Cosmo's Garden

Snow Day

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 22:34:00 +0000

We had almost five inches here by the end of the day on Monday--the only substantial snowfall of the winter. Schools closed (our part of Virginia is not well equipped for snow, and the back roads can stay treacherous until the snow melts). I'm NOT a snowbird, growing up in the desert and all--I find it beautiful but way too cold. Still, the accumulation was still light on Monday morning, so I ventured out with my camera.

My Camellia japonica picked this weekend to start to open its buds--I hope this one is still tight enough that the flower won't freeze, though there are plenty of of buds still forming.

One of my other "flowers," however, was quite happy to be dusted in snow--more on him later.

In "Desert Places," Robert Frost wrote of snow, "The woods have it--it is theirs. /All animals are smothered in their lairs. /I am too absent-spirited to count."

A dogwood,

an ironwood (golden leaves still clinging),

a holly.

But absent-spirited as I may have been (or, to deflate Frost's powerful but disturbing images, "under-caffeinated"), some of the animals were out of their lairs. A flock of red-winged blackbirds were passing through, and stopped at Salix's birdfeeder for a little respite during the storm, providing some nice blacks for my "color" photography (nature wasn't up to her full spectrum that day . . .) .

The male bird's wing adds a little splash of red in the otherwise monochromatic image:

The brown-and-white striped birds are the females, colorful in their own right.

Here's one puffed up, even hawkish in her diminutive way:

And this isn't the greatest picture ever made, but I loved the flash of red as something spurred the flock into flight:

Another animal out of his lair was brave Ranunculus, leaving his couch and warm fire to explore the snow.

He found it ticklish at first.

But quickly discovered that it's cold but joyous (again, not the best shots in the world--except to me and Salix)--

We'll be feeling the same way soon--when we head to the Caribbean tomorrow for Spring Break. So I'll be off-line and absent from blogging until the 15th, which means my Bloom Day post will probably be very late (there's the whole going-back-to-work-thing that we'll have to factor in). But I'll have great pictures of other people's gardens to offer when we get back . . .

Hellebore Heaven

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 16:10:00 +0000

There have been lots of great posts about Hellebores lately--Phillip, Frances, Jeff, Gail, and Tina, who made it plant of the month--and I know I'm missing lots of others. Mine weren't blooming by February's Bloom Day--which is unusual--but by last week, they were starting to open. I'm pretty sure that the three shown below are all Helleborus orientalis, or Lenten Rose. The first two are passalongs from old gardens in Williamsburg--they were about 6" when my friend gave them to me when she thinned out a garden 13 years ago, and they moved with me in 2000. They're now about 2' high by 3'wide (the plant is slow growing--good side, they're pretty maintenance free).

This next photo is of a young plant, a transplanted seedling from the one shown above. The young leaves are smaller and a lighter green.

One of the lovely things about hellebores is that they're evergreen--so as my friend Jacaranda reminds me, you need to pay attention to the foliage when you buy them: even though the bloom is long-lasting (well, about 3 months), you live with the leaves all year. The orientalis leaves are long and dark green--you need to trim the old leaves occasionally and check under them for seedlings.

The leaves of Helleborus foetidus, or stinking hellebore, are more sharply serrated, and the plant is more upright (or my young ones are, anyway).

When I posted on Bloom Day, I thought the foetidus would bloom first--but they're still working. I'm wondering if some will face up (hellebores typically have drooping blooms, so many people try to plant them in slightly elevated sites. Mine are on the ground, so I hope for the occasional irregularity).

Anyway, when I admired Jeff's (The Transitional Gardener's) pictures, he told me about Pine Knot Farms, a nursery in Clarksville, Virginia that specializes in hellebores.

My friend Jacaranda and I started out early Saturday morning, hoping to meet Jeff at Pine Knots. But a little rain and a lot of Cosmo's-version-of-the-space-time-continuum intervened (I live 3 miles from an Interstate that takes me just about everywhere I want to go, and I haven't quite processed that you can't go 70+ once you're OFF the Interstate), and we arrived about ten minutes after Jeff left.

But the place was lovely--on the border of Virginia and North Carolina, the farm is located on a lake that almost renders the farm almost an island--you have to go into NC to get back to the farm in Virginia. It was raining steadily, but it didn't take away from the beauty of the place. Here's the farm pond (excuse the drops on the lens) looking out over the larger pond surrounding the farm.

Here's Jacaranda in the greenhouse, trying to decide between two pinks. Several of the regulars urged him to take both--eventually, he did--but look what he had to choose from.

And the colors are fabulous. As I understand it, the hybrids are experiments--this one dusted with that one's pollen--but when they get a plant they like, they propagate by cuttings--and we get to buy the rest. I was pretty happy with the experiments (though PLEASE someone correct my science if I've misrepresented things--I had a long talk with Jacaranda about breeding guppies on the way home and what I learned was basically that you shouldn't leave your five years' worth of work in a tank with an electric filtering system where a cat can knock it over. )

ANYWAY, here are some of the Pine Knot hybrids:

And I did my part for the economy! Here's my tub of hellebore hybrids, plus a new Pieris floribunda, a new cultivar for me:

And some close-ups:

This was my favorite buy--this is one of the ones they now cultivate, Helleborus x. smithii "Moonlight Sonata." That's a hardy cyclamen leaf next to it--Gail and Tina convinced me last fall to try one in the dry shade under a tree.

So clearly I grabbed a few things besides hellebores. Pieris japonica is one of my favorite shrubs; this Pieris floribunda is supposed to to have showier flowers. I think it looks great next to this hellebore--a fortunate accident, just happens to be where the pots fit into the tub--but I think I'll try to keep them together when I plant them.

I also picked up a Daphne odorata and an autumn fern. My last Daphne survived a move and the hurricane, and then died the next year. I don't think it liked where I had to transplant it, but now that the fallen trees are cleared, I'm going to plant this one where the other one had thrived. Keep your fingers crossed for me--I love them, but they're finicky here.

And how could I resist a Ranunculus! I planted a bunch of bulbs last fall, but this way I know I'll have at least one flower!

So that was my trip on Saturday; by Sunday night it was snowing, and by Monday afternoon we had 5 inches. I took this shot Monday morning, when the accumulation was a little lighter--I hope those big hellebore leaves protect the little flowers.

And here's my other Ranunculus, protected from the cold . . .

I hope to get my snow pictures up in the next day or so--Monday's snow day should have helped time wise, except that I spent the whole afternoon taking pictures! Here's to a quick thaw.

Skywatch Friday: Double Crescent

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 15:50:00 +0000

Two crescents, originally uploaded by cosmosgarden.

Ok, so this is clearly an amateur mistake, but the shadow moon came through on all the photos I took just before dawn this morning. I don't know what caused it, but I decided the effect is kind of cool. Any advice, though, photography gurus?

It was 21 degrees when I took this photo, but the sun has brought the temp up to a balmy 35. C'mon, spring!

Signs of Life: Belated Bloom Day 2/16/2009

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 14:59:00 +0000

Oh, I've been gone way too long! After our long holiday in Arizona, Salix and I returned to one of the most, umm, eventful Januaries we've had in years. Mostly good events--or events with good outcomes--and then a lot of work. But I set February Bloom Day as my return to blogging date, and I almost made it. Hope a Presidents' Bloom Day post is acceptable!

Still, when I set my February date, I imagined pictures of emerging crocus and camellia and narcissus and hellebores. But like many of you, we've endured a colder winter than normal, and most of the early spring plants in my garden are still in bud.

This was the first little bloom I found, where I planted a new germander last fall. I think this might be the germander--it's semi-evergreen and the leaf looks right. But then germander normally doesn't bloom until August--so I may be delighting in a weed--I mean, wildflower.

A few pansies survived the great deer onslaught of 2008:

And the narcissus are starting in the sunnier spots:

I did expect my hellebores to be in full bloom right now, but I guess the cold winter delayed them a bit. The Helleborus foetidus is farthest along. By the way, mine don't stink--except maybe to deer (yay!)--so I'm not sure where the name comes from.

I think Lenten Rose--Helleborus orientalis--is pretty all year long, and the buds are a gorgeous shades of mauve and pale green.

They look kind of like the plant in Little Shop of Horrors right now, don't they?

So anyway, we're waking up slowly to the gardening season--this picture of Ranunculus and his teddy bear coming out of hibernation pretty much captures the mood at our little house in the woods:

And like my Euphorbia lomi, I have my nose pressed up against the window, waiting for it to be warm enough to go outside.

Happy Belated Bloom Day--thanks, Carol, for the inspiration.

I'll be visiting your blogs again soon. I don't know that I'll get back to posting as frequently as I did last summer before, well, this summer--but I look forward to reading about everyone's return to the garden.

Chihuly in the Desert

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 02:48:00 +0000

After almost a month in Arizona, I'm back in Virginia, cuddling with Ranunculus as the temperature drops below freezing. I haven't been outside much, although the garden is calling (well, screaming is more like it)--but after a long time away, and with the mercury falling and the new semester looming and a bad cold festering (I blame the drunk businessmen sneezing all the way from Atlanta), I haven't had much opportunity to garden or even to blog.

But like Rose--who is enduring much colder weather than I and with much less whining about it--I try to forget the wet and chill and take some comfort in the color of the desert--the Arizona desert, to be specific. Rose was there in early December, I was there over Christmas, but we both saw the absolutely phenomenal exhibit of Dale Chihuly's glass sculptures in the Desert Botanical Gardens in Papago Park near Phoenix. Rose has posted many of her photos, and the link above will take you to her posting on the exhibit.

