Striking Gold

On my recent trip to Philadelphia I was reminded, while at Longwood Gardens, just how much I miss having waterlilies in bloom. My grandmother had a "lily pond" when I was growing up--nothing more than an old bathtub that had been buried in the ground up to its rim with a few stones laid around the edges, but it worked. Each spring I would go down and spend a day or two with Granny and we'd get the garden cleaned up and go through the ritual of going down into the cellar and hauling the rubber washtub that the waterlily was planted in up the flight of old stone steps. Granny wasn't a very big woman and I was probably only 9 or 10 years old at the time, so we'd struggle and heave and haul until we'd wrangled the thing up the steps, then drag it across the yard and plunk it down over the side of the "pool" that we had just spent the morning mucking out and scrubbing clean.

The waterlily was the old tried-and-true yellow 'Chromatella', as I recall. It was cold enough in Kansas that Granny's small "water garden", as it were, froze solid in the winter, so she overwintered the waterlily, pot and all, in the cellar. We hauled it down in the fall and back up in the spring every year for as long as I can remember. We would check the tubers, make sure they were still alive--maybe remove a few if the plant seemed to crowded--and then she would topdress the pot with some old chunks of cow manure scraped up out of the neighbors pasture and top that off with gravel from the driveway to keep the mussing up of the water to a minimum. We had, after all, just scrubbed the pond clean!

So as we were walking through the magnificent water gardens at Longwood a few weeks ago, it brought back many memories. Not just memories of my summer at Longwood, but memories of summers long past--of Granny, the old bathtub, the musty smell of the cellar after being closed up all winter long and of the first waterlily flower to open each summer. Who says you can't go back?

(The waterlily pictured here is not the old-fashioned hardy 'Chromatella', but instead is a tropical lily called 'St. Louis Gold'. It's one of my favorites of the tropical clan and was in its full glory a few weeks ago when we were visiting Longwood Gardens in Kennett Square, PA, near Philadelphia.)

Finally Getting Settled In

Well, the past few weeks have truly been a whirlwind. I was in Philadelphia for a few days for the annual symposium of the Perennial Plant Association--something I do almost every summer. It was great to see old friends and make new acquaintances. I shot nearly 400 photos a day for four days, so I have a LOT of editing to do.

One of the highlights of the trip was returning to Longwood Gardens where I was an intern 17 years ago this summer. What a treat! That summer was one of the greatest learning experiences I've ever had and I found myself reliving little bits and pieces of it as though it was yesterday. Longwood is second-to-none when it comes to showmanship in the garden and I highly recommend it if you're up in that area.

The other place that simply blew me away was a garden called Chanticleer. Chanticleer was not open to the public yet when I spent the summer at Longwood, so I had never seen it in person before--only in pictures. WHAT a place! My friend Bill Thomas is in charge of things there, so of course I didn't expect anything less than perfection. Bill was at Longwood when I was there all those years ago and now has taken the reigns of Chanticleer. Funny, neither of us look a day older--especially Bill! And my good buddy Dan Benarcik is at Chanticleer, too, so there was plenty of greeting and catching up to do.

There's more, but I'll tell you about the rest of it later.

The weekend after returning from Philadelphia I FINALLY got to move into my new place. I'm beginning to settle in now and it's a wonderful place to call home. I'll post some photos as soon as I have a chance to take two breaths and actually take some.

Immediately after moving I was involved in a 4-day-long photo shoot for Garden Design magazine. It was absolutely grueling week for all of us involved, but the effort was well worth it. The photos turned out beautifully and will appear in the magazine next spring. I'll give you more details as we get closer to the time. I think it will be the April issue, but will let you know for sure.

If all of the stars align just right I could also be in Fine Gardening in April. So--that would be two of the biggest gardening magazines in the country in the same month! Sweet! Keep your fingers crossed. Even so, I'll be in both magazines, even if it's not in the same month and I'm very excited about it.

