Old Country Gardens

Daylily Show!

2009-07-11T21:34:00.003-04:00

As predicted there were tons of daylily stars in the garden today. This is Tom Polstons 'Hawaiian Coral' which is quickly becoming a favorite of mine.

Sunday July 11th is the Long Island Daylily Society's annual flower show where you can see hundreds and hundreds of daylilies on display.

While I won't be entering individual daylily scapes, I am registered to enter in two design catagories. The first is a mass design with the theme "Monet". The second is a table setting and that theme is "Water Lilies", a theme that I find hard to be creative with. To me, daylilies and water lilies are such different creatures that my brain doesn't want to try to fit one into the other's catagory.

This is daylily 'Zip Boom Bah' and the color in this photo is quite accurate.

Most people don't realize how much work is involved in putting on any type of flower show. I have not had the spare time to devote to the daylily club in the past few years but I will be working at the show. From 8:30 to 10:30 am I will enter my designs and then work the classification table with my long time friend Gene. When the judges are on the show floor at 11:00, I'm free to leave. At that time I'll be heading over to Martin Viette's to take a peek and see what treasures I might find there.

Once I've scoured the sales areas at Martin Viette's it's back to Planting Fields for me. If I remember, I'll pack a picnic lunch and spend an hour or two walking the amazing grounds. The weather is supposed to be lovely by afternoon but I will wish for a few passing clouds so I can take lots and lots of photos.

Today was perfect picture weather. I took 150 photos in the garden and many of them are wonderful. As soon as I finish this post I'll put a few up on my othe blog Melanie's Perennials. This photo shows a double Platycodon (Balloon flower) that has been hard for me to grow but well worth the effort.

The flower show at Planting Fields is open to the public at 1:30 pm. Once you park in the main parking lot you'll have to walk to the Hort Center, it's a bit of a walk but a lovely one. Maybe I'll see you there!

Melanie

A Hummingbird in the garden!

2009-07-10T22:03:00.005-04:00

Wednesday morning I was standing in the corner of my unfinished kitchen garden trying to take a photo of the incredibly tall Monarda and Echinaceas when I heard a strange sound. It was a vrrrmmmm noise and it passed so close to my ear that I thought my hair moved.

To my utter delight, I saw my first ever (in my own garden) hummingbird! It was the most magical moment and I just stood there forever watching it flit back and forth.

Thursday morning Don went out there with my camera. Sure enough, the hummingbird was back and this is as good a photo as anybody could hope for.

There are two new varieties of Monarda blooming in the front yard and I think they might actually not be red! Hooray!!! One is more pinkish and the other (not yet photographed) is lavender!

Hopefully lots of people will get to see them in their glory tomorrow. Today three delightful visitors came to see the daylilies, tomorrow the garden will be spectacular. It appears that I will be selling quite a few more plant material than I originally planned so stop by, you never know what kind of bargain you'll get.

Tonight I spent two hours walking the track at the highschool and never got to live-head the daylilies. That means I'll be out there super early tomorrow morning.

Melanie

The right angle

2009-07-08T21:48:00.003-04:00

When taking photos of blooms in your gardens, there are many different angles from which you can shoot. The most common angle is head on, an "in your face" kind of shot.

This daylily is 'Lounge Lizard' by Curt Hanson of Ohio. I am just head over heels in love with this plant, it's got all the bells and whistles, great blooms, scapes and bud count. The silver edge is just icing on the cake.

The full frontal shot though can miss quite a few details. See here, taken from the side you will see the amazing curls of the sepals. This is so incredibly cool!

Most unusual for me is to zoom in so tight that I crop out parts of the flower but I was in the mood to experiment. I have to admit, I thought I'd hate this technique but instead, I'm crazy about it. I like this photo so much that I might try printing it out to put in a frame.

One last photo, this is a follow up to yesterday's post about the right light. This afternoon I just happened to notice the sun coming through the Begonia grandis (Hardy Begonia). Isn't it beautiful?

Tomorrow my Mom is coming in from Florida. She is the worlds best weeder and I just can't wait to see her whip my garden back into shape.

The right light

2009-07-07T21:34:00.005-04:00

The past few days have been increasingly frustrating for me when it comes to taking photos in my garden. It prompted me to post about garden photography. I'm not by any means a professional photographer but my photos have been chosen to grace the front cover and inside of chapter of a gardening book a few years ago and they've been posted here for a few years now.

