. This
(11:50):
goes back to something that happened to me in my
previous job. I was a garden editor at Martha Stewart
Living and we once did an article on state flowers. Okay,
very nice thing to do an article on. Well, the
state quote unquote flower of Maine is pine and I
wrote for its description that it was not really a flower,
(12:13):
which is true botanically speaking. And I got a letter
from a very angry person and they said, how dare
you it is a flower? Just because it's not conventionally
pretty doesn't mean it's not a flower. But they were wrong,
because no conifers flower. Conifers are not flowering plants. All
(12:35):
flowering plants are in the division of angiosperms, and conifers
are what is known as a gymnosperm, and gymnosperm what
that actually translates to in Greek is naked seed. And
what that actually means is that if you think about
(12:55):
flowering plants in the actual fruit a true you're gonna
have to all forgive me for being trying to be
pedantic while also using like really wrong terms because sometimes
it's just necessary. So, no conifers actually produce fruit because
for a fruit from botanical from a botanical perspective, fruit
(13:18):
only comes from a flower, and since gymnosperms do not flower,
they therefore do not fruit. All of those seed bearing
portions of the actual conifers are indeed cones, even if
they look like a berry, like a juniper. So no,
(13:38):
the pine blossom or whatever you want to call it
is not technically a flower, and therefore it's a pine
cone is not technically a fruit, so you know, no,
it's it has nothing to do with whether or not
I think it's pretty enough to be a flower. It
has only to do with the botanical definition of a flower,
(14:00):
and that means that it has an ovary, So like
if you think about a tomato or an apple and
that fleshy ovary. Now, of course not all antiosperms have
something quite so fleshy, but that's what differentiates it. What
makes a gymnosperm a naked seed is it just has
what's known as an arrowl or a very minimal coating
on that seed, and so it's not it's actually not
(14:25):
a fruit. So it's very hard to talk about these
things and not use terms that are like correct but
just also more common, and also talk about today's plant
on trial, which I am getting to. I promise I'm
all about the fruit. See I said, I did it again,
so you're gonna have to bear with me. I'm all
about the cones today.
Speaker 1 (14:45):
Yeah, I pine for your plant on trial. Let's hear it.
Speaker 2 (14:48):
So within the uh okay, I'm sorry, I'm gona have
to buy a little more time on this to just
go back to the botany real quick. All conifers are gymnosperms,
but not all gymnosperms are conifers. The conifers make up
the majority of the gemnosperm group, but there are also ginkgos,
which are in a little class by themselves. They are
(15:10):
cone bearing, even though again that's something that we very
much think of as a fleshy berry or a fruit
or a nut, but they're not even a nut because
they're a cone. And then the cycads, so cycads are gemnosperms.
Definitely our warm climate listeners are well familiar with with cycads.
And then a plant that probably most of our listeners
(15:32):
are not necessarily familiar with is need them g n
E t u M also a little odd bowl in
the gymnosperms. Edible mostly grows in tropical and subtropical climates,
so we don't really have it here. You can look
it up. It's very cool. I can't really recall. Maybe
it's some botanical gardens. I've seen one, but they're not
(15:54):
really that common. But they do eat them in Indonesian food,
and you can buy them as crack and I would
like to try the needum crackers at some point, so
I will be looking out for the needum crackers next
time I met some sort of grocery store with a
good diversity of food. Okay, so it's a very complex
and interesting group of plants, but we tend to think
(16:18):
of them again as a monolith. And it's like you
were talking about pine cones, right, Everybody is like, oh,
it's a pine cone. Well fine, it could be a
spruce cone. It could be a fur cone. It could
be an arborvidy cone, it could be a camisiperous cone.
All of these are cone bearing plants. And sometimes we
talk about some plants that are conifers as having berries,
(16:38):
Like if you now that we're coming into the cozy
cooking season. You may be making something that calls for
juniper berries. Well, I got news for you. Juniper berries
are cones, even though they look like berries.
