These images originate from the life-long work of Catherine “Kate” Furbish, a botanist, artist, and careful observer of Maine’s flora. From 1870 to 1908, Furbish traveled throughout the state, collecting, classifying, and illustrating its plants with extraordinary dedication. Her life’s work took shape in Maine Flora, a fourteen-volume collection of botanical illustrations and notes, which she donated to Bowdoin College in 1908.

Catherine ‘Kate’ Furbish – (Left) Clematis verticillaris DC. Virgins Bower – (Orno 1881 Fort Kent 1881) | (Right) Viburnum lantonoids Michx. Hobble Bush Location Brunswick (1876)Plants and Flowers of Maine: Kate Furbish’s Watercolors

That legacy was brought into a new form in 2016 through Plants and Flowers of Maine: Kate Furbish’s Watercolors, a comprehensive two-volume publication. The set faithfully reproduces nearly 1,300 of Furbish’s drawings, produced by Bowdoin College Library and Rowman & Littlefield in collaboration with Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens, making her work more accessible than ever. Our connection to this work runs deeper still. Botanist Melissa Cullina, Vice President of Plants and Science at the Gardens—and a self-confessed “Furbish fan”—authored the foreword.

Catherine ‘Kate’ Furbish – Plants and Flowers of Maine: Kate Furbish’s Watercolors

Beyond the scale of the publication and preservation of the work, it is the illustrations themselves that continue to captivate. What’s striking to the modern observer is how contemporary the drawings feel, with little of the ornate sensibility often associated with the late 1800s. Instead, Furbish’s work is crisp, direct, and remarkably clear, reflecting her commitment to accuracy above all else.

In a letter to Bowdoin College president William DeWitt Hyde dated December 22, 1908, she wrote, “I do not claim artistic merit but merely a truthful representation of what I saw in the plants, free from all decorative effects.” That philosophy is evident in every composition.

The Gardens’ appreciation for these renderings reflects something more than aesthetics—it speaks to the way we approach our work: rooted in place, grounded in observation, and closely tied to the landscapes that surround us. Botanical illustration, at its core, is not simply about beauty: it is a scientific practice. Long before photography became widely accessible, illustration was one of the most important tools for documenting plant life.

Even today, it offers something unique. An illustrator can capture multiple stages of growth: bud, flower, and fruit within a single composition, while highlighting the features that allow a plant to be accurately identified. These are details that are often difficult to isolate in photographs but can be rendered with clarity through careful study. Furbish worked from life, often using multiple specimens to create a single, truthful representation. Each composition is the result of close, sustained observation.

Click the video to flip through a few of the pages.

She also recorded where in Maine her specimens were gathered, often preserving these as herbarium sheets, grounding each illustration in place and offering insight into the environments where these plants thrive. Together, image, herbarium specimen, and notation form a more complete understanding of the plant and its structure, habitat, and context.

In this way, the illustrations are reminders of how we come to understand plants in the first place. They reflect the process of looking closely, asking questions, and translating complexity into clarity. That same process is central to the work happening here every day, from the horticultural team designing and tending garden beds, to the marketing team feeling inspired by a particular plant’s colorway and storytelling, to the development of field guides and interpretive signage.

This relationship between art and observation extends beyond these office spaces. In the Bosarge Education Center, the Herbarium preserves plant specimens that document the region’s biodiversity—each one holding data about where and when a plant was collected, offering insight into changing climates, shifting habitats, and biodiversity over time. Far from a static archive, the herbarium is an active research tool, supporting ongoing study and conservation work.

New Exhibit in the Bosarge Education Center this Summer.

On view In the Education Center this spring and summer, Plants Over Time: Unlocking Herbarium Collections highlights selections from this collection, showcasing both the art and science of herbarium work, including contributions by botanical artist Joy Grannis.

Drawing from herbarium specimens is a skill in itself, offering both clarity and challenge. There is something undeniably useful about working from a specimen: it is still, accessible, and safe from the wind, weather, or mosquitoes! An artist can take time to observe closely, returning again and again to the same subject. Specimens also allow for direct comparison; plants gathered from mountainsides and seashores can be studied side by side, revealing subtle differences in form. The curve of a thorn, the shape of a leaf, and the smallest distinguishing features become easier to isolate and understand.

