A Dull Boy

May30

We are just wrapping up Memorial Day here, so a three day weekend of remembrance and outdoor eating has come to an end and tomorrow is back to work. Going back to work might be a bit of a relief since I’m tired and sore and could probably use some time at a desk rather than behind a shovel, but this time of year there’s always more to do in the garden than time to do it. At least I got to play a little on Saturday when friends twisted my arm for a garden visit and afterwards we took a spin out to the local garden center to see what’s new.

With an introduction date of 1992, the iris ‘Ominous Stranger’ seems like a newer one… until I do the math and realize that’s 30 years ago! This smoldering color looks fine close up but in the garden competing with yellowing tulip foliage, it gets lost.

Of course garden friends always bring a few goodies, and I may have bought a few more on our excursion, but in the grand scheme of things a few more treasures to plant is just a drop in the to-do bucket. Kind of like blogging, and with three weeks since my last post you can guess where that ranked on the list 😉

To me the 1950 iris ‘Port Wine’ seems old enough to qualify as historical. It’s shrugged off our late freeze, moody temperatures, and lack of rain and is making a bold show in the front border.

I have been somewhat busy but a dry May really de-motivates me, and with about four weeks since the last real rain I would say this qualifies. The bearded iris shrug it off but other plants are wilting and the grass is turning brown, and I guess I could continuously complain but what would be the point to that. Years back I planted with summers like this in mind but then a couple rainy years rotted all my iris and turned my cacti into bacterial mush so I changed course. Boy will I feel stupid again when I rip things out and replant the iris just to have them rot again.

Here’s the historical iris ‘Elsinore’, a special thing with some unique coloring that dates from around 1920. Of course it’s a favorite. I’d have more planted around but it tends to over-bloom, with all its growth fans sending up flowers rather than multiplying for next year.

Feeling stupid is nothing new, so I’ll just keep chugging along, stuffing the wrong plants in too closely, letting the weeds explode everywhere, and focusing on things which might just be a waste of time. Speaking of ‘wastes of time’, I guess an update on the earth moving is in order.

The back of the new addition has been dug to the level of the rest of the yard and I’m happy with the progress. Please ignore all the other dirt and rocks which still must go.

So before the update, let me just say that some people spend all day baking bread from scratch, or hours over a stove making tomato sauce. Both can be purchased for under $5 in the store. Some people spend months knitting sweaters and socks when they too are available for much less than your time is worth so let me just enjoy my dirt-digging waste of time thank you very much.

The slope up to the daylily farm has also been graded and I’m excited to say I have found plenty of rocks along the way. Never mind that the one in front is too heavy for me to budge, I can always rearrange the garden around it.

Maybe the eye rolls on top of the lack of rain is making me a little sensitive but I doubt it. Lifting shovel after shovel of dirt is far more useful than lifting weights, and the sideyard is much more pleasant a place than the gym. Also if you notice the damp soil in the last picture it’s because I washed off the wonderful rocks I found, all just to admire them more closely. Try doing that with the weights at the gym and I suspect someone would put a stop to it rather quickly.

The best part of all the shoveling is I’m finally bringing the back of my yard up to a level grade. It’s terribly rocky and poor soil, but at least it’s not clay or pure sand, and eventually mulch and compost(and water) will make a garden out of it.

So iris, dirt pictures, and complaints about a lack of rain. Hopefully it isn’t the same story all summer since I am planning on planting a few annuals and will end up resenting them if I have to water all summer. Maybe if I start really small I can ignore the dry ten day forecast and pretend that watering them in really well will be enough.

With all the amazing plants for sale, you wouldn’t think marigolds would find their way onto my cart but here they are. I’m quite pleased and they’ll go in the potager to fill up the space that should be filled with vegetables if I were one to enjoy vegetables.

You never know. Maybe we’ll get a string of thunderstorms and June will turn into a gray, humid mess and we’ll all have something new to complain about. Actually since I just ordered new pool filters and a couple billion other accessories there’s a strong possibility the weather will change just to derail my summer plans. Replanting iris would probably seal the deal, but even if it doesn’t I still like to remind myself it’s not January.

Have a great week.

Behind on Everything

May14

Happy Mother’s Day! Here in the hill-like mountains of Eastern Pennsylvania the sun is out and there’s promise of another beautiful day, and I hope yours is as well. It’s been staying cooler and I’ve much enjoyed it, but the strong sun and a decent rain have everything sprouting and growing and of course have put me way behind where I should be. Right now it’s looking like a season of repairing the garden from construction rather than a season of getting everything planted and weeded, but we will see where the energy meter goes to. We’re currently at ‘moderate’ but sadly that means energy for painting and closet building with an occasional break to dig and move tons of dirt, and not weeding and planting, but at least the very last of the tulips are still in bloom… and the Motrin and Tylenol supply is well stocked 😉

The “broken” tulip “Insulinde” is still holding strong. I love it this year, even with a subtle dark and dusty look, the swirls and patterns can draw anyone’s attention.

Nearly all the tulips in the Potager are dead-headed and focused on fattening up bulbs for next year, and even if that sounds sad remember that this weirdo looks forward to digging the bulbs and seeing how well they bulked up. I’ve set some old wooden pallets and wire mesh aside and hope to throw a few bulb racks together for drying… so that’s one more super-important thing added to the to-do list.

Another tulip who’s coloring has been “broken” by virus is ‘Mabel’, an antique dating to 1856.

We will see if that happens. Iris season is coming, and the first of my favorites began to open yesterday and I forgot how fragrant some of them are. The scents of grape and lemon are drifting through parts of the garden, on top of the last of the wisteria and lilac aromas. It’s a nice break from the diesel exhaust and asphalt odors which you run into just down the street.

