October 2001

Old Rakes Can Be Useful

On Pansies, Pumpkins and Other Ways to Work up an Appetite

 When the Levanter blows, the stones move, say Portuguese sailors; Quando con Levante chiove, las pedras muove.  While Toronto may not rival the famed “Windy City” Chicago, October’s boisterous blasts herald fall has truly arrived.  Blowing in also are many a seasonal assignment. 

“The family that rakes together aches together,” an old maxim claims.  True, but necessary unless one wishes to part with a substantial sum and retain a garden maintenance contractor with eager employees and mechanized equipment.  Otherwise, almost every garden centre, hardware store and other retail outlet has lawn rakes on sale.  Leaves must be raked and composted.  Left where they fall, they will smother lawns and perennials.  Raked into beds and borders, they provide wonderful over winter accommodation for various pathogens.  Torontonians can obtain Garden composters at a nominal price by calling the Composting order Line at 392-9573 for a listing of current locations where they are available. 

Once the lawn is clear of leaves, put away the rake and select a dandelion weeding tool or simply a sharp knife.  Then it is down on the knees, ripping the invaders out.  As Shakespeare so sagely observed:  “These weeds are memories of those worser hours.” (King Lear Act IV sc. Vi.)  A good way to build an appetite for the Thanksgiving feast.

Along with pumpkins, many retailers have been encouraged to sell pansies this fall.  A new idea this side of the Atlantic, although not unknown in northwest Europe, some outlets are going as far as to guarantee that, not only will they bloom happily until late fall, but will return next spring.  This should be successful I flower beds but more controversial in planters and window boxes.  Still it is worth the try. 

Also to be seen on sale are spring-flowering bulbs. Not all these are the bargains they are made out to be or so colourfully advertised.  A simple fact abut purchasing bulbs:  The larger the bulb relative to the variety, the better the blooms.  Cheap bulbs are usually small, sometimes virtually culls and so no bargains after all.

Pottering around the garden when the wind has died down, the sun is out and there are a few minutes to spare can be profitable.  Continue to deadhead perennials, removing their flowers before they seed.  Seeding phlox can be a special nuisance, as they revert to the old-fashioned pink form so highly susceptible to powdery mildew.  While waving the pruners around, cut back butterfly bushes to just 6-inch stubs.  On any and all other woody plants, remove dead, dying or diseased wood as detected.  Likewise suckers that spring particularly for the base of apple trees, including crab apples, along with water-shoots.  The latter are the aerial form of suckers, growing vertically up from branches.

Rose bushes such as highbred teas, floribundas and Grandiflora will survive better in our climate if the bud union, the swelling base of the branches, is buried 3-inches below the soil surface.  American and British authors and TV hosts rarely realize this – or that this is the perfect month for digging them up and replanting correctly.  While at it, collect all fallen rose leaves and discard in the garbage, as they are likely to hold black spot disease spores, which cannot be destroyed in a composter.

Still game for more? Daylilies, hostas and similar sturdy perennials can still be lifted, divided and replanted.  Prior to heading inside for a restorative beverage, use a crescent bladed lawn edger to give a crisp clean finish to beds and borders.

Repelling Mice, Rabbits, Deer and Dogs from the Garden

Toronto gardeners may not suffer deer damage, although in neighbouring Mississauga gardens are most certainly visited by these creatures.  The others though are all too common.  Last late fall through the winter, damage from mice was a major problem even in some city areas, certainly everywhere else, along with nibbling rabbits.

Dogs may have their uses when it comes to discouraging browsing by deer.  Rarely are they out all the time though, and the deer know this.  Writing in a recent issue of the trade magazine Horticulture Review, Jennifer Llewllyn tells of an “electronic audio deterrent” device, Protek-Deer ™ from Innovent Inc. (Danbury, CT).  This emits “random beeps,” and is solar powered.  The cost is about US$100; more from 1-800-732-6809.  Such ultrasonic units, Ms. Llewllyn warns, may also bother dogs.  This may be a good or bad thing depending on your viewpoint and the neighbour’s dogs.

Mice are vastly underrated by gardeners.  Not only do they chew away bark. Damaging and killing shrubs and small trees, but they may also burrow after bulbs.  Clear away dead grass from the base of all trees.  Replace with a layer of gravel or marble chips extending at least an inch below the surface.