At the same time, there are limitations. Pressed specimens do not always retain their original color or shape. The work of the illustrator, then, becomes one of interpretation as much as observation.

The exhibit also explores the growing role of digitization, which allows researchers worldwide to access high-quality specimen images and data. These digital records not only expand opportunities for study, supporting worldwide research, but also serve as a safeguard, preserving the collection in the event of loss or deterioration.

Surrounded by these images, the boundary between indoors and outdoors begins to soften in small, quiet ways through a familiar (or not-so-familiar!) bloom rendered in ink, watercolor, and pencil.

(Left) The two volumes from our library at Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens | (Right) Details from Furbish’s drawing: Andrews Bottle Gentian Gentiana andrewsii Griseb Var Andrewsii

These illustrations form a kind of visual language—one that speaks to both art and science, observation and understanding. They remind us that the study of plants begins with truly seeing them, and that even in the spaces where we work, we remain closely connected to the natural world that inspires them.

Award-winning research is helping us better understand how climate change is impacting tree seedling survival—and what that means for the future of forests.

We’re proud to share that Emily MacDonald, a University of Maine graduate student we’ve been working with over the past few years, has published a paper in Frontiers in Forests and Global Change. Her research explores how rising temperatures and drought impact tree seedling survival.

Research at Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens

Some of Emily’s experimental research work took place on site here in Boothbay, and Melissa Cullina, VP of Plants and Science, served on Emily’s graduate committee. The work dovetailed wonderfully with the Gardens’ mission and conservation research niche, which focuses on climate impacts to plants, and Melissa’s participation supported a broader initiative to encourage more student-led research, like Emily’s, at the Gardens.

Emily’s paper, titled “Combined heat and drought events reduce first-year survival of tree seedlings, especially at southern range margins,” examines how increasingly common climate stressors impact young trees at a critical stage of development.

Her research explores how extreme heat and drought — particularly when they occur together — can significantly reduce the survival of first-year seedlings, with important implications for forest resilience and long-term ecosystem health.

As climate patterns continue to shift, understanding how forests respond to combined stressors is essential for adaptive management and future planning. Emily’s work contributes to a growing body of research that helps scientists, land managers, and policymakers better anticipate how forest ecosystems may change in the decades ahead.

Emily’s research was recognized earlier this year when she was named a finalist in the University of Maine College of Earth, Life and Health Sciences Graduate Student Research Awards in February. In breaking news, she just won the award!

We are grateful for the opportunity to work with emerging researchers like Emily, and this kind of collaboration continues to strengthen our growing partnerships with faculty, staff, and students at the University of Maine.

You can read the full published paper in Frontiers in Forests and Global Change here:

Our Horticulture Manager, Jen Dunlap, shares her favorite trees for different garden conditions — sunny, shady, dry, moist, and even small spaces — many of which shine brightest in the quiet months of winter:

Are you a gardener who likes staring out of your window at the barren snow-covered landscape before you, cup of tea in hand, wistfully dreaming of spring plans and plants? If so, you are not alone!

The cornerstone of any well-designed garden starts with the “bones.” Much like the skeleton acts as the infrastructure for muscles and soft tissues in the animal world, the skeleton of the garden is the support structure that works to anchor woody and perennial specimens in the landscape offering winter interest and more.

Snuggled in and sleeping beneath their winter blanket, dormant plants benefit from the additional protection that trees provide. Humans, insects, and animals also benefit from the values trees offer. The “bones” of a garden could be represented not just by trees but by sculptures, stones, garden art, trellises, or tutors, to name a few, but of course, my favorite way to incorporate these design elements into a garden is with trees.

Trees have a multitude of benefits. By selecting the right trees for your site, you have an opportunity to add high ecological value to the landscape. In doing so, you will be providing shade, shelter, food, and medicine for humans, animals, and insects engaging in your space.

Native trees are a great consideration for the landscape. They are attractive, adaptable, and provide a highly positive ecological impact on the garden. And if you only have a small amount of land to work with, you can often find a native cultivar to fit your needs. When in doubt, talk to your favorite nursery staff—or better yet, reach out to one of our experienced horticulturists here at the Gardens!

