Upcoming Spring Flower Shows
Posted on Tuesday, January 28, 2020 · Leave a Comment
In Lewis Carroll’s poem, The Jabberwocky, the hero exalts, after killing the ferocious mythical beast, “O frabjulous day! Callooh! Callay!” That’s the way I feel when I think about the upcoming spring flowers shows. Thinking about the shows I am known to exclaim, “Oh Boy!” at random moments, such as while cooking dinner. I know I’ll get to one or more events, and suggest you do, too.
The first of the New England shows this year is in Hartford, Connecticut at the Connecticut Convention Center on February 20 to 23. The show is vast: nearly 3 acres of displays with 300 booths selling fresh flowers, plants, herbs, bulbs, seeds, gardening books, garden equipment and more. There are competitions for flower arranging and potted plants, as well.
The theme this year is “Connecticut Springs into Earth Day”. Many fine gardens are built for the show. In addition to that, there are over 80 hours of workshops, slide shows and lectures where you can learn useful information for your own garden.
The Philadelphia Show, a bit of travel for New Englanders, is one of the most impressive. As always it is at the Pennsylvania Convention Center, held this year from February 29 to March 8. The theme this year is Riviera Holiday.
With about 10 acres of floor space, the show is hard to view all in one day. I recommend going mid-week when there are smaller crowds, and getting there early. It’s an expensive show – adult tickets are $42 in advance, $48 at the door – so you may want to try to pack it all in during one day, or relax and do it in two. Doors open at 10am most days, and the show closes at 9pm most days.
The next show is Boston, March 11 to 15, another big one. I have gotten a number of reports from attendees last year that the show has gotten very commercial, but it has been a few years since I’ve gone to it. All the shows have a big commercial presence, but that’s the nature of the game, and I enjoy all the gardening stuff that is for sale, especially seeds and tools.
The Boston show has plenty of lectures and presentations throughout most of the day. I’d like to attend one on Ikebana, or Japanese flower arranging. There are also lectures on kokedama, or growing plants indoors in moss (and soil) balls, often suspended in air. I see another by Petra Page-Mann of Fruition Seeds on companion planting. She is a live wire, so I will attend if I can.
The Maine Flower Show in Portland, Maine, takes place March 26 to 29 at Thompson’s Point. Parking is off-site and shuttles are easy, they say. See their website. There will be 14 display gardens, 115 exhibits of plants, hardscape, arbor and garden supplies, and all things related to outdoor yard-scaping and living. This year’s theme is A Cascade of Color. Tickets for adults are just $20 and kids under 12 are free.
Next is New Hampshire’s modest show, the Seacoast Home Show in Durham, NH on March 28 and 29. It more of a home show than a garden show, but it’s an inexpensive weekend outing.
Likewise the Rhode Island Home Show on April 2 to 5 in Providence includes the Flower and Garden Show in it, covering 10,000 square feet of the 100,000 feet of the Home Show. But it will have 9 complete garden displays, competitions organized by the Federated Garden Clubs and gardening vendors. I haven’t been to the show since the management of the Providence Show changed a few years ago.
My partner, Cindy Heath, and I went to the Chelsea Flower Show in London a few years ago, and it was a chance of a life time. This year it will be held May 19 to 23. It’s expensive and crowded, but join the Royal Horticulture Society in advance as you can get in early and get less expensive tickets. Most of it is outdoors, so full-sized trees are brought in to make displays. It is truly an extravaganza! And be sure to visit Kew Garden while in London. Plan on a full day there, too.
Planning on visiting Uncle Ralph and Aunt Matilda this spring? Maybe you can visit one of the shows below. The only one I’ve attended was the San Francisco show, but that was 20 years ago.
The Great Big Home and Garden Show, Cleveland, OH January 31 to February 9
Northwest Flower and Garden Show, Seattle, WA February 26 to March 1
Southern Spring Home and Garden Show, Charlotte, NC February 28 to March 1
Canada Blooms, Toronto, Ontario, March 13 to 22
Chicago Flower and Garden Show, March 18 to 22
San Francisco-Northern California Flower and Garden Show, Sacramento, April 2 to 5
So have fun, go to a flower show. Smell fresh flowers, fresh soil. And before we know it, it will be spring!
You may reach Henry at P.O. Box 364, Cornish Flat, NH 03746. Please include a SASE if you wish a reply. His e-mail address is
henry.homeyer@comcast.net.
Getting Rid of Invasives
Posted on Tuesday, January 21, 2020 · Leave a Comment
My mother used to say, “The road to hades is paved with good intentions.” That is particularly true for gardeners and plant collectors. Most of those nasty invasive plants we struggle to eliminate from our landscape were brought here from abroad by people who didn’t know better. They thought the plants would be a useful addition to their landscape. Plants such as barberry, Japanese knotweed and burning bush looked great to them. What they didn’t bring, of course, were the insects that eat them and keep their numbers under control in their native environments.
January is down time in the garden, generally. We can’t plant anything, and often the snow is deep. But if the January thaw has melted away the snow and ice where you are, this is a time when you could work on getting rid of some invasive trees and shrubs.
