Tag Archives: Musings

My iPhone Plant Identifier is Very Cool

The Garden Artist Posted on by
New Mexico Plant ID-Brittlebush

Screenshot of the plant ID feature on my new iPhone 13

My new iPhone 13 has a great feature for identifying plants. Just take a photo of the plant, hit all the right buttons and voila, it gives you the suggested name or names of the plant. It also gives a few links to try to further learn about and identify the plant as well as suggestions for other plants similar to it for further research.

This is so amazingly cool and has already helped me identify the plants I was seeing as I traveled out west on vacation. Generally, in my own backyard, I’m able to identify the plants. But put me out in another climate or time zone and I can be lost. There are so many roadside plants that I was seeing while on vacation that I wanted to know more about.

It was October in the Arizona and New Mexico areas and I was at a loss for the most part plantwise. So I did a tutorial on my new iPhone 13 and low and behold, there was this feature that I never had before on my older phones. How very useful and a great tool for learning about new plants and new growing habits.

Here’s an example. All along the edges of pathways and roads in New Mexico were these plants in bloom with an overall yellow flower. I couldn’t decide if they were shrubs or herbaceous plants. I took a photo of them and Bingo..there they were. The plants were Gutierrezia sarothrae also known as Broom Snakeweed in the family of Asteraceae. With this information, I was able to spend time after the trip to read more about them. Very cool!

While hiking around Bell & Courthouse Rock in Sedona there were dozens of plants that captured my interest but couldn’t identify. I kept stopping our 5-mile trek in the breezy sunshiny day to take photos of them, all the while keeping an eye on the clock to make sure we were back safely before sunset.

First I’d take a photo on my phone of a plant. The phone would identify that it was a plant by putting a small circle with a leaf over the plant in question. Then I would click in the lower right-hand corner on the blue circle with the letter “I”. The next screen would give me results with links to research further along with images of similar plant images. Oh my! This is such a major step for them to have invented in order to feed my insatiable curiosity. Thank you Apple!

There is always so much to learn, so much to enjoy and explore when it comes to gardening and horticulture. I often feel that I like studying more than I like gardening which can be exhausting and back-breaking work. I can read about plants endlessly without losing interest or running out of topics to explore. Deadheading, planting, transplanting, weeding, mulching, is mostly not as much fun for me. Ah well, it’s a better workout than the gym at times, plus a far greater reward for all that hard work.

Sedona Plant ID-Initial Capture

The initial screenshot showing the little white circle with a leaf indicating the camera identifies that it’s looking at a plant. The blue “i” in the lower right activates the ID process.

Sedona Plant ID-Dakota mock vervain

Once you activate the search your next screen hosts the Siri Knowledge of what plant it might be along with links for further research. It also gives you links to similar web images to look at.

Sharing My Garden In Support of the Huntington Historical Society

The Garden Artist Posted on by

June 6th is one of the many days I think of my Uncle Teddy, the man who introduced me to gardening at the tender age of 6. Because of him, I began my long journey into gardening. I’ve written about him in previous posts.

This year on June 6th, I opened my garden to benefit the Huntington Historical Society. It was so fitting that it fell on Uncle Teddy’s birthday since, in the garden, he and I are entwined together. For five hours straight I taught, explained, identified plants, offered historical references, shared my knowledge, and thoroughly enjoyed myself. Between 200-250 people came to enjoy my creation.

June 6, 2021 Garden Tour Welcome

June 6, 2021, Huntington Historical Society Garden Tour – Welcoming the Docents

I helped them to understand that my garden is one of my artworks. It is an installation, an assemblage of art, plants, hardscape, and sculpture. It is a conceptual work that embraces the garden as a metaphor of the universe. There is a community of cooperation, of symbiosis and that of opposition, of parasitism in the garden. There is a quest for resources, for nutrition, water, sunshine, and shade between the multiple worlds of humans and animals, plants, pollinators, insects, and the microorganisms of bacteria and fungi. There are lifecycles of birth, maturity, senescence, death, and rebirth. There is a cyclical life experienced by all in the days, the seasons, and the years.