One last one. ‘Black and White’ goes back to at least 1920 and to me is somewhat similar to ‘Insulinde’, especially when the latter is short on its yellow base color.

Totally without scent, there’s one more cool thing to share this morning. A mystery seedling on the side of the house has revealed its identity when the poppy-like buds finally opened up into bright red blooms. For the past year I’ve been watching fuzzy foliage rosettes grow in this bone-dry, hard packed spot in full sun, and have suspected the gardener threw seeds of something odd here and forgot or didn’t even expect them to grow, but here they are.

The blackspot horned poppy, Glaucium corniculatum, is an European annual or biennial which is probably a weed most everywhere else, but here I’m pleased to see it. ‘Poor to moderate, dry soils’ describes its preferred growing conditions so it’s likely to seed around here… until we get a monsoon year and they all rot, devastating the gardener…

So I bring you more virused tulips and horned poppies this week. With all the beauty of spring I feel peonies and clematis would be more welcome but I’m sure Instagram is full of that, so maybe this is more refined? I doubt it, so thanks for reading anyway and I hope you have a wonderful week.

On the Eve of May

Apr30

I hope no one is expecting the entertaining, witty narrative which usually accompanies these posts. It’s been raining all day and the gloom has me drowsy, plus hours of inhaling varnish fumes this weekend probably killed off more brain cells than I can afford, so be prepared for a somewhat dull post.

The potager last Friday. The cool weather has been good to the tulips, but wind and rain is starting to take its toll.

As the first order of business I want to reassure everyone with the announcement that I have resolved my overabundance of yellow tulips problem. They were looking a little tired Saturday so I just yanked a good amount of them and tossed them on the compost. Sure they’ll probably show up everywhere now, as the compost will be contaminated by bulblets, but today I’m pleased with myself. Never mind that it took me weeks to come up with this solution, despite the fact many people pull their tulips after bloom, but in this garden I celebrate where I can.

My only 2022 tulip purchase, ‘Tom Pouce’. Five bulbs purchased, one came up yellow, but I love the other four for their delicious yellow with pink frosted colors.

So in a moment of distraction I started wondering who Tom Pouce was, since there’s also a pink and yellow lily, and pink and yellow daffodil named after him, and to have three flowers carry your name must count for something impressive, so off to the library I went.

Or Google… and then Wikipedia… “A tompoes or tompouce is a pastry in the Netherlands and Belgium. It is the local variety of the mille-feuille or Napoleon, introduced by an Amsterdam pastry baker and named after Admiraal Tom Pouce, the stage name of the Frisian dwarf Jan Hannema”. Apparently it’s a pastry taken seriously in the low countries. Color may stray, the pink and yellow may change based on national holidays or serious sporting events, but you don’t mess around with either shape or ingredients. It sounds like a pastry I would enjoy getting to know, although there also seems to be a little bit of a quandary on how it should be correctly eaten. I believe that discussion is outside the scope of this tulip post, so I’ll stop now and wonder about Frisian dwarves all on my own 😉

Not named after a pastry, ‘Insulinde’ is an example of one of the virused ‘broken tulips’ which are a virus risk, but just amazing enough to try growing anyway. This one dates back to 1915.

Soon the tulips will be a thing of the past, and just like snowdrops and daffodils it will be another 12 months before they return, but at this time of the year it barely matters. There’s so much coming along that even on a miserably rainy and dark Sunday you can’t help be a little excited. In the potager the wisteria is blooming again, and although it should only be a year since the last time, it’s really three since late freezes have done it in for a couple seasons. The scent of the flowers fills the potager air, even stronger than lilacs and probably just as sweet.

This wisteria only looks like it is supported by the pergola since I wouldn’t dare release it onto crushable aluminum supports and a frame of mere two by fours. Once a week for the entire summer stray tentacles of vine are cut back to a leaf or two to keep it under control. This plant is a beautiful monster.

There’s more blooming and growing out there, but I’ll spare you all except this last peony. Paeonia daurica subsp. mlokosewitschii is a mouthful so most refer to this plant as ‘Molly the Witch’. I did want the pure yellow version but when my seedling finally bloomed it showed to be a pale yellow with a pink tint, which is also within the range for this species. I love the foliage but to me the bloom is relatively small and somewhat mild mannered. Time will tell if it keeps a spot here in the garden, but even if it doesn’t I’m sure some gardening friend would take it in for me.

A nice pink tinted version of Paeonia daurica subsp. mlokosewitschii.

The rain is coming down strong again and it’s getting late. There’s work tomorrow. Ugh. I think I need something sugary and fatty or just plain greasy, because I feel like Monday has already arrived and I’m not excited. Enjoy your week at least!

Tulips

Apr24

It was warmer than expected and most of the garden’s tulips opened for the weekend. That sounds good but it was hotter than they like and a few fried up, and then the wind picked up and they took another beating… and then we had a downpour…so today they look a little tired, but the cooler weather in this week’s forecast will be perfect to keep them fresh looking for another week at least. It’s not botanical garden glorious, but I’m quite pleased with it, and also grateful that a couple friends were able to stop by and take a look as well.

Mixed Darwin tulips in the vegetable garden beds.

Some ‘Spryng Break’ lined out with the others

Another view of the potager beds

Honestly it looks much better in the closeups. From a distance you can see all the “works in progress” around the yard and these beds look more like some maniac just stuffed too many flowers into a tin can vase, but again I’m pleased with it and wondering if I have enough beds of tulips yet 🙂

Some of the tulips out front. Like everything else they need dividing but with a gardener who just waddles around the beds smiling at each new bloom there’s only a slight chance that could happen.

