This morning’s sunrise was accompanied by the finch chorale from the bamboo rookery. I feel privileged to have been awake for the event!
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We are rapidly approaching the first big holiday weekend of the summer and the river is showing off its summer beauty! The Pond, Compass Garden and Perennial Garden are looking spectacular, too! The Siberian irises are in full bloom in and around the pond and the bearded irises (donated by the neighbors when I first moved in) are in their full Memorial Day weekend glory. I love to capture the beauty and fragrance of the peonies by bringing some into the house to float in a bowl–but watch out for the ants…..I know they are necessary to the blooming process but I’d just as soon have them stay outside. Several of the shrubs are blooming now–rhodys, azaleas and Weigela. Many of the perennials are showing their beauty, too. Check out the slideshow of my favorites.
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This is an exciting time for the bamboo, too! Bamboo only grows once a year and it’s happening now! It grows a much as a foot a day as it climbs 25 to 35 feet in the air throughout the months of May and June. It can be snapped off very easily while it is in this tender shoot stage so it is a good time to tend the beds and remove any unwanted shoots. Later, after the growth stage is done and the corm is dry and hardened, it willrequire a pruning saw to cut it down. I have several Japanese saws designed for just that purpose hanging in the shed. The harvested bamboo can be used for staking and building garden structures. People often come by and ask if they can have some of the cut bamboo and I’m always willing to pass it along. Some of the strongest varieties can be used in building construction which is what makes bamboo such a great renewable resource–fast growing, low maintenance and infinitely useful!
This morning was cool on the river but held the promise of a warm day. I spent the first few hours sitting out on the deck without the awning. Pretty soon the awning will be necessary for even the early morning hours as the deck faces due East and gets the full benefit of the morning sun. I’ll probably sit out again tomorrow morning, and the next day, and the next day…….
The pond received its annual mulch primping earlier than usual in anticipation of lots of visitors on Sunday for the Open House. It will be the first time the property is officially “shown” to the public so we want to look our best! Steve Rufino and his crew from Rufino’s Landscaping, worked miracles to get this mulching done in time for the open house given all the weather challenges this spring. Between our series of tremendous rain storms and the early start of the mowing season due to the unseasonable warm week in April, he has been hard pressed to get it all scheduled! I looked out early yesterday morning (7:30 am) and saw that the whole pond area had new mulch. I was surprised as I hadn’t heard a sound and had no idea anyone was working in the yard. When I asked Steve what time they started, he shrugged and mumbled something about “daylight”. I know the sun rises at about 6:15 over the river so I’m assuming that’s when they started. I told him I was definitely passing his name along to the new owner!
The fish are getting a little more active as the water warms. The koi are usually quite tame and friendly as they are accustomed to being hand fed by visitors. I’ve attached a short video so you can see their typical “swarming” around the edges of the pond where they expect to find delicious pellets. I don’t usually start feeding them until the water gets warmer and they can survive quite nicely, eating the algae and pond plants. I’ve noticed they are a little more skittish in the past two years since they been bothered by aerial predators. The mailman told me that he has had to chase the egret out of the pond at least once. Yesterday, I saw Mr. and Mrs. Mallard Duck swimming in the pond so wondered if they were nesting nearby. My neighbor, Glenn, was sure they had a nest in the bamboo one year and spent quite a bit of time looking for it. They were quite funny to watch last year as the two males competed for the one female’s attention. This year there seems to only be one male–the apparent winner of last year’s contest.
The bronze heron have taken their usual position in the bog and will soon be surrounded by irises. The pond lilies are beginning to send their leaves up to the surface so soon the fish will have more shady hiding places. The early ornamental grasses are turning green and should be in their full glory by June. The warm weather grasses won’t start their annual growth cycle until a little later in the season. I was surprised to see the Creeping Phlox (or Creepy Phlox as Kevin used to call it!) blossoming so early as it is usually May before the lush bed appears. A local ceramic artist, Pat Mitchell, confirmed that she had the same thing happening in her yard on the other side of town. It’s amazing what one week of 70-80 degree weather in early April can do to hasten the germination process!
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It’s great fun to watch the moorings fill each year as the boats return from their winter hibernation. There are always a few hardy souls who venture forth long before anyone else. My neighbor (who leaves each weekend with the whole family and dogs on the boat headed for Block Island) is one of those hardy souls. I just looked out this morning and saw his boat moored at his dock so I know the season has begun! The empty moorings wait patiently for their owners to decide spring is here for good–always iffy in New England before the end of April.
I continue to be pleasantly surprised at how quiet it remains even when all the boats are on their moorings. They only time it gets a little noisy is Fourth of July weekend when there are spectacular fireworks displays up and down the river. I can stand on my deck and have surround sound and a complete light show whether I am looking up river, down river or straight ahead! The Laurel Park Beach Association always puts on a splendid show which I’ve discovered is best viewed floating on my back on the river on a pool float. I think it is even more special than when I used to watch the fireworks from Golden Gate Park.
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For a New England gardener, this is always an exciting time of year as our dead landscapes bud forth with new life. As each little bud pokes through the wet soil I feel like I’m greeting an old friend after a long absence. I recount the memories of past seasons shared and delight in the unfolding adventure of this season.