My garden has two major themes beyond this metaphor. I designed my garden as a journey. It must be walked through to be fully appreciated. There are no dead-ends, just options at each intersection for the choice of a different journey. No visit through the garden will ever be the same. The paths selected, the time of day, the week, the season, the year make for new appraisals. New adventures. New sights to be seen and new revelations to experience. New meditations on life to be contemplated.

June 6, 2021 Garden Tour-Crossing the Garden Bridge

June 6, 2021, Huntington Historical Society Garden Tour – The Bridge Over the Dry Stream Bed

Repetitively featured throughout the garden are circles and spheres. Circles have appeared in my art for decades in many different mediums and imagery. To me, they are the beginning, Eve’s apple. They are Woman. They are the enclosing arms of protection & nurturing. These circles are present in the navigation of the garden, the design of flower beds, sculptures placed strategically in vignettes, as well as found objects collected for decades and hidden as treasures between and around the plantings.

June 6, 2021 Garden Tour-Woodland Entrance

June 6, 2021, Huntington Historical Society Garden Tour – The entrance to the woodland walks.

I call this my “girlie” garden. The plant material is practically devoid of sharp pointy thorns & leaves. I look for soft and frilly foliage when selecting plants to include. The colors are pinks and pastels. I think of little girls spinning in their frilly birthday dresses with joyous abandon when I pick my plants. They are safe plants spreading a gentleness of spirit.

Talking with people about the meanings and thoughts behind the choices in my garden opened many eyes on the garden tour. I don’t think anyone who visited the garden could have enjoyed it more than me, except my long gone Uncle Teddy. It all began with him. And I thank him every chance I get.

 

Lessons From The Garden

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I am a gardener. So in 1989 I bought the garden with the home I could afford in the zip code I sought to live in. It’s the first house as you enter my town but some have needled me and said it was the last. I know better.

That gray day in February, the realtor brought me to five different properties. It was the first day I was actually house hunting but when we pulled into this particular gravel driveway I knew I was home. The house didn’t really interest me all that much because I knew the garden had good bones. The giant oaks and the abundance of understory shrubs of mountain laurel spoke to me. I particularly envisioned how beautiful the spring would be when all those dogwoods came into bloom.

I was home and I knew it. So I made an offer below the asking price. As a single parent of two teenage sons, I reserved enough cash to modify the living space so they could have a room of their own. The offer was too quickly accepted which dismayed me since that meant I could have bid even lower. But, oh well, what’s done is done. I had the garden I dreamed of.

Original House Purchase 1989

Two-Bedroom Cape Purchased in February 1989

That winter I would walk in the garden pulling dead leaves from the shrubs, picking up twigs, learning, and looking. Eagerly I awaited the new growth of spring the flowering of the dogwoods. Fingers crossed there might also be some perennials bursting with color in the beds.

Well, that didn’t happen as I expected. As the weather warmed and the leaves began to unwind from their tightly bound buds, eight of the dogwoods quickly announced to me that they were dead markers of what had been. No perennials decided to surprise me with an abundance of color since there were none. And the large shrub that I viewed outside my window turned out to be a pile of dead branches with ivy vigorously covering the mound.  

Waves of disappointment layered over my expectations. All I saw was so much work and expense ahead of me. The trees needed to be cut down and piles of brush removed. The feeling of mourning that spring still resonates with me. A reminder of all the other hopes and dreams I’d had in my life to that point that had been crushed. The lost expectations of joy. Happiness masquerading the death of dreams.

I took my credit card to Sears and bought clippers, an electric saw, and a gas-powered wood chipper. Rakes, trowels, and shovels followed. And I began to clear the dead and diseased plants and shrubs from the property. I sawed and chipped and raked and dug so by that summer I developed muscles I didn’t know I had. The property became my garden.

What I did that summer of 1989 set the tone for the life I am still leading. Each year the garden provides me with disappointments, with a sense of loss and despair. After a period of sadness and mourning, I recover with renewed energy to create a new reality. New plantings. New approaches. New plans, hopes, and dreams. The garden lives in optimism as do I.