Originally the mix came around when I collected stray tulips and wasn’t sure what they were, so just planted them all together. There have only been a few times when I wasn’t happy with them all together, and when that happened I just pulled out the offenders and all was well, but this year I’m wondering if growing a few as separate color blocks might be fun. I’m envisioning a Dutch bulb field look with rows of color, and since I think I have too many yellows anyway as long as I’m separating those out might as well separate a few other colors as well, right? -I can almost hear you saying obviously…

I like them. I think I need a few more still. We all have our weaknesses.

Marking and sorting out tulips sounds like a lot of work. I may have to plant them with some better spacing so they can sit where they are for two seasons rather than being dug each summer, and I think if I keep them along the edges of the beds there will be room for zucchini or whatever and hopefully the extra watering won’t bother the dormant bulbs. I always miss a few anyway, and they do fine so in theory this should work.

So much color

In any case I know I’ll have plenty more tulips next year. These will likely double in number for next year and my friend Kimberly at Cosmos and Cleome will hopefully 🙂 offer me her leftovers again when she ejects her own tulip patch to make way for the season’s next show… I’ll gleefully add them somewhere here to grow on until they’re big enough to bloom again.

An old bulb bed where a few tulips still come up through the grass and weeds. Even with the potager beds packed and in full bloom, a trio of flowers in the weeds is still amazing.

Sorry this post is just the ramblings of a tulip maniac. To make it somewhat useful I guess I should reveal all my secrets about growing tulips so here they are. Wait until frost kills off whatever is in the vegetable bed and remove the dead vines and stakes. Grab a shovel and dig a shallow grave. Dump a reasonable amount of bulbs in and to make yourself feel like you’re putting in some effort, space them somewhat evenly and turn them pointy side up. Fill the grave with the dirt and old tomatoes and rotten peppers and whatever else you were too lazy to cart off to the compost. Cover the beds with a good inch or two of chopped leaves so that no one can see how poorly you prepared the bed. Wait for spring.

I think my reputation is established enough that no one expected the “work” involved here to be anything special. I have plenty of other jobs to kill myself with here so no sense letting the tulip planting have the upper hand, but it surely helps that I love digging them up again to see how well they’ve grown. Tulip flowers are nice enough, but sacks of tulip bulbs curing in the garage must really thrill the dormant prepper in me, and make me feel like I’m more than well prepared for any civilization crumbling tulip-shortage that could happen at any moment. You never know. It’s always good to be prepared.

April in Bloom

Apr21

We had our earliest 90+ degree day ever last week (33C) and I was unimpressed. Daffodils melted and hyacinths fried and the gardener turned on the air conditioning and did nothing in the shade. Three days later he froze standing around at a track meet with a brisk 41F (5C) breeze and the occasional snow flurry. Such are our springs. As usual things are busy and people are probably relieved that photographing snowdrops had to take a back seat to work and trips and home repairs, but I did take a minute Sunday to photograph a few things. Lets start at the end… the end of snowdrop season 😦

Here’s the double snowdrop ‘L.P. Short’ holding on to a last bloom while a sea of Spring Beauties (Claytonia virginica) bring on the next show.

Galanthus ‘Narwhal’ is still hanging on in spite of all kinds of weather and me stepping on him at least once…

Of course the end of snowdrop season is always a sad time, but at least there are plenty of distractions to ease the trauma. Actually as things come on so fast and furious it will be at least another month or two before the reality sinks in, and by then I can start digging a few bulbs and buying a few new ones, and dreaming of next season 😉

I might have added an Epimedium or two over the last few years. Shade tolerant, drought resistant, deer and rabbit resistant, nice all summer… I’ve been avoiding them for a while, but what’s the harm in adding another two or ten? This is ‘Purple something’ since I lost the tag and possibly didn’t write the name down anywhere…

As trees grow, this full sun garden is becoming shady in spots and I kind of like the early flush of spring bloomers.

Some dogtooth violets (Erythronium americanum) a friend gifted me a few years back. I was shocked to see them blooming this year, I thought for sure the cool speckled foliage would be all I’d ever get in this crappy, rooty, dry as a bone all summer, growing location.

From far enough away the somewhat-shaded part of the garden actually looks nice.

Shade is nice, but full sun is still something I treasure most. All kinds of bulbs are now filling in the beds and it’s awesome to see the return of color and growth, even if at times it seems to move along too fast.

The grape hyacinths are absolutely common, and somewhat weedy if not dead-headed, but the blue color is perfect and lasts a while.

For all the treasures I see in the garden, most of the people coming and going from this house don’t mention a thing about the garden. You can imagine my shock then when not one, but two people commented on the ‘pink tropical looking flower growing alongside the porch. Species peonies are nice enough but two people? Honestly I think they’re just messing with me, but when they immediately lost interest upon hearing the blooms only last a week or so, I knew they were authentically interested… even if it was only for a minute…

Peonia daurica by the front porch.

No one mentioned the dandelions, not even the fancy white Japanese version I’ve been pampering along in the front border. I wish it would seed around a little, that would surely draw more attention.

It’s a favorite of the rabbits at least. Taraxacum albidium must have a better flavor than the regular dandelions since I practically have to cage it to keep the bunnies off.

The daffodils might draw attention even if it’s never mentioned by anyone. I need more, and I need to move a few bunches back into full sun since they’re sulking in the shady spots I tucked them into. They’ll bounce back, but I was so proud of myself when I found all that room under the trees along the side of the yard. I guess there was a reason for the empty spaces since apparently nothing really wants to be there including the daffodils.

Narcissus ‘Bravoure’ front and center near the door. It’s very nice and refined and I can’t find a single fault other than I’m not so crazy about it. Maybe it’s too stiff. I really shouldn’t try and find faults.

