Two bulb experts, Michael Hagen, Curator of the Rock Garden and Native Plant Garden, and Marta McDowell, NYBG instructor, author, gardener, and landscape historian, recently commented on some frequently asked questions about the gorgeous spring bulbs now blossoming in the garden . Here’s what they had to say.
Q: What are some of the easiest spring/early summer bulbs to grow?
McDowell: Narcissus seem to be almost indestructible and with so many varieties, you can have them in bloom for almost two months. Other choices: Crocosmia—graceful in leaf and flower and blackberry lily (Iris domestica or Belamcanda chinensis). Great foliage, flowers, and seed pods.
Q: What are some of the most difficult bulbs to grow, aside from climate issues?
Hagen: Climate aside, the hardest to grow are the ones that our native ground squirrels, chipmunks, woodchucks, and gophers enjoy eating. Species tulips have been a particular challenge in the Rock Garden. If it’s a warm fall (and the chipmunks are not hibernating yet) they can be dug up and eaten right after they’ve been planted.
While spring might still feel several long weeks away, the first cheerful blooms of the season have already made their debut in the Rock Garden! We’ve been hard at work cleaning beds, raking leaves, and removing the last of the winter debris in order to open the garden as soon as possible for everyone to enjoy. And now we’re ready.
The very first heralds of spring, the winter aconites (Eranthis hyemalis) are still in bloom where they were covered until the last snow to melt, and along with our other early bloomers like snowdrops (Galanthus nivalis), snow crocus (Crocus tommasinianus), and winter cyclamen (Cyclamen coum), they’re still putting on a great display. This past week they’ve also been joined by even more early bulbs—netted iris hybrids such as Iris ‘Pauline’, ‘Harmony’, and ‘Katharine Hodgkin’; alpine squills (Scilla bifolia); spring snowflake (Leucojum vernum); and glory of the snow (Chionodoxa sardensis).
Michael Hagen is the NYBG’s Curator of the Native Plant Garden and the Rock Garden. He previously served as Staff Horticulturist for Stonecrop Gardens in Cold Spring, NY and Garden Manager at Rocky Hills, in Mt. Kisco, a preservation project of the Garden Conservancy.
Plymouth Gentian (Sabatia kennedyana)
Summer’s definitive arrival has brought bold sweeps of color across the Native Plant Garden’s Meadow, and with so much in bloom it might be easy to overlook one of the gems of the garden, the delicate pink and white open blooms of Plymouth gentian (Sabatia kennedyana).
By its flower alone, with its delicate rayed petals and yellow and red central markings, you might mistake this flower for an unusually colored Coreopsis or perhaps a daisy, but when you see its tall, upright stems growing where it’s happy—along the wet edge of the pond next to the Boardwalk, or in among bachelor’s buttons (Marshallia grandiflora) and pitcher plants (Sarracenia sp.)—it’s hard not to realize that this beauty is something very special.
Plymouth Gentian has a patchy distribution in the wild, and can be found in just a few sunny spots in wet, open ground along the sandy and peaty shores of coastal streams and lakes from Nova Scotia to South Carolina. It is one of the few species of Sabatia that is reliably perennial among the 18 or so mostly annual or biennial species that are native to North America.
Michael Hagen is the NYBG’s Curator of the Native Plant Garden and the Rock Garden. He previously served as Staff Horticulturist for Stonecrop Gardens in Cold Spring, NY and Garden Manager at Rocky Hills, in Mt. Kisco, a preservation project of the Garden Conservancy.
Wild columbine (Aquilegia canadensis)
Asking a curator to pick a favorite plant is akin to asking a parent to tell you their favorite child—surely an impossible choice. Nevertheless, there are moments when, with plants and children alike, they do something that gladdens the heart and captures otherwise divided affections.
Such a moment is upon us in the Native Plant Garden. A visit this week will reward with the sight of spectacular drifts of the native wild columbine (Aquilegia canadensis). Their delightfully fine-textured, almost fern-like foliage is a perfect backdrop to the sprays of delicate, red-spurred flowers, with just a light flush of yellow on the petals and a cluster of exerted yellow stamens. A not insignificant bonus is that they are pollinated by Ruby-throated Hummingbirds, and this generous display is sure to offer a welcome sight to any migrating birds that make their way through the garden.
Two bulb experts, Michael Hagen, Curator of the Rock Garden and Native Plant Garden, and Marta McDowell, NYBG instructor, author, gardener, and landscape historian, recently commented on some frequently asked questions about the gorgeous spring bulbs now blossoming in the garden . Here’s what they had to say.