Speaker 1 (16:50):
And now you can see why I sidestepped this issue
and segment one all together. And can handle it. I can't.
Speaker 2 (16:57):
I mean, I know, I'm saying all this crazy stuff
all over the place. It's so fascinating. It's really just
it's so fascinating. And I wanted to bring up today's
plan on trial, which I'm finally getting to five minutes
into it. Stonehenge you or taxis, because if you want
to talk about a plant that people say has berries,
that's it. Why Because if you grew up as I did,
(17:20):
with taxis around your house, which you know, I'd say
probably everybody who grew up in the seventies and eighties
did it, really had a moment back then. Possibly the
first time you were ever aware of a plant is
your parents putting the fear of God into you about
eating the cones, berries, fruits, whatever you want to call them,
(17:42):
off of the taxes because every part of taxis is
extremely toxic to humans and pets. So of course you
know you listen to these you read these story books
about you know, girl, little girls going out into the
woods and gathering berries, and you're like, oh, baby, I'm
gonna be that. I'm gonna get berries right here in
my front yard. Oh no, surprise, they're super toxic. You
(18:04):
are definitely not gathering the cones or berries of a Texas.
But they are conifers, so they are related in that
way to pines and spruces, and all of these are
in a slightly different family within that. Here's a fun
fact as well, not specific to Stonehenge, but to taxes
(18:25):
in general. In England, they call those cones or fruits
Snottyggs's appetizing and I think that again, anyone who has
grown up with these, and even though you were, of
course terrified of them because you knew that they were
going to send you to dogs snottyggs g ogs if
(18:47):
you did squish and the red part, that red fleshy
part is actually the only part of the taxes that
is not toxic, but you still should not eat it.
But if you have ever squished it, it is really
like viscous and gross. But they know what they're talking
about it England because they are all about taxis in England,
and I urge you if you have time right now
to look up use and look up specifically ancient US
(19:10):
in the UK, and you will think about this plant
in a totally different way. You know. Here in the
US it's just this kind of like, oh, no brainer,
front yard ever green, and it's kind of boring. And
in England there are the most magnificence, magnificent specimens that
you can possibly imagine, and that is of course how
(19:31):
we were inspired to name our Stonehenge U Stonehenge after
the famous site in England. It is also very tall
and narrow, so it's a great space safer and it
has darker foliage. There are plenty of other tall and
narrow us on the market, but it has very very dark,
deep green foliage which gives it a very nice dramatic
(19:53):
look in the landscape. It's also a little faster growing
than your average taxis. Now this is primarily go to
make a difference for the growers who produce taxes, then
it will for most people who are growing them at home.
But it is amazing to me how taxes has gotten
so popular despite the fact that it is extremely toxic
(20:15):
and that it's so slow growing. But it has a
superpower and that is it is extremely shade tolerant, and
that is why it is as popular as it is.
And Stonehenge is no exception. It can grow in deep shade.
It can also grow in sun, so it's a good
option for you if you have a situation like I do,
(20:37):
where one half of your front yard is very very
sunny and one half is very very shady, but you
want to impose some symmetry and have the same plant.
So it's it's very versatile in that way. It can
also be pruned if you want to a lot of
people will prune them into you know, yep. I do
want to warn you if you have a taxis and
(21:00):
you prune it or trim it, to not leave any
trimmings around. I do have a friend who had to
go to an emergency vet with her dog because he
picked up the branch they have been pruning it and
was playing with it. So do be careful if you
do have it. Don't leave those lying around. Get something
like Stonehems dark druid, which is going to stay real
small and tidy, and you don't have to worry about
(21:23):
pruning it at all. Now, one thing I will say
for our warm climate friends, Taxes is not heat tolerant,
and maybe you know, the fact that it is native
to England should hopefully tip you off to that that
it prefers the cooler weather. It is hardy down to
USDA Zone four and only heat tolerant through about USDA
Zone seven. However, if you live in a warmer climate,
(21:45):
you can grow its close cousin Cephalotaxis, which is very
similar in just about every way. Bolder, kind of more
interesting foliage, but similarly tolerant of shade and to grow
and versatile. So Taxes has its place. And certainly again
(22:06):
if you're if you if you're just like taxes is boring,
do take a look at what it looks like in
England and maybe you can find some love for the plant.
