Rainbow Swiss chard. Photo from Mischler's Florist and Greenhouses.

by Colleen Morrissey, herb manager and container designer at Mischler’s Florist and Greenhouses

If you love salad and enjoy gardening, plant a “lettuce bowl” container garden.

It’s a quick and easy project. You don’t need much space, so you can have a “lettuce bowl” container garden on a sunny balcony, front stoop or just outside your kitchen door. Setting the container on a picnic table or other tabletop may discourage rabbits, slugs and other pests.

This is also a project you can do with kids. When you get kids involved in growing and harvesting their own vegetables, they are much more likely to eat them!

Your container garden can look beautiful, too, because lettuce leaves come in so many different colors and shapes.

Lettuce is a cool weather crop grown primarily in spring and fall, but with successive sowing of seeds or biweekly planting of starter plants, the bounty can continue through the sunny months of summer. You should be able to harvest from one plant for a month or more.

Red salad bowl lettuce. Photo from Mischler's Florist and Greenhouses.

Our modern selections of lettuce are the cultivated descendants of the wild Lactuca serriola, which is native to Asia, Eurasia and the Mediterranean. The earliest varieties were stalky with loose leaves, and  eventually the ancient Romans bred them and “brought them to a head.”

Today there are hundreds of distinct varieties to choose from. Most are compatible with each other in growth habits and culture requirements, so you can be creative and mix several varities in one container.

The most popular greens for pots include the loose-leaf varieties: butterhead, mesclun, cos or romaine, kale, mustard and pak choi. As seen in the first photo, they can be interplanted with leafy herbs such as basil, parsley, cilantro, oregano, lovage and arugula.

When planting a  a “lettuce bowl” container garden, have all your supplies ready.

Choose your planter. Lettuce has pretty shallow root system, so anything that is at least six inches deep will work.  Your container can be anything you like—be creative.

Fill your container to the brim with a humus-rich, light potting mix, patting it down with your palm gently to level.

Green leaf lettuce. Choose plants for your "lettuce bowl" that are about the size of your thumb. Photo from Mischler's Florist and Greenhouses.

Select a mix of seedlings, preferably an inch tall or thumb size. Water them well and let drain.

Next use a skinny spade to plant the seedlings a couple inches apart.  They can grow quite happily in close quarters, so maximize the space.

Plant trailing herbs such as thyme or oregano along the edge so they can grow over the edge.  Water thoroughly.

In a couple days the plants will perk up and start to take off.

If you want organic lettuce, make sure you start by mixing compost or humus into the soil.  Fertilize with  kelp meal or liquid seaweed, or the organic powders that come in a bag.

Lettuce will require a steady supply of moisture. Your plants will be bushy and ready for harvest in about a week to ten days.

Mesclun mix. Photo from Mischler's Florist and Greenhouses.

Don’t just admire your plants; you need to keep culling or harvesting leaves to make space for growth. When you harvest, take the outer leaves of the rosette, leaving the growing tips in the heart center to keep producing new leaves.

If your container is getting  crowded,  try the cut-and-come-again technique.  Cut off the leaves of an entire plant an inch or so above the soil and it will regenerate.  You can do this to every other plant.

Now, you just need a nice dressing.

Maple Dijon Dressing, from Kitchen Explorers at pbs.org

• ½ cup extra virgin olive oil
• ¼ cup balsamic vinegar or red wine vinegar
• 2 tbsp. pure maple syrup
• 2 tsp. Dijon mustard
• ½ tsp. herbes de Provence or dried thyme

Whisk all ingredients (or let your kids shake them vigorously in a jar) and store it in the refrigerator for up to two weeks.

Colleen Morrissey is herb manager and container designer at Mischler’s Florist and Greenhouses, 118 South Forest Rd., Williamsville. Mischler’s carries lettuce plants in six-packs and carries mustard and other gourmet or unusual greens in 3.5-inch pots.

All photos are from Mischler’s Florist and Greenhouses.

“Isn’t it beautiful?” she asked as I admired the tree with her this past weekend.

The tree peony is visible from the street as you drive toward her home at 22 Larchmont in the University area of Buffalo. It’s in the side garden along the driveway. It blooms two weeks at the most, she said, and it may be finishing within days.

The tree bloomed early this year because of our strange spring weather; it doesn’t usually bloom until Memorial Day.

Also early this year is the Tree Peony Festival of Flowers.  The festival was moved up due to the early spring weather and will continue 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, May 19 & 20 and Saturday, Sunday and Monday, May 26, 27 & 28.

The festival is held at Linwood Gardens, 1912 York Rd., Pavilion, NY 14525 (35 miles southwest of Rochester).

The historic gardens feature a distinguished collection of tree peonies. Linwood Gardens is listed on the National and the New York State Register of Historic Places. Linwood Gardens is a not-for-profit organization. The suggested contribution for the festival is $8 to be used for garden preservation. A guided tour is $10. Linwood Gardens is a private residence and open to the public only for the Tree Peony Festival of Flowers, Summer Workshops, and the Open Garden Day participants.

Brooks said her tree peony started to bloom in its fourth year, and it took seven or eight years to reach its full size. It’s about 12 years old now.

“It needs lots of water throughout the year to keep the plant healthy,” she said.

