Curious Gardeners

Guy Cooper and Gordon Taylor (aka The Curious Gardeners) are a British/American duo who had a couple of BBC TV series where they toodled around the country in a wonderfully batty blue car and looked at gardens.

Between them they have written 14 books on gardens and garden design and have a thriving design practice, CooperTaylor Designs  One of their most famous garden designs was for Sir. Elton John.

I can’t imagine a more exciting job than to travel around the world, visit exquisite gardens and write and design for clients with unlimited budgets.  The two are very entertaining.  I first discovered their work when I picked up a book "Mirrors of Paradise" they had written about Ferdinand Currunco --  I think one of the most exciting designers working today.

Other books include Gardens of Obsession, Gardens for the Future, and Paradise Transformed and Six Elements of Garden Design in which they they visit 50 of the greatest gardens in Britain, some traditional and some contemporary and discuss six elements that make a successful garden:- form, water, sculpture, plants, time, and materials.

Penelope Hobhouse

If you’re an English gardener in America, as I am, you are assumed to be an expert no matter what your actual experience.   The two country’s attitudes towards the subject are very different -- Americans have ‘yards’ even if they own acres, every Brit has a ‘garden’ even if it consists of a tiny patch of concrete outside the front door, yards are for school playgrounds or the Metropolitan police service.

The general stereotype seems to be that the English garden instinctively the way the French dress.  However, most English gardeners are not to the trowel born, but learn the hard way--  even the grande dames of gardening such as Penelope Hobhouse.  In an old edition of Garden Design magazine I came across a list of her ten rules for gardeners:-

1.    Always have a notebook with you.  To garden is to learn, write down the cultivar names and details of growing conditions you think you’ll remember when visiting gardens, but never do.

2.    Find a mentor -- the more the better.  She gladly acknowledges all the talented designers and plantsmen she’s learnt from over the years.

3.    Do your homework.  Very little in life is original, the more you know about the history of landscape design and the more gardens you have visited the better your own gardens will be.

4.    Trust your experience, keep a garden diary to record what works and what doesn’t.

5.    Don’t forget a garden is more than the sum of the plants.  Plantings are ephemeral, a good garden should have more to it than that.

6.    If you don’t get it right the first time, try again.  If a plant isn’t happy, dig it up and move it.

7.    A garden is not static.  Encourage self-seeders to find their place in your plans.

8.    Sunlight and shade are important design elements.  Very few gardens incorporate light and shadows effectively.

9.    Simplify.

10.    Focus on designing the garden YOU want, and that works for your lifestyle.

Clematis

The snow has finally stopped and the sun is shining though the wind still roars in the trees.

A quick walk around the the garden reveals that most of the clematis are a complete mess, the snow and high winds have taken their toll and the late flowering tall ones have collapsed into a tangle of jumbled stems.  In a couple of months they need to be cut down to within a couple of feet of the ground -- I usually cut them to just above the first bud.  Brutal as it seems they will shoot up and flower more evenly after this treatment.   A couple of them I will transplant at the same time as they have outgrown their spot.  It’s vital to know what time of year your clematis flower, if you hack back the earlier flowering ones in this manner you will lose most of the years bloom.

In the front of the house we've trained the small yellow flowering clematis tangutica along wire hoops that cover the drainpipe.  The weight of the snow and the winds have torn the supports away from the house and the clematis is flopped on the ground and over the cable wire running to the house.  It's too cold and miserable to do much now but the first decent day I'm going to have to re-ty the supports and prune back the clematis.

The climbing roses and clematis trained against the side of the house are a disaster.    The supporting wires have broken away and are now waving in the wind and the roses are a rampant mess.  It’s going to take hours on a ladder in the spring to prune back and control the mess.

I still have more clematis to plant next year.  C. Jackamanii is still my favorite with flowers of deep purple velvet covering it during the summer.  Someone had planted it against a trellis by the kitchen window of our  New Jersey house and I’ve loved it ever since.  When we moved I was so attached I was tempted to dig it up and take it to England with us, but didn’t fancy getting caught by customs over a common climber.  I later heard the people who bought our house razed it to the ground, heartbreaking.  If it’s cut to the ground in early spring you avoid the usual tangle at the top of its growth and it’s breathtaking.

Another clematis I cannot live without is the pink flowered C. Montana.  It flowers early in the season, and is a bit of a rampant thug -- I’ve planted a couple by the wood piles hiding our compost heaps.  It copes with the shade at the edge of the woods and isn’t as vigorous.  Once it’s flowers fade you’re left with a lot of green so is good to plant along with a later flowering clematis or rose.

