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Friday we went to what is becoming an annual event, The Shore Orchid Festival, in Neptune,  New Jersey.  there’s an album of about 50 photos taken at the festival on my facebook page. Here’s the link.    The Shore Orchid Festival 2011

A broad view of one of the vendor’s displays. There were a lot of unusual  plants to see and buy.  We took Amy Troutwein went with us, she’s  also a member of the Staten Island Orchid Society.

At Home

Colman’s stanhopea  embreei has bloomed. The plant is growing 3 flower spikes. The first one has finished blooming but I took photos of its progress. This particular orchid’s flowers don’t last as long as other orchid flowers, they deflate in a few days. The buds seem to take forever to grow and open. When they do open, the fragrance is overpowering, we can smell it outside of the greenhouse. I really like the sculptural quality of these buds.

It took about a week for the buds to spread and open.

Finally open.

Lc. canhamiana ‘Azure Skies’  is also blooming. These flowers last a lot longer.

Henry keeps company  outside the greenhouse.

Our rodgersia has put on a real show this year. In the past there’s never been more than  a couple flowers. Their leaves get filled up with the petals from the enormous tulip tree’s branches overhead.

Just a few quick photos of the unusual flowers blooming in the yard. This clump of Dutchman’s Britches  gets larger every year.  It just appeared about 6 years ago. 

These are  Erythronium, commonly known as Trout Lilies. I bought 6 very expensive bulbs about 10 years ago. Only leaves came up for about 3 years, since then they have spread over a large area of the  shady side of the front yard.  There are more flowers each year .  They come and go very quickly. I really like the simple celadon leaves with their  maroon markings.

It was warm enough for Henry top  come outside and help with some of the Spring Clean-up.

On the eve of the 26th a grand snow storm arrived. The snow came down as a fog of sand sized flakes carried on fast and blustery wind.

The next morning, no one was moving, it was still very cold outside and the winds continued  even as the sun was bright under blue skies.

Snow was blown into the space between the front door and the storm door.
The front porch was completely covered with about a foot of snow. This has only been happening the past 2 of 23 years. 

It only looks like about 11 inches on the deck table, but drifts were over three feet  in places.

Colman dug a path to the greenhouse, I’m adding that photo to compare with the ‘before’ shot above.

These guys, Dante and Demetrius were working on  our neighbor Bill’s walks and driveway,  I got them to open our sidewalk and then do Fay and Robert’s. 

Around midnight I got an email asking how we were doing and asking for photos.  I braved the wind and cold to make a few night shots to email to our friends in the deep south.

This morning it’s a lot warmer(?), the sun was shining into  the kitchen and our Tama Electra Camellia is blooming profusely.

There is no place to put the snow,  it’s just being piled up where ever we can pile it.

Our neighbor Michael is digging out. 

A look down Tysen Street.

The wind gave our car a nose job, looks like a whale.

Bill’s car in its snow slot.

The snow piled up in front of Bille and Karl’s home.

Karl out enjoying the warmer, windless day.

The snow drifted so high behind the sycamores that we couldn’t get the walk  entirely cleared.

Adi is cleaning off the cars. 
Henry has been helping me by watching while I type.

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.

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.

Some shots of the yard. Daffodils, chionodoxa, scilla and hellebores. Scattered plants all around the house. Daffodils, chionodoxa, scilla and hellebore. Everything in bloom today. The daffodils were rescued yesterday, we’d had a vigorous rain and wind event  that laid a lot of the new blooms flat, spattered with mud.

Colman at breakfast.

These flowers were blooming in the front yard earlier this week, I think they are seedlings of the pink chionodoxa, whose flowers had yet to open when I took this photo. They are very small, barely over two inches tall.

Scilla is all over the yard.  I planted them in the back first  shortly after we moved in to this house, then a few years later I planted borders of them in the front yard.  They have seeded themselves everywhere, these are by the hatch in the back.

two or three years ago I ordered about 200 chionodoxa bulbs to line the walks in the front.  They were supposed to be blue flowers with white centers and wine colored stems. The suppliers sent the bulbs and I planted them, I was surprised and disappointed when they bloomed pink.  Before they were gone that first spring, I decided that it was a fortuitous error.  There’s already a lot of blue blooming here.

The first honey bee I’ve seen this year.

Hellebores by the back door.

Henry caught scent of something on a Spring breeze.

It was a lazy, dark and very quiet morning. Yesterday, the snow plows were coming down Tysen street almost hourly until midnight. There were no scraping sounds of big trucks this morning and no sounds of people moving about. I got out of bed to look at the snowfall and was surprised to see that the front porch was covered right up to the front door with a 5 inch layer of powdery snow. Snow had even collected in the space behind the storm door, when I opened it, the door scraped an arc in the snow covered deck. 

I looked out the back door at our deck and  snow piled really high on our table, new snow on top of about 3 inches of the last storm’s remnants. I went back to bed, it was obvious nothing was going to happen fast today.

About 10 we got up to attack the day. It was obvious that the city had been sleeping in and was waking to the task of digging out.

Some bird tracks on a neighbor’s porch that was spared the deep snow covering mine.

My next door neighbor Gary was out shoveling his sidewalk while I was doing mine.  We’ve been having flurries all morning.

Snow plows didn’t arrive here until the late afternoon.  My ruler shows the depth of the snow on Tysen Street.

This afternoon it’s been pleasantly cool, the snow is melting and  falling off of the trees. Colman shoveled a path to the greenhouse in our 10 inches of snow. Henry wouldn’t go outside. I went out to make a little video from Henry’s perspective, I imagine this is what he would have seen if he followed us outside.  So far he’s only stuck his nose out the door.  No paws in wet snow.

After I made the video, the sky cleared and it got a lot brighter. Here are a few shots.

Henry in a warm, well lit spot.

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.

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. 

It’s been a busy few weeks leading up to last weekend. Colman and I went to Adi and Sabine’s home in Connecticut for a special event. Here’s a photo that  our friend Helen took on Saturday the 30th, the story will be in a later entry, for now, I will try to catch up a little.  

Sunday before Memorial Day  we went to a party at Kevin and Diana’s.  I didn’t take many photos except in their garden, on the way around the block  we were surprised by the fullness of our neighbors rhododendrons. Our next door neighbor Gary’s bush was at its peak, the chionanthus in his driveway was also in full bloom.

The Brown’s house next  to Gary’s is surrounded by very old plants, I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many flowers on any rhododendron.

Around the side of the Brown’s there grows a pink flowered bush.

At Kevin and Diana’s the stand out was this clematis. There were roses, iris and other flowers all around the yard but these were special.

I went into the city today to pick up some printing for another large book. As I arrived in Manhattan and got off of the ferry I glanced back toward the harbor, a fire boat was near the terminal in full spray.  I’ve wanted to shoot this for a long time, couldn’t have asked for better lighting or a better vantage point.  Two photos and it was over, the water stopped, when I got back to the terminal the boat had moved on to another place. If you look into the sprays on the right, you can see a shadow of the Statue of Liberty through the mist.

I’ll close this short entry with a photo of Henry, for the past two weeks we have been letting him outside. He gets to be a cat in the wild and he keeps us company on our trips around the garden. It’s also reassuring that when he’s out of sight, he appears when we call him. If we go inside he sometimes waits for us on the deck.