Nothing inspires more jealousy in me than a content, sedate, oxygen-gushing houseplant. I have had very few in my life. Mostly, I think, this is because I'm not very good about caring for them; I don't water regularly and there aren't a lot of sunny windows for them to bask in. But as the air grows cooler, I find myself becoming more of a kind and attentive mother. Our current roster is below, listed from most to least hardy:

Coleus (no scientific name; cutting was a gift from a friend) This thing WILL. NOT. DIE. - a great thing for an absentee owner like me! We've had it for about five years. The leaves are deep purple and fuschia in the summer, when it lives on the front porch; they fade to mostly-green in the winter, when we move it indoors. I've successfully started plants for friends by breaking off a stem and sticking it in some soil -- it's very reproduction-friendly. Sorry that I can't tell you the exact type, but I'd be glad to send you a cutting!

Purple Oxalis (Oxalis regnelli) Don't let the photo deceive you; I really tried hard to kill this one. I completely forgot about it for the first couple of months of the semester, and when I finally went to water it, there were only two sad spindly stems remaining. However, it has rebounded quickly in the Plant Hospital (the sunny basement window that seems to help just about any plant recover from neglect). The deep purple leaves are lovely, and you can see one lone flower starting to emerge from the center; they're light purple with long, sloping stems and delicate petals.

The cool thing about Oxalis is that they close up at night, folding neatly into what look like restful butterflies. In the morning, their leaves are spread out again, ready for more photosynthesis. They'd be a good plant for children to enjoy, as long as they're old enough not to put it in their mouths (oxalates are a mild toxin).

Primrose (I think? Maybe? Lost the tag) This was a hostess gift, and it's still here eighteen months after the guest departed! I'm vexed with myself for losing the tag, as it's a really lovely plant that blooms every few months or so (and more if I remember to deadhead). The flowers are a pretty bright pink, a sight for sore eyes in the drab brown days of winter.

Burgundy Ficus (Ficus Elastical Decora "Burgundy") I keep thinking this ficus is about to kick it, and then I see the magical burgundy spikes that signal the forming of a new leaf. There have never been more than 8 or 10 on the plant, but it stays healthy-looking all year (except when the temperature is too cool, as on the shady side of the house.)

Jade Plant (Crassula ovata) I was so excited to finally get my own jade plant, the one I had heard would survive a nuclear holocaust. However, as evidenced by this photo, I have done something terribly wrong. I know overwatering is a danger, so I've resisted until the soil is bone dry several inches down, then given it a thorough soaking until the next time; but somehow the leaves always seem to be dropping off, and the stems slump in defeat. A real blow to my gardener's pride!

So, there's the motley crew we're hosting here. What are your favorite houseplants? And do you have any tips for, um, making sure they don't die?

As a political conservative, it’s taken me some time to get used to the label “environmentalist.” To me, the word conjures up images of angry unshaven protesters who care more about the spotted owl than about their fellow human beings. But over the years, especially after reading Rod Dreher's excellent manifesto Crunchy Cons, I’ve come to a new definition of the word “conservative.” Conservation is the reason I started my humble garden – I wanted a way of making our land useful, of turning some ground that was already there into a useful commodity that would also bring beauty to our home. Conserving means making do, most of the time, with something that works perfectly well – not upgrading every six months to a newer model of vacuum or handbag or car. It means cherishing the wisdom of the past, moving cautiously toward truly useful innovation, and wasting neither funding nor time nor resources.

What better or more valuable resources do we have in this great country than our air, our water, and the land that grows plants that fill our bellies and delight our eyes? Many an author has waxed eloquent in considering these precious gifts and the urgent need to protect and cherish them. Such is the premise behind American Earth: Environmental Writing Since Thoreau. Numbering over just over a thousand pages, this scrupulously complete collection (of essays, poetry and excerpts from longer works) aims to trace the history of American thought since our first inklings that we might not have an unlimited supply of tall trees and rich soil.

As the title makes clear, Thoreau is the first author represented in the anthology. In the Introduction, the editor warns that “Walden is almost scriptural in its pithy discursions. There are five ideas a page; it’s no wonder that the book has never faded.” But even this description hadn’t prepared me for the depth of thought with which Thoreau analyzes the meaning of a fenced-off huckleberry field, formerly open to the public, or the exact cost of his famous cottage ($28.13, of which $1.40 paid for transportation; “I carried a good part on my back”).

Since a complete accounting of the hundred or so represented authors would be impossible, I’ll share some of the most interesting surprises:

• John Burroughs, who in his day was more famous than President Theodore Roosevelt himself. (Roosevelt is also present in the anthology, though only in a few rather disappointingly formal letters.) The editor says Burroughs virtually invented the nature essay; this one, The Art of Seeing Things, is a fascinating discourse about what happens when you walk through a field or forest and really stop to look.