The tree peony needs to be trimmed back in the spring before it blooms. When the flower fades, it leaves behind a hard shell that needs to be cut off, she explained.

While it is a showpiece, the tree peony isn’t the only attraction in Brooks’ landscape. The front of Brooks’ house has a welcoming entranceway surrounded by gracious curving gardens that are brimming with plants. Some are already blooming while others are waiting for their turn in the coming weeks and months.

“Something’s always blooming,” she said.

Even the plants that aren’t blooming now provide interest through their textures and leaf colors, which are various shades of green and silver. Her front gardens include primrose, Sweet William, pinks, lady’s mantle, hydrangeas, wormwood, roses that bloom all summer and something she called a turtle plant that will get purple flowers. Sage, the herb, provides a patch of pretty groundcover. While it can be used in cooking, Brooks said she occasionally burns it in the house to scent the air.

The medians in the street are also planted with perennials and are maintained by Brooks and her neighbors.

There are gardens along Brooks’ driveway, and a sidewalk from the driveway leads to a cozy backyard retreat, which you can see above. Vines and tall bushes, including a very fragrant mock orange, give the space privacy. In the summer, Brooks sets up a canopy to make the spot feel even more secluded.

The water feature in the backyard, seen at right, was just installed in March. She got the idea after seeing a similar fountain on one of the garden walks last summer. Nearby is a rose whose petals are very dark purple at the tips and transition to almost black at the center.

“I try not to spend an awful lot of money,” she said. As perennials spread, she would split them up and move them to other parts of her yard.

“At one time, the squirrels did it for me,” Brooks said with a laugh, “so I had plants coming up in strange places and I had to move them back.

Brooks said she didn’t start out with a grand plan for her landscape and sees what she has as just normal perennial gardens. She just carved out spaces for her gardens and developed them over the years.

“It has metamorphosed into this.”

With perennials, you can have successive waves of blooms in your garden starting in early spring, said Fran Evans of Hamburg, who is a Master Gardener with Cornell Cooperative Extension Erie County. I visited his garden yesterday, and even overcast skies couldn’t dim the beauty of the gardens.

Spring blooming is well underway, and the bulbs have already finished. Now other flowers carpet the garden.

In the first photo, you can see pastel-colored Spanish hyacinth and Virginia bluebells. Virginia bluebells are hard to transplant, Evans noted, because you must dig up the entire tap root, which is very long.

Dotted among the Virginia bluebells are the dark purple blossoms of lunaria or money plant. When lunaria goes to seed in late summer, it will get seed pods shaped like coins with a silvery, translucent paper-like membrane. Stems of the money plant are often used in dried arrangements.

Evans also has leopard’s bane (doronicum), a yellow daisy-like flower, as well as fragrant lily of the valley.

There are plenty of forget-me-nots, a delicate, low-growing flower that is normally blue. Evans pointed out a few forget-me-nots that, after reseeding themselves for multiple generations, have come up pink. You can see them above left.

When we think of flowers, we generally think of low-growing plants, but we shouldn’t forget about bushes and trees, especially in spring. The white dogwood tree at right, is in its prime and is covered in flowers. Another source of flowers in the garden  now is a showy bush called kerria japonica, which gets yellow blooms that look like buttercups.

The fragrant lilac bush, below left, is nearly done blooming. Already this year Evans has enjoyed flowers on forsythia bushes, a redbud tree and crab apple trees.

Evans has shady areas, and those areas have flowers, too. Bleeding hearts, seen below right, grace the area around his pond. He noted that the white bleeding hearts are beginning to crowd out his red ones.

Native plants including trillium, bloodroot, jack-in-the-pulpit and mayapple thrive in the shady spots, and a path winds through a wooded area, seen below left.

An unusual plant for the shade is arum italicum, the last photo on right, which can be used as a ground cover. Last year Evans planted one plant. The next week he had four plants, and the week after he had nine plants.  As you can probably guess, it can be extremely invasive. The roots sprout bulblets, and new plants grow from the bulblets as well as from the roots, he explained.

Evans also has a vegetable garden, and he’s not waiting until Memorial Day to plant. He is already growing cool weather crops including six kinds of lettuce, peas, onion sets, radishes, beets (round and cylindracal) and kohlrabi.

He also planted beans and corn last week, which need soil between 50 and 60 degrees Fahrenheit six inches down. There’s still a risk of cold weather, but Evans said that in 20 years, he’s had to cover the plants only once. 

There are more flowers to come in Evans’ garden. The lilies are doubling in size every week and will soon be blooming. He has many perennials, including clematis and a huge trumpet vine, that will draw attention with their flowers in the following weeks and months.

To keep perennials blooming in your garden from March until October, you’ll need 10 or 20 different kinds of plants, Evans said. Each perennial will bloom about six weeks, and you want some overlap of the blooming times.

Choose trees and bushes first since they’re larger, they take up more space and they’re harder to move. Then choose perennial flowers.

Evans divides the blooming season into three general parts: early, middle and late, and we’ve included some suggestions below to give you an idea of plants that should appear at those times. The time that each plant actually blooms depends on several factors.

One factor is the microclimate in your garden– daffodils on the sunny side of my house bloom a week or two before the daffodils that are shaded by the porch.

