Generations

The first day in NW Arkansas was perfect – sunny and 60 degrees, so my 8 year old nephew John Michael and I planted bags of bulbs and a flat of violas in Mom’s garden. It was fun looking at the bulbs and analyzing where the leaves and roots will come out and looking at how the blooms change colors with age on the little blue and white violas. John Michael is a born scientist with a queasy stomach – I don’t think he could be a botanist if he has to go through Biology labs and dissections. Great potential in engineering…

Then Dad took me to his greenhouse filled with blooming orchids and we found a spot for the snapdragons I was afraid would not survive the coming temps in the teens. John Michael promised to plant them later. Dad showed me the new deer fence around 8 raised veggie beds behind the greenhouse. “I’ll probably plant berries in two of the beds because I don’t need more than 6 for vegetables.” Dad devours gardening magazines and seed catalogs coming in the mail. He also turns 93 in March. Oh Lord, give me some of those genes!

The violas have been under a layer of snow and the tulips, hyacinths and crocus are under snow, mulch and soil, but all have promising, colorful futures.



Do these Felcos make my hips look big?

Into the Field with the Georgia Plant Conservation Alliance

Last week I joined a group of folks from the Georgia Plant Conservation Alliance, which is a diverse group of organizations throughout the state that have come together to meet plant conservation goals, to plant endangered Echinacea laevigata and other native wildflowers in North Georgia. This will help me complete 16 required hours of volunteer time so I can be in the second graduation class receiving a Certificate in Native Plants from the State Botanical Garden.

Complete blog post at the State Botanical Garden site: http://tinyurl.com/ykgn2rp.

Can I be a homesteader when I grow up?

I offered pumpkin muffins to folks traveling in the car with me, telling them that the chickens happily attacked the rind after I cooked the pumpkin, so I need to plant pumpkins in my garden next year. Liese replied “Oh, you’re a homesteader”.
Oh I wish I could, because to me the biggest insult is being called lazy and if there is one thing a successful homesteader is not, it’s lazy. I consider that reply an amazing, yet untrue, complement. Then Liese and Heather both laughed at me when I pulled out my knitting as I denied the title.
Homesteading for me is like reading the classics – I’d like to be able to claim such a feat, but can’t imagine ever actually doing it. Last month I was listening to Ayn Rand on my I Pod while harvesting turnips – baby steps.

Add Interest to Your Winter Landscape

I have met homeowners who would not consider anything but evergreens in their front yard. What a shame, because the winter landscape can be so beautiful and so dramatically different. A landscape should celebrate the seasons. Blooms, berries, sculptural forms, increased visibility and attractive foliage all add to the character of a changing landscape.

Evergreens can form a strong backbone for our plantings and should be used in a landscape, but not exclusively. Dwarf conifers and ornamental grasses can add height and form to a perennial border, balancing the profusion of color spring through fall. In winter, when the perennials are subordinate, the shape of the conifer, the sound and movement of the dry grasses and the dramatic forms of seedheads become the focus.

Two of my favorite plants to enhance the winter landscape are daffodils and Lenten roses. Both are easy to grow, long-lived, deer resistant, and bloom when we so desperately need flowers in our life.

Winter is when groundcovers, subordinate to showier blooming plants, often get noticed. Evergreen groundcovers contrast with bare trees, brown lawns, and fallen leaves. The bold foliage of cast iron plant and holly fern, the delicate texture of autumn fern, the expanse of liriope or mondo grass, the color of ajuga foliage - all more noticeable in winter.

Trees and shrubs provide winter interest in many forms: foliage, structure, blooms, and bark. The dogwood is a classic example of a combination of all four. The horizontal branching, flower buds, rugged bark, red berries and early spring blooms make this an all season (albeit fussy) plant. Leatherleaf mahonia has bold evergreen foliage, fall color, yellow spring blooms and blue summer berries. Many of the best winter plants offer much in other seasons as well.