Mice, rabbits and deer will also be repelled by certain long-lasting sprays.  Commercial growers have long relied on “Skoot,” by Plant Products of Brampton, Ontario.  This is also available in residential-size containers.  Spray or paint on this month, making sure applications are extended several feet up, the height a hungry rabbit or deer may rear up on snow.

The First Frosts of Fall

When to bring what inside and how to do it.

The advice that the first frost of fall may be expected the third week of September in southern-central Ontario is at least a quarter-century out of date.  Even out at Toronto International Airport, it will be the end of the firs week of October before a frost arrives.  Around Queen’s Park, frosts arrive just before Halloween and a week or two earlier in more northern parts of the city.

No need then to panic the first week of the month about bringing plants indoors.  And quit worrying about the vegetables.  True, tomatoes and such tender crops will suffer.  But others positively revel in cooler temperatures, including lettuce, radish, spinach, beets, carrots, onions and many others.

Again, a few herbs are definitely kaput even before Jack Frost clutches them with his icy fingers.  Basil is gone for certain and bay trees should be brought inside.  Most other herbs will last a lot longer yet though, although it might be as well to pot up a few of the more desirable to grow in a cool window over winter.

Around Thanksgiving, consider washing clean pots in preparation for preserving a few prize specimens of choice tender tropicals being used in the garden as annuals for next season.  Required also will be professional potting mix and a spray of insecticidal soap.

Select for saving only one or two of the very best performing specimens of those used in bedding or boxes.  Dig up and, for most, cut back to a few inches high.  Growth made outside over summer will not adjust to indoor conditions. Transfer into 6-ich plastic pots using a professional, soil-less mix.  Finally, before bringing into the house, spray the remaining shoots with insecticidal soap to destroy anything lurking there, and water very heavily to drive other pests off the roots.

Woody tropicals such as hibiscus, bougainvillea, heliotrope and fuchsia should have their present flowers sacrificed.  Cut back the soft shoots by about three-quarters of their length.  Again, spray and water heavily before they are brought indoors.  All these, incidentally, seem to be susceptible indoors to whiteflies, aphids and spider mites.  A weekly application of the same insecticidal soap is advisable.

Water and fertilize with liquid flowering plant food according to the manufacturer’s instructions through the winter months.

  Fall Colours the Land 

But Sweeping New Changes Challenge Conventional Botanical Thinking

Publisher Norman Flower remarked of Lillie Langtry in Just As It Happened (London: Cassel, 1950) that, “She always appeared to be a lingering leaf on an autumn tree which hangs on and will not die or perish beneath the blast of Winter, because it has belonged to a never-to-be-forgotten Summer.”  Poetic yes, but botanically leaving something to be desired.  And in the case of plant physiologists, a great deal more.

Canada is noted for how leaves change colour is the fall, particularly the eastern portion of the country.  Indeed, our flag is a red maple leaf.  The display that attracts millions of sightseers to the Muskokas, Thousand Islands, The Gatineau Hills and Eastern Townships commences in late September.  It can be observed from a space craft, moving south at some forty miles a day.  Within a month though, almost every scarlet leaf has fallen, 160,000 from each maple tree on average, according to Professor Rebecca Rupp in her delightful Red Oaks and Black Birches (Pownal, Vt: Storey, 1990).  But why do sugar maple leaves turn red, as so some oaks, while other trees display glorious shades of yellow and gold?

Like Lillie Langtry, leaves glow in their senescence.  The reason, so countless horticultural lecturers have instructed their classes, is that as chlorophyll production ceases as the tree’s response to shortening days or photoperiod, colours previously masked by the green chlorophyll production ceases as the tree’s response to shortening days or photoperiod, colours previously masked by the green chlorophyll emerges.

Shades of yellow, orange and brown foliage owe their colours to a class of non-protein carotenoids, the same ones that colour carrots, corn and even daffodils.  Reds on the other hand are the responsibility of anthocyanins.  They are held within plant cells in structures known as plastids.  Other plastids, called chloroplasts, are where photosynthesis takes place and, not surprisingly, are green.

Conventional wisdom has it that an abscission layer is meanwhile forming between the leaf stalk (or petiole,) and the twig to which it is attached.  The causative agent is a hormone appropriately known as abscisic acid.  This puts a plug in the leaf’s plumbing, causing chlorophyll production to cease and the carotenoids and anthocyanins to emerge from the plastid places, much to the satisfaction of tour operators and travel agents.  As autumn continues, however, the weight of the leaf along with wind stresses cause the petiole to shear away from the twig, and down it flutters to the forest floor.