First of all, I use a simple point and shoot digital camera. It's not even a newer model but it has an excellent zoom lens which was my first criteria. So fair warning, my tips are not applicable to the super deluxe cameras that are out on the market.

Lighting is a big key factor in garden photography. The absolute best light is a good cloud cover. Full sun or early morning sun is very hard for me to work with.

The opening shot was taken in full late afternoon sun which can sometimes be used to your advantage. The flower is Campanula punctata which is just a pale creamy pink on the outside. What's cool about this shot is that the bloom is almost translucent and the spotting you see is actually on the inside of the bloom.

Here's the same flower taken on a cloudy day (see the sky?) and from underneath so you can see the spots. By the way, those power lines just totally ruin the photo. Never forget to look around inside your frame and make sure that there aren't other distractions in the background.

Working in the shade can bring another set of problems. I took quite a few photos of my Hydrangea blooms in hopes of getting one with enough clarity to crop and zoom. This isn't close to what I'd like to have but good enough to share.

Blues and sometimes magenta pinks are just impossible to capture. In the days of film, it was very hard to be able to capture the blues and I'm still having the same problem with digital cameras. In real life these blooms don't look like they have some terrible fungus growing on them. Yuck!

Here I was able to capture the color pretty well but unfortunately the strong dappled lighting coming through the trees creates shadows that distract you from the true beauty of these Hydrangeas.

By the way, forget the roses, give me Hydrangeas any day. My next garden is going to be chock full of these luscious, romantic blooms.

Last week I was complaining about the never ending rainy season we were having. One advantage though was the hundreds and hundreds of photos I was able to take.

So cross your fingers for me, I'd love just a half hour of cloud cover in the morning so I can take some more pictures to share with you.

Melanie

The Promise

2009-07-04T20:27:00.004-04:00

This evening was the first time this season that I went around and live-headed my daylilies. Live-head, a term that many people have never heard.

When a gardener dead-heads a plant, they are removing a spent bloom. Some plants don't require this but others, like daylilies, show much better if the the spent bloom is removed.

Nothing looks prettier than a daylily clump loaded with crisp clear blooms like on this antique variety 'Try It'.

What you'll rarely find though is a photo of the ugly drippy mess that awaits you the next morning.

Yuck, nothing is worse than removing gooey, wet daylily blooms that stain your fingers and shorts with purple and red.

Rather than wait for the morning, I love walking around in the evening and removing the still live bloom. It gives me a chance to see each and every daylily up close. 'Dark Monkey' here was facing away from the front of the bed but when I had it in my hand I just had to rub my fingers over the velvety interior.

At first it's disconcerting to see your garden go from full glory to bare nakedness but wait, look closer and you'll see it. It's the promise, the knowing that tomorrow you will once again have a garden full of jewels.

Different cultivars show their promise differently. The long, curly spidery forms that I adore look more like banana peppers with little puckered kisses on the end.

Some varieties are brazen in their promise, sticking out their tongues in advance, hoping for that instant moment of romance in the garden, the brush of pollen against their waiting pistils.

Tonight I spent a long time looking through the lens of my camera, searching for the promise of what is to come. It was the most amazing feeling, I could have taken hundreds of photos of blooms that are just waiting for their moment of glory.

At the end of it all, the buckets of blooms are spilled upon the compost heap, and that too is a promise of riches to come.

Tomorrow will be beautiful, I promise.

Melanie

Flowers for Lauren

2009-07-03T08:59:00.002-04:00

Today is my daughter Lauren's 20th birthday. I rarely post about my girls but yesterday I posted about Emily so of course I have to write about Lauren today.

Lauren has been a constant companion with me on numerous garden tours. We've been at conventions and tours in Detroit, Philadelphia, central Florida, Boston and many other locations and Lauren won't let me forget we already have a date for a tour in Louisiana in 2011.

Last night Lauren requested lots and lots of flowers for her birthday. Not the standard arrangements that are created by professional florists but my arrangements which tend to look like my garden, a mass compendium of plant material.

When she wakes up she'll find three arrangements waiting for her. One is large and two are mid-sized.

Of course they aren't out on the brick patio but in various parts of the house. Today's lighting though wasn't conducive to indoor photography (not much better outside either).

There will also be small single specimens for her to place where ever she wants. How many of you are cringing right now?

Yes, the noxious, notorious Houttyunia cordata is in these arrangments. Fair warning here, if you see a lovely colored foliage plant with the nickname 'Chameleon Plant' do NOT buy this plant. Unfortunately, I inherited a piece but luckily I have it contained in one portion of the garden.

