More snowdrops from the Temple Nursery

Mar19

Here’s the second installment of photos from our visit to Hitch Lyman’s garden. These pictures are all taken on the bank of earth that lined the one side of the driveway leading up to the house. The drops (and a few other things such as cyclamen coum) seemed happy on the slope, even though there didn’t seem to be much in the way of soil improvement or mulching or any other tinkering with the planting area. But I don’t know that for sure, all I know is there were plenty of nice looking galanthus and even in the cold weather they were a hopeful sign of spring.

Cyclamen coum and Galanthus ‘Sickle’ looking somewhat chilly

Galanthus ‘Warham’

I’ve always been a big fan of snowdrops. When the first warm days of spring rolled around I’d always make a point of swinging by the yards and parks where I knew there were a couple growing. Although they were one of my favorite flowers, when I tried growing them in my parent’s garden they never really settled in. They just hung on.

The ones at the Temple Nursery seem to be doing much better. If you’re curious as to snowdrop names, a mouse hovering over the photo will hopefully show their identity. In this photo, the one on the right is galanthus “Sophie North” and it was one of my favorites. The blooms were big and fat and at this point when they’re still tucked in by the foliage I think they’re perfect.

Galanthus ‘Sophie North’ on the right and ‘Sentinel’ to the left

This was my first opportunity to see a lot of named snowdrops in the flesh, and it may have made a snowdrop snob out of me. I’m beginning to pick up on the variations and differences. Here’s “Spindlestone Surprise” which even an amateur like me can pick out as being different from the usual green-whiteness.

Galanthus ‘Spindlestone Surprise’

Yellow snowdrop

But I still can’t tell too many of them apart (and never with any certainty unless there’s a label stuck right next to it). Here’s another yellow, and although there was a “Wendy’s Gold” label nearby, I don’t see much of a difference between this and the other yellow.

I may be drifting into snowdrop-snobbery but I still think I’ll be fine with just a couple. Fyi they’re on order for shipment this spring.

Here are the last few pictures. “Lodestar” shows a little green even when closed, and the blooms splay out a bit instead of having the round drop shape.

Galanthus ‘Lodestar’

Wasp has a longer narrow bloom, looking a little sad in the cold.

The long wing-like petals of Galanthus ‘Wasp’

Galanthus ‘Naughton’

I think this is Naughton. I really like the fat blooms, no green showing, and the curled Pedicle (or at least I think that’s what you call the green thing over the bloom.

Not to leave things on a down note, but some snowdrops looked like they took a hit from the cold. Here’s “Lord Monosticus”, and it appears the blooms got more than their fair share of winter cold. I’ve had this happen in my garden with some of the earliest ones, and they recover fine for next season, but it’s sad to see. This one was actually on my short list for ordering. I’d like a real early one, but maybe it’s not worth the stress.

Galanthus ‘Lord Monostictus’ after a rough spring

So that’s it for the snowdrops, I guess they’re not everyone’s “thing” but I kinda like them. Also there’s not much else going on here as another 4 inches of snow comes down……

Snowdrops and snow

Mar17

First days of spring come and go but for me a major turning point is the first garden tour. Saturday was the day, and a friend and I headed up to Trumansburg NY to visit Hitch Lyman’s garden and his collection of snowdrops and other early bloomers. I won’t bore you with the details of the “should be a 2hr drive” but the clock put it at closer to 4 hours and I’m sure that was due in a large part to not having a map, not really paying attention to directions, and having a co-pilot with a lot of new stories to share. So we got there a bit later than planned, got to see a little more of the country side, and got to see a few more cities than we should have. At least we didn’t end up in Canada is all I’ll add.

A snowdrop visit to upstate New York in below freezing weather and amidst snow qualls isn’t everyone’s idea of a good time. Most of the garden is still asleep and when you pull up it’s more the house you notice, and less so the gardens.

The house at Temple Gardens

This open day was organized by the Garden Conservancy and according to their description the 1848 farmhouse was moved to the site in 1990. What a job that must have been, and I’m going to guess it needed a bit of restoration when it got here. On our side trip to reach Trumansburg, we came down rte 414 from Geneva Falls and experienced first-hand some other “in need of renovating” historical houses. Some fascinating buildings, almost kind of ghost-towny in spots, and I’m going to make another guess that the local economy can’t support the upkeep on these grand old houses. So they sit and slowly decay.

Back to the garden. As you can see from the house photo most of the front acreage is naturalized fields with a few specimen plantings here and there. The drive up to the house is also a mix of naturalized shrubs and trees, but along both sides are banks of earth spotted with all kinds of treasures.

A sloped bank of hardy cyclamen and various snowdrops

The snow and cold had many of them lying down but there was still plenty to see. We checked in for our visit and headed around the house. Plantings close to the building were pretty subdued and actually the direct opposite of what most gardeners do. I put all the little stuff right up around the house, but here the only plantings were a raised terrace with a planted fieldstone sitting area.