Other early flowering favorites are the purple flowering President and the white Henryi.  These two are fabulous training into the lower branches of a climbing rose, I plant them about 3 feet away and tip the bamboo supports they are trained on towards the rose, the tendrils will soon start clambering along the rose stems.  I’ve never had much luck planting them in the same hole, after a while competition wins out and the rose roots overwhelms the clematis which suffers a lingering death.

Hamamelis x intermedia 'Arnold Promise'

Snow is falling AGAIN with a foot promised by tomorrow afternoon.  Bird feeders are filled, at the edge of the woods you  can still see the witch hazels under the snow.  Hamamelis x intermedia 'Arnold Promise' is one of my favorites in bloom now.

The witch hazel hybrids are large deciduous shrubs that grow from 12'-20’ tall and flower in mid to late winter.   ‘Arnold Promise’ is an upright, vase-shaped cultivar with sweetly fragrant yellow flowers that blooms slightly later than the other cultivars, usually around this time from February to March.  In the fall the leaves turn yellow-orange to yellow and are attractive but not spectacular.  It was introduced by the Arnold Arboretum in Boston and was a Royal Horticutural Society of Great Britain Award of Garden Merit plant (1993).

Inside I've put a pork roast and mounds of vegetables in the slow cooker for supper tonight and am off to work.

Winter flames

Another snow storm is threatened to start at midnight tonight and last through friday.   More time inside by the fire sorting through seed catalogs.  Outside Cornus sanguinea ‘Winter Flame’ glows in the snow -- its yellow fall color is followed by amazing winter twig color, yellow at the base of the plant flushing to orange-red at the outer edges.  It looks like it is lit by fire all winter.

Deciduous trees and shrubs can have a stunning beauty in winter, a fine counterpoint to the heavier weight of conifers and other evergreens.  Probably the best-known plants for winter stems are Cornus (dogwoods) which display a wide range of colors from bright yellow to dark red.  We’ve inter-planted ‘Winter Flame’ with Cornus alba ‘Sibirica’ which has dark red stems, C. alba “Elegantissima’ whose white-variegated foliage provides a longer season of interest and C. sericea ‘Flaviramea’ whose greenish yellow stems provide a startling contrast.

Others to try include Cornus sericia ‘Cardinal’ which has vivid cherry-red stems, C.alba ‘Kesselringii’ has purplish stems (the dark color is great when used sparingly with lighter brighter cultivars) and C. alba ‘Aurea (gold leaves) and C. alba ‘Spaethii’ whose green leaves are margined with gold .

Dogwoods do best in moist, even wet soil and their winter color is most dramatic when they are planted in open sunny positions -- they can be spectacular around the margins of ponds.  Ours however are in partial shade on top of a bank and have colored up fine in the winter.  It’s the fourth year for this planting and the path is beginning to come into its own -- this spring I’ll cut them down to the ground again so they don’t overwhelm the path.  The old wood should be cut out each year as it is the new wood that has the best color.

We have underplanted them with ferns, snowdrops, aconites, crocus, hellebores and amsonia hubrichtii -- I love the stunning orange and yellow foliage of this native.  I would love (if I had the space) to color theme the yellow and orange-stemmed selections with early narcissus, yellow crocus, aconites, mahonias and witch hazels.  The reddish-stemmed cultivars would be stunning combined with the bronze foliage of Bergenia purpurasens, Hamamelis x intermedia ‘Diane’ and the pink-flowered Daphne bholua ‘Jacqueline Postill’.  I already have these plants in our spring border and cannot find the room to add anything else.

Pruning deciduous trees and shrubs

Now is a good time to prune many deciduous trees and bushes as they are dormant and it is very easy to see the structure and pattern of their branches.  Evergreens are best left until the spring and cherries and other trees which have fruit with stones are usually best left until early summer.  

The old theory was to remove tree branches with a concave cut,  now more is known about the healing process a slanted cut just above the collar where the trunk and branch meet is recommended -- although this does leave a bump some find ugly. 

Despite the cold I spent some time underneath the old Japanese Maple outside our living room, breaking off the obviously dead twigs which are easy to distinguish without the leaves.  It’s been pruned well over the years and once the dead was removed, it opened the whole structure and will allow for good air circulation when leafed out.  

My fingers were too cold to do much more, although a quick walk around the garden revealed that there was much work to be done.  

Heirloom Vegetables

Heirloom vegetables are hot item today.  Once championed only by tree huggers and horticultural luddites they are now regarded by many as superior in flavor and saviors of world food crop diversity.  As usual, the truth lies somewhere in the middle.  Some basic genetic knowledge is required to sort through the hyperbole.