But now two British scientists have questioned the reasons for all this.  Why, they ask, do trees go to all the trouble to produce colours that last for such a short time?  The late William Hamilton of Oxford University and Sam Brown, presently at France’s University of Montpellier II proposed that the display of brilliant fall colours is a warning to parasitic insects.  Looking for suitable sites that offer winter protection along with spring munchies, tree pests might tend to avoid trees that warned them away.  The trees signal that they are prepared to produce unpalatable substances to ward off such attacks.  When the researchers matched up the aphids that attack particular trees, since these bugs are very tree-specific, they found that the trees with the most spectacular colours, such as maples, were likely to be the heaviest infested.  And anybody who has parked a car under a maple in full leaf can vouch for the number of aphids aloft from the sticky mess their excrement makes of the paintwork and windscreen

Hamilton and Brown may indeed be correct, although more research is required.  The glories of the fall display and the maple leaf of our country are owed to aphids.  In the finality of everything it is, however as a Malayan proverb would advise us: “Though a tree grows ever so high, the falling leaves return to the root.”

Catalogues Received

Loewen Garden Plants. Box 1150, Ridgetown, Ontario N0P 2C0 Fax: 519-674-5784

When Stirling Perennials ceased business last year, Steve Loewen took over and has a useful, if short, free list with good descriptions and prices to challenge may GTA garden centres.

 Pieces of Pumpkin: 

Places to Plump For As Fields and Food Stores Glow Orange

Archibald Orchards and Estate Winery host a Halloween event with food, wine tasting, wagon rides and more call 905-263-2396 for more information.

Barrie Pumpkin Carving festival Call 705-734-1414

Lindley’s Pumpkin-fest in Ancaster, with plenty of fall activities, food, displays and more.  Call 905-304-0195 for more information

Parry Sound, pick your pumpkin, do your best to make it beautiful (or grotesque; take your pick) and return it for judging.  Call 705-746-9252

St. Catharines Pumpkin Festival call 905-688-5601 for more information

Waterford Pumpkin Festival games, crafts, refreshments and more call 519-443-7834.

The reason for this passion for pumpkin carving lies in legend from the British Isles.  Jack, a blacksmith, made a pact with the Devil so he could enjoy himself vastly until the time came for Jack to die.  Then his soul would belong to the Devil.  Came time for Jack to depart this worked, and sneaky Jack tricked the Devil out of his soul, only to find that, what with his nefarious dealings, Heaven didn’t want him either.  Trapped for eternity between Haven and Hell he lights his wandering ways with a glowing coal from his forge, held in a lantern carved from a turnip.  Modified to a pumpkin, this tale has come down to us for our October festivities.

Perhaps not so popular in the Upper Canada of the early settlers, though.  “As to ghosts or spirits they appear totally banished from Canada.  This is too matter-of-fact a country for such super-naturals to visit,” wrote Catharine Par Traill in her 1836 opus, The Backwoods of Canada.

Although pumpkins have been cultivated in the Americas for perhaps 10,000 years, their uses in folklore derive from Celtic autumn ceremonies.  It is supposedly lucky to keep a carved pumpkin with a light inside in the window to drive away evil spirits.  As a term of endearment also, “pumpkin” ties with “angel” as one of the top 12 such names used by U.S. adults.  The odour of pumpkin pie is also apparently one of the most appealing, at least according to Chicago scent experts.  Gobble some before the ghosts arrive!

‘Tis Time for Ghoulies, Ghosties and Things that Go Bump in the Night

The legislative buildings at Queen’s Park, Toronto are built over the site of the original provincial lunatic asylum.  This may explain the strange goings-on in the place.  Another explanation is that it is well and truly haunted by an ancient soldier and three harpies, the latter being defined in the dictionary as a “rapacious person, which seems to adequately describe the tax gatherers ensconced therein.  There are said to be over 60 more ghosts around Toronto.  Check them out at the Toronto Ghosts and Hauntings Research Society Web site at www.torontoghosts.org/.  Or meet at 4pm 28 October SE corner King & Dufferin for ghosts of the historical Central Ontario Prison.  And bring a flashlight and water!  (An Ian Wheal Walk)

Out-of-town, get in the mood for experiencing ghastly ghosts at Westfield village near Rockton, the spirits of yore are walking.  Fairies, pixies, banshees and soothsayers recreate the spookier legends of days gone by.  And, for the truly brave, Death is offering wagon rides.  Call 519-621-8851.  A trip to Niagara-on-the-Lake is the place to go after Toronto, claiming more ghosts per head of population than any other town in Canada.

