Bucking the system...or why I grow plants

Bukiniczia cabulica

The first three pictures were taken yesterday (September 28). I first grew this plant as Dictyolimon macrorhabdos--that name pertaining to a closely related (and also variegated leaf) plant from the same region which is perennial and yellow flowered. I saw the true Dictyolimon at the fabled Gothenburg botanic garden and still dream about it. The generic epithet translates as "netted Limonium"--a rather appropriate name for either taxon.

 It was Henrik Zetterlund--curator at Gothenburg--who first collected the plants we grow in cultivation on the "SEP" (Swedish Expedition to Pakistan) in the early 1980's. Dan Johnson and I also collected it there in 2001 [our form had coarser variegation and is probably lost to cultivation]. It was distributed under the incorrect Dictyolimon name at the time--which (incidentally) the Global Biodiversity Information Facility continues to confuse-q.v. I wonder how many of my Blog followers will jump down that rabbit hole?

For most of the late 20th and early 21st century I grew this as Aeoniopsis cabulica--the generic epithet suggesting "it looks like an Aeonium"--which is true enough, and the specific alluding to the capital of Afghanistan, where presumably it occurs (if it hasn't been bombed to smithereens there). This name was sanctioned by Flora iranica--Rechinger's priceless shelf-full of books that Solange Gignac (of blessed memory) purchased for Denver Botanic Gardens' library at my behest. Rechinger named Dictyolimon--ironically.

A particularly appealing specimen in my new crevice garden I photographed this spring. Somewhere, someone along the way decided that it needed a new generic epithet--hence Bukiniczia--the significance of which is lost on me. But cabulica remains. Just as the name keeps changing so do the plants. One says "I've grown this or that plant"--but each individual plant has its own allure, its own quiddity. Just as Bertrand Russell pointed out (correcting Heraclitus) you never step into the same river once.

Moreover, Bukiniczia is monocarpic: you enjoy the rosette on year, the next it produces its messy sheaf of bloom (which I never photograph) which devolve into thousands of seeds every one of which seems to want to germinate!

I photographed this growing in a chink of a wall at Durango Botanic Gardens a few years ago. Who wouldn't want that in one of ones own chinks?

For a while Bukiniczia ran wild at my dear friend Sandy Snyder's magnificent old garden (which I featured many times in other posts)*. These are weathered old rosettes that will bloom in a few months--still looking surprisingly good after a wretched Colorado winter. Draba hispanica sets them off!

A shot of the same area taken in fall--the rosettes are fresher and more pristine. I am dumbfounded that Plant Select never chose to promote this plant: any nursery that grows it sees the pots of it flying out the door. And 99% of the people who grow it will cut the messy seedheads before the seed ripens, so they won't get self sown seedlings and will have to buy the plant again (a nurseryman's dream!). In fact you'll be hard put to buy plants of this anywhere any time. Savvy people grow it from seed: I have collected vast quantities of seed in the past at the Gardens at Kendrick Lake: alas, the staff there "renovated" the bed where these grew and proliferated, and it's extinct there...

But it's alive and well in my crevice garden--where I collected a bounty of seed I will contribute to the North Amerian Rock Garden Society's fantastic seed exchange--which shall open in December. There's time for you to join www.nargs.org and line up for this and thousands of other treasures (I donate hundreds of packets each year). NARGS has much, much to offer--a fantastic Quarterly [still printed in paper--unlike the poor A.G.S. which went digital this year] and no end of other bennies such as tours, conferences, webinars. And more!

The system that NARGS and Bukiniczia buck is modern commercial culture. And specious "Progress"--join us and you'll join the world of Nature's ineluctable allure. Where every leaf, every rosette, every blossom is a treasure far greater than anything corporate culture can hurl in your face!

*I must remember to give Sandy a handful of fresh seed to scatter in her magnificent new crevice garden at her NEW place! One must never be without Bukiniczia!