Gardens of the World : FOSTER BOTANICAL GARDEN, Honolulu, Hawaii

The Foster Botanical Garden is located on Vineyard Boulevard in the center of Honolulu, Hawaii, i.e. in a highly urban area. It is the oldest of the five botanical gardens administered by the city. It started in 1853 when Queen Kalama leased a small area of land to William Hildebrand, a young German doctor and botanist.

Many of the large trees in the garden were planted by Dr. Hildebrand during his twenty year tenure. Then the property was sold to Thomas and Mary Foster, who continued to develop the garden, which was bequeathed to the City of Honolulu in 1930.

The first director, Dr. Harold Lyon, then introduced thousands of trees and plants and started its famous orchid collection. Today the garden has fourteen acres of plants from various parts of the world - but also native Hawaiian plants. It has about a hundred trees of 'exceptional significance', either for their size or rarity or origin.

 

 

Owing to their geographic isolation (3,000 km from the nearest continent), the Hawaiian Islands have developed a unique eco-system over their short history, geologically speaking (between half a million to five million years for the main islands). Which means the islands have a unique flora and fauna. However, it is today difficult to distinguish between endemic and introduced species, the latter having spread all over the islands. Introduced species started with the arrival of the first human settlements around 1,400 years ago. It is to be expected to find a variety of plants from various parts of the world in a botanical garden, and the Foster garden is no exception.

 

Let's start with some interesting trees: the first one is a baobab, originating mainly from Madagascar. Several large specimens can be found in various parks (but not in private gardens due to their size) in Hawaii, as they can make spectacular trunks with nothing growing on them and then the foliage appears only at the top. You can tell the size of the trunk of this one by looking at the size of the label on it, seen on the other photo. You can also get an idea of the height of that tree by the size of the trunk.

 

 

Another giant is the quipo (or cuipo or macondo), from South America. It has the softest wood of all trees and is bare eleven months out of twelve. Its roots are a source of water for those trekking in the forests where it grows. The trunk size of that tree was almost the same as the baobab shown above.

The Nile tulip tree can grow up to 85 meters, and has spectacular flowers, often orange, and is frequently grown as an ornamental in Hawaii. It's always a pleasant surprise to see such colors on top of large trees because at that height we usually only see green foliage:

 

 

Another tree with showy flowers is the Poinciana (called Ohai Ali'i in Hawaiian, also 'Flamboyant') from the bean family. It is endangered in its native habitat (Madagascar) but is widely cultivated as an ornamental:

 



 

How about a tree that grows cannon balls? It bears that name due to its globe-shaped fruit that grow along the trunk. They are edible, and the flowers they come from are fragrant. For that reason, and because of its unusual fruit, it is grown as an ornamental.

 

 

The tree above, 'breadfruit', could apparently save the world from hunger if it were more widespread. It is a staple food for many societies. The baked fruit has a 'potato-like flavor similar to freshly baked bread', hence its name.

Garden visitors can also see specimens of : arrow poison tree, a be-still tree (poisonous), a bottle palm tree (bottle-shaped trunk), a carnauba wax palm tree (this wax is used in automobile waxes, shoe polish, dental floss), kola nut tree (used in beverages due to its caffeine), fig trees, gold trees (which actually grow tiny particles of gold and other minerals on their leaves), kukui and macadamia trees (with edible nuts and oils of many uses), lettuce tree, elephant ear tree (thus named due to the spape of its pods), silk cotton tree and teak tree.



The garden has an orchid conservatory, and some varieties are shown below. (I apologize to orchid lovers for not taking down the name of each variety, but hopefully some of those might already be familiar to them.)

