Author: Henry Homeyer

A few flowers that attract butterflies

Monarchs are on the move! It is time for their long trip to Mexico to spend the winter. And like marathon runners, they need to bulk up on calories before the event. You may have let a patch of milkweed grow on the edges of your property to support them. That is great, and many of us have done that. But the milkweed plants are for the caterpillars to munch on. Right now they offer nothing to monarchs. Our monarchs need blooming flowers for nectar and pollen.

Of the monarchs I see floating around my gardens, three plants seem most attractive to them for feeding right now: Joe Pye weed, goldenrods and asters. Let’s look at these and their garden worthiness.

Joe Pye weed is a native wildflower that likes stream edges and places with good moisture, though it will grow almost anywhere it is planted. It is a big plant, often 5 or 6 feet tall in the wild. It is a clumping plant, with the clumps getting bigger every year.

It is readily found in plant nurseries, although most sold are a named cultivar, one called “Gateway.” I have found that Gateway blooms longer and does better in a vase than the truly wild ones that have popped up along my stream. There is now a smaller Joe Pye that is called “Little Joe” that only gets to be 3 to 4 feet tall. It is a patented variety that does not breed true, and is actually a different species in the same genus, Eupatorium dubium. Then there is one called “Baby Joe,” but I have not yet tried either one.

The flowers of Joe Pye weed are a light purple and appear in large panicles at the top of the plant. The stems of Gateway are a deep purple, though the wild ones tend to be greener. Plant Joe Pye weed where you want it as the fibrous roots go deep into the soil, and when firmly established they are nearly impossible to dig out.

Goldenrods are a wonderful though frequently maligned genus of plants. For many years they were prohibited in arrangements in the flower room at our county fair, as it was believed they caused hay fever. They do not. They have a heavy, sticky pollen that does not fly in the air but is transported by insects. There are at least 20 species of native goldenrods, including some that prefer shade, while others demand full sun.

Goldenrods are important not only for monarch butterflies but also for many butterflies, moths, bees and other pollinators. And yes, some of the big, sun-loving species will expand their territory and send tenacious roots deep into the soil, even muscling out some dainty perennials.

Years ago I purchased some blue-stemmed goldenrod at The Garden in the Woods in Framingham, Massachusetts. I grow it in dry shade and in rich soil in moist shade. It has never been a pest or traveled around my garden beds, staying just where I planted it, blooming in September and into October. It is quite dainty.

My favorite goldenrod is a variety called “Fireworks” of the speciesSolidago rugosa. It prefers full sun and moist soil, but I have also grown it in part sun and fairly dry soil. Its flowers are tiny, blooming first at the tips and working their way down the 3- to 4-foot stems. The stems arch gracefully like a fireworks display. They can be divided every three to four years to keep the clumps to a manageable size and to increase (or share) them.

All the asters and aster-family flowers are great for monarchs and other butterflies. Scientists don’t call the genus aster any more, but Symphyotrichum, which is a shame as it is much less user-friendly.

There are at least 30 species of asters that grow wild in America, including many nice shade-loving ones that are certainly uprooted as weeds by tidy gardeners long before they bloom now, in the fall.

Asters have flowers with many rays and a bright yellow eye. They range from deep purple to white, along with pink and a light blue. All are quite tough, surviving any winter thrown at them.

Similar to asters, and a plant I just saw visited by a hungry monarch, is New York ironweed. It has smaller, deep purple blossoms in big clusters at the top of stems that can reach 9 feet tall.

According to Tracy DiSabato Aust in her fabulous book, The Well-Tended Perennial Garden, shorter, later-blooming plants can be created by cutting back all the stems to the ground when they reach 2 feet tall. I shall certainly try that next spring. I moved mine from moist soil to dry soil in partial shade partly because it got too tall in the full sun.

If you care about your monarchs, plant native plants. Native plants are much more useful to pollinators and wild animals than plants imported from other continents. Many of the native plants are just as beautiful and pleasing to me in the garden, and hopefully they are to you, too.

Featured photo: Monarch feeding on New York ironweed. Courtesy photo.

How to build hedges and fences

While vacationing recently on the Maine coast I admired many nice gardens. Many of them had hedges or fences, more than I am used to seeing in rural New Hampshire.

