Daily Local News (West Chester, PA)
Summer garden harvests
As the unofficial end of summer approaches, residents at Kendal~Crosslands Communities, a Life Plan Retirement Community located in Kennett Square, PA, share their garden techniques and tips as well as ponder the life giving benefits of gardening.
Brigitte Alexander
You can’t have 21 quarts of strawberries or a colorful crop of zinnias without doing a little weeding first. I have been gardening at my community for 15 years and my experiences with bounty, weather, etc. have varied from year to year. However, the past several years, it’s all about weeding. A few years ago, my nemesis in the garden was the Canada Thistle Weed. It was all over my beds and I battled the invasive plant by digging it up. Then, the year after, an abundance of clover was the weed to battle and then a new weed the following year. But, this year, I am happy to say, I am weed free! No chemicals used just labor of love tending to the crops. Contrary to growing up in a city, I find gardening an activity where I can be in peaceful solitude and it produces a useful and beautiful bounty. I look at my experiences with my garden as a parallel to life: it goes through stages with new challenges at each stage.
Peggy Jones
I remember following my grandmother as she tended to her roses; I used to tag along carrying her clippers or a trowel. So for me, gardening has always been a part of my life; it is so connected to happy memories. During all our years on the family farm, my husband and I cared for 70-80 feet of perennial borders. These beds were filled with the plants I loved; some were ones my grandmother grew, many felt like old friends. My favorite plantings, however, have always been the Daylilies; by planting many different cultivars, I have been able to enjoy a two-month growing season. Now we live in an apartment and I have smaller flower borders. Here I bracket the daylily season with astilbe in the spring and hydrangeas for bloom in late summer. Sharing the view of my flower borders with my neighbors and hearing their accolades is almost as rewarding as seeing the first lily blossom open.
Garry Stone
I grew up in the country and have been gardening since just about when I could walk. Flowers are my specialty and I enjoy them in two ways. First, just outside my cottage, I have the ability to plant a garden and enjoy lush, colorful flowers. Cone
Flowers, Zinnias, Shasta Daisies, Yarrows, and Milkweed just to name a few, adorn my home. The Cone Flower seeds are just about ripe and the Yellow Finches are eagerly waiting for a treat. Butterflies are in abundance — so many that they bump into each other as they prance about the blooms. The other garden I enjoy is my “cutting garden.” Some perennials and lots of colorful zinnias. These I’ll cut and share with my neighbors or with residents in our Health Center. I enjoy growing and sharing beauty.
Pownall Jones
As a youngster, I remember visiting my aunt who had a cottage in Ocean City, New Jersey. Frequently she purchased gladiolas from a man
who walked the streets selling flowers. In memory it seems as if she always had gladiolas on her table. Only recently have I grown gladiolas. When I reduced the size of my vegetable garden, in the unused space, I began to plant gladiola bulbs; eventually there were more gladiolas than vegetables. Now I have a patch of 400500 bulbs, some of which I mulch heavily and leave in the ground over winter, some I lift and store. The latter I plant in 50 bulb batches every other week until about July 1. These, augmented with some new bulbs each year, give successive bloom until Fall. During July and August, I go almost daily to our farm in New Garden, cut bouquets of gladiolas and share them with all our neighbors.