Posts Tagged ‘Beverley Nichols’
November 18, 2020 Winter Garden Plants, William Shenstone, Leo Lesquereux, Asa Gray, Beverley Nichols, The Kew Gardener’s Guide to Growing House Plants by Kay Maguire, and Goldenrod
Today we celebrate the man who was a gardener and a poet and he inspired the trend toward the picturesque natural Landscape. We’ll also learn about the Swiss botanist who specialized in mosses. We’ll remember the birthday of the Father of American botany. We’ll take a look back at a popular November fruit – I…
Read MoreMost People, Early in November
by Beverley Nichols Most people, early in November, take last looks at their gardens and are then prepared to ignore them until the spring. I am quite sure that a garden doesn’t like to be ignored like this. It doesn’t like to be covered in dust sheets, as though it were an old…
Read MoreNovember 11, 2019 Kashmir Paradise, Orchids with Alys Fowler, Perennial Garden Care, Jean-Baptiste Van Mons, Chrysanthemums, the Leonids, Carl Peter Thunberg, Beverley Nichols, Gardening for Butterflies by The Xerces Society, Staking Trees, and Elizabeth Coleman White
Today we celebrate the botanist who bred more than 40 types of pears – including our most popular varieties. We’ll learn about the cultural meanings associated with the chrysanthemum and the Swedish botanist who posed as a Dutchman to botanize in Japan. We’ll hear some thoughts on November from one of my favorite garden writers…
Read MoreMost People Early in November
by Beverley Nichols Most people, early in November, take last looks at their gardens, are then prepared to ignore them until the spring. I am quite sure that a garden doesn’t like to be ignored like this. It doesn’t like to be covered in dust sheets, as though it were an old room which you…
Read MoreSeptember 13, 2019 The secret to beautiful begonias, Caspar Wistar, Roald Dahl, Beverley Nichols, English Cottage Gardening by Margaret Hensel, Dividing Bearded Irises, and for the Love of Toads
What’s the secret to beautiful begonias? I asked this to a friend recently who has gorgeous begonias every single year. Her answer was simple: fish emulsion. This means you should feed your begonias with fertilizer. Since we love that begonias flower and they do flower their hearts out, that makes begonias are heavy feeders. Since…
Read MoreMesembryanthemum
by Beverley Nichols This flower is a startling proof of the fact that when nature decides to be vulgar – really vulgar – she can achieve the effects of almost blinding beauty. For nothing could be more opulent, more blatant, more shamelessly exhibitionist than a bed of the Mesembryanthemum in full bloom. Magenta jostling scarlet,…
Read MoreRegal Lily
by Beverley Nichols The regal lilies do indeed praise the Lord. Some of my own last summer were so exultant that they praised Him through no less than thirty snow-white trumpets on a single stem, and even the most accomplished angel could not do much better than that. Note: All week long,…
Read MoreAlgerian Iris
by Beverley Nichols One of my grandfathers died of a clump of Iris stylosa; it enticed him from a sickbed on an angry evening in January, luring him through the snowdrifts with its blue and silver flames; he died of double pneumonia a few days later. It was probably worth it. Note:…
Read MoreGolden-bell Clematis
by Beverley Nichols If I had to confine my choice of creepers to a single-family – what a hideous thought! I should probably choose the family of clematis. And if I were limited to a single member of the family, I should probably select Clematistangutica. I said probably because these hypothetical decisions are so excruciating.…
Read MoreFritillairies
by Beverley Nichols Each Stage of our lives has its signature flower, and those of us who keep diaries would have a little difficulty in assigning to each year those flowers which are especially evocative… Fritillairies are linked with my years as an undergraduate… Year after year, for generation after generation, these flowers have danced…
Read MoreIris Siberica
by Beverley Nichols How can one ignore… that singular infinitely sinister blossom Iris siberica? This latter flower can undoubtedly claim to be exclusively dressed, for the petals of no other blossom has Nature designed so curious of fabric, vein with slate and violet and purple. Note: All week long, The Daily Gardener has…
Read MoreMagnolia
by Beverley Nichols I must confess that, for me, the flower of the magnolia is most beautiful when life has almost ebbed from it. These are the twilit hours when the petals flag and falter, when their immaculate ivory texture dims, when they glow with a ghostly radiance that seems to come from another world.…
Read MoreSummer Hyacinth
by Beverley Nichols On an August night, when the moon is full, there is an almost ectoplasmic radiance around its petals. Note: All week long, The Daily Gardener has been sharing quotes from the author Beverley Nichols, who was born on Monday of this week in 1898. A prolific writer, Nichols is…
Read MoreA Great Deal of Weeping
by Beverley Nichols A great deal of weeping goes on in my garden, but it is a happy sort of weeping, for all this bending of branches and bowing of heads is simply due to the fact that so much beauty is displayed on so small a stage. Note: All week long, The…
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