Chihuly's most viewed piece is probably the spectacular glass flowers suspended from the ceiling of the hotel Bellagio in Las Vegas, and his work is shown in the Met in New York and in the Smithsonian in D.C. He has done garden exhibits at Kew Gardens in London and at botanical gardens in New York, Atlanta, Chicago, and most recently at the Phipps in Pittsburg--just to name a few. The exhibit in Phoenix epitomizes his attempt to make the glass look "as if it comes from nature"; many of the sculptures seem to grow from the same earth as the cacti, succulents, and trees surrounding them.

The entrance to the gardens are hung with Chihuly's chandeliers--but even these most "artificial" pieces blend with their surroundings, both in form and color.

Still under the archways of the entry garden, "Green Hornets" seem to sprout among the cacti, including an "Old Man of Mexico" in the center.

The sculptures clearly don't pretend to be real, though sometimes it takes a second glance to realize they're not plants. But some are set almost ironically against their surroundings--like this "Blue and Purple Boat" grounded in the middle of the desert--

--or these "Blue Polyviro Crystals" floating in the Garden's "Desert Oasis":

But the works that struck me the most were the ones that seemed to grow out of the desert (and whose names are taken from plants), like these "Red Reeds and Black Saguaro."

This red and this black are not desert colors, but the forms echo natural ones, and the colors provide striking contrasts to the grays of ocotillo, pachycereus, and agave.

Here the tips of "Red Reeds" blend into the dark green landscape:

And here the vertical "Red Reeds" match the tall cactus behind them and provide a foil for the shorter, broader prickly pear:

"Blue Reeds, Marlins, and Floats" bring out the blue gray of the agave and set off the yellow green of the palo verdes.

My favorite was "Scorpion Tails and Bamboo," here stooping like the little cactus around it--

--and here sprouting almost like stalks from the prickly pear:

Chihuly does indoor "plants" as well--I THINK this is a flower, anyway (maybe it's a hat?)

As striking as they are, Chihuly's are not the only sculptures in the Gardens. This is a (relatively) permanent wood structure in the herb garden, called "St. Earth Walking."

Rosemary plants grow in hollows all over the sculpture.

And while it's not as beautiful as Chihuly's work, this little guy stole my heart. Maybe a donkey, maybe a horse--I think it's a watchdog, another Ranunculus protecting his garden.

I have more photos of the desert, and a whole lot of work to do in my Virginia garden--plenty of material for blogging, if only I can find the time. Happy 2009!

Skywatch: Sunset at the Desert Botanical Gardens

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 15:42:00 +0000

Happy Friday! I'm still enjoying time with family in Arizona, along with the fabulous sites. The Phoenix area is home to the beautiful Desert Botanical Museum, which exhibits both native and exotic (and often rare) desert plants. This holiday season, the museum has incorporated into its already stunning landscapes the glass sculptures of artist Dale Chihuly. Chihuly has arranged the sculptures so that they echo or contrast the plants around them. I'm still going through the hundreds of photos I took (Salix created a monster when he bought me that camera!), but here are a couple shots of some of the glassworks in the sunset that greeted us as we left the exhibit.

I have a few more precious days here--then I'll have more time for blogging. In the meantime, thanks to all of you for your kind comments--I hope your new year is off to a brilliant start!

Oops, almost forgot--here's the link to other contributions to Skywatch.

Happy New Year from Arizona

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 21:31:00 +0000

It's in the 70's, the sun is shining, and my mom and I golfed in shirt sleeves--I know why all the snowbirds winter here!

I've had trouble finding time to blog, but here are a few shots from our gardens. First, some of my sister's whimsy: her lady bug next to some Coleus--

And a wrought iron snail on her patio--

Tacoma stans, or yellow bells, is still is full bloom here--and apparently this plant will grow in North Carlina--so maybe I can keep it going in Virginia--

And flowers more familar to me don't seem to realize it's almost January! My mom's roses and petunias look like mine do in June (and I learned there are no Japanese beetles in the Phoenix area).

Wherever you are, I hope you are warm and happy and safe. Best wishes for 2009! Cosmo

Skywatch: Arizona

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Fri, 26 Dec 2008 18:51:00 +0000

Happy Holidays! Salix and I spend Christmas and New Years with my family in Arizona, where we never dream of white--unless it's the white of desert sands. We're enjoying temps in the 50's and sunshine--Christmas has a very different affect in the Valley of the Sun.

Of course, like most of you, I haven't had much time to spend at the computer. For Skywatch Friday, I thought I'd post on our first glimpses of Arizona skies. These first three were taken through the window of the plane on our descent into Phoenix, which is located in a valley surrounded by beautiful mountains.

I think I've said this before: even though I grew up in the Phoenix area, after years in Virginia I'm always struck by the sheer hugeness of the sky. Our oaks and pines dwarf even the palms in Arizona--in our Virginia woods, we have to look straight up (as in head-all-the-way-back-until-it-strains your-neckup) to see more than a glimpse of sky. Here in Phoenix, you can see all the way to the horizon of mountains that bracket the city. We were up early the first morning (2 hour time change and all that), so I took a walk on the golf course at sunrise--which even here in the West is spectacular. This is the view from my mom's extended backyard.

Now that Christmas is over, we'll have time for a few side trips into some gardens! In the meantime, I wish you and yours the best of the season. Ho ho ho!

Not-much-in-bloom Day, December 2008

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 05:01:00 +0000

The colder-than-normal temperatures have taken their toll--there's very little in bloom outside.This little coneflower--hardly a bloom--is nevertheless a surprise--the dark red of the seeds is still welcome color.

Normally the violas provide most of the color in winter, but when we (and most critically Ranunculus) were gone over Thanksgiving, well, I sort of forgot to spray the Liquid Fence--and without dog or deterrent, the deer had a lovely dinner of their own. As in just about every pansy in the garden. They left one tiny viola on the deck:

The strangest bloom is this Weigela bud, from a sale plant at a home improvement store. It was a late season sale, and the plant was seriously root bound--maybe the plant was so glad to be stretching its legs that it forgot the sub-30 temps.

There are still some tiny late season blooms on the tea olives (Osmanthus fragrans)--and if you're very close, some tiny fragrance.

And some early season promise as well--these buds on the sarcococca (which looks weirdly like the tea olive in these photos, except that the sarcococca at its tallest is ankle high, and the tea olive is about 7 feet)--will turn into flowers as fragrant as the tea olive's were in late summer.

Pieris japonica is my favorite plant. It's an evergreen that loves Virginia conditions--as much as azaleas, nandina, and Japanese maples do--but for some reason it doesn't seem to show up as much in commercial landscaping. I'll post more on this plant when it does its big show in the spring--it's in rehearsal now.

The oak leaf hydrangea are still spectacular, even with dried flowers and waning leaves.

What color there is in the garden is provided mainly by foliage--here, heuchera, holly fern, and ivy.

The hellebores are more prominent now that the trees and taller shrubs have lost their leaves. This is Helleborus orientalis (Lenten Rose):

And this is Helleborus foetidus--which doesn't really stink, and is a wonderful shade plant:

The only other "blooms" are after-blooms--the December berries. Most are red, like these on this cotoneaster(whose purple foliage provides its own winter color)

The pyracantha are still going strong--

--and the Burford Holly berries signal the holiday season--

--along with their native cousins, the American hollies:

(Well, I think these are American hollies--they're native and all over the property.)

Not nearly as showy, but lovely nonetheless, are the barberries on their naked stems.

And the bayberries are just coming out. These berries are fragrant in large clusters and are used for candles. People sometimes pull off the leaves and use the berry-covered stems in dried arrangements (warning to the non-crafty--pulling the leaves is kind of like plucking a turkey, or so I imagine, having never actually plucked anything feathered).

The true blooms these days are indoors. This is a contrary one--this bougainvillea bloomed once all summer. Since I brought it indoors, it's been budding like crazy. Maybe even with our dry summer, it was still too humid outside?

And one of my little holiday arrangements--some paperwhites and poinsettias--

And my stalwart Euphorbia lomi, everblooming in the sunshine through the back window. Ranunculus looks kind of like he's smelling the flowers, doesn't he?

Umm, he's not. This Euphorbia isn't fragrant. Actually, Ranunculus is at this moment mesmerized by the reflections from the disco ball Christmas ornament we hung on the plant.
Or maybe he's just tired from chasing them around.

Animal cruelty? I hope not. Human amusement? Oh, yes. Happy Bloom Day.

Oops, almost forgot the link love--to see what else is blooming this December, check out May Dreams Gardens--as always, thanks, Carol!

Skywatch: Perigee Moon

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 16:48:00 +0000

I'm a day late for Skywatch Friday, but for once I don't have to chalk it up to my organizational challenges. I waited a day on purpose--so I could catch the perigee moon.

It was as if Friday's clouds prepared for the event all day, urging us to keep eyes on the sky.

These are the woods to the back of the house--the area decimated by Hurricane Isabel. But we're literally seeing the silver lining. The heavy woods would have blocked most of these cloud formations from our view.

So I'll get to the perigree moon in a moment--as I move from nature's sublimity to, well, what I like to sublimate. We weren't the only ones watching the sky, it seems. When Salix, Ranunculus and I walked down to the river, we saw these local denizens sky-gazing as well.

