Garden Ogling

May 25th, 2010

   We’re blessed in central Pennsylvania to be within driving range of so many wonderful public gardens – New York Botanical and Brooklyn Botanic in New York, the National Arboretum and U.S. Botanic Garden in D.C., Phipps Conservatory in Pittsburgh and the nation’s biggest hot-spot of two dozen public gardens in the Philadelphia area alone.

   Put a few on your calendar to see this summer.

   I’ve been to a couple of hundred gardens in the U.S. and Canada in the last 20 years, and at least for now, here’s my top 10:

It's not exactly in driving range of Harrisburg, but this sheet of water at Canada's Minter Gardens is one of my favorite public-garden features.

   1.) Longwood Gardens, Kennett Square, Pa.

   2.) Missouri Botanical Garden, St. Louis, Mo.

   3.) Minter Gardens, British Columbia, Canada.

   4.) New York Botanical Garden, Bronx, N.Y.

   5.) Butchart Gardens, Vancouver Island, Canada.

   6.) Portland Classical Chinese Garden, Portland, Ore.

   7.) Chicago Botanic Garden, Glencoe, Ill.

   8.) Chanticleer, Wayne, Pa.

   9.) Hershey Gardens, Hershey, Pa. (OK, call me a homer, but I like the place.)

   10.) Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden, Richmond, Va.

   I’m sure you’ll disagree. I’ll no doubt disagree with myself by next year. Over the winter, my wife and I saw a little known but superb place just south of Myrtle Beach, S.C., called Brookgreen Gardens. Even out of season, the sculptures, statuary and evergreen plants had me trying to figure out how to cram it into the top 10.

   I’d be curious to hear about your favorites, which I’ll share with others so we all don’t miss a gem you’ve seen. Email me your favorites at george@georgeweigel.net.

   I’ve got profiles, photos, contact info and “George’s Take” on a few dozen gardens at https://georgeweigel.net/public-garden-roundup.

   For five years now, Lowee’s Tours of Harrisburg has sponsored a “Garden Series” of trips to some of these great gardens. I do traveling seminars on board, play quiz games with prizes (usually new trial plants, divisions from my garden or garden books), answer garden questions, give timely tips and talk about the places we’re going to see.

   We usually see one garden in the morning, have a nice lunch at midday, see a second garden in the afternoon, then stop at an interesting garden center on the way home.

   Most are day trips, but some are over-nighters.

   Earlier this month, for instance, we went on a “Plant Nerd Excursion” to three garden centers in Bucks County – two of which also have excellent display gardens (Hortulus Farm and Linden Hill).

   On June 11, we’re running a trip to see gardens in Annapolis (William Paca House, Helen Avalynne Tawes Garden, Historic London Town), on Sept. 24-25 we’re heading to Long Island to see Old Westbury and Planting Fields, and Dec. 6-9 we’re doing a “Green Christmas” garden-themed trip to Williamsburg, Va., and my No. 10 garden, Lewis Ginter.

   My favorite trip of the year, though, is going to be the July 21-25 trip to Niagara Falls, which includes a tour, lunch and wine tasting at Sonnenberg Gardens in New York’s beautiful Finger Lakes region, lots of gardens in Niagara, a day at America’s largest home and garden tour (300 plus open gardens at Garden Walk Buffalo) and a tour of the Buffalo Botanical Gardens. Also some “touristy” things at Niagara.

   The full schedule and details are at https://georgeweigel.net/georges-talks-and-trips or go to Lowee’s posting of the schedule at http://www.lowees.com/tours.htm.

   These are all really fun, not counting the track record that it usually rains wherever I go. If only I had that power during a drought…