Clatter Valley got hammered. Friday afternoon the sky got black as night, lightning flashed and driving rain and pounding hail, big as marbles, came crashing out of the sky. There was a tornado not far away. No electricity here for several days. What does all this mean for a garden that is comprised primarily of foliage, especially big bold foliage? Nothing good. Looks like Dick Cheney was hunting in the backyard. The leaves are blasted, the succulents are covered with divots--it's ugly. Clean-up, I'm afraid, will require little more than a machete and and a weed whacker. Much of what didn't get perforated got flattened, so either way its going to get cut down. Guess it will be interesting to see what bounces back, but at the moment it does not look promising. 
Good container gardening story by New York Times garden writer Anne Raver in today's paper. It's largely about succulents, but she also talks to Bob Hyland, one of the owners of Loomis Creek, a worth-the-detour nursery in Hudson NY. Hyland, along with Margaret Roach, also participated in a container challenge of sorts at the Berkshire Botanical Gardens. Their efforts will be on display this summer. I plan to go up and see them a bit later; I want to wait for the plantings to ripen and fill out a bit. Look for a future post on the topic. Thanks to photog Stewart Cairns for the NYT pix.
White Flower Farm hosted their annual eve-of-summer sale today, and, like every other gardener in a 50-mile radius of the place, I was there. After sating my plant lust with a great trove of annuals and a passel of perennials, I decided to swing by the Fergus Garrett border that was the subject of a post a few months ago. So without further ado...here's what it looks like this time of year.
There are no alliums in this shot (at left), but they do play a starring role in many of these combinations. I just wrote about alliums and their value in the late spring garden over at GGW, so it was gratifying to see that these humble garlic relatives get their moment in the sun here at White Flower Farm too.
This wet, wet weather we're having brings not only April, May, and June flowers, it brings slugs. Tons of 'em. I thought I had it bad, but after seeing this video from South Africa I'm not complaining about the slugs in my yard ever again.
TGIFFF! To celebrate, we're off on a field trip to the gardens of John Marchacos in Berlin, CT. I often proselytize about building gardens from the leaves out, about creating textures and contrasts with foliage. John-who's an epimedium enthusiast (guess who E. 'Marchacos Sprite' is named for), and lover of woodland ephemerals-lives it. He gardens in the shade, so the effects he creates are far different from the combinations I pursue in my sunnier spot. But let's not muck things up with a bunch of verbiage. Instead, just look at the pix. 
But, lest you thin it's ALL about leaves, John has a few flowers too. He's one of the few Deutzia connoisseurs I know (not that they're bad, it's just that few gardeners seem to know more than one or two varieties). Here's a shot of 'Pink-A-Boo' in bloom. Silly name, super plant.
Peonies are the belle of the ball. Any ball. Without doubt they are the most overdressed, most blowsy, most extravagant flower in the garden. They are an ode to botanical excess. I guess that's why you gotta love 'em. No other plant in my garden contributes as little as the peony for 11 and 1/2 months of the year, but during their brief moment in the sun, they rule. Totally.
One last thing...What's a peony without ants? The buds and even the flowers are usually crawling with them. The little critters just go nuts over the sweet, nectary secretions of the plant's globelike buds. They just can't keep away from those oh-so-ephemeral flowers. And neither can I.
Ever since, the thing has been going great guns, with beautiful screaming scarlet flowers erupting from bright red buds. Okay, the flowers are small, but that color! I never tire of looking at it. And the leaves! They're cool too! They come in several shapes--like sassafras leaves--and as the new ones appear they have a beauteous bronzy sheen. I'm smitten. Gee, looks like the start of yet another tropical love affair.
Beth Dow photographs all kinds of things, but she creates particularly dreamlike black-and-white images of English and Italian gardens. The limited tonal range of the overall photos, and the spooky aura that seems to emanate from some of the brighter objects makes these gardens seems rooted in the imagination rather than the earth. There's a mystical quality to her work.