Another factor is our weather. Our summer-like temperatures earlier this spring caused some plants to bloom a month early, while the unusual weather is now delaying the blooms on Evans’ locust.

These groupings are quite general, and plants overlap categories. With that in mind, here are some perennials to keep your garden blooming throughout the year:

Early (March through April)

• Snow drops
• Winter aconites
• Bulbs, such as crocus and daffodil
• Bluebells
• Spanish hyacinth
• Violets
• Doronicum or leopard’s bane
• Lunaria or money plant

Middle (May through June)

• Lilies
• Canterbury bells
• English daisies
• Columbine
• Foxglove
• Larkspur

Late (July through October)

• Monarda
• Coneflower
• Japanese anemone
• Lupine
• Black-eyed Susan
• Anise hyssop (fragrant)

In addition to the perennials, Evans plants an elaborate annual garden each year that uses about 700 plants.  He uses 35 shop lights in his basement to start $350 worth of seeds to get the number of annuals he needs. He estimates it would cost him $2,000 to buy the specimens as plants rather than starting them from seed.

That’s just one more technique Evans uses to keep flowers in his garden throughout the year.

“There will always be blossoms,” he said.

Dan Zak's Japanese maple bonsai. Photo from Buffalo Bonsai Society.

You’ll see marvelous examples of bonsai, the miniature gardening art form, at the upcoming Bonsai Show, but there is lots more to do at the show, too.

You can also watch demonstrations on how to start a bonsai tree. There will be a table where you can get advice on tending bonsai trees, and you can even bring your own bonsai and get technical help. Bonsai supplies and trees will be sold. If you want to start a bonsai, you can buy everything you need and volunteers will help you plant and shape it.

Bob Maxwell's juniper cascade bonsai. Photo from Buffalo Bonsai Society.

The  Bonsai Show will be held from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, May 19 and 20, at the Buffalo and Erie County Botanical Gardens, 2655 South Park Ave., Buffalo. The show is brought to you by the Buffalo Bonsai Society and the Buffalo and Erie County Botanical Gardens.

Admission is $9  for adults, $8 seniors (55 and older) and students (13 and older with ID), $5 for children ages 3-12, and free for members and children under 3.

Bonsai (pronounced like the English words “bone-SIGH”) is an art where trees are pruned and shaped to look  like old trees while remaining small.

“We try to imitate nature,” said Wendy Williams, president of the Buffalo Bonsai Society. “If you took a photo of a tree in a meadow, and you took a photo of a bonsai without showing the pot, you shouldn’t be able to tell which is the bonsai.”

Any tree that you have in your yard can be grown as a bonsai, she said, including oak, maple, juniper, spruce, apple and rhododendron. One exception is a chestnut tree because you can’t reduce the size of chestnut leaves to bring them in balance with the size of the rest of the tree.

Vince Philippone's azalea bonsai. Photo from Buffalo Bonsai Society.

You can take steps to get most trees to produce leaves in proportion to the size of the trunk and branches, but you can never reduce the size of the flowers or fruit.

“One apple could break the branch of a bonsai,” she said.

These are not houseplants and cannot survive inside, Williams emphasized. They are trees and must undergo the same weather conditions that full-size trees experience, including winter. People often tell her that they got a bonsai as a gift and it was doing well until suddenly it died. It generally turns out that the person kept the tree inside.

There are several ways to overwinter a bonsai. One method is to dig a trench in your garden and bury the bonsai, pot and all, midway up the trunk of the tree. That’s enough to protect the roots.

Hank Miller's ficus bonsai. Photo from Buffalo Bonsai Society.

If the bonsai is expensive or very old, you could keep it in an unheated garage over the winter. Some people buy an old refrigerator for the basement and keep their bonsai there. If you’re lucky enough to have a greenhouse, that is the best way to keep your bonsai sheltered and at the proper  temperature.

If you want a bonsai that will work as a houseplant, you can use something that normally grows in California, Florida or the Carolinas, such as a ficus, Williams said.

People interested in bonsai generally have three kinds of trees, she said. They own a mature bonsai so that they can enjoy the beauty of the art, a younger bonsai that they can train themselves, and a tropical bonsai so they have something to do during the winter.

A bonsai has the same life expectancy as a tree in your front yard, and with good care, a bonsai can last a couple hundred years, Williams said. Bonsai can be passed down from generation to generation. She has a 75-year-old spruce and is the third member of the Buffalo Bonsai Society to own it.

Wendy Williams' flowering crabapple bonsai. Photo from Buffalo Bonsai Society.

Bonsai aren’t dwarf plants. If you planted a bonsai outside and stopped pruning it, in 10 years it could be 40 feet tall, she noted.

To create a bonsai, you start with a tree from a nursery, usually in a five-gallon container, Williams explained. Look for a specimen with an interesting trunk. Smaller specimens that other customers aren’t interested in for their yards work fine for bonsai.

The tree is then pruned and wires are wrapped around the branches to bend them into a pleasing shape.

The plants aren’t injured or tortured.

“These are pampered pets,” Williams said.

It’s not hard to do bonsai, she said, but “bonsai is one of those things that if you don’t get some instruction, you can’t do it.”

