Late 19th-mid 20th C. rural house sites in southeastern Ohio are often
marked by the following:

Daylily (Hemerocallis)
Jonquil (single and double)
Narcissus
Grape Hyacinth
Myrtle/Periwinkle
Rose
Iris

Occasionally, I have noticed

Catnip
Japanese Quince
Barberry
Forsythia
Japonica
Lilac

Just today I was working at a house site where several clumps of Snowdrop
(Galanthus) have persisted behind the house foundations.

I have seen one site engulfed in Japanese Knotweed, a site so isolated and
removed from any stream that I felt confident that this introduced weed had
been deliberately planted as an ornamental.   But it would be foolhardy to
use this introduced weed as a means of trying to locate historic sites.

As in Georgia, the sighting of periwinkle/myrtle invariably means a house
or cemetery.  I have seen only one occurrence that I could not related to
an historic site.

Box elder and Ailanthus are so ubiquitous in this area that I'd be hard put
to identify an occurrence as due to artificial planting.

The problem is that some of these ornamental plants are hardier than
others.  I can't believe that the scarcity of tulips at such sites, for
example, means that they weren't popular while the houses were
occupied.  They just don't survive as well on their own.

Jim Murphy
Ohio State University Libraries
1858 Neil Avenue Mall
Columbus OH 43210



At 01:37 PM 3/10/01 -0500, Christopher P. Murphy wrote:
>Dear Ben,
>     Here in the southeastern U.S. (I'm in Augusta, GA), it is certainly true
>that certain plants are associated with residential structures.  A few years
>back I was investigating a rural area near Augusta where former house sites
>(some of the houses were completely gone, others only survived as collapsing
>ruins) could often be detected about this time of the year by the blooming of
>the jonquils (a.k.a. daffodils) which were apparently common yard flowers in
>the 19th and 20th centuries.  Even after the structures have been gone for
>years, the flowers still continue to come up and mark the spot.  Also in my
>area, perriwinkle (Vinca minor?) is known as "cemetery vine" due to its
>frequent association with graveyards (especially small rural ones).
>
>     Last year I attended a Southern Garden Heritage conference where some of
>the speakers discussed the botanical fads of the past century or two and
>called
>attention to the fact that long lived plants can sometimes remain for
>considerable lengths of time after the garden is gone to seed and lost its
>original plan.  I remember that camelias and roses were mentioned in that
>context.
>
>     Hope this is some help.
>
>     Chris
>
>
>
>Ben Ford wrote:
>
> > Dear All:
> >
> > I am interested in finding references regarding the use of plants as clues
> > for site identification.
> >
> > Are there certain kinds of plants that tend to colonize structure sites?
> >
> > What sorts of domesticates and exotics were most common around homes at
> > various times (e.g. boxelder, perry winkle, English ivy)?
> >
> > Once the types of plants to look for have been named, is there a
> > particularly good book to help with identifying these species in the field?
> >
> > Thank you in advance for any words of wisdom.
> >
> > Cheers,
> > Ben Ford
> > _________________________________________________________________
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