When settlers first arrived in New England they dug out stones left by the glaciers some 10,000 years before. They piled them up to clear farm fields, and began making stone walls to define property borders and to contain animals — or to keep them out. Gradually dry stone wallers learned how to make them look good and last forever.

Building a stone wall or retaining wall is hard work, and expensive to have someone else build. If you want to build your own, remember three things: First, the soil moves in winter as it freezes and thaws. This can make walls tumble if not properly built. Wallers have learned to add drainage under and around a wall: at least a foot of one-inch crushed stone in a trench beneath the wall works well. Round pebbles will act as ball bearings would, allowing stones to move.

Each stone should touch four others, two below it, two above it. Stones should not be stacked one on top of another, much the way bricks are laid. This helps to tie it all together and prevent movement.

Lastly, use a long string to keep the wall straight and level. Or if you are creating a curved wall, define it carefully before starting. You can place a garden hose on the soil to help define the curve.

Early settlers also made wattle fences. I talked to Crow Boutin, who makes his living making wattle fences in the Kennebunk area of Maine. These fences are simple: He cuts lengths of fresh yellow birch that are 1 to 2 inches in diameter. First he makes “pencils” that he drives in the ground with a hammer after he cuts them to length and sharpens them with an ax. Then he weaves pieces of birch 8 to 10 feet long between the vertical pencils that he spaces about 16 inches apart. The tension of the bent stems holds the fence in place. Simple? You bet, and something you could try.

But why do people need fences or hedges? Some are just for the looks, or to create a backdrop for flowers. Others are to keep others from looking into the yard, or to keep animals in (or out). Let’s take a look at a few I saw.

The nicest fences I saw were white picket fences. Maybe I like them because my grandfather had one, and I remember it from my youth. They show off flowers well, and allow climbers to climb on them. But generally you have to pay someone to install them, and, as Tom Sawyer knew, you must paint them from time to time. Now these fences come in a variety of materials including fiberglass or plastic that needs no painting.

Living fences — hedges — come in a variety of species. Evergreen hedges like yew or arborvitae can look good summer and winter, but are often eaten by deer. Hemlock and pine are less likely to be predated by deer, but they will grow to 60 feet tall unless they are trimmed every year and most somehow escape and do get tall.

Rugosa roses are commonly used as hedges on the Maine coast. They will grow in sandy soil and produce copious fragrant flowers and handsome red fruits in the fall. But they look bedraggled over time, and aren’t green in winter. Their thorns do keep people and pets from cutting corners through the yard.

Lilacs look great when blooming and have handsome green leaves eight or nine months of the year, but do little to block the view of your house and yard in winter. They do best in sweet soil, so add limestone every year or three to keep them blooming nicely. Lilacs, too, need trimming or they can get gangly.

The split rail fence is generally made of cedar, which lasts a long time — up to 20 years. It creates a rustic look, but neither keeps animals out nor blocks the nosy neighbor’s view. It will keep cars from parking on your lawn, and can support vines like roses or clematis.

Less common fences include stockade fences, which are tall wooden fences that block all view of the yard. These are what you need if you like to sunbathe nude in the garden and have a near neighbor. Definitely not a friendly signal to neighbors. Iron rail fences, wire fences and chain link fences all have their uses, but I can’t imagine having one installed.

Lastly, there is the deer fence. Many gardeners use them in order to grow vegetables, or to have tulips in the spring. Nowadays there are woven plastic fences that are inexpensive and come in 8-foot widths that work well to keep out deer. You can install them yourself on posts or stakes you cut in the forest. They work — unless you leave the gate open! Me? I have depended on having dogs to scare away the wildlife for many years. They did the job well, though I am now looking to adopt a dog as my corgi, Daphne, passed away a year ago. And I love dogs, too, which I can’t say for fences.

Featured photo: You could build this simple wattle fence. Photo courtesy of Henry Homeyer.

How to make your own compost

Most gardeners do some composting. Some compost anything that was part of a living plant, mixing it with barnyard waste; they turn and aerate the piles, making terrific compost in record time. Others are lazy composters who throw kitchen scraps or weeds in a pile and let it decompose. I’m a lazy composter. I have too much to do in the garden to take the temperature of my compost pile or check it weekly for moisture content — let alone turning it regularly.

