While I was eating delicious, home-baked cake in Juliette Mead’s enchanting garden in the village of West Amesbury last June, I had no idea we were sitting just two miles from prehistoric Stonehenge. It was only later, as we drove out on Stonehenge Avenue past this circular assemblage of 5,000-year-old stones arranged to mark the year’s winter and summer solstice, that I realized that the garden I’d just visited had once shared its chalky soil on the banks of the River Avon with people of the Stone Age. But I was not aware of that bit of geographic trivia when the family dog Ada led our Carex Tours group under a rose-wreathed timber arch into the garden behind the house.
Here, in a courtyard configured in the shelter of the U-shape of the house – originally a row of workers’ houses joined together which, from the road, still wear their original facades – were deep mixed borders and planting beds featuring multi-stemmed ‘Evereste’ crabapples forming the season’s fruit above early summer sages, alliums, irises and peonies.
Crimson roses clambered up the window frames and gold euphorbia gleamed in the afternoon sun.
I had spent the previous afternoon photographing gorgeous roses at Kew Gardens so I loved seeing Juliette’s collection.
In early June, the herbaceous colour palette in England seems to lean to lavenders, purples and blues, such as the Allium cristophii and Salvia nemorosa paired below.
But as an insect photographer, it was still tempting to want to photograph every bumble bee I saw, including this one on the starry allium flowers.
We were here on a Carex tour of “New Gardens of England”, including Dan Pearson & Huw Morgan’s Hillside and Oudolf Field at Hauser & Wirth nearby because, almost 20 years ago, shortly after buying the house, Juliette and her husband Guy Leech hired a friend, the Hertfordshire designer Tom Stuart-Smith, to re-imagine the landscape of their 3.5 acre property. In his career, he has become internationally renowned, working everywhere from India to Marrakech, won eight gold medals and three Best in Show awards at London’s annual Chelsea Flower Show, designed a garden for Queen Elizabeth’s 2002 Jubilee at Windsor Castle and been awarded the Order of the British Empire. But back then, Juliette and Guy had specific objectives: they wanted a lawn for their four children to play sports and host friends; Juliette wanted to cut flowers for bouquets; and Guy wanted a swimming pool, but not a small pool – he wanted to swim serious lengths, thus a minimum of 20 metres was his stipulation. So, from the courtyard with its traditional deep borders and planting beds lush with grasses surrounding an alfresco dining area, we were led once again by Ada the Alsatian to the stunning walled garden surrounding the 21-metre (68.9 feet) swimming pool. In the distance you can see the thatched, lime-washed cob wall that is a traditional feature in this part of England.
Though it’s difficult to discern without an overhead photo, the parterre arrangement of dozens of planting beds surrounding the pool has been described by Juliette as a Persian tapestry, and something she enjoys looking down on from the second floor, especially in winter. Phlomis russeliana is among the roster of hard-working plants that flower in June. By stepping the garden down on this side of the pool and raising it on the far side, Tom Stuart-Smith enhanced the garden view from the house and underplayed the view of the swimming pool behind layers of plants. The new walls in the garden, including above the pool, are zinc-coated steel. At right are beech hedges with a large gap to display the view through meadows and trees to the River Avon.
As I walked around the pool, I was struck by the magical movement of the golden oats grass (Stipa gigantea – Celtica) used extensively in the garden, along with other grasses such as Panicum virgatum ‘Cloud Nine’, Miscanthus sinensis ‘Malepartus’and Pennisetum alopecuroides ‘Hameln’. Along with Molinia cultivars like ‘Transparent’ and ‘Skyracer’, Stipa gigantea is one of the best “scrim” or “screen” plants, adding a kinetic quality to a garden while offering a porous veil in front of the scene behind. Interestingly, Juliette was not keen on grasses and had to be talked into including them by Tom; they now make up 40% of the roster and their tawny forms provide much of the winter interest.
The timber decking around the pool has aged to a soft silvery-grey that enhances the turquoise Marbleite pool and looks lovely with the billowing ‘Walker’s Low’ catmint (Nepeta racemosa) that was in peak June bloom. Looking out over the pool through the break in the beech hedge and a barely-visible iron fence, we see a meadow and trees that line the banks of the River Avon ninety metres away.
The windows at the back of the house look out onto the garden surrounding the sleek pool, which Juliette and Guy specified they did not want hidden behind a fence. Has an exercise setting ever looked so gorgeous? Behind the sun umbrella you can see the soft-grey, low zinc wall.
I seemed to be drawn to the golden oats (Stipa gigantea). What a fabulous grass – sadly not hardy for us in Toronto.
Purple catmint, turquoise pool, mauve sun lounger: this couldn’t be prettier or better coordinated.
