Sonia Uyterhoeven is Gardener for Public Education at The New York Botanical Garden.
As winter winds chill your bones, some of your summer pastimes can be successfully re-created in the home. One of my favorites is growing herbs on a windowsill. My biggest challenge is overuse. Healthy plants get nightly haircuts until they dwindle into a small patch of nothingness.
For those of you who are able to exercise better restraint, many herbs can be grown indoors and will happily survive on a sunny windowsill. Basil, chives, parsley, thyme, and oregano are easy to grow. Rosemary is trickier to grow as it needs a cool room (around 60°F) and high humidity. Most herbs require six hours of sunlight to thrive. Bright southern or western exposure is best. Parsley, rosemary, and mint can take less light.
All herbs are unhappy with the dry, stagnant air common in homes during the winter months. Some antidotes: occasionally crack open a window or periodically run a small oscillating fan; keep household temperatures in the 70s; mist plants daily, place them on top of a pebble tray, or invest in a humidifier that will benefit both you and your green guests.
Use water at room temperature for herbs. Some such as marjoram, oregano, sage, and thyme need to dry out between watering—meaning when the soil surface is dry. Rosemary and mint will resent dry periods and shouldn’t be allowed to completely dry out. Make sure that water doesn’t collect or sit on the leaves of your herbs, otherwise they will rot. Basil is particularly susceptible.
Indoor herbs, like all of your houseplants, will gather dust and will require an occasional bath. Take a soft sponge or paper towel and clean the leaves. Alternatively, gently run it under the shower or the tap. While herbs don’t need fertilizing when they are growing outdoors, a monthly boost of half-strength fish emulsion will help keep your winter windowsill herbs thriving.
If the herbs are moving from outdoors to indoors they should be potted up before the first frost. If they undergo a reverse hardening off procedure they will have a better chance of adjusting to your home environment. Place the containers in a slightly shady area for a week to prepare them to the lower light levels of the home. Gradually bring them in for a few hours every day until you are ready to provide them with a new home.
When bringing your herbs indoors from the garden, many will benefit from being cut back by half. Some examples are rosemary, mint, sage, thyme and oregano. Remember that herbs love haircuts—it keeps the growth nice and tender and tasty. Growing herbs in your home is fairly easy; the hardest choices you will face is whether you should put them in your salad or on the roasted chicken.
Debbie Becker leads a free bird walk at the Garden every Saturday from 11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., beginning at the Reflecting Pool in the Leon Levy Visitor Center. Join her tomorrow, December 13, for the 2008 New York Botanical Garden Bird Count.
Every year at this time, birders flock to the parks and woods across the country and beyond for National Audubon Society’s annual Christmas Bird Count. From dawn’s early light until dusk birders count all the birds they can find using a specific method and within precise geographic areas. At the end of the day the counts are tallied and compared to numbers from previous years. The information is used to determine if a bird species is in trouble or declining. Past revelations included lower than usual numbers of house finches, most likely due to conjunctivitis, and decimated crow numbers, presumably due to West Nile Virus. Occasionally, a rarity will pop up on the count as birders scour the shorelines, forests, and meadows looking for elusive visitors to their areas. Past special sightings at the Botanical Garden, which is part of Audubon’s 84-year-old Bronx-Westchester count, include common redpolls, chipping sparrows, pine warblers, Baltimore orioles, and a merlin.
Twenty years ago I started the Garden’s own unofficial bird count, a low-keyed version that is fun and educational. Instead of gathering at 5 a.m., we meet at 11 a.m. and set out to count the birds at NYBG. I keep a list of the most common New York City birds and put strokes near their names as we spot them flying by. The two decades of data from our informal count confirms the trends found in the Audubon count.
Read about the birds likely to be found on the count and of a special sighting last year after the jump.
UPDATE 12/18/08: Bird walk results
Count day was sunny and cold, with temperatures in the 20s. Nineteen people participated; the count lasted three hours and turned up 24 species and 105 birds overall. Highlights of the day included a northern shoveler at Twin Lakes, both the female and male great horned owls in the Forest, and a goshawk, for the second year in a row, by the Prop Range. A flock of house finches, a brown creeper, and a house wren also were good finds. The full list is noted here.
