Thoughtful musings on various topics by interesting people at Blithewold

Blown away

It’s certainly not over (there’s truly no such thing as over in the garden – slowed down maybe; hushed a little; moved inside, perhaps) but the blustery winds of change have made the seasonal shift … Read more.

Totally equinoxious

I have been reluctant to call it fall yet probably because we were a little (a lot) gypped by summer. But regardless of how I feel about it, the asters and Jerusalem artichokes have started … Read more.

Shop therapy

There’s nothing in the world that beats a car trunk full of new plants. Gail and I went off today to try and find a couple of things to fill a couple of holes in … Read more.

Purple haze

Back in June when we planted the lavender/purple experiment in the Display Garden, I said that I would talk more about it. Since it’s officially full grown, nearly past full bloom and it’s Garden Bloggers … Read more.

Color after Labor Day

It’s not my intention with this post to brag but we’ve still got a lot of color in the gardens. So many visitors seem surprised by that – and as shocked as if we were … Read more.

Life of the party

Some plants provide entertainment for the whole season and others just don’t and I sometimes have to try very hard to remember why we give clunkers space in the gardens. Campanula lactiflora or Milky bellflower … Read more.

Vacation house

I think it’s because I work here year-round that I tend to forget that Blithewold was built as a summer retreat. The Van Wickle/McKee family came up from Pennsylvania and later down from Boston and … Read more.

Oopsie daisy

It could happen to anyone. Even the “professionals” get it a little bit wrong sometimes … sometimes in a pretty big way. Last week when I discovered a rather substantial error in mistaken identity that … Read more.

Fight or blight

Pretty safe to say that it’s not going to be a great tomato year. If we’re very very lucky maybe we’ll get some honker waterlogged fruit with split skins but conditions are apparently favorable for … Read more.

The axis of summer

In a way it’s a little strange that this seems (maybe especially to non-gardeners) to be the hub of our gardening year – that all of our efforts revolve around this very point.  We know … Read more.