The planting beds around the pool, separated from each other by narrow grass paths, are at their best in mid-summer, but early June’s palette of meadow sage and catmint is dependable and romantic. Here you get a closer look at the thatched cob wall.
I had never come across horned spurge (Euphorbia cornigera) before, but it seems similar to moisture-loving E. palustris.
As I left the pool side of the house, I was struck by the beauty of the Chilean potato vine (Solanum crispum ‘Glasnevin’) climbing the house wall.
What a stunning vine.
Walking behind the house towards the river, I stood for a moment under the tulip-tree (Liriodendron tulipifera) in the lawn. It was the only tree that Tom Stuart-Smith kept from the previous landscape.
Then I walked around small wetland niches with lush plantings at the bottom of the garden.
Tall stems of pink flowers would soon rise from masses of umbrella plant (Darmera peltata) flanking the water.
There were moisture-loving Siberian irises (Iris sibirica) down there….
…… and luscious Japanese irises (I. ensata) too.
I walked to the edge of the River Avon, which reflected the idyllic green glades on its shores. Later, I learned that there are actually nine Avon Rivers in Great Britain, including the one running through Shakespeare’s Stratford-Upon-Avon. The root of the word Avon is “abona” in Celtic or in Welsh, “afon”, which means “river”. So, strictly speaking there are nine “River Rivers”.
Juliette graciously invited us into the house for tea and cakes – a lovely English garden-visit custom……
….. and I can say without exaggeration that she is a talented, inventive cook with a keen eye for presentation.
Then, with a last look at the garden, I turned the corner around the unique flint & limestone wall of the house towards the bus and the journey past Stonehenge towards Bath.
*********
Want to read more blogs about my English trip in June 2023?
What a beautiful weekend I enjoyed recently. Not only was it Mother’s Day and I had my first-born, ‘two-days-before-Mother’s Day’ son nearby, but we enjoyed a walk up the dirt road behind neighbouring cottages on Lake Muskoka near Torrance, a few hours north of Toronto, and found a treasure trove of native spring wildflowers on both the lake side and the crown land side. The photo below is of the road from another May. This year, the sustained, cool weather meant leaves were just breaking on the trees and best of all the blackflies had not yet emerged!
Ecologically, the address of the dirt road near Bala marked with the red arrow, below, is (broadest to narrowest classification) Ontario Shield Ecozone, Georgian Bay Ecoregion 5E, Huntsville Ecodistrict 5E8. According to the provincial classification: “The Huntsville Ecodistrict is an undulating to rolling landscape underlain by Precambrian bedrock. The terrain, particularly in the west, has been heavily influenced by glacial Lake Algonquin that inundated the area about 11,000 years ago. As the land emerged from underneath the ice, morainal material was deposited. The area was then submerged under the glacial lake, which removed or reworked much of the material through wave action and fluctuating lake levels. The western portion of the ecodistrict is characterized by a mosaic of bedrock ridges with a discontinuous, shallow layer of morainal material, bare bedrock, and pockets of deeper glaciolacustrine sediment.” Most of our district is covered by deciduous and mixed forest, including northern red oak, red maple (sugar maples predominate in the east part of the ecodistrict), yellow birch, paper birch, American beech, basswood, eastern hophornbeam, eastern hemlock and eastern white pine.
Though we’ve had our cottage for two decades, it was precisely the right moment to enjoy a bounty of spring wildflowers I’d never seen flowering all together, most of them dependent on the dappled light under deciduous trees before the leaves emerge to cast heavier shade. Plants like round-lobed hepatica, Anemone americana, both the white and purple forms.
Many gardeners think they need to do a clean-up in autumn or spring, removing every leaf to expose bare soil; indeed, I heard a leaf-blower droning away on a cottage property nearby. But nature is under no such misapprehension; the spring understory here on Lake Muskoka is thick with successive years of red oak and beech leaves, all contributing to the health of the soil and the richness of the forest. Hepatica has no trouble emerging through them, pushing fresh new leaves and fuzzy flower stems up through last year’s bronzed foliage which then withers away.
Like many plants, DNA sequencing has resulted in hepaticas undergoing a scientific name change. They’re now placed in the Anemone genus.
Carolina springbeauty (Claytonia caroliniana) was showing its mauve-striped face here and there too, the flowers so tiny they’re easy to overlook. It grows from a corm and is one of our spring ephemerals, plants that disappear and become dormant by summer.
I was struck by the proximity of the spring beauty and the decomposing stump bedecked by turkey tail fungus (Trametes versicolor)…..
….and another fungi-rich stump flanked by masses of red maple seedlings (Acer rubrum). The coming and the going, the cycle of decomposition and renewal in this mixed forest.
