A Visit to a Nursery

Grange Hollow is the name of a local nursery. One of the very best, if not the best.

Recently, our local garden club organized a bus trip to nurseries, including Grange Hollow. We had perfect weather, a bright and sunny day with a cooling breeze.

Sales area of Grange Hollow Nursery

Along the Shores of Lake Huron

I have had previous posts about the wild flowers along Lake Huron, but usually showing flowers that bloom later in the season.

Here are photos of some of the most attractive plants that were in bloom a few days ago. Because of the abundance of extreme habitats, our area has a high number of rare species and is considered one of the more botanically significant parts of Ontario.

Iris versicolor which is usually found in ditches

Rock Garden Plants

We do not have a rock garden per se. However, having been part of various rock garden societies for many years, we have accumulated some rock garden plants (and killed many  more). Here are some of the smaller plants that have bloomed for us this spring. Many of them were grown from seed.

Semiaquilegia ecalcarata

Plant Portrait - Chrysanthemum argenteum

This plant has nothing to do with what we think of as chrysanthemum.  It is rather one of those plants whose great virtue is to go unnoticed most of the time. You don't see it, but you do not miss all its neighbours, which are made more prominent by the supporting role  this unassuming foliage plant provides.

You will notice that it looks a fair bit like the ubiquitous "Dusty Miller" (Senecio cineraria). Both are grown for their foliage, their insignificant blooms being ignored or removed. However, contrary to Dusty Miller, the main advantage of Chrysanthemum argenteum, is that it is perennial!

Chrysanthemum argenteum through Allium karataviense

An Abandoned Garden

Having visited a very interesting nursery (Fiddlehead Nursery in Kimberly, Ontario, which specializes in rare perennial vegetables) we were driving back on a rural road, when we saw a sign for a nature reserve with a water falls. We stopped to look at it and were pleased to discover that an unadvertised premium came with the water falls: an abandoned garden.

I do not know how long it has been abandoned, but some of the plants have had time to run amuck. The most spectacular was Dame's Rocket (Hesperis matronalis) which covered a few acres and was a sight to see. You can just imagine the heady perfume such a lot of blooms produce.  I had not realized Dame's Rocket could be so invasive.

Like William Kent, Dame's Rocket leaped the fence, and saw that all nature was a garden