Because I certainly have uh in doing that research. So wow,
that was a lot. It was all over the place.
But I'm just so excited about conifers, and uh, you know,
as they become the prominent feature in our landscape in
(22:27):
these cooler months, uh, it's time that we uh give
them the love. And the best way to give them
the love is to to know what they're all about.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
So I'm glad and I could just sit here.
Speaker 2 (22:38):
With that's because I didn't give you a chance to
say anything. Rix, Sorry about that, No, you handled it well.
We're gonna take a little break and when we come back,
we'll have the mail bag and maybe have a little
bit more equal conversation. And Winner's Color Choice Shrubs, we
(23:01):
know that a better landscape starts with a better shrub.
Our team of experts tests and evaluates all of our
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Look for Proven Winner's Shrubs in the distinctive white container
(23:22):
at your local garden center, or learn more at Proven
Winner's Color Choice dot com. Greeting's gardening friends, and welcome
back to the Gardening Simplified Show, where the order of
the day is all about the conifers. Especially as our
landscapes the deciduous stuff goes dormant and falls into the background,
those conifers become very central to our enjoyment of our
(23:42):
gardens and our landscapes. And you know we're going to
get to your gardening questions, but I forgot something very
crucial in my long winded and convoluted discussion of conifers
and cones and taxes. So taxes, like I said, the
berries are very showy, the cones are very showy and visible.
(24:04):
But taxes is a dioecious plant, which means that male
and female plants are separate. So if you're concerned about
having those very appealing looking red berries in your landscape,
concerned that they will appeal to children or pets or whatever,
all you have to do is get a male Taxes. Now,
this isn't typically indicated on the plant tag. So Stonehenge you,
(24:27):
which was today's plant on trial, is a female that
will get fruit. But Stonehenge Dark Druid, which is that smaller,
more rounded one that needs relatively little or no pruning,
is a male. So it will not set any of
those fruits. It just sets pollen to pollinate those female
flowers on the female plants. So a good option if
(24:48):
you are very concerned about those berries, they are out there,
So that would be Stonehenge Dark Druid instead of the
much taller female stonehenge you so, and.
Speaker 1 (24:59):
For people keeping score at home, as we've talked about
this Texas ta x US not the state of Texas
and use ye.
Speaker 2 (25:09):
W s oh yeah, thank you, not use guys.
Speaker 1 (25:12):
We're not talking about me, you right.
Speaker 2 (25:15):
Oh. I have one more fun fact about the taxes
that I have to share because I was talking about
its toxicity and uh it turns out that they have
discovered that a compound in taxis is extremely useful in
treating a number of different cancers. Oh wow, so.
Speaker 1 (25:33):
Uh yeah, I did read that.
Speaker 2 (25:35):
So even though it's uh, you know, it's just it's
funny that we all just have this very different idea
of what taxes is. It's not noble at all. In
the US, it's just like humdrum. In the UK, it's
super noble, but here it is saving lives. In the background. Well,
we all do our work, so.
Speaker 1 (25:49):
It is exciting.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
That is exciting, you bet all right? What do we
got in the mail bag?
Speaker 1 (25:53):
Finally, in the mail bag after our backdrops, fences and
Screens episode Back in September, listener Carol wrote us you
wanted to know about Barb Edwyer. I went to school
at Northern Illinois University and visited this museum many years ago.
Enjoy and Carol sent us information on the Elwood House
(26:14):
that's based on Isaac Elwood, the guy who invented barbed boys.
