Sonia Uyterhoeven is the NYBG‘s Gardener for Public Education, and can often be found hosting gardening demonstrations on Saturdays and Sundays.
Hyacinthus orientalis
Next weekend, I will be teaching visitors to the Home Gardening Center how to properly site, plant and protect their bulbs from hungry critters. It is a demonstration that I enjoy giving every year. We examine a number of bulbs, learn all the basics and then find a few nice empty spots around the Garden to plant. It is one of the demonstrations where I like to get hands-on with visitors, encouraging them to jump in and help prepare a nice display for the spring.
Last week, I made the rounds with a few of the curators and gardeners asking them about their favorite bulbs and planting techniques. The first stop I made was to meet with Jody Payne, the curator of the Rock Garden. I asked her for some good recommendations for the homeowner.
Our discussion started with one of my favorite spring blooms for fragrance–hyacinths. Jody recommended the Festival Series as a good choice. Festival Series hyacinths have a more open form than your traditional hyacinth and they are not so prone to flop over once they are in full bloom. Each bulb produces several flower stalks providing a full display. The Festival Series comes in pink, white, and blue, with a delicious fragrance. They create a nice, naturalistic look in the garden.
This one’s much further along than it was on Thursday! Stop by the Garden today to see Ray Villafane and his crew of fellow carvers turning squash into screams for this year’s Haunted Pumpkin Garden. We’ll be at it all weekend, so don’t miss out!
Nope, it’s not a scene from the as-yet-unreleased Little Shop of Horrors 2. Ray Villafane and his team have been working since Thursday to prep these monstrous pumpkins for this weekend’s Great Pumpkin event, and today they’ll be at Grand Central Terminal for the kick-off. If you happen to be around midtown this morning or afternoon, feel free to stop by and see Ray whipping up the stuff of nightmares from nothing more than….well, a few thousand pounds of pumpkin. And remember: the big event goes off this weekend here at the NYBG!
The Garden’s been good for fungus, lately. This shot comes from one of our Adult Education courses in the last couple of weeks, and now is as good a time as any to point out that we have another two-parter beginning this Thursday, October 18. The Medicinal Mushroom Workshop zeroes in on the use of mushrooms for health purposes throughout history and into contemporary medicine, so if you’re looking to find more information or snag a spot in the class, head this way.
How could I possibly cobble together this week’s Greenmarket preview without a nod to October’s star of show? Oh, right–I couldn’t. Today marks the arrival of some of the country’s biggest and best to The New York Botanical Garden, and in honor of their prize-winning rotundity, we absolutely must give culinary credit where credit is due. So here’s to Halloween’s most hallowed heavyweight: the pumpkin!
Our Greenmarket has seen a steady trickle of pumpkins, gourds, and squashes in general over the past while, and we expect to see this bounty pick up in the coming weeks as we dig deeper into fall. But this Wednesday is also notable in that it’s something of an unofficial precursor to our weekend festivities. While you’re shopping your way through piles of fresh autumn eats, we’ll be prepping their monumental, record-breaking cousins from around the country that are even now making their way to the NYBG. Starting this weekend, each giant will go under the knives of master carver Ray Villafane and his band of artful miscreants as they create the most terrifying and titillating Halloween display we’ve rolled out yet.
No luck digging up your skeletons before sundown, or devils at dusk? You know it’s called “All Hallow’s Eve” for a reason! At The New York Botanical Garden, we’re all about the value of a good after-dark scream, and we’re not going to let New Yorkers go wanting when it comes to finding one. Join us weekends throughout the tail end of October for “Spooky Nighttime Adventures,” a safe opportunity for you and your kids to scare out the ghosts and goblins of the city when they’re meant to be seen. How often do you get to see the Garden in the light of the moon, anyway?
While our evening events and activities are put together for children ages five to 12, kids at heart are more than welcome to join us. We’ll be decorating treat bags near the Reflecting Pool and sniffing out sweet treats along the Whole Foods Market Trick-or-Treat Trail. We’ve got a few bones to pick at the Discovery Center as we Frankenstein our way through some owl pellets, or you can suss out what sort of creepy crawlies slither in the dank, dark world under a forest log. Try your hand at calling for owls at the Boulders, discover the many secretive creatures of the night, or, if your nerve is steeled, take a peek at Ray Villafane’s ghastly pumpkin sculptures; a jack o’ lantern may be a funny fruit in the light of day, but turn on the shadows for a fright larger than life!
Sonia Uyterhoeven is the NYBG‘s Gardener for Public Education, often hosting live gardening demonstrations for visitors on Saturdays and Sundays.
The other week, I was with the Students of Professional Horticulture, taking them on a walk around the Home Gardening Center while discussing wildlife gardening. Technically, any time of the year presents the opportunity to lecture about attracting wildlife into the garden, but fall is a spectacular occasion.
We passed by one of my favorite asters, Aster tartaricus ‘Jindai’, that was smothered with bees and butterflies–monarchs and red admirals on this occasion. ‘Jindai’ is a compact tartarian aster that reaches three to four feet in height (the species can grow up to six feet tall). It was discovered at the Jindai Botanical Garden in Tokyo, Japan.
This sturdy variety has stolen my heart since it doesn’t require any staking. The large foliage of the aster is full at the base of the plant and then tapers nicely as it extends up the stem. In September and October a profusion of flowers adorns these tall stems, a lovely combination of medium purple ray flowers with bright, buttery yellow disc flowers. The complementary colors play off of each other exquisitely.
Hi from the Nolen Greenhouses for Living Collections! Just wanted to check in on the tropicalia going on behind the glass. We’ll be having more from Nolen as we get into this year’s Kiku displays, which will be viewable there between November 3 and 18, so keep an eye out as we hustle toward the fall exhibitions.