The garden has taught me patience. The closer I watched the garden the more it taught me lessons about life. About renewal. About resilience. About how nothing in the garden or our lives is truly in our control. Tending the garden has helped me to adjust my expectations, to accept that my best intentions and plans can and often will be brushed aside.

The garden also taught me that there is a season and a time for things to happen. It has also taught me that nothing lives forever, perhaps many years, but not forever. That we only have a certain amount of spring times to get it right and we don’t know how many springs we have ahead of us. So time is precious and a gift that I choose not to squander. I still have too many seeds to start and plants to place and flowers to paint. My garden keeps me alert to the cycles of life and the benefits of endurance. I am my garden now.

Front Garden Redesigned

The original house rebuilt in 2000. The garden is redesigned every year.

My Art Starts in the Garden.

To see my art that has been inspired by the gardens surrounding my home,

Please visit my Portfolio and online Art Shop.

 

Shown Up By An Ant

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I had to take a break from the hours I had just spent weeding in the garden in the heat of the summer. I was bone-weary. Thirsty enough to pour a gallon of water down my throat. My back ached from all the hours of bending and lifting. I was dirty. Actually I was muddy with sweat.

I sat back, sinking into the cushioned deck chair in the shade, my fingers wrapped around a huge glass of iced coffee. As the dizziness started to subside, I looked down towards my feet stuck into filthy work boots and next to them I spotted a carpenter ant. Now, as you know, carpenter ants are the big ones. But size is relative. Compared to me it was really, really small. This tiny creature was carrying on its back what looked like a giant white breadcrumb that was twice the size of her own body.

This little ant had a destination in mind and was determined to get it there. Well, as I sipped my iced coffee and began to cool down I watched this creature travel across the deck, board by board. It managed to carry this load on its back over every crevasse and never drop it. Occasionally she met with another carpenter ant but after acknowledging each other they each went their own way. My ant never shared its load with others to make the job easier.

As she walked her circuitous path across the length of the deck I became fascinated with the comparative distance and wondered if this was the equivalent of me walking to town or across state lines. And the ant didn’t stop. Didn’t put down its load to rest.

When the ant began to get too far outside my line of sight I ever so slowly lifted myself up out of my comfy chair and followed it to the far end of the deck, iced coffee still in hand. I followed my ant down the steps into my garden. Almost lost it in the grass but was able to find it again because of the big white load on its back.

I followed my ant through my garden to the a pile of sand at the opening of the anthill. After carrying this load all that way, across what seemed like continents to her I presume, I watched it struggle all by itself to drag the large load into its home. She had to widen the opening since her bundle was so large. Other ants were coming and going, some bringing home their own loot. Others leaving to go on their own expeditions.

This little ant got me out of the chair, across the deck, and back into my garden, I put down my glass of iced coffee and got back to work. I wasn’t going to let that little ant out-work me. I think I could hear her chuckle as she dove into her home thinking about the huge load she had just carried out into the garden.

 

 

Bringing The Garden Indoors

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Every year I’m faced with decisions about where to spend my energy. Each year that decision shifts as my available time, available focus, and available interest fluctuates. Those issues don’t present themselves in linear time. There is no steady march towards some undetermined goal. No inevitable trudge towards downsizing.

Now I’m facing another decision point, one that I face each fall. I ask myself if it’s worth it to continue my seasonal shifts of bringing the garden indoors and outdoors again next spring. Do I let nature make the decision and just buy all new plants when the season begins again? And if I do decide to harvest, what will I bring in, where will I put it, is it worth the effort this particular plant will present me with, and what is the value of each choice given my limited space?

Some Plants in my Deck Garden

These are some of the deck plants. There are also 8 window boxes on the railings, 3 large box planters & other assorted containers around the corner from these. What was I thinking!

I’ve had years when I lost all interest in saving my deck garden. Sometimes I was so disappointed in the performance of the plants or the mutilating attacks on them by critters. Other years I was far too anxious to retreat to my studio to recreate the colors and ideas of summer on canvas. There have been a few years when a surprise frost beat me to the job and there was nothing left to save. Somehow, after the mourning is over, there’s a sense of relief of sorts since there’s more time leftover for new endeavors, new experiments.