Narcissus ‘Stella’ aka Kathy’s Sweetheart is not too stiff. She nods and sways and has joyfully twisted petals which fade from cream to white and I’m surprised how she’s grown on me. I was trying to be a show-daff kind of person but I guess I’m not.

This one just showed up. It doesn’t match anything which used to grow here yet I’m pretty sure it had a name at one time and I either never knew it or lost it. It’s a keeper though, I like how the color of the trumpet bleeds into the petals… something which I believe show-daff people frown upon…

Newer, fancier daffs which are not doing as well in the ‘terrace’ as I thought they would. It’s frightening to think how these should also be moved to a better spot.

I don’t remember ‘White Collar’ from last year, but this year he’s living up to the name and I definitely approve. Behind him is ‘Bronzewing’. Bronzewing is again amazing.

To be honest the shaded daffodils escaped the worst of the heat and are still somewhat nice when compared to the fried daffodils in the main beds. But what fries the daffodils grows the tulips, and from here on it’s the tulips which will shine.

Darwin tulips in the front border.

Years ago I took out the double tulips, but I must have missed one and over the years the one bulb has been clumping up nicely. I suspect it’s the tulip ‘Abba’.

Most of the tulips here come and go as I add new ones or accidentally dig up and then divide old ones, but the potager is filled with the tulips I intentionally dig and divide each summer. There are a couple hundred and although I planted them too thickly (entirely because I was too lazy to plant them properly), they still seem to be coming along nicely. There’s no room for lettuce or onions but by the weekend all I’ll care about is how amazing it looks.

More (mostly Darwin) tulips in the vegetable beds. Another warm day and the main show will start.

Honestly the tulip show is nothing when compared to the big shows where bed after bed is filled with a curated display of color echoes and blends, but I like it, and on a beautifully sunny day all the color is just a celebration of spring.

One day I’m telling my sister in law that this is one of the less-interesting, sloppy forms of tulip, and then two days later I think it’s one of the nicest in the garden. ‘Orange Emperor’ has a delicious color and I like the touch of green on a few of the blooms. Thanks Kimberley, I like it!

There is a little bit of a stink hanging over the display. The pear tree is covered in blooms and without a freeze in the forecast I’m anticipating a good deal of pears this summer. Fortunately this ‘Bartlett’ pear doesn’t seem to stink as much as the yucky stench of those Bradford pears planted all over the place. This one only comes on as a wiff here and there, the Bradfords stink up your whole car if you drive by with the windows open.

Plenty of pears to be.

While on the topic of flowering trees, the magnolias were amazing this year, but the heat pushed them over far too quickly. I’ll have to get photos next year of two new ones but for now the new standard magnolia ‘Ann’ is still putting on a great show. New flowers open for a while and the fruity fragrance always wins against the stink of a pear.

‘Ann’ will never be more than a small tree, and that’s a perfect size for this side of the yard.

The side of the yard where ‘Ann’ is planted is somewhat mucky in spring when runoff works its way down from the yard next door and the front of this house, and for a while the spring muck followed by summer drought rejected pretty much everything I planted here, but finally two plantings are doing well. Spring snowflakes (Leucojum vernum) and Snakeshead fritillaria (F. meleagris) rebel against good drainage and don’t mind sitting in water when water sits. Both are actually happy enough to seed around.

Fritillaria meleagris seedlings are blooming here and there below the magnolia and my plan is coming together perfectly except for the fact you don’t notice the purple flowers under the purple magnolia. Hmmm. But at least they’re happy 😉

Plenty of things don’t work out to plan here, and plenty more things don’t work out without a plan so miss-colored fritillaria are one more thing which needs moving but will probably stay put for decades. I’m fine with that. The thing or two which do work out keep me happy enough and for the next couple weeks I’ll be swimming in tulips and that’s more than plenty.

A mess of tulips

I hope your spring is also filled with plenty. Have a great weekend!

A Touch of Spring

Apr2

I took the dog out for a walk around the garden this morning and decided it’s still not shorts with a coffee weather, in spite of me trying. There’s a brisk wind blowing and with a temperature just above freezing I decided to give the thermometer a few more hours to warm up and instead cleaned the kitchen. I impressed myself, and now when my wife cleans up every other day I can bring this up as proof that I help… unlike the kids, who are still nearly useless for these things in spite of reports from work that they are quick and on top of things…

A new wave of early spring bulbs is awakening. Pink and purple corydalis, a few chiondoxa blooms, and a carpet of blue Scilla siberica. Each year I debate the ‘enthusiasm’ of the scilla, but it’s hard to think badly of so much blue in the garden.

Speaking of ‘quick and on top of things’, the gardener has been neither. Work is annoying and other than Wednesday afternoon, today is the first day he can get out there for anything. I’m sure someone will suggest he work on the next cabinet for the closet but maybe it’s too cold and windy for that. Sawdust blowing and swirling all through the garage is practically the definition of unsafe working conditions, and we’d be going backwards if some of that blows into the clean kitchen.

Fading snowdrops and the first peony sprouts. Neither cares that nightime lows can still drop well below freezing.

Maybe I’ll try and slap a few things together and then head out back with the shovel. Cold and windy is excellent digging weather and I still have a couple thousand tons of earth to move.

The spring snowflakes(Leucojum vernum) are up and trying to hold up to the battering wind. Someone mentioned that they don’t bloom long and now that’s all I think of when I see them, counting the days since they opened and questioning how many more days of bloom will be ‘long enough’.

What I should really do is divide and move a few billion snowdrops and stray seedlings. If I wait another year things might go beyond knowing who is who, and among snowdrop snobs having the wrong name with the wrong flower is akin to eating your salmon with a salad fork and we can’t have that.