The good news is Houttyunia's a beautiful addition to a cut flower arrangement. I try to pull out the whole stem with as much root as possible and just chop off the root before putting it in the vase.

Do you cut flowers from your garden?

When 1 plus 1 equals 1

2009-07-02T08:11:00.004-04:00

A number of years ago my young daughter Emily wanted to hybridize her own daylily. Daylilies are extremely easy to hybridize and she had seen me do so for many years. Her goal was to make one and name it "Mac & Cheese" so she chose two parents that she thought would create her perfect daylily.

This is 'Nutmeg Elf', a little orange daylily that blooms like crazy. It was the pod parent, meaning that it was the Mommy.

This is 'Itsy Bitsy Spider' which was the pollen parent (the Daddy). Both of these daylilies are small, of narrow form, have tall scapes, excellent branching and lots and lots of blooms.

This is one of the resultant children from that cross. Since it's been a number of years (my guess is 5 or 6) since Emily has crossed these two daylilies, the seedlings are large clumps now.

Although I will never register any of these seedlings, I also won't get rid of them. They are excellent landscape daylilies, bringing lots of color and joy to my garden.

Somewhere in my external hard drive I have a photo of Emily making the actual cross. When I have time I'll have to go hunting for it so I can post it here too.

Melanie

The Front Walkway

2009-06-30T07:59:00.002-04:00

Two years ago we had our front walkway, stoop and patio replaced. We were thrilled with the job done by the masons. I immediately planted up one section with shrubs but left the large portion open because of drainage problems we had with a basement window well.

I tried to find a photo of the area but of course I never took one because it was horrendous. Two years of no plantings and just weeds, made it the ugliest spot in our garden and of course, it was right next to our front door!

Any photo I took in the area I cropped so that you couldn't see the mess but if you peek at the right here, you'll see a little.

This weekend we finally decided we couldn't take it any more and attacked the spot. I really didn't want to spend any money on the area, we already had a Pieris japonica in a pot for a year that I wanted planted there.

The Cotoneaster at the bottom of the photo was there too, we just needed something else to fill in and give us year round foliage.

In the very back of my garden, in total shade were five Korean boxwoods (Buxus microphylla var. Koreana). These had been little slips given to me by a woman in my garden club. Over the years they grew to a nice size but they were in a spot where nobody could see them.

They turned out to be just right in this little front garden.

Now I have to bite the bullet and take out the Echinacea that seeded itself next to the Japanese Maple.

We are also going to mulch well with shredded leaves so we don't have to weed this garden. In the fall I'll add some early spring blooming bulbs.

How nice to have a neat, clean garden in this spot.

SUNY Farmingdale - The Rockery

2009-06-27T22:00:00.005-04:00

This past Thursday was not the first time I've visited the Horticulture gardens at SUNY Farmingdale. I've been there well over a dozen times so it was most surprising to me to find myself in love with an area that didn't excite me too much on previous visits.

The difference wasn't in the garden itself, the difference was me, my taste and desires in gardening right now.

The Rockery (as Dr. Iverson called it) begins at first with a small rock courtyard showcasing a few shade plants that have charmingly worked their way into the cracks and crevices of the stone walls and floor.

A few steps later though you come across the most wonderful, secret, shaded grotto just filled with a treasure trove of shade plants.

The predominant color here is green and yet it was as exciting to me as the long perennial border and the riot of color in the summer garden.

The day was damp and cool (what else has been new this season) and the plants were in prime condition.

I didn't think to take an overview of the whole area but it wasn't much larger than what you see here in this photo.
The contrast of the Hakonachloa (forest grass) against the gravel was magnificent.

There were lots of large rocks that you would swear were put there by Mother Nature and not by the diligent staff and students at the university. More plants were showcased in the cracks and crevices. I just loved seeing the Asarum europeam (European Ginger) in the garden. It's become a big favorite of mine.

Look! I did find a flower, although the garden would have been awesome even without this little beauty.

The perfect garden needs the perfect ending. How's this as the path to take you up and out of the rockery and back to the "real world".

SUNY Farmingdale

2009-06-24T15:29:00.004-04:00

Today I met a few women from my garden club and we were treated to a tour of the horticultural learning gardens at SUNY Farmingdale University.

This first shot was taken at the entrance gate.

Although we were there for a short time, I think I'll break down the visit into three posts. This first post is just to share some of the awesome images I brought home with me.

