I went to New Jersey, the Garden State, to search for spring and found it at the Leonard J. Buck Garden in Far Hills. My brother Tony and his wife Joan took us to the 29 acre garden which was originally part of Mr. Buck’s estate. In the 1930s Buck began working with Zenon Schreiber, a well-known landscape architect, to create a naturalistic garden that incorporated the various rock outcroppings, the sinuous Moggy Brook and two ponds.…
Primroses are a wonderful early spring flower. Last weekend I toured the Leonard J. Buck Garden with my brother and his wife. Spring has been slow there, as well as here, but a few of the primroses were in bloom. There are many types of primroses, but all of them are hardy and like a damp site and humusy soil. I have even seen them growing in the water at the edge of a temporary spring stream.…
How can we celebrate Earth Day every day? We can grow a garden. Forget the lawn; grow veggies and herbs and berries, trees and flowers. Gardens, ornamental and edible can feed lots of pollinators and other bugs that need different kinds of foliage to nibble on, so that they can be eaten by birds and other wild creatures. Plants are pretty low on the food chain so that makes them especially important. Edible plants feed us healthy…
Dry shade is a challenge in the garden, but epimediums and hellebores, two very different plants, both turn dry shade into an opportunity. For years I admired epimediums in other gardens, always asking the name of the beautiful low plant with heart shaped leaves. Sometimes I got no answer, but even when I did I was incapable of remembering the word epimedium. I finally saw a pot of this plant at the Blue Meadow nursery in Montague and,…
The April 2014 issue of Fine Gardening magazine has an article by Peter Kukielski, former curator of the Peggy Rockefeller Rose Garden at the New York Botanical Garden titled Easy Picture Perfect Roses. Peter knows all about 'Easy' roses because during his tenure at that garden he ripped out 200 or so of the roses in the garden that needed pesticides and fungicides to survive and then replaced them with 693 roses that did not need that kind…
Accessible healthy food is a basic human right. The Greenfield Community Farm helps insure this right to the Greenfield Community. The Greenfield Community Farm out on Glenbrook Road is actually comprised of four gardens. First, there is a production market garden, operated by grant-funded David Paysnick and his assistant Daniel Berry, that grows produce for sale through the Just Roots CSA, at the Farmers Market, and Green Fields Coop. This garden includes a greenhouse where seeds are started…
Last week I visited the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum to meet the noted landscape architect Michael Van Valkenburg and hear him speak about how he approached the challenge of redesigning the Monks Garden. He said that Isabella Stewart Gardener herself acknowledged that she was never satisfied with the small walled garden she called the Monks Garden. “That gave me the confidence and courage . . . to make a garden for the future of the Museum.” Certainly the…
These geese were crossing the street, against the light, in their hurry to look at the newly redesigned and planted Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum's Monks Garden. No luck yesterday. The Museum was closed, but the Monks garden is officially open today - a magical woodland stroll garden. Michael Van Valkenburgh, and his associates, are geniuses. For more Wordlessness this Wednesday click here.
When I visited the Boston Public Garden on September 2, I ran into this demonstration right under the magnificent statue of George Washington. It made sense to hold a demonstration for independence under the statue of one of our own founders of an independent nation, promising liberty to all, but I couldn't tell what the demonstration was all about. It was not until one woman held out this banner than I even knew the issue, but still I did…
The Boston Public Gardens begin at the foot of the Boston State House. First is the Boston Common where cattle once grazed, then the Boston Public Garden, the oldest botanic garden in the nation, and finally the Commonwealth Avenue Mall. Here are a few photos from my recent visit. Frolicking tadpoles in the Boston Common Frog Pond watched over by parents and the frog statues! The Boston Public Garden, established in 1837 is the first botanic garden…