Let’s look at the basics: Organic matter — leaves, weeds, moldy broccoli or cow manure — is digested by bacteria and fungi. These microorganisms exist in amazing numbers in biologically active soil or compost. But for them to multiply and break down organic matter, they need a good supply of materials containing lots of carbon and a little bit of nitrogen. Both are needed to build cell walls of the little critters and the proteins and oils in their bodies.

Scientists say your compost pile should be 25 or 30 pounds of material containing carbon for one pound of nitrogen. Carbon-containing materials include dry grass or leaves, straw and, in general, brown materials. Nitrogen-containing things are also referred to as “green” materials — fresh grass clippings, weeds and household kitchen waste. Just to confuse you, all manures — which are brown — are also full of nitrogen.

We keep a 55-gallon drum of dry leaves next to our compost bin. We fill it in the fall and pack down the leaves to get in as many as possible. Each time we empty our 5-gallon bucket of kitchen scraps into the bin, we add some leaves on top. This adds carbon to the pile and helps to keep flies away from the goodies. These leaves are certainly not in the ratio of carbon to nitrogen needed for the fastest composting, but it helps. We count on the kitchen scraps to have some carbon, too.

For weeds, we just pile them up and let them decompose over time. We suffer from an infestation of goutweed, a noxious invasive. We try to keep any goutweed out of piles that will eventually be used for compost as even a scrap of root can start a new place for it to grow. Other invasives we do not have — but would separate if we had them — include Japanese knotweed and black swallow wort. In fact, anything invasive should not go in any compost pile you hope to use later.

What else should stay out of compost piles? Meat scraps, oils and fat, dog and cat feces. Shredded newspapers and office paper can be used in compost piles — they are carbon-based, and their inks now are made from soy products. Shiny color inserts and magazines I avoid using. If you add shredded paper to your compost pile, mix it in well — thick layers will not decompose easily.

What about weed seeds in compost causing problems when you use your homemade compost? Ideally, if you’re doing everything right, your compost pile will heat up enough for a few days to kill the weed seeds, curing it for three days at 140 degrees. I’ve done experiments using annual grass seed and a soil thermometer, and found that even a day or two at 135 will kill those seeds. Weed seeds may be tougher, and it’s tough to get an entire compost pile hot at the same time.

How do you get your compost to heat up? Layer green (nitrogen-containing) and brown (carbon-based) materials. The key is the nitrogen layer. Fresh grass cuttings are high in nitrogen and easily collected with a bagger. Mix them in your compost pile, and it will heat up. Poultry manure, or any manure, is also high in nitrogen and will heat up your pile. Compost thermometers look like meat thermometers with a longer probe and are sold at garden centers or online.

Moisture level is important for making compost. The pile should be neither dry nor soggy. A handful should feel as moist as a squeezed-out sponge. I place tree branches underneath a new compost pile to help with drainage. Never put a pile where a roof dumps water. Your compost should be well-aerated. You want aerobic decomposition. Some gardeners turn and fluff their compost regularly.

I add compost to the planting holes for my tomatoes and kale, and work some in for everything, in fact. Why? Because even though I have great soil, compost gets oxidized and breaks down. Plants extract minerals from it. Beneficial bacteria and fungi use it to build their bodies. I try to keep my soil fluffy — roots do better in soil that’s loose and aerated — and compost helps me to create that most desirable of soils: a nice loam.

Even though I make compost, I also buy it by the truckload. It’s available from farms, garden centers and others. Ask for hot-processed, aged compost to avoid weeds.

There are no poor gardeners, just poor soil. Add compost and perhaps a little organic fertilizer and you will have a “green thumb.” It takes time to make compost and build soils, which is why you should start now!

Featured photo: Simple compost bins made of pallets allow old compost to age, and new materials to be added. Photo by Henry Homeyer.

Does your garden deserve a medal?

As I walked around the garden recently with my wife, Cindy Heath, she turned to me and said, ”Anybody whose gardens looks great at this time of year deserves a medal.” Do you want a medal? Here are some tips I have come up with.

