I have been badly remiss these last few weeks with this blog, other paying priorities in the way.
In any case, to make up for it, here is a short walk around what one might think of as the inner circle of the property:
A walk Friday, Jun 6 2014
Esperanza and gardening and Landscapes and Modern Photos and Trees gardening, landscapes, photography 20:11
Glowing gold Tuesday, Jun 3 2014
gardening and Landscapes gardening 08:17
I like iris, though their extravagant size makes June weather a hazard, like peonies they do poorly in fast moving, hard hitting thunderstorms. They were clearly bred for the British Isles and the Low Countries, where thunderstorms make the news when they happen.
We don’t have that many at the moment (it is all relative!).
The earliest bearded iris have just started: the huge gold ones. They came originally from Vermont or possibly from Boston. (it is fun to have plants with histories behind them) Light, soft gold, and a good four/five inches in size, they glow in the sun and moonlight. There is no harshness in their color at all, which is entirely different from the canary gold of yellow flag. Our neighbours have a patch we left at the East Meadow. I saw it yesterday, even from a long way away it glowed. We have a few in the Flagpole garden and in the south lawn area, given the right space with enough sun they are a fairly aggressive iris, willing to spread. But they do need sun. They are nicely complemented by an early deep blue iris, which is also just starting up in the Flagpole garden. That garden also has big red poppies in it, or will in a week, so it is wonderfully extravagant in size and color.
They are not well complemented by one of the smaller types or iris: the heirloom yellow (with a touch of orange) with chestnut falls, once found in nearly every New England garden, it is a bit rare these days, we got ours from a friend in Maine. How, and why, that one popped up in the Flagpole garden I am not sure. It is Supposed to be blooming under the roses near the fish pond, where its smaller stature is just right. I clearly will have to move it. I know why it popped up, it was released from the Shasta daisies in the digging this spring.
The bronze iris (a gift from a friend here) will be starting in a few days as well. They are doing very well this year, which is wonderful since we almost lost them two years ago to corn borers.
Now if we could just figure out the best spot for another bit of Sun garden….. 🙂
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Last light of May Thursday, May 29 2014
Esperanza and Landscapes and Modern Photos landscapes, photography 20:25
Another view of the lawn a few days ago…the temptation to start playing with modern art installations is clearly strong! That chair, by the way, is probably getting on for a century in age….
Summer’s Promise Tuesday, May 27 2014
Esperanza and Landscapes photography 18:12
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Hurrying Spring Friday, May 23 2014
gardening and Landscapes connecticut, gardening 20:11
It is an odd year, so cold for so long. Now Spring is clearly hurrying towards Summer, in some respects. The peas and lettuce are sulking, but the currants have already set berries; the Sugar Maples are fully out, but the locusts still stand gaunt against the sky. The ground is still cool, but already great thunderstorms have swept across the hills.
Spring though is always hurrying, rushing forward. Not only there is a great deal to get accomplished, and a very short optimum window to do it all in; but the plants are growing and growing fast. In some cases, inches to the day. The perennials just refill their space (which one has sometimes forgotten the dimensions of), but the trees…. The young American Beech has put on nearly a foot of growth, to all sides and up, this year. Even mature trees are suddenly bigger. And of course, they are bigger, all those leaves and all those cells swollen with water.
The color changes as well. The kitchen had a brief pink cast for awhile as the redbud bloomed, now it is green to the west with the apple tree, and a red/purple/green tint from the east where the Japanese Maple is suddenly flush with new growth. The back roads are green tunnels and the meadows are tall with grass.
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What is Esperanza? Wednesday, May 21 2014
Esperanza and Landscapes gardening, landscapes, poetry 18:18
People ask that, sometimes silently.
Picture this then, a clear May evening, the fragrance of lilacs and viburnums, watching the sun sink over the western hills and the emerald field, the pure white violets and apple blossoms, the glowing pink, purples and golds of myriad redbuds, azaleas, tulips, and a host of others. and faintly on the sweet breeze the notes of Chopin’s nocturnes.
Or perhaps it is early morning, beneath the towering spruces, oaks, and maples where the white trillium shimmers, the pure white of living marble and the vinca forms a dark green carpet studded by ferns.
Next month will be something different and the one after that.
But always, the house, quiet and cool, with its books and unknown corners.
That is Esperanza.
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Lilacs Tuesday, May 20 2014
gardening and Landscapes landscapes, poetry 18:14
Not the best year for them, but still blooming well. They are one of those plants, like daffodils but more so, which are solidly entrenched in our culture but are in fact not found throughout the continent. They dislike humidity and need cold winters. The best lilacs I ever encountered were in Canada, growing wild across the abandoned fields of Ontario and holding court in Montreal’s Botanical Garden.
We have only a few here: two classic lavenders flanking the south end along with a white one, and a gorgeous, ancient dark purple one off of the west porch. Its main stem is close to five inches in diameter, hopefully by hacking a bit of a hole in the overgrown hydrangea we can get some new growth going. I also did a bit of work today on one of the lavender ones, cutting out two declining main stems (it would have been three but the chickadees objected vociferously), hopefully it will regrow well.
Walt Whitman described them, and the hermit thrush, best of course in one of his better known but rarely read poems its worth the time to go through it, if a bit depressing: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/174748
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Un, deux, trois Saturday, May 17 2014
Landscapes and Uncategorized gardening, landscapes 20:05
Three little redbuds all in a row, well not so little…. And not in a row either, though the two volunteers are; the parent is just off the left of the screen. It sprawls a good forty feet these days and is up to three support posts, two of which you can see there. The second redbud is directly in the center of the photograph; the third redbud is the one just next to the white bench on the far right. The maroon beyond is a volunteer Japanese Maple, whose parent is the trunk looming on the left. We do volunteers around here!
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White butterflies Thursday, May 8 2014
gardening and Landscapes daffodils, gardening, landscapes 22:02
In between the crocus’ bright, almost Mardi Gras, colors and the blazing, neon orange daylilies in July; the fence-line is mostly green. Except for a week or two, when my few daffodils bloom. They aren’t the most aggressive daffodils, so I doubt they will be able to hold their own with the daylilies, as the big yellow daffodils do on the bank. It is likely that in order to keep the effect, they will have to be replanted periodically rather than divided. But they work for the space: pure white, fragrant, only 12-14 inches tall and delicate in form. Sailboat, the taller of the two, and Pueblo, more fragrant, are the two varieties. I am not inclined, I think, to try for a more solid effect. The white butterflies in the bright green space is perhaps more interesting.
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The Hedgerow Wednesday, May 7 2014
Landscapes poetry 20:49
The trees ranked
Against winter’s war
Had been gaunt, black spectres.
They were the witches’ trees,
Sketched against the moon,
As in some gothic horror
Where fear lurked silent.
But the sun called a truce.
Now, once gaunt hands
Are falls of green feathers,
The pale, blurred brushstrokes
Of a Japanese watercolor.
Acair Fearann 