Hybrids have been around for hundreds or years, the first research done by Gregor Mendel, an Augustinian monk in the 19th century who taught natural science to high school children and researched the traits of sweet peas “for the fun of it.”  His work became the foundation of modern genetics, and many of his terms we use today.

Like Mendel, commercial breeders cross two different parent varieties to create an “F1 hybrid”, the first filial generation to demonstrate a new uniform seed variety with specific characteristics of both parents.  To take tomatoes as an example, a variety with great disease resistance could be crossed with a variety with an unusual orange color to make an F1 hybrid that exhibits the best of both parents.

The unique characteristics of an F1 hybrid are uniform only in the first generation of seed, so seed saved from F1 plants  will not grow true if planted and may exhibit many different traits in the second generation.  To guarantee consistent F1 hybrid plants  breeders must repeat the original cross each season using controlled hand pollination.  Many commercially available tomato seeds such as ‘Early Girl’ and ‘San Remo’ are F1 hybrids.

All heirloom varieties are ‘open-pollinated’ -- although not all open-pollinated seeds are heirlooms.  In open pollination the seeds are the result of either natural or human selection for particular characteristics which are then reselected in every crop.  The seed is pollinated by wind or bees, not human hands, and are kept true through selection and isolation.

The definition of “heirloom” is rather vague, it usually means a variety that is around 50 years old and that is no longer available in the commercial seed trade and that has been selected and preserved in a particular area.

As a home gardener, if I buy heirloom ‘Green Zebra’ tomatoes from a local farmers market and plant the seed from the most delicious fruit in my plot, and then each year carefully select the seeds from the earliest ripening, best-tasting plants in my PA climate zone and soil type I would develop a locally adapted strain of ‘Green Zebra’ that is different from a ‘Green Zebra’ grown in Boston or Washington.  

If you are growing an unknown, open-pollinated tomato variety that has been handed down to you through five or six generations from a local friend, it would be considered an heirloom variety.  Obviously there is something special about this plant that has caused local gardeners to select and save the seed, heirloom tomatoes often have fabulous flavor and texture or unusual colors but can lack the disease resistance, early maturity or uniform shape that makes them commercially viable.

When selecting varieties it’s important to choose the right seed for your needs.  Hybrids can have great flavor, and can offer better disease resistance, increased productivity and a broader maturity range than heirlooms.

If you’re short of space, there are F1 hybrid tomatoes selected to grow as a short bush instead of a sprawling vine and that have a more concentrated harvest than heirlooms.  Aesthetically I love the rainbow colors and fabulous shapes of heirloom tomatoes and so when space permits I am happy to sacrifice the hybrids more plentiful and reliable harvest for the misshapen yellow, orange, pink, purple and striped orbs of the heirlooms.

However, I also love the colors of the hybrid ‘Bright Lights’ Swiss chard, the rich dark green crumpled leaves are a wonderful alternative to spinach and the stems are all shades of yellow, gold, orange, pink, violet and striped and are delicious to eat as well as beautiful to look at.  I’ve had miserable luck growing heirloom broccoli and would only plant a hybrid variety that is more resistant to pests and diseases.

Like most things in life I think diversity is key and those who are narrow minded in their choices lose out.  Enjoy the best of the hybrids with the best of the heirlooms and keep notes so you remember what varieties thrived in your environment and what failed.  Gardening is an endless experiment, with nature as the controlling hand.

Weekly Reminder -- February 21

A Check List of Timely Tasks

1. Spend time sketching ideas on graph paper and making notes on what is lacking in your garden.  Often the best garden plans are hatched in the middle of winter when you stare out of the window at a blank white landscape and long for the colors and fragrances of summer.

2. The time to start planting your first row of peas outside is only a few weeks away -- traditionally weather permitting this is done on St. Patrick’s Day.  Before you start sowing, sketch out your summer vegetable and cutting garden on paper, keeping in mind plot rotations and compass directions so tall plants don’t shadow sun loving crops.. There is still enough time to sow slow-growing annuals from seed.  Plant in a 2/3 soil-less planting medium, 1/3 perlite mixture and use heat seedling mat to maintain an even temperature of 75 degrees F. day and night.

3. The days are getting longer and brighter which encourages houseplant growth.  Start fertilizing your plants either by adding one-quarter the recommended strength every time you water, or full strength every couple of weeks until April when you can increase your fertilization program further in preparation for summer.

4.If the recent snows and freezing weather has damaged odd evergreen branches (or as with my sarcococca whole sections) it’s a good time to prune out the damage.  Some of my evergreens look really sickly, those I’m leaving until late April in the probably vain hope they perk up or some new growth appears.