First, pull any tall weeds. By now a few vigorous weeds can tower over flowers in your garden if you let them. Pull them before company comes if you don’t want to be embarrassed by your sloth.

I have lots of jewel weed in partly sunny to shady flower beds that have rich, moist soil. It is a native plant, but one that can take over if you let it. I recently removed some that was well over 6 feet tall. It was in a bed with tall perennials, and I guess it outgrew them to get more sunshine. In other places, where the completion is minimal, it might only get 3 or 4 feet tall.

According to the U.S. Forest Service website, it is one of just a few native plants that can outcompete garlic mustard, a terrible invasive in our woodlands. So if you have it and have garlic mustard, you might want to let it survive — and enjoy its bright orange and red flowers that I find cheery.

Next on my list, I’d recommend deadheading flowers that have gone by and are looking shabby. I have a huge bed of Shasta daisies in front of our house, but they were in their prime a couple of weeks ago. Cindy cleaned up the flowers with a pair of scissors in just 10 minutes. It made a huge difference to remove all those spent blossoms. There are still many flowers in that bed that look fine, so we didn’t need to cut it all down.

Bleeding heart is a favorite flower of mine. It’s a big plant that blooms in early summer in either pink or white. But by now the flowers are long gone and the leaves have turned yellow. What to do? Cut back the foliage to the ground. Don’t wait until fall or frost to arrive, just cut it back now. Do the same throughout the garden.

So what can you do with those empty spaces where you cut back flowers that have declined to the point that they needed to be cut back? Depending on the spacing, you might be able to fit in some chrysanthemums or fall asters. These are sold in bud or bloom in pots in grocery stores, farm stands and garden centers. They will bloom for weeks so long as you do not let them dry out. Fall asters are in the same category as the more common mums: inexpensive and lovely for filling in empty places.

Fall mums and short purple asters are often sold in compressed cardboard pots. Unfortunately, these dry out very quickly. If you leave the plant in them, you need to soak the pots and plants regularly, generally more than once a week. The solution? Plant them in the ground when you can, or put them into plastic, fiberglass or ceramic pots.

I can’t plant mums where I’ve cut back that big bleeding heart, for example, as I would damage the roots if I dug there. But I can place them in a nice ceramic pot and set it gently in the same area as the bleeding heart, though perhaps a little forward or back from the stubs of the stems. Yes, it is work to do so, but it is worth the effort if you have it in a prominent spot that you (and your visiting friends and neighbors) will see.

In the vegetable garden many plants are suffering from a variety of fungal diseases. Mold and mildew are common and make leaves ugly. The solution? Cut off the leaves. There are usually newer, undamaged leaves, and new leaves on things like squash and pumpkins are still growing. Once a leaf has mildew, you can’t make it look good, so get rid of it.

Tall flowers are flopping over now, particularly if we get a heavy rain. I grow a black-eyed Susan, Rudbeckia “Henry Eiler,” that has gorgeous, unusual blossoms, but it grows to be over 6 feet tall. I surrounded the big clump with hardwood stakes a month ago and tied string from stake to stake to support it. Recently I tied another tier of string higher up on the 6-foot stakes to prevent flopping.

For some things I can avoid using string by pushing stakes into the soil at roughly a 45-degree angle, two of them in an “X” pattern. I push the flopper up, then support it with the two stakes. For smaller things I use bamboo stakes, for larger, heavier things like New England asters that can by 5 feet tall, I use 5-foot one-inch hardwood stakes. Paint them green if you don’t want to notice them.

What about the lawn? By Labor Day it may be looking pretty shabby. I don’t believe any of us should waste water on our lawns. If you have a sunny yard with sandy soil, your lawn may be looking yellowed and dry. Crab grass, an annual that fills in where the lawn is compacted by foot traffic, is declining or dead by now in most places. My solution? Hope for rain, and try to avoid looking at the dead spots. Enjoy looking at that medal-worthy garden of yours!

Featured photo: Fall asters can be used to add color where you have cut back faded perennials. Courtesy photo.

