It's always so exciting to see how the gardens develop and thrive around my farm.
In 2020, we planted hundreds of hosta plants down behind my chicken coop yard across the carriage road from my allée of lilac. I first got the plants as bare-root cuttings and kept them in a cold frame for several months until they were big enough to transplant. In all, we had more than 700 hostas in a variety of cultivars including 'Wide Brim,' 'Francee,' 'Regal Splendor,' 'Elegans,' and 'Blue Angel.' Now four years later, they're doing excellently, filling the space with verdant foliage under the dappled shade of the stately dawn redwoods.
Here are some photos.
I tour all the gardens on a daily basis. I check how much the plants have grown, how healthy they are, and whether they need more food or water. I also assess what areas need more filling, or if plants need moving. Right now, so many of the gardens are just brimming with color and vitality – in particular, my hosta garden.
Just three weeks ago this garden was pretty bare. I instructed my outdoor grounds crew to top dress the bed with a generous layer of mulch, but there wasn’t much to see except the bit of green from the growing plants.
A week later, the hostas were up, some opened, and others were just beginning to unfurl.
And this is the garden now – hundreds of bold, green, gorgeous hosta plants are thriving.
This garden is planted under the shade of tall dawn redwoods, Metasequoia. In this photo, one can also see the allée of lilace across the carriage road.
The area is also planted with viburnum, cotinus, Spanish bluebells, and bleeding hearts, Dicentra.
It’s hard to miss these beautiful flowers. Dicentra is an elegant, easy-to-care-for perennial for shady gardens. More commonly known as bleeding heart, it is named for its heart-shaped blossoms that dangle from slender, arching stems. Dicentra is a great companion for other shade loving perennials such as hosta, astilbe and ferns. Here it is in pink.
… And here it is in red.
Viburnums have long been one of the most popular flowering landscape shrubs. This large group of plants consists of more than 150 species and numerous named cultivars. Viburnums include deciduous and evergreen specimens as well as small trees, mostly native to North America or to Asia. The leaves of viburnum ranges from glossy green to a dull, dark green, velvet appearance to foliage that is thick and leathery.
Hyacinthoides hispanica, commonly called Spanish bluebell or wood hyacinth, is a bulbous perennial native to Spain, Portugal and northwest Africa. Each bulb produces a clump of two to six strap-shaped leaves from which a rigid flower stem grows, typically containing up to 12 to 15 hanging, bell-shaped, bluish-lavender flowers that rise from the center.
I planted lots of these Spanish bluebells around the farm.
Another favorite is Continus – a few are also planted in this space. The smooth, rounded leaves come in exceptional shades of clear pinkish-bronze, yellow, deep purple, and green.
Hosta is a genus of plants commonly known as hostas, plantain lilies, and occasionally by the Japanese name, giboshi.
Hostas are native to northeast Asia and include hundreds of different cultivars.
These beautiful plants have been opening more and more every day, showing off their gorgeous leaf structures.
Hosta leaf textures can be smooth, veined or puckered. Their surfaces may be matt, shiny or waxy but are usually satiny.
This variety is called ‘Francee’ with dark green, heart-shaped leaves and narrow, white margins.
‘Regal Splendor’ is a large hosta featuring thick, wavy-undulate, blue-gray leaves with irregular creamy white to pale yellow margins and cuspidate tips.
‘Elegans’ has huge, rounded, blue-gray leaves with white flowers that bloom mid-summer.
This is ‘Wide Brim’ with its dark green leaves and wide, yellow, irregular margins. This variety prefers full shade for most of the day.
The hostas were strategically positioned and spaced, paying attention to variety, color, and growth habit.
Unlike many perennials, which must be lifted and divided every few years, hostas are happy to grow in place without much interference. In summer, blooms on long stalks extend up above the clumping hosta foliage.
Hostas thrive in sites where filtered or dappled shade is available for much of the day, but they can survive in deep shade. If you have a shady area, experiment with shade-loving plants. Hostas, with their palette of different colors, textures, and sizes have tremendous landscape value and offer great interest to any garden. I am so pleased with how well this garden is doing.
The beds in my vegetable garden are filling up quickly.
