Old Country Gardens

Planting Fields Arboretum

2019-02-18T15:01:00.004-05:00

Today I read that a gardening friend was at the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens. I realized that I've only been there once, many many years ago for a symposium in the middle of the winter. I didn't walk one path in their gardens as it was miserable weather. I wonder why I've never been back.

My favorite public garden by far is Planting Fields Arboretum in Oyster Bay. I have been there hundreds of times over the past 30 years and still find new things to see.

The amount of spring flowering trees and shrubs is just incredible. I spend hours walking the many pathways and always find lots of things to photograph.

These photos were taken May 10th so if you are planning a trip and want to see Planting Fields in all it's glory, that is the time to go. It's a huge Mother's Day location but I always try to find a day during the week so it's not as crowded.

The plant in the foreground is Bergenia. I have seen huge waves of Bergenia thriving in Germany but have not yet seen a place on Long Island where it grows well.

The fountain garden at planting fields is more of a summer location. The plant material is not at it's best in the spring time, all the more reason to go back again!

The last time I was at Planting Fields I noticed a plant that had previously escaped my attention. It's the one with the chartreuse blooms, some type of Euphorbia.

Here you can see how wonderful this Euphorbia looks combined with the pink Azalea blooms. What really caught my attention though is that this is a shady location and this Euphorbia seems to thrive. Here at Doodle-dog farm we have mostly shade so I am going to have to try to find this plant.

Not the clearest shot but I wanted to take a close-up to share with you. If you know of this plant I'd love for you to leave me a comment.

It might be February 18th, but it feels like spring is right around the corner!

Blogging, the new direction

2019-02-10T21:38:00.001-05:00

I don't know when I began blogging, I guess it's not hard to look up. For years my passion was gardening, the first place I learned to share my passion was with my different garden clubs. As the internet began to explode I joined an e-mail daylily robin. Although I had never met most of the other robin members, they soon became my dear friends in gardening.

The e-mail robin I belonged to did not allow photos at the time so once I heard about blogging it became the natural progression. I found an outlet for my love of writing, photographing and sharing my passion for gardening.

This blog, Melanie's Old Country Gardens was my first blog. It has over 400 posts and probably thousands of photos. When I began here I barely knew how to choose my background, add widgets, post hyperlinks and other technical things. In it's heyday I became quite adept at changing and updating the blog. There were so many things I wanted to share and I loved blogging so much that I began a new blog at melaniesperennials.blogspot.com. My reason was I wanted to have a blog where I could write more and share my thoughts (this blog) and a second where I could highlight a specific plant or concept.

Having spent the last 7 or 8 years redirecting my life I suddenly find myself back to the beginning, a baby in the knowledge of how to blog. The desire never went away, blog topics pop up in my head all the time, it's just that life gets in the way. I went from being a full time mom, garden writer and lecturer to a middle age woman needing a career. Somehow I fell in to banking, first as a teller, then out on to the bank floor as an officer. My hard work has paid off, I've made it to Vice President and Manager of my own branch in Bayville NY. As fulfilling as my career has become, my lottery dream is to return to full time gardening with it's writing, lecturing, garden travels and to be with the people who share my passion.

I have visited so many incredible gardens over the past years and have so many photos and thoughts to share. Today I posted a plan on melanie's perennials blog to go back over the past years and do some arm chair tours, after all, it is February! Some of the posts will be here in Melanie's Old Country Gardens, these will have longer stories to accompany the photos. By the way one of my favorite gardens visited last year was Anna Carlson's in Jordan NY and I promise a full photo tour in the very near future.

There are topics to cover like window box gardening (I could have taken hundreds of photos in Nantucket last August)

Sometimes I'll just blog about the beautiful places I've seen. At least once a year I visit my mother in Delray Beach Florida. The nature that abounds there calls me back over and over.

Of course there will be posts showcasing new plants I've bought and can't live without in my new garden adventures. Half the fun of finding new treasures is to share them with you!

Another post that is busting out of me is the discovery of my roots, a visit to the place my love of gardening first began.

Last but not least this blog, my Old Country Garden is the place I can still share stories about Calie the wonder doodle and maybe my daughters will even make a some guest appearances. The garden itself, Old Country Garden may no longer be mine in property but it's here in my heart.

So glad to be back

Doodle dog farm

2019-01-23T12:51:00.001-05:00

What’s in a name? For so many years my garden was named Old Country Gardens but that garden belongs to somebody else now. Much as I want to continue using that name it doesn’t suit the little beach cottage where we live. Calie the wonderdoodle still gardens with me, she is 13 years old now and we named the garden after her. Welcome to doodle dog farm!

Our cottage is a few blocks from the Long Island Sound on the north shore of Long Island. The neighborhood is called Huntington Beach Community Association and it’s filled with darling cottages and beach homes.

This is a view over our fence and you can see what I mean about small cottages.

We are surrounded with mature Oak trees so most of the gardens are shade beds. My beloved daylilies are not used as much as I wish but the hosta truly shine.

We have a lovely Cherry tree that rains pink petals everywhere.

This last year I set out a small sale table featuring succulents and a few perennials that were ready for dividing. This spring I will be putting more out. I’m so happy to be blogging again, just trying to figure out the best way to get my photos and words here.

Testing. 1....2....3....

2019-01-21T17:49:00.001-05:00

It’s been so long since I’ve posted anything on my blogs. Computers change, tablets come and go too. This is a test post to see if I can still get my words and photos out to the world.

These photos were taken in the spring of 2017 at Planting Fields Arboretum. Andy and I were married at town hall on Valentines Day and celebrated a few months later with our family. My name has changed to Melanie Chopay but I’m still me. Stay tuned, hopefully there will be garden photos to come.

