Ruth Kassinger's Blog, page 5

Chocolate and Algae

Chocolate and Algae. Two words you don’t often see together. But Solazyme, a California algae-oil company, has figured out how to engineer microalgae so they produce an oil that mimics cocoa butter. This is terrific news for those of us who consider chocolate to be a major food group. Why? Global demand for cocoa beans […]

New Website

Ruth Kassinger, author of Paradise Under Glass, and upcoming A Garden of Marvels, welcomes you to her new website that details information about her books, speaking events, and gardening blog called: Garden of Marvels.

Book Release Date

“A Garden of Marvel: How We Discovered that Flowers Have Sex, Leaves Eat Air, and Other Secrets of Plants” will be in book stores on  February 25, 2014

Pat your Plants

Gently rubbing your plants’ leaves can stimulate them to resist disease, according to a new report. When scientists rubbed the leaves of a thale cress plant, the leaves produced biochemicals that made the plant more resistant to the fungus that causes grey mold. So, don’t bother talking to your plants: Pat them instead! How does […]

Blushing Buddha’s Hand

A Buddha’s Hand (Citrus medica var. sarcodactylis) is an ancient variety of citron. I’ve found them hard to grow. Indoors, they’re particularly susceptible to mites and aphids. Outdoors, they can’t handle a full day of direct sun, and they’ll drop their buds and flowers if they dry out. Nonetheless, I usually manage to grow one or two fruits per year. This one  is nearly ripe — I love the way it ripens by inches![image error]

Journey into Texas

I was in Texas on Friday to speak to the Fort Worth Garden Club about Paradise Under Glass, and was delighted that over fifty members attended. (Special thanks to Beth Collins who made it happen.) The Club is very active with a monthly speakers’ program and community activities. The Club meets at the Fort Worth Botanic Garden, and the Lipstick Palm in the photo is just one of the stunning sights in the conservatory. On the side of the photo, you’ll see a fountain that drops a sheer column of water around its circumference. I arrived at about nine that morning, and the sun was shooting shafts of light through the mist-filled air and the dense greenery. For anyone who loves begonias, the Botanic Garden is a special place: It maintains a begonia species bank and exchanges plants and information with institutions and individuals around the world. A great source of information for begonia aficionados.[image error]

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Another Season, Another Mistake

Every season, it’s some new mistake in the conservatory. Two weeks ago when I brought my citrus trees inside, I forgot that they need to acclimate to the grow lights slowly. Instead, I blithely bathed them in photons for eight hours a day. Now, many of the leaves are, in essence, sunburned, and like sunburned skin, are drying and falling off. I can listen to the consequences of my mistake: all too often, I hear a little rattle as a dessicated leaf hits the stone floor.


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Domestic Goddess

I just bought a new vacuum, a canister model from Sears. I was having a great time exploring all its features, and discovered the powerful dust brush attachment. Aha, I thought I’d dust the molding around the bottom of the walls. I went down the hall and into the powder room, and it was doing a great job. Suddenly, it encountered the tail of the toilet paper and––bam––before I could turn the motor off, it sucked down half a roll. I pulled the paper out of the wand and the long hose, but I could see that paper had gone into the inside of the canister. I got a tongs and, feeling like I was delivering a baby, dove in. Success: I extricated a good six feet of it.

Upcoming Events

To learn more about me as a speaker, visit www.greatgardenspeakers.com. There you’ll find a description of my topics and you can check to see if I’ll be in a city near you.

Recently, I have  been a featured speaker at the Texas Library Association and at the Smithsonian’s Garden Fest in the Enid A. Haupt Garden on the Mall in Washington, D.C. I was at Northshire Books in Manchester Center, Vermont on July 10 and at Politics and Prose in Washington, DC on July 17. I’ll be speaking to the Chevy Chase Garden Club, the Bethesda Community Garden, and the Potomac Garden Club in the coming months. I’m giving a lunch time lecture at the U.S. Botanic Garden on Wednesday, January 19 at 12:30.

Contact me via Facebook if you’d like me to appear at a discussion or to give a reading. I’d also be happy to do a webcam or telephone visit.

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