Deciding to bring in the plants, in whatever form, means a commitment to months of work. Just like having pets, such as the cats and dogs my friends adopt, my plants need regular attention. They need the proper amount of water, food, and light. Some need dormancy. Others require bright lighting to flourish. Still others are just taken in as cuttings and need to develop roots. Some require complete darkness for periods of time in order to bloom. Learning the needs of individual plants takes study and attention to detail.

And then there are the critters that come in for a free ride. The spiders. The whitefly. The caterpillars. The cotton balls of mealy bugs. Let’s not forget slugs, earwigs, aphids, stink bugs, thrips, and stems covered in scale. I’ve found all these on my winter indoor plants at one time or another. I ask then is it worth it!

And then, in the winters when I decide to commit to the work, when it’s gray outside and I slowly wander downstairs to my former darkroom, now my plant room, the magic happens. As I open the creaking door to this unheated former root cellar, the smell of soil wafts towards my nose. The daylight adjusted lighting fills me with echoes of summer. My eyes shine with the reflection of colors blooming in the sink, on the countertops, and on the floor.

New growth, new optimism for the coming year. New plans of where these plants will go when the time comes. Gifts shared with friends. Donations to just causes. And some will remain with me to start again another season. A glance into the future. New opportunities. Renewed hope.

Plant Room Before I Bring in The Plants. Mary Ahern Artist

This is the plant room just before I began to bring the deck plants in for the winter. Choices have to be made.

 

Living With Scars

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In my garden I have hundreds of shrubs and trees. I’ve designed woodland walks that encourage immersion in the garden as you journey along the different paths. Each time I walk the garden I meander a different trail to observe the small and big changes that occurred since my last visit. Sometimes it’s a new tiny shoot emerging from the soil just seeing daylight. Sometimes there is a plant weakening and a slipping into senescence. But each time the garden tells me its stories.

Twenty years ago when I was designing this garden I hired a company to help carve the terrain. Soil was to be dumped behind the row of trees along the edge of the property to make a berm, thus creating a buffer to the street and more privacy in the woods. The driver of the bobcat had the sensibility of a construction worker rather than a gardener. There was a carelessness to his treatment of the trees. He didn’t respect their majesty. At one point he drove his bobcat forcefully into the trunk of one of these, he didn’t blink, he didn’t stop, he just backed up and kept going, Concerned only with his job at hand.

I walked to the tree truck and gently covered the gouged bark with the palm of my hand. I spoke to it as I often do while amongst the plants. Over the roar of the machine, I softly apologized and told the tree I was so sorry. I felt its hurt personally. It felt natural to me to nurture that injury as I’d cared for the scrapes and cuts on the bodies of my young sons.

Over the years I often caressed the wound as I wandered throughout the garden. Watching the healing happen. Slowly, very slowly, that tree began to heal. The inside of the gash began to close, the bark covered the wound by millimeters each year. But I noticed also, that the tree was left with a scar. It would never completely disappear. It would last throughout its lifetime as a reminder of the accident, the injury.

I too have scars that I carry on me. A lifetime of damage both big and small. Some of those scars are from physical injuries but I also carry inside of me the scars of emotional damage. Like the tree, I didn’t succumb to these many wounds. I grew scars, some of them thicker than the surrounding skin. But reminders of my resilience. My ability to heal enough to move on, move forward in spite of the pain. Like the tree, I still stand proudly against the vicissitudes of life. 

Living With Scars-A Tale of Resilience

This hemlock trunk has been healing for over 20 years now.

Caterpillars Ate My Dreams

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At the end of the darkness of winter, I start from infinitesimal seeds the hopes and dreams of a new season. Spring is about optimism, plans and possibilities for a future of glorious beauty meant to nourish our hearts and our bodies.

Dreaming of meals, the simmering soups bubbling on the stove, the roasts in the oven. I am transported by the seasonings growing in my herb garden, warmed by the sun. These meals will nourish those who gather together.

Parsley, chives, cilantro and dill flourish. Varieties of thyme sit comfortably next to rosemary. I can inhale the fragrance of food and family.