Speaker 2 (26:20):
Yes, so it's into Calb, Illinois, which happens to be
where Proven Winners is also headquartered. Yep, if you can
believe that. And so you know Carol's response. I loved
what she was saying about this because I didn't know
really about the history of barbed wire, hadn't really given
it much thought. But I'm always willing to learn some
fun facts, as you just saw. But yeah, so these
(26:41):
three guys into Calb were sitting around trying to come
up with a way to limit livestock and discovered barbed
wire made a small fortune and you can actually visit
the house that he was able to build. Well it
is it. Yeah, it's really quite interesting. But while I
was looking at this Elwood House website, which will of
(27:02):
course link in the YouTube version, they talked about the
antique the Antique barbed Wire Society website, and it turns
out that there is this community of collectors of antique
barbed wire. This is a whole thing and it's and
I understand, because really, barbed wire is what quote unquote
(27:24):
tamed the West, you know, it really changed how people
managed land.
Speaker 1 (27:30):
Served a purpose without restricting the view.
Speaker 2 (27:33):
Yeah, and so it played this huge role. So I
get I can get why people, you know, collected as
part of that history. The Kansas Barbed Wire Museum and Lacrosse,
Kansas boasts that they display over two thousand varieties of
barbed wire and each one is unique.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
Yeah, and it's true. You go back to Isaac Elwood.
His claim to fame was the two strand twisted barbed wire.
That was his thing. And this guy was what I
would call a real entremneur, so to speak. He started
out in business sauer Kraut, selling sauer kraut. Then he
(28:13):
went on the California gold Rush, comes back, starts a
hardware store, and then in the back of the hardware
store they start making barbed wire.
Speaker 2 (28:23):
Oh. I was afraid you're going to say making sauer
kraut because I would not get the customers into the
into the hardware store.
Speaker 1 (28:30):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
So a fascinating history here, and I really had no
idea that there were all of this community of barbed
wire collectors. So thank you so much Carol for that
fun diversion. I learned a.
Speaker 1 (28:42):
Lot same here. Yolanda writes, I want to create a
new bed at the foothill foot of a hill in
a full sun area. Problem is there are black walnut
trees on the hill and it's not my property. I
had that same problem at a home that I owned.
I do have hosta's still be hellibor brunera, and a
(29:03):
hydrangea on the shaded depart shade side of the bed
which appeared to be doing okay. Any suggestions. I want
to plant a flowering dogwood tree which would be next
to some pine trees which would provide some protection, or
a red bud, as well as other shrubs and perennials.
Speaker 2 (29:20):
Well, you know, one of the reasons I thought that
it was a great time to answer Yolanda's question is
because if you have a black walnuts in your vicinity,
the nuts are a fallen like crazy. The squirrels are
going bananas burying those things and breaking them up. I
know every day I come home to find a squirrel,
you know, sat on some chair and busted it all up,
and there's walnut bits all over. So a lot of
(29:44):
people when it comes to jugglon, the chemical that walnuts
can secrete that can impair the growth of neighboring pints
in a phenomenon known as alellapathy. It is primarily from
the fallen leaves, fruit and branches more so than the roots.
Speaker 1 (30:02):
I agree, and that's what I was going to say.
When I own this property, you have to be out
there cleaning.
Speaker 2 (30:07):
Yeah, you got to clean it up. People tend to
think it's just emanating out of the roots, and that
is true for some very sensitive plants like tomatoes. A
tomato cannot grow anywhere near a walnut. But for the
most part, if you just have a walnut that is
dropping foliage and fruit especially that's one of the worst
and branches on your garden, if you are able to
(30:29):
clean that up, you will greatly mitigate the negative potential
effects of growing a walnut. So, Yolanda, I did want
to bring that up because I think that a lot
of people, you know, just kind of assume that a
walnut is a death sentence and is really going to
narrow down your options where it really can be, you know,
solved with some sanitation. Now that's easier so than done,
(30:51):
because of course, picking up a ton of walnuts is
not a fun.
Speaker 1 (30:54):
Trip for anybody with the lawnmower.