The plant material was grown to perfection, even with the never ending rain we've been getting this season. I love this combination of the dwarf Aruncus athusifolius and the Pulmonaria 'Mrs Moon'.

I didn't take a photo of the name tag for this so I'm not sure if it's a Heliopsis or a Helianthus (I always get them mixed up). Behind it is Physocarpus (Nine bark).

Another combination that blew me away is Astilbe 'Deutschland' and the variegated Symphytum 'Axminster Gold'.

Sheer luck! How's this for a shot of a butterfly on Stachys bloom? I can't believe it came out this clear as it was in constant motion.

Centaurea macrocephala is something I've tried by mail order but I need to get myself a large one of these so I get to see it grow in my garden.

Papyrus in the entrance garden. This garden is planned to peak in late summer, I hope to get back and see it then.

Clematis and a Rose, sheer heaven.

Finally, the blue on this little bulb Brodiaea laxa 'Queen Fabiola' is just Fabulous! I think I'll be looking for this beauty for my own garden.

The next post will be either about the structure in the garden or the shade rockery. Both were just awesome.

Crabby Claws

2009-06-22T21:00:00.003-04:00

Iris ensata, Japanese Iris are blooming in my garden right now. I used to have more varieties, now there are 4 or 5 different ones. A few years ago I didn't remember to remove the seed pods from one of them and it went to seed. There are two seedlings out there, one I forgot photograph because the other one is really strange.

What kind of form is this?

Here's what a Japanese Iris should look like, aren't they beautiful? Nice and graceful, amazing buds even before the flower unfolds.

The pale blooms on 'Gracius' are just as stunning even if they are a bit less lush.

I love the stripes and color breaks in this one.

So what do you make of this? Should it stay or go? I think it's really weird and don't particularly like it but maybe there's an unusual form classification in the Iris world? If so, I think I'll call it 'Crabby Claws'.

In your eye!

2009-06-20T20:08:00.004-04:00

Tonight I'm sitting here at my laptop with a very achy back. I was cropping and editing some photos I took today when I zoomed in on this shot of a Astrantia (masterwort) blooming in my garden. I had such fun cropping and zooming that I decided to play with a few more images. So here's some up close and personal shots of things in my garden.

The white Astilbe in my shade bed is pristine white. I grow two white varieties, this one has dark green foliage and I wonder if it's Astilbe 'Deutschland'.

Geranium 'Jolly Bee' against the Hosta 'Aristrocrat'. What a combination!

Plain and simple, Coreopsis 'Zagreb' is so easy to grow and I love it so much better than 'Moonbeam' that flops all over the place.

Spirea 'Little Princess' has a new leaf on life. It clashed something awful with another plant growing next to it so I took it out and moved it to the woods where it promptly died. There was a small rooted branch left in the old spot and now there's a perfect shrub there again. The clashing plant up and died a year later so I'm happy to have this beauty back again.

Just can't get enough of the shade loving Japanese fern (Athyrium niponicum 'Pictum')

Thalictrum glaucum blooms are as tall as me but with all the rain we've been getting their flopping all over the place. Tonight I finally tied them up and had to shoot this closeup.

Yet another Filipendula bloomign in the garden. This one has a finer cut leaf and a deeper colored bloom. I have to hunt around for the cultivar name.

And last but not least, daylily 'Itsy Bitsy Spider' blooming it's first bloom and if you take a look at those amazing buds you'll know it's going to bloom like crazy!

Once upon a time...

2009-06-18T09:36:00.004-04:00

Once upon a time there was a bicycle. It was a happy bicycle, it lived in a beautiful neighborhood on the north shore of Long Island. One day the bicycle owners decided they no longer wanted this bicycle and put it out at the curb for the garbage men to collect.

Luckily a woman spotted the bicycle before the garbage truck arrived. She remembered her friend wanted an old bicycle for the garden and this bicycle looked like it might be perfect. She was a good friend, she loaded the bicycle in her car and brought it to her friends house.

The bicycle was placed in a lovely section of the garden. It's new owner place a nice straw basket on the handlebars and a birdhouse on the back carrier.

Within days a little wren came and made a nest in the birdhouse. Soon the bicycle was home to a clutch of baby birds. It was happy.

This is what a baby wren looks like (the one on the right :-)) the first day it left the birdhouse. This particular birdhouse has been an excellent shelter, raising many, many wren babies.

Many years later the bicycle was still in the garden, still holding up the birdhouse. The straw basket had rotted away and unfortunately there was only a metal basket to place on the handlebars.