Watering can in hand, what happened to all my parsley! It’s gone! All of it! What! It can’t be! My bubble bursts!

Then I saw movement. Lime green, stripes, slithering. A fat caterpillar. And no not one. Many were gorging to devour my dreams quickly.

Enraged I plucked each writhing caterpillar with my gloved fingers & threw with the speed of the playground training practiced in years gone by. I cursed as I hurled each and every destroyer. What a waste of my good intentions. Why my parsley? Why not the other thousands of leaves of greenery in my garden that mean less in the grand plan?

And what was I going to tell Sharon on Thanksgiving? My young new step-daughter who tentatively edged closer to me over time. We bonded over food. We had our own secret ingredients. The vanilla in the pancakes that no one but she and I knew. We whispered gently together.

Now where will she find the parsley when I hand her the small scissors on a cold Thanksgiving morning. To season the stuffing? To garnish the potatoes. To make our perfect family gathering complete. What will we whisper about now that the parsley is gone?

Still seething, I saw later that summer the butterflies fluttering. Dipping in and out around the flowers in my garden. Weaving amongst the petals. The variety of colors, spots and dots that dressed these delicate apparitions.

A gong sounded in my head from the baby books read and reread to the children. My parsley was eaten by some very hungry caterpillars. And they in turn became beautiful butterflies. Swallowtail butterflies in fact.

So now we had new secrets to share, Sharon and I. The mysteries of life, the transformations creatures are capable of and the flexibility we as humans have for reframing our hopes, dreams and expectations.

Our conversations expanded over time, beyond food. We still shared our secret ingredients but they expanded exponentially but remained nourishing.

Caterpillars and Butterflies in the Garden

My Garden Tour Video March 21, 2020

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My Art Starts in the Garden

I love to share my garden! This is a creation that I’ve been working on for over 30 years and what fun is it keeping it all to myself? That feels so selfish to me.

So the best thing I can do, since it’s hard for so many of you to travel here, is to take you on a garden tour around my 1/2 acre woodland walks in Northport NY. We’re Zone 7 here and this Garden Tour video is in the early spring on March 21, 2020 around 6pm in the evening.

I haven’t yet finished my fall cleanup at this point and of course, as gardeners well know, the garden is never perfect. At this time of year, in my neck of the woods, something new opens every single day. It’s a very exciting time for me each day as I walk around to see what’s new. Spring is about renewal. About optimism. About color. About surprises.

This is the first in a series of Garden Tour videos I’ll be doing so please remember to subscribe to my YouTube Channel to be alerted when I publish new videos.

My garden is the source material for almost all of my paintings. It is where I get my inspiration. It’s where I present yet another aspect of my creativity but this one is in 3D and seasonally adjusted over time and temperature.

Come and take a casual walk with me around my garden. Enjoy!

Growing New Gardeners

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How do we grow gardeners? We start them young. We intrigue them with our questions about what they’re seeing, what they’re hearing. We let their imaginations run rampant. We celebrate their dirty hands and knees and when they grow up they already love their favorite garden spots. 

Garden blog by Mary Ahern Artist.

My grandson CJ taking a break from chasing dinosaurs in our woodland garden on April 26, 2006.

We pass on what our elders taught us that captured our fascination with the world around us. How did we come to appreciate the complexity of leaf edges and the critters crawling under our stumps and stones?  We talked with them, we enjoyed the experience of learning and sharing. We made the garden the center of their invented stories, their imagined dinosaurs, the strolling around the paths that led to nowhere but really everywhere.

My Uncle Teddy passed down to me the mysterious and exciting world of nature and the gift he gave me keeps giving. As my grandson CJ completes his Eagle Scout project of creating a woodland path through a nature preserve dedicated to native plant species with the eradication invasive species, we see how we generationally share our knowledge and continue to contemplate our universe. 

 

Garden blog by Mary Ahern Artist.

My grandson CJ Ahern sitting at one of his favorite spots in our woodland garden on April 29, 2018 just before he started his Eagle project to restore a neglected woodland area at an animal sanctuary in Seaford NY.