6. It kills me to do it, but I now do throw out my paperwhite bulbs when they finish blooming.  They’re not hardy in zone 6 and I’ve tried coddling them, leaving the foliage to die and saving them for the next year with disappointing results --there’s nothing worse than forcing a bunch of bloom-free leaves.  I now shut my eyes and throw them on the compost heap.  

7.When there’s a warm break in the weather, and if the snow allows, check your perennials.  If the frost has heaved any up, wait for a thaw and gently dig them into the soil to ensure their roots are covered.

Indoor cyclamen

Houseplants languish in my care, suffering through irregular watering, bad nutrition and general neglect.  The one stellar exception was a cyclamen I was given as a hostess gift  years ago and which seems to enjoy my haphazard care.

When it's gloomy outside with winter flowering shrubs buried under snow, having flowering plants inside can be a great boost to the spirits.  I was just at Gentile's, a cheap and cheerful produce store, and they had small-flowered, indoor cyclamen banked up on the tables for $2.50 each, it's about as pretty and inexpensive as anything you can find in a pot at this time of year.  

Most indoor cyclamen are Cyclamen persicum hybrids and are derived from a wild species native to the Middle East. Modern hybrids include miniatures and those with silver marbled leaves, frilled petals, and fragrant blooms.  They can vary in height from 6” to 12” and come in a range of colors from white to crimson and magenta.  They're in a different league to the large-flowered, large-leaved brigade which look coarse and overblown in comparison.  Somehow the smaller cyclamen scale seems right this time of year, mine are lined up along my kitchen windowsill -- if there was not still a foot of snow outside the window their hardy cousins, Cyclamen coum as well as  snowdrops and aconites should be poking their way up in the spring border outside the window.

I love having a range of similar colors spread around windowsills or running down the center of the kitchen table.  Cyclamen bloom for several months and will flower again in future years.   If you’re buying a plant, choose one with plenty of buds showing under the foliage and avoid any plants with drooping or yellow leaves.  I dislike the plastic pots they come in and either hide them in another container or repot them.  Be careful not to disturb the roots when doing this and if you are re-planting them into a larger container add some grit to the potting soil.  They actually do better when slightly root-bound so I usually just tease them gently into a similar sized pot.

After gently firming the roots into the new pot or bowl I cover the surface with dried leaves or an emerald-green cushion of moss. If you have time, try spreading the flowers out from the base. They tend to clump together, but teased out gently and evenly between the leaves, the flowers look lighter and more elegant.

Cyclamen care
They enjoy temperatures between 45-55 degrees farenheit, which despite my family’s comments is far colder than our kitchen.   You should choose a brightly lit situation away from direct sunlight and heat sources.  They can endure or rather tolerate temperatures at around 60 to 70 degrees as long as this is not consistent and lasts for only a few days -- not all winter which is what my cyclamen seems to thrive in.   If the temperature reaches above 70 degrees, which is comfortable for most people, it will go into dormancy.  I don’t think my kitchen ever reaches above 70 in the winter which probably helps .

To prolong the bloom, spent flowers should be removed by twisting the stem and giving a sharp pull, to avoid leaving part stems behind.

As far as watering goes, they don't like much which suits my hit and miss house plant care.  The worst thing is a constant dribble of water.  Once a week I sit the pots in the sink and really soak them for a few hours so the whole root ball gets a good drink and the soil rehydrates.  I then drain them and leave them for another week or so without water.  They should really dry out before watering so the tuber doesn't rot, if I forget the flowers start to droop slightly and I guiltily soak them an wait for them to perk up.

Follow the life cycle

Cyclamen persicum are Mediterranean and follow the common pattern of coming into growth in the autumn, growing through the winter and spring and then going dormant while there is no rain and intense sun in the summer.  To mimic this as closely as possible, when mine start to taper off in the late spring I shove them into the mass of house plants eeking out a survival in the mud room.  I stop watering when they stop flowering and let the leaves go yellow and wither.  During the summer I move them to a shelf outside the mudroom, which I couldn't say is cool but is in deep shade and then totally forget about them.  

When I start thinking about taking cuttings and bringing in my tender perennials at the end of summer, there are usually a few leaves sprouting on the cyclamen, and I soak them thoroughly.  As they are tubers it’s best to water from the bottom and let the plants soak the water up for 20-30 minutes.  You can water from the top but you shouldn’t let the water get on the tuber as it can cause it to rot, for this reason you should not allow it to sit in water for more than an hour.    As new growth appears it’s good to replace the top inch of compost in the pot with fresh compost and resume regular watering.

