Welcome to Oklahoma Gardening.

On today's show, we begin a botany series by looking at leaf structure.

Then we look at characteristics of poison ivy and some common lookalikes you might find in the garden.

We then head back over to the Uchi Butterfly Farm to learn how they successfully raise butterflies.

And finally, Chrissy's back, whipping up a fresh and flavorful salad.

All this and more right here on Oklahoma Gardening.

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I wanna take a step back from looking at the garden to looking at the plants and focusing a little bit on botany and plant structure, specifically leaf structure.

Now this is important because a lot of times we get focused on how to take care of plants, but we may not know exactly what type of plant we're looking at.

So when we know leaf structure, that can help us with identification.

And identification is important for a lot of different reasons.

Not only so you know what is in your garden, but also so you know whether it's edible, whether it's poisonous, whether you need to remove it, whether it's invasive, native.

It just really helps us to know what we're dealing with.

So we're gonna talk a little bit about plant structure today.

So this is a sweet gum here.

And I wanna show you because this is a simple leaf.

So most plants have simple leaves and it's kind of the leaf that you would think of in kindergarten, right?

It's got one leaf blade or lamina, and then it's got the stalk that connects it to the branch.

This stalk is called the petiole.

So we have the petiole and the lamina, which is the leaf blade.

Now leaves can have a lot of different shapes and we're not gonna go into that today because there's a wider arrangement of different leaf shapes.

But the other thing that I wanna touch on is where that leaf attaches to the stem can be in two different arrangements.

So we can have opposite, which is like this calacanthus here, where the leaves are attached across from one another on that branch or the stem.

So again, you can see there's a little bit of a small petiole here, the lamina.

So this is a simple leaf and it's got opposite arrangement.

Now there's also alternate arrangement such as this cottonwood that goes back and forth up that branch.

Now you can tell a leaf because where a leaf attaches to the stem, you will notice that there is a bud right there in that axis, and that's called the axillary bud.

So if we were to remove these leaves, you can see there's a little bit of a leaf scar there, which is also an important indicator with identification, and then also the bud.

So when we prune stuff, a lot of times those axillary buds will start sprouting and shooting from there.

So arrangement, meaning left and right, whether it is alternate as it goes zigzag, like a step ladder back and forth, or opposite where they're completely opposite from one another.

Those are both important factors when you're trying to identify leaves.

So these are all simple leaves with a single lamina and a single petiole, and you can tell where it's connected because of that bud.

Now over here, we have some examples of compound leaves.

So this is our pecan tree that we often see.

One way to determine that this is indeed a compound leaf is to look at the leaflets and where they're attached to what is known as the rachis.

So this is the stem or the stalk that holds all of these leaflets on here.

The rachis, you will see, doesn't have axillary buds right above the leaflets.

The only axillary bud is where that rachis actually attaches to the stem.

So you can see that right there.

So we do know that this is a leaflet.

So when you're identifying this, you wouldn't wanna just look at the single leaflet, you would wanna look at that whole leaf.

Now, this particular compound leaf structure is known as pinnately compound.

So if you think of like a pen, like a feather, you can see it has one main rachis here that the leaflets are oppositely attached as they go up it.

Here, the buckeye is an example of a palmately compound leaf.

And so we've got the petiole and at this main point here, we've got these leaflets attached.

And so again, palmately being like the palm of your hand with your fingers as they radiate out from the center of that.

So this is a palmately compound leaf.

You'll notice there's no axillary buds right there.

The bud is where it actually attaches to the branch down below.

So this is important.

And I know you can really get into this.

Some people might find this interesting.

Some people may think this is a little beyond what they want to learn about when they're gardening.

However, the reason why I wanted to share this information with you is because a lot of times people will need identification, whether they're using apps or they go to their local county OSU extension office and the county extension office will ask you to bring in some leaves for identification or some pictures of that.

If we were to just bring in a picture of a leaf or a leaflet, that's not going to be very helpful to us.

So the more you can bring in to really elaborate and show us the true structure of that leaf so that we can get a full picture of what it is that we're dealing with will help us not only be able to identify that plant but possibly even diseases or pests that might be specific to that plant.

It's summertime and we're spending more time but there's one plant we want to be cautious of and that's poison ivy.

It is a plant that is native all across North America and that includes all across Oklahoma as well.

It is a very vigorous and adaptable plant which means you can find it in a lot of different locations.

Now it tends to kind of live on the edge of the forest but you can find it in full sun.

