As the holiday season looms, some of the rosebushes in my garden are still producing a few flowers. They are all beautiful in the late autumn light, but perhaps the most striking is the rose-pink rugosa rose. It has grown large, thanks to the abundance of fall rain, but now its leaves have turned bright … Read more
Last week I was in the Hudson Highlands section of New York State, hot on the trail of an interesting ruin. The ruin in question was once a stately house, built in the early twentieth century, and destroyed by fire fifty years later. All that remains of the house are portions of the stone foundation … Read more
The violets in my garden, mostly purple, white, and freckled varieties of Viola sororia, are long gone, with only their heart-shaped leaves to remind me that they will be among the first out of the ground next spring. Somehow though, violets keep cropping up in my orbit. Last summer, I read the wonderful Violetta, by … Read more
In my garden beds, I generally consider Virginia creeper—Parthenocissus quinquefolia—to be a nuisance. The seeds, “planted” by passing birds that eat and excrete the fall berries, germinate readily in inaccessible places like the base of the privet hedge that bounds three sides of the front yard. Disguised by the privet leaves, the fast-sprouting creeper vines … Read more
The name ‘sneezeweed” seems akin to “ragweed” and immediately conjures up visions of runny noses, watery eyes and seasonal misery. Most people would not deliberately plant something with that kind of unsavory reputation. There is nothing to be done about horticultural guilt by association. It is reassuring to know that “sneezeweed” does not have ragweed’s … Read more