Now that I'm in my new house, my new office and my new studio I will FINALLY be able to dedicate the time and attention to the website and the blog that I really have intended to all along. I've kept promising and now the time has finally arrived. I'm going to be going full speed ahead with the blog, with new additions to the website, the garden travel and tours division of my business and host of other things. I hope you'll keep checking back. I'm very pleased with the traffic the site has had so far and I really haven't even been trying that hard. Hold on to your hats, 'cause it's full steam ahead from here! Be sure to check back often!

Finally!

Can you believe it's already August??? I keep promising to post more regularly and little things like packing hundreds of boxes and taking four truckloads of stuff (one entire truckload of nothing but plants!) to a new house keep getting in the way! The good news: It's FINALLY done! Done!

Well, almost done. I still have to set up my design studio and office, but other than that, it's done. Thanks to some really fantastic friends, I got moved this past weekend, the furniture is in place, the art is hung, the closet is organized and the plants have made the 50 mile trek from the old house to the new. Now if it would just rain and cool off enough to actually get a shovel in the ground and be comfortable doing it. Well, one CAN wish!

Thanks so much for sticking with me and continuing to come back and read the blog. As the new garden starts to develop, I'll be posting pictures and stories as often as possible so that you can see the progress. I'll try to get some "before" pictures up in the very near future so everyone can see what I'm starting with. There are already some very good bones, as the lady who lived in the house before me was quite a good gardener and had created some beds and done quite a bit of planting. So I'll be building on what she had already accomplished and we'll see where it takes us! Stay tuned!

An Oldie, But A Goodie!!!

It's a bittersweet day in the garden today. The last blossom of the season has opened on Hemerocallis 'Hyperion' and today is the last day that I will get to enjoy its joyful beauty until next summer rolls around and we get to dance our dance all over again. 'Hyperion' is my favorite of all of the daylilies. No, there are no eyezones or watermarks or ruffles or diamond-dusting on the petals. No, it doesn't re-bloom later in the season. And no, it's probably not going to win any gold medals at any shows, at least not in today's shows. But don't think for one minute that it's a slacker.

Since its introduction in the late 1920's 'Hyperion' has set the standard for daylilies, especially the yellows. What it lacks in modern breeding it makes up for ten times over in hardiness, vigor and outstanding performance year after year after year. It's also tall, slender, beautifully proportioned and fragrant, to boot! The lemon yellow flowers open in what seems to be an endless display of color for at least 6 weeks and in a really good year, close to two months! One of the things that I love most about 'Hyperion' is that the fresh flowers actually open in the evening, so as the current day's flowers are fading, tomorrow's flowers are opening. The soft yellow color glows in the evening garden when most other daylilies have long since bowed their heads and wait for tomorrow's sunrise to open again.

'Hyperion' is also the perfect height--a beautiful mound of very slender, almost grassy, green foliage about 18" tall that provides the perfect backdrop for the lemon yellow flowers which open atop 36"-40" tall stems. That puts them right up there where you don't have to bend over to breathe in their exquisite, citrusy fragrance!

My original clump of 'Hyperion' came from my Aunt Sally, my great aunt on my father's side. She was a fabulous gardener and played an extremely important role in my life as a young gardener, always encouraging me to learn more and sharing her own knowledge with me whenever she could.

That original clump of 'Hyperion' still grows in my mother's garden twenty-five years later--never divided, no special attention--returning year after year with its spectacular show. Now that's what I call a plant deserving of a place in every garden!

Time Flies

Well, here I am again, having promised to post more regularly and all of a sudden I look at the blog and realize that it has been over TWO WEEKS!!! Some promise. All I can do is apologize. I've been swamped. Between all of the design projects, a feature article for Fine Gardening, a perennials article for Tennessee Gardener Magazine, coordinating a major photo layout for Garden Design and filming 7 segments for Volunteer Gardener since June 1, I feel like I've barely had time to breathe! So, my blogging has been put on the back burner. Oh, and I leave in two weeks for the Perennial Plant Association meeting in Philadelphia and then move to my new place out in the country as soon as I return. I hope you'll bear with me.