Actually, what I have I mind is helping to reduce the vigor and number of mature plants by cutting them down. That won’t kill them, but will keep them from producing seeds next year or even longer. Most invasives have roots that will send up new sprouts, come spring. And winter is not a time when you can dig up or pull out roots. But cutting them down and burning them is a chore you can do now.
The first task you have in this effort is to learn to identify the plants. For me, the most common invasive plants in the woods around my home are bush honeysuckle and barberry.
Invasive bush honeysuckle can get to be 10 to 15 feet tall and wide. It has fragrant white blossoms in June and oval-shaped leaves that are opposite each other on small twigs. In winter the bark is distinctive – slightly shaggy with distinctive ridges. If you cut a stem, there is a hollow spot in the center of the stem, though it might only be the diameter of a pencil lead. The shrub produces red or orange berries.
Japanese barberry is a tough plant that I have seen in deep woods, far from homes or roads. In full sun it produces massive quantities of red berries that birds eat and then drop the seeds all over. The bush has small green or purple leaves and is dense with thorns. I visited a barberry hedge recently, and it was still loaded with berries. The best solution? Cut it down now, and dig out the roots in the spring.
Burning bush ( Euonymus a) is on invasive species lists throughout New England, even though I rarely see seedlings in the woods, and have none on my property. It is best identified in the fall, when its scarlet leaves are noticeable. It is more of a problem in Rhode Island, Connecticut and Massachusetts. I once saw a bumper sticker that said, “30 Below Keeps Out the Riff-Raff. I assume it was talking about plants like burning bush which survives here, but doesn’t spread as fast as it does in warmer climes.
Buckthorns are small trees or large shrubs that are very difficult to eliminate. If you cut one down, the root system will send up many, many new shoots, come spring.
There are two different species of buckthorn common in New England: common buckthorn (Rhamnus cathartica) and glossy buckthorn (Rhamnus frangula), a smaller version with pretty shiny leaves. Both produce berries that turn a deep purple and are the size of blueberries, put with a pit in the middle like a cherry.
You can kill these two by double girdling the trunks with a hand saw, cutting through the bark and green cambium layer while avoiding the dense heartwood. By double girdling, I mean cutting two lines all the way around the stem a foot apart or so. If you do it now, the plants will leaf out and grow normally this year, and perhaps even next year, but then they will die – without sending up new shoots. I have done this.
By cutting through the cambium layer, no nutrients will be sent to the roots, and the roots eventually starve. Common buckthorn is often multi-stemmed with stems close together, so getting a saw in around each stem can be difficult.
Why bother with all this? First, although birds may eat the berries of invasive plants and distribute their seeds, they did not evolve with the plants and often do not benefit much from what they eat. The invasives also out-compete many of our own native plants. They leaf out earlier in the spring and drop leaves later in the fall than our natives. They often shade out or disrupt the growth of wild flowers, too.
Invasive trees and shrubs may be less attractive to the caterpillars that feed on our native trees and shrubs, and which are such an important food source for baby birds. Butterflies and moths lay their eggs on the leaves of native woody plants so that their caterpillar babies will eat well. Those caterpillars make up the vast majority of food for nestlings, even those species that develop into seed eaters. So avoid growing invasives.
Take advantage of the January thaw – or a thaw anytime this winter – and remove some invasive plants. Get a burn permit, some marshmallows and do your woods some good. And have fun!
Henry is the author of 4 gardening books. You can email him at henry.homeyer@comcast.net.
A Gardener’s Cookbook
Posted on Tuesday, January 14, 2020 · Leave a Comment
I can’t wait till spring. Don’t get me wrong: I love winter. But I look forward to trying a recipe I just found for pea, leek and sorrel soup while reading Deborah Madison’s fabulous cookbook, Vegetable Literacy (10-Speed Press, 2013, $40). And sorrel, a leafy perennial, is one of my first vegetables ready for eating in the spring.
I have grown sorrel for many years but have never found a good use for it. Yes, it has an interesting lemony taste, but it cooks down to almost nothing – even more so than spinach. And I have added it to salads, but it never made tickled my taste buds enough to remember to pick some regularly.
Ms. Madison’s recipe is simple: chop 5 ounces of leeks and cook with butter and a cup of water for 10 minutes. Add 1.5 cups of peas (fresh or frozen) and 3 cups of water. Simmer till peas are cooked, then turn off the heat and stir in the sorrel leaves but not stems. Then puree the soup in a blender until very smooth and add a little cream or yogurt on top. Simple and easy.
One of the great things about Vegetable Literacy is that Deborah Madison is a very knowledgeable gardener as well as a great cook. She not only includes tips about how to grow veggies (plant lettuce under the shade of big plants like tomatoes in the heat of summer), she generally lists names of good varieties and what makes each special. And she includes nutrition tips, as well (cooked carrots have more nutritional value than raw ones, for example).
Brussels sprouts are a favorite of mine, but avoided by many. Deborah Madison’s theory is that they are often overcooked and mushy. Her solution? Cut them into 3 or 4 pieces so that the center is cooked, but the outer leaves are not overdone, a common problem. She likes to pair them with bacon, smoked paprika, roasted peanuts walnuts or chestnuts. I never would have thought of those pairings, having just used butter or seasoned rice wine vinegar (something I use often of brassicas in place of butter).