 

 

The garden has a section on economic plants (spices, herbs, dyes), where I found a totally different type of creeping thyme (t. serpyllum) than the one we are familiar with here on the island, but the leaves did smell like thyme though. Then there was the other thyme (t. vulgaris) used as a culinary and medicinal herb, but this one was also different - much taller:

 

 

In that same section one can find the Buddha's Hand (or Fingered Citron), a small tree whose fruit is very fragrant and for that reason is used in China and Japan for perfuming rooms and clothing. It is also edible and used as a religious offering:

 

 



Other notable flowers include the spider lily, frequently grown as an ornamental due to its fragrant white flowers (below) at the end of a long stem, which are easily cut to make bouquets. The following photo shows a tiny visitor (gold dust day gecko) among the leaves. Geckos are useful as they eat cockroaches, and for that reason some people tolerate them in their houses. (That cute species is also the mascot of the GEICO insurance company, a successful marketing move.)

 

 

Bromeliads are a very large family (more than 3,000 species) including the pineapple and Spanish moss (the smallest of the family). They are favored as an ornamental because of their foliage, which often grows as a rosette with different shades of red, green and/or gold:

 

 

There is also a community garden at the Foster Botanical Garden. Here are some photos from that garden:



 



 

The next article of the Gardens of the World series will feature the Ho'omaluhia Botanical Garden, also part of the botanical gardens administered by the City and County of Honolulu.

 

(article and photos by Denise Motard)

 

Gardens of the World : GYOEN NATIONAL GARDEN, Kyoto, Japan

There’s two Gyoen National Gardens in Japan – one is located in the Shinjuku district of Tokyo, and the other in Kyoto. This article relates to the latter.

The area covered by this garden used to be the residential area occupied by the court nobles during the Edo Period (1603-1867), when Kyoto was the capital of Japan. When Kyoto lost this function to Tokyo, many government buildings were removed and the national garden was created to preserve the Imperial Palace. After WWII, the garden was upgraded to a National Garden.

Many features typical of a Japanese garden can be found here, for example a pond and a tea house. Incidentally, Japanese garden designers got their inspiration from the Chinese and then adapted the layouts to their own environment and concepts of natural beauty.

Here are a few photos of this beautiful garden below. As for any garden, the landscape changes with the seasons. It was March when those photos were taken, so there are few plants in full bloom. However it is easier, at that time of the year, to appreciate other more permanent aspects of the vegetation and of the landscape.

(Interestingly, most gardens I visited in Japan had bilingual labels - Japanese and English, including the latin name. Very convenient for identification!)

First the pond: a massive one-piece stone is used as a bridge over a stream going to the pond. Although access to the bridge was closed it was possible to walk around part of the pond. In the background is the tea house.

 

Although this horizontal vine on a treillis above part of the pond near the tea house was not labeled, I suspect it is a Japanese wisteria. Wisterias can be pruned and trained to grow horizontally (as below) instead of vertically to the top of trees. It is thus easier to have a better view of their gorgeous blooms.

 

 

This outcropping rock in the middle of the pond (below) was a convenient place for turtles to bask in the spring sun.

 

 

 

The tea house: tea houses can be quite an attraction by themselves in a Japanese garden. The vegetation growing around them is chosen to maximize peacefulness while enjoying one's tea in good company. The views of the garden from the inside of the tea house are also carefully planned to optimize the whole experience. This tea house is quite large (it was built for the nobility) and has two floors.

 

 

Here is the garden view one would get from the window below:

 

 

 

Some remarkable trees: the first tree below is a cherry tree (very precious to the Japanese, as the cherry blossom is their national flower). But this one must be very special. It looks like a very old tree that somehow fell to the ground, as we can see its stump covered by grass in the foreground. The interesting part is that from the trunk on the ground, in different places, are new shoots emerging as a whole group of new cherry trees, full of buds soon ready to open.

 



 

By clicking on the plaque photo below, the 'baby' cherry trees sprouting from the old trunk can be seen in full bloom on the lower photo.

