Nice To Have A Dry Day!

I couldn't get a good shot today of both the striped squill (Puschkinia libanotica) in the left of the above photo and the glory-in-the-snow (Chionodoxa sp.) to the right. Both are blooming at the gardens right now and this picture was from last spring (taken by Ed Lyon). We have masses of both of these bulbs and they bridge the earliest color to the April blooms of Narcissus and others. It's nice to see little pockets of color emerging here and there. To the left is another shot from Bill Olmsted of some of our earliest irises. It's nice of professional photographers to share their work as my intent in using it is for education and inspiration (not profit!). In going thru older pictures of the gardens and past displays, it's amazing to see how the gardens have developed and matured (and we see how we've all aged!).

Great Grumpy day again with Dick W. cutting down more grasses and Ron and Gary hauling out benches. Larry and Bob M. picked up some plants and Bob has been digging holes for our "bean towers". Dave, Jim and Bob A. worked on various carpentry projects and Dr. Gredler was painting (see Adirondak chair below) and running debris to the dump. Marv and Terry did some collective projects and came up with a great edging idea that we'll try next week. Janice and Marianne were in as well and Bev W. selected an "assigned" garden space in the sunken garden to maintain this year. We love when volunteers like to take ownership of an area. Overall, a very productive day and next week we look forward to the grounds staff starting. Little Jerry will be back in two week as his broken arm is healing quite well thus far.

I did a talk in Milwaukee last night at the Villa Terrace Decorative Arts Museum, which incidentally is not only a top notch museum/historic home but also has an awesome garden around it. This was part of a lecture series and I presented to 40 or so people regarding new and exciting annuals. Most of the attendees had not been to the gardens yet and I feel we haven't targeted Milwaukee enough for those "day trippers". I hope some of the attendees are inspired to come visit! I wont blog until Monday as I'm off tomorrow. Note the pots below which contain caladiums. These tropicals should have their bulbs (corms) started early at 70+ degrees F to give them a jumpstart. All our caladiums are started in late March so they have some size by early June when we put them out. See sample caladium ('Scarlet Pimpernel') photo too. We put them all over our shady and partly shaded gardens!