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| Ferns and wild hollyhocks |
Do you think a plant can fall in love with a person? I think I do...its not something I have given much thought to but lately I am starting to wonder. This is the first time, you see, that I have container gardened in a place that gets snow. Sure, back in coastal California there were the occasional freezes and a few things would die off or perhaps get their top leaves burnt. But here you really have to shelter plants that are delicate about the cold. Or not grow delicate plants at all--well, I bet you can guess what category I fall into. Definitely the kind that ooohs and ahhhs over something spectacular in the nursery and brings it home without much thought to this new season called "winter." Now that the season is upon us I have had to move quite a few plant friends indoors. And let me tell you--its getting crowded. I have a Boston fern the size of a small moon that is now residing in my tiny apartment. This fern goes by the moniker of "Fernando" and he's not only large but he seems to have a crush...on me. To be fair, he was encouraged. I mist him every night before bed time, rearrange his fronds, give him a little drink of water, open the blinds for his morning sun and pluck off any unsightly yellowing leaves...
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| Plants want us to love them too. |
Fernando has rewarded me by sending out new frond after new frond - so many fronds that I am now worried about him out growing the apartment before Spring comes again. In addition to all of this new growth I think I can feel a definite emotion coming from this fern. Sometimes when I walk by him I think I can feel a frond reaching out towards me and when we left for a few days over the Thanksgiving holiday I came back to a decidedly sulky fern.
I just finished watching a program called
The Botany of Desire that was based on a book by Michael Pollan. This documentary looks closely at the potato, the tulip, the apple and the marijuana plant as examples of how plants have manipulated animals and humans for their own propagational benefit. It is a fascinating program and I was in agreement with much of what was said or explained until the statement was made that plants do not possess any form of consciousness. That is where Michael Pollan and I part ways.
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| Plum blossoms in Olympia |
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| Plants see us like this - or maybe like bees too. |
I have always felt that there was something going on with plants that we couldn't see or really understand. When I was a kid I did the old bean plant science experiment. You know the one -- you take three identical bean sprouts in three identical styrofoam cups and raise them. The first one you treat the way most people would raise a plant--you give it plenty of sunlight and water and leave it alone. The second one you do the same as the first but you also lavish love on that plant: late night talks, affectionate leaf stroking, soothing music - the works. The third plant you still give plenty of water and light but you hate it. You mutter insults at it when you water it. You scowl at it as you walk by. Then you serenade it with cacophonous music (speed metal or death punk if you've got some). Crazy as it seems, you get the results you would expect. The first plant grows normally, the second plant thrives and gets large and robust and the poor third plant usually turns brown and dies. How can that happen if you don't have some form of consciousness? I don't think it can. I think in some ways plants can see and hear what's going on around them. That makes me wonder about Fernando... should I still walk about the house in my underwear in front of him?