And as you see here, you can find it in really deep shade as well.

It's also very adaptable in its growth habits.

So a lot of times it will present as a smaller shrub but what we have here is a nice size vine that's growing up into the tree.

So it's easy to distinguish it as it's growing as a vine here.

Now it's telltale signature is those three leaves.

However, there are other plants and we're going to get into that here in a minute that also have three leaves that maybe look similar but are completely harmless.

Now, the thing about poison ivy is that it contains a chemical, an oil that is poisonous called urushiol and that poisonous chemical is throughout the plant.

So we're talking about the roots, the stems, the leaves and even when it's dormant and there's no leaves present it still has that.

So if it gets bruised or anything like that it can cause some major skin irritations.

Now it's also found in poison oak and poison sumac.

Now the good thing is, is we do not have poison sumac in Oklahoma.

So when you see those sumac clumps growing along the roadsides that is not poison sumac that we're dealing with.

Now this particular vine, you can see it's growing with some very vigorous aerial adventitious roots that have helped it cling to the tree and it's doing that so that it can get some more sunlight up above and it's pretty a healthy specimen that we have here.

You can see that there are some berries on there and later those berries will turn white which is one of the ways that it spreads.

So it will spread through underground rhizomes and roots that will kind of allow it to pop up in different places but the berries are food for birds and so that's how it can also travel long distance and all of a sudden appear in places that maybe you've never seen it before.

So be careful of poison ivy.

It can last and persist on clothes for a long periods of time.

Oftentimes you might have a dog that runs through poison ivy and break some of that vegetation and gets on the fur and then you go to pet your dog and you might be exposed that way.

So it might not be a direct contact but it can still actually irritate your skin through those secondary contacts.

So you wanna be careful with that.

Now a couple of other plants that we have here that are poison ivy lookalikes.

This first one is the box elder.

Now this is a pretty prolific seeding tree and as you can see it's in the maple family by these seeds.

So you can see I can touch this and it is not gonna cause any problems for me.

However if you look at the leaves it has those leaves of three especially when it's younger.

So when it does get older you'll see that it actually has five leaves, leaflets on it I should say and till it gets a little bit mature and develops those five leaflets you're gonna see these three leaflets and you might think that it's poison ivy.

So while the leaves can be highly variable between the box elder and the poison ivy and they can somewhat look similar, one of the best ways to tell the difference between those two is the actual stem arrangement.

And so if we're looking here at where it meets the stems, box elders always have opposite stem arrangement or leaf arrangement.

So that means the buds are coming out of the main stem opposite each other all the way up.

Now in this form, it can be a large tree, but again it's those seedlings that are often suspicious as being poison ivy when they're completely harmless.

Another plant that we often see out in the wild is Virginia creeper and we have some of that here too.

So the big telltale on it is that it actually has five leaflets rather than three like poison ivy.

So this is one that's often seen growing up into trees out in the wild.

Again it will turn bright red in the fall.

It's actually a beautiful vine native plant, but five leaves so it is not poison ivy.

And then finally another plant that you might see either out in nature or in the landscape is fragrant sumac.

So this actually is a native plant out in the native areas.

It can get six to eight feet tall.

It does also have that three leaflet compound leaf as you can see here, but it tends to have a little bit smaller leaf and it's a little bit rounder on the edges or the margins of that leaf.

You can see it's got some catkins that are starting to develop.

It's very fragrant actually.

Another name for it is fragrant sumac or skunk bush, but this plant is also a great native plant to add to your garden.

There is actually a cultivar called grow low that will stay relatively smaller about two to three feet tall and so it may be one that you think is that poison ivy, but it is not.

So once you've identified the proper plant as poison ivy, how do we get rid of it?

Well if it's just a small little patch or a new plant that's coming up that you've discovered, one of the best ways to get rid of it is just by hand pulling it.

Now before you go hand pull it, you want to make sure you've got the proper attire on.

Obviously I wouldn't do that with short sleeves on.

You want to make sure you have long sleeves, long pants, boots on and that you don't have any exposed skin.

You also want to make sure you have some good solid gloves on.

You're then going to get a plastic bag and essentially do the dog poop pickup method where you put your hand on the outside of the bag and kind of pull it, pull the plant and then quickly wrap it up and tie that bag so that you have not touched it at all.

That's a really good way to get rid of a small patch, but for something like this what you're going to do is cut that vine just slightly and then you can either apply glyphosate to the cut ends or triclopyr.

