Shop early for best selection at the Easton Garden Club’s annual Greens Sale on Saturday, December 3rd. The Club’s been busy cutting fresh greens for your holiday decor.
Easton Garden Club Greens Sale Saturday Dec. 3rd
Leave a reply
Author Archives: admin
Easton Garden Club: Landscape Design Challenge Winner
Super happy to share that I’m a Landscape Design Challenge Winner, donating my talents for community service for Easton as a proud member of the Easton Garden Club. Big surprise: I included lots of native plants in my winning designs.
Easton Town Offices plantings maturing fast
Little bluestem is a native plant I featured in the design at the Easton Town Offices flagpole island bed, created in conjunction with the Easton Garden Club’s Landscape Design Challenge. The bluestems’ red colorization increases with the cooling days of autumn, and it holds its horticultural interest until spring, all wild and tangled in the wind and weather.
Easton Garden Club Flower Show “Down on the Farm” at NRT Fair
The Easton Garden Club to present a judged flower show, “Down on the Farm” at NRT Fair
Judged exhibits in flower design and horticulture, plus numerous educational exhibits will be available for viewing by the public, free of charge, with their fair admission.
Check out the Flower Show tomorrow from 10-4 at the Sheep Pasture Barn!
Find out more: Easton Garden Club on Facebook
Fall magic at Roger Williams Park Botanical Center Display Garden
Butterfly weed seed rests on Joe pye weed at Roger Williams Park Botanical Center Display Garden.
There’s magic in the air again this fall, as silky puffs burst out of butterfly weed follicles like bright white fireworks bursting out of a purse, each carrying what looks like an aged miniature copper penny that is actually a seed about to take flight.
I had the pleasure of volunteering with the URI Master Gardeners at Roger Williams Park Botanical Center Display Garden yesterday, weeding and edging beds (aka bed maintenance) just in time to spiff up for this weekend’s plant sale, URI Master Gardeners soil testing and info kiosk event, and the Botanical Center Conservancy Photography Contest Exhibition.
Even though I garden practically every day, I was in awe at the early fall colors in the Display Garden. Blooming plumes on grasses push back and forth in the wind, contrasted against stands of perennials, some in full bloom and full of pollinators, others done blooming but still beautiful with their fall-colored crayon foliage and seeds about to drop.
Native butterfly weed follicles burst open at Roger Williams Park Botanical Center Display Garden
Nymphs of big milkweed bugs, Oncopeltus fasciatus, on butterfly weed follicles at Roger Williams Park Botanical Center Display Garden
Reclaim the perimeter of your yard
Carol removes a stump after clearing a tangle of exotic invasive plants on the sloped perimeter of a client’s lawn in Sharon, MA.
Trees and shrubs, vines and weeds getting the best of the perimeter of your yard? Reclaim it! That’s what I did for a client in Sharon, MA, They were getting ready to sell their house, and I wanted to leverage their back yard with an expansive view to a trio of established but hidden ash trees on the edge of the property. So I cut down a few small trees and hacked out their roots, removed lots of exotic invasive plants like multi flora rose, Asian bittersweet and garlic mustard…though the knot weed is still a work in progress.
Carol didn’t let this stump stump her. Her reciprocating saw and pry bar and patience did the trick. She did this to open the view to the large trees in the background. It’s hard to see, but behind the iris is a native Viburnum shrub that had been hidden by overgrowth.
Join me at Sharon Green Day May 7th 12-4 pm
Enjoy a free, fun-filled, family oriented afternoon, and discover how you can make a difference for the next generation!
Black eyed Susan, Rudbeckia fulgida, is an excellent native pollinator and butterfly garden plant.
If you want to support pollinators, come find my table at the Sustainable Sharon Coalition’s Green Day on May 7th from 12-4 on High Street, Sharon Center, between the Sharon Public Library & Congregational Church. I’ll be selling perennials with high horticulture and pollinator value, and Rudbeckia fulgida v fulgida will be the star of the show.
(In case of inclement weather, the event will be held inside the Congregational Church Parish Hall.)
Carol Accredited as NOFA Organic Land Care Professional
I’m proud to have become an Accredited Organic Land Care Professional by the Northeast Organic Farming Alliance (NOFA). Read the Easton Journal’s business news for more info.
Horticulturist Carol Lundeen of Easton is a NOFA Accredited Organic Land Care Professional.
In My Horticultural Opinion (IMHO): Kill Your Bradford Pears
I agree with North Carolina Extension Master Gardener Linda G. Brandon about the environmental and economic damage caused by beautiful, fragile Bradford pears. She’s in North Carolina, but the issues she addresses are true in New England, too. See the link to her report just below these photos:
Bradford pear trees are beautiful in spring, but only for the eyes. They are harmful to the environment and our economy.
Bradford pears are unstable and tend to burst apart due to their weak branching structure.
https://guilford.ces.ncsu.edu/2013/10/bradford-pear-a-mixed-blessing-in-the-landscape/
SUPPORT OUR LIONS: Bid on a Home Soil Test at Sunday’s Easton Lions Club Live Charity Auction
This horticulturist’s best advice? Invest in a soil test before investing one cent of money or a second of your valuable time shopping for plants.
Where can you get a soil test, how do you sample and prepare your soil for testing, where do you send it, what does it cost, and what should you do with the results? Well, this Sunday, March 13, the Easton Lions Club is holding a televised charity auction at the Oliver Ames High School cafeteria from 2-8 p.m., and Garden-911 is donating two gift certificates for home soil testing.
Below is a link to the Lions’ auction site where you can learn more. To bid on these certificates, know that this is a live auction item so you must be present at the auction to bid:
Garden-911 Soil Test Certificates Available at the 2016 Lions Club Charity Auction
So come on down on Sunday, support the Lions and our community, and support the safe, smart stewardship of your land, starting with a soil test. I’ll be there volunteering, so please feel free to find me and say hello.
If you don’t win the bidding, thanks for being a good sport and supporting the Lions.
