Supporting Our Local Garden Clubs
The Frosting on the Gardener’s Cake
In this age of readily disseminated literature and specialty nurseries delivering novel and little-known plants to your doorstep, logic would have it that all the intriguing and easily grown plants would be well-known and at a gardeners’ fingertips…
Finally, the hazy, lazy days of summer have arrived – something many of us longed for during those snowy days last winter! The temperatures are warm, the days are long and hopefully the rain is ample! Your favorite plants are strutting their beauty, such as the leaves of Hardy Begonia (Begonia grandis), the orange to pink flowers of the native Plum Leaf Azalea (Rhododendron prunifolium) or the beautiful and edible flowers of Borage (Borago officinalis)…
Beauty is Worth a Second Attempt
I am not certain if it is forgetfulness or simply a lack of patience, but I am always astonished at the number of times I have grown a plant unsuccessfully and opted not to try it again until many years later. A case in point is Bowman’s Root, botanically known as Gillenia trifoliata. I remember exactly where I planted it in 1987 at a garden in Hawthorne, NJ and I did not give the plant much consideration again until some 35 years later!….
Summer has arrived! The days are wonderfully long, rain has mostly proven to be adequate while the temperatures promise to be more summer-like. The June blooms of Beardtongue (Penstemon digitalis), the late blooming Drumstick Allium (Allium sphaerocephalon) and Oakleaf Hydrangea (Hydrangea quercifolia) are giving the garden great color…..
The Bold and Beautiful
By and large, spring ephemerals require a bit of trial and error before gardeners understand how best to use them in the spring garden. By definition, this group of plants emerge in early spring, flower, set seed and enter dormancy around the start of summer. Their strategy is to complete their annual reproductive cycle before the tree canopy is fully leafed-out and competition for sunlight and water becomes more intense….