Speaking of Philadelphia, I'm really looking forward to the PPA Symposium this year. Unfortunately, I'm not going to be able to attend the entire week of festivities like I normally do, but I am getting to fly up later in the week so that I can do all of the garden tours, do some good networking and visit with friends and comrades in the industry who I usually only get to see once or twice a year.

The trip is made all the more special this year because I haven't been up to the Philadelphia area in 17 years! During the summer of 1991 I was fortunate to be able to participate in the internship program at Longwood Gardens and that was the last time I was there. I'm looking so forward to seeing what has changed, what has stayed the same and what new and amazing things Longwood is doing in the world of public gardening. Also while we're there, we'll get to visit Chanticleer, a magnificent garden in its own right, and numerous other public and private gardens, as well as garden centers, retail and wholesale nurseries and much more.

After returning from the Philly trip, I head straight into moving from my current location (where I've been for 5 years) to a beautiful little farmhouse about 20 miles west of Nashville. I grew up in the country (okay, so it was a town of about 900--that's country!) and I'm really ready to get back to that life where I can really shut down and relax when I'm at home. (Famous last words.) Best of all, I get to garden again! My gardening has been somewhat limited in my current situation, but once I get moved, it's no-holds-barred! I'll be blogging about and posting pictures of the new garden as it grows and develops and you'll probably get tired of hearing about it, but I hope not.

I'm still going to try really hard to post twice a week, so please keep checking back. There's a whole lot more to come!

Garden Tours Coming

Hey all! Just a quick note before I head home from the office! There's a new section on the website (http://www.troybmarden.com/, or click on the title of this blog entry) about a new venture in garden travel and tours that I am hoping to get off the ground in the next few months.

We're working on itineraries both at home and abroad. Two trips are in the works for 2009, one to the Pacific Northwest touring nurseries, public and private gardens and some amazing natural areas. The other will be to the 2009 Philadelphia Flower Show and will include public gardens, estates and nurseries in the Brandywine Valley (Longwood Gardens, Chanticleer, etc. etc.) Details with costs and itineraries will be posted sometime later this fall--I hope sometime in October--so please keep checking back if either of these sound interesting to you!

In the future, there are itineraries in the works for garden tours to England, Scotland, France and Italy. We're working hard to find the very best accomodations, gardens and other points of interest to make these trips fun, relaxing and beautiful!

Hope summer is treating everyone well, so far. Our thoughts are with the folks in the upper midwest who are living with the terrible flooding and those back home who have been the victims of numerous tornadoes and other foul weather in the past few weeks.

Butterfly Weed

Growing up on the Kansas prairie, butterfly weed (Asclepias tuberosa) was a common and favorite sight along the roadsides and across the grassy plains. For those of us who were in tune with these kinds of things, the flowering of the butterfly weed was the official harbinger of summer. It's brilliant orange flowers were impossible to miss, usually in individual splashes here and there in the roadside ditches, but occasionally in brilliant rivers flowing down the hillsides and across the open grassland. These memories from many years ago are still with me today.

I am reminded of it each day as I pull into the driveway and there in full bloom is one of the most spectacular clumps of Asclepias tuberosa I have ever seen. So spectacular, in fact, that I am considering giving it a name and introducing it to the nursery trade. It's a plant that I found a number of years ago that seemed much more robust and a LOT more profuse in its flowering than any other that I had ever seen, so I planted it out to see what would happen. I've kept an eye on it over the years and am convinced that it really does have serious garden potential. It will even re-bloom later in the season if it is deadheaded and given a light dusting of fertilizer after it finishes its initial flowering. I've seen flowers on it as late as September, which is at least two months after most of the others have finished.

When I pulled in this afternoon I noticed a beautiful butterfly fluttering and floating just above the plant. I just happened to have the camera with me and was able to get a couple of good shots before he or she flew off in search of the next great meal. Enjoy!