Other trees and shrubs with interesting winter structure include the weeping yaupon holly, the wonderful variety of dwarf conifers and the pieris. Foliage interest is added with the bold mahonia and magnolia, or the colorful aucuba and loropetalum,

Trees and shrubs with a show of berries include several hollies, pyracantha, cotoneaster and burning bush. Interesting bark can be found on river birch and oakleaf hydrangea (exfoliating), crape myrtle (mottled, smooth), burning bush (winged), kerria, coral bark maple and red twig dogwood (colorful) and corkscrew willow and Harry Lauder’s walking stick (contorted). Branches of these plants are fun to bring into the house for winter arrangements.

Many trees and shrubs have winter and early spring blooms, including camellias, quince, sweet olive, deciduous magnolias (which also have fat, fuzzy buds), winter daphne, winter jasmine, witch hazel and forsythia.

Ornamental grasses are at their peak in winter, with graceful forms topped by plumes ranging from airy to massive. Enjoy these all winter, then cut them back when the daffodils bloom to encourage more compact, upright growth.

This only highlights a few of the plants that can enhance the winter landscape. There are wonderful annuals, perennials, herbs and vines that can add much to your garden in winter. More can be discovered at the library or local nursery. I recommend a stroll through a botanical garden on a warm winter day, jotting down ideas in a little notebook.

When designing your landscape for winter interest, pay particular attention to those areas visible from inside your home so that you can enjoy the show. Also pay attention to the front entry and your path from the car to the house so that interesting, fragrant and colorful plants welcome visitors and you to your home.

Recharged by the Rain

“I need a rainy weekend, to stay out of my garden and get work done” I heard last weekend as several of us were leaving a charrette at the State Botanical Garden. How I could relate! The next day – a one-day weekend – I spent 7 hours in my garden weeding, planting and spreading mulch. I felt no guilt – my garden and I both sorely needed that time.
But this weekend started with a clammy, cold, persistent drizzle and I actually am getting things done inside – cooking the fresh pumpkin, weeding the email inbox, actually planning for Christmas presents and travel, and brainstorming ideas for articles. I then made a pot of chamomile tea, settled by the fire with background sounds of Vivaldi and a snoring beagle, and opened the box.
I found the treasure on the shelf of the UGA Science Library, among the thousands of books. Fragile, with many loose pages, the 1858 Hedges and Evergreens was in an archival box. I couldn’t believe they would let me check it out and take it home, just like any other book. I finally got the chance to nestle in and spend time with this 150-year-old book. What a treat.
Ah, the rains recharge much more than our aquifers.

Marie Antoinette's Garden at Versailles

This week I revised a PowerPoint on the History of Landscape Design from 2006 to speak to a crowd of retired UGA faculty. I love combining history and anything - makes it much more interesting when you put something in context with everything else that was going on at the time and previous influences. During my re-reseach I reviewed a column I wrote for the Athens (GA) Banner-Herald right after the movie Marie Antoinette was released in 2006. This was a fun column to reseach and the movie had amazing details about Versailles.

Landscape history can be seen on the big screen
Friday, November 17, 2006
more Cottingham columns

My husband and I went to see "Marie Antoinette" last weekend. The movie had exquisite costumes and an engaging story but also was rich in period landscapes - or at least one landscape: Versailles.

I have not been to Versailles, but I have read some of the many books focused on the gardens of Versailles. I thought I'd share some of the trivia that makes watching this movie (and these beautiful gardens) more interesting.

In 1661, France's financial secretary held a lavish celebration at his chateau and gardens at Vaux-le-Vicomte. Among the guests enjoying feasts, a play, fireworks and music was 23-year-old King Louis XIV.

At this time, gardens were seen as pleasure grounds and places to entertain guests. One garden historian also said this was when "garden design in France discovered a style of its own." This formal French garden design consisted of strong geometry, elaborate parterres of pruned hedges, broad walkways, statues, elaborate fountains and woodlands.

