Sidewalk Greenspace on New York's Upper West Side
Newest addition to the garden: a large Rudbeckia (“black eyed susan”). It’s slightly bedraggled after its trip here by truck, but I am optimistic that it’ll perk up over the coming days — and I think it still has enough time to make itself at home that it has a decent chance of surviving the cold this winter.
The latest addition to the garden is a lovely holly shrub donated by some neighbors, now repotted in a giant tub donated by another neighbor, with a hundred pounds of soil ordered online and delivered by cargo van.
(Not pictured: three more identical tubs, each with their own hundred pounds of soil, awaiting more flowers expected to arrive over the coming few days.)
The evergreen foliage and bright-red berries should provide some lovely color this winter.
The label describes it as a “Blue Princess” Holly (Ilex × meserveae) which could eventually grow to be 12 feet tall, although I suspect that the limited volume of soil will prevent it from reaching that size — I suppose that if it does well I’ll need to prune it back to keep it from getting much past six feet just to keep it manageable and avoid obstructing the light entering the building’s windows.)
The burdock flowers also draw a crowd of bees; these ones are European honey bees.
Another reason I like burdock is that it supports a lot of insects. A week ago, I noticed that seemingly overnight, the undersides of the flower clusters had been swarmed by hundreds of aphids. I pulled out the hose and blasted a bunch of them off with a few quick squirts, but that only thins them out, it never gets ’em all, so I was very pleased to find a couple of ladybugs crawling around on it the next day. Although they’re cute, I know they’re fiends for aphids.
And even better, by the end of the week I was seeing ladybug larvae crawling around, clearing out the lingering aphids. A few days later, I can no longer find any aphids at all.
I’ve heard people dismiss burdock as a nuisance weed, and I’m sure there are situations in which it is unwanted, but I love its odd little flowers, and since I’m growing it in a container, the burrs really aren’t a problem.
You can see why one of the common names for dianthus flowers is “pinks” — some of them are such a hot pink my phone camera doesn’t know what to do with it.
Our little rose bush is going full blast.
The little rose bush a neighbor donated to the garden last year has just bloomed for the first time this season.
Nature’s first green is gold.
Autumn color in the big city as the tiny trees growing in the fence planters prepare for winter.