My gardeners and outdoor ground crew have been very busy in the vegetable garden. After cleaning, cultivating, and adding nutrient rich compost to all the raised beds, they started planting a number of crops. Many plants are started from seed indoors, such as the brassicas, also known as cruciferous vegetables - broccoli, kale, cauliflower, and cabbage. Other seeds are planted directly into the soil. Soon the entire garden will be filled with rows of wonderful produce.
Enjoy these photos.
In March, once the weather is warm enough to work in the beds, we start preparing them for planting.
This giant half-acre vegetable garden is doing so well. My gardener and I decide what plants will go where – always keeping in mind where crops were planted the preceding year. Rotating the vegetables gives various nutrients to the soil and improves soil stability by alternating between crops with deep roots and those with shallow roots. Pests are also deterred by eliminating their food source on a regular basis.
Look at all the beautiful beds now ready to be planted. It is very easy to plant in raised beds because of the light, fluffy, well-drained soil, which encourages vigorous plant growth.
Some of the first plants we get into the ground include the brassicas. Brassica is a genus of plants in the mustard family. Members are informally known as cruciferous vegetables, cabbages, or mustard plants. They are also sometimes called cole crops – cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, and kale – all started from seed in the greenhouse.
Ryan thinks through the measurements of each bed to assess how many rows of each vegetable can be planted in the space. He takes into consideration the number of plants and the size of the vegetables when mature. Ryan places as many as he can in the bed without compromising the needs of each plant.
This is one of our cabbage plants grown from seed. Cabbage has flat or curly, tight, or loose leaves; and comes in green, white, red, and purple colors.
My gardens are often photographed and videotaped for television, print, and social media – from the ground and from up above, so it is crucial that they look their best. Ryan lines up the plants so they can be planted in perfectly straight rows.
Josh carefully plants each one. They should be planted in holes just slightly deeper than the container depth – about half the stem should be buried. Brassicas also require exposure to full sun – at least six to eight hours per day. Lack of sunlight may produce thin, leggy plants and subpar heads.
For planting Josh uses a narrow trowel. it is made of stainless steel, with a five-inch by three-inch blade and a five-inch handle.
Josh places the plant in the hole, backfills, and then lightly tamps down on the soil around the plant.
Here’s the cabbage bed all planted.
These are Chinese cabbage plants. Here, one can see how they are planted so they all have enough room to grow. The plants are about 12 inches apart. The trick to growing brassicas is steady, uninterrupted growth. That means rich soil, plenty of water, and good fertilization.
Chinese cabbage takes about two months to mature. The plant produces dense, barrel-shaped heads of pale, thin, tender leaves.
In this bed, we planted kale. Kale grows best in full sun and likes fertile, well-draining soil to grow fast and produce tender leaves.
Depending on the variety, kale can have long, crinkly leaves ranging from pale green to almost black, with a nutty, earthy flavor. Curly kale has tightly ruffled, slightly bitter leaves, varying from bright green to purple-tinged.
Wooden markers are used to identify all the rows, so we know what varieties do best.
At the end of the beds, we also plant herbs. This is oregano, an herb from the mint, or Lamiaceae family, which adds a peppery bite and slight sweetness to foods.
We also planted a bed of broccoli. Broccoli is ready to harvest 50 to 90 days after transplanting, depending on the variety.
Broccoli is one of the healthiest vegetables and is high in vitamin-C and fiber.
There’s a lot more planting to do, but it’s a great start to the planting season. Have you started planting in your vegetable garden?
Do you know… one large, mature tree can can produce more than 270-liters of oxygen a day? That's nearly half of what the average human needs in a day. The earth needs trees.
Every year I plant hundreds, sometimes thousands of trees here at the farm - it's one way I can give back to the Earth and help create a cleaner, healthier and more sustainable planet for my grandchildren and for everyone. Not long ago, we received a shipment of bare root cuttings from JLPN, a family owned tree company in Salem, Oregon. Bare root trees are so named because the plants are dug from the ground while dormant, and stored without any soil surrounding their roots. Once the young specimens arrived, my gardeners hurried to pot them in nutrient-filled composted soil to keep them healthy until they can be transplanted in the ground.
Enjoy these photos.
This is a bald cypress tree, Taxodium distichum, in summer. It is one of several that line one side of the carriage road across from my long pergola. And it is one of thousands that I planted since purchasing my farm.
