Week 1 - The Last of the Winter Pruning

Time in: 10am
Time out: 12pm

Today we finished up the last of the winter pruning. I feel that I gained lot of valuable hands-on experience in the past couple months, especially since some of the trees were very much overgrown and quite a bit of heavy lopping and cutting was involved.

I'm also happy to report that last November's crop of various winter greens have grown in quite beautifully. Here they are shown growing in inexpensive plastic bins that can be found at any retail store. This project is part of an experiment at the Ranch that has to do with gardening economically in small spaces.

Week 1 - Chamaedorea geonomiformis

Time in - 8:50am
Time out - 10am




I am entering metadata in BG-BASE about each specimen in such a way that ensures accuracy at the Huntington Herbarium. Through this experience, I get to have a close look at specimens such as this Necklace Palm which was collected on March 22, 1977 in Belize.

In addition to the metadata fields location and date of the collected specimen, details of the plant are also entered. (ie: "Fl. axis +/- erect. Fr. and seed ellipsoid to slightly lunate")

I am still learning much of the language that comes with the territory. Through this experience, I'll get to build up my plant science vocabulary. This blog will be a useful tool for noting down and looking up new words and concepts.

I'll start with the basics:


Marly-limestone - A combination of sand, clay and limestone, resulting in very soft and loose ground (source)

Fronds - In this particular case, it would mean the compound leaf of a palm (source)

Basal leaflets - Bottom or base growing leaves. They do not particularly look like the leaves on the top of the plant (source)

Objectives for Spring 2010

This week is the first week of the Spring semester. I enrolled in my third and final Horticultural Projects class. It is my intention to earn a second horticultural certificate by the end of this semester.

My objectives for this semester are to continue my volunteer education at The Ranch and the Herbarium at the Huntington. Of course, I intend to take pictures and document my experience along the way.

As a personal project, I'll be continuing my experiments in the 8x8 foot lot in my parents backyard. I've created a separate blog, as this one, I've decided, will continue to document my horticultural experiences in more of a professional setting.

Check it out: http://fromrootstosprouts.blogspot.com/

Ok, its time to get to work!