The terrace out back

I’ve seen springtime pictures from this vantage point, and the white wisteria and crabapples make for a much more lush view than the current frozen winter aconite among the paving.

Around back is the namesake temple for Mr. Lyman’s Temple Nursery…. snowdrops are the specialty in case you missed that.

Behind the temple you can make out the dark green of the yew and boxwood that surround the formal garden. I didn’t get any pictures inside the garden, but it’s a formal layout of geometric planting beds filled with lilac, peonies, colchicums, hellebores, and of course snowdrops and other spring bulbs.

The formal garden entrance

Deer seemed to be a problem outside the hedge and protective fence, with plenty of nibbled and buck rubbed shrubs, but once inside there were many signs of spring… in spite of my freezing fingers and cold toes.

Some early Lenten roses (Helleborus niger) in the formal garden beds

Galanthus ‘Jade’

Of course there were snowdrops(here’s “Jade”), but the bulk of the snowdrops were in the next (and last) section of the garden. The woodland garden was furthest from the house and consisted of a narrow path that wound its way through the secondary growth of trees and shrubs that lined the back field.

Here’s how the path looked.

The carefully marked woodland path, lined with snowdrops.

There were small clumps of drops everywhere and I was nervous to even use the outer edges of the trail since many clumps edged up to the path. For a snowdrop fan there was interest galore…. for a non-snowdrop person I suspect they would want someone to widen the path, throw down some mulch, and pick up a few of the fallen twigs.

An authentic snowdrop woodland peppered with clumps of named snowdrop varieties

Here are a few clump closeups from the woodland area.

Galanthus nivalis sandersii

Galanthus ‘Diggory’

Galanthus ‘Lapwing’

Galanthus ‘R D Nutt’

Unlabeled double snowdrop

I’ve got a few more pictures taken of the bank along the driveway but I think I’ll save them for another post. For now I’ll leave you with some interior shots of the temple (it’s not just for show!). After losing all sensation in my fingertips, we allowed ourselves a break inside by the temple fire.

Warming up in front of the fireplace at the Lyman garden.

I hope we weren’t crossing any poor-garden-conduct boundaries by going inside, but the door was slightly ajar and the fire was so inviting. Plus by then we were freezing, and a passing snow squall wasn’t helping matters much. As we were looking around and considering building our own garden temples, I saw this above the door and had the feeling we were just as welcome here as we had been in the rest of the garden.

Inside details of the temple

Thanks for having us Mr. Lyman.

A day late and a dollar short

Mar15

I go back and forth on overwintering tropicals and summer bulbs. Last year was an up year. I planted a bunch of cannas, elephant ears, dahlias, and banana plants in a new bed over at my mother in law’s. The tropicals plus a number of tasteless, gaudy, bright annuals were all right up my alley.

A little bit of tropicalismo in my Pennsylvania garden

The annuals were all seed grown and the tropicals were all little bits and sprigs that I keep over from year to year. I overwinter the lazy way and some are ok with that while others…..

In short, the good gardener will check up on them around early February, add water to the dry ones, remove the rotted ones, air out the damp ones, just give them a general once over to carry them through the rest of the winter. If you are not of the good gardener type you can still save most of your tropicals if you check on them around March 13th and give them a once over. I think the yellow, crispy asparagus ferns may still pull through, now that they got a bit of water.

Tropicals hiding from the cold

The aloes and jade plant snuggled up against the dim (slightly heated) garage window are troopers and don’t need a drop all winter.

These are the bulbs and roots and tubers that I threw into bags and buckets. I’m hoping for the best, but it’s tricky to walk the line between keeping them dry and cool enough to keep them dormant vs everything else that could go wrong. Too wet, they rot. Too dry, they crisp. Too warm, they sprout. Too cold, they freeze……

The ugly truth of my overwintering process

I guess I do just kinda throw them in a pile and hope for the best. To do otherwise would go against my natural laziness.

Here are a few bigger pots, just rolled into the garage and allowed to go dry. You wouldn’t think it but many tropicals will just “hang out” in the dim, cool garage until spring (I did throw some water on these about a month ago). The only one giving real problems is the fig which decided to sprout once it got water. I really should have left that one outside.

Geraniums….. probably shouldn’t have bothered.

I won’t make you look at the coleus cuttings. They’ve been in water on the windowsill since October and look worse than the geraniums. In a week or so I’ll pot them up, take some geraniums cuttings and see what we can do with them. It should have been done now, but I’m always running a day late and a dollar short.

