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The Martha's Vineyard Times is a weekly publication.
June 9 - June 15, 2005 Edition
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Garden Notes June 9, 2005 By Abigail Higgins Oriental poppy (Papaver orientale). Photo by Susan Safford It hardly seems possible that the summer solstice, the peak of the natural year and its processes, both seen and unseen, is almost upon us. The full moon will occur just after, on June 22, punctuating this special time of year and summer’s start. The activities of the Jaws Fest have reminded many Island residents that a cool cloudy spring is really nothing new: such a spring plagued the Island and the film crew in 1974, the year the original blockbuster was filmed here. We hope to leave it behind with the solstice. Poppies pack a solstice punch in the garden and they do like cool weather. These include the tall showy orientals, Papaver orientale and P. bracteatum, the only true perennials in the family. Other poppies include the shorter Iceland, P. nudicaule; the subtle P. rupifragum; and the annuals, P. rhoeas, P. paeoniflorum, and Eschscholzia californica, the California poppy. These are annual, biennial, or short-lived perennial members of the family. All these Papaveraceae are easily grown from seed sown in place. They like sun and good drainage and dislike disturbance or transplanting. Propagation of the perennials is by division, if one must, and by root cuttings. There are many more species for those wishing to specialize in this genus. The almost mythic Himalayan blue poppy (Meconopsis spp.) was featured in this year’s Longwood Gardens spring extravaganza. (Our current climate makes attempting these elusive flower-goddesses of cool mountain gardens seem not too unrealistic!) Stretches of the Island’s north shore are spread with yellow Glaucium flavum, the horned beach poppy, which adores the perfect drainage provided by pure beach sand and gets the rest of its sustenance who-knows-where. Woodland gardens provide the requirements for a more distant relative, the glad yellow native celandine poppy, Stylophorum diphyllum, an early spring bloomer. The soft orange Welsh poppy, Meconopsis cambrica, is another to try. The drawback to poppies is the problem of what to do with the foliage when it shrivels and dies back after bloom. It can be quite unsightly. With tall oriental poppies, one solution is to plant them at the back of the bed and make sure that something in front of them is growing up while they are withering down. If space allows, they can be given their own area, which is then ignored for the rest of the summer, until the new basal foliage reappears at the end of summer, or is inter-planted with shallow-rooted annuals. In the case of the annual or short-lived forms, production of seed heads is paramount to having a labor-free, endless supply of volunteer plants the succeeding season, albeit where they, not you, have decided to locate. Let the seed heads mature and shed seed. Weed out the excess seedlings. Look for seed and plants of oriental poppies in new, breakthrough colors. Watermelon pink, raspberry red and wine shades and blushed picotees are enticing changes from the usual orange and lacquer-red forms. The hybrid parentage of P. bracteatum shows through in clear-colored flowers with no black spots at the base, such as ‘Helen Elizabeth,’ and green leafy bracts cupping the flowers. Because I have been confined indoors a good deal more this spring than usual, it has been fun to peruse a book on home landscapes that Rodale Press recently published, “Homescaping,” by Anne Halpin (2005, $35.00, 276 ppg.) This book is all about assisting homeowners in creating the perfect fit between house, lifestyle, and landscape. There is a superlative amount of illustration of details, such as color coordination of house color and plant materials, but additional interesting parts of the book are in chapter 1, Garden Styles and Home Architecture, and in chapter 3, Hardscaping and Space Management. Ms. Halpin introduces the reader to categories of gardens (formal, informal, and naturalistic), settings (urban, country, natural) and houses (Greek revival, federal/colonial, bungalow, ranch, to cite several pertinent to the Island) and then picks apart and organizes them. Many homebuyers with little prior gardening experience have ideas and mental images of landscape features they would like their homes to possess. Through text and illustration Ms. Halpin helps assess suitability and how to carry out the concept. For example, page 21 is an illustration entitled Would an Informal Garden Suit Your House? Alongside illustrations of a bungalow, a ranch, and a Dutch colonial are listed 15 other different house styles to help one decide. Almost every page contains a “box” with focused tips on such subjects as Maintaining a Meadow or Prairie, Good trees for a Woodland Garden, Pruning Tips, or How to Do It — soil mixes for rock gardens. Chapter 3, Hardscaping and Space Management, is well illustrated with photographs and sketches that illustrate elements of the hardscape, how to get from here to there, and how to do it smartly. It has been said that we shall be living in ever-smaller homes and spaces as we crowd into our wonderful 21st century future. Protecting the privacy of our homes and making the best use of our lots will become increasingly important. “The way you manage space in your landscape determines the locations of beds and borders and provides the basis of your plantings.” What follows are examples of attractive ways to get around the property, how to wall it or fence it, plus design considerations and fencemaking guidelines. Gates, hedges, and plant screens are integral to the space management of a house-site also, and they are well covered too. I was somewhat disappointed in finding no comparable attention to driveways and parking areas in this chapter. Clever and efficient use of the space we have extends to in-town parking in the down-Island towns, for instance, where increasingly parking on the street is prohibited. The homeowner needs to plan to accommodate not only the family vehicles but also those of guests, and skillful ideas for managing this are needed — an ironic oversight in a book entitled “Homescaping.” Please note two up-coming events. A well-planned, free family program is planned to celebrate the summer solstice at the Polly Hill Arboretum Saturday, June 18, from 3 to 7 pm. With too many child-oriented activities to list in this space, for program details, please call Karin Stanley at the Arboretum, 508-693-9426. Then on June 23 at the Oak Bluffs School, from 4 to 6 pm, attend a program on environmentally compatible landscaping methods given by Matt Pelikan and Kris Henriksen, entitled Planting with a Purpose: the link between the landscape and the environment. Offered by the Polly Hill Arboretum, the Nature Conservancy and Friends of Sengekontacket, it is free and open to all. Call the Nature Conservancy, please, for more details at 508-693-6287.

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