Birches (Betula spp.) are not long-lived compared to other deciduous trees, usually around 50-70 years in our northern climate. Sometimes decomposition begins when they’re still standing, like this trunk with tinder fungus (Fomes fomentarius) all the way up. It’s called tinder fungus because it can be used to make a fire; in fact the Tyrolean Ice Man Ötzi, whose 5000-year-old corpse was revealed by melting glaciers near Bolzano, Italy in 1991, had a piece on a cord around his neck.
When birches fall, it takes little time before moss spores find them and begin to spread their green tentacles. Before long, the birch becomes part of the forest floor.
Though rare, a lightning strike can also kill a birch. This one would have made a loud crack in one of our summer thunderstorms.
I found this juxtaposition poignant: a young American beech sapling (Fagus grandifolia) growing against the decaying trunk of a beech killed by beech-bark disease, a terrible insect-fungus plague taking a toll on our central Ontario forests, especially those where beeches grow with hemlocks. The vector is a beech-scale insect (Cryptococcus fagisuga) which, like many killers of our native species (e.g. Dutch elm disease) is an invasive from Europe. It admits a canker fungus called Neonectria faginata.
Groundcedar or fan club-moss, Diphastriastum digitatum is a lycopod, a throwback to the Carboniferous era (360-300 million years ago) when spore-forming plants like these formed forests of giant trees. Their decomposition and burial over millions of years gave the world its coal deposits.
In low-lying areas, we found another spring ephemeral: dogtooth violet or trout lily Erythronium americanum which is not a violet but is a member of the lily family, Liliaceae. The “trout” part is because the mottled leaves resemble brook trout.
Although it looks like the flower has six yellow petals, in fact the reverse view shows the three brownish sepals.
The ecology of dogtooth violet is fascinating. In some parts of these woods, it made up almost the entire ground layer, but only a few plants bore flowers, the rest just had leaves. In fact, Erythronium americanum takes 4-7 years to flower, and researchers have calculated that in any given population only 0.5% will bear flowers.
There’s a little wetland along the road that drains the forest from the west. It’s where spring peepers sing in April and mosquitoes gather when the weather warms.
I went down onto the boggy mosses to get closer to the hummocks of cinnamon fern (Osmundastrum cinnamomeum) which had just emerged….
….. with their croziers wrapped in gauzy hairs. Cinnamon and royal fern (Osmunda regalis) are the principal wetland ferns here.
In springtime and after heavy summer rains, ground water moves through this wetland, passes under the dirt road in a culvert and wends its way as a creek through our friends’ property before splashing down into Lake Muskoka as a small waterfall. I made the video below to show it.
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We found coltsfoot (Tussilago farfara) in flower at the edge of the road.
Native to Europe, Asia and North Africa, coltsfoot was used as a medicinal by early settlers – its name comes from the Latin “tussis” for cough and “ago”, meaning to act upon – and seed has made its way to throughout the region.
Ferns unfurled their croziers from the moss in the low spots.
We noticed that several of the hemlocks and pines along the road had an orange-red flush to their bark, but only on the side exposed to the light. Some research revealed that this is a fairly recent condition called Red Bark Phenomenon or RBP, having been discovered and named about 10 years ago in New England. It is caused by a filamentous green algae (Chlorophyta) tentatively identified as Trentophilia whose cytoplasm contains an orange-red pigment.
Patrick leaned into a little thicket of chokecherry (Prunus virginiana)….
….. not quite in flower. He detected a minty-basil fragrance, though the twigs are occasionally described as having an ‘almond’ aroma.
It was at this point that we left the road and walked towards a rocky outcrop about 30 feet away. Maintaining the overhead hydro line here requires tree and brush cutting that provides a little more light than normal……
……and this area was rich with loads of spring ephemeral Dutchman’s breeches (Dicentra cucullaria)….
…. and the occasional common blue violet (Viola sororia).
I loved this exposed bit of rock, typical of the metamorphic banded gneiss on this part of the Canadian Shield, a remnant of the Grenville Orogeny and more than a billion years old. (If you want a lot more amateur geology, have a peek at my recent blog memoir, ‘My Jaded Past, My Rocky Present’).
I spotted an unfamiliar shrub on the lake side of the road and wandered in to check it out. It was American fly honeysuckle (Lonicera canadensis) with its paired, pendant, pale-yellow flowers.
The shrubs grew on top of the outcrop nearby – not showy, but an integral part of the ecosystem.
Finally, as we got close to the back of the East Bay Landing property, there were trilliums (T. grandiflorum). Not the vast colonies we would see on rises along Highway 38 and 400 later, just a few here and there with lots more getting set to bloom.
It was the perfect way to end our walk into the May woods on Lake Muskoka.
