Feature
Polygonatum at
by Rodney Eason Photo by William Cullina One exciting new initiative that we are working on at Coastal
Maine Botanical Gardens for 2013 is the development of some of our core plant collections. As we have grown since opening in 2007, we have sought out certain groups of plants that perform extremely well in our gardens here in Boothbay. One genus of plants that has performed spectacularly well is Polygonatum. Polygonatum is also known as Solomon’s Seal. Te Latin name, Polygonatum means “many knees” and refers to the way that the roots have knee looking knobs. Tis is a wonderful group of plants prized for their ornamental flowers and growth habit. As a matter of fact, the 2013 Perennial Plant of the Year by the Perennial Plant association is the wonderful and easy to grow Polygonatum odoratum ‘Variegatum.’ In the genus Polygonatum there are approximately 63 species.
Tere is not an up to date, thorough treatment of the entire genus. Aaron Floden, from Knoxville, Tennessee, is currently working on a rewrite of the genus which will allow us a better idea of the species in the world. Most species of Polygonatum occur in temperate and subtropical regions of the northern hemisphere. Plants can be found growing in the wild in wooded areas. Tis perennial thrives in bright, shady spots with adequate moisture. Here at Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens, we currently have 26 different species of Polygonatum. Tere are more species that we are identifying to collect and add to our collection. We are also seeking out new and unusual cultivars that will enhance our collection as well. Several members of our staff including: Justin Nichols, horticulturist, Melissa Cullina, director of education and staff botanist, Bill Cullina, executive director, Sharmon Provan, plant recorder, and I are working to make sure that all of our plants are correctly identified and labeled properly. Once we get all of our plants properly identified then we will submit our collection as a national collection. Te American Public Gardens Association (APGA) leads an
effort to conserve different genera and plant groups in the United States. Tis effort is called the North American Plant Collections Consortium (NAPCC). Once we confirm the plants
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in our collection, we will submit the Polygonatum collection at CMBG as a national collection with the NAPCC. Tis will be the first officially recognized collection for us and will serve as the cornerstone for future collections growth. It will also help solidify our status as a true botanical garden. We are extremely excited about this venture and cannot wait to go through the process. Why submit our collection with NAPCC, you might ask…
Well, as mentioned above, it helps us make our mark being a young, startup garden. We are going into our sixth year here as a public garden and having a nationally recognized collection will continue to help us grow. Also, from a plant conservation standpoint, preserving these plants will ensure that species or cultivars are not lost in the wild or in other gardens around the world. For example, in conducting some preliminary research for this submittal process, we have reached out to colleagues around the country to learn about Polygonatum in their collections. One person we spoke with in the Pacific Northwest had lost some of the plants that are now in our collection. He had even brought some of these plants back from China on a collection trip and was glad to know we had them preserved here in our gardens in Maine. We can divide the plants we have in our garden and give him a piece of his original plant back. Tis will ensure the perpetuity of this plant should it be destroyed or die in our garden in the future. We could just ask for a piece of the plant back from him. If you want to see all of the Polygonatum in the gardens here at CMBG, visit our website before you come and click on the FloraFind logo on the right hand side of our webpage. Once you are in FloraFind, just type in “polygonatum” in the search box to see all of the plants in our collection and their locations within the gardens. It is a wonderful group of plants to grow for their arching foliage and small flowers climbing up the stems. We have plants with flowers of white, cream, pink, orange-red, purple, lavender, yellow, and some with variegated or even purple foliage. I hope to see a few of you walking through our gardens this summer looking for all of our Solomon’s Seal plants.
Spring2013
Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens
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