Seeds and seedlings

Mar13

Our usual last frost is somewhere in the area of May 15th but I’ve never seen it happen that late. Usually the first week of May has been ok. Still I go off the 15th anyway and as a result I always feel behind. I did start the onions and leeks about two weeks ago (I think that’s about nine weeks early?) and the little sprouts have been coming up on the fringes of the shop light, but as they start grow it’s time for the change-over.

The cyclamen and snowdrops are kicked out from under the light, and the new seedlings take over. They’ll be fine on the cold windowsills now that its warmed up a bit and the onions and leeks should be happy with the prime lighting locations. You’re looking at lancelot leek and copra, red wings, and ailsa craig onions.

In another two or so weeks I’ll start the main crops of warm weather transplants such as tomatoes, eggplants and peppers. Also I’ll get some lettuce and cabbage started for early transplanting. A cold frame would really come in handy about now but I never did more than just collect the windows.

I did start some other stuff (hardy perennials and bulb seeds) when I started the onions, these are all chilling outside. The finer stuff sits under a plastic tote, the larger seeds get topped off with chicken grit for protection and sit out in the open. When things warm up outside to their liking hopefully I’ll get some sprouts.

They should have been planted about a month earlier to get a real taste of winter, but I didn’t get the seeds until the end of February, so they get what the get.

I also tried something new this year. For seeds that need a cold spell, I tried the Deno method. It’s named after Dr Norman Deno and is a method he used to test germination on thousands of seed types. Basically you take moist paper towels, spread the seeds out on them and then fold them up. This goes in a baggie with info on the outside and either gets room temperature treatment (warm) or refrigerator treatment (cold).

They need a little more attention (you need to check on them periodically for germination), and they need immediate planting in soil when they do show signs of sprouting, but they take up so much less room! The other big plus is you know where your seeds are and you can easily see if they’re dead and rotted. No more staring at an empty pot waiting.

Here I have a dozen or so started seeds sitting in the fridge, nice and neat and out of the way, and so much more acceptable than pots full of dirt next to the yogurt.

If you’re into seed starting, check out “the science of seed germination” at Hayefield blog. It’s a great intro to the science behind seeds and it offers a couple great links, I’d try and put the link right here for you but haven’t mastered that bit yet 😉

Good luck on your seeds!

First day of spring?

Mar12

The sun was out and temperatures crept up to the fifty plus range, so I did what every self respecting suburban boy does when the bad weather breaks. I washed the cars. Donna was pleased, clean cars and an industrious husband are far more respectable than a spouse who shuffles around the yard looking for crocus sprouts, but I couldn’t avoid poking around in the crusty flower beds. Here’s the one right next to the front walk.

The ugly reality

It was time for the trash and dead banana plant carcass to disappear so that there will be room for spring sprouts. Sure it’s early, but I think everything there will be fine even with a couple more freezes. I feel much better now.

A fresh new look

Sorry, but I can’t help putting in one more winter aconite and snowdrop photo. Sure it’s the same two inch plant from an earlier post, but in case you didn’t notice, the subtitle for this blog is “more than you ever wanted to know about my garden”, so to keep it honest I go for the overkill.

Shoots and flowers coming up to make spring a thing

A low of 20F is forecast for later in the week and winter hasn’t been completely crushed, but I’m going to call this past weekend spring (even if it’s just really really early spring).

Next I should consider cleaning the hellebore bed, it could use some attention too.

More of the ugly reality

The pussywillow at the end isn’t waiting so I better get on it, but at least for now the winter grime is off the cars and a couple plants have some breathing room.

Hope for spring

Flower show continued

Mar9

I always enjoy the individual exhibits of potted flowers, and the range and size of some entries is kinda crazy. This year there was a newly designed “Hamilton Horticourt” display area, a 1 million dollar construction donated by a Mrs. Hamilton (who’s name appeared on many impressive plant entries). There were orchids in colors I don’t normally put with orchids.

Daffodils….. featuring the reliable Ice Follies in front (for you Sue)

And hyacinths and amaryllis! I’ve never saw a pot this full. (the red is Pamela btw)

There were many many more, but I have a bias towards bulbs so sorry if you wanted foliage and cactus and more orchids.

One last display was this pot of yellow clivias. This plant always screams fancy to me, but only because I grew up reading a White Flower Farm catalog which listed it. The cost was somewhere in the area of $900 if I remember correctly, and I always thought of it as a houseplant holy grail. I’m past that (maybe?) but I still think of yellow clivia growers as having some kind of social one up on me.

The shopping area was our last stop. Lots of houseplant goodies, some excellent hardy plant displays and upscale garden knick knacks and the usual jewelry and art. I almost bought a hellebore from the Linden Hill display, but thought twice of lugging the pot around. I guess that will be a field trip for a later date.