Along came another friend. One of the best parts of gardening are the amazing friends one makes with other gardeners. This friend had found a straw bicycle basket waiting at the curb for the garbage truck. She knew it would be perfect for the bicycle. She was a good friend, she picked up the basket and brought it over to the bicycle's home.

The bicycle's owner went out to put the new basket on the bicycle. She brought along a shovel because there was a large poke weed right in front of the bicycle that was driving her crazy. As she got near the bicycle she heard that sound, cheep cheep cheep, the birdhouse was filled with wren babies. She decided that the poke weed and the basket could wait for a week or two until the babies could fly.

Two days later the owner went out to check on the baby wrens. Horror of horrors, the bird house was not there!!! Carefully creeping around the garden bed the owner saw the birdhouse was laying upside down on the ground. Worst of all, three huge squirrels were trying to get in the birdhouse while a tiny wren was frantically dive bombing all three squirrels.

The bicycle was sad. The owner was mad! She started to flap her arms and loud sounds came from her as she chased those nasty squirrels across the neighbors yard. (Upon reflection, she hopes that nobody actually witnessed her loss of composure.)

She carefully lifted the birdhouse from the ground. As she slowly turned it upright, the baby wrens started cheeping up a storm! Hooray!!! They were alive and well!

Only minutes had passed when the owner saw the wren arrive with a juicy green inch worm. Breakfast time for the baby birds.

The wrens were happy. The bicycle was happy. The owner was happy. The pokeweed was happy too.

The end.

Centaurea nigra - Where did you come from?

2009-06-15T18:16:00.002-04:00

In yesterday's blog I wrote about a perennial that has stolen my heart. There were two perennials that were amazing in the garden. This is the second one.

The strange thing is that although I always tell people to catalog their purchases with lots and lots of digital images, I can't find a single image of this beauty. In fact, I don't remember buying it but it's such a large healthy clump that it certainly isn't a volunteer.

I grow other Centaureas so I know what plant family I'm dealing with. Doing a little googling I'm pretty sure this is Centaurea nigra. Now I just wish I could remember where I bought it because I just have to get me some more! (Kim, do you think I got it at Agway? Did you get one??)

Melanie

Filipendula 'Kakome'

2009-06-14T21:45:00.004-04:00

Oh no, I think I've fallen head over heels, madly in love with a plant in my garden.

Our lousy cool wet morning slowly turned into a beautiful day. As the weather improved, we started having visitors come to see our open garden. It wasn't until the mid afternoon that I really noticed this plant and then I just couldn't stop visiting it!

One of the first blogs I wrote was about this plant. It was a mystery plant to me, I bought it at a local nursery at the insistence of a gardening friend. Luckily she remembered the name, Filipendula 'Kakome'. (That post is the second to last post under the label "Plant Profile")

When I first planted this in my garden I had no idea what kind of conditions it would need. I planted it in extremely dry shade. Since it's a semi-shade, moisture lover, I'm thrilled that it survived in my garden. While I noticed it before, it wasn't until I moved a piece into a sunnier spot near our sprinkler that I saw what this baby could do. This photo is of the piece that's still in the dry shade area.

Here's a photo from the back side of the sun border with the Filipendula in the lower left corner.

Tonight as I downloaded my photos on to the computer I realized that I took nine different shots of this bloom. I guess I was totally smitten ;-

It looks like cotton candy with little pearl tufts rising above it. Sigh... what a dream flower...

Oh yes, there was another new flower that blew me away today so stay tuned, I'll post about it tomorrow.

Melanie

And the winner is...

2009-06-13T21:06:00.003-04:00

Well how's this? I spent the last three days with the wonderful women in my local garden club. First we set up our flower show, then we exhibited in our flower show, I sold plants at our flower show and today at the end we broke down the flower show.

Talk about exhaustion!

The good news? I took home a nice amount of first place ribbons including my first ever "Growers Choice" award and the "Horticultural Excellence award" for one of my trough gardens (I entered three in the show, all three won first place in different classes).

This photo shows me at my sales booth, we should have taken it after I first set up and the booth was loaded down with plant material. The good news though was that at the end of the show I had very little plant material left!

Tomorrow we are hosting an open garden here. Cross your fingers and wish me better weather. I've been soaked through at my sales booth for three days in a row.

Melanie

I got mail!

