A pileated woodpecker

A Sunday morning excursion at the Garden (where I work) found us noticing a pileated woodpecker.

Its loud call is distinctive; no, that's not a hawk, I said, and then we spotted the vocalizer, a beautiful and striking bird.

Pileated woodpeckers are LARGE, the size of crows. 

And striking. 

I didn't have a camera along, but here's a link to the Cornell Lab of Lab to learn more about them.

Read More

One week only: signed books offer

From November 10th to the 17th, I am taking online orders for my books. See the Gift Book Offer page. Maybe you know an avid gardener who would love one of my books for a Christmas present. If so, let me know and I will hold off mailing it until the middle of December and include a Christmas card saying the book is a present from you.  But this is the only week I'll be taking orders, so don't wait until then.

Organic Methods for Vegetable
Gardening in Florida

Sustainable Gardening
for Florida

Thanks for your support!

Green Gardening Matters,
Ginny Stibolt

Read More

A remarkable window box

It's such fun to be inspired by a wonderful window box that I saw in Rothenburg ob der Tauber just over a year ago.  Rothenburg is a wonderfully preserved medieval city, but these window boxes, above a cafe on the historic Marktplatz were both current and creative, filled with dried and live plants (there were five window boxes like this, I'm remembering).

Here's the photo that I choose as my inspiration for tonight's drop-in art class.

And my drawing with watercolor pencils inspired by it.

Read More

Sunrise at Spring Park

I went to Spring Park in Green Cove Springs this morning for the sunrise to see the partial solar eclipse. We have too many trees in our neighborhood for a good eastern horizon. What a beautiful morning!

The outlet of the spring into the St. Johns Rive in Green Cove Springs.

Looking back toward the spring: the white pool house is on the right and in the background the arched walkway surrounds the Green Cove Springs City Hall.

The wonderful light just before sunrise reflects from the water's surface.

There were a number other other people in the park taking in this special sunrise, but we were not alone--there were a lot of birds.

An osprey atop a bald cypress.

A great white heron in the rushes.

Before the sun rose into view.

As the sun rose up into the cloud bank, you can see the shadow of the moon at the bottom left in this partial eclipse.

The rising sun in the narrow shadow of a lone cabbage palm.

After the sun rose from the cloud bank we could see the shadow of the moon, but the sun blew out the photos.  So the above photo is the best shot of the partial eclipse.

The best view of the eclipse was in western Africa, but this was a wonderful morning.

Back to gardening next time. The plants are happy with the 2.75 inches of rain that we received yesterday along with a cold front. Cold is a relative term here in northern Florida--it was in the low 50s here this morning.

Green Gardening Matters,
Ginny Stibolt

Read More

You can never have too many leaves!

I enjoyed sharing some thoughts about creating a native woodland garden with a class this morning;  this was one of the "slides" that was part of my presentation, showing leaf collections from years past.

I love the leaf depot image -- bagged leaves on the old coal road, ready for spreading!

 

Here was today's haul, probably just the first of many for this fall  - my gardening companion can't pass up the bagged leaves in our neighborhood ready for pickup.  Fall has come later this year than usual, in an odd way -- with glorious fall color now in the first weekend of November, with leaves falling on a delayed schedule.

They have already been spread down the slope in the ravine forest!

Read More

Bee habitats

I've been thinking about doing some interpretive work around native bees and other pollinators.

I was reminded of this wonderful "bee habitat" exhibit that I saw last year in the University of Osnabruck Botanical Garden just over a year ago.  I was a post-doc there (three decades ago) and it was a joy to see how the garden (just beginning then) had developed.

Bee habitat at Universitat Osnabruck Botanical Garden

Read More

Biltmore walled garden (2)

I've loved seeing how the Biltmore Estate has expanded and experimented with their horticulture over the last few years.  Hooray!

It's always been a great place to enjoy the expansive grounds, the wonderful landscape, and preserved viewscapes of the surrounding mountains, thanks to the stewardship of George Vanderbilt, and his descendants.

Here were two views of the same interesting border in the Walled Garden, taken on an overcast day  -- lovely!

Read More