The story goes that Louis was furious that an ostentatious finance minister upstaged him with a chateau and gardens better than anything he had. Records state that the minister was arrested within three weeks and stayed imprisoned for the rest of his life.

The king then had the designer of the gardens, Andre LeNotre, start work on transforming the grounds of his modest hunting lodge at Versailles into the elaborate gardens shown in "Marie Antoinette." This project took six years to design and the remaining five decades of LeNotre's life to fine-tune.

One of LeNotre's interests was hydraulics. It may seem the fountains are just turned on in the morning, but remember the electric pump had not been invented. First, waterwheels and pumps brought water uphill from the River Seine to aqueducts, then into tanks and reservoirs miles away. Water was released, run through pipes by gravity, then constricted into smaller pipes to create pressure. The shape of the spout determined the direction and effects of water displays. Thirty-two of Versailles' pools include hydraulic effects. When the King was coming down the road, fountain guards would whistle so servants could release the water and get the fountains running.

The French, who lived in relatively flat terrain, had to work hard to create great fountains. Nobody could have them run all day, every day. So the fountains also were designed as great sculptural elements that looked good even when the water wasn't running.

When the fountains did run, Louis XIV wanted drama. The Neptune fountain has 58 spouts. Much of the water ended up in a cross-shaped canal, one mile long and two-thirds of a mile wide. To the visitor it appeared endless, a symbol of the immense power of Louis XIV.
Louis XIV was so involved in the gardens that he wrote a guidebook on how they should be viewed. And viewed they were: From 3,000 to 10,000 people may have been in Versailles on any day. Although photos of Versailles usually show one huge chateau behind dramatic gardens, it actually was a city in itself, with quarters for guests, staff and horses, plus areas to raise food to feed everyone. Hunts would take place in the surrounding woods of the 15,000-acre estate.

After Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette are crowned in the film (after 59 years of Louis XV's reign), they walk outside, where wooden ships fire cannons in a mock battle. No, the French Royal Navy has not sailed in to help celebrate; these ships are in the canal for the sole purpose of creating amusing mock battles. A 1710 illustration in one of my books shows four sailing ships. Talk about a pricey water feature.

Another scene shows Louis XVI with an elephant. The Menagerie was started in one of the earliest stages of Versailles' redevelopment, perhaps as early as 1662. It was a working farm that provided butter and more, designed to also serve as a place to view country life and animals. At first it contained mainly farm animals, with some fish and exotic birds. A central plaza was lined with gates into several animal enclosures. When the Grand Canal was created a few years later, boat rides to the Menagerie became popular with guests. Exotic animals, such as an elephant and rhinoceros, were added in the early 18th century.

In the 1780s Louis XVI did build a "little" getaway for Marie Antoinette, a bucolic lakeside village in a Normandy style that previewed a future landscape style mimicking romantic country scenes.

It's hard to imagine the magnitude of these gardens and life under the reign of people who ruled nations in their early 20s. Yet we have a better supply of food, indoor plumbing, air conditioning, lots more books and much more comfortable clothing. I think I'd rather stay in this century.

Move and Divide Perennials in Fall

I have a restless beagle. He used to be content sleeping in the bottom of a closet, but then he discovered that by putting his front paws on his blanket and walking backwards he can move his blanket to other locations. Now he scouts new locations several times a day. The Winnebeagle can move out of the closet, around the bed, down the hall, and loop around the living room before he chooses a location - usually an inconvenient threshold .

Unfortunately, a plant is pretty much stuck where it was planted until a gardener moves it. If you notice a plant is not doing well or getting crowded, now is a great time to dig it up to move or divide it. Experienced gardeners do not hesitate to move a plant that is not thriving, because they know plants respond to the right conditions. Sometimes a plant needs to move because it did not turn out to be the size you expected or it is clashing with or crowding its neighbor. And dividing plants? - well that gets you more impact and more plants for free. Who could turn that down? So stroll around your garden and notice the plants that need to be moved. In Georgia, the recent rains have softened the soil, making it even easier to dig this weekend.