Douglas Justice's December in the Garden 2022 - UBC Botanical Garden blog is up now, with good photos as usual, almost entirely of plants to which I never paid any attention. In more or less the order mentioned, here is the Eucalyptus coccifera, mentioned as a locator for Microcachrys tetragona. Here is Coprosma atropurpurea, used as a marker for the Lepidothamnus laxifolius. The "pile of twigs" appearance in the description was apt. Mixed in with this pigmy pine (common name, yes, we know it's not a pine) is this teeny fern - Austroblechnum penna-marina 'Cristatum'. Halocarpus bidwillii, bog pine. Podocarpus lawrencei And the similar-looking Podocarpus nivalis cultivars. First photo shows P. lawrencei on the left and P. nivalis 'Jack's Pass' on the right. I have to continue this in the next posting.
Here is Podocarpus nivalis 'Otari'. Here are some plants marked as hybrid seedlings of Podocarpus lawrencei. Douglas used Phyllocladus alpinus to talk about cladodes, those silvery leaf-looking structures, which are modified branches. He mentioned that the stems of Christmas cactus and the pads of prickly pears are also cladodes. Here are a couple of non-conifers that caught my attention. Gunnera monoica, with leaves around 3cm across. And Prostanthera cuneata, which I first noticed in Stanley Park one year after @Margot posted hers. There are just a few flowers, but there are not so many flowers around right now. It's the leaves of this that are fragrant.
I moved the discussion about common names to Common names - need there be standards? | UBC Botanical Garden Forums. I used the name "pigmy pine" because Douglas was telling us in the blog what it's known as. It wasn't my prerogative to edit his words. Anyway, if you have more to say, please do it in that thread. It will just get lost in this thread.
