Would love to trade for nico,jarrahdale and borage. My list is updated, check it and LMK Lisa

Hello, I am interested in your ROS, columbine, and cherimoya. Please see if anything on my list interests you. I'll see if I have any other vines that I forgot to list. Thanks! Kim

Dixie Land Band has a white midrib on the petals. I had previously guessed the identity of a purple one that had a midrib as Indian Giver. Betsy

Thanks Ellen. :) That describes the location perfectly. The area has been protected by what appear to be a combination of dense poison ivy, mud, and neglect. Now itÂs like IÂve got a secret garden of alien life-forms all to myself! For lack of actual gardening to do, IÂve been doing research on the plants in my yard that I identify. It looks like the most recent information (gathered from my rather scatterbrained searches) on Indian pipe is that they get their nutrients from a particular fungus, which in tern lives in symbiosis with a few types of tree. There are fancy names for these relationships that I canÂt keep straight, but the relationship is described in some writings as symbiotic and in others as parasitic. The notion that these plants live off of decomposing leaf litter seems to be an old one. http://www.mykoweb.com/articles/Mycorrhizas_5.html "It has long been recognized that these plants must obtain their food from a source other than photosynthesis. In the early-1800s, microscopic examination of monotrope roots indicated that they were not connected to tree roots, but were closely associated with abundant fine threadlike structures. However, the nature of this mycorrhizal association and even the fact that the threads were fungus hyphae was initially not appreciated. "Eventually the fact that fungi were always closely associated with these roots became well established, although widely ignored. Botanists assumed that these plants obtained their food by decomposing leaf litter, and references to these "saprophytic" plants continue to appear in many college biology and botany textbooks. However, there is no evidence that these plants have any decomposer ability and it takes only one look at their short stubby roots to see that they are not designed for efficient decomposition and nutrient capture (Figure 4)." This article goes on to talk about experiments with a relative of the Indian pipe, called pinesap, that investigate whether the plants in this family are parasites or symbiants: ". . . . Later studies repeatedly have confirmed Björkman's finding that achlorophyllous plants receive their food from the ectomycorrhizal fungi with which they form mycorrhizas. With respect to the carbon-rich photosynthates, the ultimate source is the trees." It looks like these types of plants may also be giving something back to the fungus, but this has yet to be confirmed; and the relationship may change during parts of the plantÂs life-cycle. ItÂs fascinating stuff! Here is a link that might be useful: MykoWeb article