It’s a free day at the cottage and I pack a lunch and my cameras and head out on the highway to visit one of Ontario’s newest parks, the 1917-hectare (4,737 acre) Carden Alvar Provincial Park. I am an armchair geologist… well, in my own mind, where it’s possible to be anything I want to be. But having spent a few months reading John McPhee’s fabulous, Pulitzer-Prize-winning, 660-page anthology Annals of the Former World (1998) followed by geologist Nick Eyles’ engrossing Road Rocks Ontario (2013), I have decided to explore one of Central Ontario’s rare protected alvar habitats. I want to see for myself what Eyles describes as “these windswept grasslands that are now Ontario’s prairies.” Alvar is a Swedish word, first coined to describe limestone plains with little or no soil, exemplified by the biggest alvar in Europe, Stora Alvaret off the Swedish island of Öland. The Burren in County Clare, Ireland, is a large alvar. But in North America, the alvars are found near the Great Lakes, including Manitoulin Island and the Bruce Peninsula on Lake Huron, and Pelee Island in Lake Erie.
Located northeast of Lake Simcoe and east of Orillia at the western edge of Kawartha District (its map address is City of Kawartha Lakes), Carden Alvar is less than an hour from my cottage on Lake Muskoka. But as with any exploration of new areas, it’s a good idea to research thoroughly beforehand. This becomes clear as I drive blithely south along Highway 169, past Highways 46 and 47 where I should make my turn, while listening to the dulcet voice of Google maps telling me ‘Signal is unavailable’. In time I pull over and consult a map, turn around and retrace my route, and eventually come to the corner of McNamee & Wylie Roads…..
…. which, like much of the Carden Alvar, is considered an IBA – Important Bird Area. Eastern bluebird, bobolink, eastern meadowlark, savannah sparrow and the critically endangered loggerhead shrike are among many denizens of the grasslands, marshes and forest here.
It will be some time before I realize that I am not going to find a traditional ‘park’ with a visitor centre or the kind of facilities we associate with that term. Instead, I find a series of neighbouring farms with roadside signs describing their relationship variously to the Couchiching Conservancy, Nature Conservancy, Carden Field Naturalists and/or the Carden Alvar. I get out of my car at the sign for the Bluebird Ranch – clearly a clue for the bird that would be seen here in season.
I don’t see an alvar, but a wet path leads through a small meadow riddled with poison ivy.
I’m glad I changed from my flip-flops to running shoes, as there are warnings posted on all the conservancy signs. (Note to self: check to see if poison ivy prefers alkaline soil. We rarely see it on the granitic Shield in Muskoka.)
I walk back through the small pull-off parking space and kick at a plastic vodka bottle lying in the gravel. Clearly local folks come to Carden Alvar to party. But the gravel reminds me that the very fact that so many roads and building projects use crushed limestone is the reason that so much rural Ontario property is sold to quarrying companies. There is a real need to conserve alvar habitats, especially those that time and circumstance have kept fairly pristine.
Wylie Road is lined with numbered eastern bluebird nesting boxes. (Another note to self: Return in spring when the bluebirds are nesting!) As this blog on the Couchiching Conservancy says, “The bluebird is doing well in Carden, thanks to two things: first, a local man named Herb Furniss has spent the last few decades building and distributing white bluebird boxes throughout the region, quietly making a huge difference for these little birds; second, Wylie Road rolls through an area where more than 6,000 acres of grassland, forest and wetland has been conserved as natural habitat.”
I get back in my car and begin driving north on Wylie. Somewhere I saw that this is a 9-kilometre road, but that won’t be significant for a few hours. Minutes later, I see the sign announcing the conservation of the next property, Windmill Ranch. It thrills me that so many landowners forego profit for philanthropy, and so many ecological institutions devote themselves to saving properties like these from development.
I’m excited to spot a little outcrop of limestone in the farm field – i.e. the limestone ‘pavement’ or epikarst. It reminds me that much of the limestone here is under the soil, but where it peeks out or hasn’t been eroded to soil and planted to crops, the plant species it supports are unique, often rare and typically found on prairies.
Windmill ranch occupies 4 kilometres along Wylie. At 647 hectares (1600 acres), it was farmed for cattle by the late Art Hawtin – first with his dad in his 20s and 30s, then with his wife Noreen into his 80s. In 2006, the ranch was acquired by the Nature Conservancy of Canada in an arrangement with the Couchiching Conservancy; in 2014, it became part of the Carden Alvar Park. In writing this blog, I discovered that Art Hawtin was not just a favourite math teacher for 17 years, but was a POW held by the Germans in the same prison in Poland, Stalag Luft III, as the Allied fliers who escaped in 1943 in the breakout that would be celebrated in a book and the Steve McQueen film, The Great Escape.