I have never grown Belgian endive nor known how to use it, but she explains both. Europe, she notes, grows 70,000 acres of it annually, but we grow only 400 acres. It is quite a complicated procedure that can take a full year from seed to table. A related, but much easier plant is radicchio, which I plan to grow this year. She notes that you can get seeds from
www.gourmetseeds.com, a company I don’t know, but looks good on-line. It is also available from Johnny’s Selected Seeds in Maine where I buy many of my seeds, and Fedco, a seed cooperative I like.
I love cauliflower, but rarely grow it because it’s so fussy. It won’t produce a head if it is too hot or too cold, too wet or too dry. This book taught me that you can also eat the stem, which is delicious peeled and then sliced or diced and steamed. The leaves are also edible and tasty. That’s a bonus for a plant that, unlike its cousin broccoli, only produces one set of florets. She also notes that cauliflower is loaded with vitamins and nutrients that contain cancer-fighting compounds that are not diminished by steaming (but are by boiling).
In the chapter of squashes, Deborah Madison notes that winter squash “have been found effective in the remediation of chemically contaminated soils, the plants pulling up all sorts of unwanted contaminants, thus this is another vegetable where you are better off to choose organic over conventional.” Or grow your own where no sprays are used.
Tomatoes, for me, are the queens of the garden: juicy, flavorful, sweet and delicious. Deborah Madison also explains that in addition to vitamins, tomatoes are rich in lycopene. Lycopene is an antioxidant “that quite possibly protects against different cancers and lowers the risk of heart disease, of eye diseases such as cataracts and macular degeneration, and more.” She goes on to say, “The good news is that these benefits are not undone when a tomato is cooked.” Given how many I grow and eat annually, I should live to be 100!
We all know parsley, and most of us grow it. But Vegetable Literacy reminded me that a lesser known cousin of parsley is parsley root, a different species. It is an intense flavor, and great to add to soups. Not sold by most seed companies, I found it at Johnny’s Selected Seeds with the name Arat. They say it takes 14 to 30 days to germinate, and should be planted directly in soil outdoors.
This lovely book with fabulous photos is organized by plant families. Deborah Madison explains in the beginning that she believes plants in the same family go well together in recipes. Thus in the carrot family we also find parsley, fennel, cilantro and anise – and all cook well together. She has divided all her ingredients into 12 plant families according to their taxonomic grouping.
Deborah Madison has written about a dozen cookbooks, most with a vegetarian bent. This one is not strictly vegetarian, but most recipes are. She writes with ease and clarity that makes reading this cookbook a joy. I look forward to trying many of her recipes.
Tips for Making Winter Arrangements
Posted on Tuesday, January 7, 2020 · Leave a Comment
Finding things to place in vases, now, in winter, is not easy. It takes some imagination, but there really are some nice stems available.
Before the snow flew I went outside and picked stems of pachysandra, a green vine that is mostly used in shade, though also grows in part sun. It does well in a vase all winter, and usually sends out roots so that, come spring it can be planted outdoors. Although it has no blossoms now, it is green and lush and easy to care for. I use it as the base in flower arrangements. You could probably pick some during a January thaw.
For color in a vase in winter, one of my stalwarts is winterberry (Ilex verticillata). Winterberry grows in wet places in the wild, though it will also grow in normal garden soil if planted there. It is loaded with bright red berries now, though later outdoors the berries will fall off or be eaten by birds
Winterberry is dioecious, meaning that there are male and female plants. Both bloom, but only the females have berries. If you are buying these shrubs, which stand six to ten feet tall and wide, one male cultivar is needed for about every 5 females.
Unlike many hollies, winterberry does not have glassy dark green leaves that stay on all winter. American holly ( Ilex opaca), Japanese holly (I. crenata) and the Meserve hybrids like ‘Blue Boy’ and ‘China Girl’ do keep their leaves and produce nice berries. Unfortunately most are Zone 5 plants only good to minus 20, and I live in a colder zone, so I have no personal experience with them.
Also red, and also not a flower, are the stems of red-twigged dogwood (Cornus sericea). They also look great in a vase. And like the winterberries, they do best in moist soil. In order to get the brightest color possible, you should buy a named cultivar. And you need to cut back the stems every year or two, as it is the new growth that looks so bright in winter.
Staghorn sumac (Rhus typhina) is a native small tree that produces nice berries that look good all winter, and that do fine indoors in a vase. I picked some over 2 months ago, and they have shown no signs of fatigue. The berries are up high, but are easy to pick with a pole pruner – the stems, though thick, are soft and easy to cut.
Sumac berries are enjoyed by returning robins (and other birds) in the spring. Birds are a bit like teenagers – they love greasy food. So berries with a high fat content get eaten right away while berries like those on the sumac, which have little fat, are ignored until hungry times. Those early birds who can’t get a worm will wolf down sumac berries. It’s all part of having a diverse source of food for our wild friends.
Two invasive plants, Japanese barberry (Berberis thunbergii) and winged euonymus (Euonymus alatus) are also displaying bright berries at this time of year. And although I recommend pulling out both from your landscape, cutting branches now to put in a vase will reduce the number of berries available for birds. And it is the birds that distribute seeds into the woods, spreading those invasive plants.