House finch: 12; House sparrow: 3; White-throated sparrow: 5; Black-capped chickadee: 8; Dark-eyed junco: 15; House wren: 1; American crow: 1; Blue jay: 2; Northern cardinal: 2; Mourning dove: 9; American robin: 3; Red-bellied woodpecker: 1; Downy woodpecker: 1; Tufted titmouse: 3; White-breasted nuthatch: 1; Brown creeper: 1; Northern mockingbird: 3; Hermit thrush: 2; Great horned owl: 2; Red-tailed hawk: 2; Northern goshawk: 1; Northern shoveler: 1; Mallard: 23; Hooded merganser: 3; (Last week, 30 wood ducks were counted.)
The NY Times, TV, and Even the New York Lottery Charmed
Nick Leshi is Associate Director of Public Relations and Electronic Media.
The Holiday Train Show at The New York Botanical Garden has been a magical must-see for more than 1 million visitors over the past 17 years. Edward Rothstein of The New York Times called it “exhilarating,” marveling at “the wonders of this annual show” that presents “New York through a looking glass.”
David Hartman, popular television personality, produced and narrated a charming documentary about the Holiday Train Show, revealing how the structures are made from natural materials and displayed to the delight of visitors of all ages. The documentary aired last year 528 times across the country on 285 PBS stations.
In case you missed it, below is a clip of the show. You can catch the entire program tonight, December 11, at 10:30 p.m. on Channel Thirteen/WNET-TV. It will air again several times during December on PBS, including on WLIW-TV; check the online schedule. If you’re looking for a stocking stuffer or holiday gift for a loved one (or for yourself), the documentary is available on DVD at Shop in the Garden
After viewing the clip, you’ll see why the Holiday Train Show has been a sought-after location for singular New York events. That tradition again rang true last week when the New York Lottery awarded more than $17 million to two winners before replicas of the Empire State Building, Rockefeller Center, Radio City Music Hall, and others and to the delight of a festive crowd of visitors young and old that erupted into spontaneous congratulatory applause.
There have been other occasions over the years when Holiday Train Show visitors received an additional unexpected treat, including a marriage proposal between New York City police officers that was nationally broadcast on the Today show and a mayoral press conference that touted the wonders of the holiday season in New York. Amid the glow of twinkling lights in the Botanical Garden’s Enid A. Haupt Conservatory, the Holiday Train Show proved the perfect magical setting for these memorable events.
Make your own memories by coming to see the Holiday Train Show in person, through January 11, 2009. Tickets are available for purchase on the Garden’s Web site. See for yourselves what Mr. Rothstein in his review described as “this phantasmagorical landscape, which at twilight comes alive with illumination.”
Amanda Gordon, a writer and consultant to the Garden, first wrote about NYBG when she was a reporter at the New York Sun.
A glittering flurry hit the Holiday Train Show last Friday night when it became the setting for The New York Botanical Garden’s 10th annual Winter Wonderland Ball. Sponsored by Chanel Fine Jewelry, this black-tie event raised $250,000 for the Children’s Education programs at the Botanical Garden and brought 350 guests to the sparkling Enid A. Haupt Conservatory and adjacent tent for cocktails, dinner, and dancing. During the past decade, the ball has become a tradition for supporters of the Garden in their 20s, 30s, and 40s.
“I look forward to this all year. It’s the most festive Christmas event. It’s so nice to get out of the city and be surrounded by a beautiful environment and all fun, good friends of our age group,” one of the ball’s chairmen, Alex Kramer, commented. “It’s also nice because you get out of the city and you have just green everywhere,” another chairman, Christian Leone, said.
Designers Erin Fetherston and Holly Dunlap attended, along with model and writer Jessica Joffe and Marie Claire’s fashion director Nina Garcia of Project Runway fame. The guest list for the event was so fashionable that Vogue set up a photo booth to take pictures of guests for the magazine’s February issue. Bill Cunningham of The New York Times also snapped away.
