Part Four - Arisaema
A gardener's love affair with a plant, or genus of plants, is very like that between humans. A first glance can be love at first sight, or a mild interest grows into admiration then fascination; obsession, culminating in long-lasting true love.
My relationship with the genus Arisaema has followed the latter course.
Aroids are found around the world in many types of ecosystems, including both tropical and temperate woodlands. According to Deni Brown, in her excellent Aroids, Plants of the Arum Family, "Arisaema is by far the largest genus of woodlanders in the family". Those who inhabit temperate climates are deciduous, retreating to some type of tuber or fleshy rhizome when weather becomes too hot, dry or cold. Others, from tropical climates, are evergreen and generally don't form a tuber, but have a branching rhizome. A few species are stoloniferous.
Tubers vary considerably in size, shape and color. Guy Gusman has just put up a page about tubers on the IAS web site that illustrates some of the forms they take.
The shoot emerging from the underground stem (tuber), is actually a continuation of it consisting of four to six leaves. Of these, three or four are sheath-like, called cataphylls. They provide protection and support (above and below ground) for the stem or petiole. Sometimes, like the stems, they are highly decorative, mottled or spotted and colored. They usually dry off and disappear as growth matures.
Distributed more or less continuously around the globe, most temperate species are hardy (to a greater or lesser extent, depending on origin) in our gardens. Since they are woodlanders by nature, they are perfect shade garden plants.
See the Arisaema Hardiness Ratings, compiled by Tony Avent, on Roy Herold's Arisaema pages, for a list of species and their known hardiness limitations. If you grow any of these (or any not listed) in a colder area with success, contact Tony so he can add the information to the list.
The Genus Arisaema, A Monograph for Botanists and Nature Lovers, by Guy Gusman and his wife, Liliane, is a fantastic resource for those entranced by these elegant plants. The growing conditions (weather, temperature, moisture, etc.) of each area where Arisaema are found in the wild are described so that you can judge whether you can provide similar enough conditions for the one you want to grow. A world map shows where the main distributions occur. There is so much detailed information in this book that it is a 'must have' if you want to grow Arisaema beyond our tough-as-boot-leather native, A. triphyllum.