They have become friends whose blooms I’d miss very much in the winter months.  Their presence on the windowsill has also made me realize I don't have nearly enough of the hardy garden Cyclamen coum outside.   They look best in carpets as big as you can throw them, almost as lovely in leaf through the autumn as they are when in flower.  My favourites are the deepest magenta colour forms which look good growing outside or arranged inside in a small glass with snowdrops or a few early primroses.

Blue Jay Day

The temperature was in the mid 40s today for the second day in the row and I woke to the sound of bird song this morning.  The only new bird who seems to be at the feeders is a Blue Jay.

Although these can be seen all year they are migratory and travel in large flocks in fall and spring.  Ours usually disappear in the winter, so I’m not sure if the one I sighted is a local returning or one from further north escaping south.

Our mixed oak and beech deciduous woodland is an ideal habitat for them, and during the warmer months we have several birds nesting at woods edge.  Their range extends across eastern North America from Florida to Newfoundland.  I love watching them, they’re one of the most beautiful of birds, but they do tend to chase the smaller birds away from the feeders which could be a problem in the cold weather.

Brits behaving madly

Every February in England the National Gardens Scheme publishes its bible of garden visiting, the Yellow Book.  The 2010 edition features over 3,700 gardens that are open for charity, most are private and not usually open to the public.

Anybody who doubts that the British are bonkers about gardening should get their hands on a copy and read the descriptions of gardens that range from tiny terrace plots to rolling country estates, all jostled side by side within the pages.  The descriptions themselves are worth the price of the book (9 pounds sterling), which is available in bookstores in the UK or online for an additional postage fee from the National Gardens Scheme website.

You can search for open gardens on the NGS website, which is helpful if you're planning a trip the England and only want to know what's open during your visit.  The only drawback is garden photographs and extended descriptions are not available online as yet.

You also have to plan slightly ahead as not all gardens can be visited on a whim, some are by appointment only,  others are community efforts with a street or village banding together to throw open their gates.  Over 2,000 of the gardens have plant sales and 2,500 "provide the all important teas and home-made cakes" a staple of every good British garden visit.  The peak month for garden openings is June, some like Great Dixter above are open all year round.

If you’re living in or visiting Scotland, the Yellow book will not do you much good as it only covers gardens south of the border.  For Scottish gardens you need to visit the website of the Scottish Garden Scheme  

I live in hope that our annual visit to family coincides with the opening of Charles Jencks extraordinary Garden of Cosmic Speculation at Portrack House in Dumfries.

Over the last twenty years he has created a private wonderland in the grounds of an 18th century manor house complete with twisted grand-scale landforms, lakes, a geometric kitchen garden of the Six Senses, woodland walks, a Nonsense Building designed by James Stirling, sculptures that include one of DNA and a newly completed comet bridge.

This year the garden is open Sunday, May 2nd from noon - 5pm, needless to say we will not be there but if you’re in the area for six pounds you can take the tour.  Maybe I should just book a trip to Dumfries now.

Feeding the birds

It is frigid this morning snow and the bird feeders outside our kitchen window are a flurry of activity.  Such a joy to watch, I cannot imagine winter without the birds.

The cardinals are beautiful but the bullies of the feeders, when they arrive other birds flee.  Later on in the day the male cardinals will be strutting their stuff, the males are supposedly territorial but there are usually three or four perched at the feeders or eating sunflower seeds other birds have knocked to the ground.  They tend to arrive later in the morning, as yet there's no sign of them but doves, chickadees, juncos and finches are here in force.

Birds have to be well fed and healthy to make it through the winter.  Small birds such as tits and chickadees have to eat food quantities almost equivalent to their own body weight every day in cold weather just to survive the night and make it through the day to forage for food.  Bird feeders provide a ready source of nutrition and greatly cut down the amount of time it takes to find food -- however once the local birds become reliant on a feeder, forgetting to put food out in a cold snap can affect their survival of the smallest and weakest in the flock, I'm not usually the one filling our feeders so I have to make notes to myself to keep them full when I'm the only one around.

Feeding birds is a relatively new pastime, a hundred years ago there was less suburban sprawl and birds survived on weed seeds and insects.  Billions of pounds of birdseed and tons of suet are now put out in gardens throughout America.  Studies have proven that in a cold winter small birds’ survival rates are greater when feeders are put out, though it seems that birds are able to switch back to foraging for natural foods fairly quickly if the food is withdrawn so there doesn’t appear to be any long term dependency.

Our bird feeders are opposite our kitchen window at the edge of the woods, close to a stand of evergreen azaleas and rhododendrons that provide cover to which the birds can easily escape from predators such as cats – though any cats in our garden would be on a suicide mission with the dogs roaming around.  To attract birds in the garden, it is vital to improve their habitat through landscaping – this makes more of a difference than putting out feeders.  Planting native seed and berry-producing trees, shrubs and vines can provide food for a wide variety of birds as well as cover, roosting areas, nesting places and perches.  The birds are also much more likely to eat when they feel safe.

