From: ceci@lysator.liu.se (Ceci Henningsson)
Subject: Name that perennial (long and chatty)
Organization: Lysator Academic Computer Society, Linkoping University, Sweden
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 1992 19:06:28 GMT

In our ever popular series "Name that perennial", today's guest star
is Ceci Henningsson. Ceci gardens in Linkoeping, in Sweden. Linkoeping
gets just short of 500 mm rain a year. The vegetation period starts in
early April and lasts to late September. During that period daylight
averages 16 hours with about half as much sun. This is the Swedish
garden zone 2, i.e. the second best place to have a garden in from a
climate point of view. Now over to Ceci for a description of the
perennial.

-Hi, I'm Ceci Henningsson and I'm standing in my tiny garden of about
20 square meter. Here, over at the drain, is the perennial I want to
know the name of.

-It looks like a healthy bush, maybe 180 cm high.

-Yes, it is quite healthy. It gets plenty of water from the drain and
is in one of the sunniest spots in the garden. That's really why I
want to know what it is. If it isn't something exiting or exotique, I
would like to dig it out to make room for something more colourful.

-Speaking of colourful, I don't see any flowers. Has it flowered
already?

-No, I haven't seen any flowers on it, nor any flower buds. It's
pretty boring, actually.

-Please, Ceci, would you give us a description with as much detail as
possible?

- Yes, to start with it is oppositifolius. The leafs are pinnate with
an odd leaflet at the top of the compound leaf. Typically there are
5-15 pairs of leaflets in one leaf. Below the leafpair, there is a
pair of bigger leaves. The individual leaflets are serrated and
oblong, ending in a point. It is a typical Dicotyledones.

	The stem is yellow-green on this year's shots and it has
lightbrown spots. Older, lignified stems are lightbrown with vertical
lighter ridges and light spots. There are no flowers and the plant has
no particular smell.

-Would you give us some measurements, too?

-Yes. The leaflets are 6-8 cm without their stalks. The leaflet stalks
are about 2 cm long. The compound leaves are up to 60 cm long. The
bigger leaves below the axils are 15 cm long. Here is a schematic
sketch:


          |
          |
  \  \    |    /
   \  \   |   /            /  /  /  /  /  /  / 
    \  \  |  /  /        -----------------------/
     \  \ | /  /         | \  \  \  \  \  \  \
      \  A|A  /          |
       \  |  /  /
     \  \ | /  /         The compound leaf
      \  A|A  /
       \  |  /
        \ | /
         A|A

   The entire plant

-Any guess about what it might be?

-First, I thought it was an elder bush. But it doesn't really look
like the normal elders we have in the area, the Sambuccus nigra. So
now I don't know. It doesn't seem to be in my flora. <shrugs>

-I hope this isn't a too tough case for our viewers. Ceci has
described her plant with very much detail, so I hope we will get a
correct answer.

--Ceci, has been watching too much TV lately.

--
=====ceci@lysator.liu.se===========================================
"Convictions cause convicts." First catma of Discordianism
"But don't let that become a conviction!" Ceci's lemma
===================================================================
From: woodley@hpcc01.corp.hp.com (Judy Woodley)
Date: Fri, 21 Aug 1992 18:50:39 GMT
Subject: Oak Root Fungus
Organization: the HP Corporate notes server