Speaker 2 (30:56):
Just nuts and of course that you know nasty hull
husk thing that they have even if you pick them up,
that's still you know, left behind or and you smell. Yeah,
it's used as a dye. Fascinating stuff, but so and
it also helps a lot if you can give the
(31:17):
area enough water because that if they're drought stress, that
is another factor that will really influence it. Now, we
will share some links on YouTube of some resources out
there from universities of plants that are believed to be
resistant to jug loan. But I will tell you that
my frustration with them is that they are often contradictory.
(31:38):
You know, you will look at one university's website and
that will say this is resistant and another one will
say it's susceptible. Because there are just so many factors
that go into a plant's ability to tolerate jug loans.
So it's not a scientific thing necessarily where we can
say these work and these don't, because it does depend
so much on what part of the wall that you're
(31:59):
exposed to and how much water it gets, what your
soil is like, all of those factors. So there's definitely
some very very sensitive plants you can avoid or you
should avoid. But like, for example, you know, Yolanda mentions
that she has a hydrangea. Now I would say hydrangea
appears on almost every list of sensitive plants, but she
seems to be growing one without any problem whatsoever.
Speaker 1 (32:20):
So I think your point is well taken. Clean up
the debris, and that is much easier said than done.
They are messy trees, especially if you have a windstorm.
Come oh yeah, but I agree with you on those
university sites. For my purpose, I had success with service
berry or juneberry, river birch, sweet gum and dogwood did work.
Speaker 2 (32:46):
Oh by black walnuts, that's good to know. That's good
to know. I think mulch will also help you a
lot from you know, having that stuff directly contact the plant.
The way to know if your plant is being influenced
negatively by jug loan is that they will typically wilt
or turn black. So it's not really And when I
(33:07):
say turn black, I'm not like saying, you know, it
turns brown. I'm saying like it will go black black
and look immediately very sick. And that happened to some
friends of mine with their tomatoes. So again, when you
have those sensitive plants, they're going to go black and
they're going to die, and there is no recovery. Whereas
a plant that's maybe somewhat sensitive, or as only sensitive
because maybe it's too dry, you might actually be able
(33:29):
to see it wilt and be able to move that
to a walnut free area in time to save its life.
But it's a complicated issue, and I wish there were
simple answers, but there really are not. But again, we'll
provide the resources resources that we do have and try
to help you make good decisions about your planting project.
We're going to take a little break and when we
(33:50):
come back, we are continuing our conversation about conifers, So
stay tuned. Thanks for listening to the Gardening Simplified Podcast,
brought to you by Proven Winners Color Choice Shrubs. Our
award winning flowering shrubs and evergreens are trialed and tested
by experts with your success in mind. Learn more at
(34:13):
Proven Winners color Choice dot com.
Speaker 1 (34:17):
Welcome back to the Gardening Simplified Show and Stacy, as
I said, my primary nostalgic attachment to conifers is selling
Christmas trees over forty six years in a garden center.
You come home at night and you're clothing, your hair,
everything just full of needles. You get into the shower,
(34:37):
there's needles all over the bathroom floor. But the one
thing that I learned about selling these Christmas trees is
that as families with young kids come to pick out
the family Christmas tree, like Clark w Griswold, their ability
to pick out a tree and agree on it is
completely contingent on the weather conditions makes sense. It's cold
(35:00):
and snowy and windy. They can decide on a tree
in thirty seconds flat if it's beautiful outside. Sometimes I've
seen families take two three hours out the family Christmas tree.
So conifers. Let's talk about conifers a little more, and
speaking of garden centers, one of the things to look
(35:24):
for is whether or not the tree is root bound
when you purchase it. And again years ago in the
seventies and eighties, most of these conifers we were selling
Stacey were bald and burlap, and in a bald and
burlap situation, it's usually heavy clay soil that you would
find and heavy to move around. Now most grown in
(35:51):
pots and containers, but it's important to take a look
at take a look at that. An important thing also
if you're playing in conifers in your landscape is and
I want to make sure to point this out because
I see this mistake made often, and that is how
deeply buried is the root flare. The root flare is
(36:12):
at the base of the plant. It's where the trunk
flares out, and it's critical that that be visible at
the soil's surface. So if you just as is the
case with many woody plants that we put in the ground, Stacey,
we are planting them, we're not burying them. And so
(36:34):
if you get this thing too deep and water becomes
a problem, too much water, that's when we really start
to see conifers struggle for sure.
