Summer is Coming.....

At 7 o'clock this morning it was already 73 degrees and sticky when I went outside to spend a little time cleaning in the Stepchild garden.  We're nearing that time of year in Atlanta when the only reasonable gardening hours are between 8 PM and 8 AM.

This is also the time of year when I am reminded of just how heavily things are planted in the Stepchild, and I have to start getting ruthless in thinning and "passing along" plants.  We spent yesterday doing the same thing in the perennial garden at the Big House.

The Endless Summer hydrangea looked so big a few weeks ago in the mixed border along the street, but now it's almost buried by the cleome, and there there are all the Chinese lanterns coming up through the hydrangea blooms.

Hydrangea "Lanarth's White" still showing a lot of blue near the front door.

Parts of the mixed border are getting ready for July 4th, it seems.  Monarda, Ruellia, Ageratum, and Ammi majus.

The garden snobs will probably hate the garish color combinations, but I really like how happy this area looks.  The Endless Summer, cleome, rose campion, and calendula.

 

Another shot of the mixed border from the front door.  Can you tell that I'm a big fan of achillea?

As always, click to make them bigger if you'd like.

The Stepchild Garden This Morning

A few random shots from my walk this morning with Sadie the Dog.

This first one is Fallopia japonica, which everybody seems to ask about.  It's a great groundcover that grows about a foot tall.  Can be a little agressive, but it's beautiful running between conifers and evergreens.

Hyacinth Bean shares a trellis with "Madison" jasmine.  I just love the color of these flowers as I pull into the driveway!  I don't use chemicals on them, so it's sometimes a battle between me and the little critters who seem to like them as much as I do.

My classical lady is looking a little more Jamaican, with her dreadlocks of Creeping Jenny.

The olive jars near the front door are filling in nicely with New Guinea impatiens, Creeping Jenny and Jacob's Ladder "Stairway to Heaven"

Poppies in various stages of opening and passing.....

A few too many "spikey" things in the perennial bed, but I think the color combination is pretty cool.

The Perennial Plant Symposium, Part II

I should mention that the name of the symposium on Saturday was The Exuberant Garden:  Creating Joyous Spaces, and that was the theme which wove through all of the presentations.

One of the presenters was Ruth Baumgardner, who owns Mouse Creek Perennial Farm in Riceville, TN.  Her program was entitled, "Putting the Oohs and Aahs into the Garden".  Ruth recommended several great plants to add "spice" to the garden, some old, some new, but all superstars.  Here are a few of her recommendations:

Amsonia "Blue Ice"
Baptisia Australis (an old favorite of mine)
Cassia Marylandii (such a show stopper!)
Dianthus "Prima Donna," which blooms in summer!
Filapendula "Flora Pleno," which looks like a fern, but grows in full sun

Iris Siberica "Caesar's Brother" (How can you not grow this?)
Dicentra "Luxuriant", planted in with hostas for early interest
Heuchera villosa "Autumn Bride," with big white plumes
Tricyrtis formosana "Gilt Edge" (Toad Lily - another favorite)

Time to go out shopping!

Putting the Garden to Bed for the Winter

In a peculiar way, this is one of my favorite seasons in the garden, because things slow down and stop growing for a few weeks (or at least it seems so). Every year I feel a little guilty about liking this season of cleaning, but then I realize it's all just part of the cycle.

The top photo is one section of the perennial bed in early October, at is overwhelming autumn peak. The Helianthus angustifolia is tied to the wall, threatening to crush anyone who happens to walk by when it starts to topple. The asters, phlox, and zinnias are all crying out, "I'm not done blooming yet! Don't cut me back!"

The second photo is virtually the same spot five weeks later. We've reached a point of imminent (temporary) death for the blooms, and they've gone to bed for the winter. This is when I find I'm able to enjoy just how beautiful the garden at the Big House is. I suddenly develop a new appreciation for the beautiful hardscaping, which is just starting to develop some of that "softness" that comes as a garden ages. It seems that our days are filled with removal of spent blooms and foliage, hauling it off to the green waste site for composting. We are finally getting rid of the packaging involved with the winter annuals, and getting the opportunity to take brushes and hoses to things.

On one hand it's a little sad, but on the other, very refreshing! Go outside today and enjoy what's left of autumn!