To help reduce the amount of food eaten by squirrels, (whose very presence drives me crazy) we don’t hang the feeders from trees but have them hanging about five feet off the ground from poles – not that effective as the squirrels can jump about six feet.  We’ve tried every squirrel proof feeder on the market, after a while they seem to conquer every one of them.  Cayenne pepper mixed with peanut butter and spread over surrounding branches is fairly effective (although ugly), attaching a large inverted cone to the feeder pole is meant to work – also ugly.  Or you can learn to live with the squirrels and fill the feeders constantly.

We’ve placed a number of feeders in different places and heights in the woods to attract a variety of species, since birds typically feed at different levels.

A sunflower-seed tube feeder is the best choice if you are just going to put out one feeder. Small birds such as chickadees, titmice, nuthatches, goldfinches, siskins, and purple and house finches make frequent visits.

At the base of the hanging sunflower seed tubes we’ve filled an old handmade concrete birdbath with seed for the cardinals, doves, towhees, sparrows, and juncos that usually feed near the ground. As the ground feeding birds can catch salmonella when seeds and droppings mix it’s a good idea to scrub any low feeder out with a bleach solution once a year.  Woodpeckers, jays, nuthatches, titmice, chickadees, and finches populate the higher hanging feeders.   We have another birdbath for water – also vital for year round drinking and bathing but the creek at the bottom of the garden fulfills most of the birds water needs.

Suet feeders are  loved by titmice, chickadees, nuthatches, and woodpeckers. Suet chunks can easily be hung from a tree in a half-inch hardware-cloth basket, or in a more durable cage feeder like the one shown here.

The Cornell Lab of Ornithology has a fabulous site with many tips for feeding birds.  They also run Project Feeder Watch, a winter-long survey of birds that visit feeders at backyards, nature centers and community areas throughout America.  The data is used to help scientists track movements of winter bird populations and long-term trends in bird distribution and abundance.  Anyone with an interest in birds can participate and get their backyard bird population on the map.

Sleeping with Seed Catalogs

Another cold snowy night, just an inch or two of slush fell so no two-hour school delay which disappointed the kids.  It's still snowing and looks like more to come today.  Outside the icicles are dripping, inside I dream of summer.

Last night I fell asleep with seed catalogues piled around the bed, myriad choices for summer blossoms and mouth-watering vegetables.

I’m always drawn back to Renee’s Garden seeds, partly through nostalgia.  I planted my first cutting and vegetable garden in New Jersey with her seeds when her company was Shepherd’s.  At that time she was very “cutting edge” offering heirloom and hard to find seeds and was one of the first in America to introduce international vegetables, flowers and herbs to home gardeners .  In the mid 1990’s Shepherd's Seeds was bought out by White Flower Farm and prices went up while descriptions went down, becoming flowery and useless instead of informative.

Shepherd's seeds is now out of business and Renee has re-emerged.  I think her seeds are still expensive, but customer service is excellent, the germination rate is very high and (it may be my imagination) the seeds I order from them seem to grow faster than other companies. The seed packets are great, wonderful hand drawn watercolors of the plants on the front and all the information you need about the variety on the back.

The choice isn’t fantastic, but the older I get the less choice I crave.  I’d rather have an expert devote the time to narrow the field to the best in taste and quality and offer a selection of say 5 excellent extraordinary carrot varieties I dither over than 25 that overwhelm me.  Of course you need an arbiter of taste you trust, which in this case I do.

There are several heirloom combination packets that are extremely tempting and allow you to experiment with different varieties without wasting vast quantities of seeds -- who needs 500 pepper plants if you want to sample 5 different types?  As a stroke of genius when you order a mixed packet, the seeds are color coded with food grade dye so you can distinguish the different varieties.

This year I'm planting for clients as well as myself and wanted greater choice and more quantity than I see in her catalog.  After skimming through numerous others, I settled on my two other favorite companies.  Johnny's seeds for great vegetable selection, good prices and customer service and excellent germination rates.  And the old British standby Thompson and Morgan for fabulous flower selections.

I'm always tempted by plants I know I can’t grow.  Old fashioned sweet peas are one of my favorite flowers and I had them twining over our fence in England.  Here I can grow the perennial sweet pea seen above, but it lacks the fragrance of the annuals which on the East Coast of America are usually miserable paltry things that wither before they flower.

