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Hepatica nobilis

4/2/2017

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"Spring is like a perhaps hand (which comes carefully out of Nowhere)..." -  e e cummings
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Spring Has Come

3/19/2017

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“You can cut all the flowers but you cannot keep Spring from coming.”- Pablo Neruda
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Autumn

10/20/2014

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Autumn is like an old book:
Marred spines turn mean yellow,
staples rust red-orange.

Every stained page is stressed
by a splat of color. Rough-red,
like an old tavern,

we become hungry birds
and prepare for fall.
Shape and shadow are candied citron

as lanterns turn bitter yellow. Autumn
is a red fox, a goblet filled with dark wine,
a hot chilli pepper with smoky eyes.

Pressed leaves take in the colors
of seafood paella and saffron; these leaves
are like death, climaxing with a smile.

Autumn: Her dress is a net of mussels;
dark shelled, it covers up
summer’s weatherbeaten body.

So pull out your boots
and stand on an aged, wood floor
like an evergreen.
                                    Mary Hamrick : "Autumn"


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Lily of the Valley

5/15/2014

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It happened  long time ago in a country that never existed. A happy country whose only inhabitants were gods of all sorts.  Filled with  insatiable longing for beauty,  the almighty gods  resolved  to create a flower, a perfect flower, far more beautiful than all the flowers  thriving in the endless and colourful meadows of the country.  Surprisingly, the  realisation of the dream appeared  to be impossible, as  the divine  designers could not work out the shape for that perfect flower. All  suggested forms fell short of their expectations. They were all too inferior.  The initial enthusiasm slowly morphed into doubt and then despair, which had never been  favourite  emotions among gods. Suddenly, one of them cried that he had seen an ideal shape they might copy.  It was... 

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Mary's Milk Drops

2/13/2014

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"Once upon a time the Virgin was slowly waking to Jerusalem carrying her  little baby in her arms. She wanted to present her beloved son to the Temple. The weather was hot and she knew that soon she would have to feed the infant. She sat quietly in a nearby garden and begun to nurse  the baby when suddenly... she had a horrible  vision which made her weep without consolation. She saw the future fate of her son and started trembling with horror.  As she shook, the mouth of the baby pulled loose from her teat and several milk drops fell onto the leaves of a plant growing next to her feet. At the same time her tears dropped on the little buds changing them pink red,  the colour of her weeping eyes. When the buds opened into flowers, they were as blue as Mary's veil."  That was the way how Jerusalem cowslip or Mary's milk drops, or Adam and Eve, or soldiers and sailors, or spotted dog, or lungwort, or Pulmonaria officinalis appeared in the world. 

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Lucky Leaf

2/7/2014

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And extremely easy to find because it  can be grown on... a window sill.  Unlike the four-leaf clover whose dubious or at least mutable existence makes all of us spend hours in the meadow, busily scanning  all growing shamrock to find a reward: a four-leaf  trefoil. You really are lucky if you find one.  However, if you do not feel like  hunting for luck in the field and  would like to have  at home a potful of lucky leaves - without any substantial effort - all you need to do is buy a bag of small bulbs labelled: Oxalis deppei or Iron Cross (its  common name) and simply plant them in a pot. Within two or three weeks the first lucky leaves will appear and start  working wonders. Some of them are even observable as the leaves move. Botanists have coined a somewhat little flattering term for that activity and call it nasty. Well, it is the photonasty.

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Unsurpassed Begonia

1/27/2014

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All begonias are unsurpassed, but this one is The Unsurpassed. Tuberous begonia- as the name suggests- grows from tubers whose appearance does not indicate nothing near the overwhelming beauty of the  flowers they bring into the world. Being a fortunate result of multiple hybridisations this unusual plant has produced so many and  so different cultivars that leafing through a catalogue - where they are portrayed- can cause  uncontrollable but  fruitful dizziness.  Inspired by that aesthetically shocking  experience, we should not wait any moment longer and  order  a lot of  magic  tubers. Time flies and quite soon they will have to be planted into pots to trigger the  sleeping forces hidden inside.

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Blue Rainbow

12/11/2013

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Siberian Flag  is beautifully blue. And graceful. And... . There is a long list of outstanding characteristics in the catalogue which illustrate this particular perennial. Two of them deserve special attention, though: reliable and eternal. If we want to understand the essential meaning of the word 'perennial', Iris sibirica satisfies all  possible questions and doubts we might harbour. It is an everlasting plant whose elegant flowers appear every late spring adorning  gardens with hopeful blues and purples that are so hard to match. Only delphiniums might consider competing with these irises but instead, they only prove to be a perfect complement to Siberian Flag: a vertical one, whereas Iris sibirica expands its blue clouds rather horizontally. What a lucky -and geometric- coincidence they bloom at the same time. 

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Spiderwort

11/27/2013

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Spiderwort is not spider plant nor spider flower. If not, what is its relation with spiders? None!  However, after a closer inspection of the open spiderwort blooms, we might find some justification for the common name of  Tradescantia x andersoniana, just in the middle of each of them - a tuft of downy hairs, a straightforward (or farfetched) resemblance  to a delicate spiderweb. Anyone who dreads looking at spiders will probably willingly accept  another interpretation, e.g.,  a delicate cosmetic brush.  This one is much closer to beauty than spiders are and definitely exposes better the somewhat modest  assets of this charming yet underestimated  perennial: decorative leaves, profuse flowering and exceptional durability.                                 

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Seal Of Wisdom

11/19/2013

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Maybe not of  wisdom itself but definitely of someone who is said to have been extremely wise: Solomon. And here the puzzle begins. Why should a rhizomatous plant have anything in common with one of the most reverenced  biblical figures who "the whole world sought audience with to hear the wisdom God had put in Solomon's heart"? Nobody knows. There are more or less plausible explanations why, and the more we try to understand the mystery the more we want to have that symbol of sagacity in our garden. It does not hurt to grow something  so closely related to that noble quality, does it? And the appearance of the plant perfectly matches its symbolic meaning for in the case of Polygonatum, both the wisdom and beauty reside in one home.  

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    I was destined to be born gardener. In order to become a professional  one I had to enjoy years of studying at various  schools and  universities...  read more

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