As I drive along the road, grazing cattle move towards the fence and my car. I presume they’re used to being tended to here by ranch employees — the only people who likely use the road, along with bird-watchers. Parts of the properties under protection continue to be grazed or farmed for hay.
Before long, I come upon a small pull-off where I park. Just beyond is a little ochre-yellow bird blind.
I undo the latch and enter, gazing through one window…….
…… then the other. What lovely framed views.
I wish I was the kind of person who wakes up early and goes out with binoculars to check off avian species on a life list. But I’m not. I notice the species list (a little damp from rain) published by Bob Bowles of Orillia.
(An aside: I have fond memories of Bob, in the navy ball cap, coming to my own cottage in Muskoka one autumn to help my hiking pals and me identify mushroom species on our peninsula.)
When I go back out to get in my car, I’m rewarded with the sight of barn swallows diving across the road and returning to sit on the wire fence. Evidently, they are increasingly threatened by loss of habitat.
Here I see adults….
….. and sweet little chicks.
There seems to be a great abundance of wild fruit along the road: lots of staghorn sumac as well as non-native honeysuckle.
All around is the buzz of bees visiting the blue flowers of viper’s bugloss (Echium vulgare) and white sweetclover (Melilotus albus). Though they’re not native, they’re feeding every manner of bumble bee and solitary bee.
I stand for a while and listen to the meadow and the wind in the grasses.
The day before saw a deluge of rain in central Ontario, and the fields in lower sections are partially flooded. One of the characteristics of alvars is shallow soil and frequent flooding.
Wylie Road ahead of me is a series of giant, deep puddles stretching from one side of the limestone gravel surface to the other.
I stop at an interpretive sign for the Sedge Wren Marsh Walking Trail and get out of my car and begin walking in …..
….. but decide that the puddles on the path might be too much for my footwear.
Coming out I make my first sighting ever of wild fragrant sumac (Rhus aromatica).
Back in the car, I come to lovely wetland and open my car window to gaze at spotted Joe Pye weed (Eutrochium maculatum) and cattails (Typha latifolia) right beside me.
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As I cross a rusty bridge, I gaze out across a fen with floating sedge mats and a forest of white spruce in the distance.
I adore central Ontario’s wetland plants, including the fluffy, white tall meadowrue (Thalictrum pubescens) here.
And then, of course, there are the usual alien suspects: bull thistle (Cirsium vulgare) and Queen Anne’s lace (Daucus carota).
From time to time, farm fields give way to fragments of woodland, like these lovely aspens. That ‘edge’ habitat bordering on open fields is excellent for attracting birds of all kinds.
A sign advises visitors not to block traffic on the road. I smile a little, since the only car I’ve seen in my two hours of dawdling along Wylie Road is mine! But it’s popular with birdwatchers, especially in spring. Have a look at this blog for some fabulous bird photos made in late May, when pink-flowered prairie smoke (Geum triflorum) appears to fill the fields.
Now I come to Art’s Ranch.
Staghorn sumac (Rhus typhina) is one of the most abundant native shrubs in Ontario, growing on both the northern Shield and the central limestone belt. Its fruits feed myriad birds and mammals.
Roads made of limestone tend to erode easily because limestone carbonates break down in water of any kind, and even more quickly in acid rain. I cross my fingers that my car is up to the rough conditions (I’ve never had a flat tire)…..
…. and begin to drive north, splashing deep every few minutes.
Finally, as I begin to think I’ll never reach the end of Wylie Road, I do. And here is the North Bear Alvar, a 325-hectare (800-acre) parcel of the Carden Alvar that was conserved in 2011. According to the Nature Conservancy of Canada, there’s a 4.5 kilometre ( mile) wilderness loop trail here “that leads you through a lush wetland where blueflag iris and swamp milkweed grow. Keep an eye out for turtles basking on logs or rocks…. Continue through a meadow of wildflowers, listen for the music of grassland birds, such as upland sandpiper, and watch for the flash of the brightly coloured golden-winged warbler.”
I drive west on this road and come to the definitive clue that I’ve been in the right place for the past 2-1/2 hours, a signpost for Alvar Road.
At the west end of Alvar Road, it intersects with Lake Dalrymple Road. I drive south along the lake and here I have my most thrilling avian moment – if not exaclty a notch on an alvar species list. High up on a power pole is a massive nest…..
…. in which two juvenile osprey are chirping their hearts out, waiting for their parents to return with fish.
Have a listen to their plaintive cries. (I have no tripod, so the extreme zoom on my little Canon SX50HS camera is put to the test.)
Back in the car, I continue driving south along the lake and come to the Carden Township Recreation Centre. The door is locked and the place is empty…..
…. but there are interpretive signs nearby promising wonderful flora on the alvar…..