 

My Garden My Muse My Inspiration

The Garden Artist Posted on by

My muse is my garden. Other gardens as well, but my garden in particular. I move in it, feel it, and hear the breezes whisper through it. I watch the lighting during the day as it slides over and around the textured surfaces.

Mary Ahern - Azaleas and Tree Peony in my garden

This azalea and tree peony combination bloom in my garden together every year. Their colors match perfectly and are so inspiring to me!

Lighting is so different on days with sun and with clouds. Lighting in the spring with the bright yellow-greens of optimistic new growth and lighting by the fall with ambers & tans of a lived life. Morning light offers tender ambiance while afternoon colors not only light the scene from a different direction, the colors are deeper and warmer.

My garden brings consciousness and meaning to me. It keeps me grounded. The ephemeral beauty of an unfertilized blossom studied up close with magnifiers and macro lenses is a representation of a miracle. The world of possibility. The beginning of a story I represent in my Art. I walk through my garden gathering ideas. Stories I want to tell. Suggested ideas I want to convey.

In my garden I spend time designing the landscape or I spend time closely and intimately with a singular specimen at a particular stage of growth. In my studio I may paint a vignette or a full landscape view of a part of the garden I’ve designed, or I may choose to paint a small portion of one flower that has moved me. The minute miracle. This is my work. Outdoors and indoors. These are the stories I tell. This is my Art. You can see more of my work in my online Art Shop.

Fire Flame Peony

These Fire Flame Peonies bloom in my garden each year in May at the same time as the color matching azalea.This and other pieces of my Art can be purchased in various sizes on canvas, fine art paper, metal and acrylic in my online Art Shop.

Planting Combinations – Peonies and Azaleas

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There are some plants in my garden that just demand to be viewed together. In my front garden bed is a Fire Flame Tree Peony that for years has bloomed at the same time as a perfectly color matched azalea. Together they light up their niche in the world for a week or two each year if I’m lucky.

Mary Ahern - Professional Artist

These Fire Flame Peonies blooming in my May garden along with the azalea inspired my original painting.

Keep the rain away from the peonies and the heat away from the azalea & I’ve got a perfect vignette. I love the way the focal points shift around my garden all year when either color takes prominence or form, as it does in winter.

I think of my garden as a theater production where spotlights guide your eyes around the action on stage.

If you want to extend the season of the colorful joy of these planting combinations you should consider buying one of my pieces of Art. Visit my Art Store to see your options. You won’t be disappointed!

Fire Flame Peony - Available in the Mary Ahern Art Store

Fire Flame Peony – Available in the Mary Ahern Art Store

Adding a Tree to my Garden

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In October of 2012, Superstorm Sandy felled 4 large Oak trees in my woodland garden. We were lucky that was the only damage we suffered in that severe storm other than loss of electricity. Instantly my garden went from full shade to sunshine a dappled shade. What a transformation for it and for me.

Oak tree lost in battle with Hurricane Sandy

Oak tree lost in battle with Hurricane Sandy

After a period of mourning, I started rethinking, planning and studying what to do with this newfound daylight.

One of the mighty Oak trees was left with an interesting sculptural remnant which I originally planned to keep in remembrance of what had been. As usual, I changed my mind as I started designing and replanting. Like most gardeners, I change my mind all the time as I work in my garden.

I decided to plant a Heritage River Birch, Betula nigra “Heritage” in memory of my Uncle Teddy who introduced me to gardening. As a child visiting him in Schenectady from my treeless home in Brooklyn, he one day found me peeling the bark from one of his many white birch trees. When he asked me to stop as I was pulling the “skin” from the tree and hurting it, I looked around with tears in my eyes and realized that the entire garden was alive. I was transformed!

1940's-WWII-Theodore-Gerrits

Theodorus Hendrik Gerrits, 1914 – 1991. Thank you!

 

This tree is for my uncle who shared with me his garden and his love. Thank you!

2014-Uncle-Teddy-birch-tree-IMG_6821

 

Hurricane Sandy Stole Some of My Tree Friends

The Garden Artist Posted on by

I lost some friends.