In addition to the learning opportunities at the Bonsai Show, the Buffalo Bonsai Society offers instruction at its monthly meetings. Roy Wixon will talk about tools and tool care at the next meeting at 7 p.m. Wednesday, May 16 at Menne’s Nursery, 3100 Niagara Falls Blvd., Amherst. For a half hour before each meeting, anyone can bring in a tree and ask questions.

Dan Trzepacz's larch bonsai. Photo from Buffalo Bonsai Society.

Williams notes that the Buffalo Bonsai society has a number of very experienced members, but there are many who are new to bonsai, too.

“Don’t be intimidated,” she said. “Bonsai is something anyone can do.”

Photos are from the 2011 Bonsai Show and used with permission from the Buffalo Bonsai Society.

Occasionally readers contact me with specific gardening questions. Since I’m not an expert gardener, I often can’t answer the question myself, so I try to seek out someone who can.

Did you know you can use the same resources I use when trying to answer questions?

Often I call the Master Gardeners with Cornell Cooperative Extension Erie County at (716) 652-5400. These knowledgeable volunteers are available from 9 a.m. to noon weekdays. You can also email them at mgeriecce@gmail.com. There are helpful Cornell Cooperative Extension offices in other counties, too. Find contact information here for your county’s Cooperative Extension office.

You can also stop at a garden center to get great information. Check out our advertisers, click on their ad and you’ll be taken to their website or Facebook page to get their hours, address and other important information.

If you have a specific gardening question, I suggest using those routes. It will be the quickest and most efficient way to get the information you need.

Today we’ll try something where we can get a wide range of responses. I’m going to post three questions I have received and let my readers respond. You can join the conversation by leaving a comment. We welcome input from Master Gardeners and from our advertisers, too.

If you have questions that lend themselves to this process, email me at connie@buffaloniagaragardening.com. You can even attach a photo to illustrate your question.

Please leave a comment if you can help these readers with their questions, or just let me know what you think of this idea.

Question #1

My hostas are unfurling and look beautiful, but sooner than later, will be buggy and have holes.  What can be sprayed, or what can be used on these plants to stop the leaves from being eaten?

Diane Wacker

Question #2

All of a sudden, I have wild leeks growing throughout my gardens.  Last year they were in one section, now they are everywhere.  I have to dig down up to 8 inches to get the bulbs but they still come back.  How do I get rid of them?

Mary Fadeley

Question #3

This question was sent to me some months ago, and while I kept track of the question, I lost the information on who sent it– my apologies! The reader had heard about growing artichokes, and wanted to know if it can be done in Western New York.

I already talked to Bev Caffery, a Master Gardener intern at Cornell Cooperative Extension, who said you can’t really grow artichokes around here because they need mild winters and cool foggy summers. They are generally recommended for zones 7 to 9, which is warmer than Western New York. While artichokes are normally planted in fall, you could try treating them as an annual and plant them in spring, but you may or may not get a harvest. You could try to prune and mulch them in an attempt to get them through the winter, but she wasn’t optimistic that it would work.

There may not be much to add to this answer, but if anyone has tried growing artichokes, let us know how it turned out for you.

The labyrinth at the Chautauqua Institution lies partly in shade and partly in sun. Photo from the Chautauqua Institution.

Labyrinths date back thousands of years and have been used in many cultures. During Medieval times, many Christian churches incorporated labyrinths into floor designs. Today garden labyrinths are getting new attention at places of worship, medical centers, conference centers, parks, colleges and even backyards.

World Labyrinth Day is Saturday, May 5, so this seems a good time to introduce you to some  local labyrinths: one at Unity Church in Buffalo, one at the Chautauqua Institution and one in the yard of Suzanna Drozd-Kowalski of Corfu.

You don’t have to create a labyrinth in your own yard; you can explore these spiritual landscape features in many spots all over Western New York. You can search for a labyrinth near you at the World-wide Labyrinth Locator.

What labyrinths are

A labyrinth is a meditation tool.

“People have a sense that it’s ‘New-Agey,’ but labyrinths are classical,” said Debra Dinnocenzo, labyrinth coordinator for the Department of Religion at Chautauqua Institution. “They have been used extensively in the Christian tradition.” One of the most famous labyrinths is in the Chartres Cathedral in France, built around 1200 A.D.

You can find labyrinth designs on pottery, tablets and tiles dating back 4000 years, she said. In Native American culture it is called the Medicine Wheel and Man in the Maze. The Celts described it as the Never Ending Circle. It is also called the Kabala in mystical Judaism.

One feature all labyrinths share is that they have one path that winds in a circuitous way to the center. The labyrinth is not a maze; there are no tricks or dead ends. The entrance is the same as the exit; you can never get lost in a labyrinth. The path is in full view, which allows a person to be quiet and focus internally.

Steve Thoren, team leader of the Peace Park project at Unity Church in Buffalo, walks the church's labyrinth that was completed in December. Photo by Connie Oswald Stofko.

How to walk a labyrinth

The Rev. Allaurah Olson, minister emerita at Unity Church, offered some suggestions for walking a labyrinth.

The entrance is a place to stop, reflect and set an intention for the spiritual walk. As you walk, focus on the intention. At the center, you can take as long as you wish and be open and receptive to spiritual guidance. On the return journey, focus on what you bring from the center.

