Flowering plants in the common garden

We are very interesting in observing (and participating in) the Echinacea mating season this summer. We are still waiting for the action to begin.

Here is a map of the flowering plants in the main garden. Each dot represents a plant with 1 or more buds (immature capitula). The short purple bar indicates a plant with one bud, a long bar indicates two, and n short bars indicates n buds. In the main garden we found 869 plants with at least one bud and a total of 1572 buds. The most buds on a plant is 11. This is a modified “sunflower plot” that was generated with R.

We are waiting for the action to begin. At this time last year, like most years, Echinacea flowering was in full swing.

We are prepared for the flowering to begin. We flagged all positions evenly divisible by 5. We mowed paths between rows so we can avoid stepping on plants. We have flagged every flowering plant. Note: don’t buy fluorescent colored pin flags. The flags tend to detach from the more frequently than non-fluorescent colors. What’s up, Forestry Suppliers? We weeded thistles and sweet clover, trapped gophers, found plants with Aster yellows, and are waiting for the action to begin.

This flog entry from last year proved valuable. I just looked it up and followed the common garden maintenance protocol.