Spring Clean-up

2017-03-26T20:25:00.000-04:00

When do you know it's time to begin your spring clean-up? Andy saved me an article that had a different garden chore for each day. Articles like that are written well in advance and in actuality are only worthwhile as a list of garden chores. In real life mother nature (aka the weather) has everything to do with deciding on which garden chore can or should be done.

Early this week our garden was covered in snow and ice and I had no plan to begin clean-up. Temperatures in the upper 50's and the amazing sight of this Hellebore that began to bloom with a vengeance changed my mind. It's instinct, I suddenly knew it was time to begin removing all the winter leaves from the beds.

I spent much of the day filling bag after bag with leaves and I was in all my glory.

This morning we made our first trip of the season to Home Depot to get some tools and potting soil. Their pansies were ok but not what I really wanted so we stopped at Fort Hill Nursery on the way home where I got a juicy flat filled with pansies and a few pots of Johnny Jump-ups.

Unlike yesterday though today was raw and cold with occasional periods of drizzling rain. Ugh... but I was determined to do more clean-up.

On the side of our cottage (as you look at it here) there's a little spot on the right of the porch. It's sheltered on three sides by the porch the house and a picket fence. In the fall we placed all my succulent pots in this area and left the fallen leaves where they fell.

It's not the most attractive sight but it's the perfect holding area to overwinter potted plants.

As I started to remove the leaves I was thrilled to see how well everything wintered over. The Sempervivum (Hens & Chicks) and various varieties of Sedum looked great.

Calie spent the day supervising from her new favorite spot.

Look how beautiful these pots are! They are chock full of succulents and with a bit of sun and warmth they are just going to explode.

Sempervivum come in different colors, sizes and shapes. During the summer heat they lose their colors but this time of year the colors are super vibrant. I can't wait to start to repot these babies, it's one of my favorite garden pastimes.

So what are you doing in the garden right now?

The Front Porch

2017-03-19T16:31:00.000-04:00

Tomorrow is the first day of spring. Much as I want to be in the garden right now it's just not possible. Last week's storm left us with several inches of frozen ice and snow and today is the first day that's warm enough for it to begin to melt. So I'm doing the next best thing, I'm sitting here on my front porch, in the chair you see in this photo. The cushions are still in the shed but the heat of the sun is warming this sheltered spot. While the air temperature is 45 degrees, it's in the high 50's at least here.

When I first moved here there was a solid 6' tall stockade fence where you see the picket fence now. A grouchy old couple lived in the cottage next door. With all their complaints about where to park and where to place our garbage cans we had no desire to have them watching us. As soon as they put the house on the market I asked Andy if we could remove the fence and replace it with picket fencing to match the front and he immediately hired somebody to do so.

Our new neighbor Helen has done some amazing things to the inside of her cottage, but the yard is a bit daunting. While planted with many sturdy perennials years and years ago the weeds were allowed to take over. Still, when the Iris, Peonies and Daylilies start to bloom I love to sit here and look at her garden. This year we'll divide some perennials together.

Our porch isn't large, comfortable for four, just perfect for two (and a doodle dog too). The white vinyl wicker furniture I've been moving around with me for 5 years seems to be made for this space.

There's a small wind chime hanging over my head and it makes the softest chimes. Our neighborhood is so far from any major roads that we don't have any traffic noises nor plane or train noise.

The garden centers are starting to stock pansies, I just adore them. I'm sure before this week is over I'll have bought a flat of them. It's so hard to choose which colors I want. Last year I bought white, blue and yellow ones. This year I want to add pink and purple. Our cottage is a pale yellow with blue and white trim so I want to stick with those colors. Maybe I'll add a flat of Johnny jump-ups in hopes they reseed in the garden.

One of the advantages of gardening in a small space is being able to make a big splash with just a few plants. Coming home from work to this sight is the most wonderful feeling.

Hurry up spring, I'm ready for you!!!

Armchair gardening

2017-03-14T13:02:00.002-04:00

Hi there! It must be time for my annual post again. Gee, I'd like to apologize and say I'm going to better at the blogging but I know better than to make promises I might not keep.

So much has changed in my life that I hardly know where to begin. The biggest change came a few weeks ago on Valentines day when I married the man of my dreams, Andy.

While Andy isn't a big gardening fan he is a huge fan of anything outdoors so we spend lots and lots of time hiking trails and visiting various garden. One of our new places we visited last year was Sweet Briar Park in Smithtown. I can't wait to go back when it's in bloom later this year.

As you can see it was late Autumn so we had to make our own excitement in the garden.

Luckily there are many wonderful gardens right here in our community. I have a number of favorites and walk almost daily to see what people have going on in their gardens.

SUNY Farmingdale was one location I visited, I have to get back there more often.

The Peconic River Herb farm is another favorite place for us to go. I made sure I brought home a pot of that fabulous Hakone grass.

We are only a few blocks from the north shore of Long Island. It's almost impossible to go for a walk without a water view.

Planting Fields Arboretum in Upper Brookville is the place I visited the most this past year. It's close enough to my work that I can visit it on my lunch break. My daughters Lauren and Emily both visited with me at different times.

Andy and I spent a weekend in eastern Pennsylvania and I took photos of rocks. I had visions of rock gardens and borders for our cottage garden and needed inspiration. I'll go in to more detail on another post.

Our neighbor Helen moved in just a year ago and she and I have been having such fun watching the amazing plants bloom in her garden. The Siberian Iris are amazing. I can't wait to help her divide them and add some to my garden too.