An Evening with Allan Armitage

I had the opportunity to spend a few hours yesterday with Dr. Allan Armitage, as part of a small group from the Smith Gilbert Gardens Foundation. As I have mentioned in the past, we are incredibly lucky in Georgia to have Drs. Armitage and Michael Dirr associated with UGA. As a result, those of us in the gardening community in Georgia tend to have access to some cool information.

As always, I was impressed with just how approachable Dr. Armitage is, particularly in light of what a big deal he is in the horticulture world. There were about 12 of us, and we spent an hour strolling the grounds at the Smith Gilbert Gardens, and then another hour getting a sneak peek of some of his new favorites in the world of perennials.

I'll share more information later (my notes are outside in the truck, and it's way too cold to go outside this early), but for now, here are some tidbits from last night:

Dr. Armitage spoke about hydrangeas, and how strong the paniculatas are coming onto the scene. Some of the cultivars have been around for a long time, but some of the new ones like Pinky Winky and Limelight are really making a big splash. It's no secret that I am a bit of a hydrangea "junky," and have lots of them in the stepchild garden, but I can't argue with the statement that the macrophyllas can be finicky, particularly for new gardeners. In contrast, the paniculatas seem to grow most anywhere, loving sun, shade, or a mix of the two. They aren't the waterhogs that the big leafed relatives can be, either. I've had H. paniculata "Unique" for a couple of years, and it's just a workhorse in my own garden, and at the Big House, as well. Guess it's time to add in some others..... (That's Pinky Winky in the photo.)

Achilleas (Yarrow) are coming on again in a strong way. The newer cultivars like "Pomegranate" are better behaved than some of the older strains, and stay lower to the ground. Yarrow is another plant that I personally can't get enough of, even if it does tend to roam all over the garden when it's happy.

Lastly, one of the new perennials Dr. Armitage likes is a wallflower called "Jenny Brock." This is one of those flowers that doesn't get used often in the south, since it doesn't like heat, but according to the trials at UGA, "Jenny Brock" is perennial, and has flowered there from February until July! Wallflower is an old favorite of mine (as a transplanted New Englander), so this is one I'm going to start looking for today!

I'm starting my day at the greenwaste site, then planning to work in the stepchild garden today; I'm sure there are still plants living under the foot of fallen leaves......

A Glorious Day to be in the Garden

It's been much colder than normal here lately (as it has been in lots of areas of the country, it seems), and definitely much wetter. We had what has now been categorized as a "500 year flood" about four weeks ago, and it seems as though it's been raining or drizzling ever since. Since I moved South from New England largely because of the dreary weather, this has not been a happy month for me.....I've been grumbling daily that "I just want to be dry......" It happened today!

It is still pretty cold (about ten degrees cooler than average, and the nights almost twenty degrees colder than average), but the sun was out in all its glory today! I spent the morning at the penthouse garden, which I really think was designed for days like this. Everything operates by remote control there, so when I pushed the button to open the drapes, it was nothing short of a stage production! Most of the apartment is floor-to-ceiling glass, and it's one of the highest residences in Atlanta. It was just amazing to see the buildings on the skyline glistening and shining again! It feels as though it has been years! Everyone's mood was noticeably improved over the past few weeks.

I got to spend the afternoon working in the stepchild garden at home with Cricket, starting the end of summer cleanup. In a few hours we managed to fill the back of the truck to overflowing with the remains of the cannas, angelonia, lantana, and other things that are finsihed for this season. We had to wear sweatshirts while working, but there was no fog, there were no clouds, there was no rain, there was no bitter wind......just fabulous sunshine!

It's supposed to warm up again starting tomorrow, and then probably we'll have rain for the weekend, but I'm trying not to think about that....for now, I am a happy camper working on my farmer's tan in a parka!!

(You might have noticed I changed the photo.....that smiley face was scaring me early in the morning!)

Moore in the Garden

I finally made it to Atlanta Botanical Garden yesterday to see the Henry Moore exhibit, which is pretty awesome! Until seeing them in person, I didn't really have a good grasp for just how enormous some of these pieces are!