How to start wildflowers from seed

I recently visited the Nasami Farm in Whately, Mass. This is the plant production facility for the Native Plants Trust, formerly the New England Wildflower Society. I met with Alexis Doshas, their nursery manager. The 75–acre farm produces perennials, grasses and some woody plants — mainly from seed. The plants are sold at their headquarters in Framingham, Mass., and at the Nasami Farm on weekends.

If you’re interested in growing wildflowers, the least expensive way to get plenty is to start them from seed. This takes some effort, but it accomplishes a number of things: if you collect seed from the wild, you’re getting plants in your garden without diminishing the wild population — the way you would if you dug plants (which is prohibited anyway in most places).

Starting plants from seed also encourages genetic diversity. Many purchased plants are propagated from cuttings or by division, which means they’re all clones with the exact same genes. Seeds from any given plant produce seedlings with a wide range of characteristics, making some less susceptible to environmental challenges such as global warming.

Starting wildflowers from seed can take patience. While some seeds will germinate and grow the same summer you collect them (campanulas, for example), other things like lilies might take four or five years to bloom. Many require a cold period of three months, which is called cold stratification. Some planted now will grow underground next spring, but not send up any green growth until the following spring.

The Nasami Farm grows seedlings in big plastic hoop houses. These aren’t heated except in spring, or if temperatures go below zero in winter. The greenhouses allow the seedlings to be monitored and tended easily on long tables. You could set up a table in your barn, shed or garage for a few flats of seedlings. Some wildflowers do fine in flats with good drainage in the outdoors — preferably in a shady place that won’t see too much of the hot, drying sun.

Lastly, you can plant seeds directly in the ground in a site where they’ll thrive as mature plants. The disadvantage to this is you never know what percentage of seeds will germinate. If you plant 100 seeds in a flat indoors it’ll be easier to thin or transplant the seedlings than if you must do so on your hands and knees. And there shouldn’t be weed competition if you’re using a germination mix in a flat. On the other hand, I plant things like goldenseal directly in the ground as it takes two years to sprout, and I don’t want to have to water and tend them so long.

Alexis Doshas gave me some tips for starting wildflowers from seed. First, she said, collect seed when it’s easy to pull off the plant, and remove any fluffy stuff attached to it. Generally seeds start light colored, and darken when fully ripe. If you want to store seed, make sure it doesn’t dry out. Store in a cool, dark place.

Buy a very fine seed germination mix, something made of finely ground peat and perlite. A coarse mix can let seeds wash down deeper than they should be. For small seeds (the size of a grain of sand or less) just sow seeds, pat them into the soil mix and water them in. No need to cover them. Alexis suggests germinating seeds at 60 to 80 degrees, but cautioned that many wildflowers need a 90-day cold period before they’ll grow.

Alexis said you may need to provide rodent protection: metal hardware cloth over the flats to keep mice from eating the seeds. Rodents can be a problem as easily in your cold basement as in a barn or outdoors.

I asked Alexis to recommend some plants that are easy to start from seed right now. She suggested blueberries, huckleberries and plums for fruits. Of the flowers, she listed these: milkweed, mountain mint, black-eyed susans, wild bee balm, wild iris, asters, Joe Pye weed and all the goldenrods, which are great for pollinators.

Woodland wildflowers, she said, often have very specific needs and aren’t as easy to grow as the field flowers mentioned above. Soil pH and type are important. When I plant spring wildflowers I try to mimic the forest type of their native habitat: if they grow in a maple-beech-ash forest in the wild, I try to plant them in a similar environment.

Plants with large, fleshy fruits such as jack-in-the pulpit or goldenseal probably will require you to remove the fruit portion before planting. Gloves are suggested, as some have strong chemicals that may irritate your skin. You can soak seeds like that to allow fermentation to remove the skin and flesh.

A good reference text for starting wildflower seeds is by William Cullina, Growing and Propagating Wildflowers of the United States and Canada. Unfortunately, it’s out of print, though I’ve heard it’s in the process of being reprinted. It’s worth its weight in gold as it gives specifics for hundreds of wildflowers.

Featured photo: Goldenseal fruits are ready for picking in my woods right now. Courtesy photo.