This week is the Hicks flower show, I haven't attended it yet. This photo is from last year. A blizzard was forecasted for today and I didn't want to buy plants and have to keep them indoors. We dodged the bullet and it's mostly rain and sleet out there. I'll be sure to stop at Hicks later this week to pick up some bulbs and pansies.

Here's another peek at Planting Fields, probably what it looks like right at this moment.

This is our little cottage, taken just a year ago. So much has changed in one year. The front garden is really shaping up, this year I am going to attack the back yard.

Wish I could do more than just armchair gardening today...

The Ruthless Gardener

2016-05-04T20:11:00.001-04:00

Warning! There will be no pretty gardening photos in the post….so be forewarned!

I was considering titling this "The Good, The Bad & The Ugly" But there's only bad and ugly here. One of the lessons I'm learning quickly is that when you have a small garden every inch counts. Gone are the days I could plan sweeping beds and try a multitude of plants. I'm not complaining, we live a wonderful life and I put in a full week at work but I've still got lots to learn about cottage gardening!

In the past I could afford to let plants take a few years to settle in or maybe I'd move them to another location. Here in our darling cottage garden I'm becoming much more ruthless. A few spindly daffodil leaves and some blind tulips? (Tulips that don't bloom are called "blind") You're outta here!

This is Lamiastrum "Hermann's Pride" planted just last year in lovely soil.

Shame shame Hermann, no pride here.

See that little spec in the middle? It's Hermann's Pride again. The Hosta are loving the location. So I've got to fault Hermann. Too bad because it's such a lovely plant when it's happy.

Seeing these bare spots I know I lost something here too, I added some Labrador violets in hopes they spread to fill in the holes.

Anemone tomentosa "Robustissima" not looking too robust to me. In the past I've had Anemone's go wild, will have to look for a different cultivar as I love their fall blooms.

Phlox is blooming all over my neighborhood, huge billowing massive drifts of phlox. Here in my garden it's half the size it was when I bought it last year. No bueno, move over baby there's a Heuchera waiting for that spot.

Here you can see the hardy Geranium cantabrigense "Karmina" and golden Oregano. Both are growing like gang busters but right in the middle was pretty Dianthus planted there last spring. With the cost of perennials today I won't bother to replace it, in a few weeks the surrounding plants will fill this spot which gets plenty of sun and water.

Today was cold and rainy, a challenging day for gardening but I managed to visit and photograph two of my favorite places here on Long Island. I'll post the photos on my other blog www.melaniesperennials.blogspot.com

Next post will be a pretty one, I promise.

Melanie

May Day 2016

2016-05-01T20:53:00.000-04:00

May Day has always been a day to celebrate. Not only is the garden busting out in all it's glory, May 1st was my father's birthday. He always told me he had the coolest day for his birthday and I have to agree. Dad truly gave me the love of the outdoors, the fascination of things that grow. Mom gave me a love to walk, the two traits combined keep me busy at this time of year.

Today we had unusual weather for May 1st, it's been cold and rainy since we woke up this morning. Not to be put off by the weather we still went to a nursery to add plants to our new garden and just as the light began to dim I took my daily walk down past the gardens of Huntington Beach community and along the foggy beach itself.

This photo was taken as I walked the route, a lovely curbside garden filled with spring blooms.

Our garden has lots of spring blooms too, it's a new garden though so I still see too much soil and not enough plant material.

The good news though is I really have a garden again. Not my own, this garden is mine and Andy's. It's a darling little cottage garden just blocks from the beach on Long Island.

This is the second year I've really been adding plant material, there was and still is quite a bit of overgrown material to remove. At one time this garden was artfully designed with top quality plant material but it quickly over-grew the small space.

Working on this small scale is a whole new experience for me. My mom tells me it's a blessing that we have a small garden, I work full time now as an assistant manager at a bank. She's right, this garden is just the right size to fit our lifestyle.

We have a darling front porch that is one of my favorite places to sit and share my dreams with Andy. I don't know if anybody is actually going to be a reading this but I finally feel like I'll be back to blogging. At first I'll struggle a bit, I use three different types of cameras to photograph plants and it's taking me a bit to get up to speed with the newer technology.

Can't wait to show you more!

melanie

SUNY Farmingdale

2015-02-23T20:57:00.000-05:00

What could be better on a cold winter night than to go through photos of lush gardens? It's a fridgid 14 degrees outside but this topic is doing it's best to warm me up.

One of my favorite places to visit on Long Island are the trial gardens at the State University at Farmingdale. There are 9 or 10 distinct different garden rooms/themes there to see, one more spectacular than the rest. It's a hidden jewel, few people know where to find it. As you drive past the parking lot there's not much more than these gates to see.

If you are lucky enough to to stop and park your car, all you need to do is take a peek through the bars and you'll find yourself transported to another world.

Andy and I visited the garden this past September, it had been a few years for me and I was thrilled to find a whole new addition with vegetables and a wild spill of cutting flowers.

Zinnias are so easy to grow and so beautiful. We grew one solitary Zinnia here last summer, I expect to grow lots and lots more this coming year!

When touring a garden of this magnitude, it's hard to find one single thing that just rocks your world. This time though it was an easy choice, those big Dr Seuss like tufts are Cyperus papyrus 'King Tut'. Although I took a dozen photos, not one does them justice, I am in love with them.

One of the first gardens you will walk through are very formal beds but the plant material is cutting edge tropicals surrounded by perennial borders.

Of course there is a silver garden, it's such a restful place after walking through a riot of color and textures.

My happy place is the tropical garden room. I think I could sit there all day. Give me a foggy day like this and I could take hundreds and hundreds of photos too. The plant with the long red blooms is Amaranthus 'Love lies a bleeding'. It's so cool!