However, everyone interviewed for this article agreed that there is no right or wrong way to walk a labyrinth. If you want, you can run or skip or play a flute. You can use a labyrinth in whatever way works for you.

An open gateway welcomes visitors to the labyrinth in the yard of Suzanna Drozd-Kowalski of Corfu. Photo by Suzanna Drozd-Kowalski.

Chautauqua labyrinth incorporates tree

About eight years ago, Debra Dinnocenzo and Harriette Royer of Rochester, one of the instructors of classes related to labyrinths at Chautauqua, secured space for a  permanent labyrinth there.

The labyrinth is based on a design by Lisa Moriarty. As Royer made calculations to lay it out, they made a discovery: A tree was in the way! Rather than hack it down, they incorporated the tree into the design, which is unusual, she said. You can see it in the first photo.

Because of the tree, part of the labyrinth is in the shade and part is in the light. The earth is uneven, so sometimes you are walking downhill and sometimes you are walking slightly uphill. These physical features provide interesting metaphors for a spirtual journey, Dinnocenzo noted.

The beautiful rocks that line the paths were donated and installed by a local farmer, she said. They mow the area once at the beginning of the season, and the foot traffic keeps the grass down after that.

There are so many talks and concerts happening at Chautauqua during the summer that people can feel guilty to just sit on their porch and relax. Dinnocenzo encourages them to walk the labyrinth.

“It’s an opportunity to take a moment away from having too much to do,” she said. “You can take time to just be quiet in our culture.”

Rope lights illuminate this Corfu labyrinth. Photo by Suzanna Drozd-Kowalski.

Peace Park is evolving around labyrinth at Unity Church

Unity Church had its labyrinth professionally installed. It was completed in December.

The path is wide enough for a wheelchair or walker. It is made of crushed stone and bordered with red bricks. For a donation, a brick can be inscribed with your name or a loved one’s name.

The labyrinth is located on what was once a vacant lot on Linwood behind the church, explained Steve Thoren, team leader of the Peace Park project at the church. The church decided to create a Peace Park, where people in the community could come to find peace and relaxation.

The first feature of the park was the yellow gazebo, which you can see beyond the labyrinth in the second photo. A group is now planning gardens for the park.

Resident creates labyrinth in her own backyard

Suzanna Drozd-Kowalski has walked labyrinths in Germany, Italy and England. She has drawn labyrinths in the sand at beaches in Mexico and Fiji. And she has built a labyrinth in her backyard at 10 Maple Ave., Corfu, which is always open to the public.

She dedicated it to her mother, who was ill at the time, and her son-in-law, who was deployed in Iraq.

Unless the snow gets too deep, the labyrinth in Corfu can be walked during the winter. Photo by Suzanna Drozd-Kowalski.

“He came back safely from Iraq to cut the ribbon, and she was on the porch,” said Drozd-Kowalski.

Drozd-Kowalski comes from a long line of gardeners. She is a past president of the Corfu Garden Club, so the labyrinth is surrounded with plants. There are antique roses, clematis, ostrich ferns that get four feet high and hostas with white flowers that smell like orange blossoms. Statues are used in the garden as well.

It’s easy to build a labyrinth, she said. You can find many diagrams on the Internet and in books.

Lay down landscape fabric to keep the weeds down. Then spray your design with the paint they use to draw lines on sports fields.

She initially used mulch on the surface, but it breaks down and needs to be replaced, so she now uses a stone surface. If you collect rocks in your travels, you could use them in your labyrinth.

Rope lights illuminate the path at night.

“It’s a very tranquil place,” she said.

Labyrinth events

As part of World Labyrinth Day, Unity Church will participate in the “Walk as One at 1″ event, where people all over the planet walk a labyrinth at 1 p.m. in their time zone. The event will be held in Unity Peace Park, which is behind the church, 1243 Delaware Ave., Buffalo. (Walk past the gazebo.) People will meet at 12:15 p.m. for a short program, then walk the labyrinth at 1 p.m. Anyone may attend.

This summer, weekly “Introduction to the Labyrinth” sessions will be held at 7 p.m. Mondays,  June 24 – August 25 at the Chautauqua Institution. The sessions are open to the public. The labyrinth is easily accessible from SR394, and access to the grounds of Chautauqua beyond the gates is not required.

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Photo by Maxine Osiewicz.

Sometimes I have bits of information that I think will interest readers, but each bit is too short for a whole article. I save them up until I have enough to offer you a potpourri of news. I hope you find something that interests you.

Add height to your garden with an old ladder

Maxine Osiewicz of Clarence had an old wooden ladder that was no longer safe to use. Instead of throwing it away, she secured it to her garden shed and used it as shelves for shade-loving annuals.

Originally, Osiewicz’s idea was to use the ladder as a trellis for clematis, but she realized the area was too shady for that. That’s when she decided to go with pots of colorful coleus and impatiens.

To hold the pots in place, she drove a long skinny nail through each step of the ladder. The pots have small holes in the bottom, and she set one hole over the nail. Osiewicz arranged the pots so that they would line up neatly.

She notes that if you have a different space, you could hang the ladder horizontally.