….. and rare bird sightings.
I walk out on a path and see the same abundant milkweed meadows I might find near my cottage. Clearly, I am late for the alvar floral display, which seems to have peaked in late May and early June, but I see a lone monarch butterfly circling..
Back in the car, I drive a short distance south and come to the Lake Dalrymple Resort. I pull in.
When I ask the proprietor about the alvar flora, he looks puzzled. “There’s a sign back at the Recreation Centre”, he offers, as he scoops me an ice cream cone, I tell him there was no one at the rec centre. “Maybe another sign down the road,” he says, pointing south. (The flavour is Muskoka mocha, and highly recommended.)
A short drive down Lake Dalrymple Road and I slam on the brakes. Looking east and up a rise through trembling aspens, I see the characteristic layers of a limestone shelf. When I set out in my boat on Lake Muskoka this morning, I left a shore of Precambrian gneiss that is somewhere between 1 and 1.4 billion years old.
Here, on the other hand, these exposed layers of fossil-rich limestone in the Bobcaygeon Formation were laid down in the Iapetus Ocean in the Ordovician era, roughly 500 million years ago. While sediment deposited when the glaciers retreated 10-12,000 years ago covers much of Ontario’s limestone, here in much of Carden Alvar, it forms the pavement (epikarst).
Finally, having driven counter-clockwise around much of the alvar, I come to the place that holds such appeal for me. It’s the Prairie Smoke Alvar, a 2006 donation by artist Karen Popp to the Nature Conservancy of Canada, and now managed with two other conservation bodies.
But I am a little puzzled, because from here, it just looks like a hayfield. Indeed, hay-baling is happening at this very moment. It will be days before I understand the relationship between the farms and the conservancies that manage them. Indeed there is a mandate for this hayfield: “Hay fields near the entrance of the property are being managed to support grassland breeding birds such as Bobolinks and Eastern Meadowlarks, and also provide grazing for several dozen White-tailed Deer in early spring.”
Understanding these relationships and the late May flowering on limestone pavement of many of the rare alvar species, including prairie smoke and Indian paintbrush will dictate a return trip next spring and a walk down this well-worn track to find them.
I finish my search for Carden Alvar in the small parking lot of the 1,214-hectare (3,000 acre) Cameron Ranch…..
…… and leap-frog rain puddles to stroll the boardwalk. Here, according to the Couchiching Conservancy, are “northern dropseed, tufted hairgrass, early buttercup, alse pennyroyal and prairie smoke.”
I’ve been exploring the alvar for 4-1/2 hours and it’s time to drive back to Muskoka. As I head back to my car, I gaze down at my feet standing atop limestone gravel. For decades, the only use that people made of central Ontario’s Ordovician limestone and dolomite was aggregate for roads and buildings or flagstone pavers for landscaping.. Today, intelligent, ecologically-attuned people understand that digging out more and more limestone quarries for human use eradicates vital habitat for many species that depend on these ecosystems. As I kick the 500-million year old gravel beneath my shoes, I give thanks for the efforts of the many conservancies that have secured vital protection for Carden Alvar.
And, of course, I promise myself a return trip next spring to see the prairie smoke in bloom.
Day 14 of our New Zealand tour took us out of Aoraki Mount Cook National Park and down onto the Canterbury Plains with its patchwork of agricultural fields. Here’s a bus window look at the descent.
In late morning we drove into Akaunui Farm Homestead in the countryside near Ashburton. As we walked down the long, hedge-lined driveway, we were greeted politely by the two family dogs.
The brick house was lovely, with its generous verandahs and covered balcony. Built in 1905 for Edward Grigg, a son of one of Canterbury’s pioneering colonial farmers, John Grigg, first president of the New Zealand Agricultural Society and a large-scale sheep and cropping farmer, it was originally part of the Grigg family’s massive Longbeach estate. But it has long been in the family of our host and hostess today, Di and Ian Mackenzie.
Di and Ian, below, share that farming pedigree with their predecessors. Though their grown son now farms Akaunui’s 600 hectares (1500 acres) in vegetable and grain seed and sheep and dairy cattle, Ian has previously served as the national grain and seed chair of the Federated Farmers of New Zealand.
Di Mackenzie does all the gardening on a property whose landscape was designed originally by Alfred William Buxton (1872-1950). As the New Zealand government historical entry says, “Buxton’s landscape designs were typified by curved entrance drives, perimeter plantings of forest trees, water.…” We saw that all here at Akaunui, the curved entrance drive and perimeter plantings of forest trees. ……
…… ….. a sinuous pond….
….. and a bog garden……
……with Gunnera manicata, among many other choice plants.
The pond curved around past Di’s vast collection of trees and shrubs, including bottlebrush buckeye (Aesculus parviflora) …..