I neglected to deadhead this batch of snowdrops (G.elwesii) last spring and will now have to deal with a sea of grass-like seedlings. Obviously they’re too precious to just weed out.

And now I’m hungry. I’m afraid to dirty the kitchen with a snack before anyone has the chance to admire it but am also pretty sure the empty bags of Easter candy will be a bigger deal, and no one will even acknowledge my hard work this morning. If you have coffee with your peanutbutter eggs it’s breakfast and people shouldn’t deny you breakfast when you’re cleaning the house for Palm Sunday.

Have a great week!

Cooler

Mar21

We missed most of the snow, but in general it was cool here last week. In a fit of mid-March optimism I drug a few of the hardiest things out of the garage and onto the driveway for a little sun and fresh air and then forgot about them for a few days. Things got cooler over the weekend with a Friday night low around 25F (-4C) and I had my concerns for the rosemary, Fatsia, and potted Dracaena, but in the light of the next morning they didn’t look too bad. Of course I left them out for the next night as well, with similar temperatures, because like a small child I’ll try and get away with it for as often as I can until things backfire. Some people only learn things the hard way.

A spring shower and March sunshine have brought on the big dutch crocus (Crocus vernum ‘Pickwick’). The rabbits only nibbled a few of the blooms, but they’ll be back soon enough to finish them off.

In spite of two cold nights, the calendar and stars both say today is the first day of spring, and I’m happy the heavens have finally caught up to where I’ve already been for quite a few weeks. It’s exciting to know that spring has been given its official recognition for the new year but also sad to think that some of the most exciting highlights of the year have already passed. Next week promises warmer weather and with it the peak of the snowdrop season and then the fading away while other things step up for their moment. Already the witch hazel are dropping their petals and the winter aconite are on their way to setting seed and I’m almost missing those chilly afternoons shuffling around the garden looking for the first sprouts.

In a nook shaded by the fence, the last of the winter aconite is holding on to bloom. Seed pods will come next, ripe seed thereafter, and soon I’ll be scattering a new crop of flowers into the next patch of garden.

I think this gardener is feeling a bit of a crash following the abundance of snowdrops this spring. They’re still amazing and a few late ones are just starting and trust me I spend more time than I should soaking them in, but maybe I’ll need some help coming off the high this year.

‘Melanie Broughton’ is just one of the many late forms which supply perfect flowers once the earlier sorts begin to look tired. Maybe I need a late bed strictly devoted to these kinds so they’re all perfectly perfect together. Surely the garden can handle one more snowdrop bed?

Maybe daffodils can be my methadone. In spite of this weekend’s turn to cold the first daffodils are just a few degrees of sunshine short of opening, and you can trust I have my eye on them.

New waterlily shoots frozen into the night’s ice. I’m continuously amazed that soft things like fresh lilypads and tiny things like fresh duckweed can survive a solid freeze.

Oops. One thing which I didn’t have my eyes on were the four pots of daylily seedlings which were put out into the coldframe last week. Daylilies are hardy enough plants, but for seedlings to come out from a cozy winter under the growlights and face a freezing cold night (or two since what’s done is done), might have been more than they should have to handle.

Kinda mushy and wilted, the frozen daylily seedlings will hopefully survive to enjoy spring. Hopefully.

Generally if things freeze off I’m quite quick to write them off and move on, since there’s never a shortage of new seedlings and divisions and gifts and purchases waiting to find a home, but the frozen daylily seedlings could really be a setback to the future of the farm. I was counting on these to provide the 2025 introductions which would be unveiled when I put out my first daylily catalogue. Golly. This really does throw a wrench into things.

You can’t look at snowdrops all day, so Saturday I decided to regrade the entire construction area. The wife kindly pointed out that working on closets would be a better use of my time, considering a machine could do this in a day, but God forbid I have to join a gym to work off my winter fat.

So moving a couple tons of rocky fill did help ease the stress of the ups and downs which come with building a world quality daylily farm, but the even better part to all the hard labour was filling in a few more square feet of the low spot which haunts me in the back of the yard. I feel like the Dutch must have felt when they reclaimed their land from the sea. Every square foot of flat ground holds the potential of a new planting area, and perhaps in their honor I should plant it all to tulips one year, just in case the daylily farm doesn’t keep me busy enough.

The lowest areas back here were perhaps three feet below where I’d like them to be, so into the dip went all kinds of stone and mortar debris, now to be topped off with a foot or so of rocky dirt/fill.

I’m estimating this job should be finished up somewhere around late 2027, assuming I don’t end up in the hospital first. Hmmm. Actually I’m surprised that didn’t come up in addition to the talk of closets, and honestly don’t know if I should be flattered or insulted by that. In another year I’ll be closer to 60 than 50 so…

In the last few days tulips have started to sprout in the potager beds. There will be no room for cabbages, but three or four heads of cabbage didn’t stand a chance against armloads of tulips.

Well that’s not the direction I had planned for this post. It’s the first day of official spring and as always I’ll be gardening as if I’ll live to be 120. In my opinion it’s the only option since imagine planning for a bucket-kicking at 90 and then sticking around for another 30! That’s a long time to regret the unplanted acorn.

Cool

Mar14

I’m feeling a little guilty since I expected great things for this snowdrop season, but never expected it to go on forever. I’m apologizing. Sorry that every post for the past few months has mentioned ‘snow’-anything, and as the East coast gets a little winter weather, and parts of the West coast tunnel through to find front doors and buried cars, I’m also sorry that there’s no end in sight. I’ll try to be quick.