So the trip was nice, we ate well at the Reading Terminal across the street, travel went smoothly, and the crowds weren’t too bad (for a Thursday). That said it will be a few years before I want to return. I like the springtime dose of gardening, but many of the show displays were silly fluff and there weren’t a ton of wow moments. Am I being crabby? Yes maybe, but it looks like the show is being geared up to a larger crowd and a broader interest range. It’s working too since I believe they’re expecting somewhere over a quarter million visitors, but still I never like change… unless it was my idea.

So I better get back to gardening now that spring is in the air!

Philadelphia Flower Show Time

Mar9

The signs of spring keep building. A major one from last week was the return of turkey vultures to the skies above the valley. I never really gave it much thought, but they are migratory and they do head back up north when things start to thaw out, so I guess they are a good sign of higher thermometer readings. Them being vultures you can figure out on your own what it is that draws them back, but it’s not just flowers that appear when the snow recedes.
For a different dose of spring, a friend and I made a mid-week road trip down to the flower show. This was the 185th show held by the Pennsylvania Horticulture Society and this year’s theme was “Brilliant” and had a British flair to it.

There was a music video show every hour on the Big Ben screen. It was funky and modern and not what I was expecting, but its been a couple years since I was last to this show. I was also surprised by all the cash bars (there’s one in the front left of the above photo) and snack stands sprinkled throughout the show. Maybe it was geared for the evening visitors, but I saw plenty of afternoon beverages being served. Made me wish for summer garden tours with a favorite beverage in hand, but being on a hard-core tour schedule, we opted out.

Florist displays were popular, table settings galore. I do like a green/white theme.

or a nice flower thicket looming over the dinner table.

This one makes me think late night party with way too much wine.

I think this one was a bronze manufacturer out of England (not a florist). Their display was a “Wonderland” theme. I liked it!

That’s enough table settings, I prefer the little yardscapes much more. Here are a couple I could see inspiring someone to do the same to their own place…. not me of course, I can barely keep up with the weeding and planting.

This is also take home worthy, even though there’s a bit too much “stuff” laying around (crap maybe?)… but to be honest I love having a bunch of interesting crap around!

I wish I could take better pictures, mine just doesn’t do this display justice. View for this display goes through the gate, down a flower lined grass path, and continues through a brick potting shed, and out to another garden. Nice plan and plants!

This one also appealed to me. Probably not much to take home, although I do have a pair of disfunctional wheelbarrows, but I liked it. There’s a nice wall-o-cabbage and other brassicas for a backdrop.

There were other great displays, but I won’t bore you with photos that get a little too far into the out of focus. Last one for the post is a mailbox entry from under the sea. The kids were impressed when they saw this picture, lets hope they don’t expect a mailbox overhaul at our own house.

Now it’s off to the ‘Horticourt” for individual plant entries!

Winter aconite

Feb25

I guess with a name like winter aconite there’s no kidding anyone that spring is here, but I guess I’ll take anything in February. These bulbs were moved last summer and now I feel like a squirrel trying to remember where I put them. I swear I had more.

Winter aconite (Eranthis hiemalis)

Breaking the back of winter

Feb25

We might be getting close. It’s still winter, but based on the strength of the sun and melting snow, I’m going to call it late winter. To me it matters. If it wasn’t for the low of 17F that’s sitting in the weekly forecast I might even say it’s early early spring…. but not yet.

Winter Aconite (eranthis hyemalis) has joined the ranks of flowers braving the cold.

Yellow winter aconite alongside the first snowdrops

The cyclamen coum are trying to make a go at it, but really get no respect from the kids….. Actually I have to say they are pretty conscientious about being careful, but when it’s 25F and windy and they have to clean up, things get tossed about a bit.

The first of the Cyclamen coum. You wouldn’t think a cyclamen would want to brave our winters…

Witch hazel (Hamamelis pallida)

The witch hazel is still going strong. I bet it could use an evergreen background to show off a little better, but I would first need evergreens for that

The hellebores still have a way to go, I wouldn’t call this a vision of spring just yet, but there’s hope. With March coming maybe I can start cleaning this mess up.

The attractive winter foliage of a Hellebore in Pennsylvania in February.

Color in the Garden

Feb11

Orange gerbera daisies in a cobalt blue pot, surrounded by red gomphrena. Classy.

Too much orange and red? I got it in my head two years ago to put together a red bed and this is the far end where the colors were a bit mellower. Gardeners are supposed to mature over the years as they gain a little experience and their plantings become more sophisticated. I must be developmentally delayed as this hasn’t happened to me in the over 30+ years since I planted my first seed. I still get suckered in by anything with a bright bloom.
Today as more bad weather keeps me inside I’m looking at dahlia websites. A few dahlias have nicer foliage but it’s for the blooms that you grow them. Not exactly a step forward in garden subtlety.

At least I’m not planning on adding more cannas….. yet.

sorta like suburbia

more than you ever wanted to know about my garden

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