monocots: a geeky theme for collecting plants and designing gardens, with ken druse

“Monocots,” he said.

To which I said, “What?”

“I want to talk about monocotyledons,” he said, using the unabbreviated name of one of the two groups that all flowering plants fit into, the other being dicots. And so we did. And yes, it’s geeky, but also a lot more revealing than you’d imagine–and a hint that seemingly esoteric facts like the taxonomic relationships between plants can make for fun themes for a plant collection, or even a concept for a bed or border or display of grouped containers.

Ken Druse is an old friend and a garden writer with 20 books to his credit, and most recently, one about fragrance called “The Scentual Garden,” and another called “The New Shade Garden.” He made a visit the other day to Wave Hill, the renowned public garden in New York City, where they have a whole Monocot Border that was in its glory, and hence our topic today: plants that are monocots, and why to care. (Above, a red-leaf banana, canna in flower, and more at Wave Hill’s Monocot Border; photo by Sandy Schaller.)

Read along as you listen to the Oct. 18, 2021 edition of my public-radio show and podcast using the player below. You can subscribe to all future editions on Apple Podcasts (iTunes) or Spotify or Stitcher (and browse my archive of podcasts here).

Margaret Roach: Hello, Ken with the crazy ideas for segments.

Ken Druse: Margaret, you sent me… Talk about a rabbit hole[laughter]. I said “monocot” and now I know a whole lot about… Little more about monocots than I would like to have known, except theMonocot Border at Wave Hill [in New York City] is spectacular. [Above,