April has been quite an eventful month in our garden, what with the mild weather and timely rainshowers. The other day, two ladies came to our door to tell me that I had won the Garden Club’s Green Thumb Award. This is the first time in thirty-some years that I have received any recognition for my work in the garden, apart from the grateful thanks of neighbors who have received plant cuttings and seeds from me over the years and the people who occasionally walk by and stop to comment. I don’t belong to the club but I did once fill in for a particpant who had dropped out of their Garden Walk many years ago. The Club doesn’t resume regular meetings until September, but I will definitely look into joining them when they do.
The Birdfy camera has produced some amazing shots, giving us a greater understanding of which birds visit, what they eat and how they interact with each other. They may not always be the sharpest images but they certainly serve their purpose.
And lest you should think that I am relying too heavily on the Birdfy camera just lately, I still keep my Canon EOS handy for those shots that don’t come within its view.
Roll up! Roll up, folks, and see the greatest show on earth! The Chicago Botanic Garden’s Orchid Show, with this year’s Circus theme, is a spectacle not to be missed.
After passing through The Big Top, you come to a section that resembles a giant carousel, with lights and fantastic creatures all decked out with orchids.
These colorful displays feature every kind of orchid that you could possibly imagine. And to put us in the circus mood, appropiate music and sound effects play throughout the show.
As we enter the Hall of Mirrors, young and old alike can’t help but laugh at the distorted images that look back at them.
Walking through the greenhouses, I feel, once again, like a kid in a candy store. And for those of us who are itching to get outside and play in the dirt, this is the perfect antidote to the winter blues.
In keeping with the circus spirit, the orchids are performing on the trapeze, while overhead, they are doing tricks on a unicycle. But don’t worry there’s a net below to catch anyone who falls.
Despite the fact that a timed ticket is needed for entry to the show, the place was packed, and everyone naturally wanted to take pictures. I was no exception, as you can imagine. This is always an incredible oppotunity that is too good to pass up.
As the band played on, everyone seemed in very good spirits, enjoying the beautiful flowers and remarking on what a great show it was this year. I agree with them. This was just the boost that this annual show needed.
But if you want to catch the show, you need to be quick. Saturday is the last day to visit before the circus leaves town. If you can make it, I highly recommend seeing the show. It really is amazing!
The drought this summer really took a toll on the seeds that I planted in the hopes of having lots of flowers this autumn. I spent a fortune on some fancy new seeds most of which didn’t even germinate. Ironically, the seeds that I gathered the previous year from good old faithfulls like zinnias, cosmos and marigolds survived and I was thankful that they, at least, stayed around long enough to brighten the garden.
Typical of the weather gods, we have now had several days of rain and the only things to benefit from it are the lawn which until recently was almost brown, and a fine crop of mushrooms that have been popping up all over.
As I was clearing away some of the dead leaves from the irises and daylilies, I came across this spider. I’m not a huge fan of spiders especially when they’re indoors but this one was a beauty. There are still one or two butterflies hanging around and this one landed on what remains of the butterfly weed.
It’s that time of year when we are starting to see more and more squirrels in the garden, gathering their stores for the winter months. I’ve been putting out critter food along with the bird seed and thanks to the squirrels burying corn niblets all over the garden, we had quite a few corn stalks growing amongst the flowers. I left them to mature and now the squirrels are reaping the harvest.
The birds are enjoying the critter food too, and the other day a flock of grackles spotted the corn and landed in the garden. It made a change from the mob of sparrows that we usually see. It makes me laugh when I read on the seed bags all the different kinds of birds that the contents are likely to attract. Anything from nuthatches to ostriches from what I can make out. But they don’t stand a chance. I hardly get back inside the house when the sparrows are down and mopping up everything in sight.
But if we are going to see something other than sparrows, now is the time of year when they’re likely to show up as they make their way south for the winter. I was surprised to see a male rose-breasted grosbeak on the feeder the other day. I’m no expert when it comes to bird names so I usually rely on Google to set me straight. Hiding in plain sight among the sparrows are two that might easily be overlooked. The one pictured left is what I think they refer to as a lark sparrow and the one on the right, a white crowned sparrow.
Other birds just passing through are the feisty redwing blackbird and the blue jay, that likes to imitate the call of the hawk to frighten all the other birds away.
