Melampus Daisy

Growing Native with Petey Mesquitey

Melampus Daisy

Oct 03 2023 | 00:04:27

00:00 / 00:04:27

Show Notes

There are a dozen species of Melampodium and I wonder which one Linnaeus was looking at when he honored Melampus with the genus name. And, I wonder when the genus name started being misinterpreted to mean blackfoot and not honoring the mythological soothsayer. Anyway, another cool thing about Melampus, besides him being a legendary soothsayer was that he was “reputed to understand the speech of all creatures.” My kind of guy…er, god. So, a fun discovery for me in an old paperback booklet of plant names. Lemme see…oh, if you are interested in other plants named from Greco-Roman mythology (not…

Other Episodes

Episode

May 10, 2017 •

Berlandiera lyrata

The common name of chocolate flower refers to the surprising chocolate fragrance of the flower. Another common name I came across is lyreleaf greeneyes....

Episode 0

May 03, 2022 • 00:04:15

Goodding Verbena

I started my nursery/horticulture career in the spring of 1980 at Desert Trees Nursery northwest of Tucson. It was and still is a wholesale...

Episode

April 13, 2017 •

Growing Native- Black Swallowtail

Growing Native- Black Swallowtail The scientific name of the black swallowtail is Papilio polyxenes. Papilio is Latin for butterfly and the specific epithet polyxenes...