Beautiful at All Seasons

Lawrence Elizabeth Lawrence

Description

Elizabeth Lawrence (1904-85) is recognized as one of America's most important gardeners and garden writers. In 1957, Lawrence began a weekly column for the Charlotte Observer, blending gardening lore and horticultural expertise gained from her own gardens in Raleigh and Charlotte, North Carolina, and from her many gardener friends. This book presents 132 of her beloved columns. Never before published in book form, they were chosen from the more than 700 pieces that she wrote for the Observer over fourteen years.Lawrence exchanged plants and gardening tips with everyone from southern "farm ladies" trading bulbs in garden bulletins to prominent regional gardeners. She corresponded with nursery owners, everyday backyard gardeners, and literary luminaries such as Katharine White and Eudora Welty. Her books, including A Southern Garden, The Little Bulbs, and Gardens in Winter, inspired several generations of gardeners in the South and beyond.The columns in this volume cover specific plants, such as sweet peas, hellebores, peonies, and the bamboo growing outside her living-room window, as well as broader topics including the usefulness of vines, the importance of daily pruning, and organic gardening. Like all of Lawrence's writing, these columns are peppered with references to conversations with neighbors and quotations from poetry, mythology, and correspondence. They brim with knowledge gained from a lifetime of experimenting in her gardens, from her visits to other gardens, and from her extensive reading.Lawrence once wrote, "Dirty fingernails are not the only requirement for growing plants. One must be as willing to study as to dig, for a knowledge of plants is acquired as much from books as from experience." As inspiring today as when they first appeared in the Charlotte Observer, the columns collected in Beautiful at All Seasons showcase not only Lawrence's vast knowledge but also her intimate, conversational writing style and her lifelong celebration of gardens and gardening.

Sujets

• Gardening

Informations

• Publié par: Duke University Press
• Date de parution: 28 février 2007
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780822389767
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

Beautiful at All Seasons

....................................................................................................................................

Beautiful at All Seasons

Southern Gardening and Beyond

with Elizabeth Lawrence t elizabeth lawrence

edited by ann l. armstrong and lindie wilson

Duke University Press Durham and London 2007

......................................................................................................................................

∫2007 Duke University Press

All rights reserved

Printed in the United States

of America on acid-free paper$

Designed by Amy Ruth Buchanan

Typeset in Fournier by Keystone

Typesetting, Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-

Publication Data appear on the last

printed page of this book.

To Bev Armstrong, and our beloved cats Paku and Beau, who helped every keystroke of the way

Illustrations follow page 120 xiiiAcknowledgments xvIntroduction xxiNote to the Reader

t Contents

...................................................................................................................................... one Seasonal Flowers ......................................................................................................................................

1 3 5 7 8 9 11 13 14 16 18 19 21 22 24 25 27

Garden Resolutions Flowers for Christmas Time Flowers Greet the New Year Winter Flowers The Green Winter A Hard Winter Bamboo Storm Damage The Merry Month of May Tender Perennials for Hot-Weather Gardens Flowers in the Fall Border Fragrance in the Garden Fall Additions to the Border Sow Hardy Annual Seeds During September Planting Annuals in Autumn Late-Blooming Flowers The Gardening Year Is Just Beginning

...................................................................................................................................... two Perennials and Annuals ......................................................................................................................................

29 31 33 34 36 38 39 41 43 45 46 48 49 51 53 54 56 58 59 61 62

Planting in Relays Badge of Gardening Includes Black Knees Gardening Surprises The Law of Supply and Demand Variegated Foliage Selections for the Rock Garden Tropical Plants Annuals Sweet Peas Peony Tree Peonies and Others Clematis also Flowers in Shade Beautiful Lilies Asteromoea mongolica—Kalimeris pinnatifida Hellebores The Christmas Rose and Other Hellebores Giridlian . . . A Master of Plants Night-Blooming Cereus The Dividends of Fall Planting Savannah Lands of East Carolina Petasites

...................................................................................................................................... three Bulbs, Corms, and Tubers ......................................................................................................................................

65 66 68 70 72 73 75 77 78 79 81

Planting Bulbs, Corms, and Tubers Bulbs Through the Seasons Some Early Spring Bulbs Da√odils Need Early Start Specialty Bulbs Crown Imperials Lycoris radiata Amaryllis Family The Surprise Lily Lilies Grow Where None Were Garden Casualties

...................................................................................................................................... four Trees and Shrubs ......................................................................................................................................

83 85 86 88 90 92 93 95 97 98 100 102 103 105 106 108 110 111 113 114 116 118 119 121 122 124 125

Planting for Ice Storms Plants for Parking Strips Flowering Trees for the City Street Trees Trees with Colored Bark Witch Hazels Flowering Cherries Serviceberries and Sloes Dogwoods Buckeyes Eucalyptus Honey Locust Osmanthus Hollies Conifers Firs and Cedars Flowering Shrubs March-Flowering Shrubs Viburnums and Other Flowering Shrubs June-Flowering Shrubs Viburnums Pyracanthas Nandinas Hydrangeas Sasanquas Camellia saluenensis E. A. Bowles’s Lunatics

...................................................................................................................................... five Vegetables and Herbs, Climbers and Creepers ......................................................................................................................................

129 130 132 134 136

Fall Vegetables Two Vegetable Gardens Mrs. Hobbs and Her Herbs Sweet Woodru√ Dandelions