The tropical garden is not large but every single inch is planted. September is the perfect time to visit this garden, just before the plants are brought in to the green houses for the winter.

The color and foliage combinations don't stop, there's something amazing no matter which way you turn. It's hard to grasp all that surrounds you.

The rustic arbor and goldfish pond have been there since my daughters were young. It's still just as magical as it was back then.

If you make your way to the back corner of the gardens you'll find a shade garden filled with wonderful plants that just thrive in our Long Island conditions. I love the combination of this fern and the Asarum (ginger).

Although it wasn't rose season this part of the garden was still lovely. We'll have to make a point to go back this May when the roses and peonies are in full bloom.

There were plenty of autumn perennials to see such as this Aster. I'll take a guess and say it's 'Alma Potschke'.

One last photo, a riot of yellow blooms. If you live on Long Island or are coming this way for a visit, try to get in to see these gardens. You won't be sorry!

melanie

Photo's through the years

2015-01-04T16:26:00.001-05:00

Being January, there's not much I can do about gardening right now. One of my new years resolutions is to rejoin the gardening world, plant a new garden and hopefully see some gardening friends again. Over the last four years I've continued to grow some things, visit gardens and take photos. My mind though is rusty, plant names that used to trip across my tongue are hard to remember. I've been reading my old posts and going through thousands of photos to loosen things up in my brain.

Thousands of photos? Absolutely! Today I added up a few photos and found that in 2008 I took 1,656 garden related photos. 2009 was a banner year with 2,498 photos. 2010 was the last year I had my big garden, I was working at that time but I still managed to take 799 photos. Today's post will take you back through those years with a focus on what I want now for our new garden.

We have more shade than sun in our little cottage garden. This opening shot of variegated Lamium taken in 2008 shows the type of plant that will grow well here.

In 2009 this pink Symphytum combined with a very tall Thalictrum caught my eye. I won't have the luxury of many large plants but I think I can fit both of these in our back shade corner.

There will definitely be room for a few Pulmonaria. I like this variety without spots on the leaves.

Succulents were already a passion of mine. The first time Andy brought me to his home I was thrilled to find he grew cacti in his kitchen window. We will both have a nice little succulent garden out front.

Hosta "Liberty" was a show stopper. I'll be on the lookout to see if I can find it again.

One small garden we haven't begun clearing yet will be the perfect spot for some cottage flowers. I'll be looking for handouts, hope somebody has an Iris or two to share with me. This was taken in 2010, the hot pink plant behind it is an annual that self sows, "Silene armeria".

Stokesia is another cottage garden plant that will do well for us. I remember being disappointed at first when growing it as it sprawled all over. Once I learned to take advantage of that trait, it became a favorite.

My life has been full of changes since 2010. For three years I rented a darling cottage in Centerport, just two blocks away from here. Early 2013 I met the love of my life, Andy. We spent many an evening that summer sipping a drink in my little patio garden.

Andy loves the outdoors as much as I do if not more. We both love to travel, in 2013 we rode bicycles on Block Island, walked the Brooklyn Bridge, swam in Florida, rode a motorcycle all over Long Island and so much more.

While visiting Andy's family I got my first glimpse of Green Lakes State Park outside of Syracuse NY

2014 brought a new change, Andy surprised me with an awesome new camera, a Nikon D5300. to tell the truth, it was so advanced from anything I ever used that it's taken me a year to begin to become comfortable with it. We love to visit all the wonderful parks and gardens around us, this was taken in September at SUNY Farmingdale. I have so many amazing photos from that day that I'll have to post them on their own.

The Peconic River Herb Farm was a delightful afternoon ride for us with the reward of visiting some delicious vineyards before heading home. The trips only escalated in 2014, Florida and Block Island again plus a trip of a lifetime through California.

Long Island isn't the only draw, we go in to Manhattan often. A fall walk on the HiLine was a mind blowing trip. Hopefully we'll go back there again around Mother's Day.

I can't tell you all how much I am enjoying sharing these photos and words with all of you, it feels good to be back.

melanie

In a nutshell - 2014

2014-12-28T19:41:00.001-05:00

With the year coming to a close I find myself looking through the photos I've taken this past year. Although I haven't been posting, it doesn't mean I haven't been gardening. Those of you who know me will recognize that the location of my garden has changed again. This time I think I'm really home.

The gardens here are quite different than anything I've worked with before. It's by far the smallest property I've worked with which actually turns out to be quite difficult. In the past I had a large empty piece of property to develop. The yards here were overgrown and quite shady. Luckily Andy
encourages me to make changes.

The existing beds still need quite a bit of work, this one is filled with the common ditch daylily. I've learned not to rip anything out until I'm ready to replant the area.

My first focal point was this small garden along the front porch. It gets afternoon sun, just enough to support most perennials. I'm trying hard to stick with a cottage garden theme.

This small area was already planted with a few perennials and bulbs. Although I thinned them out I tried to keep what I liked. I'm not sure but I think these are scilla, if you know better please let me know.

By June the plants filled in well enough. Maybe it's silly but I have the hardest time buying plants that I used to give away. These all grew in such abundance in my other gardens, I'm looking forward to having enough plants that I can trade some for other varieties. The Ladies Mantle (Alchemilla Mollis) was a must have for me.

The next bed was the one inside the front fence. This is another key location as we see it when we sit on the front porch and walk out the door. It's also visible to the many walkers that fill this neighborhood. It will take another year before I have this filled the way I like. Andy replaced the globe light with a nice lantern just last week, it makes a huge difference.

In front of the picket fence along the street is a stretch that is just covered with pebbles. In a moment of genius I realized I had a spot to grow my succulents. While they'd like a little more light, they did quite well in this location. I was thrilled that nobody tried to help themselves to anything here.

