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Q. Who is Mr. Smarty Plants?

A: There are those who suspect Wildflower Center volunteers are the culpable and capable culprits. Yet, others think staff members play some, albeit small, role. You can torture us with your plant questions, but we will never reveal the Green Guru's secret identity.

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Ask Mr. Smarty Plants

Ask Mr. Smarty Plants is a free service provided by the staff and volunteers at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center.

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Please forgive us, but Mr. Smarty Plants has been overwhelmed by a flood of mail and must take a break for awhile to catch up. We hope to be accepting new questions again soon. Thank you!

Need help with plant identification, visit the plant identification page.

 
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Wednesday - August 13, 2008

From: Colfax, WA
Region: Northwest
Topic: Plant Identification
Title: Plant identification
Answered by: Nan Hampton

QUESTION:

Bought a plant don't know what it is or how to care for it. It looks like it's dying. Description: light to dark green, long, skinny, rounded trunk, surrounded and topped with grass like blades(top grass like blades are quite a bit shorter than the rest) they said it was a cactus but I'm not sure.

ANSWER:

Mr. Smarty Plants would be happy to try to identify your plant, but we are going to need some photos to do so. Please take photos of the entire plant and a closeup of the leaves. Visit the Ask Mr. Smarty Plants page to read instructions (under "Plant Identification") for submitting photos.
 

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