We seem to spend a significant amount of time working on and with the fundamentals of plant growth. The category for conversation on our Plant for That posting this week is Staples.

An interesting catch-all category that in many ways falls in the hands of the writer’s creative discretion. One Staple that everyone knows is necessary yet misunderstood, and often overlooked, is the topic of water. Water is the stuff we are all made of, and something we all need. A few fun facts:

Herbaceous Plants – the leafy ones like annual and perennial flowers, grasses and vegetables etc. – are almost 80 to 90 percent water by weight.  And those big trees on your property and other seemingly solid plants are about 50 percent water by weight.

On a hot, windy day when plants need to cool themselves down they generate their own cooling process known as transpiration. In excessive conditions it’s entirely possible for each individual leaf to transpire an amount of water equivalent to its own weight in just one hour. Now that’s a lot of botanical air conditioning going on just to moderate temperature!

Impossible to have a Plant for That conversation without water!  How we manage it, use it, apply it and preserve it is essential in all the landscapes we inhabit. Now there’s a err… Resource for That.