Griffith Buck, a professor at Iowa State University, was ahead of his time. He bred 80 roses over many years. I was quick to fall in love with Buck roses because I was living high on a hill with very cold winters. Carefree Beauty was one of the first Buck roses I bought and planted.  It tolerated the cold, rarely had trouble with insects or disease, and wasn’t fussy about the soil. I was a new rose gardener and Buck roses were  the perfect way to start. (more…)

Yesterday, on our way home from a Heath party, we stopped at the Bridge of Flowers to see what is blooming. It is such a gift – the Bridge is not only blooming, we are now allowed to walk across the Bridge and see the ever changing flowers. (more…)

From our kitchen window we have happily been watching birds splash around in our birdbath. We wash out the birdbath every day,  but we have just gotten bad news from Mass Audubon. (more…)

Garden Blogger’s Bloom Day is late for me this July, but we will begin anyway, in spite of all the rain. The plants mostly seemed to enjoy the rain – as you can tell from this array on the hell strip. There is golden achillea (yarrow), echinacea (coneflower), daylilies, and if you look very very closely you can see one of the bee balm blossoms. Many of these plants are in the main garden behind the house. (more…)

Last summer there was no Forbes Library Garden Tour. The Covid-19 pandemic threw all our expectations and schedules and plans up in the air. The special events in every season that promised excitements and camraderie were cut down to Zoom gatherings. But now, at last, we can again thank the Forbes Library for the beautiful Garden Tour with its many delights. (more…)

The birdbath in our garden is located so that we can look out from the kitchen window and see what the birds are doingl  The birdbath is located at the edge of our energetic yellow twig dogwood which is currently rich with seeds. We understand that the  birds need a little privacy. Our yellow twig provides lots of privacy. We can recognize a bluejay when we see one, which makes us very  happy. (more…)

A front page story of Sunday’s New York Times shows a young man, Peter Treiber, Jr., standing in front of his vegetable truck at a farmer’s market. The side of the truck was painted with our Stars and Stripes flag, a perfect design for the Fourth of July. But no one was stopping to buy his honey, wild bergamot or sunflowers. At last he stopped a customer to ask why no one was shopping with him. “She said, ‘Oh, you know, I wasn’t so sure about you. I thought you were some flag-waver something or other.” Mr. Treiber was not happy to think that our flag could have this dichotomy between the ways people now thought about our flag. Our Flag! (more…)

Pollinator Week may be over, but we must think about  Aesclepias and Lobelia cardinalis every week - along with other flowers that will attract pollinators. We are all familiar with the common milkweeds of the field that bloom, and the flowers that produce green seed pods turning brown as they mature. When mature the pod will split open and we can see 50-100 seeds, each seed attached to a white, fluffy 'coma' or parachute that can send the…

When we moved to Greenfield I was  already concerned about planting a garden that would welcome pollinators, or which there are many. Today is the first time I have ever heard of Pollinators Week and Pollinators Month. I have planted many flowers that welcome pollinators - bees, bugs, and butterflies. Asters come in many sizes  and colors. I will start with these low growing asters, Woods Blue, bloom in the fall - and they are spreaders! A friend…

The Coral Drift rose brought us into Garden Bloggers Bloom Day as one of the first bloomers in my garden. The weather has been alternately hot and very cool, very dry and very rainy, but Coral Drift endures - and will continue into the fall. This is a small rose, about  two and a half feet tall, but also plump and lush. I brought the Alchemist rose from Heath, as a reminder of those days, but she didn't…