 

Here are more examples of the great care the Japanese are taking for some of the trees that are of significance to them:

 

 

What would we do in Canada with horizontal branches growing towards the garden walkway - would we not merely chop them off before they get that big? Not so for Japanese landscapers : they just let them grow where they are and where they want to go. They give them a chance and simply support them (photos above). Here's a detailed view of one of those strong supporting ties:

 

 

Although (in my humble opinion) this particular one appears a little overdue for a loosening of its grip lest it will do more harm than good by choking the limb it's supposed to protect. That one is an exception though - the other ties I've seen (dozens of them) were usually fitting just fine. Just that aspect of garden maintenance - watching for all the ties and re-adjusting them accordingly - must be a daunting task!

And here (below) is a different type of protection - this time from damaging insects:

 

The type of wrapping for insect protection seemed to be of high quality and is tightly adjusted so one would assume it's efficient. Would we really bother here in Canada with all that trouble?

 

 

It might not be apparent at first glance but this photo below actually shows some sort of work of art made from garden waste. Its location is quite strange - on the roof of a small building somewhere in the middle of the garden. Quite unexpected indeed.

 

 

The Gyoen National Garden also has a museum which shows, among other things, traditional garden tools used by Japanese landscapers and some landscaping techniques (next two photos):

 

 

  

Finally, this article would not be complete without at least one image of some flowers. Here it is:

 

Although this shrub was not labeled I suspect it is an enkianthus, which is part of the heath family. I've seen several specimens in various gardens and parks in Japan and their early blooms have a nice fragrance.



 

(article and photos by Denise Motard) 

Gardens of the World : HAMARIKYU GARDEN, Tokyo, Japan

This garden is relatively new with regards to the usual longevity of gardens in Japan. It was turned into a public garden in 1946. The Hamarikyu Garden is situated along the Sumida River. The garden features a pond, a typical feature of Japanese gardens, and is surrounded by a moat filled by Tokyo Bay. On the garden site there used to be a villa belonging to the last shogun family, the Tokugawa (between 1600 and 1868).

 

There is a tree in there that predates the opening of the public garden by three centuries : a black pine that was meticulously trained to grow horizontally for one main branch starting low from the main trunk, while the other main branch was allowed to grow vertically as one would expect that a tree should grow.

 

What is so fascinating about that horizontal branch is how the Japanese, for so many generations, patiently trained it to the point where it is now a huge trunk in its own right. The plaque (below) mentions that this pine is one of the largest in Tokyo:

 

 

Below are some pictures of that tree from various angles. You can clearly see the huge posts used to support the horizontal trunk along a good part of its length.

 

 



This photo (above) shows how even the vertical part of the tree is supported. And below is a more distant view of that vertical part, with Tokyo buildings in the background and the horizontal part of the tree in the foreground.

 

 

 

 

 





The photo above shows some detail of the supporting posts for the horizontal part of this venerable black pine, while the one below gives an idea of what that part of the tree looks like when walking on the pathway.

 

 

Below is a view of the branching out of the horizontal part of the tree from the main trunk. The branching out is about one meter from the ground

 

 

 

(Please remember to click on any of the photos for a larger image.)

 

Aside from the above attraction, the Hamarikyu garden has a plum grove. Plum trees are a favorite for Japanese, after the cherry trees. Both are appreciated for their blooms, which occur early in the spring, the plum trees showing their delicate flowers first. It is a common sight, in Japanese gardens in the spring, to find visitors (including the Japanese themselves) taking photos of blooming plum trees (ume) and cherry trees (sakura). More will be said about the sakura in a future article.

 

Here is a sign below welcoming visitors to such a plum grove in this garden:

 

 

And here are (below) some of those beautiful plum tree blooms:

 

 

With the photo below it will be apparent that I have a liking of various tree shapes:

 

 

 

The tree label indicated it was a 'cockspur coral tree' (Erythrina crista-galli) and due to the early season (it was March when I visited this garden) I had no way of knowing if the tree was dead or not. It sure was pruned quite severely in any case!

