Mumsy's Romantic Garden Advice

[aoxa]

If it is a naturalized wild flower, my knowledge will be limited. Your region may host a plethora of varieties unknown to me. You could pick a branch with flowers and leaves and take it to your local nursery and ask them. Ask someone that looks like they've been working there a long time and has grey hair. Often these local old timers are the ones that can identify your local flora. I will keep looking through my old books. Might find it yet.

You'd love my favourite nursery Mumsy.. It's stunning.



They have a little cafe and rose seminars. This is all out in farm country. Beautiful.. absolutely beautiful.


What a good excuse you have given me to go I used to live within 10 minute of it, but now we are 45 minutes away.

Other nurseries are big box stores and a few smaller stores but they don't specialize in plants like Cornhill Nursery does.

 

[MumsyII]

You'd love my favourite nursery Mumsy.. It's stunning.



They have a little cafe and rose seminars. This is all out in farm country. Beautiful.. absolutely beautiful.


What a good excuse you have given me to go I used to live within 10 minute of it, but now we are 45 minutes away.

Other nurseries are big box stores and a few smaller stores but they don't specialize in plants like Cornhill Nursery does.

These are what I refer to as 'The mom and pop' places. I would love this nursery. My idea of getting out of the house to clear my mind and refresh, is to frequent these places. I've been offered a job at nearly all of them and I always politely decline. They are my 'get a way' places. Would hate to turn them into 'gotta go to work' places.

 

[MumsyII]

You all that are following this thread so enthusiastically, have inspired me as well. It's forced me into the forgotten corners of this garden to look with fresh eyes at plants that have been here a long time. It's kind of like a picture you have on your wall in a room you frequent multiple times a day. You love the painting when you first hang it. Stare at it every chance you get. Then as time goes by you don't look at it so much and you even forget about it until a visitor to your home says, "Nice painting. Where did you get it?" That's what I'm feeling right now.

There is a tree on the North side of our house. It was there when we moved here. A wild cherry tree. Probably a seedling when our house was built. The neighbors told us it was the largest wild cherry in the area. We believe it. It's huge. It is also ominous. A huge branch came down twelve years ago and hit our house. Husband has removed branches that his forty foot ladder could reach. I just hate the thought of losing it but lose it we must in the coming years. It is a giant cloud of white in May while in bloom. A micro climate unto itself. When the blossoms start to drop, my children would come running excitedly thinking it was snowing. The first garden room I put in was under that Cherry tree. I named it the Magic Garden. Snowing in May was magical. I under planted with a ground cover called Sweet Wood-ruff. It is covered with white blossoms the same time as the cherry. My Grandmothers Rhododendrons and Azaleas were planted here too. I added Blue Berry shrubs, Sweet Cicely, and other things over the years. One of my favorite features is the Wild grape I planted at the base of this enormous tree. When it is leafed out, it reminds me of theater curtains. Just jungle-y and lush.


The Magic Garden second or third year after planting. Shadow is posing for me all prim and proper.


This time of year is quiet in The Magic Garden. Green, cool, and tranquile. A garden path runs through it and out into the rest of the wild garden. The children play in here.Grandchildren retracing the foot path of their parents.


The wild grape is a purple leaf variety. Vitis Purpurea if you want to look for it.




The vines near the base sometimes get very thick. It never seems to hurt the cherry tree. The flock love to hang out in this thick tangle. They are safe from predators from above.
This tree in fruit is a food source for multiple kinds of wild birds. Cedar WaxWing, Black Head Grosbeak, Western Tangier, and countless other tweeters. Many types of Woodpeckers too. I've seen them all over the years.The squirrels use the huge upper branches like highways from tree to tree.
Harsh winters take the grape back to the ground so the tree has many dead vines hanging down. I sometimes pull them off and make grape vine wreaths. I use the young leaves to cook with in olive oil and the larger leaves are useful for lining serving trays as well. It's gorgeous all year round in my eyes.

 

[armorfirelady]

Mumsy I got some pictures of that the bush I got yesterday



And here is the tree I have also called a crab apple. It just blooms white on one side pink on the other. I always thought there was only one tree but tonight I looked closer at the base and it looks like 2 trunks instead of a low division of branches like I always thought

I have included pictures of both trunks. The leaves on both are the same. The flower pod things remind me of green blueberries. The trunk on the left still has green leaves but the one on the right looks like it has died. It always does that and blooms again in the spring. The trees themselves are about 8-10 ft tall. They really havent grown much since I bought my house 8 years ago.

The one tree from looking at its bark looks older than the other. Perhaps it seeded itself? Though I dont have other saplings around there. Those berry looking things dont every drop either that I have noticed.

 

[echosrevenge]

You all rock my freaking world right now.