Those are good ways to get rid of that.

Obviously we have it growing on a tree here that we are going to try not to harm that tree, but that's one way to remove a larger area is with triclopyr or glyphosate.

So we want you guys to have a safe summer and make sure you have your plants properly identified.

Today we are in Leonard, Oklahoma at the Uchi Butterfly Farm and when I talk about a butterfly farm it truly is.

Joining me is Jane Breckenridge, owner and operator.

Look at this livestock you have behind us.

I do, you know it's a real thing.

People don't think you know when you think of farming in Oklahoma you don't really think of butterflies, but yeah we are a real USDA regulated working butterfly farm.

Okay, so you're working with natives, right?

Yes.

Let's talk about the the type of butterflies you're raising here first of all.

Right, and so right now we have monarchs, we've got pipeline swallowtails, we've got Aenea andrea also known as the goatweed leafwing butterfly.

We're the only people in the country that raise it and and we've got variegated fritillaries and painted ladies as well.

Excellent, so what does it look like to raise butterflies?

Talk us through that process.

Okay, yeah so it's like any kind of other livestock or farming operation, agriculture operation.

I'm just very lucky because other people are dealing with big cattle or hogs or goats or something and I got these beautiful little butterflies, but it boils down to the same thing.

Your animals need good clean quarters to live in and they got to have plenty of healthy forage.

They got to have a lot to eat.

Okay, and for monarchs specifically we're talking about milkweed.

We are talking about milkweed.

But each of them need a specific forage.

Right, what they call a host plant and so with each different species of butterfly they have a different host plant.

So for instance if we're raising eastern black swallowtails, a lot of people get those in their gardens.

They eat dill or fennel or parsley.

Monarchs, it's milkweed.

Pipevine swallowtails, you can guess, pipevine.

Right, right.

So but the cool thing is with butterflies you're working with nature instead of against nature on your farming operation because these plants, these are native butterflies, native plants, they want to grow here.

So you're not just growing butterflies, you're growing all of that forage as well.

We are.

And it starts with microgreens?

It does start with microgreens, just like for people.

A different type of microgreens, right?

Well yeah, because I don't, you know, if you come over I don't think you want me to serve you a milkweed salad probably, right?

So right, so we use microgreens with the butterflies to kind of walk you really quickly through the process is we start with an egg.

Every butterfly or moth goes through four life stages.

Egg, caterpillar, chrysalis, adult.

When they're in their caterpillar stage of their life they are a voracious eater.

The very hungry caterpillar turns out it's a real thing.

They're going to increase their mass by over 2,000 times in less than two weeks.

That's like a newborn baby going to the size of a school bus that quickly.

Huge caloric demand.

So those microgreens in particular are really packed with nutrients.

So we feed those a lot.

When you say microgreens, that's essentially a flat of milkweed.

It is a flat of milkweed.

And so when it just first comes up, it's really those greens are really, really packed with nutrition.

They've not thought about producing seed yet or putting their energies into other things.

So those are really highly efficient in terms of meeting their caloric needs.

Okay, so how long are those caterpillars, those hungry caterpillars on those microgreens?

So they can, you know, you think about a flat, you know, a 10-20 flat, right?

And so they can, if you've got like say 50 caterpillars in there, 24 hours they'll have that whole thing decimated.

Yeah, they're so hungry.

They're so hungry.

Okay, so you've got several black little cages behind us.

Essentially they're feeding in there and then they chrysalis in there.

Exactly.

They'll pupate in there once they go to the fifth instar and they'll go to the top of the cage and they will spin a little silk pad.

They'll hang in what looks like a form of a J for about 24 hours, and then they'll shed their skin one more time.

And then what's left behind will harden off into the chrysalis.

A lot of people think that butterflies are going to have cocoons.

Those are silk moths, like those beautiful luna moths and that kind of stuff.

But most of our butterflies are going to shed their skin.

It's going to harden off.

And then if like their monarchs are going to be the most beautiful green little chrysalid left behind.

They look like jewelry.

They do look like jewelry.

I've seen earrings made not out of the real ones, but if I can recreate, you can never recreate.

Yeah, they're absolutely beautiful.

And so at what point are you then selling your stock off?

Right, so livestock, just like any other, you know, you can sell little ones or the big ones, right?

So for in our case, we do sell caterpillar kits because those are a wonderful educational thing.

We sell them as chrysalids and we also sell them as adult butterflies.

And so we can ship them as well.

