Bayport Plant Farm has a Sale!

May is always the busiest month in my working year, and this May is no exception. It's been made more entertaining by also being a real spring this year, as opposed to the cold, wet and unpleasant Mays we've seen in recent years. The gardens are blooming like crazy, including the native plants--which some refer to as weeds.

Anyway. I've written numerous times about Bayport Plant Farm and my friend the late Captain Richard Steele and his daughter Diana, who have worked the farm and developed many amazing plants over their years of working with rhododendrons, magnolias, and other choice ornamentals. Captain Steele passed away just over 2 years ago, and we miss him deeply, we plant nuts.

Today I made my way to Bayport, a few miles from Lunenburg, on Nova Scotia's picturesque south shore, to visit Diana, who continues to operate the plant farm. I didn't call before heading down to see her, and it was just good luck that she happened to be home. We hugged and wept a little over lost loved ones, but as we toured around the hilly woodlands of the plant farm, we found ourselves laughing over things her father would do, events that she and he shared in their work on the farm. And of course, I spent a great deal of time gawking at beautiful blooming plants.

Magnolias, evergreens, rhododendrons and azaleas, native plants, rare plants...all grow together in a lush and joyous celebration of horticultural heaven. I can't be sad walking around Bayport, not when the legacy of Dick and Diana's work is all around me. 

Diana doesn't operate a website for Bayport, so I decided to help out a little bit by creating an advertisement for her that links to this post. And if you drop in to visit bloominganswers.com, you'll find a downloadable file of some of the plants she has on sale this spring season. 

Naturally, I had to buy some plants, but this one she gave me...one of her father's crosses, with his beloved signature burgundy 'blotch' in each flower. "You have to name this variety," she told me. And right there and then I named it. "Steeles Legacy". 

For both of them, Dick and Diana, in gratitude for all the fabulous plants they have given us over the years. Long may they bloom.

Want to visit Bayport? Here's the coordinates and the hours:

Bayport Plant Farm

Diana Steele

2740 Hwy 332, Bayport, NS

902-764-2090

Hours Friday, Saturday, Sunday, 9-5;

Other days by appointment

Closed on Mondays

Rarities and Radio Shows

We're already well into May and there's been little time for posting. That's because this is the busy season for garden speakers, gardeners, and just normal life-living. I've been grateful to be so occupied with various events, including the Saltscapes Expo last weekend and this weekend's native plant sale at Acadia's Harriet Irving Botanical Gardens, plus appearing on Niki Jabbour's radio show, The Weekend Gardener. Still, I did get a little weepy when I noticed Lowell's trilliums are coming into bloom. I sure hope he can enjoy them, too. 

Slow down, Spring, you move too fast!

It seems there's a trend across the continent for a blazingly fast spring. I don't know whether we're starting to be like Australia (where this fabulous plant, Kangaroo Paw hails from, but is used for containers and specimen plants here), or just what is going on, but things are moving quickly in the nurseries and in our gardens.

The early warm weather is catching all of us off balance, but our local nurseries do have plenty of product to sell, and more plants arriving daily. Over at Blomidon Nurseries, there is a nice collection of heaths and heathers,

And some of the earlier blooming rhododendrons are starting to put on a show, like this beauty, 'Blue Baron'.
If you're thinking about annuals, it's plenty early to do anything with them unless you have a protected greenhouse to hold them in til the risk of frost is past. But with the Hort Couture plants (such as that Kangaroo Paw, above) we are going to see a lot of clever use of tropical plants, some with spectacular foliage or flowers, in container and specimen planting.

The staff and customers at Briar Patch in Berwick were all staring eagerly at 'Limelight' yellow magnolia, trying to will this flower bud to open. Probably on the weekend. There's just something about yellow flowered magnolias. This is my year to plant one.

Briar Patch has a great collection of hellebores, including this lovely 'Pink Frost'. I like this one because its flowers face outward and upward, not as shy as some of its cousins.

'April Mist' is a dainty double-flowered rhododendron, with delicate petals that look almost like tissue paper.

Today was the first day of being open for the season for the folks at Glad Gardens in Waterville. As always, they have a terrific collection of plants, annuals, perennials, shrubs and trees of all kinds.

Succulents in containers are popular both indoors and out, and Glad Gardens has a great collection of non-hardy succulents this year. These plants will overwinter nicely in a home, but don't leave them outside for the winter or they will be mush.

Things are blooming hot and heavy at Baldwin's Nurseries in Falmouth. Rob has always had fantastic trees and shrubs, and in the past couple of years he has become besotted with perennials, too. Including these fragrant and colourful dianthus. This variety is 'Black Cherry Wild' and it IS very fragrant.

'Golden Lotus' hellebore is just the prettiest double flowered beauty, isn't she? Actually, I personally have never met a hellebore I didn't love.

Den Haan's in Middleton is going full tilt too. Their greenhouses are filled with annuals basking in the heat, while perennials, shrubs and trees are in more ordinary climates. I love the cheery colour of this pink strawberry plant.

And this rhododendron, 'Janet Seleger' caught my eye because the flowers have a bluish tinge to them. I have been very good at resisting purchasing plants right now--it's not time yet.

I have lived at our home for 13 years, and know the land and the climate and the garden as intimately as I knew the body, mind and soul of my beloved Lowell. This year is the EARLIEST I have seen the plants blooming and breaking dormancy and flourishing. Pieris 'Captain Steele' is opening its cascades of fragrant flowers,

The puschkinia are competing with snowdrops, crocus, chionodoxa and early dwarf iris for attention in the 'small bulbs' category.

In the pond, the cattails are doing brilliantly, making the red winged blackbirds and the frogs very happy.
Wait a minute. These aren't my cattails.
They're the work of the fabulous Al Simm, metal worker and 'reluctant Artist, from Avon River Metalworks. Al will be displaying some of his work in my garden during my second annual Open Garden Fundraiser (this year, June 30-July 1). He will also be unveiling a special memorial sculpture to my long-suffering Lowell that weekend--it'll be a surprise for everyone.