The plants were doing well until the deer discovered them. Osiewicz sprayed the plants with deer repellent and they grew back.

Rain barrels are free to qualifying organizations

Buffalo Niagara Riverkeeper is donating rain barrels to qualifying organizations.

You must have an external gutter system with a downspout to divert runoff  into the rain barrel. Priority sites are high visibility sites and low-income residential communities including key public buildings, government offices, community gardens, schools and education centers in low-income communities within the Buffalo and Niagara River watershed. Private residential buildings are not eligible for this program.

Get more information and an application.

Check out native plant garden in Lewiston

Photo by Donna Brok.

If you enjoyed our article last week on native woodland plants, you might enjoy a visit to the small, shady native plant garden at the Lewiston Museum, 469 Plain Street, Lewiston. The plants are labelled with markers so you know what’s what.

Donna Brok did a great article about the garden on her blog Garden Walk, Garden Talk and featured many wonderful photos, including the photo of the yellow wood sorrel above right. I had seen this pretty flower in my neighbor’s lawn and thought it would make a pretty garden plant.

“This plant is considered a weed by most,” Brok wrote, so I don’t think my neighbor will mind if I dig up a few for myself. Yellow wood sorrel might work in a shady part of my yard or in a pathway.

“It is tough and can withstand some light foot traffic,” Brok wrote. “It grows robustly in a variety of conditions, including degraded habitats. What it does not like is competition with taller plants.”

The business office of the Lewiston Museum is open year round during normal weekday business hours, and the Exhibit Hall is open from 1 to 5 p.m. Wednesday through Sunday during June, July, and August, or by appointment.

Mischler’s named Small Business of Year

The Amherst Chamber of Commerce named Mischler’s Florist and Greenhouses the recipient of its Small Business of the Year Award for 2012.

Mischler’s  employs local residents, provides exceptional customer service, offers unique services and keeps commerce buzzing within the community, said Caitlin Campbell McNulty, the Chamber’s director of advocacy and communications.

Frank Mischler, president of Mischler’s, and Mark Yadon, vice president, will accept the award at a luncheon presented by the Chamber and First Niagara Bank on May 18.

Western New York Land Conservancy receives grants

The Western New York Land Conservancy will receive two grants totaling $48,400 from the Conservation Partnership Program of the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation and the Land Trust Alliance.

One grant will enable the Western New York Land Conservancy to begin the implementation phase of a multi-year Niagara Escarpment Legacy project intended to protect and restore approximately 320 acres of private and public lands along the Niagara Escarpment.

The other grant will enable the Land Conservancy to complete current condition reports and management plans for two properties in preparation for national land trust accreditation.

Town of Amherst no longer selling compost

The Town of Amherst Compost Facility will no longer be selling compost, wood mulch or soil blend products at the facility. If you have any questions, you can call the facility at (716) 689-1280.

Golden Alexanders or Zizia aurea. Photo by Ken Parker.

If you want something in your garden that your neighbors don’t have, try native plants, suggests Ken Parker, CNLP, native plant specialist and manager of trees, shrubs and perennials at Lockwood’s Greenhouses.

He will talk about native woodland plants that you can grow in your own garden at 10:30 a.m. Saturday, May 5 at Lockwood’s Greenhouses, 4484 Clark Street, Hamburg. The fee is $10. He will also be one of several speakers at a Native Plants Day at Lockwood’s on Saturday, July 7.

It’s rare to have local indigenous plants in our gardens, Parker noted. The majority of our garden plants are species that were introduced to Western New York. You don’t even see native woodland plants in our parks.

Ironically, native plants constitute a new product line for nurseries.

“It’s not that it’s a new product, it’s just that we lost that knowledge,” said Parker, who is part Seneca. “I look at native plants from the Native perspective.”

His knowledge of Native plants led to the development of numerous horticultural programs and lecture series within Native American communities, including the Mohawks of St. Regis, NY; the Iroqouis of Six Nations of the Grand River Reserve, Ontario; the Florida Seminoles, and Pueblos of New Mexico. In recent years he has presented for the Intertribal Native Nursery Council and U.S. Forestry Department.

Penstemon digitalis or smooth penstemon. Photo by Ken Parker.

Native Americans have long used native plants as food, as medicine, for fibers, for dyes and in ceremonies, he said. Other people are more interested in becoming self-sustaining nowadays, and they’re beginning to look to native plants.

There are many reasons to use native plants in your garden. Non-native plants can become invasive. Native plants support birds and insects. Our actions can have far-reaching environmental effects.  Parker noted that Native Americans look to the seventh generation, realizing that what we do now affects the next seven generations.

Lockwood’s is beginning to grow native plants for sale. This year they are offering native grasses and native perennials grown from seeds. Many of the plants that Parker will be discussing in his talk will be available for sale at Lockwood’s.

Parker’s definition of a native plant is a plant that was locally indigenous before European settlement.

There are plants, such as a Colorado spruce, that are indigenous to North America but not to New York State. For a plant to truly be a native plant, its seed source should be within 60 to 90 miles of Western New York, he said. Ideally, environmentalists would find a good wild specimen as a source of seed and document the plant’s location using GPS.

White Trillium. Photo by Ken Parker.