My friend, Hillary, is the Sr. Horticulturist at ABG, and for the past few months she's been telling me what a task it was to incorporate a sculpture into the middle of a perennial bed for which she's responsible. I kept thinking, "I'm sure it's big, but how bad could it REALLY be?"....as you can see, it's definitely a serious challenge to a gardener! Fortunately Hillary is very talented, and did an amazing job! (I love the White Joe Pye Weed dancing around the giant white sculpture!)

To give you a feel for size, the Joe Pye Weed near this sculpture's leg is at least six feet tall!

The Tour

“Of course you can look at my garden if you’d like to consider it for next year’s tour……”

“Why not?” I thought, “this will motivate me to finish some of the things on that list.”

Reality check! There are at least one hundred items on that list to finish by May! Some of them are as “simple” as painting the house!

In all seriousness, I really am flattered that my garden is on the short list for next year’s Cobb Master Gardeners tour, and it really will give me the motivation to tie up lots of loose ends…..not sure the house will get painted, but certainly the doors will get a new coat of color. (At least that nasty sweetgum got cut down a couple of weeks ago, so I'm making progress.....)

Perhaps the most notable feature about my garden is the 120 foot “mixed” perennial bed, that wraps the corner of the property. I know that tradition dictates that a perennial border is supposed to be in the back of the garden, but I have sun along the street in the front of my house, so that’s where the perennial border went!

Over the past few years, it has filled in beautifully, and looks pretty awesome, if I do say so myself. There is a sheared evergreen hedge that runs down the middle of the bed, so it provides a great background for the colors. The problem, of course, is that many perennials really don’t come into their own in Atlanta until June, and the tour is in May.

At one end of the border there is a pretty substantial arbor, which is quickly becoming engulfed in a combination of New Dawn Rose, Golden Celebration Rose, and Roguchi Clematis, all of which should be blooming for the tour. (This photo was the day of installing said arbor, since the New Dawn kept pulling down the old Smith & Hawken arbor). Where the bed turns the corner, there is a Doublefile Viburnum Standard that is about 12 feet tall and should also be in full bloom in May. There really will be a lot of perennials showing off their stuff for the tour, but I still want a little more "oomph."

The challenge is finding some really cool perennials to add into the mix that will be peaking in mid May. Any ideas? I have tons of iris and hydrangeas that will be blooming, so I’m going to try to stick with highlighting blues and bronze colors. This other photo is “Eye of the Tiger” Dutch Iris, which will be blooming in five different spots of the border. So far I’ve only thought about adding in drifts of annual coleus in some of the bronze colors, but I’d love the input of some other clever garden folks!

An Island Garden

If you’re reading this, you know that we visited Celia Thaxter’s garden last week, after wanting to do so for many years. In a nutshell, the garden is located on Appledore, an island about 6 miles off the coast of Maine/New Hampshire. It is on an island managed by Cornell and UNH, and is only open for tours eight days each year; we were finally able to make all of the components of our lives come together to visit the garden this year!

The short version of the story is that Celia’s father opened a grand Victorian resort hotel on the island in the mid 1800’s, and she developed this garden over the course of many years, primarily to furnish fresh cut flowers for the hotel. She wrote about it in her book, “An Island Garden,” which was published in 1894, a few months before she died. The garden was abandoned for many decades, and then restored about 25 years ago; it is now planted and maintained by a group of volunteers (and UNH), exactly as Celia had maintained it. There are many paintings of this garden by impressionist artist Childe Hassam in museums around the world, and the book itself is available for purchase (or you can read it online at www.digital.library.upenn.edu/women/thaxter/garden/garden.html.)

For anyone who is a passionate gardener, this is definitely a trip worth taking! Just to get an idea of Celia Thaxter’s passion, go to the online version (or the print version) and read her interpretation of the thunderstorm hitting her island and garden, on page 105. In other parts of the story, she relates going outside at 4 AM in her Victorian nightdress to squish slugs and encase them in salt! It’s really quite a fun read, and can be handled cover to cover in a few hours.
On a practical note, there were some extraordinary flowers in the small garden, and I’m sure my photos don’t do them justice, but here’s a few of the shots.

The New Hampshire Trip - Fuller Gardens

The trip to New Hampshire was awesome, and provided a good opportunity to see the area during good weather for the first time in many years. We both grew up in that area, but since we typically do the trip home at the holidays, it is always gray-brown and dreary. I had truly forgotten how glorious the summers are!

