The garden escaped the late October hurricane without substantial damage, but storms earlier in summer blew trees over and broke some nearly in half, so there are gaps to be filled and considerable rough edges to smooth. I’ve resisted the urge to replant for the most part. For once I’ll take a bit of time…
Category: Native plants
Not only native
Cardinals and jays frolic in the rear garden. Here, there is a substantial cover of deciduous trees and tall evergreens, some from the native forest and others planted by the gardener over twenty-three years. Mossy boulders nestled beside the rills of garden ponds (above) provide still water easily accessed for a drink or bathing. And,…
A December project
I am not typically anxious to undertake projects in the cold of December, but recently I discovered an invasive bittersweet vine invading the tree tops of a grove of wild mulberries that lurks in the thicket beside the garden. If the vine was not eliminated it would have easily hopped over to the nearby ‘Elizabeth’…
Hollies, berry nice!
Before finishing up here today we’ll have a good idea of the number of hollies in the garden. I haven’t counted (and won’t), but I’m guessing the number will be a dozen, and possibly a few more. I suppose that I can recall all the varieties, and then how many of each are planted, so…
It’s bittersweet
Yes, I know it’s bittersweet. But, is it the native American (Celastrus scandens) that is increasingly rare, or the invasive Oriental (Celastrus orbiculatus)? Before any research is done, it seems most likely that the vine will be the more prevalent Oriental bittersweet, but further investigation is required. Both are lovely vines with prominent winter fruit. Both…
Sparkleberry, or no sparkle berries?
The Sparkleberry hollies (Ilex serrata x verticillata ‘Sparkleberry’, below) are bare. The leaves are supposed to be gone by now, but in most years the branches are cloaked with an abundance of red berries. Not this year. I blame environmental factors, though I’m guessing and really haven’t a clue why the berries are missing. The…
An old spruce
The old columnar blue spruce (Picea pungens ‘Fastigiata’) is ready to give up. In twenty years it has gone from nearly full sun to part shade, and the Bigleaf magnolia (Magnolia macrophylla) and a pink flowering ‘Satomi’ Chinese dogwood (Cornus kousa ‘Satomi’) have further crowded it. The lower limbs are nearly bare, and I figure…
Through freeze and frost, until ….
With little effort the gardener can find a surprising number of plants that flower late into the autumn so that the garden’s season is extended and the drab of winter is shortened. There are also winter hardy flowers for January and February, but that’s a story for another day. By early November there were frequent…
Waiting, waiting …..
Surprisingly, the purple flowered hybrid passionflower (Passiflora x ‘Jeanette’, below) that was planted in early spring has just begun to bloom at the start of October. It is sterile, so it doesn’t develop seeds, and thus more energy is devoted to flowering so that it is supposed to flower over a more extended period than…
Tall and ruggedly handsome
No, not me. Tatarian daisy is a tough and beautiful perennial that shines in the early autumn garden. ‘Jindai’ Tatarian daisy (Aster tataricus ‘Jindai’, below) grows nearly five feet tall, but it’s habit is more compact and a few feet shorter than other Tatarian daisies (really Asters, but this is the hazard of common names)….
What I’m planting
What did you do on your summer vacation? I didn’t take one. Haven’t since the kids have grown up and moved out. Not that I’m all work and no play, but nowadays I’d rather putter around the garden. This is about as much excitement as I can stand. For various reasons I happened into a…
The Sun King
The flowers of ‘Sun King’ aralia (Aralia cordata ‘Sun King’, below) are not entirely inconsequential, but the small globes of tiny white flowers are unremarkable from more than a few paces away. This does not deter abundant pollinators (mostly wasps and ants in my garden, both quite harmless) from visiting the blooms over the period…
Ramblin' through Dave's Garden 