 

 



 

 The photo above shows a mustard plot protected by a plastic mesh, presumably from some pests. Finding mustard growing in a public garden devoted mainly to trees and flowers comes as no surprise in a country like Japan, where edible greens of all kinds are actively grown in every available space.

Finally, I had to show this one below, a small palm tree (sorry I don't have the specific name) growing in this garden. The Tokyo area is not that cold for palm trees to be able to grow there.

(article and photos by Denise Motard)

 

Creating a pond

The January 2014 meeting of the Garden Club of PEI featured Chris Prouse, who has many years of experience creating his own ponds and other water features in his own back yard.  He says he has built 10 ponds, and nine were mistakes!

There are many types of ponds:

• natural
• cement
• pre-formed
• liner (Chris says this is the best choice)
• container (Chris says old bathtubs or discarded satellite dishes make a great container)

Site selection

Choose a site where you can dig at least 2 feet deep.  In a shady site, the pool will develop fewer algae problems.  You want to avoid being too close too close to overhanging trees, because falling leaves will have to be cleared out.  Decide if you want your pond to be the centrepiece of your backyard, or if you want it to be a hidden surprise.

Building the pond

The best site has a backslope.  Dig a hole at least 2 feet deep in front of the slope, and put a berm in front.  The pond should have two levels.  One level is about 6 inches deep, which will be for plants such as rushes.  The second area should hold at least 18 inches of water.  Use a sheet of styrofoam to stabilize the slope. Cover the bottom of the hole with old carpeting.  That will cushion the liner and protect it from punctures.  Buy a good quality pond liner that is at least 1/3 larger than the size of the hole, to allow for the depth and the overhang.  The liner must be one piece, to avoid leaks.  

An 18-inch pond will allow plants to overwinter, but will not support fish over winter.  Fish in a shallow pond must be brought inside for the winter.  Chris says his biggest mistake in building ponds was to not make them deep enough.  He says 18 inches is good, and 2 feet deep is better.  Other mistakes include a cement bottom that cracked, buying a cheap liner, and creating a pond that did not have a level bottom.  The bottom of the pond must be perfectly level, or the water will not be level.  

A submersible pump keeps the water flowing.  One option is to use a UV light to kill bacteria, and to build a filter box to keep the water clear.  You need an outside electricity source to plug in the pump.  Make sure the electrical source has a ground fault interrupter.  If you bury the electrical lines, feed them through a PVC pipe first to protect the wires from damage. Bury wires at least 6 inches deep.

Access

People, especially kids, are naturally drawn to ponds.  Make it easy to get close by building a small platform that slightly overhangs the edge of the pond. 

Plants

Submerged plants:  Waterlilies taken from the Agriculture Canada lily pond are very hardy. He contains the plant roots in nylon stockings, which will stretch to accommodate root growth.   

Floaters:  duckweed, water hyacinth

Wetland plants:  arrowhead plant, bull rushes, native grasses, elephant ear (taro), yellow flag iris.  

Around the margin of the pond:  Willow, siberian iris, lupins

Wildlife

Chris does not find that mosquitoes breed in his 18-inch deep pond, but they do appear in his shallower, smaller container water features.  The pond attracts birds, pond insects such as dragonflies, amphibians such as newts and salamanders and frogs.  The salamanders appear in the spring, lay eggs which hatch into a form that has external gills and walks on the bottom of the pond.  The mature salamanders disappear into the woods after breeding season.  Frogs appear for a short time, but do not lay eggs in the pond.  Racoons visit too.  Chris suggests stocking the pond with feeder goldfish, which grow quickly and are not expensive.  

Maintenance
Chris says in the 17 years of owning a pond, he has had to drain it only three times.  He drained it to tackle his waterlily plants, which were growing so profusely they had to be divided.  He says that the pond's water will eventually settle into a natural balance with little algae forming.  He does not use chemicals.

Container ponds
An old bathtub can become a bog garden or a water pond.  It can be planted with arrowhead and water plantain, which are free to dig up.