Parker knows a lot about native plants. He has been actively growing, installing and promoting indigenous plants of North America since 1992. Originally from South Buffalo, he moved to Canada and ran his own nursery that sold only native plants.

Parker also was featured for two seasons on the Canadian TV show Gardening Gamble, which was like Trading Spaces for yards.

A jazz and blues musician as well as a former U.S. Marine, Parker recently moved back to Western New York.

Many native woodland plants thrive in shade

“There’s more to life than hostas!” Parker said. Many woodland native plants grow well in the shade.

There are two kinds of shade. If you live in the city and have a small yard with a big tree sucking up all the water, you have dry shade. If you have an area under a tree that has had generations of leaves building up, you would have moist shade. Parker has provided lists of plants that do well in each kind of shade.

Elymus virginicus– Virginia Wild Rye

Carex plantaginea – Plantain-leaved Sedge

Actaea pachypoda – Doll’s Eyes or White Baneberry

Allium tricoccum – Wild Leek

Anemone canadensis – Canada Anemone

Aralia racemosa – American Spikenard

Arisaema triphyllum – Jack-in-the-Pulpit

Asclepias exaltata- Poke Milkweed

Ostrich fern or Matteuccia struthiopteris. Photo by Ken Parker.

Aster macrophyllus – Large-leaf Aster

Cimicifuga racemosa – Black Cohosh

Podophyllum peltatum – Mayapple

Sanguinaria canadensis – Bloodroot

Trillium grandiflorum – White Trillium

Cornus alternifolia –Pagoda Dogwood

Hamamelis virginiana – Common Witch Hazel

Lindera benzoin -Spicebush

Matteuccia struthiopteris –Ostrich Fern

Dennstaedtia punctilobula -Hay-scented Fern

Hystrix patula – Eastern Bottlebrush

Elymus virginicus– Virginia Wild Rye

Rubus ordoratus or purple-flowering raspberry. Photo by Ken Parker.

Carex plantaginea – Plantain-leaved Sedge

Elymus villosus – Silky Wild Rye

Aquilegia canadensis – Eastern Columbine

Asarum canadense – Wild Ginger

Eupatorium coelestinum – Blue Mistflower

Geranium maculatum – Wild Geranium

Helianthus strumosus – Paled-leaved Sunflower

Mertensia virginica – Virginia Bluebells

Penstemon digitalis – Smooth Penstemon

Celastrus scandens –American Bittersweet Vine

Cornus florida –Flowering Dogwood

Cornus racemosa –Grey Dogwood

Hydrangea quercifolia –Oakleaf Hydrangea

Parthenocissus quinquefolia –Virginia Creeper Vine

Rubus odoratus –Purple-Flowering Raspberry

Matteuccia struthiopteris –Ostrich Fern

Dennstaedtia punctilobula -Hay-scented Fern

Zizia aurea – Golden Alexanders

Native woodland grasses, perennials and trees

Parker offered this list of native grasses, perennials and trees. While all the plants listed here are North American, not all are indigenous to Western New York, he noted. All of these will be available at Lockwood’s. Those marked with an asterisk  are currently being propagated to be available early June.

Grasses

Eastern bottlebrush grass. Photo by Ken Parker.

Hystrix patula* -Eastern bottlebrush grass: A unique clump-forming woodland native offers a wide bladed, dark green foliage.  The very attractive seed heads resemble bottlebrushes and normally bloom during our Western New York summers.  Seed heads are excellent specimens for dried arrangements. (Medium to loam soil/part to full shade/height: 2-4′ feet)

Elymus virginicus*- Virginia wild rye : This cool-season native is widely adapted throughout Canada and the United States.  The straight, stiff and bristly seed heads are attractive in floral arrangements.  Blooms in early summer and is often found in woodland flood plains, thickets and prairie. (Average to moist soil/full sun to part shade/height: 1-3′ feet)

Carex plantaginea- Plaintain-leaved sedge: The uncommonly wide leaves form impressive clumps in shaded or woodland settings.  Naturally occurs in shady forested areas near oak stands. Once established, it can tolerate dry shade locations. Seeds feed a variety of wildlife. (Rich loam soil/part shade to shade/height: 1-3′ ft.)

Elymus villosus*- Silky wild rye: An attractive woodland grass with nodding bristly seed heads that mature in mid summer. Also tolerates dry shade areas once established. As the name suggests, the grass sheaths are hairy & silky. (Average soil/Part shade to shade/Height: 2-3′ ft.)

Perennials

Aquilegia canadensis – Eastern Columbine

Arisaema triphyllum – Jack-in-the-Pulpit

Asarum canadense – Wild Ginger

Asclepias exaltata – Poke Milkweed*

Aster macrophyllus – Large-leaf Aster

Eupatorium coelestinum – Blue Mistflower

Celastrus scandens or American bittersweet vine. Photo by Ken Parker. 

