Grooming the Boxwood On My Terrace
Lots of late summer gardening chores are getting done around my Bedford, New York farm.
Supporting a working farm is a huge responsibility and a tremendous amount of work. In order for it to thrive, animals and gardens need constant tender loving care. My gardeners and outdoor grounds crew cover lots of projects - weeding the garden beds, pruning the trees, and grooming the many boxwood shrubs. Yesterday, they tackled the boxwood in the garden outside my Green Parlor - in gardening, so much of it is in the details.
Enjoy these photos.
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- I love boxwood, Buxus, and have hundreds of these bold green shrubs. They’ve grown quite a bit this summer. I take very special care of these specimens and make sure they are pruned and groomed regularly.
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- At least once a year, we groom and prune the boxwood and barberry on my Winter House Terraces. This is mostly done with hand shears to give them a more clean and manicured appearance. Phurba starts from the top of the shrub and works his way down.
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- These are Okatsune 30-inch long Hedge Shears. Okatsune shears are light and precise, and come in a range of sizes.
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- Buxus is a genus of about 70 species in the family Buxaceae. Common names include box or boxwood. The boxes are native to western and southern Europe, southwest, southern and eastern Asia, Africa, Madagascar, northernmost South America, Central America, Mexico, and the Caribbean. The leaves on boxwood branches are arranged opposite from each other, making pairs. This is ‘Winter Gem’ – one of the hardiest of the small-leaved boxwoods. The rich green foliage can acquire a golden bronze hue in cold winter zones, but is one of the first to become green again in spring.
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- Buxus ‘Green Velvet’ or Green Velvet Boxwood is a hybrid boxwood cultivar. It is a broad, compact shrub that grows to three to four feet tall and three to four feet wide.
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- Brian tackles the boxwood on another side of the terrace. This chore is time-consuming and takes most of the day to complete.
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- Here, Phurba is using our STIHL HSA 25 Battery-Powered Garden Shear. It’s lightweight with a rubberized handle for user comfort and a secure grip. It comes with its own roll-up case to store all its accessories. The hedge shear attachment with double-sided cutting blades cut both directions. It’s one of our favorite tools – it’s very light and handy.
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- This is the striking golden barberry, Berberis thunbergii – a deciduous shrub that is compact, adaptable, very hardy and shows off golden-yellow foliage year-round. The barberry grows very well here and also needs trimming.
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- Some of the smaller plants around this terrace include lady’s mantle, Alchemilla mollis – an old-fashioned herbaceous perennial that is fairly low-maintenance and blends well with other specimens.
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- Euphorbia is a very large and diverse genus of flowering plants, commonly called spurge, in the spurge family. Euphorbias are valued for their whorled leaves, with colors ranging from bluish-green to variegated green colors all the way to dark bronze-purple. Euphorbias ooze a white toxic sap when cut or broken, so it is important to wear gloves and eye protection whenever working with Euphorbia.
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- The ginkgo biloba is one of the most distinct and beautiful of all deciduous trees. It prefers a minimum of four hours of direct, unfiltered sunlight each day. The ginkgo has a cone-like shape when young, and becomes irregularly rounded as it ages.
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- The leaves are unusually fan-shaped, up to three-inches long, with a petiole that is also up to three-inches long. This shape and the elongated petiole cause the foliage to flutter in the slightest breeze. Ginkgo leaves grow and deepen color in summer, then turn a brilliant yellow in autumn.
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- Many of you will recognize this – it’s pachysandra. Pachysandra is a favorite ground cover in hard-to-plant areas such as under trees, or in shady areas.
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- On the left is a purple columnar beech tree, Fagus sylvatica ‘Dawyck Purple’ – the same variety as those surrounding my pool. On the right is a Slender Silhouette Sweetgum Tree, or a columnar sweetgum. Similar to other Sweetgum varieties, the Slender Silhouette reaches a towering mature height of nearly 60 feet, but only gets about six feet wide.
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- The sweetgum’s star-like leaf has five to seven lobes or points and turns from green in summer to yellow or purple in autumn.
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- Behind the Green Room Terrace is a weeping hornbeam, Carpinus betulus ‘pendula’ – a deciduous specimen with a tight, dense growth pattern.
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- These are the hornbeam’s drooping clusters of sac-like, seed-bearing pods. Many hang from the hornbeam this time of year.
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- By the afternoon, the entire space looks markedly different. Here is a row of mature boxwood after trimming – they look so much better.
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- I love the grouped effect of the boxwood, especially when they are so lush and green.
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- One of the most important reasons to prune is to shape up boxwood and provide a cleaner more defined appearance. These boxwood shrubs look great.
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