I persevere each year and thanks to last summer's cold wet weather hit the sweet-pea jackpot and fell in love again.    The catalog descriptions   “...graceful beauty ..  ruffled blossoms, soft texture and glowing colors ... one of the most irresistible flowers... scent is an exquisite perfume of orange blossoms and honey, surely one of the most seductive of all flower fragrances...”  has induced me to try ONE more time.    I’ve added “Queen of Hearts”, “Jewels of Albion” and “Cupani’s Original” to my long list of seeds to order.  Exquisitely fragrant and heat resistant .. we’ll see!  I'm planning to sow them under lights as soon as they arrive to give them a really early start.

Copper pots

In the center of one of Sissinghurt's courtyards is a great copper pot, planted out with bulbs in the spring, followed by a succession of annuals.

Planting tulips and bulbs directly into pots worked for me in England, but they failed abysmally here, the bulbs rotting down into a soggy mass during winter's freezes and thaws.  This year I filled plastic planting pots full of potting soil and layers of bulbs and planted them in nursery beds.  I'm hoping they will be ready to remove and plant out in the spring.  The holes the pots leave I'll fill with dahlias and other tender tubers I now have wrapped in shredded paper in the garage.  

My copper pot is currently filled with snow, brimming with little but ice.

Weekly Reminder -- February 14th

A Check List of Timely Tasks

1. If the weather permits, now is a good time for some woodland maintenance.  It’s important to remove vines such as bittersweet, honeysuckle and wild grapes that can eventually strangle the trees.

2. Check indoor ficus, jade, citrus and cacti for fluffy white mealybugs which tend to gather at the intersection of leaves and stems.  They can be removed with a cotton swab dipped in rubbing alcohol.

3. If any houseplants show aphid damage -- curled leaves, malformed buds, and a ‘honeydew’ or sticky substance on leaves you need to take action.  In general pests on houseplants can be controlled by an insecticidal soap spray -- for maximum effectiveness buy a soap and pyrethrine combination and spray on a regular schedule.

4. Finish placing your seed orders and make sure that you order sufficient seeds for multi-season crops  such as lettuce, spinach and herbs that do well in spring and fall -- your favorite varieties could be out of stock by late summer.

5. If you don’t already own a cold frame, consider buying or making one with some lumber and old window frames.  You can then push spring planting forward and start sowing cold tolerant crops such as lettuce, mustard greens and spinach.

6.  Cut some forsythia branches when the temperature is above freezing and bring them indoors to force.  Choose branches with fat flower buds and place in water a cool, dimly lit place.

7. While you’re outside cutting branches, pick up any sticks from the lawn, remove leftover leaves on  garden beds and dead wood in evergreens.

Happy Valentine's Day

Cold and sunny, a day to curl up by the fire, browse through seed catalogs and dream of spring.

Apollo

I would love to have a gold Apollo's head in our woods that was 6' tall and towered over the snow.  I had to settle for one that is much smaller, a stone discard from the garden center I covered with gold leaf.  In the winter he's visible from the kitchen window.  In the summer he disappears from view, seen only when you wander down a path in the woods and turn a corner.

The first dusting of snow...

breathing room only...

obliteration by snow.

Snow Angel

Most of the statues are now buried under snow.  When we first bought this concrete angel in an auction and set it under a maple by the road, one neighbor stopped to let us know that it was not suitable for the Main Line.

I saw it in the auctioneers catalog and thought it hideous, but when I saw him in his concrete flesh I fell in love and had to bid for him.  Surprisingly I was the only one so compelled.

In the summer ferns surround it and only his head can be seen from the road.  Now the snow has provided a covering a thick blanket that should satisfy even our most prudish neighbors.

Bowed but not broken

A day spent bashing snow from buried bushes and trees.  My first concern was the pieris japonica on the patio.  Instead of reaching above our bedroom window the branches weighed down under the heavy wet snow.

With the help of a large broom I shook the snow gently from the upper branches, getting covered by wet snow in the process.

After being released from snow the branches sprung back almost to their original height.

Next to tackle is the old japanese maple in front of the living room window followed by the yew hedges enclosing the front perennial garden.  They were 5' tall when we planted them four years ago and have grown a few feet since then but are now weighed to the ground.

Japanese maples line the pathway...

ice now coats the wet snow and the additional pressure on this weeping japanese maple could be enough to break fragile branches and ruin the form.

The yew hedges around the perennial garden have practically disappeared under the snow.

Heavy wet snow

Another 18" fell, weighing down trees and bushes, breaking tree limbs and taking down white pine branches.

The greenhouse outside the kitchen on Tuesday...

and nearly covered Thursday morning.

Everything is groaning under the weight of the snow.

