One year I had 71 flowering stems of Rough Blazing Star (Liatris aspera) in my gardens–it was gorgeous, but I don’t have a photograph. They eventually petered out and I now have only a few plants I added to a border last year. This is a photograph taken several years ago at Morton Arboretum of […]
I’m back! My book Design Your Natural Midwest Garden sold out this Spring and the publisher, unfortunately, has declared bankruptcy. I have no more books to sell but there are still copies available at Amazon. I haven’t just been lolling around all summer, eating bon-bons–I have been working on my new book. The working title […]
What’s in Bloom Today? Violets–Common Blue Violet (Viola sororia) and Confederate Violet (Viola priceana) grow in the garden and the lawn. They are considered weedy and some people try to rid their lawn of them, but I consider them delightful wherever they are. Dog-tooth Violets or Trout Lily (Erythronium albidum) are abundant now. Karen […]
Has the sky fallen? No, it’s Siberian Squill (Scilla siberica), a European lawn weed that has naturalized in the lawns of large older historic homes in near northwest neighborhood in Elgin. An abandoned house in my neighborhood last spring, contained not only Squills. but daffodils and Penn Sedge, as well. Two miniature, cobalt blue […]
What do these three trees have in common? They are all called Blue Beech (Carpinus caroliniana) 10/28/07 Trout Park Elgin. Blue Beech growing wild next to the trail Blue Beech at Chicago Botanic Garden, Glencoe 8/30/09 Dick Young describes Carpinus caroliniana as “a light gray, smooth-barked tree to 30’, with undulating, muscle-like ripples in the […]
Book Report I belong to an Environmental Book Club and I encourage all of you to begin or join one. Invite like-minded friends to create one in your area–there is no end of books to read concerning the environment. What books to read? There are old ones: Small is Beautiful, E.F. Schumacher, 1973; new ones:Eaarth: […]
Through the Year 2016 January My Street Corner–I do love winter’s long blue shadows. Late February-Early March The catkins of American Hazelnut (Corylus americana), formed last summer, elongate and spill their golden pollan, showy in the still drab landscape. In March, Sharp-lobed Hepatica (Hepatica acutiloba) is the first to bloom in my patio […]
During winter the winds come in crisp and invigorating from across the prairies. At this season of the year the landscape assumes a dreary look to many who do not understand. But to others, when the gray arms of the cottonwood are illuminated by the January sun and silhouetted against the blue sky, when sleeping […]