The last garden which was the only one we planted in 2013 too is the small vegetable bed. We had tomatoes, eggplants and peppers here. The peppers did the best but we loved the eggplant so much that we want to plant more next year. The fence won't make it through another year so there'll be a new one before we plant our next crop.

Over the next few months I'll break these gardens down a bit. It looks like Melanie's Old Country Garden has become a cottage garden. Hope you don't mind!

melanie

A New Blog For Me

2014-11-30T22:29:00.004-05:00

Hi there!

It's been an awful long time since I've posted to this blog. As some of you know, there have been many changes to my life in the past four years.

The good news is I'm in a wonderful place now and finally back on track for some writing and photography. While my gardens now are a small cottage garden and not yet ready for photos, I get to visit lots and lots of other gardens like the one photographed above, The Peconic River Herb Farm.

My partner Andy and I travel quite a bit, even if sometimes its just to one of the stunning locations right here on Long Island. I've started a new blog, it's at The Island Walkabout and I hope you'll come visit me and say "hi"!

I've missed so many of you so I will try to post here too, there's always lots of gardening ideas to share like this hanging bottle tree.

Glad to be back!

melanie

Love at Sagamore Hill

2013-05-14T11:28:00.000-04:00

In March Andy bought a brand new Harley Davidson Road Glide. It was chilly out for riding but we bundled up and went for some rides here on Long Island.

Last Saturday he suggested we visit some places on the north shore, near us. The first was the Vanderbilt estate in Centerport, then we decided to visit Teddy Roosevelt's home, Sagamore Hill. The flowering trees were in all their glory and as we drove into the parking lot we drove right past a female turkey.

It's courting season and soon we saw the male turkey, trying his best to gain the female's interest. I took a photo even though the light was too harsh. Off we went then to sip mimosa's on the front lawn.

On our return walk to the parking area I wondered out loud if we'd see the turkeys again.

As we got close to the parking area, my wish came true. Not only were the turkeys there, they were circling Andy's Harley! The female turkey seemed to be quite taken with this large beast and the male turkey was working very hard to get her attention once again.

For quite some time the female continued to circle the motorcycle. People had gathered and were all taking photos of this amazing scene.

Then the female turkey saw something else that interested her and off she went...

It was Andy! Now she began to circle around him, the male still trying to gain her admiration with his feathers all puffed out.

Back they went to the Harley where finally the male turkey won out. The female allowed the male to stand on her back, his feet stomping back and forth for a number of minutes.

It was the most magical moment, a once in a life time opportunity. If you scroll up and down and look at the photos you'll see something Andy pointed out to me. The male turkey's neck turned red as his excitement grew.

When they finished, they walked a few feet away. I thought the sound of the Rinehart racing pipes would make them run away but instead the male puffed up larger than ever and started approaching us while making aggressive gobbling sounds.

VROOOOOOMMMMM Hurry up Andy, I don't want to get pecked by an angry turkey!

Somehow I think this is only the beginning of some amazing adventures on Andy's Harley-Davidson

melanie

In retrospect

2013-01-28T20:42:00.000-05:00

The end of January, bitter cold winds and temperatures but suddenly one notices the days getting longer. Winter still has it's icy grip on us but Spring is just around the corner.

Beauty can still be found in the ice formations along the water front but brrrr, how much nicer to look at something green.

I thought I'd choose a few old photos from the past to get our imaginations flowing...

From the smallest frond unfurling to color in all it's glory, I love ferns!

Fuzzy drumstick heads...

Fat prickly fronds...

Airy and delicate lady ferns...

None of them are here in my new home but oh to dream that they will once again grace my garden...

Such are heavenly dreams made of.

Raised beds & Edging materials

2012-11-25T20:12:00.000-05:00

Raised garden beds... There's a million and one reasons why, where and how, here's a few of my ideas. It was many years into my gardening craze before we built the raised beds I longed for. Rock and stone hold a fascination for me, I remember many walks with my Dad where he'd find a cool stone and put it in his pocket (I still have a few!).

Stone walls last longer than wood and many other materials. If built well they are also much sturdier. My new neighborhood here in Centerport is chock full of amazing rock walls I'll be photographing in the spring. This opening shot was in my old garden, one of my favorite spots, built with Pennsylvania wall stone. (Hey, there's one of Dad's stones right on the top ledge!)

Of course there's many different building materials to edge a bed with besides wall stone. Brick was popular at one time and if you have free bricks laying around, they still will work. A word of caution here, bricks will move easily and slowly sink in to the ground so you need to dig them up every few years.

(Now how many of you were looking at the planted shopping cart instead?)

Here's another side of that Pennsylvania field stone wall in my old garden. We had some old local boulders that were found when digging a nearby foundation and I was so happy to be able to incorporate them in the design.

Raised beds like these are easier to weed as there is much less bending but there are also negatives. Chipmunks delighted in tunneling throughout these beds and the soil also dried out much faster than nearby beds at ground level so required extra watering.

There will always be extra stone left over from a wall installation. In my case I simply laid them out in a wandering line near the back of my property. As a weed barrier I put newspaper under them. It worked well for years and had a nice rustic, tumbled look in my shade bed.

From this angle you can see how haphazard they were. A tap by the lawn mower and they were soon in a slightly different formation but that's the exact look I wanted.

The front entrance of our driveway had been edged with boulders that came out of the hole for the foundation of our house. They had been there for about 35 years when we moved in. As a shade bed filled with tree roots it was a challenging spot but once I figured it out it was incredibly rewarding.