While it is impossible to choose favorites, I have taken the guesswork out of it for you by providing site-specific tree selections that work for a variety of applications. These are my top-rated selections, worthy of including in the winter landscape. I hope you are inspired to try something from this list. Enjoy!

Spectacular winter interest: White birch (Betula papyrifera) 

With its characteristic white, peeling bark, white birch, also known as canoe birch or paper birch, is a widely recognized native of the Northwoods. Typically a multi-trunked tree, white birch can grow to heights of 50’ or more over time. Birch has been used for centuries for food, medicine, and utilitarian products like baskets and canoes.  

While preferring moist soil, white birch is adaptable to different light conditions, thriving in full sun to light shade. Birds and mammals use birch for food and shelter while the dappled shade provided by its toothed leaves swaying in the breeze, cooling the air, offers a respite from summer heat. A perfect spot for that garden bench! You have been working hard, now sit and relax.

Now reflect on the fact that white birch is also a larval host for the Eastern Tiger Swallowtail and the Luna moth, and you have succeeded in increasing the ecological impact of your garden.  
To accentuate the white peeling bark, especially in winter, consider planting dark evergreen trees as a backdrop and be rewarded with spectacular year-round interest. 

Sunny, dry soil: Jack pine (Pinus banksiana) & (Pinus banksiana ‘Schoodic’)

This funky pine thrives in full sun, preferring lean, dry, sandy, or rocky soils—perfect for a water-wise garden. While considered by some to be scrubby or shabby in habit, I personally love the gnarly, twisted growth of this species, especially along the coast where its wind-swept branches contort over time. 

While this native tree can grow upwards of 50’, the highly compact P. banskiana ‘Schoodic’—a prostrate-growing form found on the Schoodic Peninsula in Maine—is perfect for a smaller garden where it can be used as a groundcover. A fun alternative to juniper, P. ‘Schoodic’ is a slow growing cultivar reaching approximately 2’ high by 4’ wide. 

Since pines are evergreen, they hold their needles throughout the winter, giving your garden extra flare during the cold season. 

Sunny, moist soil: Atlantic white cedar (Chamaecyparis thyoides)

The Atlantic white cedar is one of my favorite conifers that sadly gets overlooked by its faster growing arborvitae cousins. This tree thrives in full sun but can take part-shade as well. Rot-resistant wood makes this tree an excellent choice in the building industry where it has been traditionally used to make shingles, posts, and telephone poles. 

While considered rare in Maine due to habitat loss from logging, this tree thrives in moist soil and wetlands and is a useful consideration for your rain garden. It has a gorgeous peeling gray-toned bark with gray-blue fruits developing in autumn. Atlantic white cedar provides food and shelter for birds and mammals, slowly growing upwards of 45-50’. The fruits of this lovely evergreen persist into winter. 

Shade: Pagoda Dogwood (Cornus alternifolia) 

Pictured here: Varigated Pagoda Dogwood (Cornus Alternifolia Argentea)

The Pagoda dogwood is a small tree growing upwards 25-30’ tall with alternate horizontal branching. White, fragrant, flat-topped flowers turn into delicious dark purple fruit in the fall, clustered atop red stems—beloved by small winter grazers, less so by humans who may find their bitterness a burden too heavy to bear. This dogwood species, a bird haven, also attracts butterflies and is larval host to the Spring Azure butterfly.

Prized for its rich fall color, dark fruit, colorful branches, and architectural shape in winter, this species prefers shade and moist soil and is even tolerant of clay soils. The Pagoda dogwood is a perfect specimen for a natural or woodland garden or for use along a wooded edge.

Small space? Don’t worry, try: Smooth Serviceberry, a.k.a. shadbush, saskatoon (Amelanchier laevis)

This common species of serviceberry is found throughout the state of Maine. Growing to heights of around 20’ tall, this species will not overwhelm a smaller garden. Winter bark is a gray-violet color, fissured and twisted.