Elora north of Guelph housed the county’s destitute in what is now the Wellington Museum and Archives.  Many of the poorhouse’s inhabitants have returned to haunt it, ‘tis claimed.  Over at Fergus not one, but three hapless headless spirits prowl the Cumnock-Gluyasvilel Road in search of the man that murdered them in 1850.

According to a traditional belief in old Ireland, you will only be able to see these ghosts if you happen to possess blue or grey eyes.  If you happen to be boating on the waters of Lake Ontario’s Humber Bay at night, you might keep a sharp lookout for a ghostly ship and hear its bell.

It is back to Toronto for a canine ghost, one bound to appeal to all.  After the dog of a Danforth pub owner died, his tail was mounted on a plaque over the bar.  One night as the barman was cleaning up, the now tailless dog materialized.  “Where the heck did you come from,” gasped his former owner,  “I can’t get into heaven until I have my tail back” replied the dog.  “Sorry,” said the bar man, “but the LLBO won’t allow me to retail spirits after 1 a.m.”

News form a Gardener’s View Point

City Gardening peers at past news from Canada along with the rest of the world.

Landscaping

Alas, Winona Ryder will not star after all in the Brit gardening flick Lily and the Secret Planting after the actress came down with a mysterious stomach virus in London and flew home to the land of milk and hamburgers.

A wild boar escapes form its farm pen and destroys a Balm Beach, Ontario backyard.

Such ornamentals as the Chinese tallow tree (Sapium Sebiferum) now banned in Florida as an invasive weed, may offer an ecological threat when introduced by eager gardeners, suggests a scientist from Washington State University.

Male trees and shrubs, releasing up to three times more pollen with increasing CO2 levels, are being blamed for up to 40% of the world’s population suffering from allergies.

Trees

Hockey player Len Barrie of the Florida Panthers fells 28 trees on the property of Victoria, B.C.’s exclusive Royal Colwood Golf and Country Club, of which he is a member, and gets booted after refusing to pay $18,500 in restitution.

Scientists at Dundee, Scotland’s University of Albertay have used genetic modification to create a new form of elm resistant to Dutch elm disease, which also gives hope for similar success against chestnut blight.  Elms may be reintroduces in as few as three to five years.

Thanks to a wet spring and hot dry summer, this fall’s foliage colour is one of the most spectacular in many years.

Mohawk David Grey Eagle chains himself to a willow on a Unionville, Ontario Golf course to save it from developers, winning support from a local Boy Scout Troop, who enrolled him as an honorary member.

The silver maple (Acer Saccharinum) in east Toronto that inspired Alexander Muir’s the “Maple Leaf Forever” is now estimated to be over 180 years old and is in the Maple Leaf Forever Park.

But elsewhere in east Toronto, Dean Wasykyk threatens to demolish a maple tree in front of his Courcelette Avenue home in order to install a pad for his car and avoid fines for illegal parking.

Brampton, Ontario plants a memorial tree in Gage Park in respect for those lost in the terrorist attack on the U.S.

Need to know more about forests, including pests?  The journal Science recommends the site hosted by the University of Georgia at www.forestryimages.org and its sister site www.bugwood.org.

“We might be better spending the money on planting some trees,” says Mississauga’s venerable Mayor, rather than enforcing a tree preservation bylaw.

Foresters say that Toronto’s long, hot summer is the reason for leaves starting to turn colour the final week of September. 

Lawns

“In the near-Annex part of Toronto where I live, residents would prefer written notice for everything, including lawn watering, house painting, dog bowel movements and overnight visitors.”  Christie Blatchford of Robert St., National Post.

The indefatigable New Scientist journal reports a lawnmower manual that advises owners: “Do not tilt the lawnmower when starting the engine or switching on the motor, except if the lawnmower has to be tilted for starting. 

Flowers

The count in Kamloops, B.C. of youths hospitalized after sampling the alleged highs of angel’s trumpet reaches 13. 