But the eye-catching gowns competed for attention with the equally eye-catching trains, bridges, and buildings featured in the Holiday Train Show. “I wish I were a little person who could ride on the trains,” model Coco Rocha noted before getting in front of a camera to interview guests about their outfits for the Web site Style.com.
For Chanel, the event was an opportunity to support an important New York institution as well as to enhance the botanical legacy of its signature flower. “We’re excited tonight because we’re working with the Garden to create a variety of camellia that is going to be named after Coco Chanel,” Chanel’s Division President, Fashion, Fine Watches & Jewelry, Barbara Cirkva Shoemaker, revealed.
With or without fancily clad guests, the fairyland atmosphere is present for all visitors to the Holiday Train Show, which runs through January 11 and is especially magical for children. “I brought my young son today,” a Ball committee member, Adelina Wong Ettelson, said. “It’s pretty amazing for a four-year-old to see; actually, it’s pretty amazing for a somewhat older than 40-year-old.” Ms. Wong Ettelson hinted that she might come back for another visit. “I told my son that if he was a really good boy, I’ll bring him back to see Thomas the Tank Engine in January,” she added. The popular character will be visiting the Botanical Garden from January 3 through January 11.
Charles M. Yurgalevitch, Ph.D., is the Director of the School of Professional Horticulture.
Each year the School of Professional Horticulture—a professional gardener-training program at The New York Botanical Garden—allows its first-year students to practice what they have learned in the classroom and in the field through the design and implementation of a student garden. It is an opportunity for students to use their newly acquired skills in a creative manner. Students split into three design teams, each of which drafts a plan for the student garden, which is situated in the Home Gardening Center, a place frequented by the public. A panel of the Botanical Garden’s horticulturists chooses one winning design and suggests alterations; the design is then installed and maintained by all the first-year students the following summer.
The proposals for each team from the Class of 2010 are described below. Make sure to visit the student garden next summer to see the implementation of the selected design.
Natives & Neighbors
We wanted to focus on native plants with an emphasis on plants of North America, but also including plants of Central America and northern South America. There are no Asian or European species. We are especially fond of the work of Piet Oudolf, who has designed the recently planted Seasonal Walk here at the Garden. We sought to design a garden that would partially serve as an educational tool within the larger context of the Home Gardening Center to show native plant specimens, some of which may be surprising (native canna, native rose, native marigolds). However, we’ve included Central American and South American natives to provide color early in the season and to put the garden in the larger context of a real show/display garden. The main colors will be violet, lilac, purple, and rose-pink, with accents of chartreuse and yellow. We expect this garden to offer color from the end of May to early November; it will also provide excellent and exciting fall color (Solidago canadensis, Muelenbergia, Echinacea, Eupatorium purpureum, Callicarpa americana, Salvia leucantha, Hydrangea quercifolia). —Peter Couchman, Amanda Knaul and Alyssa Siegel
The Sunburst Garden
We aimed to create a garden that gives a sunburst effect, like a morning sunrise, with colors going from yellow to orange to pink to purple. There will be flowers throughout the summer season, with a greater textural component in late summer/early fall due the grass inflorescences. Textural effects will come from the sweeping movements of feather grass (Nasella), Panicum, and Veronicastrum. An amphitheater-like impact will be achieved with lower plants in the front and larger and fuller plants spreading out toward the sides and back. —Ashley Burke, Gabriela Marin, and Barbara Pearson
The River Bed
In creating this design, we wanted to represent of a river or streambed, with rocks, moss, and plants growing along the banks; we were influenced by the Dutch garden of Keukenhof. Think of an English cottage sitting on the banks of a stream. The rocks (three clusters of small-sized boulders) will provide contrast with plants. Grasses like Miscanthus and Pennisetum will be on the left side; the right side will be anchored with oak-leaf hydrangea. Along the back side will be Panicum and pampas grass. In the middle there will be a broad sweep of blue-flowering Ageratum. The front edge will have Ajuga, moss, and Mexican feather grass. The sequence of bloom will begin with Irises and dwarf daylilies in early June, followed by Hemerocallis. The peak will be in July and August with perennials like Rubdeckia and Monarda and Echinacea. The plants have been selected to add texture, height, and color for late-season interest. —Christopher Bale, Naftali Hanau, and Brian Kennedy
Sonia Uyterhoeven is Gardener for Public Education at The New York Botanical Garden.
