It is yellow season in the Desert Southwest. It is that brief time between our short spring and very long hot summer when yellow flowering plants seem to be everywhere. No plant announces this season more beautifully than the Palo Verde tree in full bloom. The small yellow flowers are like spring rain drops suspended in the air letting you see the spray of thousands of petals. In the city the yellow trees are scattered about, in neighborhoods one glorious tree after another is in bloom. In the shopping and resort areas the landscape design marches them around the perimeter in symmetrical groves surrounding the architecture.
What’s Your Sign?
What is the sign you look for to tell you spring is near? Is it a robin, a crocus poking up through the dead leaves of last fall, a just awakening snake in your path, a citrus blossom, a pussy willow branch, or that first walk out of doors without a jacket?
Digging Deep
Fran Sorin’s 10th Anniversary edition of Digging Deep,
Unearthing your creative Roots Through Gardening
Author Fran Sorin offers such a clear song of hope in an era of ernest gardening. This book offers garden guidance, motivation and inspiration to reframe your definition of gardening. So many gardeners are digging in their plants with a fear of doom and food appocolypse in their hearts. If a gardener isn’t connected to the beauty and randomness of nature in gardening many will give up when the birds devour the first crop. In these pages find you find a way to weave the everyday joy a garden offers as the essential work is done. You will know flowers are essential to feed the soul. This book will coach beginning gardeners, encourage the discouraged and inspire the devoted. If you are lucky enough to have a small patch of earth to tend, this book will speak to your heart and help you see you are indeed lucky enough.
A Garden Love Story – Abkhazi Garden
“A Garden is a perpetual reminder that there are no shortcuts to the important things in life”.– Princess Peggy Abkhazi
In Victoria, BC there are many fabulous gardens. The Abkhazi garden is an acre heritage site tucked away in a residential area of Victoria. This garden situated on a rocky ridge overlooks the Strait of Juan de Fuca and the Olympic mountains. Peggy and Nicholas Abkhazi built this garden over a period of 40 years as an expression of their shared joy.
The Artist’s Garden, edited by Anna O. Marley
“The Artist’s Garden American Impressionism and the Garden Movement” edited by Anna O. Marley
Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia C 2014
Garden Conservatory – A Crystal Palace
It is citrus season. Outside my door the oranges are ripening on an overloaded tree providing a surplus of the sweet fruit. If you don’t have a tree right outside your door, you can still find an abundance of the succulent fruit right down the street at your supermarket.
Seeds, One Man’s Serendipitous Journey to Find the Trees
“Seeds” by Richard Horan 2011 “One Man’s Serendipitous Journey to Find the Trees That Inspired American Writers from Faulkner to Kerouac, Welty to Wharton,”
Plants of Ice & Fire
The Royal Tasmanian Botanical Garden
A few years ago I had no idea where Tasmania was. I remembered the Looney Tunes ® cartoon character of the Tasmanian Devil, but beyond that I knew little else. Until this year, when I found myself in the Tasmanian Royal Botanical Garden in Hobart, Tasmania, Australia, over 8000 miles from my garden.
The Artichoke Project
Late last November I planted two Artichoke plants in a sunny spot in one of my new flower beds. I wanted something to grow fast and add some variety of color and shape to my view. They grew beautifully! By March their silvery-green leaves spiked up vigorously at both ends of the bed providing a framework for the smaller plants between them. The end of each symmetrical leaf was punctuated with a fine thistle tip.
Floriade Nightfest
In ancient times much of the world paused in their work to celebrate flowers. Weary of winter and with food supplies running low the Roman Goddess Flora was celebrated. In the spring a Maypole was erected, ribbons streamed down and the dancing began. Young women wore crowns of flowers in their hair. The beauty of life, flowers and fertility was thoroughly celebrated with the hope of a great harvest in the Fall. The celebration lasted several days with games, performances, feasting and drinking. Australia’s Floriade does just that! By day the festivities are lit by the sun and by night lights multiply the magic of the celebration.