Native vs exotic plants

I remember seeing a posting on the question of native vs exotic plants in
our gardens, but it was deleted after reading.  I am firmly on the exotic
side, for while I have nothing against native plants and use them when I
like them, I am fascinated by the exotics.

For example, daylilies were originally native to the Far East -- China,
Korea, Japan, Siberia.  I have 10,000 daylily plants, give or take a few
hundreds.  I grow about 30 plants of 10 wild species of Hemerocallis to
remind me of their origins, but there are over 700 varieties of named
modern hybrids here, and the rest of the 10,000 are our own seedlings.  We
not only grow exotic plants, the whole family hybridizes them.

Some purists may argue that it is immoral to move animals and plants from
their native lands.  Let's hope that does no catch on, as I don't want to
go back to Ireland or Scotland or Central Asia or wherever my clan
originated, 300, 400, or ca. 3000 years ago, respectively.

We visited the Republic of South Africa on vacation last August.  (But not
quite into East Africa, whence we all originated!)   While there, I saw
some interesting and to me not unreasonable examples of "going native" in
gardening.  The early European settlers in South Africa tried very hard to
create gardens with the plants they knew from their homes in England and
Holland.  That has persisted down to this very day.  Now South Africa has
some of the most exotic and fascinating flowering plants in the world!  The
network of National Botanic Gardens in South Africa devote themselves
exclusively to the study of indigenous plants of southern Africa.  I was
told that in recent years, there is a small but growing trend for private
home owners to garden with strictly native plants.  We saw numerous
examples of this style of gardening, and they did stand out among all the
European-style grassy lawns and rose bushes.

It is strictly a matter of choice, even a matter of one's personal
"gardening religion" and, like other forms of religion, is best not imposed
on others.

Jim, writing from among the exotics in Indiana

NOT FOR PUBLICATION
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Jim Shields             jshields@indy.net            Shields Gardens, Ltd.
P.O. Box 92                                WWW:    http://a1.com/daylily/
Westfield, IN 46074-0092                              Tel. +1-317-896-3925
USDA Zone 5                                     AHS Region 2
(c) Copyright 2000 by James E. Shields.  All rights reserved.
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