Lisa still doesn't have power, their house dark and cold and waterless as they need electricity for their well water.  They come over here for dinner, I had bought a roast beef for the weekend but after our power cut yesterday decide to use it tonight.  I rub a mixture of dry mustard and flour over the outside of the rib roast and put it into a hot oven.

Time to use up a multitude of root vegetables, parsnips and carrots peeled, boiled and mashed with a tiny smudge of butter, turnips mashed with a lump of butter the size of a golf ball served with yorkshire pudding crisp and puffed from the oven and roast potatoes.  It took me a while to roast these perfectly, the trick is to parboil them for 5 - 10 minutes until the edges are soft then sprinkle on some semolina flour and bash them around in the pan for a bit to gently smash the edges.  The semolina flour is Nigella Lawson's trick and it creates a deliciously crunchy and slightly sweet exterior.  Then just tip them into the blistering hot roasting pan with the roast beef.  Somehow tucked around the roast they always taste better, tonight I added some whole garlic cloves and a sprinkling of rosemary leaves that had dropped onto the windowsill.

Snow on snow -- historic levels.

The snow fell from around 9:00pm tuesday and snowed throughout the day with a brief respite around noon.  The dogs and Emma ran out to play in the breaks.

 I stayed in and watched deer through the window made, a bread pudding from left over panetone and then I drove James over through the snow for a voice lesson Wednesday afternoon.

Lisa's kitchen was full of delicious aromas, she'd spent the day cooking, macaroni and cheese, sloppy joes and beef stew.  Comfort food at its best.

While we were there Emma called for batteries and matches as our power went out.  Instead of cold lamb by candlelight we all ate at Lisa's -- though we finished by candlelight as their power flickered and then went out by the end of the meal.

We drove home slowly through treacherous streets to find the lights back on and the house warm

Nigel Slater's Roast Lamb

Stocked up at the farmers market in preparation for the next storm.  A large leg of lamb that should feed us for days the left-overs either eaten cold if we loose power or turned into a deliciously hot shepherds pie.

We've finished all the potatoes from the garden, but for this recipe any large scrubbed potatoes will do.  I don't bother to peel them, just cut them into chunks I can shove through the food processor attachment so they are sliced thickly.  Then place them into a roasting pan and drizzle olive oil over them before scattering over some lumps of butter and a generous sprinkling of salt and pepper.

My oven is still temperamental, for a temperature of 450 I have to set it at 500 and watch closely.  The leg of lamb I pierce with the point of a sharp knife and then push into each hole a small sprig of rosemary from the plant I'm overwintering above the kitchen sink, and a slice of garlic.  Drizzle this with some more olive oil, grind over some salt and pepper and place the leg on one of the oven shelves with the roasting tin of potatoes directly underneath and leave to roast for about an hour.  I usually turn the oven down after 15 minutes or so, but if I forget it doesn't seem to make much difference.  The juices from the lamb drip over the potatoes below, soaking them in flavor and creating a wonderfully crunchy, soft dish.  I'm not sure if you need to serve anything else, but I always feel the need to add something green and my kids choice is always for peas.

Snowed in with another storm on the horizon

Cars are stuck along the roads, snow plowed high against the doors.

It reminds me of Boston street scenes, here the snow usually melts before it piles up but more snow is forecast for tomorrow.  Predictions so far are for around 8" - 12".  Time to stock up on groceries again.

Weekly Reminder -- February 7th

A Check List of Timely Tasks

1. If the weather permits, prune the dead wood from shrubs such as lilacs.

2. Wash pots and trays for seed-sowing later on.

3. Make a crop-rotation plan for the vegetable patch.

4. Call a tree surgeon and ask for a long term plan for pruning and tree removal.

5. Check the dates of your old seed packets, throw out those that are past their viable date.  This could be years for peas, beans, beets and tomatoes, sooner for lettuce, parsley and onions.  You can test viability by placing seeds on a wet paper towel and keeping in a warm place.  If they don’t germinate well, throw them out.

6.  Sift through seed catalogs and start ordering for the year.

7. If it snows, as predicted, lift the weight from your evergreens by beating the plants gently from below with a broom.  Working from above can break the overladen branches.

Bryn Mawr College -- Snow covered

We braved the snow to walk down Millbank Rd and through the Bryn Mawr College Campus.

Calvert Vaux and Frederick Law Olmsted (famous for their Central Park landscaping) were both involved in the plans for the Bryn Mawr College buildings and grounds at the end of the nineteenth century.  Today the campus is snow covered, host to dozens of kids sledding down the hills and college students improvising with dinner trays.

The grounds are beautiful, we walk past through the campus, and then cross New Gulph and pass the Russian House, once the home of the Vaux family, and then scramble down through the woodsand home.

The Russian house