This is the archive for the ‘garden chat’ Category

Bartram’s Garden

July 19th, 2010

Went to Bartram’s Garden. Very hot but a nice breeze, took two tours, one of the grounds and one of the house.

Fig tree

I didn’t know Fig trees would grow in Philadelphia!.

Born in 1699, John Bartram became America’s first great botanist and with his son William identified and cultivated over 200 new plant species. In 1765 King George III appointed John as Royal Botanist, a position he held until his death in 1777.

1790 Yellowwood tree

July 2010 storm damage of Historic 1790’s Yellowwood Tree.

Research has shown that this tree planted by John Bartram, has been damaged in previous storms and hopefully will recover.

Many plants are direct descendents of ones he cultivated, including one of his most well known, the Franklinia, (Franklinia alatamaha), he named it after his friend, Benjamin Franklin.

2010 is under way!

January 16th, 2010

Well, the holidays are over and school has started. My first classes were yesterday. Right now I’m headed to VA to my Mom’s to dedecorate her house and to celebrate her birthday! My decorations at home are down except for greens around the door but it has been too cold to deal with that.

We’re driving down the Delmarva peninsula and it is still cold, but I hear it’s already over 50 degrees in Virginia Beach. So that’s good! Here the ponds are frozen and the fields which will soon have green things growing are all brown and stubbly but the sky is full of birds in “V” formation—I wish flying to Canada but that won’t be until around March. Yeah, I know, in Philadelphia, I still have to deal with Feb. and March but the days ARE getting longer and stuff is starting to grow. Really!

Get’s me making plans for my garden— the catalogs have been coming for almost a month now and we have been having snows that melt slowly watering the ground so I hope there will not be any dry spells this summer to turn my world into a dust bowl.

My back yard has a place that needs seeding but other than that it’s pretty ok—just maintenance and veggies. But the front – under the living room window, is a shady place that is just a mess of pacasandra and a stunted azalea bush that need work. There’s a project to think about.

Or perhaps along the side walk—we could revisit that as well. I like to plant seasonal things along my way from the house to the car. Then, if I’m busy at work and don’t have time to wander my garden, I don’t miss the changes.

Strange doings in Germantown!

November 16th, 2009

I live in a fairly urban area. Granted there are yards with lots of trees and gardens and it is about 3 blocks to a large park along a busy bus route, but it is in the City of Philadelphia and the usual wild life we get are stray cats and a possum or two. Today about 10:00 in the morning a full grown deer ran between my house and my neighbors—maybe 20 ft apart—into their back yard. It stood near a large bush and by the time we could get a camera it was gone. Don’t think my garden has seen a deer in a very long time, but you never know.

My street used to belong to a house on Germantown Ave. which was built in the 1600’s. Properties facing the avenue were long and narrow. Narrow on the street side but long enough to accommodate gardens, orchards and stables. During the Battle of Germantown, revolutionary soldiers had to hop fences as they chased each other through these narrow yards.

Land was subdivided after the Civil War and it is now a neighborhood of Victorian homes where stables or carriage houses have been turned into coveted homes. There has not been any livestock kept here for many years, (although Luke does keep chickens, but that’s another story). So a misplaced deer is a big deal.

October Sunday

October 5th, 2009

Yesterday was a very nice day. Beautiful fall day. Worked in the garden, nice lunch, read a little, carded some wool, dinner with music and later, a little TV. Lazy and very relaxing.

Today was also beautiful but not so relaxing—back to work. I did get to update the image at the top of the page to one of pumpkins on our side porch. (View older header images.)

It Rained Last Night

September 12th, 2009

Late summer rose.

Late Summer Rose in the Rain

Bob grows lots of roses and this is one of my favorites, Frederic Mistral. It is named after the French Nobel Laureate, Fredric Mistral, (1830-1890), whose collections began The Museon Arlaten, a wonderful ethnographic museum in Arles.

The year I visited that museum I also visited La Bonne Maison, a most incredible garden of ancient roses in Lyon. I had been studying printed Textiles at the Musee de l’Impression sur Etoffs in Mulhouse France with graduate students from Philadelphia University. We were lucky enough to join The Friends of the Museum on a trip to Provence. On the way we had lunch in Lyon at La Bonne Maison.

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