The most creative edging I've ever used was old pier pilings being ripped out of a neighbors garden. We simply put them in a curvy "S" pattern on their end and they were wonderful. If I was building a garden today here on Long Island I'd be combing all the curbsides taking the 2' log rounds that everybody has lined up from Hurricane Sandy. What a perfect building material!

Across from my old house were these beautiful newly built beds at my friend Cynthia's house. A simple design and I was oh so jealous. How silly of me :-) but there's nothing like seeing all that naked soil and dreaming of what can be planted there.

Down in the Carolina's I managed to take a picture of simple block edging. Here on Long Island we call these Belgium blocks. The soil isn't raised very high at the front but gets higher in the back.

I tried the same thing with a few blocks I had beside my garage. One problem I had here was grass growing up between these blocks so I had to go out and find a top of the line weed digger...

As you can see, she worked very hard at digging up those weeds. Nothing would get in her way!

Today if I was going to go wild and crazy I'd try something totally different. Looking through my photos for these edging materials I stumbled across this on and thought to myself that it would be so cool to edge a bed with a few rows of clay pots in graduating sizes. Just fill in behind them, fill the pots with all kinds of cool succulents and Voila!

Ah well, this is the time of year to dream!

This post is a milestone for me. Number 400 here on Melanie's Old Country Gardens. You can scroll and click along the sidelines under "labels" and find all kinds of different things. Hope you enjoy reading as much as I love writing.

Full of thanks, (and Thanksgiving leftovers)
melanie

Hurricane Sandy...the day after

2012-11-17T18:58:00.002-05:00

As the world knows, the north eastern region of the USA was struck by Hurricane Sandy on October 29, 2012. These photos were taken as the storm subsided, October 30th. I've continued taking photos and will share them in a timely fashion.

This first shot was taken right in front of my house, facing the corner of Garfield and Jackson Crescent.
Power was out here by early afternoon.

This was the first time I have ever been alone during a storm and frankly, I was scared. Dinner though was an adventure. I took some left overs from the fridge, cooked ravioli, pulled pork, homemade tomato sauce and put it all in a frying pan with shredded mozzarella on top. YUM! Thank goodness the top of my gas stove was still working.

As I walked the neighborhood Tuesday morning this was the first house I saw with a tree upon it. Only 3 houses away from me, reality struck home and the tears began to flow. Tears of sadness for my lovely new neighborhood, tears of sadness for the unknown world (no contact via phone/internet/tv/radio) and yes tears of relief that my little cottage was still whole.

By the time I saw this house I had seen many others in similar distress. For some reason though I thought this house was occupied by a family with children and I didn't want to imagine a child's fear if this monstrosity came crashing upon one's bedroom.

The root systems in some cases were enormous, almost more to deal with than the trees themselves. These were large healthy trees.

We had little rain with the storm, it was a blessing for us. We would have lost so many more trees if the grounds were saturated. Look close and you'll see how dry the soil under this root mass is just as the storm was leaving our area.

It was hard to venture far from home on October 30th. The winds were still strong, squalls blew through and there was an underlying sense of "what might yet come".

A few blocks down the road the aftermath on Coolidge stopped me in my tracks. I only had my phone with me on that trip but had to snap another photo.

We were lucky to have power at my bank in Islandia so I had to be there the next few days. In the next post you'll see photos I took a few days after the storm.

melanie

Step onto the road...

2012-11-12T18:11:00.000-05:00

"You step onto the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there's no telling where you might be swept off to." Gandalf (JRR Tolkein)

With much of the fall foliage gone due to Hurricane Sandy, I took advantage of today's bank holiday and went on a hike.

The first stop was Twin Ponds park right here in Centerport. Just a small walk around one of the ponds, but enough to whet the appetite for more. The sun came and went behind big fluffy clouds and cast the most delightful hues through what was left of the autumn foliage.

The ground is quite saturated in spots, the moss was the most jewel-like green tones I've ever seen.

From there it was a quick drive out to Sunken Meadow State Park. Apparently I wasn't alone in wanting to spend today outdoors, the park was packed with families!

One of the advantages to Sunken Meadow is there are walkways through wooded areas, walkways through beach scrub and bird sanctuaries and of course, the beach front itself.

I was so taken by this rock growing next to the gnarled tree trunk. It made me think of Treebeard from the Lord of the Rings and his gravely voice saying "with rock and stone..."

This tree stopped me in my tracks, I took multiple photos from various angles. The twisted trunk shows the full force of the winds from Hurricane Sandy. I had to apply an antique enhancement to get the true feeling I had while standing in front of it.

The grassy meadows seem to stretch on forever. It's easy to feel like a great photographer when you have water and skies like these.

The beach had already been cleaned well after the storm with only the usual pebbles and shells to be found. I only saw two of these, an angel wing for my friend Lorene.

Driving out the park at the end was a reminder of what is really going on in our world. A sea of tents, trucks, mobile kitchens and tankers. Linesmen from all over the USA and Canada plus the National Guard are sleeping here and many other similar locations. My heartfelt thanks to them.

Centerport, my new home

2012-03-21T19:16:00.008-04:00

Welcome! It's about time you dropped by to see the place :-)

As promised, here's some images of my new little cottage in Centerport, New York (north shore of Long Island, between Huntington and Northport).

Not everything in my life has changed. As you can see, Calie-the-wonderdoodle still greets any visitors that have managed to find out my little hide-away. At six years old though, Calie has grown a bit wiser. She'll stay on the front stoop if I ask her unless a dog is being walked right along our fence line.

This is the cottage, the whole thing. As you can see, there's not much to it but more than Calie and I need to put a smile on my face. 2 bedrooms, kitchen, living room, bath and dining room downstairs, one room upstairs. Life is simple here, I can clean house in one evening!

