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I know it’s late and I have a backlog of photos to put into the blog. There are a couple of drafts that are approaching a first year’s birthday waiting to be posted. I will try for the next few days to get some of these online so that I can retire the photos to a disk somewhere outside my hard drive.

Our Ken Janek rhododendron was spectacular. All the plants this year seem to be blooming with numbers of flowers above and beyond all expectations. There’s only a close up of the KenJanek.

I cut one of the May Apples to have inside. The white flower developed these translucent windows in the water in the vase.  Don’t know if this is a usual development as the flower ages.

These are two of my seedling azaleas.  Geisha was one of the parents,  these are planted where we buried Max, he used to sleep under these plants on summer nights.

Bill and Mary started to  replace their fence last year.  The Montana rubens clematis was undisturbed and bloomed very well. It has climbed to the top of one of Bills  conifers next door and the tree is also covered with the vanilla scented flowers.

My primulas put on a nice show too.

Joker (azalea) and an azalea  whose name we have forgotten blooming with Gordon Jones.

The Azalea Joker.

This is  Rhododendron Gordon Jones. It has been languishing in the back garden for years, it is finally putting on a show of its large and marked flowers.

The rhododendron Grumpy has finally bloomed in the correct season.  In the past we have had mild Novembers and Grumpy would bloom just before Thanksgiving thinking (?) it was Spring. Even in the Fall it never bloomed this well.

This peony, Cytheria is an unusual and luminous color. I cut two stems to have inside and protect the blossoms from some predicted heavy rains.

Toward the end of May our Nathan Hale  Kalmia started to bloom. You’ll see more of this when it’s fully opened.

Inside, I have been concerned with wire work for wine cup stems.

These tulips were blooming in the park in front of the Staten Island Ferry Terminal, Manhattan side, last week as I went into the city to make some deliveries uptown. The flowers are blooming in our yard too.

It was the beginning of a weekend of beautiful weather ( it’s rainy and cold again today).  There were a number of events on our island but I’ll show photos of that later, this entry is about our tree peony seedlings. Colman planted seeds that formed on the plants we bought;  the seeds take two years to visibly (they don’t show leaves the first year)  germinate and another 4-5 years before they bloom. This first photo is from our Green Dragon in a Pink Pool, it may have been one of the parents of our seedlings. I cut the flower because it had been beaten down by a shower and I wanted to trim the plant back a little too. This particular Chinese hybrid is always the first to bloom.

This next plant was the first of the seedlings to bloom. It has bloomed  three years now and the flowers have gotten better  and more plentiful each year.

The flowers have subtle flares in the center.

The next plant bloomed the first time this year.  It has a strange center and lots of petals.

A very pale pink, almost white flower is blooming its second time in the back yard.  It has a beautiful shape and subtle color.

Our primulas are in full bloom too, These are just outside the back door.

The white primulas are my favorite for their cut edge petals and textured leaves.

Yesterday, late afternoon, I got back to the island from Manhattan and was hearing tornado warnings for Staten Island on the radio. It was for a distant part of the island so I wasn’t too worried. Heading across the island to our store in Stapleton, I was suddenly caught is a torrential down pour. With headlights on and the windshield wipers going at their fastest rate, I couldn’t even see the hood of my car. I crept along through the downpour avoiding other headlights and moving to the stoplights glowing in the watery haze. I parked across from the store where we were to have a weekly meeting, the rain stopped and I saw that the power was out in the store. We held our meeting in the twilight as the sun set and adjourned when we were finished about an hour later.

I drove home and didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary until I got to Henderson and Clinton, about two blocks from home. Lights were flashing from a fire truck, the crossroad was closed on three of its arms and I had to turn back and find another route to Tysen Street. When I got home, Colman said we have some branches down in the back yard. I was not prepared to see what looked like the demolition of several trees in our back yard. It wasn’t until this morning that I was able to see the extent of the damage. Our neighbors were unscathed, we had a complete carpet of large and heavy debris that was over six feet deep from fence to fence, deck to back fence.

Here’s a ground level view.

It was amazing how complete the coverage was and that the greenhouse and our home and the deck were unharmed.  Even the ground on the North side of the greenhouse is completely covered with HEAVY branches  from the maple and the linden trees.  There was so much on the ground that I was surprised to see anything hanging overhead.

