Garden Variety: Garden travel - Mid-Atlantic gardening: Tips and pictures on flowers, vegetables, public gardens, composting and farmers’ markets

March 28, 2011

On the road with Garden Variety

I was the guest of owner Stephanie Fleming at Behnke's Nursery in Beltsville, Md., this weekend -- giving my talk on "Gardening on the Internet" during their spring open house -- and she was kind enough to give me a history lesson of the family-owned garden center.

The nursery was founded in 1930 by her grandparents, Albert and Rose Behnke, and she grew up in a little house that is still on the property.

Her mother, Sonja Behnke Festerling, was featured on the cover of the Washington Star weekend magazine as a 17-year-old beauty, watering African violets, which was one of the nursery's mainstays.

"We sent violets to every first lady from Bess Truman to Nancy Reagan, and we have all their thank-you notes," said Stephanie.

The office at the nursery is filled with pictures -- overhead shots of the nursery during different times -- and they are a vision of Beltsville in its agricultural prime.

Posted by Susan Reimer at 11:52 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Categories: Garden travel

March 15, 2011

Garden trip: Longwood Gardens

The Art League of Ocean City is sponsoring an all-day bus trip to Longwood Gardens and the Brandywine Museum in Pennsylvania on Monday, April 11.

The bus will depart from the Superfresh parking lot on 94th Street and Coastal Highway at 8:30 a.m. The cost of the bus trip and admission to the gardens and museum is $47 for ALOC members and $57 for non-members. Call the Art League at 410-524-9433.

Reservations will be accepted on a first come, first served basis.

Garden Variety would be delighted to post your bus trips to regional gardens. Just email the information to susan.reimer@baltsun.com at least a month in advance of the trip.

Posted by Susan Reimer at 10:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Categories: Garden travel

December 9, 2009

Colonial Williamsburg: a gentleman's garden

Colonial Williamsburg

Photo credit: Baltimore Sun/Susan Reimer

The doors were not the only things in full flower during a recent visit to Colonial Williamsburg.

Across Duke of Gloucester Street from the stunning holiday wreaths and swags was "the gentleman's garden," filled with fall vegetables.

Even city dwellers had gardens during the pre-Revolution days in Virginia's capital, from which to harvest vegetables and herbs needed for their households.

Though it was December, this garden was going strong, with varieties of cabbage, broccoli, beets and celery, plus greens and herbs. The only difference, we are told, is that the garden would not have had so many varieties of each growing at once.

(The bell jars are used to protect the most tender vegetables from frost and there is a cold frame for varieties of lettuce, but our guide tells us that this garden will continue to produce all winter.)

Across the way was a compost pile about as tall as the colonial house behind which it smoldered. It included not only leaves from the abundant trees in Williamsburg, but the droppings of the horses and oxen who play roles in the city's on-going live theater.

(One note. There would have been no trees in 1775. All of them would have been harvested for building or for firewood.)

Our guide tells us that the size of a gentleman's garden in Williamsburg was limited by one thing: the number of his slaves. The garden would have to be hand-watered -- a continuous process during the hot summer months Colonial Williamsburg.

For more photos from the gentleman's garden, visit my photostream on flickr.

Posted by Susan Reimer at 7:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Categories: Garden travel

December 8, 2009

Christmas in Colonial Williamsburg

Photo credit: Baltimore Sun/Susan Reimer

Those fabulous, fruit-laden wreaths that are the hallmark of the Colonial Williamsburg style of holiday decorating?

Never happened.

In truth, the wreaths that the historic city made famous are the invention of Louise Fisher, who was in charge of holiday decorating in the late 1930s, soon after the newly restored Williamsburg opened to the public.

She traveled to England to study the holiday decorations of the 18th century upper-class, but was taken by the Renaissance style identified with the Della Robbia family of artists and sculptors, who often included a vine studded with fruit around a medallion of the Madonna and child.

That's the style she brought back to Williamsburg, where holiday decorating had previously been limited to candles in the windows of the historic houses on Duke of Gloucester Street. (Indeed, workers were paid $1 a night to babysit the candles because strict restorationists at first forbid electricity in the historic district.)

Today, 15 miles of pine roping, 30 to 40 bushels of apples, and 10 to 12 bushels of lemons are used to decorate the historic buildings. Many more are used by homeowners nearby who also compete for the decorating blue ribbons (and $200 prizes) that go to the best six designs.

What would decorations have really looked like in Revolutionary War Williamsburg?

A modest wreath made of pine or other greens, hung inside the house. Colonialists would have considered the use of all that food for decoration -- everything from avocados to hops to cacao beans -- a terrible waste.

For more photos of the holiday decorations in Williamsburg, visit my photostream on flickr.