Speaker 2 (36:45):
Yeah, you're no tree that you plant, whether conifer or
anything else, should look like a phone pole. You should
have that. You should have it to be straight and
then that gentle flare, And I would say buy and large.
Well drained soil is very crucial for most conifers. But
of course boltzypress grows in standing water, so there's always
an exception. And that's a really cool thing. Because you
(37:06):
can use that to find the perfect conifer for just
about any spot. You know, we really can't just say
conifers need these conditions. Like I said that Taxes one
of the most shade tolerant evergreens, if not the most
shade tolerant evergreen, Whereas there's plenty of conifers that if
you try to put them in the shade, you're not
going to get much at all. But there is one
(37:27):
for every kind of different scenario because they are so diverse,
and they occur just about everywhere, I think, on every continent.
Speaker 1 (37:36):
Sure, sure now, And speaking of that, I'm glad you
brought that up. I think it's important to know where
a conifer is native too, In other words, what is
the environment that it likes to grow in. Now, people
love frasier furs, so do I. They make a great
Christmas tree, straight trunks, very fragrant, beautiful, But they're growing
(37:58):
up in the mountainous regions of let's say North Carolina.
And if you don't have that humidity, basically, if you're
unable to replicate where they're native too, you're going to
have difficulty growing it in your landscape.
Speaker 2 (38:12):
Right. Well, look what happened with blue spruce. You know,
blue spruce got so so popular. It was everywhere. Blue
spruce grows in the rocky mountains in Colorado, not in
you know, the suburbs of Detroit, where you know, summers
are hot and winters are cold and wet and not arid.
And yet it was such a popular tree. And now
(38:33):
they're all dying because they got stressed, because they are
not in the right conditions for how they want to grow.
Speaker 1 (38:39):
Yeah, and you watch them decline out there, and there's
thousands of them. That's true. Back in the seventies and eighties, boy,
we sold a lot of those oh it shows and
it shows exactly. So make sure to make sure to
do that. Also, one very popular thing in the garden
(38:59):
center industry for years has been to bring a live
conifer indoors for Christmas and decorate it so that you
can plant it and then you have the memory of
that tree for years and years. But make sure you
prepare the whole before Christmas.
Speaker 2 (39:16):
Like now would be a great time, and.
Speaker 1 (39:17):
Now would be a great time. And then also make
sure that that tree is not inside for long a
week or two tops keep it away from a fireplace,
heat register that sort of thing, you're going to have
better success.
Speaker 2 (39:31):
I mean, I think it's a great idea that people
do that as long as they have the space, because
of course, too many years of doing that, you're gonna
you are going to run out of space. But it
is pretty simple to do as long as you you know, again,
prepare the hole for it now. I would even recommend
that you put the excavated soil into the garage or
basement or someplace that that isn't going to freeze. Here
(39:52):
in Michigan we aren't usually super frozen by Christmas time,
but you know better to have it available for you
to actually plant. And then you know you're still going
to want to water that in to settle the soil
around it, and ye do keep it as cool as possible.
And you know, I would say, if you're going to
do that, you're doing that as a labor of love. Yes,
(40:13):
it's not a cost savings. A Christmas tree is going
to be far less expensive than a growing plant, but
it is still a really nice thing to do. Whether
it's your first Christmas as a couple, or you know,
in commemoration of your first Christmas with your child, or
something like that it can be really special, but it's
done for the love of the tree, not as a
(40:33):
money saving I think you know.