Believe it or not, they get packed into little special shipping containers and can go FedEx.

And the next morning they can be there in 1030 in the morning.

Wow, beautiful.

And those are little advocates out there, right?

There are, there are.

So, you know, when people see them, we want them to think about, you know, when you see that beautiful butterfly that we've sold you, we want people to think about, yeah, these are really special and wonderful.

I wonder what I can do to help make sure that we don't lose them, you know, to extinction.

Well, that's fantastic.

And thank you so much for sharing your operation with us today.

Oh, thank you for visiting.

We'd love to share it with folks.

Today, we're going to be making a chimichurri green bean salad.

Now this recipe is going to be a great salad to try if you've got fresh vegetables and fresh herbs in your garden.

Now to start, we're going to use one pound of fresh green beans.

Now you'll want to trim or wash the green beans and trim the ends before adding them to the salad, and also blanch them for about two to three minutes in boiling water, then in an ice bath.

And then we're going to use two ears of corn, and you'll want to do the same thing with your corn, blanch it before, or you could even use frozen green beans and corn.

That would also work.

You just want to make sure that you thaw them before adding them to the salad.

And the next we'll add one finely minced shallot, and we will add that to the bowl with our green beans and our corn.

And then we'll move over to our chimichurri sauce.

Now the chimichurri sauce is really going to be the highlight of this dish.

This is a great sauce to utilize some of those herbs from your garden.

And to start, we're going to use two cups of parsley.

And now this is a great if you don't really know what to do with the parsley that you've got growing.

A lot of times people will think of parsley as just being a garnish, but really parsley has such great flavor that you can really tell when you make this how the flavor that it will give this salad.

So after we add our two cups parsley, we'll add one third cup of cilantro, and then we have one quarter cup of oregano leaves.

Now if you don't like cilantro or oregano, you can also substitute some different herbs for this.

You could maybe use mint leaves if you'd prefer to try that.

Otherwise, I would go with the cilantro and oregano because of the flavor.

Next, we'll add one half cup of olive oil, and this is extra virgin olive oil.

And then we'll add two tablespoons of lemon juice, and two tablespoons red wine vinegar.

Okay, and then next we'll add in one clove minced garlic.

And you can always add a little more or less garlic depending on how garlicky you like your salads.

And then we'll add in one fourth teaspoon of crushed red bell pepper flakes.

And then lastly, we can add in about one teaspoon of salt, or you can omit the salt if you want.

Okay, now that we have everything in there, we'll go ahead and we're going to just pulse this in the food processor until it's a nice and smooth sauce.

Okay, now that our chimichurri sauce is nice and smooth, we can go ahead and add it then to our salad mix.

And we'll just pour the chimichurri sauce over the top of the vegetable mixture.

And then we'll give it a nice toss.

We want to make sure that we try to coat all of the vegetables with the sauce as much as we can.

And then the last thing that we're going to add is about a half a cup feta cheese.

Now you can use a little bit more if you really like feta cheese, that's always an option.

Give it another nice coat, make sure that we get everything nice and covered with the sauce.

And then there we have it.

That is our chimichurri green bean salad.

You could also, you know, you could add the, like maybe tomatoes or red bell pepper if you wanted to, it might give it a little bit more color.

But if not, this is great how it is.

And it makes a great side dish for maybe some beef, pork or chicken.

But I hope you give this a try.

It's our chimichurri green bean salad.

And as always, if you have a question about today's show, feel free to reach out to your local county OSU Extension office or leave us a comment on our social media.

There are many great horticulture activities this time of year.

Be sure and consider some of these events in the weeks ahead.

Join us next week as I share with you how plants travel right here on Oklahoma Gardening.

Can I start with the recipe?

Is that, was it good Tillman?

To find out more information about show topics, as well as recipes, videos, articles, fact sheets, and other resources, including a directory of local Extension offices, be sure to visit our website at oklahomagardening.okstate.edu.

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Oklahoma Gardening is produced by the Oklahoma Cooperative Extension Service as part of the Division of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources at Oklahoma State University.

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We would like to thank our generous underwriters, the Oklahoma Department of Agriculture, Food, and Forestry, and Shape Your Future, a program of the Tobacco Settlement Endowment Trust.

Additional support is also provided by the Tulsa Garden Club, Greenleaf Nursery and the Garden Debut Plants, the Tulsa Garden Center, the Oklahoma Horticultural Society, and the Tulsa Herb Society.