Showing posts with label native woodland wildflowers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label native woodland wildflowers. Show all posts
Saturday 18 April 2015
Wednesday 15 April 2015
creating a new garden, Golden ragwort, native woodland wildflowers, natural gardening, woodland restoration
Creating a new space and garden
Consolidating to a smaller house is an "interesting" process.
We're going to good space.
We've enjoyed it as a weekend and summer home, so we've gradually been changing things to suit it better to be our new space as home. (It was built by an architect as his own eco-friendly house, so it was full of somewhat unusual personal choices).
We've changed some things to suit us better over the years, but the blending with the move will bring a more dramatic change, definitely pushing it even more towards a more rustic feel, adding a few favorite old pieces we've had for many years, switching around artwork around, and deciding what suits us best.
We have a view into a ravine forest (a major selling point), now mostly freed of invasive plants.
I posted about that view 2 years ago. It's a lovely and ongoing project.
My gardening companion has added understory natives and shrubs to the ravine forest, with woodland wildflowers on the list. The plantings under the eaves of the house are flourishing, with Celandine Poppy and Aquilegia canadensis now in flower.
The Golden Ragwort patches are in full flower, in the front of the house (as well as transplanted patches to the sides and below) -- it's beautiful. It's a "thug," spreading happily, and will definitely need more editing this spring.
We're going to good space.
We've enjoyed it as a weekend and summer home, so we've gradually been changing things to suit it better to be our new space as home. (It was built by an architect as his own eco-friendly house, so it was full of somewhat unusual personal choices).
We've changed some things to suit us better over the years, but the blending with the move will bring a more dramatic change, definitely pushing it even more towards a more rustic feel, adding a few favorite old pieces we've had for many years, switching around artwork around, and deciding what suits us best.
We have a view into a ravine forest (a major selling point), now mostly freed of invasive plants.
I posted about that view 2 years ago. It's a lovely and ongoing project.
My gardening companion has added understory natives and shrubs to the ravine forest, with woodland wildflowers on the list. The plantings under the eaves of the house are flourishing, with Celandine Poppy and Aquilegia canadensis now in flower.
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| Golden ragwort: image from Wikipedia |
Wednesday 26 March 2014
Native woodland gardens
It was nice this morning to share thoughts about creating native woodland gardens with an OLLI class (check out OLLI programs if you're in the US -- a great lifelong learning initiative).
It's been a lovely journey to transform lawn to woodland habitat over the last two decades, and we now finally have Christmas ferns, bloodroot, wild ginger, crested iris, green-and-gold, and pussytoes flourishing along our front pathway.
It was all about creating a decent "forest" soil -- more full of humus, a bit deeper, etc. from the shallow, shade-stressed grass that grew there before.
And the water oak that anchors the driveway produces slow-to-break-down leaves -- not the best situation, but eventually they DO turn into humus-rich leaf mulch.
That's what supported the bloodroot expansion!
P.S. See the sidebar for a link to a pdf version of the creating a woodland garden presentation.
It's been a lovely journey to transform lawn to woodland habitat over the last two decades, and we now finally have Christmas ferns, bloodroot, wild ginger, crested iris, green-and-gold, and pussytoes flourishing along our front pathway.
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| a giant bloodroot |
And the water oak that anchors the driveway produces slow-to-break-down leaves -- not the best situation, but eventually they DO turn into humus-rich leaf mulch.
That's what supported the bloodroot expansion!
P.S. See the sidebar for a link to a pdf version of the creating a woodland garden presentation.
Saturday 22 March 2014
Bloodroot is in flower!
It's such a joy to see the bright white flowers of bloodroot after a long winter. It's one of our early spring flowering natives, along with hepatica and trout lily.
It's done well in our emerging woodland garden, too.
After slowly amending the soil with mulch and leaves, our patch in front of the house is doing well, with companions of Christmas fern, green-and-gold, and pussytoes.
Happily, the large plant (transplanted from a shadier site in back) has been a prolific seed producer, and ants have "planted" new clumps around. Even the small seedlings (with the abundant rain over the last year) have flourished.
We now have over 9+ plants in front, including the biggest bloodroot we've ever seen -- testament to how natives in a more benign (garden)
environment can really flourish.
Bloodroot has been a favorite spring wildflower.
Here are some previous musings over the past 5+ seasons.
It's done well in our emerging woodland garden, too.
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| clumps of bloodroot along the front path |
Happily, the large plant (transplanted from a shadier site in back) has been a prolific seed producer, and ants have "planted" new clumps around. Even the small seedlings (with the abundant rain over the last year) have flourished.
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| parent with offspring |
environment can really flourish.
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| the original parent (transplanted from a shadier spot in the garden) |
Bloodroot has been a favorite spring wildflower.
Here are some previous musings over the past 5+ seasons.
Sunday 31 March 2013
First native spring wildflowers, native woodland wildflowers, natural gardening, Pigeon Mountain, spring wildflowers, The Pocket, wildflowers
Spring woodland wildflowers
A second visit to a botanical wonderland this weekend ("The Pocket" on Pigeon Mountain, GA) -- along the Shirley Miller Wildflower Trail found numerous treasures in flower. The Pocket is a rich cove forest (so pH levels are nearly neutral), supporting a rich array of wildflowers.
Virginia bluebells (Mertensia virginica) are abundant and were in flower (actively visited by bumblebees on the day we were there).
Spring beauty (Claytonia virginica) was still in flower (it was in flower 3 weeks ago on our first visit).
Yellow trout lily (Erythronium americanum) was in flower (younger plants and seedlings are abundant at this site). Its large flowers were impressive.
And the fiddleheads of Christmas fern were striking!
Virginia bluebells (Mertensia virginica) are abundant and were in flower (actively visited by bumblebees on the day we were there).
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| Mertensia virginica |
Spring beauty (Claytonia virginica) was still in flower (it was in flower 3 weeks ago on our first visit).
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| Claytonia virginica |
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| Erythronium americanum |
And the fiddleheads of Christmas fern were striking!
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| Christmas fern fiddleheads |