Down in the Vegetables

According to National Post’s Shinan Govani, Lyle Lovett was seen in Yorkville, Toronto, sporting a “butternut squash leather jacket.

To the delight of those who prefer to read about their vegetables, A.C. and C.A. Castelli have written a book, The Sensuous Artichoke

The annual tomato fight festival takes place in Bunyol, Spain.

Metro Today reports that potato farmers under contract to McDonalds must first have their fields “chemically tested for pH balance.”

Both the watermelon harvest and size of individual fruit are reported greatly increased over last season’s poor showing in the U.S.

But some Maritime spud farmers are in trouble, with a 25% drop in yields predicted by the industry group Potato New Brunswick.

The University of Newcastle, England, lays claim to a disease resistant “purple potato” which, in fact, has long been grown in gardens and small holdings elsewhere. 

Fruit & Nuts

A correspondent of New Scientist draws attention to a the paper “Banana and latex allergy” by F. Steurich and R. Feyerabend in Allergologie (vol. 21, p.33)

Blueberry farmers using propane cannons to scare birds off their Fraser Valley, B.C. crops have incurred the anger of local residents, who want the noise stopped.

A bumper crop of buffalo-berries (Shepherdia) keeps Jasper Park bears form raiding human food sources.

Libya offers to purchase the entire banana crop of several Caribbean islands at above-market prices.

Every citrus fruit is descended from but three species, claims Gloria Moore, a geneticist at the University of Florida in Gainesville. 

Herbs

Catnip oil is an excellent bug repellent, 10 times more effective than the standard DEET, report a pair of scientists from Iowa State University.

Dr. Stephen Jones of West Lorne, Ontario, claims garlic juice, applied as a repellent or sprayed in the garden, will ward off West Nile virus-carrying mosquitoes, based on tests conducted by the Swedish army.  Gardeners using garlic also report never, ever being attacked by vampires.

A consumer group in California launches a lawsuit against Starbuck’s, alleging the company adds the herb ephedrine to their Tazo Chai Tea.  According to one report, the natural herbal extract has been linked to “heart attacks, seizures, strokes and psychosis. 

Organic Gardening

Scientists sniff at claims made by the Soil Association, British organic farming promoters, that organically raised food has higher levels of minerals, vitamins and flavenoids.  “The report is not critical science and their bias is pervasive,” says Bruce Ames, University of California Berkeley. 

Bugs and Gardeners

Winnipeg continues to suffer its annual onslaught of mosquitoes, with the attack doubling in size.  Venture out in the evening and expect eight bites every minute.

According to wife-and-husband research team at Manchester University, female cockroaches are sexually indiscriminate with age, mating “very rapidly with any male,” says Patricia Moore in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

In the wake of reports of West Nile Virus infested birds, Toronto doubles its mosquito test traps from 5 to 10.

Reports to Rome, meanwhile, offer a new method of controlling skeeters as Italians prepare for the annual mosquito killing championships.

The discovery of a venomous black widow spider on an oilrig docked in Halifax caused the entire structure to be fumigated.

New Zealand researchers announce they have discovered a fungus that combats the infamous Botrytis cinerea mould, which affects grapes as well as other fruit and vegetables, along with crops such as roses.

Biocontrol with parasitoid wasps may not be such a good idea after all as researchers show that they can go on to attack innocent native species.

Quebec considers aerial spraying of pesticides to control mosquitoes in case of West Nile virus outbreaks.

But in the wake of terrorist attacks on the U.S., the F.B.I. grounds crop-dusting aircraft.

While urban areas elsewhere are invaded by cougars, coyotes and bears, Ottawa Citizen reports that squirrel attacks on humans are endemic to the west end of the nations capital. 

Weeds

Removing rare species from grassland plots in California allows alien weeds a greater chance to establish themselves, report researchers.

Sowing crops more densely and evenly, but not in rows, assists in weed suppression, scientists say. 

Gardening in the City

An explosion in Toronto’s wasp population has the city’s crème de la crème dismayed as they are endangered displaying themselves in patio cafes sipping wasp-infested beverages.

Then the city along with much of southern Ontario, receives an invasion of ladybugs, arriving en masse to knosh on an earlier outbreak of aphids.

A 20-inch, two-pound fish crashing through a nearby tree startled a woman gardening in Waskatenau, Alberta. Officials speculate: an osprey could have dropped it.

The journal Science recommends Scott’s Botanical Links at www.ou.edu/cas/botany-micro/bot-linx for gardening help at every level. 

