margaret’s may and june 2017 garden events

Today we’re off to the Mohawk Valley in central New York State to visit Lee’s beautiful garden.

FOR THOSE OF YOU IN THE AREA, meaning the Hudson Valley of New York State or thereabouts, these spring events here in the garden and elsewhere may be of interest: Saturday March 14, Spring Garden Day, Cornell Cooperative Extension of Rensselaer County. (518) 272-4210. This popular, day-long annual event in Troy, New York, includes a choice of classes, from growing orchids at home to successful vegetable gardening.

I’ll be roaming the Northeast in the early going, in places as close to home as the Berkshires of Massachusetts and the Hudson Valley of New York, but also across Massachusetts and as far as New Hampshire, Maine, New Jersey and coastal Connecticut. Events here in the garden will begin again in April; stay tuned for a fuller schedule of those, with just the first couple mentioned below.What’s planned already:Saturday, February 19, 2 PM: Lecture to benefit Berkshire Botanical Garden, Monument Mountain Regional High School, Great Barrington, MA.Thursday, March 3, 7 PM: R.J. Ju

BESIDES OUR SOMEWHAT OFFKILTER HUMOR, Andre Jordan and I have another thing in common: We not so long ago each headed for the hills. (Wait, are there even hills in Nebraska?)

Since 2011, Timothy has worked at Untermyer Park and Gardens in Yonkers, New York, which is becoming a horticultural destination for keen gardeners wanting inspiration–and a getaway for anyone just wanting to be surrounded by bold, contemporary plantings in a dramatic, historic setting. The Untermyer Gardens Conservancy is a non-profit organization collaborating with the City of Yonkers to facilitate the garden’s restoration (details on tours and how to visit otherwise are at the bottom of this page).In case you’re wondering: that garden has many vivid miles to go before it sleeps for winter. I even saw the phrase “floral fireworks” (such as the crape myrtles and hydrangeas in the right-hand photo below) used to describe it at the end of August, and there are plenty of foliage fireworks, too.Timothy and I worked together for years at “Martha Stewart Living” magazine, and he has been a gardener at the famed Wave Hill in New York City, and at the Garden Conservancy project called Rocky Hills

UH-OH. WHAT IF WE GET THE GARDEN ALL DRESSED UP, and then nobody shows? Tours of (disclaimer) The Garden After the Flood are next scheduled for Saturday, August 22, 10 AM to 4 PM, during Copake Falls Day (that would be my town’s second annual shindig).

I PROMISED I WOULDN’T ADD EVEN AN EXTRA TRIP TO THE CURB WITH THE TRASH to my schedule, with all the mowing I have to do, but (big surprise) I layered on a couple of events, and I want to make sure you know about them, in case you are in the Hudson Valley/Berkshires vicinity this summer. Another container-gardening class, a 365-day garden lecture with an extra focus on water gardening and the frogboys, and a tour here in August (that last one you already might know about). Details, details:Sunday July 12, Containing Exuberance, container-gardening workshop, with Bob Hyland at Loomis Creek Nursery, near Hudson, New York, 11 AM to 1 PM, $5.

I spoke about some notable natives with my friend Andy Brand of Broken Arrow Nursery, with whom I often hosting half-day workshops in my Hudson Valley, New York, garden, when we focus on upping the beneficial wildlife quotient in your own backyard with better plants and better practices. Andy has been one of the experts I’ve pestered for ideas as I’ve been doing that in my own garden in recent years to good effect.Andy is manager of Connecticut-based Broken Arrow, and he’s a serious amateur naturalist, and founder of the Connecticut state butterfly association. (That’s a photo by Andy of a red-banded hairstreak on a Clethra blossom, top of page.) Learn where many familia

Full lecture and class descriptions below, along with ticket ordering for succulent events:11 am lecture: ‘succulent love’PRACTICALLY carefree, with low water needs and available in amazing forms in nuanced colors that mix and match beautifully…that’s why succulents have been the rage in horticulture in recent years.In this visually rich talk, longtime collector, nursery owner and garden designer Katherine Tracey will share some of her favorite ways of using both hardy and tender succulents in Northeastern gardens, including using them as ingredients in mixed planters, vertical gardens and lately as the subject of long-lasting cut material for

We’ll cover everything from what makes a good potting medium and how to read the labels of those bags at the garden centers, to why not just annuals but also perennials and even trees and shrubs belong in outdoors pots (a philosophy I call, “Hosta pot? Why not?”). Also on the agenda: overwintering tactics for “investment plants” so you can learn to extend your palette without breaking your budget. (Those are some examples in the photo shot by Bob, below, of Phormium and succulent pots in his garden. Want more pot ideas? All my container-garden stories can be browsed at this link.)And, of course, design and staging of pots in the landscape—speaking of which, the workshop includes a garden walk-through at my place. Featured plants–really special things from Landcraft Environments–will be available for purchase as well, so that registrants can get the raw materials for their own home creations.‘Contained Exuberance’ Details

THE FLYER PIQUED MY INTEREST: Dan Benarcik, part of the creative team at Chanticleer Garden in Wayne, Pennsylvania (a must visit!), would be lecturing nearby about “The Art & Craft of the Garden,” and how to personalize a garden using artistic elements, found artifacts, and ornamental containers. I quickly got a ticket—you can, too, for the June 16 event, including garden tours and a garden market, in Spencertown, New York—but also asked Dan to share some of his ideas and images (including the bromeliad-artemisia- urn-and-melianthus moment at Chanticleer, above) with us, no matter whether we can attend. A Q&A with this enormously talented plantsman and garden artist.

Many visitors have asked me to take it to the next level. Now Broken Arrow Nursery—they always do plant sales at my big Open Days—and I are offering smaller, ticketed, workshop-style events and sales on September 17, lasting a half-day each, with lots of individual attention. Our spring version sold out fast; space is very limited. Ticket includes $25 Broken Arrow shopping credit at the plant sale.Tour with me, Margaret, focusing on how I made a garden for the birds (60-plus species visit yearly); my maybe-too-crazy obsession with gold foliage; my passion for great groundcovers; the pollinator- and bird-enhancing “meadow” I’ve cultivated by observing carefully and mowing differently; and most of all, my intimate relationship with the place that goes wa