If you are looking for green to add to a vase, white pine, balsam fir and blue spruce all do well. Canadian hemlock (the one that has short, soft needles) is said to be not as good as the others, tending to drop needles sooner than the others. But for my purposes, I find it just fine.
In summer we want pink, white and purple flowers in our vases, but in winter browns can be nice in a vase, too. Beech trees are still holding their leaves, or at least the young trees do. Many oaks still have leaves, too. If you put them in a vase, don’t bother with water. Add other dry flowers or grasses.
My peegee hydrangea is still displaying blossoms, and I might pick a few more to use indoors. Each year I pick the pink blossoms before frost, and they keep their color quite well. Now they are brownish, but still better than nothing. Again, no water in the vase.
Dry grasses are good to appreciate outdoors in winter, swaying gently in the wind. But indoors they are just as handsome. I like my fountain grass (Miscanthus sinensis) ‘Morning Light’. It is a tall grass, but can be cut to fit in with other items of any height.
A walk through a field can yield lots of dry flowers from goldenrod and Joe Pye weed to field spirea and willow stems. Making a winter arrangement is different than a summer arrangement, and you may have to adjust your attitude a little bit about what you expect. Enjoy whatever you can find!
A Time to Nestle in with a Good Book
Posted on Tuesday, December 31, 2019 · Leave a Comment
It’s cold outside, and nothing is happening in my garden. Well, I guess deep beneath the soil surface there are microbes and worms and moles alive and doing whatever they do in winter. But I am doing nothing in the garden, so this is a time to read about gardening.
At a gardener’s dinner I asked my friends to bring me good books to read about gardening. The first one I picked up is Gardens of the High Line: Elevating the Nature of Modern Landscapes by Piet Oudolf and Rick Darke (Timber Press, 2017). I have visited the High Line in New York: a mile and a half of gardens growing on what was an elevated railroad bed that fell into disuse until it was re-purposed as a fabulous outdoor space in the heart of the city.
The book if full of fabulous pictures of the gardens, along with ideas about how gardens can be designed. None of us can do what they did there, but we can get ideas from the designers. Piet Oudolf, a Dutch landscape architect, was one of the primary design forces for the garden. I interviewed him at his home in Holland back in 2007.
A quote I liked from Oudolf was this: “The one tool I can’t be without are my eyes. Sometimes you need a spade, sometimes pruners, but when you are gardening you really have to look.” It’s for that very reason that I can’t design a garden on paper. I have to have to be in a garden, and have plants to work with before I can figure out where they’re going to go.
Yes, I know some basic design principles. For example, create mystery or tension by obscuring part of the garden with plants (or hardscape), thus leading viewers into the next portion of the garden along a path. Or create waves of color, masses of color instead of sprinkling little bits of color in the garden. Enjoy seasonality. Let one portion of a garden be special in spring, another in fall. All this really becomes possible for me when I have plants in hand and I can see – and then imagine them in a year, in five years, in ten. Eyes are the key, along with the imagination.
Another design principle used heavily at the High Line is this: borrow a view. Create your garden in such a way that visitors see not only your plants, but the view of a mountain, a river, or in New York, buildings. The High Line is surrounded by, and towered over by, buildings. Interesting architecture, filigreed steel of the bridges over city streets, for example. The gardens encourage visitors to stop and view the surrounding cityscape, day or night.
The plant palette is an important part of the success of the gardens. According to the book there are nearly 400 species of plants at the High Line, about half natives, half from other continents. The important thing for a tough location like the High Line is to get plants that will survive, thrive, and move. Yes, the book explains that the gardens are dynamic: plants get to pick, to a certain degree, where they will grow. Garden staff and let “volunteers” (self-sown plants) to spread in the gardens.
Obviously the small trees growing there were planted in a location, and stay there. But some do spread by root, and do wander a bit. For example, the designers used sumac in some places for its interesting branching and splendid fall color, and it does spread by root.
I remember seeing a grove of sumac adjacent to a lawn in Wilder, Vermont years ago. The sumac had sent underground stolons (roots) to a sandbox in the middle of the lawn, and new shoots were popping up in the sandbox – the lawn mower had only controlled those that appeared in the lawn. Concrete walkways and old railroad ties and rails on the High Line do inhibit spread to a degree.
A book like this one is great if you want to expand your plant palette at home. It has common and Latin names of the plants in the photos, so you can make notes in your notebook with a wish list. I found myself seeing interesting plants in the photos and not being sure which was which, but in this day of Google, it is easy enough to find out.
Not all the plants are easily found, however. I saw mention in the book of Dale Hendricks, a fellow I interviewed a decade or so ago when he was running North Creek Nurseries in Pennsylvania, a wholesale nursery, which he has since sold to others. Dale built up a huge inventory of native species, including named cultivars of specialty goldenrods, for example. I gave him a call recently, and got some plants he likes for hot, tough places.
Dale Hendricks said he likes Hyssop-leaf thoroughwort (Eupatorium hyssopifolia), a late summer bloomer that is related to Joe-Pye weed and boneset, but that is quite diminutive. It has attractive white blossoms in meadows with good drainage and full sun. Growing with it often is little blue stem, a native grass. ‘The Blues’ is a named, non-patented variety he developed.