Yeah, those are buzzards on the gate to the boat ramp--or, as they prefer to be called, Cathartes aura (which seems way to lovely a way to denominate turkey vultures). There are collective nouns for vultures, and some of them are brilliant--a looming, a wake, a volume--but I'll go with my favorite: a committee of vultures on a gate like this is a fairly rare sight. They congregate at night, in the tops of trees; otherwise, they're usually looking for a meal or eating one (and we saw no carcasses around). But I'll anthropomorphize and assume that they, too, were mesmerized by the sky--that is, until they caught a glimpse of Ranunculus and his petters.

But back to what these skies were forecasting. Perigee moons happen once a month--the "perigee" (as opposed to the "apogee") is the point at which a body in orbit is closest to what it orbits--in this case, the moon to the earth. But perigees are relative--in one month, the moon can be closer than it is in another month--and they can happen during any phase of the moon. Last night's perigee moon was special because it was a particularly close one and it occurred during a full moon, making it appear 14% larger and 30% brighter than it has since 1993 (that's according to NASA, so I'm sure they used their largeness- and brightness-measuring technology.

Me, I just had my camera. This is my much-photoshopped-and-nevertheless-still-lame attempt to shoot the moon late last night:

But this picture, taken at sunrise this morning, comes closer to capturing the impact. That bright light is the moon.

Happy skywatching--now I gotta get ready for Bloom Day (and prove I still have a garden . . .)

Book Boost and a little link love

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 22:42:00 +0000

So--if you're NOT interested in books, check out my friend Phillip's new blog, How It Grows. Phillip--whose blogonym on my blog has been the Curmudgeon--is a landscape designer, and he's done three postings on designing with native plants. Plus he has a link to his photos of the natural wreaths displayed in Colonial Williamsburg this holiday season.

So--if you ARE interested in books (or looking for gifts for someone who is), check out Sarah Laurence's Blogger Book Boost. This is my contribution, starting--since this is a garden blog--with the garden books on my Christmas list.

(Given the nature of Sarah's post, I need to say that although I use pictures below from an on-line source, support your local bookseller!--that way you can look at all the pictures in the garden books I don't mention . . .)

The Well-Designed Mixed Garden is by Tracy Disabato-Aust. Marnie at Roses and Lilacs has already posted on Disabato-Aust's The Well-Tended Perennial Garden, one of my favorite and most-(ab)used garden books. In the Mixed Garden, Disabato-Aust extends her expert advice to trees, shrubs, annuals, and bulbs, and provides 27 sample designs.

Another book I'd love is Making the Most of Shade by Larry Hodgson--lots of pictures, lots of suggestions, lots of design ideas.

And Tony Lord has published a follow up to Gardening at Sissinghurst called Planting Schemes from Sissinghurst. Not that my garden will ever look like Sissinghurst, but one can dream . . .
I've also added Tina's suggestions from In the Garden to my list. That ought to be enough garden reading to get me through January.

Salix has just picked up P.D. James' new novel, The Private Patient. I've been reading James's Adam Dalgliesh novels since I was a teenager (these are fabulous British murder mysteries; Dalgiesh is a poet as well as a detective). Word is, this one (the 14th) may be the last one. Anyway, I can't wait until Salix finishes it.

The book on my nightstand right now is John Dunning's The Bookwoman's Last Fling. Dunning's detective, Cliff Janeway, is a rare book dealer who moonlights as a detective--in this book, he's investigating forgeries he discovers in a dead woman's estate, and his investigation takes him to California racetracks, where he gets a job as a hotwalker to get behind-the-scene info. Books, murder, racing, horses--I couldn't pass this one up. (But as someone who once got a job as a hotwalker to get behind-the-scene info, I have to tell Janeway--the horses say almost nothing useful).

And on my Christmas list, Jane Smiley's latest novel, Ten Days in the Hills. Here's a blurb from the Washington Post:

"A violent war has begun, and a small group of family and friends has taken refuge in a secluded house high in the hills to escape the fighting. Actually, they are hoping to escape news of the fighting. They're in southern California. The fighting is in the Middle East. But most of them don't approve of the conflict, and, besides, the house where they've holed up has a pool and a terrific room in which to watch movies. It's March 2003, and the war in Iraq has just begun. Such is the backdrop for Jane Smiley's new novel, Ten Days in the Hills, a work modeled in part on Boccaccio's Decameron."

Smiley is one of my favorite authors--whether she's rewriting King Lear (A Thousand Acres), sending up academia (Moo), or writing about her love of horses and horse racing (Horse Heaven, A Year at the Races), she's consistently smart, funny, weird, ironic, and often eloquent.

So those are my recommendations. I haven't been doing much reading lately, but the cooler weather and some time in Arizona (and away from the garden) may give me time to catch up.

Sunrise, Sunset: Duck, North Carolina

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 13:55:00 +0000

This post will be my first contribution to Skywatch Friday. These pictures were taken last Friday, when my friends and I were in Duck, North Carolina--I don't think it's likely I'll post every Friday, as I can barely keep up with Bloom Day once a month. But while shoppers across the country were lined up at dawn for Black Friday deals, Ranunculus and I were bundled up (well, I was), sipping coffee (well, I was), and on the beach for sunrise. (No worries--we were shopping in Manteo by noon--as one of our crew suggested, patriotism takes different forms--we did our bit for the economy!)

Duck is on the Outer Banks of North Carolina, a peninsula that runs almost the length of the state. The Outer Banks are bordered by the Atlantic Ocean on the east and by a sound on the west. Duck is a small village toward the northern end of the peninsula, where the peninsula is less than a mile wide--which provides the advantage of beautiful sunrises AND sunsets. Ranunculus and I reached the beach just as the sun came up over the horizon--the moon was still visible.

Duck's beaches are nearly empty in November, and seabirds are everywhere. I had trouble catching them in the dim light, but a few pelicans were out looking for breakfast.

I thought when I went out that I'd take a couple of shots and head home for more coffee. But I'd look down to turn off the camera, look up again--and the sky would be a different color.

As the sun came up, the sky turned magenta, and the photography became easier (not only was I trying not to breathe during the long exposures, but I had Ranunculus on a leash as well--once I could see into the distance, I could let him off leash and there wasn't so much, umm, jostling).

Duck is 1/2 a zone warmer than we are--8 as opposed to 7b--and one marker of the difference is the number of live oaks. Here's a shot of the morning sky through the leaves of one nearby.

Ranunculus found the whole enterprise befuddling. "Beach" to him means "I'm gonna run around and roll in dead fish while mom walks"--but I wasn't walking, and he had to stay close in the dark. I have Robert Frost on my mind still, and I project onto my dog a bit of Frost's horse in "Stopping by Woods": "He gives his harness bells a shake/ To ask if there is some mistake . . ."

So we went home, had breakfast, went shopping--and then headed to the sound side of the peninsula for sunset. The cell tower on the mainland actually provided a nice accent to the brilliant orange skies. And the photography captured what I didn't see until I looked at the photo--a reflection of the sun in the water in the lower left.

I like Duck in November--not only are there fewer people, but there are more clouds, making the sunsets more spectacular.

And I had company at sunset--human company, I should say. This is my friend the Curmudgeon, whose real name is Phillip.

He is an artist, a professional landscape designer, an expert on native plants, and a talented photographer. Check out his new blog, How It Grows.

The Oven Bird

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 20:36:00 +0000

There is a singer everyone has heard,
Loud, a mid-summer and a mid-wood bird,
Who makes the solid tree trunks sound again.
He says that leaves are old and that for flowers
Mid-summer is to spring as one to ten.
He says the early petal-fall is past
When pear and cherry bloom went down in showers
On sunny days a moment overcast;
And comes that other fall we name the fall.
He says the highway dust is over all.
The bird would cease and be as other birds
But that he knows in singing not to sing.
The question that he frames in all but words
Is what to make of a diminished thing.

“The Oven Bird,” by Robert Frost

This poem always reminds me of Thanksgiving--and vice versa--because for years, I thought "Oven Bird" was Frost's dark metaphor for a turkey. But as all English teachers learn eventually, sometimes a cigar is just a good smoke; there is actually a little bird called an oven bird (I'm from the West, and it wasn't until I moved to the East that I learned about oven birds, which are small birds named for the shape of their nests). Still, wrong as I was, the poem evokes late November for me and remains one of my favorites. So it seemed a good intro for my (early) Thanksgiving post and my (late) contribution to Dave's Garden Blogger Fall Color Project.

We're in the middle--really, past the middle, moving toward the end--of that other fall we name the fall. The sky is full--of rain, of wind, of leaves, of birds. The leaves are inches thick on the ground, and yet the trees are still full (lots of work ahead). The woods around the house shimmer in the lower autumn sun, which almost seems to catch them from the underside.

The gold of the poplars sets off the deep reds of viburnum and dogwood.

I've never seen an oven bird--we may not be forested enough for them anymore. But other migratory birds keep our autumn woods in constant motion.

They rest in the pines--from 40 feet below, it's hard to tell the cones from the birds.

And their "song" is deafening. Fall is busy--the trees and flowers may appear diminished, but the chaos of autumn reminds us that nature is in constant flux, and that falls leads inexorably to its opposite. Still, spring seems a long way off.

Salix and I are spending the holiday at the beach with friends. Happy Thanksgiving, everyone.

Vegetable update (on the very pathetic side)

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 13:59:00 +0000

My contributions to Garden Blogger's Vegetable Update are always minimal because I don't have a vegetable garden (or, as we like to call it, a deer diner). But plummeting temperatures this week took out the few offerings I had. My little cowhorn pepper, despite being sheltered by the house, crumpled in the cold:

I'll be able to ripen these last few peppers, but I'm afraid the plant will have to go to the compost heap. And the last brown turkey figs didn't get a chance to ripen.