Compost

Improper backyard composting is blamed as a major reason for the enormous increase of rats Vancouver is experiencing, according to the director of environmental health for Vancouver-Richmond.  Montreal and Toronto rat populations are also booming.

The annual Prince Edward Island Manure Tossing championships are held at Little Sands with the longest pitchforked throw nearly 25-meters.  Island Premier Pat Binns pitched the first forkful. 

Science and the Gardener

Vandals destroy test fields of GM corn in France.

Claims that “mystery DNA” had been found in GM soybeans is proved to be yet another canard levelled at biotechnology.

For the second time within a few months, a UN report credits science with saving the world’s population from hunger and recommends developed nations’ technology, including specifically genetically modified foods.

Arabidopsis thaliana a weed of the cabbage family is grown in space and produces seeds.

Further research on Arabidopsis thaliana identifies genes labelled Embryonic Flower (EMF) 1 and 2, which offer exciting opportunities for manipulation, so scientists report.

Moisture availability for trees and grasses has historically had considerable influence on their response to carbon dioxide concentrations, reports the journal Science.

Enquiries by the U.K. government have resulted in the rejection by residents of the possibility of growing bananas in Scotland and production of anti-cancer forms of broccoli was equally unenthusiastically received.

Xing-Wang Deng’s team at Yale University discovers why seedlings turn green when they emerge into light, a process known as photomorphogenesis.

French scientists at the School of Agriculture Engineering, Toulouse, use genetic modification to create a melon that keeps for a month in cold storage.

Scientists in the U.S. and Netherlands are learning how to control the “inducible defences” of plants against diseases, which includes salicylic acid, a close relative of aspirin, reports New Scientist. 

Weather

At the International Conference on Global Warming at Dalhousie University, some scientists deny temperatures are rising because of human activities and say that the Kyoto protocol was based on poor science and public scare mongering.

Maritime Farmers, suffering from crop losses due to a blazing hot summer, can now locate hay through a hotline.

American scientists demonstrate that the continent’s growing season has been extended by 12 days over the last two decades, but “what is good for the plants is not necessarily good for the planet,” says researcher Ranga Myneni of Boston University.

Environment Canada predicts above-average temperatures for fall across the country. 

Law and Gardeners

Flower boxes and fences made on the Queen’s Sandringham estate in Norfolk, England, are threatened by European Union bureaucrats for not shoeing metric measurements prominently.

A Whitby, Ontario police constable pleads guilty to pouring gasoline on his neighbour’s lawn.

10,000 pot plants are torn out of a New Brunswick field by the authorities, which arrest one man in the process while sagaciously observing it was likely the work of more than one person.

The European Commission approves plans for labelling all food containing more than one percent genetically modified materials.

A 22-foot-high Siberian elm is worth $1,500.  Famous players paid the city of Victoria, B.C., that for allegedly poisoning the tree with rancid popcorn oil. 

Business

Thanks to the new federal laws regarding marijuana growing, an enterprising entrepreneur from, where else but B.C., offers “Power Grow” system for easy cannabis culture.

Maritime worm pickers fight over collecting territory along the shores of the Minas Basin in Nova Scotia.

Bio-business Signet is accused of backing out of a promise not to experiment in British fields with “terminator technology” to prevent BM plants reproducing.

India wins its case in the U.S. Patent Office, which strikes down almost all claims of the company Rice Tec Inc. In which the company ought control of India’s famed basmati rice 

Environment

The Grassroots Hillcrest Neighbourhood Group wants to hear from those who dislike leaf blowers at 416-392-0208.

The federal government declares salt a toxic substance under the Environmental Protection Act.

Sound ecologists are aghast at the noise that engulfs Toronto’s Music Garden, Queen’s Quay West, as well as other parks and open spaces in the city.

According to UN figures, tropical forests are being lost at a rate of less than 0.5% annually, not the 2% to 4% often claimed by many environmentalists, according to nemesis Bjorn Lomborg.

The new Ontario Nutrient Management Act may threaten the spreading of Toronto’s treated sewage on local farmers’ fields and even jeopardize a project to pelletize the sludge for fertilizer, warns Councillor Sandra Bussin.

While northern B.C. reports a half-dozen or so crop circles the U.K., still suffering from foot-and-mouth disease, experiences approaching a hundred of the phenomena, “including a dazzling fractal-type design,” according to the journal Science, which also labels the circles as “art”.

