Welcome to Havenwood in mid-May!
Our nearly one-acre garden is in northwestern Pennsylvania, zone 5/6. We have had an early spring this year, and so the tulips have come and gone since my April tour, the trees are entirely leafed out and roses in bud. It will be a June garden before we know it, and my family and I will start taking our after-dinner ice cream walks around the summer garden.
There are over a dozen different garden rooms in our British-style garden, so I will do my best to give you a quick walk around today to see the highlights for many of our areas. We will begin in the Cottage Garden which is on the south side of the house near the road…
The Cottage Garden
Primrose Path
Bluets along the wood chip path
Spring Bed
Foliage around the Woodland
The Daffodil Dell
This month the yellow of Trout lilies and daffodils has slowly changed in this garden to white, beginning with the Poet narcissus and continuing now with our large patch of Great White Trillium (Trillium grandiflorum) with the Doublefile Viburnum (Viburnum plicatum tomentosum mariesii).
Iris Bed
The Pond and Bogs
Thanks for joining me for a quick May walk around Havenwood!
We have had a wonderful month so far, and I am looking forward to more time working in the garden. We have loved having two different college groups here in the last few weeks. It was especially fun for me to have the GCC Environmental Ethics class here for their end-of-semester field trip.
In the garden…
This week I am finishing up planting my new plants and hoping to get a vermiculite-filled cutting bin started. This is the season for taking cuttings from all sorts of perennials (especially those who need the “Chelsea Chop”), so it is a good idea to get some free plants out of the work as well.
We have been planting up a new area of Hosta, ferns and Iris near the Fruit Tunnel. We worked through the pouring rain on Saturday, but I’m so glad to to have that section better set up. My dahlias are in the Kitchen garden’s raised beds and shooting up already! The Banana trees and Cannas are outside—I think we are past our frost, though I can wheel their trash bins back in to the basement at a moments notice. I am holding off on setting up the little greenhouse for tomatoes, but that will be on the list soon as well when the night time temperatures get a bit higher.
Thanks to Carol for instigating this tour with her GBBD!
This is so beautiful Julie! I love learning about your garden! I live in central Washington state so my climate is a mixture of high desert sage in the valleys of Mt Rainier and Mt Adams. I have so much to learn about gardening in this climate. Our town is in the 7a and 7b zones. We have nearly an acre as well and it’s my dream to one day cultivate more of this vast yard into a beautiful garden. Yours reminds me of one of my favorite places, the Missouri Botanical Gardens, with its various “rooms”. Blessings on your garden! 🥰 - Jen
I have just moved to southwest PA into a parsonage that basically has a blank slate of a garden. I’ve been excited about planting a garden to add beauty and comfort to this home, even if it can’t be our forever home (since when my husband retires we will have to move). I planted tulips in the fall and they bloomed beautifully in April. But now I am planting like crazy so that this summer and next year I will have even more blooms to look at. I put in an herb garden and lilacs and apple trees so far. Tons of annuals too for now until I figure out what perennials I want to live with here. I’m enjoying myself and I’m loving reading your Substack. It’s very encouraging!