2009-06-11T20:14:00.005-04:00

Yesterday when I went out to the mailbox, I found a surprise. There was a small package waiting for me. I knew immediately that my shipment from Squaw Mountain Gardens had arrived.

You can see how small the package is by looking at the standard sized scissor next to it.

Now I wasn't expecting a huge package by any means, Squaw Mountain Gardens specializes in Sempervivums, Sedums and so on.

Opening the package I was in for another surprise. The box was filled with little paper bags. I had never seen plants shipped this way.

Looking inside the paper bags I found the Sempervivum (hens & chicks) that I had ordered. In all cases there was more than one plant in the bag, sometimes there were quite a few in there!

I suddenly realized that a strong gust of wind could take those bags and scatter the Semps all over the patio. It was time for action and I quickly made up a bunch of pots for those new babies.

Planting instructions were in the box and they were wonderfully clear.

I simply pressed the rosettes against the soil, I didn't bury them. This part literally took a few minutes in total. Not one little chick was allowed to escape. There's a tiny one here near the bottom lip of the pot.

Don't forget the name tags! Some of the varieties I ordered because I couldn't resist the name such as this cultivar 'Legolas'.

Apparently when I was looking at the photos on the website I must have been taken by the cobweb varieties because almost all the ones I ordered were webbed.

Here they are all potted up. I can tell you that I am absolutely thrilled with the shipment and would highly recommend this company for those of you looking for new Sempervivums for your trough gardens.

Melanie

Aruncus - the perfect perennial

2009-06-10T07:03:00.006-04:00

The most well behaved plant in my garden has to be Aruncus aethusifolius. The plant catalog at my desk here describes it perfectly: "10" compact mounds of dense, finely cut foliage, miniature spires of creamy white".

It forms a perfectly round mound, looking as if a garden gnome came upon it in the middle of the night and trimmed it.

Right now (June 10th) it is in full bloom. The blooms last a pretty long time, I'll be watching carefully this year to see how long they are here. Gradually they fade to a tan color and I just leave them on the plant since they remain nice and neat.

I also love the fact they they will scatter a few seeds this way although I never get as many seedlings as I'd like to get.

Last year I added two more types of Aruncus to my garden. This photo shows Aruncus 'Misty Lace' which is described as a " 2' X 2', compact and heat tolerant, deep green Astilbe-like foliage topped with delicate pure white plumes.

Sure enough it too is behaving as perfecly as it's little sister. It's just a bit larger than the athusifolius variety and has even more blooms.

I have this one in part shade, it gets lots of direct morning sun but no afternoon sun and it is as happy as can be.

Here's another angle, I love how it looks against the deep purple foliage of the Ligularia 'Britt Marie Crawford'.

The last variety of Aruncus in my garden is Aruncus dioicus which is the large version. 4-6' tall giant cream plumes in July, foliage looks like a giant Astilbe is just about the perfect description. What the catalog doesn't tell you is how wonderful this looks in the landscape.

For many years I walked past the pots of this giant Aruncus at nursery centers. It looks awful in pots. The blooms sprawled all over and seemed dingy in color. In the garden though it's a whole different story. The creamy white is just dreamy and the soft arching blooms are so much better than I ever imagined.

Sitting here typing on my laptop I can look out my dining room window and see it in full bloom. It looks magnificent and I hope it too gives me some seedlings like the athusifolius variety has done.

Magical Peas

2009-06-08T13:35:00.002-04:00

Peas peas, heavenly peas. I love to eat raw peas and pea pods. Last year was the first year in many that I decided to try to grow a few vegetables. I had huge success with the peas in containers, enough so that I could munch a nice big handful each day while working in the garden.

This year I planted two varieties. Burpee Snowbird and Burpee Sugarsnap Peas. The pea you see here is the Snowbird which is just covered with blooms and pods.

See the pretty white flowers? Yesterday I stuck my nose up against them and inhaled. Yummmmm, they smelled delicious!

Now for the magic part. Here's how I grew my seeds this year. My potager is still under construction so I planted the pea seeds in large black plastic containers. I made my own pea supports with long branches I cut from my Physocarpus 'Diablo' (purple nine bark).

Take a good look here, do you see what I see? The Physocarpus has leafed out! How cool is this?

Now for the ultimate, not only did the cut Physocarpus branches leaf out, they are currently blooming. I can't tell you how happy this makes me (well, ok, I just told you ;-)

Happy happy me,
Melanie

An Aerial View

2009-06-07T21:42:00.004-04:00

Once or twice a year I remember to go upstairs and take photos from our bedroom windows. I love to look at these photos years later and see the progression of the gardens.

