News Articles

Stay updated with the latest developments and discoveries in the world of plants and horticulture with our News Articles category. Here, you’ll find timely updates on conservation efforts, botanical breakthroughs, gardening trends, and industry news. Whether it’s a new species discovery, tips for sustainable gardening, or global botanical initiatives, this section keeps you informed and connected to the ever-evolving plant world. Perfect for enthusiasts, researchers, and nature lovers looking to stay in the know.

Cooling and Curious

News Articles /
Cooling and Curious

Last weekend was the Hardy Plant Society of Oregon’s Study Weekend. The Study Weekend event—a long weekend filled with lectures, a plant sale and garden tours—rotates between Portland, Victoria BC, Seattle/Bellevue WA, and Vancouver BC. The last time we all gathered in Portland was 2019.

Friday’s garden tours happened under cloudy skies, with drizzle and actual rain falling at times. This fountain and it’s dramatic borders are in the Griffin and Eastman garden in North Portland. The foliage was all glittery with drizzle.

By Saturday afternoon things were warming up as we toured gardens under a sunny sky. The walk up the driveway to the Connall garden—with it’s stately eucalyptus and wide swaths of lavender—had us feeling like we were touring a garden in a Mediterranean setting, rather than suburban Portland. 
Later that afternoon we enjoyed the cooling effect of the Willamette River as it passed along below the Sheng garden.
I don’t know how much gardening I would get done when I could just chill and watch the river pass on by.
On Sunday things were warmer, 90 was the high (Monday was even warmer at 94, a bit too warm to comfortably tour gardens), but my friends and I saved the Quirk and Neill garden—with it’s meandering creek—for last that day.
A beautiful setting to stop for a moment and relax, after all the excitement the weekend had to offer.
That is until one in our group spotted something odd in the water. What the heck? 
Most of the pebbly tubes were in the creek, but there were a few on the rocks where we were sitting.
Cropped close-ups…

So what are they? The larvae cases of the caddisfly; caddisflies (order Trichoptera) are a group of insects with aquatic larvae and terrestrial adults. “As larvae, caddisflies live underwater. Caddisfly larvae can be divided into two groups: cased and caseless. Cased caddis larvae use a silk secretion to build a portable structure around themselves, made of materials such as sand, shells, stones and leaves.” (source)
In this horrible photo you can (kind of) see their black legs, but wait, it gets better! 

The French artist Hubert Duprat collaborated with a group of caddis fly larvae to produce cases incorporating gold, opal, turquoise and other precious stones.
Photo via imgur, read more about it here. Crazy right? After all the creative gardens we saw during Study Weekend (lots of photos to come) this was an excellent reminder that mother nature is the ultimate creative force. 
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“Building a leafy greens facility starts with production goals and cultivation decisions, not technical specifications”

News Articles /
“Building a leafy greens facility starts with production goals and cultivation decisions, not technical specifications”

Building a greenhouse specifically designed for leafy greens requires integration between horticultural strategy and technical design. During the Leafy Hydroponics Event, Ronald Thijssen of Ammerlaan Construction provided a detailed walkthrough of the key considerations for constructing a high-tech…

“Building a leafy greens facility starts with production goals and cultivation decisions, not technical specifications” Read More »