While smaller in stature, its ecological impact is great, providing food for birds, small mammals, and humans alike. The fruits make delicious jams and pies. The early bloom time of Amelanchier laevis rewards the gardener with sweetly scented white flower clusters at a time when other trees are just starting to awaken from their winter slumber. This early bloom makes it easily identifiable and provides pollen for insects at a time when not much else is available.

Though shadbush prefers regular moisture, it can sustain mild drought conditions once established. Plant it in full sun along a woodland edge or in a naturalistic garden.

Large specimen: Basswood or Linden (Tilia americana)

Especially evident in winter, American Basswood is identified by its deeply angular, fissured gray bark. The generous size of this tree makes it well suited as a shade tree in a larger landscape. Basswood can grow up to 50-80’ tall and provides food and shelter for birds, insects, and small mammals.

Humans prefer basswood wood for making a myriad of assorted products ranging from furniture to tools, and the flowers make delicious and nutritious tea.

While not a specimen that you might think of when you think of trees for winter interest, it is worth highlighting the special attributes of this tree that make it worthy of consideration. From its zig-zagging red tipped branches to its hearty swollen buds and nut-like drupes attached to an elongated bract that can persist through winter, there is a kaleidoscope of features of this tree to admire all year long.

Staff pick, my personal favorite: Eastern Larch, Tamarack or Hackmatack (Larix laricina) 

If I absolutely had to pick one tree to look at for the rest of my life, it would certainly be Eastern Larch. As if being one of North America’s only deciduous conifers was not cool enough, the tamarack, or hackmatack, boasts one of the most architecturally pleasing—in my opinion—structures of all the trees in the northern boreal forest complex.

The precursor to needle drop is the most beautiful golden fall color. The once perfectly dappled shade provided by the soft needles of this tree gives way to knobby branches, where male and female cones once gave way to delicate needle bundles. With a preference for acidic, moist but well-drained soil, try growing larch in full sun to light shade.  
The Eastern Larch has a narrow, pyramidal habit growing to heights of 50-60’ and is host to hundreds of species of caterpillars. 

It is truly a tree worth having in the winter landscape and all year long. 

Unlike animals, plants cannot move around to find a mate. Instead, they rely on wind, water, and even wildlife to help them accomplish the task of pollination. Once pollination is complete and the flowers are fertilized, the process of fruit development begins. This process is an essential part of a plant’s life cycle and can have serious impacts on the success and future of a species.

Beach plum (Prunus maritima)

One of the most compelling examples of how reproduction shapes a plant’s fate is the beach plum, Prunus maritima. Beach plum is native to the eastern United States, from Virginia north to Maine, where it grows along sandy coasts and dunes. In its natural habitat, it faces a harsh coastal environment with salt spray, high winds, and shifting soils. Despite these conditions, this hardy shrub puts on a delicately beautiful display of white flowers each spring.

Beach plum flowers are self-sterile, meaning a single flower cannot pollinate itself. Instead, it needs pollen from another beach plum plant to produce viable fruit. While this system helps promote genetic diversity and resilience in plant populations, it also makes successful pollination more complicated. It depends on several factors: genetically different plants blooming at the same time and enough native bees traveling between them to carry pollen from one plant to another.

In places like Maine, where beach plum populations are already far and few between, this reproductive requirement can become a conservation concern.

When plants grow in isolated patches, the distance between them may be greater than what their pollinators can travel.

Habitat fragmentation, coastal development, and climate change can reduce plant density, making successful pollination even more challenging.

Dogwood (Cornus spp.) 

Because flowers rely on pollinators, many plants have evolved creative ways to attract pollinators to their flowers. Several species of dogwoods offer an interesting example of how structure can influence reproductive success.

Consider these three species: flowering dogwood (Cornus florida), kousa dogwood (Cornus kousa), and bunchberry (Cornus canadensis). What many people admire each spring as their “petals” are not petals at all —they’re bracts.

Bracts are modified leaves that mimic large, showy flower petals. They surround the plant’s true flowers, which are much smaller and less noticeable on their own. By framing the tiny flowers with showy bracts, the plant makes them far more visible to pollinators—almost like creating a natural landing pad.

The structure of the true flowers also shapes the pollination process. Because the flowers grow in clustered arrangements, it encourages insects to move across multiple small flowers in one visit, increasing the chances of pollination.