The view from the street is starting to hint at a snowdrop theme, and I think they’re ready for some more dividing and spreading around this spring for an even better show next year.

These photos were taken yesterday afternoon, and today we’re looking at about four inches of snow covering them, but the white stuff always melts quickly in March, even when a foot or two drops. Fortunately we don’t have that here… Sorry Eliza 😉

Finally a flower that’s not white. Crocus heuffelianus, ‘Tatra shades’ doing well but I bet a little dividing and spreading around (once they go dormant) would make for an even better show next year.

A light snow will highlight any new sprouts and flowers which stand out above the snowline, and surely mark them for decapitation by rabbits, but for a few days at least we were able to enjoy them. The rabbits probably figure out real quick that snowdrops are a yuck thing, but crocus are not, and once they find the first blooms they’ll spend the next night or two searching out every last flower in the yard. Good for them I guess. I do get annoyed when they keep coming back to eat every attempt the crocus make at growing foliage, since it will weaken next year’s show, but for the few days the crocus are in flower I don’t mind sharing… a little…

A white flower which is not a snowdrop (Galanthus). I love snowflakes (Leucojum vernum), and this form, which lacks nearly all the green of the normal tips, is even more special. I need to divide and spread around this and the clump behind so it bulks up quicker and puts on an even better show next year.

So that’s two flowers which are not snowdrops and I feel less sorry again, so back to normal!

Can you tell I never pruned that rose last year? Add that to the list. Also add dividing ‘Augustus’ to the list, he’s the drop in the front and with such nice foliage I think dividing and moving him around to a few new spots would make for an even better show next year.

Did you notice a few snowdrops behind ‘Augustus’? They’re all random patches of the giant snowdrop (Galanthus elwesii) and are quite a few more snowdrops than I need. It’s hard to plant new snowdrops when the spots are already filled with old snowdrops so I might have to address all the less-special clumps and their seedlings this summer. Seedlings. Don’t even get me started on seedlings. I have baby snowdrops coming up in all the wrong places, and even though every snowdrop is special your own babies are even more so which means they all need attention.

I’m guessing this is a seedling of ‘Blonde Inge’ because of the bright yellow inner petals, even though I’m not sure how a seed managed to travel the six feet between here and the mother clump. There are a few more scattered about but they lack the yellow and are just plain green. All of course should be divided and moved to spots of their own for an even better show next year.

Although it’s a good excuse, the gardener here isn’t using the on-again, off-again cool weather and snow as a reason to sit on the computer all day looking at daylily sales. He did already divide and move a few bunches of snowdrops to new locations. To be honest it amounted to about 25 minutes of work between vacuuming plaster dust and scooping ice cream, but it does fall into the work category so that’s a good thing. Take a trowel or small shovel, dig deep to avoid slicing through the deeper bulbs… which for some reason always happens anyway… tease a few bunches apart or take it down to single bulbs if you’re greedy, trowel out a new spot and shove them in at the same depth, give them a little drink to settle in. My gardener uses a water-soluble fertilizer like Miracle-Gro as the drink, but better gardeners with more ambition could work in soil amendments and organic fertilizers to start your new plantings off on a good footing.

The new stone wall will probably need rebuilding some day as a result of poor workmanship, but at least the results of the 20 minutes spent planting these snowdrops will last. I can’t wait to see them settle in for an even better show next year!

There’s snow on the ground, the year is barely off to a start, and I’m already obsessing about next year. Sounds about right. I hate to think what I would waste my time with if it weren’t for the garden, probably something silly like managing retirement investments, or monetizing a youtube channel or Ticktock feed. Who needs that, right?

Enjoy this flashback to winter, and may all your bids on your favorite daylily auction not win especially if you were counting on a lot to not win since that’s a bunch of daylilies even if you have a daylily farm to plant. Yeah 😉

A Gala Comes and Goes

Mar10

Last weekend Downingtown Pennsylvania played host to a ‘Galanthus Gala’, an American version of the late-winter gatherings which have tended to form amongst growers and admirers of the brave little snowdrop. As a grower and admirer I felt it was my duty to attend, and true to form I arrived late and stayed too long. Also true to form I forgot to take pictures, which really cuts into the the basis for any of my posts, but content and quality have never stood in my way before so here goes!

My only photo of the vendor area. Thank you Timothy for this one, when he stopped talking for a second to take a photo, I was inspired to do the same. The crowds have thinned and there’s bare table. This is several hours after the frenzy of the doors opening.

I was glad to be there talking to friends, going on and on about plants and snowdrops, listening to talks, getting expert advice, soaking in the atmosphere, enjoying the auction… it was the return of the gala I had missed during the two year pause from Covid.

A little bit of celebrity at the Gala with the famed author David Culp alongside a friend who came to join him. Many thanks to my friend Bridget Wosczyna for this photo, she has enough sense to photograph people as well as all the plant treasures.

So to stick with the important highlights let me just mention that David Culp has read my blog but I don’t think his friend Martha has. But… David’s partner Michael Alderfer admitted he had read the last post about our visit to his garden and that’s one of the highlights of my day for sure. I hope I wasn’t too awkward when he said it though, because for a few seconds I thought he was joking with me and so I of course tried to change the subject pretty fast. Fortunately the Galanthus Gala’s artist-in-residence, Gerald Simcoe, was also there and we started talking about his amazing gala centerpiece. I don’t know if Gerald reads my blog, but I do know that if you click the link for his name you’ll not only access images of some of his artwork, but you’ll also be able to find your way to his online snowdrop listings. All the galanthus in his display are out of his own woodland, and to add to the fun he’s listed some for sale on his site.

