As each day goes by, the season for fall color continues to fade, but one last time (oh maybe another to come), here are a few features from last week, starting with the lead photo of the European larch at OSU’s Wooster Campus showing its final glories before winter quiescence.

 

  Next, check out the roses in German Village, still blooming during the OSU Nursery Short Course and Ohio Turfgrass Foundation Show last week. Now they are surely blasted. But those leaves with the black spot will fall to the base of the plant and lurk into next season, developing spores for...

  Last week was the Ohio Turfgrass Foundation Show and the OSU Green Industry Short Course and I took a few pastry-seeking walks down to German Village from the Columbus Convention Center. With this weekend’s cold and snow, let us remember some of the – last vestiges of fall, starting above with florist's geraniums, sure to no longer be with us.

 

  Barberry (Berberis) fall foliage is quite colorful, and while fact-checking a bit, I was surprised to learn that the Berberidaceae family also includes two of my favorite wildflowers, Podophyllum...

And now…for BYGLQuest 2016-3...I hope you are adorned in your togas, using your fingers to eat olives and figs.  Or how about nocello poured over gelato?  At any rate, here is your weekend challenge – and timing is everything. The best answer to these four plant name and classification questions by 11:59 Sunday night, December 4, 2016 will receive a publication from my archives. 

Have you always wanted to know more about trees and why they grow like they do, why they need the resources that they utilize and just what exactly do they need to grow and thrive… And have many other question like these?  Well the perfect learning opportunity has arrived with some outstanding speakers and researchers willing to share their current tree knowledge with you!

 

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{Text and photos for this bygl-alert are provided by Paul Snyder, horticulturist for OSU’s Secrest Arboretum at the Ohio Agricultural Research and Development Center in Wooster, with a little help from Jim Chatfield}. Deck the halls with boughs of holly, winterberry (Ilex verticillata) that is. While this member of the genus Ilex is not what Thomas Oliphant had in mind when he transliterated the lyrics of this ancient welsh carol into English, it is what we think of at Secrest. Ilex verticillata is perhaps the most visually stunning member of the genus Ilex. Ilex, which comes from the...

 

  You may recall that the challenge for BYGLQuest 2016-2 (http://bygl.osu.edu/node/649) was to identify all plants in the images accompanying the text. There were numerous fine responses, but the discriminator was the one and only person to identify the lead image (see above).  It is a blueberry (Vaccinium sp.) in my backyard.

 

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Asian longhorned beetle (ALB) has been in the news recently, including a BYGL Alert written by Joe Boggs on November 18, 2016 - "New ALB Infestation Found in Clermont County, OH."  That BYGL Alert can be found by clicking on this link:  http://bygl.osu.edu/node/641

 

While there is an interest in regular ALB Updates in Ohio since eradication efforts are underway to eliminate this exotic invader in the buckeye state.  People may occasionally want a national update with reports from Massachusetts and New York...

  Buckeye Nation. Buckeye World. O pacem in terris, mir, shanti, salaam, hey wa.

  Without knowing it, bygl-alerts have started a new feature – a weekly plant quiz.  

  I have decided to take my cue from Joe Cochran this week and instead of a single tree (or shrub), select several that spoke to me in November. Starting with the scarlet-and-gray Japanese maple pictured above.