Snow is one of nature’s greatest insulators. As long as it is not crushing a plant or placing too much weight on vulnerable branches, why not let it naturally pile up. It shouldn’t be a problem; in fact, it may actually help the plant weather the season.
In the Garden, we do have areas where we need to remove snow such as from our yew hedges, which could be damaged and disfigured by heavy snow. We gently remove heavy snow from hedges and specimen trees by using a broom or broom handle and slowly pushing upward. If the snow has iced over, we wait until the sun warms it up.
Do not try to break off ice crystals or be too hasty in your treatment. The trees and hedges are stressed enough in the winter months and patience is one of your greatest virtues. Avoid using a shovel; it tends to be too heavy, unwieldy, and sharp and will damage branches. If you are in a hurry or have a large area to cover, try a snow blower on low volume.
Mark your driveway with reflectors so that you delineate areas to be plowed before the snow piles up. Do not shovel or plow snow onto valuable trees and shrubs. While this sounds like common sense while sitting at your computer, this decision is not always straightforward when you are holding a shovel full of heavy snow. Not only will the force damage branches, but you will be piling up harmful salt residues.
Be careful of damaging plants with salt runoff from paths and sidewalks. Salt burns plants and kills root systems. Rather than using sodium chloride, try products that contain calcium chloride or magnesium and potassium chloride. Two products that do less damage to plants and that you can easily find at a hardware store or The Home Depot are Lescomelt2™ and Combotherm™.
If salt damage does occur, use gypsum (hydrated calcium sulfate) to counteract the salt at a ratio of 20 pounds per 100 square feet. As with any product, read the label and follow the directions for best results.
Kevin Peterson, Assistant Manager of the Everett Children’s Adventure Garden, is responsible for the design and fabrication of exhibits in the Children’s Garden.
We had a great time creating the new decor for Gingerbread Adventures in the Everett Children’s Adventure Garden. We had wanted to do something a little different for its seventh season. I sat down with Jim Storm, senior museum technician, to brainstorm about the project, and we began to develop some initial ideas. Next, I did some preliminary sketches of a gingerbread town on a roll of vellum. Those series of drawings were the launching pad for the new look. As we started building, our concepts continued to evolve, we continued to collaborate, and Gingerbread Town took on a life of its own.
One aspect of our design was to have the gingerbread people look like they were occasionally popping out of the wall and existing in “our” space as well as having their own adventure. As it became a 3D reality, some things had to be reworked from the drawings because of the limitations of the physical space. The timeline was also very challenging: We started in early August and just kept plowing away at it until we installed it the week before Thanksgiving.
We completed the city scene first and then moved onto the country and farm scenes. Next came the gingerbread couple ice-skating under a cookie moon. But maybe I should stop there so I don’t give it all away. Jim and I were able to add pigment to caulk so we could “frost” the gingerbread people and make other objects look like big cookies. It was quite successful in that the gingerbread people and their world really do look good enough to eat. We wanted to have kids feel as if they walked into a fun-filled fantasy world and to light up their eyes and to spur their imaginations. We wanted a world that made them feel good. One little boy who visited made sure he said goodbye to all his gingerbread friends before he left the Adventure Garden. That was pretty nice.
Visitors to the annual holiday puppet theater production of The Little Engine That Could™, which opens this weekend in the Arthur and Janet Ross Lecture Hall, will enter through the Ross Gallery, where they will be welcomed by The Heirloom Tomato, an exhibition of bold, bright photographic still lifes. Here, Victor Schrager, the award-winning artist behind the images, talks about how he made these magnificent portraits of historic tomato varieties from the gardens of Amy Goldman. The two have collaborated on several books, including the most recent The Heirloom Tomato: From Garden to Table as well as The Compleat Squash: A Passionate Grower’s Guide to Pumpkins, Squashes, and Gourds (2004) and Melons for the Passionate Grower (2002), all available at Shop in the Garden.