Geranium maculatum – Wild Geranium

Helianthus strumosus – Paled-leaved Sunflower*

Penstemon digitalis – Smooth Penstemon

Trees, shrubs and vines

Celastrus scandens–American Bittersweet Vine

Cornus alternifolia –Pagoda Dogwood

Cornus florida –Flowering Dogwood

Cornus racemosa –Grey Dogwood

Hydrangea quercifolia –Oakleaf Hydrangea

Lindera benzoin -Spicebush

Parthenocissus quinquefolia –Virginia Creeper Vine

Rubus odoratus –Purple-Flowering Raspberry

It turns out that St. Pierre didn’t make hers; she bought the inner workings at a garden show. What she got was a long bar with a large fork at the end to be placed in the ground. The fork prongs give the rod more stability, she said.

Just above the fork is a small piece of metal welded in a slanting position.

“I’m sure someone could make his/her own rod, but that small welded slanted piece is the key component,” she wrote. “I’m happy so many people were interested in my pots. I think it has a Mexican flair to it.”

Other readers said that you can indeed make this yourself. Following their instructions, I gave it a try, and here are my directions.

The basic idea is to stick a pole in the ground and thread the pots onto the pole through the drainage holes, as you can see in the photo at  right.

You could use rebar or copper tubing. I used a wooden dowel, and I think it should last for at least one season.

You can use any size pots you want, but remember that if you use small pots, they will dry out more quickly than large pots, so you’ll have to water them more often.

There must be a hole in the bottom of the pot. Few plastic pots have that drainage hole, so if you want to use plastic pots, you would have to drill a hole.

You need a dowel that will fit through the drainage hole in the pots. I used a 1/2 inch diameter dowel. The pots were ones I already had on hand,  ranging in size from 6 inches to about 4 inches. The holes in the smaller pots just fit on the dowel.

Buy a dowel that will be about the same height as your stacked pots, plus at least 1 or 2 feet longer. I used a 36-inch dowel.

Hammer the dowel into the ground. Thread the first pot on the dowel. Fill the pot with soil and plant it. It’s a bit awkward planting the pot while it’s on the dowel, but if you plant the pot first and then try to thread it on the dowel, everything in the pot will get disrupted.

Thread the next pot on and slant it any way you want. See photo above left. Plant the pot.

I wasn’t pleased with my first effort, which you can see at right. The pots were nesting in each other, taking up the room I’d rather use for plants. Plus, the pots weren’t achieving those interesting angles.

Here are two tips on rectifying those problems.

First, I believe that Cherie St. Pierre was right–Getting that initial slant is key. On my second try, which you can see below,  I wedged a rock under the bottom pot to get the whole arrangement off to a good start.

Second, I think using pots that are all the same size will help you get those great angles. Look at the two pots just above the bottom pot. They’re the same size and they angle very nicely.

You don’t need to glue the pots.

Another tip: Set up your leaning tower of pots on a firm spot. I assembled mine on a soft spot that had been recently dug up. A few days later, it rained and the bottom pot began to sink. Just tamping down the earth a bit should solve that problem.

I used plants that were growing in the wrong spots in my garden and needed transplanting: chives, parsley, violets, forget-me-nots and sedum.

St. Pierre said she found that Portulaca is a great plant for this design because the top pot dries out quickly and Portulaca does not need so much watering.

If you’re going to have your tower in the sun over the summer, I second St. Pierre’s suggestion for selecting plants that thrive in hot, dry conditions. That way you won’t have to water as often. You could also plant up a leaning tower using coleus to add color to a shady spot.

She shared her colorful garden during Garden Walk Buffalo last year. This year the event will be held July 28 and 29.

Rodgers’ garden is another example of grassless front yards that are so charming. They seem to be turning into a symbol of Buffalo-style gardening.

Her front yard was mostly clay, so she got peat moss and humus (decomposed leaves and such) and rototilled  those materials through the clay. The first year she just planted annuals because she wasn’t sure what she wanted to do. The next season she added more peat moss and humus, and it’s now flourishing.

“I love Charleston, S.C., so that’s the look I’m going for,” Rodgers said, adding that she wants to install a fan on the front porch of her 1830 Italianate house.

Color is important to Rodgers, and she has plenty of it in her garden. What’s surprising is how little of the color is supplied by flowers. Yes, she has many flowering plants, but they’re not all in bloom at the same time.

The large areas of color are supplied mainly by coleus, sedum, mosses and grasses in strong yellows and green.  Notice the dramatic contrast between the red coleus and yellow creeping jenny in the photo below. There’s so much color without any blooms. The dark mulch also adds to the look of the garden.

Rodgers aims for a symmetrical design.

One of the interesting flowers in her garden is the pretty ice plant, which you can see below right. In California, where wildfires are a problem, the ice plant was touted as a fire safe plant, according to the San Diego Horticultural Society.  They were planted along roadsides and on hillsides of thousands of homes in San Diego. Unfortunately, the ice plants crept out of gardens and began competing with native plants. Ice plants are no longer  recommended in that area.

The ice plant doesn’t grow that aggressively here. In the spring, the plant looks like dead wood, so Rodgers cautions you to take care not to weed it out.

Another interesting plant in her garden is a fragrant grass called threshing grass. During Victorian times, people didn’t bathe often, so they would toss the grass on their floors, she said. When you walk on the grass, it gives off a sweet scent.

Tip: If you plan to share your garden on a garden walk, Rodgers has this suggestion. Lay down a layer of mulch early in the season. A week before your garden walk, add a “tuxedo” layer to polish it up.