Loniceria maackii. Grows freaking EVERYWHERE here. I have been trying to ID it for almost two years, the chickens love it but it's been driving me absolutely crazy trying to figure out what it is. I've asked everyone I know, and gotten a wild range of answers that have all been wrong, wrong, wrong. I've had my botanist father in law searching his books for months, hassled everyone I know that grew up around here, and can't count how many hours I've spent on Google trying to ID that danged shrub.

I can't even express what a blessed relief it is to finally know what this plant is! I try to ID a new-to-me plant on our land every few days, and no other plant has given me this much trouble. You all are awesome.

....and now that I've done some more reading on it, ill be cutting down a lot of them tomorrow. At least the chickens will be happy, and they're in fairly inconvenient places so im sort of glad that they're classed as a noxious invasive and should go.

 

[MumsyII]

Mumsy I got some pictures of that the bush I got yesterday



And here is the tree I have also called a crab apple. It just blooms white on one side pink on the other. I always thought there was only one tree but tonight I looked closer at the base and it looks like 2 trunks instead of a low division of branches like I always thought

I have included pictures of both trunks. The leaves on both are the same. The flower pod things remind me of green blueberries. The trunk on the left still has green leaves but the one on the right looks like it has died. It always does that and blooms again in the spring. The trees themselves are about 8-10 ft tall. They really havent grown much since I bought my house 8 years ago.

The one tree from looking at its bark looks older than the other. Perhaps it seeded itself? Though I dont have other saplings around there. Those berry looking things dont every drop either that I have noticed.

Yes! That is the Gaura I know and love! It is a semi-hardy perennial in my garden. If it grows like a shrub for you, I am one jealous cookie!

This is a Hawthorn as I guessed. It is very possible the reason there are two trunks growing out of the same hole is because the original tree was probably a named pink variety grafted onto the rootstock of the common white one.. Over the years, the graft took off and grew up with the original and they have merged. Those leaves and wicked thorns gave it away.

Edited to add: I have got to put a disclaimer in. I'm living a couple thousand miles away squinting at a picture on a computer screen. I could be wrong when identifying plants. Everybody please go easy on me if I screw up.

 

[Leahs Mom]

Confession: I'm pages and pages behind! But I'm trying to catch up. I know I'm probably totally off subject right now, but sent these photos to Mumsy in PM and she asked me to go ahead and post them here. So...I apologize for jumping right in to break up a flow

I have lots of interior gardening items I want to do, but this crazy fence-line is something I want to get some privacy on. We used to be in the country...they have now widened the highway and city is moving out. They put a sidewalk in last year and we just put up the 6 ft. high chain link fence (black).

I want something that will give privacy in WINTER as well as summer. I'm hoping to find something that keeps foliage but doesn't have huge thorns. Probably asking too much.

Most of the spruces here die from the bottom up so that's probably not a good option even though I do like spruces. (They do make a good privacy and can be a good backdrop for some pretty items in front if you can keep them healthy.) In the first photo you can see spruces across the street that they had to trim up due, likely to salt spray from the snow plows during the winter.


Photos: From inside out.



From outside in.



Another view from outside in.



Any thoughts would be appreciated!


Thanks so much...and LOVE the thread

 

[Leahs Mom]

Addendum: I keep wondering if there are any fruiting bushes that stay thick enough to be a good privacy in the winter.

 

[MumsyII]

You all rock my freaking world right now.

Loniceria maackii. Grows freaking EVERYWHERE here. I have been trying to ID it for almost two years, the chickens love it but it's been driving me absolutely crazy trying to figure out what it is. I've asked everyone I know, and gotten a wild range of answers that have all been wrong, wrong, wrong. I've had my botanist father in law searching his books for months, hassled everyone I know that grew up around here, and can't count how many hours I've spent on Google trying to ID that danged shrub.

I can't even express what a blessed relief it is to finally know what this plant is! I try to ID a new-to-me plant on our land every few days, and no other plant has given me this much trouble. You all are awesome.

....and now that I've done some more reading on it, ill be cutting down a lot of them tomorrow. At least the chickens will be happy, and they're in fairly inconvenient places so im sort of glad that they're classed as a noxious invasive and should go.

This makes me smile hugely! Rocking homebody's freaking world is what I live for.

 

[echosrevenge]

Aoxa, hawthorn is traditionally used in the British isles as a stock-proof hedgerow plant - they are coppiced and the thorny branches woven together to make a hedge even a determined goat will think twice before pushing through. I dont know how easily they propagate, but it might be a long term fencing option for the goats - im trying to locate some hawthorn cuttings or seeds to use with Osage Orange and other plants for a perimeter hedge around our land, takes some time to get established but in the long run is way cheaper and more resilient than any other sort of fencing. There are hedges in the UK that are hundreds of years old, and still doing their job. Better wildlife habitat than chain link, and depending on the mix of species you can feed your birds/livestock and even get human food from the hedge too! Show me the barbed wire fence that serves breakfast, and ill eat my hat...