We have a corner lot. Since each house on my street has only 2 homes, I guess we all have corner lots! The street is only 5 blocks long, so we really are well tucked away from the rest of the world. I love the views out of all my windows, I see flowering trees and shrubs and darling cottages in each direction.

Here's the other side along with the little side yard. Upstairs is a single room my daughters have set up when they are here. At 5'9" poor Lauren can only walk down the very middle of the room. Ouch, banged my own head once too often up there!

I brought what garden accessories I could, probably more than I should have but some just couldn't be given away or left behind. This antique chimney top came back after a wonderful trip with my friend Chris and I will drag it where ever I go.

There's a little garage although I don't use it. My landlord has the most incredible antique red tractor stored in it! A little fish pond is there too. I've put my money pot by that pond, as close to the rear left corner of the lot. The wealth has begun to flow although not cash, just lots and lots of peace, happiness and laughter.

Now here's the real treasure, just 3 short blocks (super steep down hill) is the beach! Sunday I sat there with a beer in hand (pure heaven) and watched this darling Dachshund walk along the water edge side by side with a slowly gliding swan. They continued like this for at least 5 minutes!

I've always loved birds and we have so many here but I will admit I was surprised at just how many swans are on our water. There's easily 30 of them out at one time.

The tide here changes pretty drastically. Our sand is well kept but when the tide is all the way out there's always some green sand. I spent as much time as possible there last summer but didn't go for a swim. Somehow the water doesn't appeal to me that way.

Lots of locals have kayaks and that is something that I am very interested in trying! As you can see, when the tide is out the opposite shore is quite close. We're surrounded with little coves and beaches so a kayak would have plenty of places to visit.

Hope you liked the tour! My new camera came today so soon there'll be lots of garden shots.

melanie

Maintenance

2012-03-16T12:56:00.002-04:00

Getting back in to "writers mode" takes quite a bit of self reflection. Everybody has their own style or way to do things. For me, writing was something I used to do on a regular basis and it worked best if I sat down at the same time every day.

I'm a morning person, evenings are quiet time, usually spent with a book and rarely spent writing. Now that I work full time in a bank, finding time to write has been difficult. Thanks to my new MacBook though I have discovered the perfect solution. Simply bring my Mac to work and get used to writing on my lunch hour.

Yesterday was a tough day at work and I must say that posting to my other blog Melanie's Perennials was the best tonic ever!

One task I've been working hard at is going through all 396 previous posts (wow, not too shabby!) and making sure they have been labeled. Without a label on the post, they won't show up on the side bar here for you to be able to read. So I urge you to scroll and click away, more than 300 of those posts are already labeled and by the middle of next week all should be up and ready to go.

I've been thinking that once a week I might simply post a direct link to an old post that I find timely or amusing, what do you think about that idea?

Side note: How cool are these Saxifraga stolonifera (Strawberry Begonias)? They were growing in a small corner in my old garden. As many times as I tried to move them to another spot, they would not take anywhere else. Hopefully they continue to thrive without any added maintenance.

Of course the word "maintenance" also applies to physical work in the garden. The little town of Centerport that I live in is along the water on the north shore of Long Island. The land is hilly, most property lots are quite small with many homes being built into hillsides. Having a lawn is not a possibility in many places, instead we have huge Oak trees.

This photo was taken after Hurricane Irene hit last September. Most of our streets were totally impassible, we were without power 5 days (not too bad in comparison with some others). The gardeners in my neighborhood will find quite different growing conditions this season. The scars are still visible and some areas that were totally shaded will now get several hours of direct sunlight. It will be interesting to see what the season brings us.

melanie

Testing for Photos

2012-03-12T20:10:00.003-04:00

Over this past weekend I took on the Herculean task of downloading 20,000 photos to my new MacBook. While my children have been Apple users for years, this is a new venture to me.

Trying to find my way through that maze of photos is daunting, although I'm sure I'll eventually learn ways to catalog and file those images to make things easier.

For now it's just easiest to steal a few shots from late winter 2008 (a file that popped up quickly :-))

The wonderfully mild winter here as been a boon to Pansies that smart gardeners planted this past autumn. One never knows what to expect though, especially after last years record breaking snow falls.

I am missing my Hellebores dearly. Wish I had thought to bring one or two here, maybe I'll hit a nursery or two this weekend and see what I can find. They should thrive well here in the shady gardens of my little cottage.

Snowdrops are up all over my neighborhood. None are on this property, right now there's a few crocus here and there but no Galianthus. A home near me has a nice mass planting of them along with some nice fancy Chickens that roam the tiny yard.

My dog Calie is fascinated by those chickens and when ever we walk past the house she has to thrust her nose through the chain link fence trying to catch a glimpse of them :-)

This post was mostly to test out grabbing and posting photos. Hope it works out!

melanie

A new beginning...

2012-03-09T18:54:00.002-05:00

Well here goes, a toast to new beginnings!

Old Country Gardens has moved, not the site itself but the gardener. It took longer than I expected and was oh so much harder than I imagined but it's done.

Don't know if this will reach any of my past readers or if we are all starting on this new page. This post will be a short one, hopefully it will explain enough.

After a couple of years of painful divorce proceedings, the family house and gardens (my Old Country Gardens) were sold this past October. Due to the woeful housing market, it had almost been sold several times before that so I basically moved out and abandoned the gardens in the spring of 2011.

While I only relocated a few miles north, my whole world has changed. Instead of a large house on 1.3 acres with sun and shade gardens, I now live in a darling little cottage, 2 blocks from the beach (north shore of Long Island), on a postage stamp lot.

My girls are off, one living in New York city and one in college in Staten Island (also New York city) so most often it's just Calie-the-wonder-doodle and me. We rent this adorable home so can't make major changes to the gardens. Luckily they are chockfull of heirloom plants and my landlord welcomes any ideas I have.