I began to clean up after posting photos on FaceBook and sending photos in email to friends and neighbors. Our neighbor Joe was helping someone else  clean up and he showed up with a chainsaw on a post and began to cut some of the larger branches for us. Joe had just pulled down a 25 foot long limb that was dangerously balanced against the  tulip poplar when our next door neighbor Mary came to see the mess.

Colman was trying to uncover and recover his orchids that had been in the way of some of the breaking branches.

Joe cutting some pieces deep in the yard.  You can see how thickly layered the branches are.

As we cleared nearer the greenhouse I saw that the hardy cyclamen were in full bloom under some Solomon’s Seal.

Henry  is a constant companion.

Our friend Diana stopped by to deliver this  Passiflora alata blossom. The plant wasn’t blooming while we were there last weekend.  

Most of the abutilons on the south side of the greenhouse were okay. I had to dump a lot of water out of their trays. It looked like we had about 6 inches of rain in a bucket that was under the orchid table by the deck.

While Diana was visiting, she told me about some other trees that had fallen in the neighborhood, this one took out a chimney and did some roof damage to a house near Snug Harbor.

Tysen Street, north of Cassidy looked like this, this afternoon.

A little further up on Tysen Street. There is a 20 foot conifer lying down behind the bench too.

On Henderson, I saw that a huge tree had fallen on the St. Peter’s School grounds.

Henderson was still closed off at Clinton towards Lafayette.

Branches littered the streets everywhere, this is on Clinton Street.

After about 6 hours of breaking branches and  lifting the logs I could lift, the back yard began to reappear.  We will have to have some professionals to come in and take the stuff away.

I wasn’t able to get too the back corner on the left, there are three huge, long limbs that have to be cut to be moved in that area.

We had a mixed bag of weather this weekend. A beautiful Saturday and torrential downpour on Sunday. There’s water in the basement. It rained Monday too and I stayed inside to finish work I wanted to deliver and show today. The Lion Cup is done, I intend to have a mold made so that we can have it electro formed in a variety of metals and finishes.
Her are two shots.

I went into the city today to buy gold leverbacks for a pair of earrings to go along with the necklace I finished yesterday.  The beads are carnelian, they alternate in a chain with 9-10 mm freshwater pearls. The necklace is just under 20″ long, all the wire and findings are 14kt gold, I soldered and forged the hook clasp.  It’ll be available on my website soon, as a set for $350. Or you can email me at colsage@earthlink.net

The Azaleas are blooming out of sequence this year because of the little heat wave we had a few weeks ago and the prolonged cool weather we are having now.

My cross between an Exbury and  a Ghent hybrid  azalea is having a banner year. I love the color which is more subtle than here in the photograph. You’ll see the whole bush in the pans of the garden at the bottom of this entry.

The Ken Janek Rhododendrons are also blooming in a strange way this year.  In the past the blooms all were together, the bush showing pink buds and then with the flowers opening the intense pink was all gone. This year some flowers are opening  and some buds are delayed so that we have a real splash of mixed color.  Colman thinks it’s because the plants are sensitive to the microclimates around each bush; sunny branch, cool pocket, warm draft.

In the front the Sekidera Azalea in blooming. The flowers are very nice and large, but the bush itself looks wretched most of the year. I cut it back severely last year and it started to look better, I’ll do the same this year after it finishes blooming, that is if it doesn’t continue to rain like it has the past few weeks.

Here are two pan shots of the back yard, one dappled with sunlight when I got home today around 4:30 and then again a little later as the sun got behind clouds. You can see my glowing, orange azalea in front of the greenhouse. The red azalea on the left in the shade pan is Girard’s Scarlet, the one in the center is Silver Sword, called that because the leaves are variegated with white edges.

About 15 years ago I was hybridizing with azaleas. We had clipped and rooted cuttings from a friend’s collection in Lederach Pennsylvania. He had a wonderful collection of Japanese azaleas that I used to make my crosses. These seedlings from that time are crosses that were made with a variety called Geisha. It has single white flowers splashed with stripes and spots of bright pink. Geisha is still growing in our garden and it is usually the first azalea to bloom each spring. The whole bush can be seen in yesterday’s entry, the first photo.