…..and presented the most spectacular reflective view of the house.
There was a lovely tranquility about this pond, with its little rowboat.
I liked this combination, of a hybrid of native Phormium tenax with Verbena bonariensis.
Many of the specimen trees are very old, like this southern magnolia (M. grandiflora)…..
….. which was still putting out shimmering blossoms in mid-summer.
The lawns alone take Di Mackenzie 15 hours a week on her sitting mower, and clearly they had just been done before our arrival.
The beds around the house feature roses and perennials…..
…. and Di’s exquisite sense of colour is on display here, like this buff peach rose with Phygelius capensis.
There is a sweet parterre along an outbuilding wall.
Rain showers started as I made my way from the lovely swimming pool……
……(Canterbury’s summers can be hot and very dry)…..
…….. to the enclosed garden……..
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….with its espaliered apple allée and stunning focal point.
Outside, there were pears…..
….. and peaches…..
…..and figs……
……and more apples.
Di’s vegetable garden produces an abundance of produce…..
……which she uses for family meals. What’s left over gets preserved for winter.
I loved this flower border, with its pretty white-and-blue theme including Ammi majus and love-in-a-mist (Nigella damascena).
And I liked the way Di mixes perennials with roses, making the roses earn their keep instead of segregating them in a rose garden.
We were walked up to the newest part of the garden: the 4 hectare (10 acre) native-rich designed wetland. Paradoxically, when John Grigg bought his 32,000 acre estate here in 1864, the property was said to be mostly “impassable swamp”. But for Di and Ian, turning part of it back into a designed wetland with a meandering, marshy swale……
….. bordered by native flaxes (and also some colourful Phormium tenax cultivars, below) and grasses…….
….. like Cortaderia richardsonii, a New Zealand cousin to pampas grass…….
…. and native hebe,below, with a foraging bumble bee,…….
…. offered more than an embrace of modern ecological sensibilities. There are also family golf matches in this area, where the water hazards are clearly abundant.
Perhaps the dog has been trained to retrieve lost balls? Or maybe he just likes a dip.
That bridge above, in fact, was where Ian Mackenzie showed us something he’s very proud of, something that for him seems to have made the return of the wetland all worth it. Have a look at these, below. They’re Canterbury mudfish (Neochanna burrowsius), an amphibious species that can survive long periods without water by burrowing into the mud. And they’ve been making a big comeback here at Akaunui.
We returned to the picnic tables via the previously overgrown woodland, which Di has started to clear in order to plant rhododendrons and lots of shade-loving plants.
We were offered a luscious home-cooked lunch with delicious beets and greens, courtesy of Di’s garden. Oh, and the best rhubarb cake ever!
And there was a little wine (actually a lot of wine!)
As we made our departure from this beautiful farm, I stopped to watch the dogs’ tails move through a big field of something green. Looking closer, I realized it was another of the Mackenzie family businesses: radishes on their way to ripening seed. I read later that New Zealand supplies almost 50% of the world’s hybrid radish, carrot and beet seed. Next time you slice a radish for a summer salad, consider for a moment that it might have started its journey in Ian & Di Mackenzie’s pretty field in Canterbury.
World-class is an overused term, but it is not an exaggeration when describing what I consider to be the finest public garden in the United States: New York Botanical Garden. In my two decades of visiting NYBG, I have seen it change its focus somewhat to become more ecologically attuned, as befits any modern botanical garden, but it has not lost its charm no matter what the season. And 2016 marks its 125th anniversary, a milestone to celebrate. So let’s celebrate with a photo tour of some of the gardens on its 250 acres (100 hectares). Whenever I visit (via the Metro North Railroad from Grand Central Station, Botanical Garden stop), I head immediately to the Seasonal Border, designed by Dutch plantsman Piet Oudolf. When i visited this August, I noticed a new sign dedicating the garden to Marjorie G. Rosen, who chairs the Horticulture Committee and is Vice-Chairman of the Board of Directors.
I love this border in all seasonal guises, for its inspiration for those thinking about making a naturalistic meadow-style planting. Here it is, below, in July 2011 with ‘Green Jewel’ coneflowers (Echinacea) front and centre.
I was especially fond of this combination of Lilium henryi and Scutellaria incana.
This is how it looked in spring 2012. The bulb plantings were designed by Jacqueline van der Kloet.
They’ve even gone to the trouble of making a sign showing Piet Oudolf’s hand-painted plan for the garden.
It’s a short walk from the Seasonal Border to the Jane Watson Irwin Perennial Garden. This is what it looked like in August.
I loved these combinations: Colocasia esculenta ‘Blue Hawaii’ with zingy Gomphrena globosa ‘Strawberry Fields’….