Posted by Susan Reimer at 7:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
Categories: Garden travel

November 30, 2009

She's baaaaack!

San Diego Zoo

Photo credit: Baltimore Sun/Susan Reimer

Garden Variety has returned from The Left Coast, as we like to say, where she spent Thanksgiving with her son, and the sun!

I mention the weather because all my Mid--Atlantic friends seem to have spend Thanksgiving dodging raindrops.

While in San Diego, Garden Variety and the man who edges her beds took the daughter who cooks with her herbs to the San Diego Zoo.

They took pictures of all the animals; while Garden Variety took pictures of all the flowers. And there were plenty of them.

It was a hibiscus festival in the Zoo, with more varieties and colors than I have ever seen back East.

There were lots of tropicals and succulents, as you might expect to find in November in San Diego.

But the azaleas, the snapdragons, the geraniums and the daylilies were plentiful, too.

You can see my photos -- all 70 of them -- on Flickr by following this link.

Oh. Did I mention? We went to the beach on Thanksgiving Day.

Posted by Susan Reimer at 1:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Categories: Garden travel

September 28, 2009

Homeward bound

Garden Variety faithful!

Flying home from Raleigh today with about 60 blog posts in my notebook! Not to mention slide shows of garden tours.

I will begin to roll them out later today.

Oh. And the 15 plants I am flying home with? Dramamine all around, kids.

Posted by Susan Reimer at 7:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Categories: Garden travel

September 25, 2009

Be right back

Hey there, Garden Variety readers....

I am attending a Garden Writers Association convention in Raleigh, N.C., and I have spent the last couple of days on a bus to a garden, on a bus on my way back from a garden, or sitting in a classroom learning about gardens and, not coincidentally, the Internet.

Not a whole lot of time for blogging.

I have an absolute TON of information to share with you, and I will start to do that when I return to Maryland on Monday afternoon.

Be patient. There is really, really good stuff coming.

Susan

PS. Did you see my column in The Baltimore Sun Thursday? The short version is, it doesn't look like the tomato blight that devastated crops this year is a strain that will winter over.

Posted by Susan Reimer at 9:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Categories: Garden travel

September 24, 2009

Garden Writers update

Lowell Catlett Good news from the Garden Writers convention in Raleigh, N.C.:

Great barbecue at The Pit last night.

No, wait. That's not it.

There are 655 in attendance. Second highest in 61 years.

I guess the recession IS over.

Keynote this morning was by Dr. Lowell Catlett and it was one of the funniest and yet most insightful and inspirational talks I have ever heard. And I am really jaded.

His point? Our grandparents thought paved roads were a miracle that made their lives so much easier. Our children have grown up with flowers planted in medians strips on those highways.

And they will never allow them to be taken out. The world goes forward, not backward, and sometimes that is a very good thing.

Humans cannot have healthy lives if they are separated from plants and animals. Gardeners and green people have set a new standard and the world will never go back.

This afternoon?

The Sarah P. Duke Gardens on the campus of Duke University.

And you are, where?

Sorry. That was mean.

Duke Gardens

Duke Garden photo credit: John K. Wyman

Posted by Susan Reimer at 11:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Categories: Garden travel

September 23, 2009

Hello from Raleigh!

Garden Writers of America

Photo courtesy of Garden Writers Association

Your intrepid Garden Variety reporter is in Raleigh, N.C., this weekend for the Garden Writers Association convention.

Lots of workshops, tours, tips and new tools and plants.

I will be blogging as best I can from here -- the days are pretty jammed packed -- and I will bring back lots of information.

So stay tuned!

Posted by Susan Reimer at 2:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Categories: Garden travel

July 30, 2009

What I did on my summer vacation, Part 2

Photo credit: Bill Gordon

I mentioned in yesterday's post that the island of Hilton Head looks like one great big perfectly manicured garden, and indeed that's what the town fathers have in mind. Approximately 70 percent of the island is located inside gated communities, and the grounds around them are gorgeously maintained.

Hilton Head is also well known for its "eco-friendly" development. The height of buildings and their placement is strictly governed to minimize their impact on trees. As a result, the island enjoys an unusual amount of tree cover.

Among the trees are these live oaks, which have grown to enormous size over hundreds of years of undisturbed living.

The first picture shows a live oak that was felled during a storm but managed to re-root itself to become the centerpiece of a public playground.

The second is a live oak in its more traditional shape.

Live oaks do not lose their leaves and thus provide a year-round canopy for this beautiful jewel of an island.

Posted by Susan Reimer at 7:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Categories: Garden travel

July 29, 2009

What I did on my summer vacation

Garden Variety

Nobody cares as much about somebody else's vacation as they do about their own. But I saw a couple of things on my travels in the Carolinas that I thought I would share.

The first is pine needle mulch.

