Author Archives: talesofanashvillegardener

This last photo is of great interest for it is of one of the new “Flower Kisser” series of hardy autumn blooming salvias. This plant came from High Country Gardens online. It has been in the garden three years, but this is the first time it has bloomed.

The Meadow Garden has matured over the past three years, and despite the severe drought and the sickening heat this summer, thrived on minimal watering. This fall was the first time Amsonia hubrectii “Butterscotch” reached maturity and showed its autumn coloring as it flowered along side the hardy ageratum Cononclinium colestinum and the aromatic asters.Continue reading “Fall 2025. The Meadow Garden at the Goffstown Historical Society, Goffstown New Hampshire.”

The garden I call “The Sandpit” lies facing east and is backed by a tall retaining wall of granite boulders. The soil is that of a blueberry barrens. Sandy and infertile, any hose water or rain runs down to Gregg Mill Pond, that is if any is left by the hundred plus year old maples.Continue reading “Unwatered and Undaunted.”

This is a small garden bed in the Goffstown Historical Society Gardens. The stone birds or frogs or gargoyles came from a building in Goffstown, where they peered down at Mast Road while dutifully diverting rain off the roof. Now they sit along beneath a retaining wall beside abandoned stone steps. I have seen picturesContinue reading “Gardens Need Mystery and Yes, A Little Whimsy”

I planted all perennials in the Meadow Garden, but did include some non-native grasses. Despite the heat and drought it was watered only a handful of times. It bloomed in late summer and included goldenrods, asters, ironweeds, and the showy butterscotch fall leaves of the spring blooming amsonias. This garden bed is only three yearsContinue reading “A Look Back- The Meadow Garden at the Goffstown Historical Society . Late Summer /Fall 2024”

We in Southern New Hampshire are looking towards temperatures in the 50s for most of the next week after 50s in this one. This will banish the last snow pockets and dry up the mud. The robins will come to the front lawn and the song sparrows will return to their favorite rhododendron. And theContinue reading ““Goodbye and Keep Cold””

Years ago, when I lived in Nashville, I belonged to the Middle Tennessee Perennial Plant Society, and I remember best a garden designer named Duncan Caldecott who finished his talk with a reminder I have never forgotten. “If someone visits your garden and makes fun of you for planting lowly common orange daylilies, you tellContinue reading “Remember Whose Garden It Is”

I am a Volunteer, an unpaid, unlicensed worker, who like millions before me on every continent and in every age finds a mission they feel they must undertake because they value their precious time as worth more than money. Someone or something needs them. Some of us are heroic. We are the Cajun Navy, rescuingContinue reading “Volunteers”

After 20 years, the USDA has confirmed what I have suspected for the last year or so. Southern New Hampshire is now Zone 6a with pockets of 6b. I now live one hardiness zone from Middle Tennessee, where I lived for almost 40 years. Last Saturday I, and Marian, another Goffstown Historical Society volunteer, wentContinue reading “Zone 6”