IT’S HARD TO THINK OF ANOTHER TREE that gets more appreciation here from me and the birds. (And don’t forget: I know what birds like, even beyond crabapples.) This last week has been crabapple time on my hillside (above), and it made me think about how much I love these extra-showy members of the genus Malus, and not just in flower. [read more…]
deciduous
must-have (for you and the birds): crabapples
May 1, 2012 at 10:43 am
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giveaway: q&a with broken arrow’s adam wheeler
March 9, 2012 at 5:19 pm
WHAT I MISS MOST about my Martha job: I had other garden geeks as colleagues, and the chance to talk plants nonstop. These days I pester people like Adam Wheeler of Broken Arrow Nursery in Connecticut instead. The latest in my series of nursery and seed-company Q&As: a chat with Adam about everything from outstanding wildlife shrubs and underused hydrangeas and magnolias; to using variegation in the garden, growing giant pumpkins and more. Plus: a chance to win one of two $25 Broken Arrow gift certificates I’ve bought to share with you. [read more…]
all warm and fuzzy about the world of willows
February 6, 2012 at 12:08 pm
IMARCHED UP THE HILL and stuck my face in a stand of twig willows and dogwoods the other day, starved for some color in this relentlessly mud-toned non-winter. The world looked really bright and shiny through their gold and red twigs, and then I remembered the giant pussy willows (Salix chaenomeloides, cut and stuck in a vase, above) down by the road and went to pay them a visit as well. Time to sound another cry in favor of these easiest of plants–and offer a new source of an incredible variety of willows, in particular. [read more…]
great shrub: intermediate hybrid witch-hazels
January 28, 2012 at 2:55 pm
ILOST A LOT OF SHRUBS last year, between deliberate culling required by the garden’s age (twenty-five overgrown years!) and a freakish late-October snowstorm that then took even more than were in my giveback plans. One silver lining—or should I say golden and coppery, perhaps?—was that spots opened up for some witch-hazels, or Hamamelis, and I’m enjoying the first rewards from my young plants like the intermediate hybrid called ‘Jelena’ (above) right now. [read more…]
great shrub: fothergilla, a multi-season star
October 23, 2011 at 3:48 pm
SOME OF THE FIRST SHRUBS I PLANTED here 25 years ago are looking a little past their prime (as is their keeper), so I was cheered today to read an entry for Fothergilla major (above) in a woody plant encyclopedia that said some specimens have been witnessed to look good even after 60 years. Coming up momentarily is Fothergilla’s second big moment of the growing season—its autumn show (above)—so it seemed like a good time to recommend this true multi-season beauty. [read more…]
sentimental shrub: viburnum sieboldii
September 5, 2011 at 11:37 am
COARSE AND SLIGHTLY UNKEMPT AS IT MAY BE, Viburnum sieboldii was one of my first viburnums and is still beloved here. And as if it knows it has some rough edges to make up for, it gives me little extras, in addition to being easy to grow. There is fruit the birds enjoy that evolves through several colors as it ripens over a long period, and foliage that smells like a somewhat funky pineapple to me when rubbed or crushed (one not-quite-aroma-therapeutic way to tell if V. sieboldii is the plant you’re looking at). [read more…]
great shrub: aralia elata ‘silver umbrella’
August 22, 2011 at 2:45 pm
IHAVE ALREADY CONFESSED MANY TIMES OVER to a love of the genus Aralia. One fairly recent acquisition, bought as a young grafted shrub maybe five years ago, is finally shaping up enough to cause people—and a happy frenzy of bees and wasps—to really take notice this time of year. Aralia elata ‘Silver Umbrella,’ a variegated form of the Japanese angelica tree, is in fine form. [read more…]
the other bottlebrush buckeye: ‘rogers’ strain
August 7, 2011 at 2:32 pm
I’M ALWAYS SAD WHEN MY BIG BOTTLEBRUSH BUCKEYE, Aesculus parviflora, fades from its July bloom—until I remember that there will be another performance a couple of weeks later. No, not from the same plant, but from its close cousin, the later-blooming variety called ‘Rogers,’ whose “bottlebrushes” are about 30 inches long. [read more…]
a fallen kousa branch (and no vase big enough)
June 19, 2011 at 5:52 pm
THE ONLY THING THAT WOULD HAVE MADE THIS MISHAP a little more bearable: if I’d had a vase big enough for the spectacular flower-covered branch I lost to storms from one of my Cornus kousa, or Korean dogwoods, last week. Come to think of it, I don’t even have ceilings tall enough to accommodate the 11-foot consolation prize indoors, vase or no vase. In other current Cornus kousa calamities here, the little variegated beauty called ‘Wolf Eyes’ has finally given it up to dogwood anthracnose, the devastating fungal disease that has taken out so many of our native flowering dogwood, Cornus florida. The kousas are typically a great disease-resistant alternative to C. florida–except for a few varieties, including ‘Wolf Eyes.’ Oops. Guess I found that detail out a little late.
