William of Orange, a Dutch revolutionary, and his descendant King William III, who ruled England in the 17th century, are associated with two orange delights that, if we’re lucky, grace our gardens: one is carrots, and the other is monarch butterflies.
Carrots are among the trickiest vegetables to grow since carrot seeds are tiny, planted no more than a quarter inch under the soil surface, and need to be kept moist for as long as three weeks until germination is assured. They are also notoriously difficult to transplant, so you are unlikely to see carrot seedlings growing in plastic cells at your neighborhood nursery or garden center for the purpose of installation in your garden.
Such being the case, it’s advised to keep moist burlap over your carrot seeds until they sprout. But it is worth growing carrots since they are largely regarded as the tastiest crop when homegrown, as compared to what you find at the grocery store. Although vegetables in general are tastier when homegrown, this is especially true for carrots, whose sweetness is legendary when they are plucked from your garden soil.
Once upon a time, carrots were not orange. Up until the late 1500s, carrots were nearly always white, yellow, purple, or red, with orange specimens infrequently encountered. Native to Afghanistan and gradually making their way into Europe via traders, orange carrots came into their own under the hybridization of the Dutch. And so a myth arose that orange carrots were favored and selected for growth in Dutch gardens as a tribute to the man whose moniker included the color of a certain root. However, this idea has been debunked by research into the historical record as verified by John Stolarczyk, the world’s leading authority on carrots, who curates The World Carrot Museum, a comprehensive website on Bugs Bunny’s favorite food.
Even when carrots do sprout in the garden, their roots are often misshapen or split. To avoid this eventuality, consider growing them in containers with fast-draining soil and drainage holes. Standard 5-gallon plastic nursery containers are suitable. Fill with a rich soil mix and sprinkle carrot seeds over the top, around 1/2 inch apart, covering them with a little compost. Germinate them in the shade and, once they begin to grow, set them in a sunny exposure and cover with hardware cloth to prevent birds from eating the seedlings. Even so, you would be wise to select small-diameter varieties since these are most likely to grow symmetrically downward.
Carrots are relatives of parsnips, another flavorful root. The parsnip is a nuttier, if not sweeter, kind of carrot which, when cooked, has the texture of a potato. Both of these vegetables belong to the Umbellifer family of plants because their flowers are parasol-shaped in a cluster known as an umbel, a word akin to umbrella. This family of hollow-stemmed species includes celery, parsley, cilantro, and dill. It is one of the three plant families — along with the daisy (Asteraceae) and mint (Lamiaceae) families known for attracting beneficial insects. Some umbellifers, however, are highly toxic and include poison hemlock, so it is advisable not to do a taste test with any part of an unknown umbellifer.
While the commercial development of orange carrots cannot be attributed to William of Orange, the naming of the monarch butterfly is typically associated with another of his house since this endangered lepidopteran was named during the period of his kingship. It could not have been named before the Dutch arrived in North America since monarchs are indigenous to the western hemisphere exclusively, with one species in North America, one in South America, and one in the Caribbean. The fact that monarchs are orange makes the case for their name’s association with William III that much stronger.
Monarch butterflies are currently in crisis. There has been a catastrophic drop in monarch numbers in recent years among the two North American monarch populations, one east of the Rocky Mountains and one west. The eastern monarch population, which overwinters in a fir forest north of Mexico City, has shrunk from 1 billion 20 years ago to 93 million today. Western monarchs, the ones that overwinter in pine and eucalyptus trees on the California coast, have had their numbers reduced from 10 million in the 1980s to 12,260 today.
A population of 30,000-500,000 western monarchs is necessary to assure their survival, and there has been a wide fluctuation in monarch numbers over the years, as the population went from 1,900 western monarchs in 2020 to 250,000 in 2021. We can only hope that there will be another similar rise in numbers in the coming years.
Several reasons have been advanced for monarch decline: loss of milkweed habitat due to real estate development, use of pesticides, and extreme weather conditions. There is also the matter of wildfires, which have destroyed acreage frequented by monarchs.
Speaking of milkweeds, care should be taken to plant California native species as opposed to tropical milkweed. If you see a milkweed at a commercial nursery or in the garden department of a home improvement center, it is typically the Asclepias curassavica tropical type, with flowers that are yellow and orange. Although attractive, this evergreen milkweed — native milkweeds die back in the winter — disrupts the migration habits of monarch butterflies.
I want to thank Kristen Joseph for bringing three sources for native milkweed plants to my attention. Four native milkweed species are available at the Theodore Payne Foundation nursery in Sun Valley, and eleven native species are available at the California Botanic Garden in Claremont. Glendora Gardens Nursery also has native milkweed for sale.
Do you have carrot or monarch butterfly experiences you would like to share? If so, send them along to joshua@perfectplants.com. Your questions and comments, as well as gardening conundrums and successes, are always welcome.
California Native of the Week: Arroyo lupine (Lupinus succulentus) is a stout annual plant that blooms in April and May. It can grow up to four feet tall, displaying glittery silvery foliage and purplish-blue flowers. It can grow in heavy or light soil, watered regularly or occasionally, thriving in full sun or partial shade. The more water it gets, the taller it grows. Although it dies after flowering, it is known for self-sowing and becomes a reliable garden companion that you can expect to return from one year to the next.