The Secret Garden Coloring Book by Johanna Basford

Our new favorite book by Scottish artist Johanna Basford

My girls love to color and it is an activity that I like to encourage. Coloring is great for working on hand-eye coordination, detail work and even color theory. And kids gain all this practice while completely enjoying themselves. When I purchased this book on Amazon last week, I knew that it would be a winner. At least, I hoped so.

The Secret Garden: An Inky Treasure Hunt and Coloring Book by Johanna Basford is more than a winner: it is captivating. I was totally blown away by the intricate styling of this book. Every detail is sublime and every page opens up more discovery. It is part treasure hunt, part coloring book, part drawing class and altogether beautiful. And I wanted you all to see it for yourselves...

Tips for Applying Mulch

Mushroom compost at "Gilmore Garden Center."

We will have 3 yards of mushroom compost delivered this week. When I begin filling my first wheelbarrow full, I will think about the mulching techniques I have learned from many and various gardeners over the past 10 years...

A Gardener's Christmas gifts...

Some garden reading for the winter months: The Wild Garden by William Robinson, Monet's Passion by Elizabeth Murray, Drought Resistant Planting and Beth Chatto's Damp Garden by Beth Chatto.

Autumn Colors

Maple leaves coordinating with the mums at the local park this October.

Ways to Use A Garden Journal

My Date Books turned Garden Journals from the past three years.

Do you have a garden journal? Journals are a great idea for furthering your garden education... but then there is the patient work of actually writing in them. Where to begin? How do you scramble to catch-up when you are behind?

One of my favorite garden authors, Rosemary Verey, said, 

"Take note as you go... Learn to build up your knowledge of plants, not only to be able to recognize them but to know what growing conditions they like or dislike, when they will flower, what their leaves will contribute before and after flowering, how they will relate to their neighbors.  This knowledge comes only with familiarity, observation and experience" (Rosemary Verey's Making of a Garden, page 17).

Guide to Common Names of Ornamental Grasses

Japanese forest grass, Hakonechloa macra 'Aureola', shinning with yellow tulips at Chanticleer Gardens in April.

I am learning a ton about ornamental grasses this summer by reading a book called Designing with Grasses by Neil Lucas. While in the middle of the book though, I started to feel that my head could just not wrap itself around all of the new grass names.  Learning the Latin is one thing, and learning the common name is another. Putting them both together was giving me fits!

Designing with Grasses by Neil Lucas

Grasses flowering in a natural area at our local park.

I am beginning to really delve into the world of ornamental grasses this summer by reading a fantastic book, Designing with Grasses by Neil Lucas.

This book covers many topics including: grasses in natural communities; using grasses to decrease garden maintenance; designing pleasing gardens with grasses by using repetition and form; choosing the correct grass for damp, dry, sun or shade; and discussion of sustainable environmental practices that utilize grasses. It also includes a sizable directory of "Grasses and Grass-like Plants," which is so helpful a reference even while reading this book to help you remember which grass Mr. Lucas is describing at the moment. Beautiful and practical photos are throughout the book to help illustrate using grasses in different types of designs.

Inside Reports on Spring Gardening at Christopher Lloyd's Great Dixter, East Sussex, UK

The orchard meadow (to the left) and Long Border (right) at Great Dixter just two weeks ago.

If you have been a long-time reader of this blog, you will know that I have a great love for the challenge of succession planting at Gilmore Gardens. You may also have figured out that I have done most of my study on the subject by reading about the great gardens and gardeners of our time, especially those that have used these principles (see a partial book list here).

The garden that epitomizes this ideal of year-round gardening is Great Dixter in East Sussex lead by the late Christopher Lloyd.  There are over a dozen books from Christopher that I have enjoyed over the years, but my favorite must be Succession Planting for Year-Round Pleasure. (Which I hope to review very soon...) He is largely responsible for many of our current garden trends, including returning Cannas and other exotic plants to our gardens.

Christopher Lloyd's dare to be Adventurous with Color

The Front Walk at Gilmore Gardens in May

"I often practice colour harmonies myself. But just consider what you may be missing if you stick only in that groove... I do believe that excitement is an essential element in the most successful gardening."

Christopher Lloyd

pg. 12 of Color for Adventurous Gardeners

More on restraint and looseness...

The English Garden at Stan Hywet.   More photos from our recent visit to come.

Every garden makes a philosophical statement about the relationship between art and control on the one hand and nature and wildness on the other.

~Noel Kingsbury in his introduction to Designing with Plants by Piet Oudolf

Pruning Daylilies in Mid-Summer

Herbaceous pruning (cutting the foliage of perennial plants) has a few uses. Often, it is used to delay the bloom of a plant, or to make it have better branching instead of just one main stem. This is known across the pond as the "Chelsea Chop", because gardeners in the UK can plan on cutting their perennials around time of the Chelsea Flower Show. (The show is usually held at the end of May.)

Another good reason for pruning perennial foliage occurs later in the season. During the hot months of July and August, perennial foliage often starts to look old and tattered. For many years, I sighed and assumed that yellowing leaves meant my garden was passing into its fall foliage already.

Before: Hemerocallis waiting for their trim in the Front Woodland

A few years ago, I started experimenting with cutting back (also known as "dead-leafing") my hardy Geraniums, lamb's ears (Stachys byzantine), lady's mantle (Alchemilla mollis) and Hosta. Even that took a bit of courage at first, but my plants looked better for it!

Then I read Tracy DiSabato-Aust's thorough treatment on herbaceous pruning in her book, The Well-Tended Perennial Garden. New challenge: the bold step of cutting some plants to the ground. This was supposed to regenerate their foliage. But would it really work?

After: Post chop. Hedge shears made quick work of the entire Front Woodland.

I love daylilies early in the year. Their flowers are beautiful (sometimes scented!), their foliage covers the ground quickly in early spring and they are generally undemanding. Once they are done blooming however, I begin to despise their tattered appearance. In past years, I have torn off just the yellowing leaves under the base of my daylilies (Hemerocallis). This year, I decided to be brave and cut down the entire foliage clump when they had finished blooming.

After: Front Woodland with Hemerocallis nubs.

 I was very pleased with the overall appearance of the Front Woodland once I had cut the daylily foliage down at the end of July. It looked kept. Rather a satisfying bit of restraint at the most jungle-like time of year.  And with the Sedum 'Acre' ground cover in this garden, there was less bare mulch seen than I anticipated. I rather hate bare mulch. Better than dirt, yes, but that is what drives me to cover it with plants instead.

And for those of you wondering: Just a couple of weeks later, they are sending up new foliage. We have had some rain this week, which has helped them to recover quickly. The hope is that they will have new, fresh looking foliage all the way til frost.

Before: Cherry Corner

In the case of our Cherry Corner Garden, my decision to chop the daylilies worked out even better. The black-eyed susans (Rudbeckia) were barely visible at all above the mess of foliage. Once it has been cut down, I was delighted to be able to see the yellow flowers dancing above the annuals. This is the best this garden has looked yet at this time of year. 

After: Wow! I could not tell there were that many susans back there!

All that was left was a wheelbarrow load of foliage. After a long afternoon/morning of herbaceous pruning, I usually park this sucker in the garage and deal with unloading it later. Are you as lazy as I am?

Happy pruning!

Garden Blogger's Bloom Day - August 2011

 I am happy with the gains I have made this year in our summer season at Gilmore Gardens.
(A look back at August 2010.) Not satisfied yet, but happy with the progress.  I have had little time to write about it (I have started five posts on the subject!), but I am in the middle of figuring out what tricks I need to add to my bag to make the gardens be show-stopping at this time of year.