Flower Power

On this rainy Monday, while we are hard at work inside on our Stokes National Field Guide to North American Birds, thought I'd show you what's in bloom in the gardens at "Bobolink Farm", our NH home. Iris Immortaily is blooming her head off, with at least 30 blooms on the plant. Such a beautiful white, with a blush of blue. Looks like an angel's petticoat. It's on our front path, so every time we walk to the car, we pass it. Put your best plants where you can enjoy them most.

Our wildflower area near the barn, has a small, yellow Ladies Slipper plant just covered in little sunshine shoes. This precious orchid came from New England Wildflower Society, which sells native wildflowers. We brought it with us when we moved from Mass. to NH, 5 years ago. Underplanted is twinkling, white Sweet Woodruff. Trivia fact, Donald W. Stokes middle name is Woodruff. We pick this herb and steep it in a bottle of Savignon Blanc wine, to make "May Wine" to serve at garden parties.

One of our long borders looks like a wildlfower meadow, full of yellow Doronicum, an antique plant I was given years ago, from a master plantswomen who cultivated the historic gardens in Concord, MA. This plant grew in the gardens of the Old Manse, home of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Nathaniel Emerson, near the Old North Bridge, site of the "shot heard round the world" that began the American Revolution. When it blooms I think of its history. One of the great things about being given plants from others gardeners is, it reminds you of them every time they bloom. With it is midnight blue Salvia "May Night." Peeking out in the background is our Borghese garden urn from Lunaform.

Photos, © Lillian Stokes, 2007