Category Archives: Flowers and Plants

Hello all:
Vibrant mums of purple, white and yellow plus leafy green cabbages are still blooming all around Boston.  It’s great to see them alongside carved pumpkins and other remnants of Halloween.  Love those ghosts!
The frosty evenings have tinged the mums with spots of brown and the cabbage leaves are droopy but it is good to see color in neighborhood yards  for a while longer…

The beds in the Boston Public Garden are neat, rounded mounds of soil.  No plantings remain.  The raised beds near the front of the Prudential Tower are equally spare and clean of greenery.  Today the weather is going to be lovely – above 60 degrees and sunny – so it is my turn to remove my garden plantings from their street-side bed.  It is bittersweet to tug out the plantings.  Such finality…  I’m reminded of that song Turn, Turn, Turn by the Byrds… “To every thing there is a season.  And a time to every purpose under heaven.” For your listening pleasure… It is a good day.  Enjoy every minute!

The humble hosta has gotten a bad rap.  It’s not a flashy plant  but it is hardy, easy to grow, offers great leaf patterns and loves the shade!  These are assets that a city gardener loves!

 True, green hostas can do well in the sun if  in moist, deep soil, but most like shade, especially the blue hosta.  As Grounds Superintendent Steve Baxter from 1000 Southern Artery in Quincy counsels, go beyond the eye roll and give this plant a chance! He is so right!
Here are two hosta fun facts you may not know…  Did you know that hostas flower? And that some are fragrant? Interested? Read on….

Hostas are best used as groundcover, as an accent plant or to edge a garden.  They come in many colors – shades of green, yellow and blue.  Some sport gold, cream or white patterns and edges.  Leaves can be rippled, glossy, veined, ridged, puckered – pick your favorite.  Hosta flowers are white or lavender and, depending on the variety, bloom as early as June and as late as October.   And when you are at your local nursery or garden center, look  for Hosta plantaginea – it’s a fragrant hosta.   The  ‘Aphrodite’ hosta has a fragrant, double white flower. 

And if you really like hostas, here’s an event to consider…  The 2011 American Hosta Society National Convention will take place June 22 – June 25 in Marlborough, Massachusetts, hosted by the New England Hosta Society. For more information, go to http://www.2011hosta.org/