I haven’t always been an avid gardener. Matter of fact, I spent most of my adult life on the road, living in hotel rooms and working in conference centers without much contact with nature. I wasn’t inspired to do much gardening in the nearly 20 years I spent in the Chicago area because most of the housing developments looked like cornfields to me. I used to joke that they had just rotated crops from soy and corn to splitlevels and ranches–still looked like a farm! I returned to the Boston area in 1992 and bought a house that came with a lovingly tended garden. The garden had gotten overgrown as the couple who built the house aged but it still had good “bones”. It was just a matter of ripping out all the so-called low-maintenance solution pachysandra and discovering what was buried underneath. (I used to have nightmares about pachysandra roots after days in the garden ripping them out!!). As a new homeowner tending the garden I had inherited, I discovered the joy of gardening in New England and so entered the ranks of obsessed horticulturalists.
Five years later I had done much to improve the yard and property, much to the dismay of my contractor, Angelo Tofani, who always marvelled that I could do so much physical labor, simply tending a garden. It was then that I learned to appreciate the difference between those of us who earn our living by thinking and talking versus those who labor physically for their wages. For me it was a delight and priviledge to exert so much physical effort after a long day at the computer, on the phone or a week spent in conference rooms, hotels and airports. Angelo, on the other hand, with his 50 lb toolbelt strapped on each day, worked very hard–harder and longer than any of his employees. So when the week ended it didn’t make any sense for him to expend more physical effort on a “hobby”, especially one in which he saw no tangible reward. After all, gardens are “here today, gone tomorrow” in the changing seasons of New England.
However, I have learned the burden and pressure of being a avid gardener when the seasons wait for no one. I am feeling that same pressure today as the weather begins to warm and the garden starts popping forth with new life. I feel the urgency to get the acid lovers fertilized, the Compass garden beds rebuilt and the perennial garden weeded before the migrant grasses take deep root. Part of me would love to curl up with a book today but I know a week passes very quickly this time of year. We are now in “garden time” with the germination clock ticking in its own special rate. Things will slow down after June but we are on the annual express train right now.
This seasonal pressure is one of the reasons that I vowed not to have a garden when I moved to Northern Arizona in 1997. But, wouldn’t you know, the one house I fell in love with and bought had been built by an artist and her husband. They had planted a very unusual garden on a rocky 45 degree slope down to a ravine. The house was perched on the side of a hill, one-story in the front, four-stories in the back, so it required all kinds of innovative thinking in both construction and landscape. I was amazed to see roses and yarrow growing abundantly in her garden. It never occurred to me that roses would grow in Arizona. As I tended her garden I learned that, at nearly 6000 feet, the alpine meadow climate of Northern Arizona was perfect for growing roses. There was no problem with fungus or mold! The soil was rich enough yet the atmosphere was cool and dry so the roses thrived.
You would think by now I would have been cured of my gardening and landscaping affliction. Not so, the blank canvas on 81 Harris Ave was just too tempting! I stared at it for a year and then had to plant something. The current madness started with a little, modest perennial garden in the front corner of the yard, facing the street. The soil was rich, but very rocky. I found that using thefancy rototiller attachment on my weedwhacker was just plain dangerous in those conditions (kind of like using a snowblower on a gravel driveway!) so I learned how to manually till the soil. I met the “Iris Lady” at her garden shop in Rehoboth and learned her secrets for amending New England soil. She used equal parts of composted manure and vermiculite to balance the clay in the soil. So I began following her strategy and now the perennial garden thrives with little or no maintenance other than occassional weeding throughout the season. Periodically, I do have to divide and transplant so as a result, the perennial garden keeps getting bigger.
From the time I lived in Northern California in the 1970s and my sojourn in Arizona in the 1990s, I developed a love for ornamental grasses. I wasn’t sure they could survive in New England so the during winter of 2002-3 I spent a lot of time researching grasses online. Xeriscape solutions using ornamental grasses hadn’t become popular yet in New England so I had to buy them from an online source based on catalogue pictures. Imagine my dismay when I compared the tiny specimens that UPS delivered with the massive 14 foot tall Ravenna grasses in the catalogue! I had created a large poster board with my landscaping plan, pasting all the catalogue pictures along the street border of the proposed perennial garden and now was faced with the reality of 6 inch spindly tufts, two feet apart, on border patrol duty. That’s why I say it always takes a lot of faith in “things unseen” to be a gardener. You can see the Ravenna and Miscanthus grasses today in their full majestic spendor as you drive by or visit the photo galleries. You’ll find pictures of them in the Beauty of Bamboo.
There’s more to this tale but the sun is out and it’s time for me to pick up the shovel. My hands will be too swollen to use the keyboard when I come in later today so it may be a day or two before I continue. Meanwhile, please enjoy the photos of the spring buds. I promise more bubbling brook video footage, too.
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I awoke to a spectacular sunrise this morning. The sun was tinting the horizon pink as I came down the stairs to make my coffee and I couldn’t resist the temptation to go outside and capture the moment. Watching the sun rise over the river is such a delight! Although, it will require getting up earlier and earlier until we hit the summer solstice on June 21st…….
