Late July Around The Farm
As we approach mid-summer, I thought I would start the week off with a little tour of the farm. The crew is in maintenance mode with a lot of weeding, watering, mowing, and pruning going on. I hope you enjoy this collection of photos.
1 A view towards the stable
2 The pasture fencing is 100-year-old white spruce railings from Canada, dropped between new cedar uprights that have been pounded into the ground.
3 A gorgeous sky
4 An electric wire runs along the top rail to keep the horses from rubbing or chewing on the rails.
5 These Oriental lilies are about 8 feet tall!
6 There are so many flowers and so much fragrance!
7 A landscape nursery in Long Island is closing and is liquidating their merchandise. I got a great deal on 150 Japanese maples to continue planting in the maple grove.
8 These trees are colorful and very healthy.
9 The cotinus, or smoke bush, did so well this year.
10 Their flowers actually look like puffs of smoke.
11 It's time to prune the hornbeam hedges, keeping the crenelated look of a rampart built around the top of a castle.
12 The Hi-Lo is used to prune the tops.
13 Tall Thalictrum, or meadow rue, towers above other plants in the shade garden near the Tenant House. Thalictrum is often found growing along stream banks and in moist meadows.
14 This is a viburnum, which has showy white blooms in the spring. During summer, the plant bears colorful ornamental fruit, which is very pleasing to the eye in the landscape.
15 A closeup of the viburnum fruit
16 These are the strong, lavender plumes of Astilbe Amethyst, which has spread so nicely throughout the years.
17 Bartok, my remaining Himalayan cat, was enjoying sunbathing on the terrace.
18 Bartok is feeling lonely as his companion, Vivaldi, went to cat heaven last week.
19 The crevices in the wall of the terrace were planted with sedum a few years ago.
20 Sedum, a large genus of flowering plants, are also known as stonecrops and are members of the succulent family.
21 Sedum, with their fleshy, water-storing leaves, are drought tolerant and adapt well in situations having very little soil.
22 Sedums thrive nearly anywhere, as long as they get good drainage.
23 This sedum is planted in the gravel between a stepping stone path and is growing and spreading very nicely.
24 This is an espalier of Gravenstein apples.
25 A better look at this very pretty ripening fruit - Gravensteins are a wonderful cooking apple, being crisp and tart and with a touch of honey. They are especially good in sauce and cider or even dried.
26 Walking beneath the long pergola with a wall of lavender Rose of Sharon.
27 This granite post has a matching shade of lavender clematis.
28 More clematis in a deeper shade of lavender
29 A lovely cream colored fragrant lily with a lemon-yellow center
30 My housekeeper, Laura Acuna, was busy picking blueberries in the blueberry patch.
31 This is a mint garden, planted with many varieties of mint. Mint is quite invasive and it's important to plant it where you won't mind it growing rampant.
32 This is Agastache foeniculum, or anise hyssop, whose are highly attractive to bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds.
33 The entrance to the cutting garden is flanked by a pair of giant Kenneth Lynch urns, planted with banana trees.
34 The sunflowers are very tall and pretty.
35 This bed of nasturtiums is quite colorful.
36 As is this bed of ageratum
37 This is one of the hay fields on the way to the woods.
38 The carriage roads are topped with recycled asphalt from old roadways, providing an excellent surface for horses, vehicles, and pedestrians. This one meanders through the woods.
39 Fungi growing on a tree usually means the tree is dying or already dead.
40 There are many wild raspberries in the woods and it looks like a bumper crop this summer.
41 These berries are quite good for eating, but they provide a lot of nourishment to the wildlife.
42 Many kinds of birds can be seen picking and eating these berries.
43 This is the little woodland cottage.
44 This is the Christmas tree field, which was planted in 2009. It's growing very well.
45 This is the other hayfield where something unusual was spotted.
46 These are hawk feathers. It's usually the hawk catching the prey, but this one was the prey of something else - perhaps a fox.
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