Tag Archive for: plant history

The history of plants

the history of plants
This planting in Maine makes so much sense when you discover its history: the ancestors of these Volcano™ Phlox grew wild in North American woodlands.

Who gives much thought to where a particular plant comes from, its history? It’s sitting there at the garden centre with a handy pot label telling us all we need to know about how much sun and water it likes. What’s never on the label is the plant’s back-story – where its ancestors grew. Were they clinging to the side of a mountain in China when discovered by western plant collectors? Or were they growing wild in North American woodlands when a fresh wave of settlers arrived in the 17th Century? For a bit of fun, here we reveal the history of plants…

1. Take everyone’s garden favourite, Phlox, for example. Do the gardeners who plant it know that a few hundred years back it was growing wild in the United States, a native to New York right the way west to Iowa, and south to Georgia, Mississippi and Arkansas? It was such a lovely plant, that when settlers from the old world arrived, they quickly sent samples of it home where its exotic beauty could be admired. Thomas Jefferson himself – one time US President and keen botanist – brought Phlox into his garden at Monticello, Virginia. Imagine if he could see what plant breeders have achieved with phlox varieties over the 200+ years since, to produce the robust, sturdy no-need-for-staking options (like Volcano™ Phlox) that are available to us today – lush, rich in colour and the most easy-care – Volcano phlox is the best phlox around.

There are many Volcano™ Phlox varieties and they all know how to thrive in the garden, with the best disease resistance of all modern phlox. They’re each lovely in their own way – this is Volcano™ Phlox Pink with Red Eye.

2. Given Bird of Paradise is the official flower of Los Angeles, you might think it comes originally from that part of the world, but it doesn’t. These astonishing plants are a tight knit family with only around five species recognised. And they all come from Africa. It’s very likely Birds of Paradise arrived in Britain around the time botanist Joseph Banks was officially advising King George lll, helping His Royal Highness to create the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. The clue is in the botanical name they were given by western botanists – Strelitzia – named after Queen Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, George’s wife, who had a keen interest in botany and the new gardens.

plants back-story
This watercolour of a Strelitzia is thought to have been painted around 1850. Notes to the bottom of the study suggest that it was cultivated near a warm stove – possibly in a domestic kitchen or more likely as part of a horticultural set-up. (Credit: Wellcome Collection)

3. Fruit trees are so valued that they have been carried around the world for people to grow and enjoy probably from the moment we started to plant gardens.The Apricot is a good example – it’s grown in so many places around the world, it’s almost hard to believe that apricots (a prunus species) originally grew wild in China and central Asia. These days modern hybridisation, on top of centuries of selective breeding, means gardeners have brilliant options when choosing a small, pretty flowering fruit tree covered once a year in delicious fruit.

plants back-story
Proof of our long-standing love of apricots is this Arles orchard thriving in the south of France in 1888 when it was painted by Vincent Van Gogh. These trees may have been growing a long way from their original native Asian setting, but the Japanese style of print-making which influenced Van Gogh is obvious.

Volcano Phlox has travelled far and wide

Volcano Phlox
Is it a surprise that a plant this pretty seduced humans into transporting it around the world? This is Volcano™ Phlox Pink with its glowing Red Eye.

Plants don’t have legs, so how do they get from A to B? And why? In other words, how has something like phlox, which grew wild originally in the United States, ended up living a cosmopolitan life almost everywhere around the globe? The answer comes down to us plant lovers, the people who look for lovely things to add to our gardens, balcony pots and window boxes – anywhere we can squeeze them in. Here’s the story of how Volcano Phlox has travelled far and wide…

When the first European settlers landed in the United States and began to take a look around, they would certainly have seen phlox. It’s probably safe to guess that they planted some around their settlements, and it wouldn’t have been long before samples were being sent ‘home’ to the ‘old world’ to share with family, friends and botanists. We know from records kept that examples of wild Phlox paniculata grew in moist stream banks and wooded areas in Virginia, and specimens travelled on returning ships in the early 1800s firstly to England and then to France. From there, those glorious phlox plants would have gone anywhere and everywhere.

Volcano Phlox
This easy care and showy Volcano™ Phlox was an obvious candidate for the flower garden: here it is in a mixed planting easily stealing the show from the lilies.

And that’s because phlox were very good looking. Yes the original forms were probably a bit lanky and prone to powdery mildew but they were astonishingly lovely and, to plant collectors and gardeners, they were new and exotic. Fast forward to the 19th and 20th centuries and those wild-caught phlox had been selectively played with over the years by plant breeders in the United Kingdom, Germany, the Netherlands and the United States to create the modern phlox options that we enjoy today. Case in point, Volcano™ Phlox are strong and sturdy and very good at holding their many flowering heads up high. They’re also much better able to dodge the dreaded mildew, especially if you water them at ground level with a soaker hose. Plant breeders also had a lot of fun producing colour options – to the point where there are almost too many options to choose from – Volcano phlox has nine!

Volcano Phlox
Check out the easy care and showy Volcano™ Phlox, not just because they have a good shape and cope best with powdery mildew, but they come in so many colour options – like this version White with a Rose Eye.