Cummings and Goings in Agriculture
Yalobusha County Is Beautiful This Time Of Year
By Steve Cummings
The holiday season is upon us and, as usual, Yalobusha County is beginning to look a lot like Christmas. Yalobusha County is always beautiful this time of year. There are a lot of activities going on this time of year and Farm Bureau’s Annual Convention is one of them. Yalobusha County’s Farm Bureau Delegation will be very active as always at the convention.
Horticulture Tips:
Who says the winter landscape can’t be colorful and interesting, especially if you have an abundant supply of trees and shrubs that bear winter berries? Most gardening folks tend to call any showy fruit a berry. Now, if we want to be “botanically correct” a fruit is a ripened ovary that forms around fertilized ovules that become seeds.
There are many types of fruit based on their structure. A “berry” is just one of these types of fruit. A true berry, botanically speaking, has fleshy pulp filled with multiple seeds. A blueberry and nandina are true berries and, believe it or not, so are a tomato as well as a honeysuckle. Contrary to what you may think, a “drupe” is not a condition of a tired gardener, but is a type of fruit that has a single hard seed like a cherry or peach. This hard seed is sometimes described as a pit or stone. Some of our most beautiful winter berries are actually drupes. These include holly, beautyberry, coralberry, dogwood, glory bower and viburnum. Another odd name to describe a unique fruit is a pome. An apple is a pome fruit. The fleshy part that we eat which surrounds the seeds actually is formed from modified stem and receptacle tissue. Bet you didn’t realize you were eating stem tissue when you bite into a ripe apple! Chokeberry, cotoneaster, rose hips and pyracantha “berries” are all examples of pome fruit.
Having an abundance of fruiting plants for the winter landscape is not only very attractive but provides food for wildlife, in particular, our feathered friends. Hungry birds can strip an entire shrub in a day. Planting fruit-bearing plants in mass, if you have the space, can ensure an ample food supply without taking away from the attractiveness of the display.
Be aware that some of our berried plants are invasive both in the garden and in native habitats beyond the garden. Bright, colorful berries are attractive and are nature’s way of ensuring that birds and animals consume and disperse the seeds near and far. This is a great system for our native plant species, but when the species is an exotic invasive it is not so good. For example, one of our most destructive invasive species is the privet (Ligustrum sp.) which is spread mainly by birds. Nandina and eleagnus is just a couple of our landscape plants that can escape into the wild. It’s always wise to familiarize yourself with a plant’s origin and habits before you buy it.
So, enjoy the many “berries” of the winter landscape, but be mindful of those plants that could become too “berry bountiful” and spread themselves around too much. Also, it just might be fun to share your new botany terminology with your friends and neighbors. Be prepared to have folks think you are a little odd when you refer to a ripe tomato as a berry. You might get some strange looks, as well, when you talk about using those red holly drupes to make your Christmas wreath!