Speaking of hawks, we have seen them in the garden more frequently since the beginning of autumn. There are two kinds that appear to have taken up residence in the neighborhood, the red-tailed hawk and the Cooper’s hawk. The Cooper’s hawk is the one that usually lands right near the house, sometimes on the neighbor’s fence or occasionally on my fake tree, which is also favored by the downy woodpecker .
One of the last plants to remain flowering in the garden is the Brazilian Blue Sage, and the hummingbirds, that it attracts all summer long, paid one final visit before leaving for warmer climes.
This is always a busy time of year in the garden, clearing up and preparing for the spring, collecting seeds and dividing plants that are perhaps taking up too much space. Any plants that are surplus to requirements I like to put out where people can help themselves. I’d much rather give them away than throw them in the bin. I even have people stop by and tell me how well the plants are doing in their new home which is always good to hear.
With autumn rapidly approaching, I thought it was about time to look back at some of the things we’ve seen in our garden over the summer. The flower beds and lawns have really suffered from lack of rain and the majority of the flower seeds that I planted in the spring didn’t survive but most of the perennials like the daylilies and Asiatic lilies did well.
Despite a major bunny boom in the garden (at least three families) many of the plants managed to survive being nibbled on. We seem to have reached a reasonable compromise. I put a certain amount of critter food out when I feed the birds and leave some areas to the weeds and wildflowers and the rabbits have agreed to leave most of the other stuff alone.
I always make sure that I have some Brazilian blue sage growing in the garden. It’s a hummingbird magnet and once again it has attracted several of these little gems to the garden. A little house wren was enticed by the peanut butter that I pasted into the fake tree. So was the squirrel, and it was quite entertaining to watch how it tackled the problem of reaching into the holes.
The butterfly bush and weed both lived up to their name and the Joe-pye-weed attracted at least one monarch that stayed around long enough to produce some caterpillars. Although there haven’t been as many butterflies as we would like to see, it’s nice to catch a glimpse of them every once in a while. There have been plenty of bees, though, which is good.
Between processing pictures and a couple of other projects that I’ve been working on recently, I’ve been spending quite a bit of time at my desk, so I was happy to take a break and stretch my legs with some walks around Spring Valley Nature Center in Schaumburg. The weather on the first trip was overcast but the second visit saw clear blue skies. Despite one or two good downpours just lately, the water levels in the pond are quite low.
Despite the rapidly receding waters, there are still plenty of frogs around and I am able to get quite a few mug shots as they smile wryly back at me from the duckweed.
Speaking of ducks, I rarely see anything other than the usual mallards by the pond but, on this occasion, I sight a mother wood duck and her brood. Unfortunately, the more colorful male is nowhere to be seen.
Leaving the pond, I walk through the woods, up to the farm where I stop to talk to one of the docents as we watch another gentleman demonstrating how to carve a wooden spoon. I’m told that, ever since the Covid pandemic, they have had a hard time getting people to come in and take care of the animals which explains why they only have a couple of cows and a few piglets now. The horses have been sent out to a farm in Indiana for now.
Walking back through the prairie area, I always marvel at all the different wildflowers there are and, although I hardly ever see rabbits at Spring Valley, on this occasion I spot two young ones.
Continuing my recent tour of the Chicago Botanic Garden, after taking a stroll through the Sensory Garden, I headed back around the lake to my favorite spot, the English Walled Garden.
Designed by English landscape architect John Brookes MBE, this area has six garden roooms that feature various elements of English garden design. It has recently undergone some restoration work and is really looking magnificent. Of course, there are people working in the Garden all the time, keeping it in tip-top shape. They were busy clearing out growth from between the paving stones on this particular morning and if you look closely you will also see a blue aerial work platform that was being used to trim the tops of the trees in the neighboring allee.
The next stop on the tour is another one of my summertime favorites, the Butterflies and Blooms Exhibit which includes species of butterflies from South America, Asia, Africa and North America. Hundreds of these little gems were fluttering about the enclosure and many more made it easy to capture them with the camera as they rested on plants and flowers, although the giant Atlas Moth wasn’t quite so easy to spot, hidden tantalizingly from full view inside a shrub.