A corner of this year’s centerpiece featuring ‘Walrus’ and ‘Blewbury Tart’ behind. ‘Walrus’ struggles here, and to hear Gerald say he divides it and spreads it around just in case a clump decides to pick up and die made me feel a bit better about my own clump’s failure to thrive.

At times during the Gala events there was an air of sadness, as the recent death of Alan Street was still fresh on the minds of many. Alan was Head Nurseryman of Avon bulbs and is one of the great names of the snowdrop world. He was one of the featured speakers at the last in-person gala, and to hear him talk of special drops and the stories behind them, peppered with references to art, literature, and mythology, was a treat to everyone in the audience. I didn’t know him personally, but he struck me as a fun person with a spark of mischief, but also a plain nice soul. At the last gala I stumbled upon him and his friends eating lunch, and tried to be unobtrusive on a bench in the corner, but he spotted me and insisted there was still plenty of room at the table for another chair or two. And that’s how I ended up eating lunch next to Alan Street. I don’t think he ever read my blog, but he was so polite that day asking about my little backwater garden and what I was growing, that I felt like a brilliant grower, on par with one of the greats, and it was my highlight of the day.

A growing legacy in the Downingtown Friends Meeting House cemetery. Each gala, attendees are encouraged to bring and plant a few snowdrops in memory of loved ones. It has been heartwarming to see the plantings of past years begin to grow and flourish.

Of course these things end too quickly and before I knew it I was back in the mountains spending the evening taking kids for ice cream and dropping them off at basketball games. Just for the record these kids do not read my blog.

The Gala haul, a mix of trades and purchases but all purely excellent. For some reason I bought one more pot of gravel which claims to be an expensive peony seedling, and it’s things like that which you never see coming.

All the hardier purchases were planted out the next day, which is unusually prompt for me, because it was such a nice day (in spite of being just 24 hours after the latest slush and ice storm).

It took me a number of years, but I can finally appreciate ‘Modern Art’. This is after several years of a ‘just meh’ opinion.

‘Armine’ is particularly large this year. Here it usually colors more yellowish than deep green, and as it gets paler, takes on the airs of a much more expensive ‘color changing’ irrlicht drop.

Galanthus ‘Lapwing’ in front with his distinctive inners, and ‘Erway’ behind with his odd ovary and overall paler foliage and stems. I don’t know if ‘Erway’ looks the same everywhere, but here he’s pretty consistent in his pale coloring.

As you’ve probably guessed, the rest of this post is just random snowdrops around the garden. It’s been a long, drawn out season with few destructive cold spells, and no loads of heavy snow, so the drops have never looked better.

‘S. Arnott’ clumping up from his original single bulb. This is one to divide and spread around, I can’t imagine ever having too many.

‘Good Blue Leaf’ is one of my favorite forms. Everything about it is perfect and I’ll divide this one as well, more so you can enjoy the uncrowded blooms and foliage.

If all goes well I’ll be investing some time this spring into dividing and moving crowded clumps, and addressing wayward seedlings. I can’t possibly complain about volunteer plants, but I don’t want them confusing the names of my purchased bulbs.

Yellow snowdrop seedlings are marching away from the original mother clump of ‘Primrose Warburg’. I’m surprised by how consistent the seedlings are, nearly all of them could pass themselves off as the original… which they are not.

Perhaps I shall start a ‘good’ seedlings and an ‘average’ seedlings bed, in addition to my North Pole bloodbath bed and my white trash bed. Last weekend a friend traded me a ‘Beluga’ to swim with ‘Narwhal’, and threw in a ‘Polar Bear’ to see what happens. Hope it doesn’t get too ugly adding such a predator to the mix.

Lest you become too impressed by this year’s snowdrop photos, this view shows something a little closer to reality. Closeups and careful cropping make things look far lusher than an in-person visit would show.

Speaking of visits, the dog has become a regular even though he’s always a regular, and a total of two children have toured the garden. Although they haven’t mentioned being impressed by the snowdrops, I’m sure they are and that brings this year’s tour total to three. Perhaps this is the reason I enjoy the Galanthus Gala as much as I do. It’s always nice to escape the eye rolls for a day!

Snowdropping ’23

Feb26

It’s a shameful fact that for as much as I talk up the year’s snowdropping adventure, I also drag my feet in getting the post up. It’s been a week. A week and a little, and I need to stop going through the pictures again and again, reliving the day, and just get them out there with as little babbling as possible. Fortunately the morning is cold so maybe for a few minutes I can be productive while the flowers here soak in the sun before standing back up… and again completely distract me.

Naturalized snowdrops (Galanthus nivalis), winter aconite (Eranthis hiemalis) and spring snowflakes (Leucojum vernus) in a Pennsylvania park.

I started the morning on my own, wandering through a Philly area park admiring the century old blanket of snowdrops and other spring bulbs which carpet the now neglected former estate. There used to be a dream that I’d stumble upon some priceless new variation in white here, but over the years I’ve become satisfied with just seeing them greet the spring each year and carry on unbothered. Between my crawling through the underbrush and bending over backwards to admire trees it’s a miracle I haven’t yet left the park on crutches after tumbling down a rocky embankment, but so far so good.

When planting trees always remember proper spacing and mature height.

I survived, and so off to meet Paula at her garden. It’s been a few years since I’ve had a full-sun, comfortably warm visit there, and this year we made it a priority.

The patches of snowdrops are becoming sheets!

I always get stupidly excited to see all the bulbs in bloom, but this year to see it all in full sun with the blooms wide open I may have let out a naughty word as I got out of the car. That’s a lot of &*^@g snowdrops was my eloquent first impression.

I always love the mossy bed surrounding this ugly old ‘Kwanzan’ cherry tree. There’s so much character in the tree and even though it’s a pain fighting the roots and keeping it in shape I hope it stays for a number of years.