Other tough plants Dale likes? Poppy mallow (Callirhoe involucrata), bluestar ammsonia (Ammsonia hubrechtii), butterfly weed (Asclepias tuberosa), prickly pear cactus (Opuntia spp.) and a blazing star called Liatris microcephala.
So do some reading this winter, and make plans for new summer plantings. You may have to ask your local nursery to order in some of the less common plants I mentioned above, but they might be in stock.
Looking Back on 2019
Posted on Monday, December 23, 2019 · Leave a Comment
This past year was, overall, a good one in the garden. It started off cold and wet in early summer, but then turned hot and dry. Most vegetables and perennial flowers did fine for me. I finally splurged and got an Itoh hybrid peony, one called ‘Garden Treasure’ and it bloomed gloriously. It is a cross between a perennial peony and a tree peony.
Carrots and onions, however, were a bust for me this year. Granted I had them in a place where they got more shade than ideal. Still, my carrots were pathetic. Very small. I accept that each year something will under-perform. Fortunately there are good organic farmers who have anything I need. I bought half a bushel of organic onions at the Norwich Farmer’s Market, something I had never needed to do before. Oh well. And good carrots are always available.
My tomatoes did all right. I tried hard to pick off diseased leaves, which always helps. I regularly sprayed an anti-fungal solution called Serenade that contains a bacterium said to combat fungi. I didn’t spray a couple of plants to see if there was a difference, but didn’t notice much difference. It may have delayed the onset of disease, but basically the only way I can get enough tomatoes is to have lots of plants.
Last summer I wrote about a farmer in Pennsylvania who said that staking tomatoes was a waste of time and energy. I said that I would test his theory and report back to you. The results? Staked tomatoes did better for me.
During that dry time in August I installed some drip irrigation in a garden for a client, and found it very helpful for new installations. Gardeners Supply Company (
www.gardeners.com) sells a “Snip and Drip” system that installs easily and delivers water just to the places that need it. I encircled new trees and shrubs with sections of soaker hoses that “leak” when the water is turned on. I found an daily was fine, and used a timer to control it.
Magnolias in my part of the world bloomed deliciously this year. My ‘Merrill’ magnolia bloomed a little late this year, just barely blooming for my birthday in late April, but holding its blossoms well into May. I met a new (to me) magnolia this year, a yellow one called the cucumber tree magnolia (Magnolia acuminata). I am looking for a space to plant one, perhaps this year.
Two years ago I planted a catalpa tree, a 10-foot specimen, in the middle of a section of lawn. I had fallen in love with the blossoms on a neighbor’s tree. The blossoms are creamy white with purple-red stripes inside, and are fragrant. It bloomed after its first winter, but not this past year. But the tree showed no winter kill, and I imagine next summer it will blossom dramatically.
Not all trees bloom every year, and weather has a lot to do with that, I think. So as I nestle in here near the woodstove, I dream of catalpa blossoms in 2020. Maybe gardeners live longer, in part, because we so want to see our plants perform.
Grapes produced huge quantities for most everyone this year. I made over 5 gallons of juice and froze it in half-gallon plastic jugs. I used a NorPro brand “Steamer/Juicer” for this, and it was very easy. The grapes were purple Concord type, and produced juice with a very intense flavor.
Each year it gets harder for me to find space to plant more spring bulbs, but each year I find some. This year we planted 300 or more bulbs at our home here in Cornish Flat. I can’t wait to see them bloom, and to see the others I’ve been planting for decades.
What else happened in 2019? My life partner, Cindy Heath, finally moved in with me in Cornish Flat. We had lived 6 miles apart for the last 10 years, but this May we joined forces here. She is an avid gardener who loves to weed, which really helps a lot! Life is good.
In August I broke a bone in my ankle while pruning a tall apple tree when my ladder slipped off the branch it was on, and I hit the ladder with my ankle when I landed. The fracture was not serious, but it kept me from doing as much as I’d like. It is only now that I am fully healed.
Fortunately, I met and made friends with Jim Spinner, a retired fellow who wanted to learn to garden and who has lots of energy. He helped me a lot, as did Cindy, and by the end of October our gardens were in great shape. I managed to help them despite wearing a big plastic boot much of the time.
And in 2019 two of my good buddies, Jerry Cashion and Brian Steinwand, passed away. I had known them for a total of over 80 years, and miss them a lot. We had all worked in Africa together. But I find that gardening is a fix for almost any sadness. Get out, dig in the dirt, plant a flower or pick a tomato and life seems a little bit better.
I wish you all a wonderful 2020. I hope you will start thinking about the garden now: dream, read gardening books, make lists, and learn about trees or flowers you want to try this coming year. That’s how I make it through the winter.
Reflections on a Gardener’s Life
Posted on Tuesday, December 17, 2019 · Leave a Comment
During the holidays I try to take time from the humdrum of festivities to sit quietly and reflect on how happy and grateful I am for my life here in rural New England. Much of what I appreciate is linked to a life that allows me to spend time in my garden, raising some of the food I eat and growing flowers that bless me with their beauty.
The summer of 2020 will mark the fiftieth anniversary of buying a ramshackle old butter factory built in 1888, The Cornish Creamery. I still live in it today, though I have improved its condition considerably. I was just two years out of college when I bought it and had the energy and motivation to learn how to make most improvements myself.