The birds' vegetable gardens, however, are doing fine. Best-in-show right now are the Pyracantha coccinea, especially the one with the western exposure, which is covered in berries.

Even the herbs are feeling too straggly to have their pictures made--unless I decide to grow some inside this winter, my next updates will have to be more bird food.

Thanks to Tina, Skeeter and Dawn at In the Garden--check out their site to see what's growing in other vegetable gardens. And, umm, happy winter.

Books, Rules, Memes, but no Gardening

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 22:29:00 +0000

There's this book/meme thing going around. I'm not tagging anyone, so don't run away! (umm, yet--at least if you like to read). So Mr. McGregor's Daughter found out about it from both Red Dirt Ramblings and Gardening While Intoxicated, and then invited others to play. Or really, read.

Here are the rules, which I've broken twice:

Grab the nearest book at hand (no fair looking for something intellectual, just what’s within arm’s reach of your keyboard). Turn to page 56, go to the 5th sentence and post your results - include the 2-3 sentences that follow to provide some sort of context. Then turn around and “tag” 5 or so more blogging friends to do the same.

I'm not much for memes, especially since I didn't even know what they were until like a month ago, but I'm pretty fond of books, so this game sounded great. And then I looked at rule 1. And this, no lie, was what was (and still is) next to my computer today--

Two instruction manuals, my sudoku book, and a book about CSI (I'm obsessed with crime drama). Pretty slim pickings.

So I cheated a little--I went up to our old desk top in my office, and had better luck--this very sweet book from my sister, the last book-for-fun that I've read:

It's the memoir of a woman who rescues a standardbred (a trotter, if you follow horseracing at all). Here's p. 56, line 5 ff.--she's adopted the mare and her foal, but has just discovered that the previous owner's vet is going to reclaim the foal to offset a debt:

"Giving out the names and addresses of all the foster homes to the former owner of the horses seemed completely irresponsible to me. What was to prevent him from stealing back the mares, from threatening us, from sending one of his cronies over to beat us up, or from chopping off Georgia's head and sticking under my blanket while I slept?"

If this book were a film, it would be a chickflick. I'm more inclined to the dark side of things--another 10" would have brought you one of the Dexter series (the crime drama thing again)--but I love horses, and this book was heartbreaking.

So, the other rule I'm ignoring? As I promised at the start, no tags. But check out Intoxicated's and Rambling's, and MMD's selections, and I'd love to know what you're reading. As long as it's not a cell phone instruction manual.

And my next post will definitely be about gardening (hmm--does anyone know of any crime dramas with a garden motif? I've often imagined an episode involving foxglove . . .)

Still-in-Bloom Day, November 2008

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Sat, 15 Nov 2008 17:23:00 +0000

It's 73 F. and raining--not the warmest November 15th we've ever had (the local news tells me we went into the 80's in 1993), but quite unusual nonetheless.

And the flowers are loving it (well, at least after I pull the wet leaves off them).

The Knock-out is still a knock-out.

And it's still in bud--a little spider is using one as home base.

The Rosa moyesii is looking a little tattered, but it's still blooming alongside some Salvia guaranitica.

The red of the petals is much deeper in the fall, almost crimson, especially against the gold chrysanthemums:

And a little bug has found some shelter in its petals:

My white shrub rose is also still going strong (and providing food for yet another bug):

This Stokes aster (Stokesia laevis) would probably not be in bloom this time of year, but I just bought it at Lowe's plant clearance, so it's proving a nice addition to the otherwise mum-dominated white garden.
A low-growing white begonia is spreading nicely--I pulled this out of an on-sale hanging basket in summer 2007, and it came back beautifully.

In other parts of the garden, blues dominate. The Angelonia and the Mexican Heather are still going strong--I hope that if the winter remains mild, the Mexican heather might even overwinter.

The heliotrope is loving the cooler weather--this one is nestled in with some thyme and a yellow pansy.

The pansies are establishing themselves nicely--they should bloom all winter. I've planted these blue ones next to some gentian.

I've never grown gentian before (another fall sale at Lowe's)--the blossoms close at night and open again in the sun. I think it's a cool weather plant--it will be interesting to see what it does next summer.

I've been trying to get a good shot of a gaura blossom all summer--here's one (also with buds, also with a bee).

And the ginger lily (Hedychium--I'm not sure of the cultivar) continues to bloom--this one's providing a bed for a sleepy drone (if you haven't already, check out Randy's post on Creating Our Eden.)

And here's my ever-blooming Euphorbia lomi--along with Ranunculus wishing you a Happy Bloom Day (created by Carol at May Dreams Gardens--stop by and check out what's blooming all over the world!)

Arizona Still Life

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 17:00:00 +0000

Arizona and Virginia are eerily opposite. Virginia is humid, semi-tropical, and almost chaotically lush; Arizona is dry, desert-y, and from a Virginian's point of view, almost austere. (Case in point--a Southern Californian visiting my Virginia neighborhood once remarked, "Why don't people here take care of their lawns?" He was used to the pristine, manicured, leafless neighborhoods that an arid climate allows--I told him a Virginian with that goal would either be rich enough to afford a landscape crew or on the brink of insanity). My Virginia garden isn't just visually "noisy." It's often literally loud and it's in constant motion--most months, it's difficult to separate the birds' chatter from the hum of frogs and insects--and the slightest breeze sets the trees going--leaves rustle and trunks groan. Arizona--at least the southern part--is probably windier than Tidewater Virginia, but nevertheless it's incredibly quiet. The distinct calls of a coyote, a quail, a mourning dove punctuate the silence, and long periods can pass in which nothing moves. And the sky is blue, and cloudless, and huge.

This is the view from my mom's back porch in Sun City, Arizona, an expansive retirement community northwest of Phoenix. I grew up in Glendale (also just to the northwest of Phoenix), and my five sisters and brothers and most of their kids and grandkids still live in Arizona. It's a second home to Salix and me, and we spend as much time there as we can.

As you can probably see in the photo, my mom's extended back yard is a golf course. When I was growing up, most people had lawns, but I'd say now that most--or at least many--don't. You usually see expanses of grass like this only on golf courses and in parks, and even on the golf courses, the grass is mainly on the fairways with relatively small rough areas (and lots of rocks). Most homes have desert landscaping.

This is a shot of the back of my mom's house from the golf course. The two tall palms are in her front yard, and the back porch looks out on the 13th hole--it's an ideal location if you like golf, especially since the tee box is close enough to the house that we don't have to worry about stray shots (even mine!).

One of the reasons Arizona seems so still to me is that cactus are imperturbable. Even the smaller ones like agave and aloe seem unruffled by the wind. I didn't like cactus growing up--probably stepped on one too many--but I've come to love them as an adult. Still, I've had trouble identifying a lot of these desert plants (I'd love to be edified and corrected if you recognize any . . .) This cactus in the corner MIGHT be an Espostoa lantana, or snowball cactus--it's "woolly" (meaning lots of fine needles), and it's 12-15 feet tall.

In the other corner of her yard, a kind of Cereus cactus grows between the two palm trees. Cereus have beautiful white flowers, and typical of many cacti, they bloom at night. Most cacti aren't flowering in October--that will be substance for a later posting.

This is a barrel cactus in her front yard--if you look to the left side of the photo, you can see a little yellow baby sprouting.

The iconic cactus is the Sajuaro (Carnegiea gigantea). The Sajuaros can grow more than thirty feet tall, and like many cacti, are very slow growing. It can take decades for a sajuaro to develop its first arm. They are protected in Arizona (for example, you can't just knock one down to put up a house). This one is across the street from my mom's house--the house is a one-story rancher, so this one looks to be about 20 feet. You can see holes where martins or maybe small woodpeckers have nested.

Of course, not all of the plants in Arizona are cacti. One of my favorite shrubs is Caesalpinia mexicana, or Mexican Bird-of-Paradise. My mom's is about 7 feet high and maybe 10 feet wide--rabbit and quail nest underneath it. From about April through September, it's covered in bright orange and red blooms that give way to seed pods in the fall. Here's one last bloom among the pods:

And here's a closer shot of the leaves and the seed pods:

My mom will cut hers back to about a foot when the weather cools down (the plant dies back in the cold). It self-seeds very easily--I've started several plants, hoping at least to grow them as annuals here, but they don't like the humidity and they don't live long. Still, our Virginia summers are getting dryer and dryer--maybe one more go this spring!

Lots of flowers in Arizona bloom almost year-round, like these oleanders on the golf course:

Bougainvillea clambers up walls and across roofs (in Virginia, it's a good year when mine hits 6 feet before the temperatures dip).

This flower is a fairly common landscaping plant--it's all over the golf courses. But no one knows what it is and I haven't been able to find it in my books or on the internet. I have the sense that it's something really common--anyway, I love the gray and yellow combination.

This is another common plant in the neighborhood--it's a large shrub, often trimmed into a flat hedge or a ball shape, and the flower looks like an abelia, and again I have the sense that I should know what it is . . . but I don't. And again, I love the combination of the purple flower against the gray-green leaf.

