Though an old gardener, I am but a young blogger. The humor and added alliteration are free.
Sunday, October 19, 2025
Lilacs, Lavender, & Lepidoptera
Saturday, October 11, 2025
Lilac Libations
Friday, April 18, 2025
Dandy Standout
And every season, it seems, some plants seem to decide all on their own to step up and stand out, to shine or sparkle. This year the first plant to do so seems to be the lilac 'Yankee Doodle', a relatively recently introduced (1985) cultivar of S. vulgaris selected by the late Jesuit priest, Father John Fiala at his farm in Medina, Ohio, the acreage he called Falconskeape.
My 'Yankee Doodle' caught my eye today as I was engaged in my first spring mowing, mowing not so much grass as a crop of rampant henbit, chickweed, and other spring nuisances. 'Yankee Doodle' was planted in 2003 among a line of right lilacs along the west border of the garage pad, a line that perfumes the entire yard if provided the proper temperature and a gentle breezes comes out of the south or west. My intention at the time of planting it was to both screen out the two-foot tall ugly concrete wall that constitutes the edge of the garage pad, and, to create just the sort of saturated fragrance showstopper that it has become. My lilacs amply fill both roles.
Most years, 'Yankee Doodle' struggles, lanky, tall, and sparse, its stems prone to borers and breakage, as are the cultivars that flank it, 'Nazecker' to the right and 'Wonderblue' to the left. I should complain less about them since this bed is labeled "Forsythia Bed" on my maps and contains not a single forsythia, all perished or shovel-pruned for their inconsistent bloom. This year, somehow, 'Yankee Doodle' bloomed extra-prolifically and it is the most prominent lilac of its immediate group, indeed of the whole line. It is at the end of its bloom cycle as pictured here, the deepest purple single flowers of lilac-dom faded just a bit here by age and a recent rain. And yet, still it caught my eye as I mowed, a 'Yankee Doodle' all dandied up and showing off its best side in this, its seemingly random year to stand out. So now, 'Yankee Doodle' fading, I'm left to wonder what species, what variety, what plain, regularly overlooked plant will step up to be the next Cinderella or Dandy.Sunday, October 15, 2023
Accepting Miracles
The title is the subject for ProfessorRoush today, a meme on my mind for all this past week. My week of miracles started a week ago on a warm Saturday as I was engaged in lots of late Fall work in the yard, mowing, trimming, bushhogging, putting up hoses, and fully engaged in the activities I lump into "Fall cleanup." My first glimpse of the miracles to come was this late crocus, Colchicum autumnale, a single, annually reoccurring survivor of the few toxic bulbs of the species that I planted years ago and long forgot. Old age and fading memories sometimes provide unexpected benefits to old gardeners beyond our creaky knees and grumpy exteriors.
And then, the same day, sitting down outside with Mrs. ProfessorRoush while we chatted with our grandsons, I spied this little sprig of life, a baby juniper bravely growing in the middle of a clump of River Birch, shaded from the sunlight it so desperately wants but also kept moistened and protected in the embrace of the birch. Can't see the miracle for the tree? Look closer!
If I left it here, to grow in the rotting organic debris gathered in the birch clump center, will it survive? Choke out the birch? Wither eventually, starved for light? The young scientist in my mind still wants to know so I'm going to leave it growing here in the true sense of "letting nature take its course" while I observe. A good gardener should always know when to accept miracles when miracles appear.
The sun and earth also conspired in the parade of miracles this week to give me these views of home and prairie as I came home late Tuesday. Sometimes the light on this corner of the globe overwhelms me, although perhaps poorly captured in these photographs, as it did on this day. The right angle, the right moment, and the grasses and trees and house were all shining left and right of me as I opened the mailbox and I just couldn't let the miracle moment go uncaptured.
Thursday, another miracle presented to Mrs. ProfessorRoush and I as we came home from supper, a moment of marriage so like many others until we pulled onto the garage pad and I noticed this unexpected bit of Spring transported to Fall, a blooming sprig of common lilac, isolated and alone among a dry and beaten hedge, but full of fragrance and hope for the next Spring to come. I robbed the bees by taking it indoors where, for a few days, I could smell lilac before it faded into time again.
Saturday, April 30, 2022
Fun, Disappointment and Home
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Owens-Thomas garden and Enslaved Persons Quarters |
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Gardenia jasminoides 'Daisy' |
Saturday, April 23, 2022
Finally, Spring
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Lilac 'Betsy Ross' |
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'Betsy Ross' |
Sunday, April 17, 2022
Dabs and Dribbles
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'Cole's Red' Quince |
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'Betsy Ross' |
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'Annabelle' |
In similar fashion, the red horsechestnut leaves remain tightly furled, the rough, prehistoric texture safe from frost and marauding deer, and my beloved red peach is mightily trying, but failing, to become a beacon of spring for the neighbors. It is covered, as you see below, in buds, but yet to glow, the cloudy skies and brisk winds battling against its nature, its reason for survival, those buds to become seeds, those seeds to be trees.
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Red Peach |
Sunday, October 31, 2021
Autumn Cometh
Hi, Everyone! I apologize for the long lapse in posting, but autumn has been moving along and the world is streaming past my eyes at the speed of life.
We finally, finally received a nice rain this week, about 3.6 inches total over a long night and day of rain, so I hope the garden will go into another Kansas winter well-hydrated and ready to rest.
And I hope the garden stops the weird antics that fall sometimes brings. I've been worried about the row of lilacs to the west of the driveway pad. Several of them, primarily the older Syringa vulgaris, have leafed out some of those precious green buds after they dropped their summer leaves and a couple even bloomed, like this 'Nazecker' light blue lilac. I won't minimize the sublime joys of smelling lilacs in October, but I also don't need to constantly feel like they've sacrificed their last for me. I suppose the chance always exists that I won't be around to smell lilacs next spring, but I'm planning to be here when the snows melt and the lilacs bloom next April, the world right and everything in its own time, just as it should be.Saturday, April 27, 2019
I Just Love Spring!


Still further confusion ensued later, when intrigued, I decided to search the internet for yellow wisteria. There are fabulous pictures everywhere on the internet of bright yellow pendulous blooms labeled Yellow Chinese Wisteria (which I want lusted for instantly), and offers for seed from any number of irreputable sources, but no descriptions of yellow wisteria from either more scientific sources or offers of grown plants by reputable nursery wholesalers. Wisteria, I maintain, likely only comes in white, lavenders and blues, and offers to purchase seed for the mystical yellow forsythia are likely hoaxes, but I'm happy to be educated if I'm wrong.