When I bought the Creamery, it had little space for gardens. The building sat on just an acre of land, and most of that was dominated by trees, with just a little lawn surrounding the house. I cut down a few small trees to create my vegetable garden that first summer. If I recall correctly, I had just a couple of tomato plants, lettuce, perhaps some squash. I was busy fixing up the house and had little time to garden. The garden was too shady and not a big success.
Later I was able to buy an adjoining acre or more, a field behind the house that was dominated by brambles, alders and a small brook. I cleared the land by hand using a brush hook my father gave me. The tool, with a sharp curved blade on an ax handle, did well for clearing. Come to think of it, I’ve never seen one for sale in modern times.
After clearing the land and digging out many roots I used a second-hand rotary mower to discourage re-growth of golden rod and weeds. Eventually I hired a farmer to come with a plow to turn the soil for a huge vegetable garden. The land around it I mowed, and that eventually turned into lawn and flower gardens. It was in full sun with rich alluvial soil deposited by the brook. It produced fabulously, and I was hooked.
My grandfather, John Lenat (1885-1967) was an organic gardener. He subscribed to a little newsprint magazine called Organic Gardening and Farming, which was always on his kitchen table. He believed in using compost and feeding the soil with manure tea. Earthworms were plentiful in his soil and his tomatoes were perfect.
Although Grampy probably only had a grade school education in the old country, Germany, he spoke 5 languages and understood how to make plants grow. He knew he didn’t need chemicals to “fight” bugs or diseases. He handpicked beetles and encouraged birds to visit. He fed his family and shared food with his neighbors. Grampy rarely told me how to do things but I learned by watching him in his garden.
I am grateful that Grampy grew flowers, too. I learned to appreciate their beauty and to know that life is more than just producing food. In the 1980’s I started to get serious about flower gardening.
My boy Josh and I built an 80-foot stone retaining wall to create a terrace for fruit trees and flowers. The stone came from our own property, or from tumble-down stone walls that a neighbor let us pick through. It was back breaking work, but oh so satisfying. Thirty-plus years later the wall is still there, albeit somewhat decrepit. Still, it makes me happy when I reflect on that project.
In the late nineties I started gardening and designing gardens for others. At that time I was an electrician, and getting bored with it. But creating flower gardens and beautiful landscapes made me intensely happy. So I largely gardened in the summer and wired houses in the winter.
I am happy and grateful that I was able to start writing a gardening column over 21 years ago, and still have a group of newspapers and websites that use my weekly column. It also pushes me to keep trying new plants, new tools, and new approaches to gardening. I like sharing all that with you, my readers.
I started my professional life as an elementary school teacher after college. Now, more than 50 years later, I still enjoy teaching. Most of that is done right here in this column.
Gardening has been good to me. I believe it will help keep me healthy for another decade or two. And my thanks to all of you, too. Enjoy the holidays – and I hope you find time to count your blessings.
Now is the Time to Plant Acorns
Posted on Tuesday, December 10, 2019 · Leave a Comment
You may think that the planting season is over. Not for me. I recently planted 8 giant red oaks. Or, I should say, potentially giant oaks. I planted eight acorns. I’m hoping that at least one will begin growing next spring, and that it will eventually provide shade, food for wildlife, and beauty for all who happen by.
This is the season for planting acorns. They need an extended cold period in order to germinate, come spring. That cold requirement prevents them from germinating now, and being killed off before getting established. Most nut trees, including most oaks, have a tap root that grows deep into the soil. Red oak (Quercus rubra), I have read, has relatively shallow roots. Still, if you want an oak, plant your acorns where you want a tree. Don’t move them once they have started growing if you can avoid it.
Here is what I did: Before I planted the acorns I inspected them carefully to see if there were any signs of insects boring into them, but saw no holes. Then I put them in a bowl of water to see if any floated. Any that float should be discarded, as they are probably not viable. Of the 10 I put in water, two floated and went to the compost pile
Next I went outdoors to plant. I looked for a place where a young oak would get plenty of sunshine – six hours a day is adequate – and where a big tree would not be competing with other trees. According to my favorite tree expert, Michael Dirr, a mature red oak will grow to be 60 to 75 feet tall and nearly as wide at maturity. I did not have an area quite that wide to dedicate to an oak, but I found a spot where it will fit between two maples along my property line.
Oaks do well in well drained, acidic soil. Red oak, because it has a relatively shallow root system, can be prone to drying out when the trees are young, so I am prepared to water my seedling until it is well established if the summer is hot and dry.
I raked off leaves and snow and loosened the soil in a 2-foot wide circle with a hand tool. Then I pushed acorns into the soil and covered each with an inch or so of soil. Then I patted down the soil and covered the area with leaves. I placed a nice metal name plate in the middle of the planting zone with the date I planted the acorns.
If more than one of my acorns grows, I will have to choose the best to keep. Yes, I could keep more than one for a while, but brother and sister trees will compete for sun, water and nutrients, so the extras will need to be weeded out.
If digging in frozen ground doesn’t appeal to you or if the squirrels are watching your every move, acorns can be collected in winter, stratified in a refrigerator for a minimum of 30 to 60 days, and then planted in the spring. Store them in a paper bag in the vegetable drawer to keep them from drying out. By spring, the squirrels will have better fish to fry (like the tender shoots of my hostas).
