A Gardening Life – April 1
This is serious stuff so I thought I’d better pass it on here:
If you see strange root markings on your roses, coreopsis, or daylilies, beware! You might have ‘Knockoff’ roses, ‘Faux Moon’ or ‘Big Bogus’ coreopsis, and ‘Stella D’Ceit’ daylilies.
According to the Department of Horticultural Security, gardeners in the United States are being assailed by counterfeit plants. “These plants look real, feel real, and smell real,” a department spokesman told me when I called their offices, “but they are far from authentic. There is some concern that these poser-plants might even be some type of alien life form. When you take them out of the pot or dig them up, a close examination shows that the roots say ‘Made on A. Centauri,’ sometimes along with other, indecipherable markings.”
It is speculated that the first such plant to be introduced into North American gardens was the Mock Orange. This has yet to be confirmed by the DHS.
Gardeners who think that they might have phony plants in their gardens should contact the Department of Horticultural Security for instructions on how to destroy these pseudo-photosynthesizers. My understanding is that if these fakes are composted, they break down not into compost but into artificial manure, aka, “no shit.”
Image used with the permission of the U.S. Department of Horticultural Security.