Southern gardeners seem to prefer it to the pine bark mulch we use, and it makes sense...there are pine trees everywhere and they drop a lot of needles. You use what is at hand.

I guess I thought this mulch just fell from sky and gardeners raked it into place around their beds. Not so. It actually comes bundled like straw. I saw stacks of it waiting to be distributed in the many incredibly manicured beds of Hilton Head Island...which looks like one big landscaped garden, by the way. Not a bloom out of place anywhere. It must be zoned that way.

But that does not account for the pine needles that DO fall from the sky, landing on top of shrubs and flowers like a snowfall. Not to mention driveways and walkways. The result is, you hear a lot of leaf-blower noise around these gardens.

Of course, pine needles will increase the acidity of your soil, and certain plants love it: azaleas, rhododendron, chrysanthemum and roses, plus hydrangeas, oaks, hickorys, dogwood and holly. Onions, garlic, mint and tomatoes are just a few of the plants in the vegetable and herb garden which will also enjoy the acid boost. But the acidity might damage grass. If you are worried, sprinkle some lime over top.

Pine needle mulch is incredibly attractive, I think, and I have read that it contains certain retardants that stall weed germination. But that also means they can retard germination of the seeds and plants that you like. The answer is to use your nose. If the needles still smell very "piney," they contain the terpenes that you might not want.

Posted by Susan Reimer at 8:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Categories: Garden travel

June 5, 2009

Rainy day road trip

rain drops Don't know what the weather is like where you are, dear Garden Variety reader, but it is raining here in Baltimore for what I am sure is the 40th day.

All this rain is good for the garden, but it isn't good for gardening. I am sure there is much mischief afoot out there right now. Slugs and bugs, mosquitos and diseases, mildews and rusts.

Not to mention weeds and all those morning glory seedlings everyone warned me about when I planted the vines last year. You better want morning glories forever, they said.

But there is respite from the rain. Visit today's New York Times' photo tour of the gardens of Philadelphia. And there are plenty of them. The accompanying article says that Philly boosters claim the city has the largest concentration of public gardens in the country.

The author chose four to visit, and the slide show produced by photographer Mike Mergen to go with her story will get you through this rainy day.

Photo credit: Baltimore Sun/ Jed Kirschbaum

Posted by Susan Reimer at 12:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Categories: Garden travel

May 26, 2009

San Diego Flowers

Photo credit: Susan Reimer

May, I think, represents the last of a flowering season that might begin in February in Southern California and is certainly underway in March. The flowers that you recognize from the East – foxgloves, lantana, roses, geraniums, straw flowers, petunias, day lilies, and gaillardia – are in full flush, a good month or more ahead of us in Maryland.

The climate in San Diego is so diverse that they give the weather reports in three parts – coastal, mountains and inland. And the differences can be striking. I am just guessing here, but the cool moist climate of the coast – my son and daughter –in-law living in a gated community with no air conditioning because it isn’t needed – means that the flowers have a long bloom time and it is almost unfair.

I mean, I can’t grow foxglove and delphiniums. Why should someone 20 minutes from the Mexico border be able to grow them?

For pictures of the delphiniums, continue...

Continue reading "San Diego Flowers" »

Posted by Susan Reimer at 7:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Categories: Garden travel

May 25, 2009

Sweet Petunias

Photo credit: Susan Reimer

I have never thought of petunias as particularly fragrant flowers. But in San Diego, where they are planted everywhere in multi-colored mounds, they are. It is an unfamiliar fragrance, not nearly as sweet as roses, but lovely nonetheless. I don’t think we give petunias the appreciation they are due.

Posted by Susan Reimer at 2:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Categories: Garden travel

San Diego Sunshine

Photo credit: Susan Reimer

I am just back from a week in Southern California, in the foothills around San Diego, and it was a revelation.

Instead of the verdant landscape of Maryland in May, there were craggy, rocky and brown hills and mountains around us, often capped by the Sea Fog from the Pacific but, as often as not, baked by a bright sun.

My husband has a theory that, considering the earthquakes, mudslides and brushfires, everyone in California should be required to evacuate and the entire state should be declared a national park – with free admission.

From the redwoods and wine country in the north to the avocado farms and palm trees of the south, the flora in California is about 12 different kinds of beautiful.

There will be lots more pictures. Stay tuned.

Posted by Susan Reimer at 10:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
Categories: Garden travel

May 14, 2009

Garden getaways

Looking for a perfect spot to escape the urban landscape? You don't have to go far. These three gardens are well within driving distance of central Maryland and make great springtime or anytime getaways. Pack a picnic to take along and you're all set. The travel folks selected only three, but we know there are many more garden destinations in the mid-Atlantic. What's your favorite?

Posted by Michelle Deal-Zimmerman at 10:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Categories: Garden travel

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