Red oak nuts may need help opening their shells if they have been stratified, or preserved indoors, because they do not go through multiple freeze and thaw cycles. Simply score the acorn with a knife or rub it with 80-grit sandpaper until the kernel is exposed.
Not all acorns will germinate the first year, which makes sense from a Darwinian point of view: If a drought or a forest fire kills off some seedlings this year, others will be able to pop up the next.
One of the best oaks for suburban areas is the pin oak (Quercus palustris). It is smaller than many oaks (still, it grows to about 60 feet), with shallow fibrous roots that can thrive in the heavy clay often found in the disturbed soil of subdivisions. It prefers acidic soils, so it does well in the Northeast.
Pin oaks grow more quickly than many oaks, often adding two feet of height or more per year, and they have a profile that is handsome year-round. Like all the oaks discussed here, they are hardy in zones 4 to 8 or 9.
The white oak (Quercus alba), is majestic and can live 500 years or more, attaining heights of 100 feet. It does best in deep, moist, well-drained soils. It is susceptible to anthracnose and other diseases, but thrives in the wild from Maine to Florida and as far west as Minnesota and Texas. It is worth planting where space permits.
The chestnut oak (Quercus prinus) is handsome, with deeply furrowed bark and a nearly globe-shaped form that is striking in winter. It can survive in dry, rocky places that would be eschewed by other trees.
Being a gardener means, among other things, being optimistic. Having a long view. And being a little silly – after all, surely most people seeing me digging in the frozen soil would consider me a bit daft. I don’t care. Planting acorns in winter is more fun than sitting at a computer any day.
Living Christmas Trees: Good Idea or Bad?
Posted on Wednesday, December 4, 2019 · Leave a Comment
I know people who say we shouldn’t be cutting down trees just to brighten our homes for the holidays. Trees are, after all, sequestering carbon and making our environment cleaner, greener, and all that. I disagree and will cut a fresh tree from my neighborhood tree farmer. I say Christmas trees are a crop like corn: planted, then harvested and then more are planted the next year.
If you want to have a live tree inside the house and plant it outside afterward, you can. I’ve never done it, but I’ve talked to people who have. Here’s what I’ve learned.
First know that chances of survival are only 50-50 or thereabouts. Planting a tree in New England in January is not easy. For starters, the ground will probably be frozen. And keeping a tree hydrated and happy in the house is a challenge, even for an attentive tree steward. But let’s see how you can improve your odds
Want success? Think small. A six-foot tree will have a big, heavy root ball, and will be harder to move and harder to plant. Think three to four feet tall, maximum, and even smaller if you can. The best? A tabletop tree.
Buy a fir or spruce that has been grown in a plastic container, not one that is recently dug up or wrapped in burlap. Place the tree in the coolest part of the house – and never near a radiator or woodstove.
I suggest that you think where the tree will be planted after the holidays before you buy one. Too many times I’ve seen a huge blue spruce towering over a nice little ranch house, blocking out the sun from the big picture window. Why? Because the tree was small and cute when the owner of the house planted it, and he never thought about its ultimate size.
Balsam fir (Abies balsamea) is one of the classic Christmas trees. In the wild it will grow to be 45 to 75 feet tall with a spread of 20 to 25 feet. This is not the tree to place close to the house. There are a few cultivars that are supposed to stay small, but mostly such trees just grow slower than the standard varieties. In 40 years, a dwarf may no longer be a dwarf.
Blue spruce ( Picea pungens) is another good-sized tree in the wild, 30 to 60 feet tall with a spread of 20 to 30 feet. There are spruce that stay small, I have read. ‘Blue Kiss’ is one that, after 40 years growing in Ohio, is reported to be only 8 feet tall and 10 feet wideBut that’s still enough to block most windows. So choose the location well. ‘Fat Albert’ is one that is designed to stay low – and wide.
One thing you could do to keep the ground from freezing solid would be to buy a bale of hay or straw now and use it as insulation. Just spread a thick layer of it over the soil at the site where you will plant your tree. Between now and January it is likely we will have some very cold days. And unless we have a thick layer of snow, the top few inches of soil can be frozen solid by the time you want to plant your tree outdoors. Yes, you can break up frozen soil with a pick ax, but do you want to? Or you can dig the hole when you buy your tree.
I would also buy a few bags of topsoil now and store them in a warm basement. Then if the soil is frozen when it’s time to plant, and you hack out a hole, you can backfill the hole with soil that is not in frozen chunks. You will want some bark mulch or wood chips to spread over the soil once the tree is planted, too.
Instead of keeping a live tree in the house for a month, the way many of us do with cut trees, think about having it indoors for just a week or 10 days. That will reduce the stress on the tree considerably. Keep the soil lightly moist, but not soggy.
When the time comes to plant your tree, be sure that you dig the hole the appropriate depth. Never plant a tree in a hole that is deeper than necessary. Look for the trunk flare, that part of the tree that would be above ground if growing in the wild.
Keep the trunk flare above ground and do not cover it with bark mulch. To do so is to consign your tree to an early death. The bark will rot if covered with soil or mulch, and the tree will decline in 6 to 10 years. Many trees come in the pot with the trunk flare covered with soil, so you may have to expose it when you plant. And don’t forget to water your tree after you plant it, even if it is below freezing outdoors.
