What is your favorite moment in the garden? I’ll confess this is a question that I can’t easily answer, but a few come to mind: the lengthening days and long shadows of February, the entire month of April (OK, I cheated on this one!), the profuse blue flowers of May, the variety of shapes, colors and textures in the summer flower border, the symphony of autumn hues, and the quiet bones of the winter landscape. This time of year, the evening garden ranks right up there with these favorite moments; hummingbirds gathering the last bits of nectar before the day’s end, bumblebees tucked-in for the night inside flowers, and the illumination of colors in the twilight. One plant that truly shines at this time is Cimicifuga racemosaor bugbane. The white bottlebrush flowers of bugbane sit on top of long green stalks above handsomely divided, dark green foliage.
As nighttime falls on this native woodland plant the thin, green flower stems fade into the background leaving the flowers to magically “float” in the air (which accounts for its other common name, “fairy candles”). The flowers are long lasting, starting out as small pearl-like flower buds and opening from bottom to top creating a fuzzy effect. These regal plants make a statement in the woodland border with foliage mounding 2-3’ high and flowers stalks reaching up to 8’, which amazingly enough do not require staking. The seed pods persist and can create an interesting texture in the winter landscape. At Winterthur, where we mulch-mow our woodlands in the fall for our winter bulb displays, we strip the seed from the stalks prior to cleanup (late October/November) and disperse it throughout the woodlands. It takes many years for the seeds to turn into flowering plants but given enough time the end result is magical.
I had two favorite moments just this morning! At the top of the walk down from the Visitors Lot are two planters which contain one of the most remarkable looking coleus specimens–the leaves are a brilliant chartreuse on the top side and a rich chocolate mauve on the underside–take a look!
Then, almost at the bottom of the hill close to the Visitors Center on your right, is a small stone and stucco structure which covers an old spring. If you stop and listen, you can hear the water pouring through (particularly on a day after a steady rain); however, today was an especially quiet trickle, but still there.