Bush honeysuckle grows kind of like bougainvillea (as opposed to the kudzu-like invasiveness of honeysuckles here), and the residents often trim it into neat arrangements against walls . Here's the lovely orange blossom with a little visitor:

And a closer view:

The palms are the tallest trees one sees; most of the trees are quite small by Virginia standards, many of them never growing as tall as the ranch-style houses they surround. This little oasis on our golf course is framed by palms, juniper, and mesquite.

(By the way, I love golfing on nearly tree-free courses. Sand and water don't bother me that much--but put a tree in sight, and I'm going to hit it. I spend most of my time on Virginia courses looking for my balls in the woods . . .)

Here's another mesquite tree on the golf course:

And one at my sister Kelley's more rural home in northeast Phoenix:

My mom and I think this next one is a kind of juniper. The curved trunk makes it look like a bonsai (I realize of course that bonsai trees are stunted tall ones--still, when I first arrive in Phoenix, I have the impression for the first couple of days that not only is everything quiet, but the trees also seem miniatures).

So I'm exaggerating a little bit: there's lots of movement in my mom's back yard, and this little morning trek from the Cereus cactus through the Bird-of-Paradise shrub to the tall cactus on the other side is a daily occurence.

And when Virginia visits Arizona, things don't stay quiet. The occasion for our visit was my mom's 80th birthday party, and we all dressed in the style of the decade of her birth (well, most of us). Here's my mom with her brood, save one brother who arrived fashionably late.

And here's the latecomer with Salix, clowning in Amelia Earhardt's goggles (I call this one "Superfly").

I was busy enough with the party, then with catching up with sibs, then with a side trip to Southern California, that I didn't visit any of the great sites like Sedona or the desert museums--I'll do that at Christmas. In the meantime, I'm working on another post on Venice, California gardens--and trying to find time to get work done in my own!

Arizona Wildlife

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 12:11:00 +0000

No gardens here--I'm still processing photographs and (more time consuming) trying to identify at least SOME of the plants I saw in Sun City, Arizona and in Venice, California. But I haven't posted in almost a week and I had to break up the pics somehow, so here are some of the critters I encountered while I was looking for flowers.

This little tortoise has been adopted by my niece, Erin.

Box turtles and snappers are a common sight here in VA, but these desert tortoises (Gopherus agassizii) are more rare and are protected in Arizona (my sister Carrie, not Erin's mom, that would be Kelley--anyway, Carrie has a mated pair and finds homes every year for the babies). So it was a bit of a surprise when this little one just wandered into Kelley's yard. This is probably a female, though she's young and it's easier to tell when there's a male and a female together--but females have more dainty horns (what we'd see as a nose) and their shells are rounder. She'll get to be about a foot long and maybe 6 inches high, and if she survives predators and real estate development, she'll outlive most humans. Erin has made her a pen and feeds her gourmet meals:

We're not supposed to take these tortoises directly from the wild (there's an official adoption procedure), but this one is actually safer in controlled surroundings. Kelley lives in foothills, in a formerly remote area that is now being heavily developed--the combination of the human threat and the threat posed by natural predators whose terrain is being drastically reduced makes Erin's pen a safe haven: plenty of water, plenty of food, plenty of room to burrow. So don't tell.

I live with wildlife, as anyone who reads regularly knows--deer, turkeys, squirrels, and rabbits call my backyard home (and, unfortunately, sometimes my gardens). Still, I'm fascinated by some of my mom's wild "pets." These are desert quail (Callipepli gambellii--the species name means "beautiful robes")--they trek across her yard at the same time every morning. By fall, the covey is all adults. Here, they congregate under a rosebush--these quail fly only short distances, and so make their homes (and find their safety) in thorny shrubs. Their chief predators on the golf course behind my mom's house are coyotes, roadrunners, and hawks--but judging from the quails' numbers, the rose bushes are doing their jobs.

I want to say "here's a couple," but all I really know is that it's a male and a female--you can tell the male by the more intense coloration, including the black face, the little rust "helmet," and the topknot (I have these vague memories from childhood of a cartoon quail who kept blowing the topknot up out of its face--not too inaccurate as far as I can tell).

And here's a male close-up, posing on a boulder near a Cereus cactus:

My mom's backyard extends onto a golf course, and the other course mascot is one of the quail's natural enemies, the coyote.

Despite the cartoon, I have to say that given the choice between a roadrunner and a coyote, I'll take the coyote any day. I SO wish I could have captured a picture of a roadrunner, but sightings are rare (and often brutal--they show up when they're chasing prey) and ephemeral. But they are aggressive and, IMHO and oxymoronically, pretty ugly--the one "truth" of the Warner Brothers cartoon is that the roadrunner is in fact more ruthless than the coyote (I think of them as really fast buzzards after live prey).

On the other hand, I have an affection for coyotes (a dog lover to the core). I don't underestimate the potential danger--they pose the same threat as any wild or strange dog does. On the other hand, they've been weirdly domesticated on Sun City courses--sometimes you have to golf over them, and they're not perturbed by humans or golf bags or carts or flying balls. And so they're easy to capture on film. Here's one (could we say, posing?) on the course just outside a neighbor's yard:

And another sauntering away after my mom and I disturbed his sunbath (on the edge of a sandtrap)--notice the resentful look?

Arizona is lovely in October--it can hit 90, but as they say, it's a dry heat (which is true at 90--Arizona's low humidity 90 is pleasantly warm, as opposed to Virginia's 90, where the humidity renders the heat index in the 100's--however, at 120, it's another story--do you want some broth around you as you braise or do you prefer to be dry roasted?) Still, the coyotes seemed to relish the sprinklers:

I'm still learning how to shoot video on my camera, but this one was fun:

I'll be posting more on these trees in my next post--but for now, Mr. Coyote says it all:

Gotta go (for now).

More on Arizona and California VERY soon.

Bloom Day October 2008

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 21:15:00 +0000

First off, a confession. These are pictures from my garden in Virginia, but I've been in Arizona for about ten days on an extended Fall Break, so these blooms are about ten days old. But I'm pretty sure most of the flowers I've represented here will still be around when I get home.

Second, if anyone's reading who doesn't already know about Bloom Day, do check out May Dreams Gardens for Carol's cornucopic compendium of fall blooms!

It's been a relatively warm (and thank goodness, relatively wet) fall in Virginia, so the garden is still pretty lively. I've featured the buddleja all summer, but it deserves special mention this month because the monarchs have arrived!

Their bright orange is spectacular against the pale purple of our volunteer. In fact, this bush is so popular that the bees and butterflies are fighting over it. Forgive the little burps in this video--it's my first--but listen and watch for the bee toward the end:

The Rosa moyesii is almost as abundant as it was in the spring, and the combination should be spectacular when the chrysanthemum around it opens.

The tea olive (Osmanthus fragrans) is in bloom. I've heard the fragrance described as apricot, but I think it's more like orange blossom. Anyway, it's heavenly--I grow mine near windows so that the scent wafts into the house when we open the windows to the cooler fall evenings.

Not a great picture--and I'm not sure I'll find this clematis still blooming when I get home--but we had a little surprise blossom at the top of our vine (I don't know the cultivar).

Beneath the clematis, a few Echinacea purpurea have decided to rebloom--more fresh seed for the goldfinches if the weather stays warm-ish.

And another critter is enjoying the coneflower--I assume this is some kind of spider, but I couldn't identify it (for one thing, my Virginia native stuff books are three time zones from here!)

The Loropetalum chinense is blooming again as well.

And in the new blooms department--my leopard plant's flowers are starting to open. My tag (from Elizabethan Gardens) calls this plant Farfugium japonicum. I've also seen it (or something very similar to it) called Ligularia tussilaginea and Fulfugium tussilagina. The plant should still be in bloom in November--the daisy-like flowers are wonderful as other plants in the garden begin to nestle underground.

The azaleas are still in their full fall rebloom:

And the Pelargonium I pulled out of an on-sale hanging basket at a local grocery store is loving the cooler weather.

The Mandevilla vine is still going strong. The first frost will kill it, but it thrives in the early fall when it gets a bit more rain. I will probably try to overwinter it--when the nightime temperatures dip into the low forties, I'll trim it back to about 12" and bring it in to a sunny space in the house (if weather permits, I'll leave it just outside the back door for a couple of days to provide it some transition). If I keep the soil dryish, the plant should stay alive but stop growing--then, after frost date in the spring (April 15th here), I'll start its transition outdoors again). Overwintering the whole plant gives me a better shot at a large vine next summer--if it doesn't work, I can always get another one at Lowe's . . .

The Salvias guaranitica and uliginosa are still going strong--the leaves are actually fading faster than the flowers!

And the mums are blooming like crazy. These orange ones started as a small housewarming gift in 1993--within a couple of years, they were all over the garden at my old house, but I just had to take a few with me.

And now they're all over my gardens again--here, they grow with coneflower and salvia--

--and here, delightfully if thanks to my lazy weeding, it grows with clover.

My annuals are doing well, too--the Mexican heather, angelonia, pansies, and even the heliotrope are still blooming. But here are a few other things I've found around the garden:

Ranunculus seeking shade when I spend too much time taking pictures--

--a black and yellow garden spider moving her web from the garden to a window (perhaps she's a bit vain?).

And to close: here's my Euphorbia lomi, perpetually in bloom, but now safely inside when the temperature dips below 60.

Ranunculus says, "Happy Bloom Day!"

Yucca yucca yucca

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 15:14:00 +0000

This one's not going to be pretty--no photos of charming European cities filled with charming European flowers. I'm back in my own backyard, doing one of the things I enjoy most--dividing crowded perennials and deciding where to put the new plants.