There is still a lot more to see in the Chicago Botanic Garden so I’ll return there at a later date to continue the tour. In the meantime, a future post will include some recent pictures from the Olbrich Botanical Gardens in Madison, Wisconsin.
If you haven’t already done so (and even if you have) come with me now on a brief tour of the Chicago Botanic Garden. I was there last week to renew my membership, the only one I have that has proved itself invaluable over the years. The first area that you come to when you cross the bridge from the Welcome Center is The Crescent. This year, the predominant colors are red and orange and everything in between.
Up a short flight of steps to the left is the Heritage Garden which is dedicated to Carolus Linnaeus. It contains 7 perimeter beds that display plants from different parts of the world, and 14 beds that display plants group according to their scientific classification, with a central fountain and three aquatic pools.
Then it’s time to stop off at the McGinley Pavilion for some Thursday morning music, on this particular day, a piece by Dvorak played by a group from the Midwest Young Artists Conservatory. Splendid music in a delightful setting.
It’s but a short walk from there to the Buehler Enabling Garden, an area that demonstrates garden techniques for all abilities.
This is only a small part of the Chicago Botanic Garden and I hope I didn’t lose any of you along the way. Please join me next time as I visit The Sensory and English Walled Garden and the Butterflies and Blooms exhibit.
There has beeen a steady procession of flowers in bloom in our garden over the past couple of months. It’s hard work but good exercise and the results of all the planting, weeding, pruning and dead-heading are well worth the effort.
Among the star performers every year are the irises and poppies. At the end of the year, when I’m overhauling one or two of the flower beds, I usually put out a few iris and daylily roots for people to help themselves. Last night a lady came to the door and said that she had taken some last year and was thrilled to see them blooming now in her garden. I’m always happy to know that these transplants have been a success, and have received many such kind notes and messages of thanks over the years, for which I am truly grateful.
These early bloomers are all perennials and many are starting to fade, so I have spent the past few weeks planting annual seeds such as cosmos, zinnias, marigolds and 4-0-clocks. These will take a while to germinate and flower. In the meantime we continue to enjoy the peonies, false indigo and nigella (grown from seeds that fell last year) as well as some late blooming iris and poppies.
On the wildlife front, we have had one or two unusual sightings (for us, anyway) including a white throated sparrow, a female rose-breasted grosbeak and a performing rabbit. Unfortunately we had to take out the improvised duck pond as shown in an earlier post, when a baby sparrow fell in and nearly drowned. Luckily we were there to see it floundering and managed to scoop it out without further damage, but I didn’t want to risk it happening again. The new bath isn’t big enough for the ducks to actually climb in, but they still visit even if they are rather disgruntled, and I’m sure the other birds, especially the young ones such as this grackle , appreciate the new safety measures.
The weather was still wet and cold at the end of April, so we decided it would be a good time to visit the Mitchell Park Domes in Milwaukee. There was a lot to see and much to photograph so I’ve divided the posts in order to cover the three individual domes.
The first is the Floral Show Dome. Five times a year, this dome transforms with unique floral displays. Our visit coincided with a special exhibit called ‘Metamorphosis’ which detailed the life cycle of frogs and butterflies with larger-than-life sculptures and artwork.
The colors of the flowers, hydrangeas, hyacinths, ranunculus and tulips, to name but a few, and the perfume that wafted to us from the Easter lilies was just amazing. And over everything, the giant dome, reflected in the pool.
Look out for upcoming posts that will feature the Desert Dome and the Tropical Dome. The Domes are open year round so whatever the weather, you can enjoy nature at its finest in these beautiful displays.
During the first week in May, I made my annual trip to Lilacia Park in Lombard in perfect time to see the lilacs and tulips at their best. The garden was originally established by Colonel William Plum and his wife Helen. After the Colonel’s death in 1927, the grounds were left to the city of Lombard and opened as a public park. In 2019 the park was listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Whoever picks out which tulips to plant every year is a genius! The colors and pairings are fantastic! And the perfume from the lilacs is just heavenly. What a treat for all the senses.
Covering 8.5 acres, the park is not that large, but, thanks to clever use of paths and plantings, you can easily spend a morning, walking around admiring the different views. I also noticed several artists seated in various parts of the park, sketching and painting all the beautiful flowers and trees that were in bloom.
The Nature of Things 