Delightful surprises at public garden

I recently visited Bedrock Garden in Lee and came away feeling refreshed and enlightened. This 37-acre public garden was created on the premises of a 1700s farm that was purchased in 1980 by artist and garden designer Jill Nooney and her husband, Bob Munger.

Jill Nooney is a talented designer, who has won many awards at the Boston Flower Show. She is a welder who uses her skills to create metal sculptures from small to mammoth, as well as working with other media. Bob is a natural builder and fix-it guy who has enabled Jill to install her art in the landscape, along with water features, walls, paths and much more. They are a couple who really bring out the best in each other.

When I toured the gardens I was lucky to have Jill as one of my guides. Also touring the gardens with me was John Forti, Executive Director and Horticulturist of the nonprofit that manages the gardens. We spent nearly three hours together looking at the gardens and I learned about many plants I had never seen before.

Bedrock Garden is full of surprises that delight, enlighten and inspire visitors. I came away wishing I had a bigger garden space for my own efforts, and with an appreciation for how much Jill and Bob have packed into their gardens.

For years Bedrock Garden was open a few weekends each summer, but five years ago Jill and Bob decided that since they were approaching what some call “retirement age” they needed to look seriously at the future of the gardens. They created a nonprofit, hired John Forti as the director, and figured out how to separate the public and private spaces.

During the pandemic they created a parking lot and visitors center that are accessed away from their home, the old farm house they have lived in for over 40 years. They have created a space that is family-friendly that delights children as much as their parents.

Near the parking lot is a gnome house kids can enter made from a huge hollow sycamore log that Jill capped with a steel roof reminiscent of a mushroom cap. She saw the wonderful hollow log alongside the road and hit her brakes immediately to ask for it. Luckily, she was the first to ask, and got it. (Five others stopped and asked for it that day, she told me, but she was the first).

I consider myself well-exposed to the palette of plants available to gardeners in New Hampshire. Bedrock Garden is in Zone 5b, meaning that most years it does not get colder than minus 25 degrees. But Jill has installed and grown many plants that I have never seen before, including many woody plants normally found in Japan or China.

Jill Nooney has used plants in ways that surprised me. For example, she used Bulls Blood heritage beets in a flower bed for their deep purple leaves. An annual effort, but very striking. When a hollow tree was cut down, she had Bob cut it in two-foot sections and stack the sections between two trees so viewers walking by could see through it like binoculars. One can see where branches had been swallowed by its growth. They call it “Log Jam.”

Jill has used decorative grasses well throughout the garden. Fountain grass is a genus of grass that gets to be more than 6 feet tall and very bushy in full sun, where she grows it in an “allee” arrangement that is gorgeous. But she also uses it in shade. “It’s wispy in the shade,” she said. “I like that.”

Metal sculpture is a key element throughout the garden. Early in our tour I admired a space made by forming ¾-inch steel rebar into a series of 11 arches 13 feet tall and spaced 7 feet apart. “I’m using the sky,” she said. She consciously mimicked the lines of a Gothic cathedral, bending each steel frame to a gracefully pointed Gothic arch. And she is growing European fastigiate beeches to clothe the metal frame as part of the installation: one on each side of the archways and tied to the steel. They will eventually reach the sky, the apex of the arch.

Also in the garden are two iron “Chiwaras” modeled after antelope masks made by the Bambara people of Mali. Many years ago I had told Jill the legend of the antelope in Mali, where I had worked with the Peace Corps. The Bambara people credit the antelope for teaching them to plant millet, their primary grain. The antelope pawed the ground, and dropped a little manure into the soil containing seeds. So they honored the antelope with their stylized masks, which Jill captured beautifully.

So plan a visit to Bedrock Garden if you can. There is a guided tour each day, and two on weekend days. Or just wander around and study the design elements. See how Jill has used plants that awe and inspire, and how she has added whimsy and art that delights and amuses. This is a garden worth visiting even if you don’t have a big space or the energy to develop it the way Jill and Bob have. Bring a lunch and plan on spending the day. You’ll be glad you did. And if you have children in your life, think about attending the Fairy Hobbit House Festival Oct. 9 to Oct. 11. Learn more at bedrockgardens.org.

Featured photo: Gardens and sculpture go well together. Courtesy photo.