The seedlings in the following photos are most likely a cross of Florence Waldman and Geisha. Florence Waldman was a hybrid  from Roslyn Nurseries on Long Island, one of the only American hybrids to have stripes and spots. While it had beautiful flowers there in Long Island, it performed poorly here in Staten Island, the buds came early and were often blasted by late frosts. Crossing it with Geisha, which has similar coloring, gave us plants with larger flowers that perform much better and reliably in our garden.

This first hybrid is outside near the back yard door, it’s one of the small bushes that Max used to sleep under on summer nights. The flowers are larger than Geisha. A strange thing about the seedlings is that all of them, at least the ones that survived some neglect for a number of years, have hose-in-hose flowers, that is to say the blooms are two azalea flowers, one inside the other.

The second seedling has more substance and color, the petals are more ruffled rather than rounded like the first seedling.

Primulas are blooming in the bed closest to the deck, there are more in pockets all around the back yard, but this is the main part of the collection.

I am especially fond of these white  flowers with the cut edges, I think I bought them on 28th street about 5 years ago.

I got these yellow  primulas a few years ago to replace some that just weren’t surviving very well.  The types I like come from higher altitudes and don’t like it much here at near sea level.

These came from our friend, Bud, in Lederach too, in his garden they are in an abundant array in a border and along a path that leads to his azalea collection.

The painters have been here most of the week, the front door couldn’t be used as usual and we had to walk to the front by going around the house from the kitchen. Spent the early part of the last weeks days moving abutilons out of the basement so we could finally turn the lights off down there.

Walking around to the front,  the ephemeral arabis flowers were blooming. It’s been cooler than usual this year; that coupled with the mini heat wave a week or so ago, has made a lot of our plants bloom early and stay fresh longer. The rhododendrons are on time but the azaleas are already showing color, if it had been a little warmer they would all be open today. Here are two rhododendrons with Japanese Geisha, an early azalea on the right.

We were driving around Staten Island this morning with our friend Diana who  introduced us to places we should have known about and visited for the past twenty years. We took her to the store on which I’ve been working with Friends of Fire (we will have a Grand Opening May 8-9), it’s been a lot of fun and we’ve met some nice people. Just one shot of a new arrangement at  the store. (you can see more photos of the store in my FaceBook Album)

The striking visual thing about our drive today was that the cool weather this week has slowed the passing of many of Staten Island’s blooming trees.  There are a LOT;  flowering almonds are in peak bloom everywhere, forsythia, crab apples and red buds color every road.  It seems that part of mayor Bloomberg’s Million Trees Project includes redbuds, there are streets lined with them.

Here’s a shot of my arabis before the rain last Thursday night.

And a view of the path from the back to the front. I shot this about twenty minutes ago, the arabis is still looking good.

Fritillaria melegaris, ‘Checkered  Lilies’, have naturalized in the front border.  I think it’s unusual for the white flowers to do better  than the colored varieties, they out number the maroon flowers.

All the porch furniture had to be stacked in the yard while they were working last week.

One of the treads being cleaned and trimmed.

Colman on the porch with some of the carpenter’s tools.

Trevor on the right with his Dad, a family carpentry business.

All new risers, the old ones had rotted edges.

Today the porch is finished and the paint has cured. I began to move some of the furniture back into place and hang new chains for the plants.

Some more Spring flowers.

Ipheion, attractive and fragrant, it’s also invasive. . . the leaves last until July, dying off  (so you can plant annuals over them), reapperaing in late October to grow in the pale winter sunlight.

A close-up of some Rhodies in the back yard.

And Henry keeps us company where ever we go.

Here are a few shots taken in the back yard. The tropicals are responding to the cooler night time temperatures. Begonias are blooming and the anthuriums are looking very fresh with lots of new flowers.  The red anthuriums are a new hybrid that I found in Scituate, Massachussetts in August.  The pinkish  ones are very purple in person, that plant came from Home Depot a couple years ago. It is a constant bloomer but it has really put out the flowers in the past couple of weeks.

This is a hybrid names Sara, the flowers are enormous. If they get pollinated and fruit forms, the spathe will turn green and look like more leaves.

I’ve forgotten the name of this begonia.  It has incredibly large flowers.  This is the first time it’s had more than one umbel.

A composite shot of a small part of my anthurium collection.

It’s plum season and time to make tarts.  These have a modified rich tart pastry and a layer of chopped walnuts under the plum quarters.  This is just before they went into the oven.