I'm working on the photos from Celia Thaxter's garden (the whole point of the trip), but here are a few from the Fuller Gardens in North Hampton, NH. I would really encourage anyone to visit if they are in the greater Boston area between May and September. It was the summer home of Alvan Fuller (governor of Massachusetts during the early 20th century), and is maintained much as it was during the Fullers residence there. Since it was designed as a (pretty grand) private residence), it is not as large as most public gardens, but the details are exquisite. The Fullers collected lots of art in the travels around the US and Europe, and those pieces are some of my favorite things in the garden.

Obviously most of these things are out of reach for the real world, but things like the tuteurs for the clematis are something I'm going to try to copy in the big house garden. (Don't forget that you can click on these photos to see them in more detail).

Some Passalong Perennials

The perennial bed is popping out all over the place, thanks to lots of "passalong plants" I've inherited in the past couple of years (mostly from my friend, Alice). These are some of those that straddle the fine line between "exuberant" and "invasive," but all are great old-fashioned beauties in my eye!

(Ignore the blatant aversion to edging in my own garden!)

Some Blooms from this Weekend

Here are some shots from Saturday morning at the big house, with a little editorial, as well.

First, the Echinaceas are literally buzzing these days, as you can see.

Anthony Waterer Spirea is not a favorite shrub of mine, since I think it is "done to death" in most landscapes, but for these few weeks, I have to admit the show is pretty amazing.

Lastly, however "pedestrian" they might be, Annabelles are still one of my all time favorite hydrangeas. Between the big house and my own garden, there are several cultivars of macrophyllas, serattas, and oakleafs; there are none that I would want to part with, but Annabelles still hold a special spot in my heart as the first hydrangea I grew myself. There is something very simple and lovely about Annabelle in my mind.

Some Spring Blooms

I pride myself on living a somewhat slow and "off the grid" life......clearly that's all fantasy on my part, since being without a cell phone for six hours and without a computer for a few days has put me into a complete state! Fortunately there is always the gardening to bring me back to the ground, and fortunately Chuck's camera isn't dead, as well.

Anyway, here are a few shots of what's in bloom over at the big house this week. Enjoy!

Top to Bottom:

Tradescantia "Sweet Kate"'

A Summer Container Just Starting to Flush Out;

Graham Thomas (a personal favorite) starting to show off;

White Foxglove in the Perennial Bed;

William Morris competing with Graham Thomas for the bloom show

(As always, click on the photo to enlarge)

Photos for Monica and "Missus"

These were on the morning of April 9, which was ridiculously cold, but really beautiful with the condensation still on all of the blossoms and leaves.

From top to bottom: The Vegetable Garden Ready for Planting (Blueberries, Asaragus and Some Lettuces Already Showing); An Azalea that's "way too bright" so early in the morning; Kwanzan Cherry blossoms up close; a Foxtail Lily that doesn't know how early it is; and the Bridal Wreath Spirea I can never get enough of.

They're Not Invasive! They're Exuberant!

I was walking through my own garden this morning with a cup of coffee, just sort of roaming (as much as one can "roam" on a half acre). It was too wet to work in someone else's garden today, since the skies were opening every fifteen minutes. As I looked around, I realized that I have accumulated lots of those dreaded plants that every garden snob hates; I like to call them "exuberant," instead of invasive.

The Akebia is already half way up the poles of the pergola, and the scent was awesome. It's one of those things that garden snobs say, "You grow that???" To add insult to injury, I have porcelain vine (AKA crazy weed) growing up the other pole (that's it in the picture above). I have never found anything else with such beautiful berries.

I seem to now have six forsythia bushes growing in different spots. Is there anything as happy in the gray of winter? I planted two, and don't truly know where the others came from, but they aren't bothering anyone, certainly not me.

Then there is the Mahonia, with those awesome butter yellow blossoms in January, followed by the berries than look like hanging clumps of blue grapes until the birds get them. The Eleagnus ("Ugly Agnes") really needs a good haircut, since she's looking more like Medusa, with those gangly shoots that appear out of nowhere, and reach out to grab small children. (I haven't seen the little boy from next door recently......)