This is the view from my front bedroom window. I can see straight up the driveway. The funny thing is I rarely look out my bedroom window, I guess I'm outside more than I'm inside!

My daughter Emily has a better view, she can't see all the way out to the street but she has a more sideways view of the front perennial borders that flank the driveway.

My bedroom has windows that look out the back of the house too. Here's the newly opened swimming pool. Still too cold to swim in but who cares, at least it looks lovely!

At the front of the swimming pool is my little rock garden. If I could change one hardscape location here in my yard it would be the pool and patio area. It's just so big, rectangular and of course, smack dab in the middle of the yard.

I zoomed in on the back shade border with my adorable shed and my neighbors hideous white vinyl fence.

One last look at the opposite corner where I make my black gold (compost of course!).

If you look carefully you can see Calie-the-wonder-doodle taking one of her many laps around the pool patio.

This evening I took lots and lots of photos. The next week is chock full of gardening plans. My local garden club is hosting a flower show this Friday and Saturday at the Historic Kissam House in Huntington Village. I've got a ton of things to get ready but at least I've got lots of photos and ideas to share with you when I find a moment or two.

Shave and a haircut...

2009-06-03T07:23:00.003-04:00

Today's Perennial Spotlight is focused upon a charming little creeper, Cymbalaria muralis which is known locally as Kenilworth Ivy.

These sweet little plant was given to me many years ago by a neighbor, just a little slip that I had in a pot near my garage. A piece escaped from the pot and rooted by the door. When I was looking for plants that would grow in my rock wall, I removed a piece and tucked it into a crevice out back.
Over the past four years the Cymbalaria worked it's way around the corner of the raised bed. It doesn't like the sunny spots, just the most shaded corner of the wall so I really didn't have to do anything to contain it.

Yesterday I decided that it needed a haircut. It looks so lush and healthy here but it was hiding some of the elements of the rock wall that I really like.

See, now you can see the boulder that we worked into the plan.

It was really simple to cut back the Cymbalaria, I just used a basic pair of scissors. The whole area took less than an hour and I also added lots of compost and top dressing to the bed at the same time.

Rather than cut too much, I left some areas with little tufts of Cymbalaria. I know that it will grow back again soon. Look at what I found underneath, a nice little Sempervivum rosette that will now get some much needed afternoon sun.

I think I'll pot up some Cymbalaria and add it to the sales table. Don't you think it's sweet?

In Bloom

2009-06-02T08:10:00.005-04:00

With so many things beginning to bloom here at Old Country Gardens, I just don't know where to begin. There's just not enough hours in the day to do all the things I'd like to do in the garden.

Here's a little peek at what was blooming this morning:

I'm so glad I moved these Iris siberica from a shade bed where they were struggling. I was only able to save a few small pieces but they've responded wonderfully in their new sunny locations and I foresee huge swaths of white blooms in years to come.

The little white Rhododendrons I rescued after a flower show many years ago have grown and grown. How nice to capture a shot of them in bloom.

Another shrub blooming today is the Physocarpus opulifolious 'Nugget'. What a great foliage color too!
The pink Symphytum is chock full of pretty pink flowers that just hum with all the big fat bumblebees that visit them. When it's finished blooming I'll hack it back and it will rebloom nicely.

Hardy Geranium cantabrigiense 'Cambridge' on the right has mixed nicely with a simple Nepeta mussini (cat mint).

Thalictrum flowers are so delicate that you need more than one or two to make a statement.

And for the hall of shame, look at this lovely little Rhododendron that's been tortured for two years in this pot. Maybe I"ll finally find a home for this baby.

Back to the garden, I'm in the middle of a little project and will take lots more photos when I'm done.

Hens and chicks and chicks and chicks

2009-05-29T07:13:00.005-04:00

On Wednesday my friend Kim called me with a hot tip. A local nursery had pots with Sempervivum (Hen's and Chicks) just exploding out of them. Needless to say I got in my car immediately and headed over there.

They only had three varieties to choose from, a red named 'Pilioseum', a heavily webbed varieties named 'Cobweb' and a green variety that I didn't purchase. Kim was right, the pots were literally exploding with hens and chicks. The price on these pots were $9.99, if you wanted to spend a bit more you could get even larger pots for $11.99.