One nice thing about buying a cut tree that reaches the 10-foot ceiling in my house is this: after the holidays I will cut off all the branches and use them to provide some protection for less hardy plants that might be harmed by cold winter winds. I will layer them over perennials that are “iffy” in my climate, or use them to protect roses or other shrubs that might be damaged by the cold.
So go ahead and buy a live tree for the house if you wish, but please don’t hold your nurseryman responsible if your tree doesn’t survive the winter.
Holiday Gifts for the Gardener
Posted on Monday, November 25, 2019 · Leave a Comment
Bad news: I hear you can’t depend on Santa to deliver presents to your favorite gardener this year as he is vastly overworked – and pretty cranky. Last I heard, he is planning on give coal to almost everyone over the age of eight. But here are some of my recommendations that you could give to your favorite gardener.
Tools are always good. I recently bought a harvest knife, a Barnel BLK730. This is a lightweight curved blade on a wooden handle that is great for cutting back perennials and grasses by pulling it through a clump of vegetation. Best yet? The price. Only $7.10 from OESCOinc.com or 800-634-5557. This is a tool supplier in Conway, MA that has an amazing assortment of good tools.
Also from OESCO I borrowed two “anvil” type pruners to try out. I always thought that anvil pruners were just low-cost pruners sold in big box stores for $10 or so. But these pruners are made by a German company, Lowe (with 2 dots over the O, not to be confused with Lowe’s, the American retailer), and cut very well. Their blades are sharpened on both sides, and are thinner than the blades on by-pass pruners so they take noticeably less effort to cut.
For people with small hands, I like the Lowe mini-anvil, L5.127 for $40. It weighs just 6 ounces and cuts stems up to 5/8 inch in diameter. For bigger hands like mine, I like the Lowe Ergo Anvil L8.107 for $64. These weigh just 8 ounces and compare with my Felco 5 pruners that weigh 11 ounces.
Of course every gardener needs a good weeding tool. My favorite is the CobraHead, and has been for years. They now have a mini-Cobrahead which is designed for smaller hands. Available from CobraHead.com or 866-962-6272 or at your local garden center. It has a single curved tine like a steel finger that will tease out roots from below while you tug a weed from above.
Last summer I installed a garden during a dry time, and used a watering kit from Gardeners Supply called “Snip and Drip” (Item 8587044). I loved it. It comes with hose, soaker hose, and all the fittings needed for watering a small garden. I ran soaker hose around each shrub or cluster of perennials, then regular hose to the next planting. The fittings are easy to install and go together quickly. The basic kit costs $52.95 from Gardeners.com or 1-888-833-1412.
A good wheelbarrow is a nice present, though pricey. My favorite is the Smart Cart (
www.smartcarts.com or 207-591-4250). It is great for heavy and bulky loads. The axle is centered under the load so that it feels light to the touch and turns easily on its two wide 16-inch diameter wheels. It has a tubular aluminum frame and a big plastic bin (7 cubic feet).
You can easily remove the bin from the frame so that you can wash the dog in it, or carry compost in the back of your car. My model (with wide wheels) is rated for 600 lbs; the wire wheel version is rated for 400 lbs. At $299 with free shipping, it is a lifetime investment. I’ve had mine for about 20 years, and never had a problem.
If a wheelbarrow costs too much, you could get a small blue plastic tarp. My partner, Cindy Heath, loves hers to drag away weeds. Go to your local hardware store and get a six by eight foot tarp for under $10. Not perfect for everything, but very economical.
Books are great present, too. Go to your local family-owned bookstore and pull some gardening books off the shelf. Find a chair, sit down and have a look. It helps if you know what the recipient of your gift is focused on – shrubs, perennials, learning to compost, etc.
A book I liked this year is Mini Meadows: Grow a Little Patch of Colorful Flowers Anywhere around Your Yard by Vermont gardener Mike Lizotte. (Storey Publishing, paper, $16.95). It is full of practical easy ways to get more flowers to attract pollinators – and supply the table with bouquets.
A wonderful book by Vermont garden designer Julie Moir Messervy and architect Sarah Suskana is Outside the Not So big House: Creating the Landscape of Home (Taunton Press, $34.95). Wonderful photos, lots of good design ideas.
I start a lot of seeds each spring, and I’m tired of buying disposable plastic 6-packs. Gardeners Supply has an alternative: heavy-duty planting trays that can be washed in the dishwasher and re-used for years. Called the GrowEase system, there are two sizes: the 24-cell tray with 2-inch deep cells and a 15-cell tray with 3.5 inch deep cells. Both come with clear plastic domes and self-watering wicking systems.
As I get older I look for ways to save my knees, back, and energy levels. There are lots of kneelers on the market, and I’ve found one I like. Also by Gardeners Supply, it allows me to kneel just a few inches off the ground on a padded shelf, and has very sturdy side handles that allow me to use my arms to push myself up to a standing position. It weighs 9 pounds, and is very sturdy. Flipped over, you can sit on it. Item 40-009.
Santa may be cranky and unresponsive this year, but we don’t have to be. Send me your ideas, particularly for books you like – I need winter reading. Enjoy the holidays!
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