So one of the things I've put off too long (as you will see in a minute) is dividing my Yucca filimentosa. I was raised a desert rat--in Glendale, Arizona--and although I've lived in and loved Virginia for most of my life, my family ties are in the West and I try to fill my house and yard with reminders of it. And besides being a little echo of my own past, this plant has a past of its own. It comes from my old house, which was a heavily wooded lot of about an acre. When I first moved in many many years ago, I wanted to plant herbs, and there was only one small area with full sun. The previous owners had filled it with low growing juniper and a yucca plant--and in my garden naivete (this was my first house), I pulled them up and tossed them back in the woods (I've learned my lesson. . .)

I'm so glad I didn't toss them in the trash--because several years later, when something drew me back into the woods, there was the yucca plant, flourishing in leaf mold and in the shade. I brought it back to its place in the sun--and when I moved, it was one of the plants I brought with with me.

Yucca isn't a plant one normally associates with Virginia. By all accounts, it likes sandy soil and dry conditions, and it's prolific in desert states. Nevertheless, it's a native plant in the Eastern U.S., and it's almost as popular in VA as it is in AZ, despite our heavy clay and humidity. And it's a very low maintenance plant (as mine's tenacity in its woodland exile shows).

Of course, in my gardens anyway, the low maintenance plants suffer from benign neglect, and I noticed when the yucca was sending up its 6-foot stems of white flowers this summer that it needed dividing--so when the weather cooled down a bit, I resolved to give it some attention.

(And talk about lack of attention--although I started taking pictures for this blog in late May, this is the only one I have of the yucca plant, right before it bloomed--the photo's not great to begin with, and the stalk is barely visible on the left side of the photo, at the far end of the white garden).

Here's a more recent close-up. Yucca can be propagated from seed, from cuttings, or from the offsets that grow up on the sides of the parent plant. It grows from a very dense rhizome, so division isn't especially easy--but this plant clearly needs dividing.

Here's one baby:

And another:

The offsets don't just pop out--I had to dig up the whole plant just to see how many there actually were and to be sure that I got sufficient root on the new plants. Here's a photo of three offsets just on one side:

When I could cut out a piece of rhizome, I did--but in some of the denser parts, I had to cut the root by inserting two shovels back-to-back and prying it apart. The root on this offset maybe gives a sense of the size of the mass I was dividing.

I ended up with many more babies than I anticipated--I thought I'd be taking out about three, but I ended up with nine.

I transplanted three of them into other parts of the garden, and I added a little bit of hummous around the parent when I replanted it (but not a lot--they don't need rich soil). I potted up the rest of the babies and nestled the pots against the parent--it's thriving there, so I figure the light is right. Yucca is hardy to Zone 4, so the pots should be fine in our 7b climate until I find new spots (or new homes) for them in the spring.

The little orange pots have little pieces of rhizome in them that chipped off when I was separating the offsets--we'll see what comes up. The plant grows in 3x3' clumps and sends up magnificant 6' flower stalks in summer; it's almost maintenance free and incredibly drought resistant; the deer don't bother it . . . I think I can find a spot for these little ones.

P.S. on time, posts, and desert plants: I started this posting a couple of weeks ago, and it's maybe a little ironic that I'm actually finishing it in Arizona, where the yucca is still in full bloom. When I left Virginia 2 days ago, 8 of the 9 transplants looked great--maybe I'll design a yucca allee or something. And I'll be posting on my trip to Arizona soon--but not until I provide a little more evidence that I actually do occasionally work in my garden!

Amsterdam Flower Market

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 16:41:00 +0000

Our best fare on our way back from Norway involved a 24-hour layover in Amsterdam. Since what we saved would be more than the hotel room, we thought, why not? We'd get to see one more Western European city (a little of it, anyway), and break up our marathon flight.

Amsterdam is charming. It's built over canals, like Venice (one of its nicknames is "Venice of the North"--do you think they call Venice "Amsterdam of the South"?), but the canals are more narrow. Our hotel was near the Singel canal, which is the oldest canal in the city.

Amsterdam is a medieval city, but most of the buildings in the part of town we stayed in date from the 16th and 17th centuries. It's a small city, but heavily populated--I took most of these pictures in the morning, before the crowds came out onto the streets.

Still, someone was up--I've tagged this next one "Got Milk?"

But the coolest thing about the Singel canal--to me, anyway--was that it leads to the Amsterdam Flower Market, which is several blocks long and built out over the canal. This is the back side, from across the canal--with the front side painted on.

Notice the tops of the tall buildings (probably former warehouses)--I'll talk more about those in a minute.

The flower market was gardener's paradise--cut flowers, potted flowers, bulbs, seeds--it was hard to be satisfied with pictures. Here's one of my favorites, black dahlias:

Some gorgeous sunflowers:

Lilies, lilies, lilies:

Crocosmia and chocolate cosmos:

I very carefully took a picture of the bulb package next to this plant--but I didn't get the species name in the frame, so I don't know what it is! I assume it's some kind of lily--the cultivar is called "Gloriosa Rothschildiana":

Carniverous plants were very popular, especially pitcher plants:

And bulbs everywhere:

There are very strict regulations about which bulbs may be brought back into the U.S., and they're not the most interesting ones. And that's all I have to say about that.

We did see a few sites beyond the flower market. Here's one of those buildings I mentioned earlier--see the decorative gismo at the top?

Here's a close-up. It's a little crane--when these were warehouses (they seem to be apartments now), barges would come down the canals, moor next to the building, and the cranes would haul the goods up into the warehouse. Salix could be a tour guide.

We saw other sites--and sights! This is a statue of Multatuli, pen name of Eduard Dekker, a famous satirist and critic of Dutch colonialism in the East Indies (Indonesia):

This gorgeous building is now a shopping mall:

This is the Westerkirk, where Rembrandt is reputedly buried:

We didn't see nearly as much of the city as we would have liked, because we were there for only an afternoon and evening and because I spent so much time in the Flower Market. We missed some of the things for which the city is famous, like Anne Frank's house and the Van Gogh museum. But we did get some sense that Amsterdam is a bit of a party town (the beer for two euro was SUCH a deal after the $12 beers in Norway!):

We couldn't figure out what this building was--we think apartments--maybe the tenants frequent the coffee shops? (more on those in a minute)

Salix at the Torture Museum (actually, the real torture museum for him was probably the third hour in the Flower Market--but he's got quite a high threshold, Salix does)--

Anyway, to make up for all the time spent smelling the flowers, I took him to the famous red light district--BEFORE the red lights came on:

Of course, Amsterdam is also famous for its coffeeshops, where you can in fact get coffee (they can't sell alcohol in them anymore). But that's not the main attraction (and the cafes are a, umm, less edgy place to get your cappucino). I loved the names of the coffeehouses, like Amnesia. Or Grey Area. Or this one, the Grasshopper:

Or "Homegrown Fantasy":

And just in case you think the "homegrown" might be false advertising, back to the Flower Market for a moment:

The "Starter Kit" comes with a "User Manual" (hmm)--and yes, the label in this next shot does say "Canned Cannabis."

So Amsterdam has a whole other kind of flower power going on.

It's taken me a month to post a day's worth of photographs--in part because I'm spending every spare, precious, cool early fall moment in the garden. My next post won't be so exotic (or probably interesting)--but back to my back yard for awhile. Still, Europe is wonderful and I can't wait to get back!

Bergen, Norway: The Leprosy Museum and The Botanical Garden

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 01:04:00 +0000

It's a little embarassing that almost a month later, I'm still finishing up the postings on our Norway trip. And I think the pictures in this posting are going to look more familiar than those in my earlier postings. The reason: my favorite part of my trip to Norway was the plants, many of which grow here. I spent the most time in the back yard of the Leprosy Museum and the back yard of the Natural History Museum. That's a future posting--other people's backyards. I do get into them occasionally, not always by invitation (I'd love to get into some of yours . . .).

Ok, so the Leprosy Museum is quite famous--it's the former site of St. Jorgens Hospital, which was dedicated to the treatment and eradication of leprosy in Norway during the 19th century. Leprosy is also known as Hansen's Disease, named for the Norwegian, Armauer Hansen, who discovered the leprosy bacillus. The museum itself is fascinating and occasionally depressing--some of the patients' incredibly cramped quarters have been left as they were, and the medical instruments and depictions of the patients on display are a little frightening. The part of the museum I liked best? The medicinal garden in the back.

The herbs--more accurately, the medicinal plants--grew in slightly raised beds set between a small lawn and a walkway. The plants fell over the edges of the bed, providing lots of fragrance as I brushed by them.

The plants weren't marked, which was both frustrating and a little humbling. I kept thinking, "I know what this is!" But then I couldn't remember . . . (in some cases, still can't).

Of course I recognize coneflower, though I've started to think of it as ornamental, forgetting that it's Echinacea, the root of which was traditionally used as an antibiotic. I don't think I'm telling anyone anything they don't already know, but Echinacea root is sold in capsule form as a very popular means of boosting one's immune system. (The voles in my garden have been going after my coneflowers--maybe they're gearing up for flu season?)

Another wonder herb--allium. This is one of those things that I'll probably be embarrassed by--but I'm not sure exactly what this is. I've read that onions and garlic are among the most beneficial foods we can eat. Almost everything I cook starts with garlic, onion, and red pepper (ok, so maybe not brownies). But I don't grow garlic or onions--this is some kind of garlic, right?

And this next one--I'm pretty sure it's some kind of Eupatorium--I guess they might still be growing Boneset for historical color. There was no flower, so it's pretty hard to identify.