Sandy came to visit and in a fury broke, smashed and tore away some of my garden friends. These huge and venerable trees were here before I moved into their space many decades ago. They’ve provided me with the backbones of my woodland garden. They helped me design the paths I carved out of the thickets. They offered the strong verticals of a towering garden design.

These old oaks shared their shade keeping me cool in the summer. This shade offered me the opportunity to explore the great variety of plants and shrubs that thrive in their speckled light. Shredded oak leaves of these generous trees have been the basis of the garden mulch that nourishes my woodland garden.

I am mourning the loss of what was.

But now I’ve planted bulbs where the oaks once stood.

I look forward in the spring to enjoying their sunshine.

Hurricane Sandy Tree Damage

The Joys of Gardening in the Shade

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So now, after an unusually warm & snow-free winter, the weather has already skimmed the high ’80’s during the month of May. As I sit on my deck exhausted from the heat, wondering how I’m ever going to be able to do all my planting after I’ve indulged at our plant sale & exchanged plant trophies with my gardening girlfriends.

The good news is that I’m a shade gardener. (That’s not to be confused with a shady gardener.) If I play my cards right I never have to bow down in the bright sun, slather myself in sunblock, or supply myself with a straw hat. The sun, which in my youth was my friend, now entices me only from sheltered nooks.

I garden in full shade, dappled shade, high shade, mostly shade & some minimal shade. Because shade is an elusive distinction, my garden is a type of laboratory. Often I’ll divide a plant in order to test the shade tolerances of specific species or cultivars. I document my garden with extensive photos & data as part of my enjoyment of the Art of gardening.

Shade gardens are about subtleties. Textures of leaves, the size & scale of those leaves, the shiny leaves versus those with indumentation, rough to the touch or smooth as suede. Color in the shade is not blinded out by the harsh sunshine. One can appreciate the varieties of green, the blue-greens, the lime-greens, the purple-greens & how about green-green. The color of an emerging stem or bud versus that in its maturity is quite an event to observe in the shade garden.

My shade garden is zen-like for me. It’s about savoring the space, the sounds of the birds singing for their supper, the smell of the soil on moist mornings, the wandering on my woodland walks.

Oh, and one final thing, because of the shade there is very little weeding to be done. Sweet!

Woodland walkways with Ginkgo bench the inspiration for the artist, Mary Ahern.

Woodland walkways with Ginkgo bench in the distance.

Five Plants I Would Save In My Garden

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Kansas Peonies Artwork made from the original gift from my son Chris. By the Artist, Mary Ahern.

“Kansas Peonies” Art inspired from my Mother’s Day present.

Four O’Clocks were my first introduction to growing plants from seed. Uncle Teddy took me by the hand at his home in Schenectady and introduced me, the kid from Brooklyn, to gardening. I can still smell the soil as we dropped the seeds of Four O’Clocks into the ground he taught me to prepare. Four O’Clocks weren’t the only things growing in his garden, so was I.

The Kansas Peonies I grow in my garden was a Mother’s Day present from my son Chris. I have so many gifts he’s given to me over our many years together but I still cherish the bright pink of these robust plants each year as they bloom for me right in season. They return each Mother’s Day, expanding and adding to their beauty, as does he.

Japanese Maple in the garden of the Artist, Mary Ahern.

Japanese Maple a birthday gift.

One year for my September birthday, my son, Michael came swooping in proudly bestowing upon me a stripling of a Japanese Maple. Still dangling was the $9.99 tag placed on it from Home Depot. Now, this mature specimen holds court as a central focal point in my front garden.

A bouquet of Zinnias comes into my hands each year when my husband Dave buys them from the gardener with a stand up the street from us. The grin on his boyish face as he hands them to me with love is matched only by the riotous colors of the single and double flowers grouped tightly in his hands.

On Mother’s Day this year my grandson C.J. bounced up to greet me with a pot full of poppies. He shares my garden with me and helps to bring my attention to all the wonderful colors and shapes he finds there for fear I might miss them. These poppies are pink he told me and reminded me that we need to photograph everything so we’ll remember how they looked.

I’ll remember.