Open Garden Day (and recap)

Karin Kiontke

Last weekend was GreenThumb’s “Open Garden Day”. On this weekend, all community gardens are open and many offer an event or workshop. People can garden-hop see a variety of the more than 500 community garden in the city. It was a gorgeous summer weekend with plenty of sunshine and a cooling thunderstorm on Saturday night.

Of course, at LaGuardia Corner Garden, every day is open garden day: we unlock the gates in the morning and only close them up again at night (weekdays at 8 pm, on weekends at 6 pm or when the last gardener leaves).

To make the day special, we prepared a little crafts workshop for children. This time, we were making flapping butterflies out of carboard and drinking straws.

Here is the adults version

A couple of kids had fun with this, too.

Hard to believe that the last entry here was from the beginning of May and we are already well into June. So let’s see what has happened since:

The roses bloomed beautifully although they were again attacked by the “rose slug” about which I wrote last year.

Butterflies and wild bees emerged from their winter quarters, below a leaf cutter bee (and a tiny masked bee, too) and a painted lady butterfly. We still wait for black swallowtails and monarchs won’t make it here until August or so.

Hugh repainted the labyrinth. He used a different paint this time, which will hopefully last longer than the kind Laine applied last year. This coat of paint did not stand up to snow plowing and ice chopping during the winter. We are really grateful that our labyrinth is fresh and new again because it brings such joy to children and adults alike.

The late spring/early summer flowers are already fading. However, we had a stretch of cool weather that made them last longer than usual. Below is a theme in purple and blue: a Lamium and a Campanula.

Now, the earlist Heliopsis sunflowers and Echinaceas are open, the hollyhocks and clematis are blooming and the first hydrangeas show their stunning colors.

Lastly, the New York Sanitation Department delivered two pallets of compost for our garden. We are still busy spreading the bounty. It should help our garden grow lush, beautiful and bountiful all summer long!

A little arts project for Mom

Karin Kiontke

Today, on a sunny but very windy and cool Sunday we made some cards for Mom since next week is Mother’s day. This year we used the shaving cream method to create a marbled heart. It’s simple: shaving cream is spread out on a tray, acrylic paint is dropped onto the surface, a small stick is used to draw a pattern, a white paper heart is placed onto the paint and pulled off again, the shaving cream is wiped away and voila! Even little kids can do it.

Around us, the garden was blooming beautifully. There are still some late tulips around and the field of irises shines blue as before. But now, there are also purple iris and some really lovely columbines.

Next week is forecast to be warmer and more seasonable for May. If this holds true and it doesn’t rain, we may repeat the card-making on Saturday just in time for Mother’s Day.

What’s in bloom now

Karin Kiontke

Last week, the pink tree peony was the star of the garden. Today, the showstoppers are our other tree peonies and a field of irises and Korean lilacs in full bloom.

The yellow tree peony is always the last to open its flowers. It is an Itoh peony, a cross between a tree peony and a herbaceous peony. Only these have such bright yellow flowers.

We love the Korean lilacs because they not only look lovely in spring and have a wonderful fragrance, but they also reliably re-bloom later in summer. And these flowers are attractive to pollinators, too (here honeybees).

Everybody loves tree peonies (especially bees)

Karin Kiontke

Last week, our variegated tree peony near the gate was in full bloom. Two warm and sunny days made it shine in all of its glory. The flowers attracted attention from us gardeners, passersby and an astonishing number of honey bees. Since we saw the first honeybees in the garden, a lot more must have graduated from hive duty to foraging. And they just love these flowers with lots of yellow pollen.

Every flower of this peony looks a little different. All were equally attractive to bees.

Photo by Agnes Chen

Our other tree peony, a magenta colored beauty, is always blooming just a little bit later. It still had lots of buds. Still, here, too, bees were eagerly looking for pollen.

This weekend is no flying weather for bees. We gardeners are actually very happy about the steady rain that is falling this afternoon. It was much too dry for several weeks. However, when we come back to the garden tomorrow, we will likely find most of these pink and purple petals the ground. The beauty of peonies is fleeting and lasts only for a short moment of the gardening year. Good that we can capture it so easily in pictures.

Tulips!

Karin Kiontke

Much has changed since the last entry here. The roses are pruned, shrubs are cut back and the flowerbeds are mostly cleaned up. The first daffodils are already spent and the crab apple tree has buds that will open any day now.

The most colorful flowers at this time of the year are without doubt tulips. They shine in bright red, pink, orange and different shades of yellow. Each fall, some of us plant new tulips. But some of the bulbs from previous years present a fresh flower every spring. This is true for species tulips like the cheerful yellow woodland tulips (Tulipa sylvestris), and for some of the big showy Darwin tulips, for example the red variety below, which looked just as lovely last year.

Woodland tulip (Foto Agnes Chen)

Tulips look a little like a colorful easter egg when seen from the side. They show an entirely different and more interesting “face” when seen from above. In this view, new colors and fancy markings show up. Some tulips paint the inside of their flower pitch black, perhaps to let the yellow pistil, the female part of the flower, stand out so that pollinators can clearly see it. It is meant for bees and flies, but we humans enjoy this display, too.

Here are a few more tulips (updated on April 19), these are the later varieties.