{"id":800,"date":"2010-02-17T09:01:44","date_gmt":"2010-02-17T15:01:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/?p=800"},"modified":"2010-02-17T21:07:44","modified_gmt":"2010-02-18T03:07:44","slug":"elbowbush-or-spring-herald","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/?p=800","title":{"rendered":"Elbowbush or Spring Herald"},"content":{"rendered":"

Elbowbush, either Forestiera pubescens<\/em> or F. angustifolia<\/em> (we have both species), is the first of our woody plants to flower in spring, and yesterday the first of the elbowbushes on the north fenceline west of the dry woods was opening.<\/p>\n

\"butterfly-elbow-bush263\"<\/p>\n

From a distance, a flowering elbow bush doesn’t look that impressive; the flowers are small and at this stage–with fewer than half open–it’s just the impression of dull gold that shows it’s flowering.\u00a0\u00a0 Up close, the flowers are like tiny fireworks packed along the stems.<\/p>\n

\"elbowbush-flowers269\"<\/p>\n

They’re also packed with pollen and nectar, attracting insects even before they open.\u00a0\u00a0 Flies are the first customers at the flower bar:<\/p>\n

\"bluebottle-elbowbush272\"<\/p>\n

Many of the early flies are bluebottles, greenbottles, and an equally shiny bronze-bodied fly.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 They come in various sizes, and I don’t have the full ID on all of them.\u00a0\u00a0 Later in the year, they’ll be found around dead things, trash and garbage, etc.\u00a0 Others are flies more commonly associated with flowers…some are bee or wasp mimics.\"sm-fly-elbowbush274\"<\/p>\n

In addition to flies and the occasional butterfly, early elbowbush flowers attract early beetles, including the unwanted (but pretty) cucumber beetle.<\/p>\n

\"cucumber-beetle-elbowbush273\"<\/p>\n

Later, bees will dominate the insects at the elbowbush and then wasps and moths like the Grapevine Epimenis.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Elbowbush is thus a very important plant to support the insect population in early spring. \u00a0\u00a0 Elbowbush is also a good browse plant for deer.\u00a0\u00a0 Various vines grow over and through it without harming it, including the lovely Pearl Milkvine, Matelia reticulata<\/em>, which–like all the milkweed relatives–supports some of the milkweed butterflies like Queen and Soldier.\u00a0\u00a0 Later in the year,\u00a0 elbowbush produces abundant berries eaten by many birds, and when it’s dropped leaves in the fall, the dense twiggy cover provides a safe but sunny haven for wintering birds, where aerial predators can’t get at them.<\/p>\n

And yet, to most people (including developers) elbowbush is just “brush,” a nuisance plant to be bulldozed away.\u00a0\u00a0 Instead, it should be preserved where it exists, and planted where it doesn’t, as a native shrub of great value to wildlife and beautiful through much of the year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Elbowbush, either Forestiera pubescens or F. angustifolia (we have both species), is the first of our woody plants to flower in spring, and yesterday the first of the elbowbushes on the north fenceline west of the dry woods was opening.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,7,4],"tags":[13,36,38,32,70],"class_list":["post-800","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-photography","category-plantlife","category-wildlife","tag-beauty","tag-butterflies","tag-insect","tag-native-plants","tag-photography"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/800"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=800"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/800\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":827,"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/800\/revisions\/827"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=800"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=800"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=800"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}