I didn’t remember to take a picture until we had eaten half of the large one.  This is one of my favorite things. . .

The colchiums bloomed last week.  It’s a pretty nice clump of bulbs.

Walking across town last week I came across this event on Christopher Street. It was surprising to see that the model was a large red furred rabbit.  There was a tent further down the street and a trailer.  There was a computer set up with monitors too. The only thing missing was the sidewalk buffet .

It’s been a lot drier and warmer, plants are finally responding. This sanseveria bloomed, a rare occurrence.

High Voltage has been performing admirably, three flowers at once.

And two of Colman’s orchids

Henry  met a beautiful feral kitten  and they had words about trespassing. . . he must have been passing through, haven’t seen him since this encounter.

Hoya loyceandrewsiana ins a new plant that Colman bought earlier this year. I seem to like the cool wet summer weather we’ve been having. It has put on growth and the flowers formed rapidly. Here is a shot of the flowerhead as it was early in the afternoon of July 26.

As the sun went down the flowers began to open, here it is just a few hours later.

A couple of days later I noticed that there was a visitor, the fragrance of this flower is overpowering.  The whole day there was only this one, I think it’s a hornet (and the lady bug), and no other type of insect, no bees, no ants.  And no other hornets, it was as if this was the only insect for this flower, a solitary feeder. Here’s a video of one of the visits.

Hoya and Hornet movie

My friend Ray gave me this link about the hornet,   Bald or Whitefaced Hornet.  thanks, Ray.

Saturday started with the arrival of a crushed box from Florida,  a plant I had ordered  online  was here in just about no time. Here’s the photo from the web.  There had been an email notice that it was on sale,  it was sort of like paying full price and getting free shipping.  The plant is more than 2 feet tall with wavy edged, arrow shaped, lax, very fleshy, succulent,  green leaves.  It’s in bud. . .  Traveling so fast did it some harm, but I think it should recover.  It’s name is Synandrospadix vermitoxicus,  does that mean it’s poisonous to mice?

This weekend was the first of two weekends that Art By the Ferry took place. It will run next weekend too. Colman and I got out early (for us), picked up our art works from the Staten Island Museum and found a parking place in the no-space-for-cars-land of St George. Walking toward the spaces where the art was being shown, we ran into so many people we knew that it was some time before we got to see any of the art. For those of you who don’t know what this event is, it’s a mass showing of hundreds of artworks and performances ( musical and words) by the artists, craftsmen, musicians and writers who live on this (larger than Manhattan ) island. It’s a great opportunity to see and hear a really wide range of works in a lot of different mediums. The art work is displayed in a number of buildings behind the Borough Hall on Stuyvesant Street all the way to a warehouse that we calla Fish’s Eddy (for the last tenant) toward Stapleton on Bay Street. I didn’t take many photos. Most of the people we knew were moving too fast that early in the morning.  Here is a photo of our friend Irma, who is known for her photography, (displayed in another space), she’s showing some of her jewelry here.

This is Denise with some of her work in the left background. 

The weather couldn’t have been better. It was nice to see a lot of our friends in person, in the open air, a lot of us are on FaceBook  so we have an idea of what we are doing but FB isn’t like actually seeing the work or as pleasant as being able to talk face to face.

As we were heading back to the car,  I noticed this hole in the sidewalk. it , at one time must have held a post of some sort.  A lot of alianthus seeds had germinated filling it with a bright green salad of leaves.  the photo is about life size. 

I spent most of today sewing books for a client, the telephone rang quite a bit too.  I took breaks to go outside to tend my  abutilon seedlings and see the the new flowers. This is a mid season azalea, Full Moon.  We bought it because  of the large white flowers and because the bush produces flowers in three  different  colors;  pure white, white broken with salmon (or solid salmon) and a picotee pink with a flare.  The leaves are a beautiful glossy green. 

This is the first day the martagon lilies opened.  We bought one bulb a long time ago, it’s the only martagon we have been able to keep. We don’t dare move it , once martagons are happy  in a place you let them stay there.  Last year there were two stems.  It’s martagon dalhansonii. 

This azalea is a seedling from one of my crosses done about 10 years ago,  it has a compact form and varied flowers. Most of my other seedlings are salmon colored late season plants. 

Henry is a constant shadow where ever we go.