Author Archives: talesofanashvillegardener

This plant, taller than I am, traveled 3000 miles to New Boston to live with me. I bought it, and two other Nicotiana cultivars, from Annie’s Annuals in California. I grew this flower in Tennessee where it remained small and reluctant. But I remember Elizabeth Lawrence, the best of American garden writers, writing that onceContinue reading “Nicotiana mutabilis”

I live up the road from the Lang Railroad Station in New Boston. The station is now part of a town forest and walkway along the old railroad line. No train has been heard here since early in the last century. But one went through last night. I was home from work at midnight andContinue reading “The Fourth of July, and a Phantom Train”

When I moved to back to New Hampshire I bought books about New England gardening,but nothing in them taught me as much as driving down Rockingham St. in Concord , or visiting The Fells near Lake Sunapee, or stopping on my way home from work in the morning to see what was blooming in theContinue reading “The Bow Garden Club Garden”

Orange hawkweed may be a pest and an opportunist, but it does shine, and it shows how complimentary orange and green can be. It came from the old world through the old seaports, not one hundred miles from here. The maiden pink came too. This patch came with the garden here at the farm. ThisContinue reading “In The Meadow”

Though I have left crape myrtles, ginger lilies, and cannas behind, there are some favorites from the South I could not give up, even if I have to keep them in containers and have them shipped from Louisiana or California. Here are the salvias,ever-blooming and ignored by deer and woodchucks. This is “Cold Hardy Pink”,Continue reading “Blooming in Mid-June”

Across the road, down from Dunn Cottage and its daffodils, is a small conservation area. Naturalized lupines are blooming there now, and I stopped to take pictures. Anyone who thinks to pick these or dig them out, would see, as they grow closer that these flowers are surrounded by “Leaves of three, Let it be!”.Continue reading “Lupines in Dunbarton”

I found several fine specimens of Oenothera biennis, the tall evening primrose, growing in a ragged section of the lawn. I wanted them for the new dry border so I dug them out, potted them up, and put them on a shady porch to wait out transplant shock. Then I went onto the Internet whereContinue reading “Tall Evening Primrose”

The ground I garden on is the same ground that defeated New Englanders trying to farm and live on hillsides away from the fertile valleys of the Merrimack and Connecticut rivers. They abandoned their plots after the Civil War, and left for the more docile, welcoming soils of the Midwest. Always dry, this soil isContinue reading “New Hampshire Desert”

These Marsh Marigolds were blooming last month along a stream in New Boston. I had not seen this flower since I was a child, and I am now old. I was going to post this photo earlier, but spent April unnerved. Every week the plants I ordered in February and March came via UPS orContinue reading “Marsh Marigolds”

I am going to let these photos speak for themselves. They were taken on Gorham Pond Road . The site is Dunn Cottage.