The soil is coarse, sandy, rocky, not amended at all and most of the property is shaded by huge old Oak trees that are limbed up high. Last year I barely maintained the potted plants I brought along. The good news is I took the time to watch each season here and now I hope I know what I'm working with.

Stay tuned, our winter has been wonderfully mild and I took a few photos that will soon be posted here.

Melanie

Holy Cow!

2010-07-20T10:54:00.005-04:00

This spring my friend Beth gave me some beans in trade for a cow...

Actually, Beth gave me two bean plants. She explained to me that these beans have been handed down generation after generation and came from Thomas Jefferson's garden. I'm pretty sure they are Hyacinth beans.

I have two groups of potted herbs on my back patio, so I planted the beans in a large container and placed it among those pots. Once I realized the beans were climbers, I took one of my copper stick-figure-folk and stuck it in the pot as a support.

This subject is hard to photograph. It would be better with a plain backdrop but I can't move the pot around and the thin lines of the copper pipe are hard to pick up with the camera.

Hopefully you can see the structure here and how the beans began to grow up the copper pipe.

I decided my stick-figure-folk needed a head (I named him "Tom") so I added a nice shiny copper toilet float on top.

Uh oh, those beans really started to grow and before I knew it they were encircling poor Tom's neck!

Something had to be done quickly, so I thought it would be nice to have Tom hold up an umbrella that the beans could still grow upon. Luckily I have a number of pieces of copper pipe left over from an old flower show exhibit.

Here you can see the collection of pots, the stick-figure and the long section of pipe. Ahhh, now I felt my beans had just what they needed.

This last photo was shot this morning. At the top of the long pipe I spread out some more copper tubing to simulate the spokes of an umbrella. Unfortunately I noticed that the beans are already as high as the gutter of the house and I don't think this is nearly enough of a growing frame for them!

Looks like a trip to Home Depot is on my "to-do" list. I'm going to have to get some more copper fittings and get creative. I think I'll buy a bundle of refrigerator copper tubing and create a larger umbrella structure up top.

Anybody have a better idea? I'm listening but hurry up, at this rate there's going to be a giant climbing down this structure by the end of the week!

Fe-fi-fo-fum,
Melanie

Bridge Gardens, Peconic Land Trust

2010-07-18T09:20:00.005-04:00

This past Thursday I had the distinct pleasure of joining my fellow garden club members in a delightful tour of Bridge Gardens. Bridge Gardens is on the south Fork of Long Island in the town of Bridgehampton and is part of the Peconic Land Trust organization.

If you are vacationing on Long Island or lucky enough to live here, and if you are into herb gardening, I highly recommend a trip to see this place. There are lots of other things to see there too such as the perennial border pictured above but the herb garden is superb!

A number of topiaries can be found (hmmm, my spell check likes topiary and topiary's but not topiaries?) dotting the landscape. Some of them jump out at you like this trio of swans, others are more subtle.

There's a small water garden which had a nice reflection for me to play with.

As I said before, the herb garden is incredible. There was so much to see, touch, smell and photograph here. I think our club spent 45 minutes checking everything out.

There are four corners and a center planting. One corner had cooking herbs, one was medicinal herbs, one was textile/household herbs and the last was ??? (I'll guess ornamental herbs?). There were Boxwood borders, Lavender borders and Berberis borders. The Berberis (Barberry) was such a beautiful shrub and I never thought of using it this way. One warning though, it does have sharp thorns!

The brick walkway had no weeds growing in it, Rebecca and I wondered how they managed that but never got around to asking.

I took a number of close up shots such as this one of Saponaria (bouncing bet - used to make a type of soap) but I'm going to post those on my Melanie's Perennials blog. I usually try to limit my posts to 5 photos so that people who still don't have high speed internet can also view them but there's just too much to share this time.

I thought the use of pots around the garden was charming and had to take a photo of the simple cinder block used to raise the pot higher. In my own garden I've been raising pots up like this and it makes such a difference!

There's a number of pieces of artwork and sculptures around the gardens. Many of them elegant, other's are quite whimsical.

Hidden in the back (I still can't believe I found it) was a piece of artwork that's right up my alley. A lovely shopping cart with a burlap border and planted with some yummy edibles. Now you know I'm going to need one of these. In my case I think I'd plant it with kitchen herbs so I can wheel it right over to the barbeque when grilling dinner :-)

Off to spend the day trying to water the gardens. While I love swiming in my pool every day, I do wish we had a bit more rain.

Enjoy!

Who knew?

2010-07-13T15:27:00.002-04:00

Wonder of wonders, the ultimate "duh" moment came yesterday when I learned the reason my laptop wouldn't connect to the internet because the wireless switch on the front of it was turned off... Oh well, I might be a great gardener but computer guru I am not!

I have so many photos to share and things to say that I'm totally backlogged...need an internet version of bran ;-)

Hope you enjoy this series of photos, I'll keep you guessing at the plant this bloom is on (until the last shot).

I had such fun taking these photos, aren't they beautiful?

The color range surprised me, while I expected lots of pinks, the yellows were totally unexpected. This one has a wonderful darker center.

From this angle you can see the pollen. Something for the bees to come buzzing around for! I never thought to look for seeds on these flowers later on but I just might remember to do that this year.

While having fun and cropping this photo I immediately thought of Kathleen McElwain. If you haven't seen some of her artwork, you should treat yourself and take a look! Just click on her name and it will take you to her site.

Last but not lease, a lighter pink. Have you guessed yet what these blooms are on? They're from my darling hens & chicks (Sempervivum)!