• Gene Stratton-Porter, a naturalist who wrote novels to pay the bills, details a painfully poignant account of what was quite possibly the last passenger pigeon spotted in the wild. It begins when the land was full to overflowing, and farmers used to cut down every tree that stood between him and a piece of arable land: “Nowhere was there even one man who had the vision to see that the forests would eventually come to an end.” It ends with the author alone, staring up at a pigeon whose plaintive call of “See! See!” came across as “a blasting accusation.”


• You cannot top The Fog for sheer environmental horror; the result of a freak temperature inversion wherein lighter polluting gases sank close to the earth instead of rising above it. Centered around Donora, Pennsylvania, home of several industrial mills, it follows a pair of doctors through an appalling week of ministering to sick and dying residents, who eventually come to number in the thousands. It took this kind of disaster to decide that factories shouldn’t just be able to belch out whatever chemicals they please. This story actually had more of an impact on me than Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring, which is also represented here in part.


• Sigurd Olson has a beautiful meditation called Northern Lights – perhaps it appealed to me because seeing them is one of my top 10 life goals. Skating along a frozen pond, he has the incredible experience of seeing the swirls of color both above and beneath him: “At that moment I was part of the aurora, part of its light and of the great curtain that trembled above me.”


• Lyndon Johnson’s Remarks at the Signing of the Highway Beautification Act of 1965 was extremely inspiring. The editor points out that the act was really the brainchild of his wife, Lady Bird Johnson, but the remarks still belong to the President, and they were quite moving: “This bill does not represent everything that we wanted. It does not represent what we need. It does not represent what the national interest requires. But it is a first step, and there will be other steps. For though we must crawl before we walk, we are going to walk.”


• Probably the most amusing entry in the group is Colin Fletcher’s A Sample Day in the Kitchen. A famous hiker whose Complete Walker has sold over half a million copies, Fletcher humorously details a day in the life of a hiker who eats, cooks, plans and dreams in his sleep sack.


• A close second in the “most entertaining” category, especially for anyone who’s read the original, is Gary Snyder’s Smokey the Bear Sutra: “Bearing in his right paw the Shovel that digs to the truth beneath appearances; curs the roots of useless attachments, and flings damp sand on the fires of greed and war!”


• Two of my favorite modern conservatives (and I take devious joy in calling them so) are Barbara Kingsolver and Michael Pollan, whose work argues for a simpler, deeper, more careful existence. Kingsolver has an excellent essay, written before Animal, Vegetable, Miracle but about the same piece of property, a summer home that later becomes a year-round residence. Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma is another excellent, if somewhat grisly, warning against the unnatural feeding practices of recent years: in this excerpt, he visits a Midwestern feedlot to see what his own steer (purchased for this reason) actually eats. The answer? Lots of corn, some medicine and fertilizer, and well, other cows. (You should really read the whole book; it’s not all this disheartening, but it’s just as fascinating and well-written.)

Two features also worth mentioning are a chronology of American events that begins at 15,000 BC and runs through the present (there are considerably more entries around the time of the latter) and a few dozen color and black-and-white illustration plates that provide a helpful visual for the many people and scenes depicted in the book’s pages.

Bottom line? It’s a great book, the perfect gift for any conservative on your holiday gift list. And if you think they might bristle at that name, buy it for them anyway. If I can call myself an environmentalist, they can handle “conservative” just fine.

You can pick up American Earth on Amazon.com for $26.

I took my son and wife to the Piper's Creek Orchard at Seattle's Carkeek Park recently. It's an old pioneer orchard, recently saved from the blackberries and partially restored by volunteers. Almost every tree is a different kind of historic apple or pear or quince.

Anyway, as we walked in, this dude's lying there on his back in the middle of the orchard. Was he barefoot? My mind may have embellished the memory. But he looked all the world like Johnny Appleseed.

It turns out he's the protector of this orchard and an expert on heirloom apples. He gives free advice to anyone who asks. I asked about my apple problems. He made me feel better.

Here's what Johnny said: The nylon booties I've been using did keep out the apple maggot. He says I got away with my mid-June application this year because the spring was about two weeks late. Generally I should apply the nylon booties June 1. However, it doesn't keep out the coddling moth (or of course the scab). To keep out the moth, he's experimenting with dipping the booties in BT prior to their application. (BT is an organic pest control method, a bacteria that various bugs eat which causes them to lose their appetite and then starve to death.)

The apple maggot tunnels all over the place and destroys the apple. That pest was stopped by my booties.

However the coddling moth, after penetrating my booties, tunneled straight to the core via a visible hole and straight back out again. This is consistent with what I found when I dug into one of those troubled apples a few weeks ago. You can cut around that kind of damage.

The crop is saved! Thanks, Johnny.