the last week of October and the first of fall's peak color

Today I had to walk a good bit on Duke's west campus. I made four trips to and from my car which I park on the far side of Sarah Duke Gardens and along the way I took about two dozen photographs. This week everyone will really notice the variety of trees, shrubs, and perennials in various stages of fall color all over the piedmont.

Left - fallen leaves from a Japanese cherry tree.
Below- a big leafed hydrangea starting to turn. Not pictured here are the dogwoods, redbuds, ginkgos, and Chinese pistaches which will be at their best over the course of this week. Be on the lookout. Our rakes and lawn mower-bags will be gathering much of this stuff too soon.

what's in bloom in my yard this week

SWAMP SUNFLOWER

CAMELLIA SASANQUA

AROMATIC ASTER 'October Skies'

good choices at golden belt

I ran into Katherine Gill last week. She is a landscape architect who lives in southwest central Durham, not far from my house. I profiled her and her wonderful garden for the Durham Skywriter back in May. Besides starting a community supported agriculture project (literally in her own backyard) she was also commissioned to design and implement parts of a new landscape around the renovated Golden Belt factory in east Durham. There, she has filled containers, beds, and pathways with smart plant choices. Especially noteworthy are the perennials, shrubs, and trees that can stand the heat and the humidity of our summers.

(pictured above: Stones of this shape and size have always been necessary to control erosion and vegetation along rail lines. Here, their use in a parking lot median is a nice touch given the industrial history of Golden Belt and the track that still runs nearby. Native switchgrass and a low growing evergreen juniper will soften this feature throughout the year --even after winter turns the grass an appealing brownish-blond .)

enough light to work by

Late summer and early autumn kind of run together around here. I hiked through Sarah Duke Gardens last week and even though I felt warm, I was not uncomfortable. The real guide is the sun. This picture was taken on my lunch hour. I think the sunshine looks like four o'clock in June. That difference makes me a feel a bit melancholy.........but anyway, I am not an astronomer or a poet, so let's move on.

I am a gardener so I do know that shorter days make it hard to finish my chores: dividing perennials, seeding rye grass, digging a French drain, thinning the arugula seedlings. Those boxes remain unchecked. It didn't help that on Saturday, I came home with almost two dozen items from the annual plant distribution event at the JC Raulston Arboretum in Raleigh. I now have the charge of deciding where to plant my climbing hydrangea, a narrow-leafed possumhaw viburnum, the mysterious-sounding hidden cone ginger, a false rosemary, and a trunk full of other things that will probably outgrow their assigned seating around the perennial border. Not only is my garden running out of room but I am running out of hours. And daylight savings ends in less than a month.

But if I were caught up with everything I would not have a reason to work in the garden. What is the point in that?