Speaker 1 (40:36):
You mentioned that, and one of the primary memories I
have of Christmas trees as a kid was my dad
bought a Christmas tree a pine Christmas. It was Scotch pine.
Bought the tree from a kmart for seventy five cents.
Oh wow, and boy did it look like it.
Speaker 2 (40:57):
I think pretty much all Scotch pines looked like the
costs of ay five cents. It came heart, just my opinion.
Speaker 1 (41:02):
And it fell over numerous times until my dad finally
got sick of it, dragged it out of the house
and stuck it in a neighbor's landscape in the dead
of winter. The neighbor, of course, did not recognize that
until the following summer when the needles started falling a
(41:23):
lot turn brown. So many memories like that, you know.
I also have memories when my kids were growing up,
or in the seventies again, in the garden center, we
would sell these incandescent bulbs on strings called C nine
or C seven lights, and they were painted incandescent bulbs.
(41:44):
The paint would flake off them. They were hot I'm
outside putting them on the house like Clark w. Griswold
on an aluminum ladder, stepping on the bulbs. It was horrid.
In today's day and age, the led Christmas lights that
are available are unbelievable.
Speaker 2 (42:03):
Yeah, and you pair them with the little clips that
they have to put on your house, you get that
nice tidy line. Oh, it's a different world we're living in.
Speaker 1 (42:10):
It is indestructible. I mean, just yeah, unreal. Anyhow, all
these memories come back. Let's run down the list real
quickly a minute. So we're talking conifers. We've got to
start with the pine tree, right, so pine trees, then cypress.
We mention the bald cypress. That's a conifer. Cedar trees right,
evergreen conifers native.
Speaker 2 (42:31):
Many Yeah, you know, cedars in cypress are definitely two
very confusing terms. They're common names, so they don't benefit
from that strict botanical definition. Like when I was going
between fruit and cone and berry and all of that,
those all have strict botanical definitions. These do not, So
it can be a little bit confusing, but that's where
scientific names come in.
Speaker 1 (42:51):
Large trees, love them deciduous. You mentioned the beautiful color
in fall use or taxes. We've all he covered that. Junipers, hemlock.
I love hemlock trees, and it breaks my heart here
in West Michigan with what's happening with the wooly adelgied insect,
(43:12):
an invasive insect that's just wiping them out. And hemlocks
are so beautiful, especially if you're taking a walk in
the wintertime. Spruce trees spruces here there and everywhere around
the United States, but spruce trees, they were not my
favorite Christmas tree, and the needle retention was not good.
(43:33):
And boy, they're real poky on your arms. Fur trees.
I love fur trees, balsam fur, frasier fur, but my
favorite's got to be Douglas fir. And again going back
to Christmas time, which is in a fir exactly, you're correct,
it is not a fur, but we call them Douglas fir.
And of course at Christmas time, that citrusy type smelled
(43:55):
to the foliage. Whenever we'd get the Christmas trees in
at the garden center, that was one of the first
things I did, just stick my face right into one
of those trees and take a big sniff.
Speaker 2 (44:06):
Well that must be why you had needles everywhere. Yes,
it's true, but you're right. If you want that classic
conifercent in your house for is the way to go,
no question about it.
Speaker 1 (44:17):
Would I be correct Stacy and saying arguably the biggest
conifer in the world are Redwood's, like.
Speaker 2 (44:24):
Just from size Redwood tree, Yeah, most likely, but I'm
sure we've I'm sure someone could prove us wrong. Yeah, exactly,
but I've seen them and they are amazing. This giant Sequoias, yeah,
I mean yeah, I guess it depends on if you're
talking with or height, but both of them are just incredible,
incredible trees that everyone should should go see because well breathtaking.
Speaker 1 (44:42):
Well I think we both agree. We love connif love
them absolutely. Thanks Stacy, thanks Rick, Thanks Adriana, and thanks
most of all to you for watching us on YouTube,
listening to the radio, or looking for us where you
get your favorite podcast. Have a great week.
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