86 Richard Hawke of the Chicago Botanic Garden Perennials

Plant of the Week:

The Banyan Tree

Photo of a Banyan in Hawaii by Fallon Michael on Unsplash

Unless you live in a tropical clime, you cannot grow this plant. Even then, you probably wouldn’t want to.

The Banyan Tree (Ficus benghalensis) is really more about gawking at and standing under, as it can grow to acres across over time.

Hurricane Ian had its way with my favorites, which exist on Boca Grande Island in an allée that was planted in the early 20th century.

I found this before and after the Hurricane photo on Reddit. As bad as it all looks, they are still standing…

By the time we got to see them again, they were well on their way back to health. Arborists had made thoughtful cuts, and all the new light is probably helping the undergrowth.

It’s always growing season in Florida, and it was great to see all of the fresh foliage.

The Banyan, the strangler tree, the walking tree— all apt names for this plant that spreads itself so majestically.

Artist Karen Blair

You heard me mention my friend Karen Blair on the pod. Karen is a local Charlottesville artist who sponsors Into the Garden with Leslie

Have a look at what Karen can do— she worked with one of my listeners, Anne Brooks Rudzki, of Capital Roots Containers, and created this beautiful commission of Anne Brook’s garden.

Follow this link to see more of her paintings.

And follow her on Instagram here.

Richard Hawke of

The Chicago Botanic

Garden Trials

Evaluator extraordinaire— this photo of Richard is from the Fine Gardening article about the trials.

I saw Richard Hawke’s presentation on perennials last summer at the Speaking of Gardening conference in Asheville, NC.

I had paid for my ticket, but more dollars were to be spent after I heard his recommendations on the BEST perennials.

Gardeners face a lot of information, and it’s nice to know that trials can help us to understand which plants can grow well for us.

Richard Hawke has paired with Fine Gardening Magazine to get that information to us, and you can go back and look at all of the FG articles that have featured his work right here.

More garden space and more trials are coming at the Chicago Botanic Garden! Peter Wirtz and Mikyoung Kim were selected to design new beds that would allow more plants, including shade lovers, to be trialed.

Mikyoung Kim— a familiar name because she also is designing our own Charlottesville local garden: the Botanic Garden of the Piedmont, which I featured back in Episode 80.

Richard’s FULL list of articles written can be found here. Warning: you might get tired scrolling through all his excellent articles.

Below is the list that I could not resist. Looks like my color palette could use some expansion, but I’m good on texture diversity.

L-R, top to bottom you have the Allium ‘Lavender Bubbles’, Geranium pretense ‘Boom Chocolate’, Heuchera ‘Wildberry’, Eupatorium ‘Polished Brass’, which I have not gotten my hands on, yet, Agastache ‘Rosie Posie’ and Muhlenbergia reverchonii ‘Undaunted’.