Since I plant so many trees, I get some that are older and taller for various gardens, and many in the form of bare-root cuttings for hedges, or larger group plantings. Each bundle here contains 25, 50, or 100-cuttings. JLPN’s cuttings are harvested in December, graded, and then held in cold storage until they are shipped out in spring.
The root portion of the plant is placed in the water and left to soak overnight. This good soaking helps the plants get off to a better start. Among the benefits of getting bare root cuttings is that they are very easy to inspect for root development – roots should never have a dry, grayish appearance, or in contrast, be saturated or water-logged.
I feel the bare root trees do best when potted up and nurtured for a period of time before being transplanted in their permanent locations. I have a fenced area designated for these trees in one corner of my middle hay field.
These newest specimens will remain here for about a year or two until they are planted in the ground.
For potting up the trees, we use a nutrient-filled composted manure and top soil mix.
A generous sprinkling of fertilizer developed specially for young trees is added and mixed into the soil.
We save pots whenever we can – they always come in handy for projects like this, and I always encourage the crew to reuse supplies whenever possible.
The trees in this shipment include bald cypress, Japanese maples, witch hazel, black locust, and hornbeams. A large marker indicating the common name and the botanical name is made for each variety.
The hornbeam, Carpinus betulus, is a fast-growing deciduous tree. Carpinus betulus is native to Western Asia and central, eastern, and southern Europe, including southern England. Because of its dense foliage and tolerance to being cut back, this hornbeam is popularly used for hedges and topiaries.
With more than a thousand varieties and cultivars including hybrids, the iconic Japanese maple tree is among the most versatile small trees for use in the landscape. Japanese maples are native to areas of Japan, Korea, China, and Russia. In Japan, the maple is called the “autumn welcoming tree” and is planted in the western portion of gardens – the direction from which fall arrives there.
Japanese maple forms can be weeping, rounded, dwarf, mounding, upright, or cascading. Red leafed cultivars are the most popular, followed by green shrubs with deeply dissected leaves.
Japanese maples prefer slightly acidic, well-draining soil in sheltered areas with morning sun. My Japanese Maple Woodland is located in the perfect spot just beyond my allée of lindens.
Witch hazel grows as small trees or shrubs with numerous clusters of rich yellow to fiery orange-red flowers.
They perform best in full sun, or filtered shade. Witch hazels also possess shallow, slow-growing root systems, which do best in large planting areas. Fortunately, I have a lot of room to grow these pretty shrubs. I have several mature shrubs near my Summer House and more near my allée of lindens.
Black locust trees, Robinia pseudoacacia, is a medium-sized hardwood deciduous tree, belonging to the tribe Robinieae. These are the leaflets of the black locust – pinnate with seven to 21 oval leaflets on each leaf branch. A leaflet, occasionally called foliole, in botany is a leaf-like part of a compound leaf. Though it resembles an entire leaf, a leaflet is not borne on a main plant stem or branch, as a leaf is, but rather on a petiole or a branch of the leaf.
And these are the feathery needles of the bald cypress tree, a deciduous conifer. Though it’s native to swampy conditions, the bald cypress is also able to withstand dry, sunny weather and is hardy in USDA climate zones 5 through 10. These trees do so well here at the farm.
Each pot is laid out with a small layer of soil ready for the tree and backfill. The crew has devised an efficient production line process for potting massive amounts of trees. Each bare root cutting is placed into an appropriately sized pot. The root section should fit into the pot without bing crowded at the bottom.
Healthy bare root trees get off to a more vigorous start because their abundant, fibrous roots have already had a chance to develop unrestricted. The tree is placed at the same level it was grown by the nursery – where the roots start and the top shoots begin. If it’s in good condition, the plant should sprout leaves in the same year it is planted. If planted in spring, a bare root plant should have leaves by summer.
The soil is then gently filled in around the roots, but not packed too tightly. The important thing is to keep the soil moist. Matthew then pats the soil gently around the roots to ensure good contact.
As each tree is potted, it is placed in a row with all like specimens and the appropriate marker. Some of these have leaves, but most do not. Bare-root cuttings are difficult to identify when there are no leaves, so it is important to keep them separated by cultivar and always properly marked.
While here, these trees will be watered and fed until they are more developed. I already have some ideas where these trees will go. Follow this blog and see where…
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