Magnolias (Magnolia spp.)  

 
Some of our most beloved and charismatic pollinators are insects like bees and butterflies— but how did flowering plants successfully reproduce before these insects evolved? Magnolias offer a glimpse into this earlier chapter of plant history.  
 
Magnolias are among the most ancient groups of flowering plants, with fossil records dating back 100 million years ago. When early species of magnolia evolved, they had to rely on the insects that were already present at the time: beetles.  
 

Magnolia flowers are well-suited for pollination via beetles. Beetles are attracted to the abundant protein-rich pollen in each flower. This encourages beetles to travel from flower to flower, ensuring cross-pollination.

The carpels—the female, seed-bearing structures—on Magnolia flowers are firm and durable, making it challenging for beetles to damage these essential reproductive elements.

These examples remind us that the story of plant reproduction is also a story of relationships. Each plant species has developed a unique reproductive strategy completely shaped by its environment, timing, structure, and— most importantly— its pollinators. Whether relying on traveling bees, deceptive bracts, or pollen-hungry beetles, each plant reveals a different strategy for survival.

Have you ever wondered how (or if!) butterflies survive cold Maine winters? Out of captivity, lepidopterans (the order of insects that includes moths and butterflies) use many tactics to survive the colder months.

Keep reading to learn how these winged pollinators manage.

We meet Kristin while she’s working away at the wheel. “I’d shake your hand, but–” she holds up her hands, which are running with wet, saturated clay. She laughs at this, shrugs, and returns her hands to the wheel while she chats.  

“I’ve always liked clay,” Kristin explains. “Since elementary school, when I’d open a box of clay and go, ‘YES!’ It’s very exciting.”  

Clay is found everywhere in her studio: slabs of it on the tables, splatters on the walls, dust on the floor, stacks on the shelves. Its dusty rose color sets a warm tone in the room. Kristin creates dozens of pottery pieces from this clay, and you can see them filling her shelves and tables, each at a different stage of being shaped, fired, and glazed.  

Kristin discovered her love for making pottery in high school, when she had the opportunity to take an apprenticeship with a ceramics maker. Apparently, she was “terrible” at throwing and shaping clay from the start, but she already fell in love with the art that she kept practicing. She found that she liked the beauty of the pottery, but she especially liked its practicality.  

 “[Pottery] is a mix of creativity and has a purpose,” she says. “Functionality comes first.”  

Kristin felt the pressure to have a “real” degree, so she went to college for Psychology instead of art. She didn’t really believe she could make a living out of pottery until she started working at ceramics studios and meeting artists who were successful. She eventually gained the confidence to pursue art as her career, and now she is very happy building her ceramics business.  

Her Goodland Pottery has taken on a distinct style with its maximized shapes, thick lines, and smooth textures. She is inspired by ancient pottery and vintage dishware, as well as the environment around her. Maine has a profound impact on her understanding of the natural world.  

 And, inevitably, she is influenced by the peace and beauty of her studio, a rural refuge in the woods of Montville, Maine.

Kristin moved to Maine thirteen years ago from her Cape Cod hometown (she still thinks about Cape Cod; her pottery is “definitely” inspired by the Cape’s coastal colors). She and her husband came to Montville and converted a sheep farm into their family home. The exterior building that is her pottery studio used to be a “dark, dingy thing” that took years to renovate into the gorgeous, bright space it is today. 

She is constantly in her studio these days because she’s hungry to create: “I like making useful things… I do a lot, but it’s never enough,” she remarks.  

Kristin finishes shaping an entire tray of mugs while we talk. She will add a leaf design to them and then “fire” the mugs in an electric kiln to dry out and solidify the clay. She will pick a glaze to color the mugs, then fire the mugs once again. They will be good for sale after that.  

Kristin believes in investing in creativity as a career. “That’s what I tell teenagers,” she explains. “If you know that’s what you want to do, just do it.”   

She stands up and retrieves a new tray for her next mug design. She returns to the potter’s wheel and sits back down, ready to pick up more clay. The wheel begins to spin as she goes through the motions again.   

“It’ll work out,” she smiles.   

Kristin’s pottery is sold at Gardenshop and online.