Victor Schrager is the photographer featured in the exhibition The Heirloom Tomato.
The shooting to produce Melons for the Passionate Grower took one year. The Compleat Squash was done over two years. The Heirloom Tomato was planned to be much more extensive than either of those: The photographs would have to be done when the fruit were ready, so the photographs were made at all times of day in all kinds of weather. The project eventually lasted five seasons.
It was important to give the work its own unified sense of time and place—a quality I find in the best botanical illustrations and photographs, in vivid distinction to garden catalogs. To achieve this, I used a single artificial light in a studio I made in a barn near Amy Goldman’s garden. So the photographs took place in their own time.
During the first three seasons, I used an 8×10 wooden Deardorff view camera (the kind where you put a dark cloth over the back of the camera to see better to compose); the last two seasons I used a Sinar 4×5 digital view camera—the closest digital approximation to the qualities of the large-format transparencies I had made during the first three seasons and the most similar in use to my film camera. I would like to think you cannot tell which are which.
Various objects—teacups, marble blocks, colanders, spice cans, etc.—were used to put the tomatoes on a pedestal, giving each picture a unique architecture derived from the tomato’s place in domestic life in the kitchen and garden over its long history.
George Shakespear is Director of Science Public Relations.
One of the pleasures of working at The New York Botanical Garden is meeting scientists from around the world and learning about their fascinating botanical exploration, biodiversity research, and conservation projects. The Garden is a nexus of international plant science, where scientists come to consult the incomparable collections in our herbarium and library, to confer with the Garden’s staff scientists, or, as happened the week before last, to accept a well-deserved award and to share information on current projects.
I attended the presentation by distinguished economic botanist and former Botanical Garden scientist Sir Ghillean (Iain) T. Prance on two current (and very different) projects. In the largest tract of rain forest in northern Argentina, he has been studying the ethnobotany of the Guaranà people, documenting their use of plants. The Guaranà are threatened by the expanding timber extraction industry. One result of his team’s documentation has been the purchase of more than 12,000 acres of land by the World Trust Fund to return ownership to the GuaranÃ. Sir Prance also talked about his systematic studies of Barringtonia, a genus of flowering plants.
Prance was in New York to receive the Gold Medal of The New York Botanical Garden. The medal, the highest honor conferred by the Botanical Garden and awarded very infrequently, acknowledges contributions made by individuals in the fields of horticulture, plant science, and education. Iain Prance served for more than a quarter century at the Garden, arriving as a post-doctoral researcher and departing as Senior Vice President for Science. In 1988, he returned to his native Great Britain to become Director of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (1988–1999). He was knighted in 1995.
Prance is perhaps the most prominent scientist in botanical exploration of Amazonian Brazil and is vitally interested in the documentation of the use of plants by indigenous peoples in Amazonia. That led him to found in 1981 the Garden’s Institute of Economic Botany, whose programs continue to thrive and grow.
Daniel Avery is Sustainability and Climate Change Program Manager at The New York Botanical Garden.
You may have noticed rather colorful cans posted around the perimeter of the Garden and wondered what they’re doing there. Well, here’s the explanation.
When Mayor Michael Bloomberg and the New York City Council approved the city’s Solid Waste Management Plan (appropriately referred to as “the SWMP,” pronounced swamp) in 2006, they included a pilot program to extend recycling to public places such as commercial strips, parks, and transit hubs. The pilot was successful enough to expand the program, and the Garden, working with the local Sanitation District, was selected to participate.
The NYC Department of Sanitation provides the bins, and the recyclable material collected therein is combined with the Garden’s recyclables and carted off each week by Sanitation.
Sonia Uyterhoeven is Gardener for Public Education at The New York Botanical Garden.
As winter winds chill your bones, some of your summer pastimes can be successfully re-created in the home. One of my favorites is growing herbs on a windowsill. My biggest challenge is overuse. Healthy plants get nightly haircuts until they dwindle into a small patch of nothingness.