The huge clumps of Yellow Cannas (I would love to say they're a "cultivar," but they're just yellow) seem to swell more each year. Another plant that gets zero attention from me, and blooms its heart out in summer.

I tell people I'm going to thin out some of the yarrow this year, since the clumps now run together in various shades and colors, but I'm really not....one can never have too much yarrow.

I was excited to see all of the new sprouts of Verbena Bonarensis, which I like to think of as "punctuation marks" around the perennial bed. This is a plant that everyone should have in their garden somewhere. Just buy one, since you'll have ten next year!

If Alice's Cleome and the Verbena B. ever cross-pollinate, I'll have no choice but to move!

A Bit of Spring Cleaning

After a weekend of cold drizzly rain (which we desperately needed), it was a treat to be in the garden today in the warm sun. It got into the high 60's, and was the perfect day to do some "spring cleaning" in the vegetable garden and the big perennial beds. Can you believe we're only a month from planting summer annuals?

The blueberries are positively covered with blooms, which are pretty in the walled garden, since everything else there is either still dormant or just starting to grow for spring.

I managed to pull out some of the winter cabbages, which had started to bolt with this warm weather, and are developing that funky odor that occurs when they start their decline. Time to move the last of the "Antique Shades" pansies from the nursery area to the displays at the front of the house, since it still needs to look good for another month before the spring things arrive. They are the perfect color for the brick of the house, but a challenging cultivar that needs lots of babying.

Took the broom to the creeping fig that covers the wall in the garden; it starts to look pretty ratty at this time of year, so the broom makes quick work of brushing away the dead leaves, exposing the new growth; it was exciting to have to tiptoe through the spears of asparagus that have just started popping up in the past couple of days! One of the luxuries of being the gardener is standing in the garden, in the silence, in the sun, eating the first stalk of the season's asparagus......

I was raking away the last of the autumn leaves from the vegetable beds (we leave a light covering there for the winter), and discovered the tiny little shoots of sweetpeas around the base of the tuteurs....I can't wait to see them start racing up the slats in the next couple of weeks!

Across the gravel walkway, the peonies are showing their heads (one in a particularly hot spot is about six inches high already), so I got to put out their cages for another spring show. Peonies always make me smile, thinking of my grandmother calling them "Pee-OH-nies" with the New York accent that still came through, even 70 years after leaving her childhood home.

I finished my day giving a haircut to the "Sunny Yellow" Knockout Roses that arrived a few weeks ago, grooming them to go into containers at the pool in a few weeks. There is something magical about spring, when you can literally watch things grow right in front of your eyes!

Leave the dreaded leaf blowers and power mowers in the garage for just another week! Sit back and enjoy the simplicity of the spring garden.....and look for those first spears of asparagus!

PS....The sakurafubuki is getting closer!

Any Big Plans for 2009?

One of the bloggers that I follow has a list of winter projects that she reviews in the winter. Since she's in the great frozen north, that winter is much longer than ours (thank goodness!). The premise is the same, however, and one I thought was worth pursuing more.

Do you have any major plan for your garden this season? Anything you've identified as "missing" in your garden world?

Mine is STRUCTURE, STRUCTURE, STRUCTURE!!!!

As much as I would like to be organized in my plant purchases, I am inevitably drawn to those "I really need one of those" purchases, that manage to stay in pots behind the house for weeks or months until I discover the PERFECT spot for them. Mike Francis (the Japanese maple guru) accused me (unfairly, of course) at this year's Southeastern Flower Show of redefining "competitive gardening" with my purchase of the Aurea pine, and my delight when he ran out of them shortly after my purchase!

In any case, over the past few years, the perennial bed has gone from a specific color driven design to a "mixed border," to a somewhat hodgepodge collection of things that all happen to like sun. A few "must have" hellebores, a daphne odora and some sweet woodruff plants have found their ways into the "only ferns" bed by the front door. The Japanese maple island seems to have discovered a couple of exotic hydrangeas and a dogwood or two......you get the picture.

All that said, my commitment this year is to add some STRUCTURE to my garden, which is affectionately called the step child. I'm sure by September it will look like Versailles......maybe with a couple of quirks.......(Check out the photo of a "redneck Stonehenge".....that's my fantasy!)

So what are your major plans this year?