And I loved this flower! The Curmudgeon says it's a Saponaria. I've grown the kind called "Bouncing Bet," which is taller and pinker. This one is gorgeous--I think it might have been a volunteer in their tansy bed.

And could this be Gunnera? At first I thought Norway must be too cold, but then Bergen has a milder climate than we do in Eastern Virginia. I've never heard that Gunnera has a medicinal use, but this was the more ornamental edge of the garden--or, just as likely, I don't what the medicinal use is . . .

From the Leprosy Museum, I headed over to the Botanical Gardens--they're behind the Natural History Museum at the University of Bergen. I was there on an unusually sunny day--and like students in Virginia, the students in Bergen were making the most of it.

The gardens had a huge collection of Primula, a number of which I'd seen in other gardens. This long border is mostly Primula and ferns.

This one is Primula vialli . . .

I couldn't find the tag for the next one. I think it might be Primula sikkimensis--I love the flower:

This next one is embarassing. I thought I'd included the tag in the frame, but I missed half of it (so I can see c-a-p, maybe -i?)--I haven't been able to find it in my books--the flowers look a little bit like an allium, though the leaves are pretty clearly Primula.

This flower was in a bed of Rudbeckia, and again I couldn't find the label. I love it--is it possible it's Inula?

This was another flower I loved but couldn't find a tag for--my friend Jackaranda thinks it might be Impatiens balsamina.

I did run into another tourist in the garden, but he didn't know the names of anything:

I was happy to see that, like me, the Botanical Gardeners occasionally missed a spot (or maybe they just want some things to go to seed?)--I loved these yellow flowers on the ornamental kale (it's kale, right?--I might actually get some if the flowers look like these).

And the sign says this next plant is a cherry belle radish!

I have grown cherry belles, but I never let them go--will they really get this big?

Anyway, the Botanical Gardens were lovely. These are very familiar plants--two of my favorite annuals, marigold and heliotrope--the arrangement falls under the category "why didn't I think of this?"

So I came away from my trip with some ideas for my garden next year--and I have been working in it (one reason, in this cooler weather, that I haven't been posting very regularly). I'll be back to my own flowers soon--after one more post on Europe--on Amsterdam's flower market--coming soon. Adjo, for now.

"Vegetable Garden" Update, September 2008

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Sat, 20 Sep 2008 04:00:00 +0000

I had to put it in quotation--I don't have a vegetable garden--just some pots on the deck, a few fruit trees, and a lot of herbs. But Tina and Skeeter at In the Garden have suggested that we post on our edibles on the 20th of each month, and I do have a few. So here's my update--and maybe I'll spend my down-time this winter figuring out how to have vegetable garden (for human consumption, I mean) in deer country.

So, what's ready for harvesting? The cow horn peppers (I've also heard them called bull horn, not sure how to tell the gender!)--these weathered the drought and our absences this summer pretty well--

The jalapenos are still putting forth peppers, but aren't really photo-worthy right now (still, straggly or not, they are SO hot--don't know if it's the breeding, the weather, or what, but they're hotter than is typical and I love 'em).

The herbs are blooming--I usually let them flower (but heed Tina's advice if you have only a few plants), which means mine are kind of spindly this time of year. Right now, I'm more interested in their forming seedheads and coming back next year--I've dried oregano, sage, and thyme, and I'll buy a few more young basil plants to nurture (and pluck) over the winter (I don't like dried basil or mint--though pesto is fabulous and freezes well).

The rosemary is generally evergreen, unless the winter is brutal (Virginia-wise, I mean--we get
spoiled here in 7b). I'd like to think that Ranunculus is smelling the herbs, but I'm pretty sure he's chasing a lizard (no worries--he never catches anything).

My lemon verbena is thriving--it's almost a shrub--it dies back completely in the winter, and I sometimes foget about it under the marjoram until it pops up with a vengance in May.

And the thyme--well, it's everywhere. This used to be an herb border in the front--it's now a thyme lawn. There are two kinds in this picture--culinary (Thymus vulgaris) in the bottom left-hand corner, and ornamental Mother-of-thyme spreading across the yard. We'll leave the thyme lawn (and hope it spreads even farther), but I'm mining the thyme to start elsewhere.

There are other herbs I love that I've never grown successfully: tarragon, borage, cilantro--and some that haven't thrived: dill, fennel, parsley. I'm wondering if it's a climate issue or operator error--subject for future post.

Here's an annual visitor to the old vegetable gardens in the front--no, not Ranunculus. I just brought him in to provide background for a plant you couldn't see otherwise.

(But note how he embraces his work--he knows he looks best in 3/4-profile. He only wishes he'd included the no-nudity clause in his contract--can I say that without putting that little "Rated PG" on my posting?). Anyway, look down by his left forepaw--

That little fernlike plant against his leg is asparagus. It's been here since we moved in--it comes back in these slender stalks every year, never getting quite big enough to harvest. If we ever do get a vegetable bed going, I'll have a pretty resilient starter (well, in a year or two . . .)

Our figs are still producing. We have two trees--a Celeste and a brown turkey. In early August, the Celeste was incredible--we were having fig appetizers, fig desserts, fig chutneys, and tossing the overripe ones under the bird feeder. We're harvesting from both trees at a much more reasonable pace, now--and a lot of the green ones probably won't ripen completely. This is ripe fruit on the brown turkey fig:

This tree has grown much faster--and wider--than we expected. It's only a couple of years old, but it's already over the (first story) roof--Jackaranda and the Curmudgeon are going to help me prune it next spring.

The Celeste fig is smaller and the fruit ripens earlier. I can't actually tell the difference in the taste of the fruit, but the tree is much more polite--it's about 8 feet high and much more contained. There are still scores of figs on the tree, but most are green and I don't think many will ripen--we're taking off two or three a day, as opposed to 20-30 earlier. (That little orange spot, by the way, is a daddy-long-legs on guard duty).

We have other fruit trees as well. Salix started an orchard last year, so the trees are very young--but he did get a small harvest, most of which has already disappeared into Salix. But here's the last pear. I'd like to say we saved it for today, but in fact I think it just looks too weird to eat.

And finally, another surprise right off the back deck. Obviously, something thought this was tasty--I spent an anxious afternoon hoping it wasn't Ranunculus.

So I wonder if what's toxic to humans is less so to rabbits or deer? We haven't seen any sick (or worse) animals around here--but I threw the mushroom away just to be sure.

And speaking of toxins (oh, my segues are getting lame)--one more shot of my new friend, on guard duty off the deck:

She's a friend to vegetables (bet she's never eaten one!) and so I made her my Update mascot.

Tina, Skeeter, and Dawn--thanks.

Bloom Day September 2008

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 04:00:00 +0000

I can't believe it's mid-September. For one thing, here in Virginia it's 90 degrees in the shade--and that would be the full deep cold shade produced by the northeast corner of the house--I'm just not going to think about what the temperature might be in the sun. Suffice it to say that I finished gardening by 7:30 this morning. I'm also just not going to think about the fact that, despite the heat, summer is effectively over. Still, as I went out to document my September garden for Bloom Day (check out May Dreams Garden if you haven't heard about Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day), I was struck by the fact that many plants seem about a month behind, I think because of the heat and drought this summer. My Don Juan climbing roses, for example, are in glorious rebloom--I usually see this early in August.

This rebloom is especially welcome because the Japanese beetles are long gone--the roses haven't been this pretty since May.

The Rosa moyesii "Geranium" is also still in its second bloom (the other shrub roses have faded).

But it's had some unwelcome guests--the heat is, I think, giving some of our other bad bugs a slightly longer life:

The same bug seems to be after this dahlia--the flower was a sweet surprise, as it's either a volunteer or something I forgot that I planted--it's actually come up under the Rose moyesii, so I'll have to move it once it finishes blooming.

Ok, I have to think about my principle of organization here--do I stay with bugs or say more about rebloom? This next photograph combines the two--but I'll start with the bugs.

The detail I get with my new camera has a potential downside--so I snapped this picture of a little allium coming up alongside an azalea in bud, and then I decided to crop so I could better see the visiting bug:

Do you think this might be an adult onion maggot? (Here's the whole blogging-as-a-gateway-drug thing again--I need more comprehensive books with color plates . . . ) Or could it be a male deer fly? The onion maggot is trouble (and every online site I visted showed the same lame b&w drawing of the adult, not much help); the male deer fly would be just stopping by for some nectar. And of course, when I cropped the photograph, I saw all the little bugs--aphids, right? I think I need another dose of insecticidal soap.

Here, I hope, is a better bug, on the same allium plant (I like the shadow in this photograph).

The cropped version shows this bug in closeup. I hope this is a soldier beetle, and I hope it likes aphids--seems to be what it's after.

More bugs (one more, anyway) later.

On to happier subjects: the azaleas are starting their fall bloom. The one below gets a little more sun than the one in bud by the allium, and is in its full autumn splendor:

Here's another view of it behind the japanese painted fern, elephant ear (Colocasia esculenta), and our whimsical little weather-horse:

(Forgive the digression: azaleas are deer candy, which reminds me that I was speaking to a gardener who's recently moved to our area, and he was asking me how I coped with the deer. When I mentioned the deer cages, he looked at me like I was insane. At first I thought it was an aesthetic thing--granted, the cages are not the loveliest things in the world--until I realized he thought it was the deer that I put in the cages. Clearly I need to work on clarity.)

