Wildflower superbloom south of San Antonio
March 23, 2019 Is Texas experiencing a superbloom of wildflowers this spring? It’s certainly the best display I’ve seen since the epic flowering of 2010. Following a mild and wetter than normal winter, bluebonnets have burst into bloom several weeks early, turning roadsides and fields azure. Indian paintbrush have joined ...
Wildflowers revving up at Wildflower Center
March 19, 2019 Although its name is a bit of a misnomer — the gardens at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center showcase native Texas trees, shrubs, grasses, perennials, succulents, vines, and water plants, not just wildflowers — the Wildflower Center really does shine in early spring when bluebonnets, pink ...
Go figure, gopher plant blooming already
February 22, 2019 With bluebonnets already blooming around Austin at least a month earlier than usual, I shouldn’t be surprised to see gopher plant (Euphorbia rigida) in full flower too. They usually start in early March, but mine and my neighbor’s, shown here, went all electric-chartreuse in mid-February this year ...
Winter bees and flowers
January 08, 2019 Just because it’s winter doesn’t mean bees disappear. Warm winter days draw them back into the garden, where cool-season flowers lure them with nectar and pollen. Mahonia flowers in the winter here in Texas. This is ‘Marvel’, a new-to-me mahonia I’m trialing from Southern Living Plant Collection ...
Rainy day visit to Jenny Stocker’s garden
October 23, 2018 A visit to Jenny Stocker‘s gorgeous walled garden is always a treat, even on a chilly, rainy day like last Friday (and actually all this month). Jenny kindly opened her garden to me and my friend Susan Morrison, who was in town for a Garden Spark presentation, ...
Plant This: Pride of Barbados, Caesalpinia pulcherrima
October 01, 2018 When summer’s heat sizzles the back of your neck and it hasn’t rained in a month and the rest of your plants want to give up, Pride of Barbados (Caesalpinia pulcherrima) sassily unfurls dozens of ruffled, ember-hued flowers at the ends of blue-green, feathery-leaved branches and throws ...
Oxblood lilies are baaaaack!
September 13, 2018 Five inches of rain soaked the soil last week, and the oxblood lilies (Rhodophiala bifida) have raised their celebratory red flags in response. Popping up from dormancy seemingly overnight, they’ve splashed color along the front of the raised beds in the back garden. The herald of the ...
Playing in The Gardens on Spring Creek in Fort Collins
September 12, 2018 During our Great American West road trip last month, my daughter and I passed through charming Fort Collins, Colorado, and visited The Gardens on Spring Creek, the city’s community-oriented botanic garden. The entry garden was ablaze with late-summer flowers like purple coneflower, rudbeckia, and cleome. Pink cleome ...
Topiary meadow and sunken pond garden at Great Dixter, part 2
August 14, 2018 In part 1 of my recap of my tour of Great Dixter in England earlier this summer, I confessed that I didn’t like the overplanted, claustrophobic feeling of the Peacock Garden and surrounding hedged gardens. But I found breathing room and the longer views I’d craved along ...
Close encounters of the plant kind at Great Dixter garden, part 1
August 13, 2018 After spending the morning at Sissinghurst, during our travels in mid-June, we drove a half-hour to Great Dixter, another famous English home and garden at the top of my must-see list. The family home of gardener and garden writer Christopher Lloyd, who died in 2006, Great Dixter ...
Sissinghurst Castle Garden, part 2: White Garden, meadow, and tower views
August 04, 2018 Has any garden been more admired, copied, and written about than Vita Sackville-West’s White Garden at Sissinghurst? We visited in mid-June, and I was excited to finally step into this glowing space and see it for myself. Twilight would be better for appreciating the pale effect of ...
Sissinghurst Castle Garden, part 1: Walls and roses in the English countryside
August 03, 2018 Sissinghurst. Mecca to gardeners worldwide. Like every traveling gardener, I’d put Sissinghurst Castle Garden at the top of my bucket list, and when we started planning a trip to England I insisted on seeing the famous garden of Vita Sackville-West. So one sunny mid-June morning, we drove ...
Shopping and English breakfast at Burford Garden Company
July 25, 2018 Before we visited Victoria Summerley’s garden in Bibury, England, last month, we stopped along the way at Burford Garden Company, a nursery, home decor, clothing, furniture, kitchenware, and gift shop. Oh, and did I mention they have a restaurant too? The place is huge, with a diversity ...
Garden powers through a Texas heat wave
July 24, 2018 Arizona-level heat is plaguing us here in Austin this week. Temps reached 110 F (43.3 C) yesterday, and we’re cooling down to “only” 101-105 F all the rest of this week. The Death Star is on high beam! The garden must power through, as must we all, ...
Flower power at Kew Gardens: Perennial borders and rose garden
July 10, 2018 My indulgent family and I took the Tube to Kew Gardens (officially, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew) while in London last month. I could easily have spent the whole day there, but we had only about 4 or 5 hours, so I had to pick and choose among ...
Roses, swans, and ravens: Rambling in London’s parks and Tower of London
July 08, 2018 We arrived in London in mid-June, where we stayed two nights and spent our days eating fish and chips and Indian food, sightseeing, and rambling in London’s excellent parks. (We also visited the magnificent Kew Gardens, which I’ll share in my next post.) London’s public parks made ...
