A Nice Gardening Day

There was no shortage of beautiful spaces out in the gardens today as evidenced by the Japanese garden photo directly above and the fern & moss garden directly below. It was another warm, sunny day with temperatures around 80 degrees F. Tomorrow looks more mild but the heat and sun were welcome today. It was a nice day to garden and by the looks of it, a nice day to visit the garden. We saw lots of visitors and some of the youth education participants out in the gardens. We had plenty of work to accomplish and it truly is "brush fire mentality" as we bounce between the most important projects which still include the new electrical service to the future fountain, watering and other tasks. Further below are some additional nice shots from the garden.

'Bloodgood' Japanese maple (Acer palmatum) foliage from below

emerging foliage of the variegated sycamore maple (Acer pseudoplatanus 'Variegata')

Volunteers abounded today. Above are Stan (left) and Jumbo Jim in the Japanese garden which they tend religiously with Karen. We did a tour of that particular garden to talk about removals, additions and other "edits" we'd like to accomplish yet this year. Stan came back later in the day to do more pruning in that garden. Jim brings the RECAPPERS down regularly and is a huge asset to the gardens. Marsha M. (directly below) was out with her camera in hand and has no difficulty capturing the beauty of the gardens almost daily as our resident volunteer photographer. Kay (second photo down) was busy tidying in her area of the shade garden when she wasn't posing for a photo. She does thorough work and if I had 20 volunteers like Kay on a daily basis, I'd sleep better at night. Eva and Kathy spent significant time in the Nancy Yahr Memorial Children's Garden doing more weeding in the real tough spots. Mary, Myrt and Nancy came in for similar weed patrol on the east end of the gardens and never ran out of work. They do a nice job and are my reliable Wednesday afternoon team (with Gena too). Bob K. (third photo down) was with us for another day of working on the new electrical line for the fountain. He really took on this project and has done spectacular and much appreciated work. He's received some great help from both volunteers and staff and we're looking forward to the new fountain being installed next week. Bob T. was in for most of the day for tidying up our edging and Janice worked with Dawn and three of our Chestnut House Volunteers. We also saw Julie G., Dick P. and many others. Lots of people coming and going!

Our Wednesday grounds staff worked wonderfully as a team with lots of bouncing between projects. Pat and Terry helped Bob K. (above) for most of the morning and tidied up the gazebo garden after this electrical project because of looming weddings in that space this weekend. Terry later made a trip to pick up plants. Big John had various tasks this morning followed by a morning trip for plants. He later watered, rototilled and worked on some other projects too (including also helping Bob K.). Cindy and Cheryl started the day deadheading spent tulips (Tulipa) in front of the building which made the next wave of 2,000 'Pink Diamond' tulips (Tulipa) stand out at peak coloration. Cheryl moved on to work in the Japanese garden and spent most of the afternoon watering our almost full yard of newly arrived plants. Cindy helped organize and prepare the cosmos collection with Jenny. Jenny spent her day in the yard matching labels to plants, organizing plants, working on the cosmos collection, etc. She does a great job and did have a small planting project as well. I was able to also spray some herbicide in vital areas and helped with some other projects while chipping away at my desk work. Below are more photos from the gardens this morning.