I had just intended to take a picture of two before going back in to drink my coffee and quietly contemplate my day but it was too beautiful not to capture more of the moment. I took shots of the Touisset trees reflected in the absolutely still water as it grew lighter and lighter. Then I thought it would be great to capture all the sounds of the birds–the finches all chipper in their bamboo rookery and the geese honking their greeting to the sun. Of course, the streams and waterfalls have their own chorus to add to the burgeoning day…
Please take a moment to enjoy this wonderfully fulfilled promise as you listen to the joy all creatures expressed as the sun rose once again.
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So now we can begin the drying out process. I’ve had calls and emails from friends and colleagues in other parts of the country who were concerned after hearing how bad Little Rhody was hit with the storm. I’m sorry that so many people had flooding but also real grateful to have stayed dry! Not a drop of water in the basement and very little in the yard. Actually, I’m pleased to say that the “grass sponge” strategy that led to planting grass instead of wood chips in the Compass garden worked very well this spring. Last year’s spring flooding dumped lots of wood chips in the bamboo beds and it was a lot of work to clean up! That’s when I decided that it was finally time to add loam and seed the “grass sponge” to see if that worked better. We just had a major test of the experiment and it worked!
I left my computer this afternoon long enough to take a few photos of the pond in the sunshine just in case the sunshine didn’t last. I guess the past couple of wet weeks have made me appreciate the sunshine while it’s here but not take it for granted. The koi are out and beginning to sun in the warm water after their winter hibernation. Domina’s Agway came yesterday and did the spring cleanup and pond startup so the water should be looking real clear in a couple of days. (I think I’ll wait until the pond water warms up before climbing in and completing the clean-out. I have waders but it’s really best done in a bathing suit!) I really appreciate the great job Domina’s Agway does each spring and fall maintaining the pond they built in 2003. Each year it matures and becomes more beautiful. It’s hard to imagine it wasn’t always here.
I also snapped a few shots (do we still say that with digital?) of the “Ugly Tree”, otherwise known as Harry Lauder’s Walking Stick (there’s a story there somewhere….). I think it looks its best this time of year when it is festooned with catkins. I always think it looks like a “Witch Tree”, all twisted and knarly but when it has catkins, it is transformed into a fluffy delight!
Tomorrow I’ll head to J&J materials to load the Highlander with more bricks to finish lowering the beds and then swing by Redwood Nursery and Landscape to buy some Hollytone for all my acid loving shrubs and plants. I’ll have to resist the urge to head to Seven Arrows Farm in Rehoboth/Attleboro to check out their lastest creations in ornamental grass, hosta and perennials. I can always think of a good excuse to visit Judy and Miche and drink herb tea in their lovely garden retreat but it really is too early to think of planting here in New England!
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Usually I wait until a little later in the spring but I really wanted to show off. The streams and waterfalls add so much to the beauty–and the sound of the water is the source of much tranquility when doing yardwork. I may get a chance to sit out and enjoy it after I finish some of my weekend chores. I’ve already put some chaises on the deck but not the good La Fuma lounges yet. I’ll also put some out by the pond near the Compass garden so I can take a break in between shoveling dirt and laying bricks as I continue to lower the raised beds. I hear we are due for a warm and sunny weekend but I don’t think the umbrellas need to go out yet……
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The cats have also been having fun with one of their favorites tricks–bringing live birds into the house so I can chase the little creatures. I don’t know if the fun is in teaching me to “hunt” or watching all the gyrations I go through trying to save these hapless little creatures who don’t seem to know I’m their rescuer?! I’m sure the feline frolics have to do with the site of me chasing the bird with the fish net from the pond–no grace or dignity in that picture!
It seems like we’ve had 40 days and 40 nights of rain and I’m wondering if I should build and ark or if my two kayaks will be sufficient?! The good news is that this house was undamaged in the famous New England Hurricane of 1938 so it’s likely to withstand our current flood watch without a problem. This is especially true since we fixed the problem in the front yard by adding all the raised beds and planting grass. I think I’m going to wait a few days before going back to converting the Compass garden beds to a lower, easier to maintain, profiles as I finished the first 4 beds while the soil was still pretty wet from the previous torrential rains. It was a real workout!
Lowering the raised beds for mowing without trimming
You can see how the bricks look nice and flush with the grass
Puddles are still far away from the house
You can see from the photo that there are large puddles on the waterside of the yard but a long way from the house. We don’t even have a sump pump installed because the water never gets in–one of the benefits of an earth-bermed house! Dry and cozy inside while miserable and wet outside–good day for curling up with a book!
The property is officially listed on MLS and the signs are out front, announcing Lisa Glowacki as the listing agent. I’m excited by the great videos Lisa has created which can be viewed at www.81harrisave.com. The pond isn’t up and running yet nor are the flowers blooming but the video will give you a good idea of what the property looks like in all seasons.
We’ll continue getting it all ready to debut at the broker open house in April. Make to contact Lisa and get all the information. You might want to drive by as the people who have seen it already say the listing doesn’t do it justice!
