Musings on horticultural therapy and the soothing effects of plants and nature
With the big melt we are having, this thyme plant emerges from the snow. I haven’t seen it for a month as successive little snows have kept it hidden from view next to our primitive snow gauge. This type of melt is typical for February: a brief warming spell soon quashed by more snow and […]
Microgreens are one of the best ways to get back into the garden during these days when the real garden is a foot-plus under snow and ice. These arugula (Eruca vesicaria ssp sativa) sprouts are only two weeks old and almost ready to sample. If you want to extend your harvest, wait until real leaves […]
Ice is beautiful but potentially frightening at the same time. The outdoors are bejeweled with freezing rain. We are lucky as the amount of precipitation is slight so it adds a only slight, shiny glaze to plants rather than a potentially heavy and dangerous coating. The Japanese maple (Acer palmatum) branches are enveloped in ice […]
In writing A Therapist’s Garden, I have received so much help from so many people. But in certain ways it is a family affair with my sister-in-law Rosana @artbyrosana drawing a wonderful cover and plate illustrations and Juana my wife tasked with providing two dozen spot illustrations that appear within the book’s pages. Botanical illustrations […]
Even better than finding the blueprint of the greenhouse adjacent to my house (formerly a barn)has been the discovery of the formal garden plans and plant list of the estate. Consisting of over 100 different plant types and 2000 individual plants, it is a wonderful view of what the back of the estate appeared to […]
Amazingly, a potted rosemary (Salvia rosmarinus) that as a lark I left in the greenhouse for the Winter continues to live on. I did not expect this as we have had many nights where the temperature gets down to the single digits Fahrenheit. In the past, we have attempted to bring rosemary plants into the […]