Esther Jackson is the Public Services Librarian at NYBG’s LuEsther T. Mertz Library where she manages Reference and Circulation services and oversees the Plant Information Office. She spends much of her time assisting researchers, providing instruction related to library resources, and collaborating with NYBG staff on various projects related to Garden initiatives and events.
The Proven Winners Garden Book: Simple Plans, Picture-Perfect Plants, and Expert Advice for Creating a Gorgeous Garden (2019) is a new resource from Ruth Rogers Clausen and Thomas Christopher meant to encourage new gardeners with basic information about landscape and container gardening. Both Clausen and Christopher are experienced garden writers, and the resulting text is simple and clear. Proven Winners plants are recommended for a variety of settings and designs. At 192 pages with 309 color photographs and 50 drawings, it is very beginner-friendly.
Shrubs: Discover the Perfect Plant for Every Place in Your Garden (2018) by Andy McIndoe teaches readers about shrubs in the garden, and makes recommendations for appropriate plants in different growing conditions. McIndoe is managing director of Hillier Nurseries and Garden Centres in Hampshire, England, although Shrubs is written for North American audiences. The book includes information about choosing the right shrub, planting, and care, shrubs for challenging growing conditions, shrubs for restricted planting spaces, and shrubs with desirable characteristics. The format is useful. The plant recommendations can be suspect. For example, McIndoe recommends no fewer than five varieties of non-native Berberis. In four out of five instances, he notes that the genus is invasive in parts of North America. The plant profiles themselves lack what are arguably essential details. Full size and zones are noted, but not nativity, which makes the book far less useful for readers who are hoping to work with native plants. All in all, Shrubs covers a lot of ground. However, it is not useful as a single resource for those interested in the topic, especially for those who wish to garden with native plants.
When I was a kid, I used to collect buckeyes or horse chestnuts, shine them and keep them in my pocket for good luck. The large, shiny nuts were a perfect treasure for a kid, and there is a centuries-old tradition that a buckeye in your pocket is a sign that good luck is on its way. The nickname “buckeye” comes from the Native Americans who thought the nut resembled a deer’s eye. My mother went to college in Ohio and my grandparents were from western Pennsylvania, so the common name buckeye was used in my household instead of horse chestnut.
Horse chestnuts are delightful in autumn, when the large nuts litter the ground beneath the trees after the prickly, globe-like husks split open to reveal the treasure inside. Equally intoxicating are the statuesque flowers of the horse chestnut in spring. These great spires of red, pink, or white flowers appear in late spring and liven up the landscape.
Our newest garden, the Native Plant Garden is a 3.5-acre notebook of ideas for your home garden. Native shrubs—like the ones you will see here—are an asset to any landscape, as many of them are durable plants which serve as homes and food for native bird species. Native shrubs often have beautiful spring or summer flowers and colorful fall foliage.
Deciduous winterberry hollies, Ilex verticillata, a standard in the nursery trade, are indigenous from Nova Scotia through Florida and west to Missouri. In their native habitat they prefer moist soils and swampy areas where they tend to sucker. However they will still grow prodigiously in average garden soil, but with a more upright form that can tolerate full sun and light shade.
These hollies are dioecious meaning there are male and female flowers on separate plants. The females are covered with berries later in the season. The male, meanwhile, can be tucked back in a corner. The bright-colored berries, technically drupes, are often red, but can vary from scarlet to orange-yellow, and are eaten later in the winter by over-wintering birds. They are too hard for migratory species which mean they hang on into the winter when they can nourish the birds toughing out the winter, hence the name “winterberry.”
Forsythias have a bad reputation for good reason. They are ubiquitous and weedy and we bemoan them while simultaneously populating urban and suburban landscapes with them. Forsythia is far too easy and that is a recipe for horticultural disaster in terms of abuse and overuse. It’s a sad story for a shrub with potential but there it is.
We all know forsythia with its dependable bright yellow flowers in spring. It’s an easy shrub to grow, tolerating a wide range of conditions and is free from pests and diseases. Forsythia flowers best in full sun but tolerates part shade, is fast growing and easy to propagate from cuttings.
Forsythia is indigenous to eastern Asia. While it is hard to distinguish different species–it seems like there is one generic mass market version –different species and varieties do exist.
It’s come in fits and starts this year. Snow falls one day, only to vanish in an instant through heat or a heavy rain. With all the yo-yoing we have experienced this winter, oscillating from warm to cold, the fluctuating temperatures have sent me and many of my colleagues home with lingering ailments as our bodies try to figure out what’s going on.
While walking through the Garden in these early days of spring, I notice that Mother Nature is equally confused. The persistent cold has slowed down the cycle of spring, leaving us somewhere between one and two weeks behind schedule in terms of spring bloom. Once the warm temperatures arrive in earnest, things will accelerate. What this means for now is that some of the early signs of spring–the ones that we usually like to see from our living room windows–are out and worth perusing.
The Cornelian cherries (Cornus mas) started flowering around the very end of March this year, whereas they usually bloom sometime in the middle of the month. As one of the many cheerful harbingers of spring, they’re a welcome sight; the 15-foot, multi-stemmed branching shrub is smothered with tiny umbels bursting with golden yellow, star-shaped flowers.
Every year during the winter months, growers start parading their new introductions through gardening magazines and catalogs. It’s the annual horticultural fashion show. And the horticultural models that hit the catwalk usually tell us a great deal about current trends and market demand.
As I peruse the pages of magazines this year I am struck by the balance of practicality and aesthetic. We all love beautiful plants–there is no denying it. This year, however, beauty is amalgamated with functionality.
The peonies that line Perennial Garden Way are getting set to explode into a riot of color and aroma. There are a few out, and hundreds more just waiting for the perfect weather to burst forth into a profusion of petals. Here’s a few of the early peonies to get you set for peony prime time!
‘Do Tell’
‘Kevin’ – Isn’t it great that there’s a peony named Kevin?
‘John Harvard’ – This peony which bears the colors of the Ivy League school founded by the man it is named for was one of the first to open this year, and is still going strong.
The Proven Winners Garden Book: Simple Plans, Picture-Perfect Plants, and Expert Advice for Creating a Gorgeous Garden (2019) is a new resource from Ruth Rogers Clausen and Thomas Christopher meant to encourage new gardeners with basic information about landscape and container gardening. Both Clausen and Christopher are experienced garden writers, and the resulting text is simple and clear. Proven Winners plants are recommended for a variety of settings and designs. At 192 pages with 309 color photographs and 50 drawings, it is very beginner-friendly.