One tip I have for you if you are purchasing Sempervivum, look to see if any are blooming. You see the long stem coming up? That is going to be a bloom stem. Many people don't realize that Semps bloom. After a sempervivum blooms, it dies. Now if you have lots and lots of chicks like here, it won't matter. But, if you choose a pot with lots of bloom and not many chicks, you might not have any babies to carry you through the next year. Still, if you are looking for one year of interest, you might want the pot that was full of upcoming blooms.

Getting them out of their pots wasn't the easiest thing. Once I slid them free I removed the soil from the bottom half. Sempervivums don't have huge root systems and don't mind being disturbed like this.

It was easy to break apart the clumps just by using my hands, no need to damage the fleshy rosettes with a sharp tool.

Isn't this a pretty little division? I really like the cobweb variety although my daughter who was taking the photos wasn't as enthralled as me.

The red 'Pilioseum' was even more crowded in the pot but it also broke apart quite easily.

When working with Hens and Chicks, I like to have a tray underneath me to catch any babies. Here I'm using an old wine box.

You can split them down to single pieces with one "hen" and her "chicks" but I had enough plants to be able to leave a few divisions larger.

Next step was putting them in the troughs I just bought. These troughs will be for sale on June 12th and 13th at the Kissam House in Huntington Village. I hope they'll sell!

Too big for their britches

2009-05-27T06:55:00.002-04:00

Oh woe is me, too many plants trying to grow in one spot. This happens every year, either something seeds itself into a spot where it doesn't belong or I just make a mistake and plant things too close.

In this case the two Sedums were planned. A tiny little Sedum (possibly nevii) and the larger Sedum 'Vera Jameson' were encouraged to grow in this spot but the big Digitalis (fox glove) moved in. I guess I have to get in there and remove the foxglove but boy is that going to hurt.

The Hosta on the left is 'American Sweetheart', it was planted there last year. The tag said it would get 18" tall and 36" wide. Uh huh, it's already taller than 18" and I seriously doubt it's going to stop at 36" wide. I searched the web last night but everything has the same measurements. Anybody else grow this beauty? I'm thinking it will need to be moved pretty soon if I don't want them to hit the leaves when they mow the lawn.

Off the top of my head I can think of two more places where there's a serious crowding spot. In one location a lovely Ligularia seeded itself just an inch or two from a large Hosta. In another spot a Dicentra Spectabilis (Bleeding Heart) seeded next to Hosta 'Striptease'. In both cases the Hosta were late emergers and now have to fight the lush foliage of their overabundent neighbors.

Last night I typed out this same post and though I hit the send key but this morning there was nothing waiting for me in cyber space. If two of these posts suddenly appear here you'll know what happened.

Garden Talk

2009-05-24T21:40:00.004-04:00

The title for my other blog, Melanie's Perennials, was the same as this one but the idea behind it is different. On the other blog I wrote about websites I thought my garden visitors would find helpful . Now though I'm writing about some of the things I learned this weekend.

One of the best things about having garden visitors every weekend is getting to hear what they like and don't like. Here's some of this weekend's favorites:

The opening shot is a Geranium phaeum, also known as the mourning widow geranium. It wasn't Lisa's favorite plant in the garden but she and I looked at too many for me to begin to remember which one was ;-)

The yellow variegated Sedum seiboldii variegatum is a favorite every weekend! I wish I had dozens of pots of this beauty. I do have some extra ones and did promise to pot up a few, Liz was really crazy about this plant.

Newcomers to the garden, George and Joan, were on the hunt for Hosta 'June'. While I have a nice large clump of 'June', I'm not planning on cutting it up just yet. I'll be on the lookout for more 'June' in the near future.

Carol was in such a rush that I never got the chance to show her the Iris from Old Westbury that has started to bloom. Hope you're looking Carol!

Almost everybody has to stop and admire the variegated Kousa dogwood in bloom right now. How could you not just love this beauty?

Bonnie was on a mini Hosta kick this weekend but she had to stop and visit the succulants too. How sweet is this tiny Sempervivum?

Anita brought her delightful son Craig and they hit the ferns and mini Hosta too. Unfortunately I have yet to figure out how to take a decent photo of a fern.

Gloria came for ferns but had to stop and admire the Hosta 'Spritzer' sitting so pretty behind this clump of Heuchera 'Caramel'.

As for the number one, most popular plant this weekend? The Heuchera 'Caramel' you see in this last photo. If I had 100 of them, I would have sold all 100 of them over the past month. Unfortunately, I only have the three I planted in my garden last year...Lucky me!

What's your favorite?

Melanie