Thanks to a lack of storms failing to break up Lake Ontario Algae, rotting mats coat the northwest shoreline. 

Health

“I put tobacco as a bigger risk.”  Dr. Colin D’Cunha, Ontario’s chief medical officer of health, press conference on West Nile virus.  A week later the disease is confirmed in 32 birds found dead in Ontario.

Herbal supplements containing colchicines may cause birth defects, according to researchers at Wayne State University, Detroit.  They identified high levels of this substance in a commercial preparation of Ginkgo biloba.

The babies of fathers who smoke marijuana are twice as likely to die form sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), a University of California research team reveals.

The Gardeners Bookshelf 

John Must:  Toronto City Guide

(Toronto: Firefly, $9.95; ISBN 1-55297-537-1)

Sadly, there is no guide to Toronto specifically written with gardeners in mind.  But until such comes along, John Must’s extraordinary thorough compilation will go at least some way toward filling this need.  There are, the author tells us in the section of “Parks, gardens, zoos and squares,” no less than 2,000 parks in Toronto and 8000 hectares of “green space.”  This includes the continent’s largest urban wilderness, Rouge Park in Scarborough, with 5,400 hectares of ravines.

The book has 68 very detailed maps, which is about 67 more than most books on Toronto.  But for our parks it includes specific location maps.  If you plan to travel by TTC, then information on the bus, streetcar and/or subway routes is there also and even the appropriate website for further information to supplement the thumbnail sketches given by the Toronto City Guide.

Obviously only the tiniest fraction of the 2,000 parks the city offers can be covered.  So expect just major ones such as Humber Park, the new Music Garden, Edwards Gardens and Humber Arboretum to be covered, for example.  Author John Must has, however, obviously sought to spread his offerings over the entire city and not limited it to the downtown core.

Although it may come as a surprise to many, an entry is included for Mount Pleasant Cemetery, containing a major collection of trees, very conveniently identified by labels.  St. James Cemetery is also described, the oldest such in the city, again with many trees.

Walking through parks is inclined to leave one peckish.  Not to worry: Toronto City Guide has almost 400 restaurant entries along with an enormous selection of cultural attractions.  These range from music to museums, ballet to bars and much more.  The only appalling omission is that of Canada Blooms, one of the four biggest shows of its kind in North America.  Then again, what gardener worthy of that designation doesn’t know of this extravaganza?

This is a useful little volume for poking in the packet or pack and a bargain at under $10, as well as a good gift for visiting out-of-town friends.

Maple Tree Forever?

Lastman Snubs Petitioners

A leaf drifting down from a stately maple is said to have inspired Toronto schoolmaster Alexander Muir into writing the “Maple Leaf Forever.” Alas, in another part of east end Toronto over 5,000 annoyed petitioners are left wondering what they have done to incur Mayor Mel Lastman’s disdain for their concerns.

Since mid-July, attempts to present him with the 5,200-name petition have met with rebuff.  At the request of the Mayor’s Office at City Hall, a letter was sent asking for an appointment when about a dozen of the petitioners could meet him.  Since then, there has been a deafening silence.  Every time his secretary, Julia, it telephoned, she says she is busy but will return the call within half-an-hour.  That half-hour has stretched into over two months.

The story, covered by City Gardening several times, commenced three years ago when a 50-year-old maple tree at the rear of 2513 Danforth Avenue, in east end of Toronto’s Main Street area was threatened by construction next door.  Under local Councillor Tom Jakobek, the tree received protection from the city.  A year ago, city budget chief Jakobek, after some two decades in politics, decided not to run again, going on to a similar posting at Toronto East General Hospital.  Shortly thereafter, city foresters claimed the tree was dying, something they apparently could not detect in previous visits.  Despite being denied by other professionals, they summarily withdrew city protection.

The local community was outraged.  Signs have gone up all around the property.  Over a thousand letters have been sent to the local councillor; Sandra Bussin who, owner John Triantafillou says, has publicly berated him as a “troublemaker”. And most days, John and his wife Mary, along with eager volunteers may be found outside their store, Danforth Picture Frames, explaining the situation to passers-by.

And ever their petition continues to grow, but not a peep, not an acknowledgement has come form Mayor Lastman, who can be reached by phone at 416-395-6464 or by fax at 416-395-6440.

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