(Forgive a second digression, something of an editor's note (actually me unable to edit): for some reason, at this point in the posting, the Enter key apparently stopped functioning--although there are spaces between the paragraphs when I edit the post, the published version has everything jammed together. Maybe blogger is trying to imitate my garden . . . But onward]

The Abelia, too, is producing some new blooms (I think this is A. "Edward Goucher"--another lost tag) --Les, the Tidewater Gardener, posted on the (grand?) parents of this plant in August.

So, from rebloom to steady bloom. The stalwarts are still, well, stalwart. I'm amazed that the Salvia guaranitica (black & blue) and the Salvia uliginosa are still going strong. Granted, I first encountered them at the Elizabethan Gardens in mid-October, but mine started blooming in May this year, so I thought they might finish earlier. They're so tall that they're starting to flop in some spots--this one's stooping to visit a Coleus.

But this one stands as tall as the Agastache and elephant ear neighboring it (and these little mum buds will pretty surely be the stars of October's Bloom Day):

The butterfly bushes go on and on. Both the light purple volunteer bush . . .

. . . and the one in the white garden continue to put forth new blooms.

Echinacea purpurea "White Swan" keeps the white garden looking white,

with the help of one last Shasta Daisy.

And the annuals keep the color going at the front of the borders. Here's annual vinca (from a bargain basement hanging basket, no tag, don't know the Latin name) in the white garden:

And in the sunny border, one of my favorites, Angelonia

pops up amidst Mexican heather (Cuphea hyssofolia--actually a tender perennial) and Heliotrope.

A Mandevilla vine provides color alongside the house.

Some blooms have given way to fruits--or almost, anyway--while this isn't the greatest shot (the breeze this morning was wreaking havoc with my depth of field), I was delighted to find this little blossom among the Pyracantha berries:

The Callicarpa berries are ripening--a little later than Tina's at In the Garden, who posted last month about this wonderful native.

And the seedheads are starting to form on my Harlequin Glorybower (Clerodendrum trichotonum)--another one of my favorites--the flowers smell like vanilla; the crushed leaves smell like peanut butter.

Some plants are just starting to bloom. This Ceratostigma plumbaginoides is a new plant in a new bed--more on that project soon.

I picked up this Plectranthus plepalia (Swedish ivy) at the same time I bought the Cerostigmata (this one an impulse buy)--it's getting its first little flower. This is a very tender perennial--I'm going to keep it in a pot and try to overwinter it indoors.

Another new plant with an autumn bloom: Chelone "Hot Lips," or Turtlehead--another plant I learned about from Tina.

And speaking of amphibians (or is a turtle a reptile? an embarrassingly corny segue, in any case)--my toad lily (Tricyrtis, probably hirta, "Lightning Strike") is starting to bloom:

But my favorite new bloom is my ginger lily, Hedychium (most likely coronarium or flavescens). This is another acquisition from the Elizabethan Gardens. It's a tropical plant, originally from Nepal, but it's said to be the national flower of Cuba (where it's called "Butterfly Flower") and it's become an invasive weed in Brazil. It's been hardy in my Zone 7b garden--in fact, it's spread quite a bit, which is fine with me because it's incredibly fragrant. And it often blooms into November if conditions stay mild.

It's a tall plant--this next photograph isn't particularly good, but it gives a sense of its height. You can see the back door in the background, and the Don Juan blossom is probably close to 6'.

Something else I've been waiting for--the return of the Black and Yellow Garden Spider. Gail at Clay and Limestone posted about these beauties earlier in the summer, but they show up later here than they do in Tennesee. Today, I saw the first evidence of their return--the distinctive zigzag in the web.

And then, on the deck, the spinner herself:

I plan to close every Bloom Day with the only plant I have that blooms year round--my Crown of Thorns (Euphorbia lomi). Since it will be a regular on my blog, I figured I better switch out its surroundings from time to time. We've actually started its move indoors (prematurely--who knew it would hit 100 on September 14th?)--but since it will need to come in as soon as the temperature drops below 60, we've moved it close to the door to deck, where I caught its reflection.

So Ranunculus and I say, "Happy Bloom Day!"

Bergen, Norway: Mount Floyen, the Bergenhaus Festning and Lille Lungegardsvan

noreply@blogger.com (Cosmo) — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 20:54:00 +0000

We've spent the morning waiting for Tropical Storm Hanna. And speaking of depressions:

School has started. Summer is (all but) over. Time in the garden is hard to come by.

So by way of repressing the depressing (and because Hanna is dropping some much needed rain and keeping me inside), I'm going to return to Norway for a little while.

The best view of Bergen (the city we visited, the second largest in Norway) is from the top of Mount Floyen. It's about a 45 minute hike to the summit (at 1050 feet)--but to save energy for the trails at top, I took the Floibanen, a funicular railway with huge windows and a glass roof that affords spectacular views of the city center. This is a view of Vagen Harbor.

The harbor opens onto the Byfjorden. You can see a cruise ship moored on the north side of the harbor (top right); the Fisketorget (fish market) is at the end, and our hotel is the red building on the south side (to the left). Here's a closer view of the hotel, above the trees in the foreground.

The slopes of Mt. Floyen are typical of the forest in the fjords--lots of spruce, pine, aspen, oak, birch, and mountain ash (or rowan). The rowan trees thrive in incredibly rocky conditions; this time of year, they are covered with red berries.

At the summit of the mountain is a restaurant surrounded by balconies with spectacular views and beautifully landscaped lookout points.

Potentilla seems to flourish in Bergen's climate--besides roses, it was the most common perennial I saw in the cultivated gardens. In this border alongside the restaurant, it's nestled alongside a sedum and an adorable little yellow flower that I haven't been able to identify--maybe some kind of impatiens? Does anyone recognize it? I love it--and though I haven't had much luck with potentilla, sedum does well here--maybe this yellow flower would grow in Virginia?

Here's more potentilla in a larger, more sprawling border . . .

. . . with primula and heathers (mostly erica purpurea, which grows both in the wild and in cultivation) . . .

and coreopsis very like my "Moonbeam."

This border led to the hiking trails through the forest, which were bordered by ferns and wildflowers--I think this is delphinium:

The forest was gorgeous on its own, especially in the late morning--it was hard to stay on the trail.

But I still had a lot of Bergen to explore, so after a lovely morning in the woods, I headed back down to the city. This shot is from the top of the funicular and shows where I'm headed:

The body of water to the right (north) is Vagen Harbor; the lake to the left with the fountain in the center is Lille Lungegardsvan, which is surrounded by gardens and art museums; between them is the theater district and Ole Bulls Plass.

At the north end of the harbor--where the cruise ship was moored--is the Bryggen, which is the site of the first settlement. The facades of these warehouses--some dating from medieval times--make up THE iconic image of Bergen--so wouldn't you know it, I never took a photograph! No flowers, I guess. Anyway, I've provided a link. It's also the most touristy and the most expensive part of Bergen, and a cruise ship had just landed, so we didn't stay there long. But we did visit the Bergenhaus Festning, a (reconstructed) fortress just beyond the Bryggen at the mouth of the harbor, now used as a park.

This courtyard in front of the Rosenkrantztarnet looks out over the harbor--the church tower of the Nykirke is actually on the other side of a very large harbor (as I tell my film students, telephoto lenses collapse distance).

Here's a shot I took a couple of days later of the Nykirke from the other side of the harbor, looking over at the Rosenkrantztarnet (the big building with the turquoise roof):

The other side of the Bergenhaus Festning courtyard opens out to another yard alongside the old officers' quarters.

From the harbor, we headed inland a bit. This is Bergen's cathedral, Domkirke. The guidebooks regard it as dull, but I fell in love with this tree in the churchyard.

More potentilla surrounding tombs from the 17th century:

And on the street leading away from the Domkirke, maybe the world's smallest buddleia?

From the Domkirke, we walked over to Lille Lungegardsvan, a lake at the city center. It's flanked by five art museums and a concert hall, as well as some lovely gardens. Here's a rose garden, with Salix and the art museums in the background:

And maybe my favorite garden in Bergen--a cosmos garden! (Cosmos grow on the interstate medians in Virginia--but not 10 miles away in my garden--perhaps they need more exhaust? Anyway, I loved these).

A reminder of how close the Atlantic is--seagulls flying over the lake:

At the northwest end of the garden (heading back to the harbor) is the Design Museum, whose external "exhibitions" are arguably as lovely as the ones inside:

Here's the facade and another view of the sculpture in front.

Immediately to the east of the Design Museum is Ole Bulls Plass, leading through the theater district. A gazebo marks the boundary between it and the lake.

One of my favorite roses in the bed around the gazebo:

And one of Salix's:

And this is Ole Bull, a 19th-century violinist who was Bergen's Frank Sinatra--local history says women would swoon at his concerts. The only disappointment during our trip was that I didn't get to visit his home at Lysoen, where he laid out footpaths through his woods.

So these were the sights we (were) meant to see--we caught a couple of others along the way.

These guys are actually pumping beer into a hotel--we would love to have seen what was at the other end of the hose (a pool? a pond? a fraternity?). Here's a picture of the truck, just in case you think we mistranslated:

And we caught this picture on our walk through the theater district, just beyond Ole Bulls Plass. This was some kind of publicity for a play--but I'm not sure this is exactly the kind of photo op they had in mind. Maybe she's smelling the roses?

That's it for now. Hanna's been benevolent--about 24 hours of relatively gentle rain with no loss of power. But I think I'll knock wood and publish just in case.