The Rural Voice, 1995-05, Page 50TE -EM FARM
Wholesale & Retail
Open Mon. to Friday 9 to 8
Sat. & Sun. 9 to 6
ts, OPEN/to
MAY 5,6&7
Our greenhouses are overflowing with colourful
hanging baskets, geraniums, tuberous
begonias, bedding plants, herbs, vegetable
plants, perennials, etc. All grown in our
greenhouse with Tender Loving Care.
Nursery stock and windbreak
trees also available and
landscape plants too.
Visit our
Perennial
Garden
through-
out the
R.R. 1, Bayfield, Ontario
WESTSIDE
NURSERIES &
GREENHOUSES LTD.
MAY SPECIALS
Large Clump Birch
3 stems or more '94.99
Patmore Ash
60 mm calibre '149.99
Goldflame Spirea
Reg. '14.99 Sale '9.99
Bagged topsoil 5 for '10.00
Bagged manure 4 for '10.00
Complete line of.. .
shade trees, flowering shrubs,
evergreens; More than 70
varieties of roses and 100
varieties of perennials
Owen Sound Port Elgin
Hwy. 6 & 21 west 899 Goderich St.
519-376-6521 519-389-5258
46 THE RURAL VOICE
Gardening
Monkshood is the stuff of legends,
and of beauty
by Rhea Hamilton -Seeger
As soon as the snow is off some
of the garden I am out peering
around the leaves and poking under
the last bits of snow to see what
will break the
ground first. The
Christmas roses
are always first
by at least a
week and then it
is a race between
the snowdrops
and the brilliant
yellow winter
aconites. During
an exploratory of
the garden this
spring I
discovered the
unfurling leaves
of a white
monkshood.
Last spring,
during a moment
of weakness, I
saw white
monkshood for
sale and pictured
it in a perfect
garden. I have a
dark purple blue
monkshood that
blooms during
September and
October. It is a
striking five feet
tall and stands
out sharply
against the first
snow. Imagine,
the two stately
plants, one
blazing white
and the other
spied its new leaves. No, it is not a
seeded spot from the purple one
since the colour of the leaves is pale
green and the more established
plant has dark, almost bronze
coloured new
leaves.
Monkshood,
also known as
Wolfsbane, is
one plant that I
would heartily
recommend.
The only
drawback is that
the juice from
both the plant
and roots is
highly
poisonous, so it
would be best if
left to the back
of the garden
and keep the
young ones
from helping
you with work
in that area.
Wolfsbane
derives its name
from the old
superstition that
the plant would
repel
werewolves.
There may be
some truth here
somewhere.
The poison from
the roots was
used in India on
spears and
arrows and even
William
Shakespeare
mentions the ill effects induced by
monkshood in his play King Henry
IV.
These perennial herbs are from
the buttercup family and are
officially called Aconitum. The
brooding purple. Well, I nurtured
that wee specimen for a few weeks.
The leaves turned yellow and
slowly died away. Well, I kissed
that goodbye. So you can imagine
my surprise when this spring I