Brookside Gardens in October 2012

October at Brookside Gardens - fall and the always lush conservatory plantings. This post is a quick sweep of plants from the conservatory and fall foliage in the rest of the garden. I’ll do some themed posts over the course of the next week on roses, gourds/squashes/pumpkins and mums.

The collage above shows plants in the conservatory. The bird of paradise always seems to be blooming. There were several grasses with large seed heads; the one in the lower right of the collage has a lot more color than some of the others. The shape of the uncurling leaf to the right is what caught my attention….and the lighting heightens the effect of the curves and color. The images in the collage below are all from the outdoor gardens. One of the few bushes blooming in the outdoor gardens was a fall camellia; otherwise the color is from fall leaves. The shelf fungus at the bottom right is on a stump I always check. The colors are more subtle than the fall leaves; the shelf fungus will stand out more in winter when all the fall color has faded away.

The collage below has two of my favorite trees - the sweet gum against the sky and the gingko in the lower left. The tea house with the colorful maples and the still-mostly-green papyrus in the pool complete this collage.

Brookside Gardens Cloudy Day - July 2012

Brookside Gardens - high humidity relieved a bit with an occasional breeze - was between rain showers. We were there first thing in the morning before the heat of the day became overwhelming and the water droplets dried. The gardens were lush with greenery even though there was still some visible damage from the storm in early July and the more recent rains: freshly cut marks on some trees where limbs had broken, trampled high grass and buds nibbled by deer that got in when part of the fence was down, mulch washed to the side of paths leaving mud behind. I particularly liked the papyrus in pots in one of the pools and the garden with a low wall looking toward the wisteria arbor and tall trees beyond.

The slide show below includes my favorites of the closer study pictures: flowers with water droplets and shiny from overall moisture, a small stem of leaves blown into a pine, water droplets on a large leaf, and a classical looking tree trunk.

Summer Lotus

Over the past month, I’ve seen lotus plants in two separate gardens and photographed them. The pink ones were in the Dallas Arboretum (with the Chihuly glass) and the white ones were in Brookside Gardens in Montgomery County Maryland.

I like the big leaves of the lotus. They 

• Are almost circular.
• Curve into a shallow bowl to capture a pool of water in their centers when it rains.
• Unfurl like lily pads, starting out in two curls toward the center.
• Are veined from the center outward.
• Flutter gently in the breeze on their long stalks that are anchored in muddy shallow water.
• Have gentle waves around their edges. 

Enjoy the lotus slideshow below!

April Celebrations

April is just about here. What is there to celebrate? Here are some ideas:

Wild Flowers. This is the time of year that many wild plants bloom; hikes to photograph then are a beautiful way to celebration spring. Don’t forget the flowering trees as well - dogwoods and redbuds are my favorites. Information about the wild flower festival in Smokey Mountain National Park can be found here. The one in Shenandoah National Park is planned for early May but the program schedule is already published and could be used to plan your own hikes in the park in late April.

Kites. March is the month most associated with kites but many communities hold kite festivals into April and early May when it is a bit warmer and still breezy.

Palm Sunday on the 1st, Good Friday and Passover on the 6th, and Easter on the 8th.  Observe the days in April that sustain your spiritual health.

Gardens. Formal gardens are greening in April too. Depending on the area of the country - there could be rows and rows of tulips or iris just getting ready to bloom of camelias. This time of year orchards are quite beautiful as well - full of blooms. Just as with the wild flowers - noticing the unfurling of spring is a great way to celebrate spring time.

Spring Break. Some schools have already taken a spring break…others have it early in April. A mini-vacation before the sprint to the end of the spring semester is always welcome. Celebrations can be as simple in a picnic in a local park on a warm day. In many parts of the country, showers are frequent in the spring so have a backup plan for if the day turns rainy and cool (or cold!).

Earth Day on the 22nd. Some communities have celebrations or festivals associated with Earth Day. One in my area is at Brookside Gardens.

Brookside Gardens Conservatory - Feb. 1

The conservatory at Brookside Gardens in Montgomery County, Maryland is a warm moist building full of plants that need protection from winter. It is one of my favorite plant places, particularly when the plants outdoors are still mostly dormant from the winter. Yesterday was warm enough to enjoy outdoors but the plants were still braced for winter….so the conservatory was the place to get the ‘green plant’ fix. One side of the conservatory was somewhat in disarray…not quite recovered from the model train exhibit that is always there for the winter holidays. Even with that work going on, the conservatory is a mass of greenery. There are orchids and bananas and bird of paradise; there is even a corner of cactus. The water trickling through and the smells of lush vegetation make this a place to savor. Enjoy my photos from yesterday!

 

Pictures from the outdoor part of Brookside Gardens posted here.

Quote of the Day - 1/14/2012

The passage through the garden is often via stepping stones, which are very skillfully placed precisely to control the speed and direction of walking.  These inner gardens are sometimes damp mossy places … - Bryan Albright and Constance Tindale in A Path Through the Japanese Garden

~~~~~

I am thinking of gardens…a favorite pastime on a cold January day.

Gardens are different than a natural assemblage of plants in that we have somehow modified the place to meet our intention. I love the contrast of the rock garden and lush plantings…and I need to keep my own garden plans as simple as possible since I have a history of benign neglect after an initial flurry of activity. Stepping stones are something that I do relatively well.

Unless the garden is a very small plot that can be seen and tended completely from its edge, a path is needed into it. Stepping stones perform that function and become part of the garden itself. Somehow the plants, mulch or pebbles around stepping stones draw them into the whole of the garden; dirt or paved paths tend to act as dividing lines.

I am not skillful enough to place stepping stones ‘precisely to control the speed and direction of walking.’ The stones are placed along a route I want through the garden at comfortable step intervals and meet their generally pragmatic function. The picture below shows the stepping stones through the front garden to the water faucet; in the summer there are lilies growing around the stones; the red mulch is evident now. One of my most successful groups of stepping stones is in an area that frequently gets muddy under the deck. They are placed a little further apart than a comfortable step and go in every direction from the door of the house into the garden and yard.

In public gardens, stepping stones are rarely seen. Pathways are paved to handle the increased numbers of people walking through and wheel chairs. The pathways are straighter too. It is a sacrifice we are willing to make to increase the accessibility of the garden.

Favorite Things to do on a Lazy Winter's Day at Home

It's a January afternoon. The Christmas decorations are put away, the kitchen is cleaned up from lunch, and the laundry for the week is almost done. This is a lull after the flurry of winter holiday activities....what would you do with 4 hours available? My list is below (not in priority order):

1. Take a nap....for about 30 minutes.
2. Get outdoors. The day was unseasonably warm but even had it been snowing, getting outdoors would have been on the list.
3. Read a good book by a window. Natural light always seems better...and I enjoy the view from the window too.
4. Cook. There has been a tremendous amount of good food recently so I'm enjoying getting back to the more normal foods like a wedge of pomegranate while I let soup simmer.
5. Plan the spring garden. I am not real serious about this yet...for now I'm just looking at catalogs that came in the mail and browsing web sites.