… and a more romantic look with Salvia guaranitica and a lovely pink rose.
I spent a lot of time watching butterflies and bees nectaring on Phlox paniculata ‘Jeana’, a late summer mainstay at NYBG.
This garden also offers lots of design ideas, whether you visit in spring (this was 2012)….
…. or summer (2011). If you sit on this bench with that gorgeous lily within sniff range, you’ll understand why designers recommend planting perfumed plants where you’re going to be walking or sitting.
I love the use of gold/chartreuse foliage in this part of the perennial garden.
The Jane Watson Irwin Perennial Garden and the adjacent Ladies’ Border were designed by New York’s champion of public gardens, the venerable Lynden Miller, below, right. When I was there in 2012, she and NYBG’s vice-president of outdoor gardens, Kristin Schleiter…..
…. conducted a tour of NYBG’s then brand-new Azalea Garden, below, with azalaes and rhododendrons arranged throughout the garden’s natural rock outcrops and underplanted with natives like white foamflower (Tiarella cordifolia). If you visit in late April or May, this part of the garden is a must-see!
I loved this spectacular pink cloud of azaleas!
Speaking of spring, it was sometime in the late 1990s when I visited New York in Japanese cherry season. At NYBG, that means a stroll to Cherry Hill, where you’ll see pink and white clouds of beautiful “sakura” trees. And there’s a daffodil festival bolstered this spring by a huge planting commemorating the 125th birthday.
But back to the perennial garden area. Adjoining it is the Nancy Bryan Luce Herb Garden, a formal knot garden. This year, the parterres were filled wtih artichokes….
…. but a few years ago, there was a charming planting of clary sage (Salvia horminum).
The perennial garden also sits in the shadow of the spectacular and historic Enid Haupt Conservatory.
Here is how that magnificent dome looks from the perennial garden.
I always make a point of visiting the conservatory in order to see the season’s themed show, as designed by Francisca Coelho (they run from mid-May to mid-September). This year, it was all about American Impressionism, and the long gallery in the conservatory featured plants that represented that art movement, such as Celia Thaxter’s Garden. Here’s what it looked like from the entrance….
…. and from the far end of the gallery.
I loved the 2014 show, which was titled “Groundbreakers: Great American Gardens and the Women Who Designed Them”. The conservatory show was titled ‘Mrs. Rockefeller’s Garden’, and was a nod to Eyrie, the Maine garden designed for Abby Aldrich Rockefeller in 1926 by Beatrix Farrand.
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But my favourite was 2008’s “Charles Darwin’s Garden”.
They even created a little study for him, complete with desk and rocking chair.
Adjoining glasshouses contain stunning displays of tropicals…..
…..and another has cacti and succulents.
Behind the conservatory is the wonderful courtyard pool.
Here you see sacred lotus (Nelumbo nucifera)….
…sometimes with resting dragonflies….
…and luscious waterlilies, like Nymphaea ‘Pink Grapefruit’, below.
Walking through the garden (or you can take a tram), you’ll come to one of my new favourite places: the Native Plant Garden. On August 16th, despite the lack of rain in the northeast this summer, the meadow portion was a symphony of prairie grasses, goldenrods and flowering spurge (Euphorbia corollata), among other late season plants….
….. and buzzing with pollinators, as promised in the interpretive signage for the garden.
Have you ever seen a glacial erratic? This is what happened in this very spot when the glaciers retreated from Manhattan thousands of years ago, leaving this massive boulder behind. Geologists identify these behemoths as erratics when they do not fit the mineral profile of the underlying rocks.
The meadows are beautiful, but the new native wetland is also a revelation. Imagine, coming down this boardwalk…..
….. and looking over the edge to see a huge collection of carnivorous pitcher plants (Sarracenia species and hybrids), along with orchids.
Keep walking and you’ll find a bench where you can contemplate the waterfall.
All around you are native plants that are fond of damp conditions, including cardinal flower (Lobelia cardinalis) and New York ironweed (Vernonia noveboracensis).
We’re not finished touring, so rest your legs until you’re ready to cast a glance over the rosy cloud of Joe Pye weed (Eutrochium) before heading back up the slope to the meadows.
Keep walking – you’re almost at the best place in New York to see roses: the Peggy Rockefeller Rose Garden. In June, there’s even a festival – and it’s worth the extra cost to add it to your general admission.
There are many other gardens, of course, including deep botanical collections of trees and shrubs. I usually pay a short visit to the Louise Loeb Vegetable Garden.
And I sometimes pop by the Pauline Gillespie Plant Trials Garden to see how the new plants are faring.
But I never visit New York without making my way to the front gate of the New York Botanical Garden! Happy 125th birthday, NYBG. Still humming along after all these years!