It’s hard taking it all in yet finding the time to focus on all the different forms. She has quite a few and there’s a story behind nearly every last one. Fortunately Paula knows me well enough to not get offended when we’re talking about one clump and suddenly I turn to take a picture of something else or jump over to a new plant!

A big clump of a big drop, ‘Rodmarton Regulus’.

My wish list always grows during these garden visits.

One of the greenest of the greens, galanthus ‘Green Mile’.

A growing clump of ‘Amy Doncaster’

The witch hazel Hamamelis x ‘Princeton Gold’

There was something other than snowdrops which really caught my eye (besides the hellebores and witch hazels), and that was the pink viburnum (Viburnum x bodnantense ‘Pink Dawn’) in full bloom. It actually caught my nose, and I followed the scent over to where the shrub was tucked into the shrubby edge of the garden. Of course I’ve already looked for a source 😉

The fragrant pink blooms of Viburnum x bodnantense ‘Pink Dawn’

With all the distractions, this visit was running into our typical behind-schedule run-mode, but because we sometimes know our limits we made sure to pencil only one more garden into the day.

White snowdrops, blue reticulated iris, and a bunch of other things spread around the driveway slope of Paula’s garden.

It’s almost time for the Galanthus Gala, and Paula’s got a bunch of stuff dug and potted for the day, but that doesn’t mean there’s not more planning and preparation needed. I knew she was headed over to David Culp’s Brandywine Cottage to meet with David that afternoon and discuss, so of course I invited myself along.

The fenced in vegetable garden feels like the heart of the gardens at Brandywine Cottage, and even in the middle of February there’s a jewelbox bed of floral treasures outside the gate.

The gardens were at a snowdrop peak and I don’t even know why I’m bothering to post since books have been written and photos taken which are far superior, but it was an exciting visit and David was nice enough to say ‘post what you want, I enjoy reading your blog’…. um, did you catch that? David Culp said he knows I have a blog and says he might have read it? Honestly I’ll probably try and work that into nearly every conversation I have from this snowdrop season beyond, and I hope it’s not too embarrassing when he finds out.

Yellow on yellow with winter aconite and a nice yellow hellebore with just a faint blush of speckling.

Oh and also these pictures. David’s last two books, ‘The Layered Garden’ and ‘A Year at Brandywine Cottage’ were photographed by Rob Cardillo, so I hope I don’t embarrass myself on that level as well since all my photos rely on luck rather than skill.

Plantings along the driveway. There was actually an apology that we missed the lavender sheet of crocus which had mostly ended.

Not the fanciest view of the cottage, but this view shows how every bed of the garden is layered with snowdrops, snowflakes, winter aconite and other goodies which shine before the perennials and shrubs take center stage.

David and Micheal know how to live, and ‘A Year at Brandywine Cottage’ sounds real fancy with decorating suggestions, planting ideas, and delicious recipes and all the things you like to see in a book, but the crazy thing is that’s just Tuesday to them. You pull up on a Wednesday and there’s a bowl filled with floating hellebore blooms, celeriac soup with a crème fraîche, a toasty living room with fire burning, cutflowers, winter arrangements inside and out, friends pulling into the driveway… It’s pretty cool.

Paths through the garden, snowdrops are settling in everywhere.

There was a bunch of snowdrop talk. There was also snowdrop work which was in progress, but you’ll have to wait until the gala to hear more of that since the heart of it was going on in the growing beds. Clumps were being selected for dividing and potting up in order to fill the sales table, and for the sake of honesty I had to steer clear of any place where shovels and fancy snowdrops were close to one another. We headed round to the meadow and up through the hillside instead.

Paths meander throughout the sloped areas of the garden. If you’re familiar with ‘The Layered Garden’ you’ll know this all began with a noxious, weed-filled slope and a run-down shell of a cottage.

Treasures are tucked throughout the hillside.

Of course we stayed too long. The light was already dimming as we meandered back off the hillside.

Hellebores and a million other things cover every inch of the slope, and there’s much more slope than you can see here. In another week or two the scene will completely change as all the narcissus come in and the hellebores really get blooming.

The hillside is filled with hellebores, and for many people ‘Brandywine’ is more a strain of hybrid hellebores rather than a cottage. There’s a reason for that. Early on in the development of modern hellebores David asked friends overseas for the best and brought back a bunch of these to the US to start ‘dabbling’ with his own hybrid strain. He wanted a few “nice ones” for the slope and needed more than just divisions could supply, so over the years the ‘Brandywine Hybrids’ came into being. They were my first experience with a more upscale hellebore and the strain made plants with clearer colors and more outward facing blooms available to even the more average gardener.

A red section of the slope just getting started. Notice they’ve all been trimmed back of their old foliage. Thousands of plants all trimmed neatly and the debris removed…

A perfect combination of structured shrubs, background evergreens, and spring enthusiasm.

So hellebores are awesome, but for a little while longer all my focus is on snowdrops and snowdrop galas. David Culp’s snowdrop gala is set for this upcoming weekend (March 3rd and 4th) and will again make Downingtown Pa the epicenter of American galanthophiles, either in person or in spirit. There will be online events, in-person and virtual talks, auctions, and Q&As, plus my favorite part the specialty vendors. I’ve been good and only contacted one seller for a super-special plant, but that doesn’t mean my budget ends with that. There’s a reason I’ve been holding back with online sales 😉

So maybe I’ll see you there, maybe I’ll see you online, maybe I’m glad this weekend worked out well and didn’t disrupt my plans on attending, but however it works out I hope you’re having a great end of February!

sorta like suburbia

more than you ever wanted to know about my garden

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