Return to New England

Summer days skip by quickly and as July 4th approaches I am reminded how much busier it is here at Vermont Flower Farm than before I left for the west coast a couple weeks ago. Despite where you travel, there is something special about returning to Vermont. My trip to Portland and Seattle was a good one, always too short and always leaving me with a list of places to visit that will be copied onto my next trip schedule.

I like the Seattle airport if you can like an airport at all. It doesn't seem as noisy to me and there is plenty of space in the central core to find a place to sit. I am impressed by the way the display cases are managed as they exhibit local artisans and businesses. This visit's display was impressive and occuped me for some time.

Glass art sculpture has intersted me more each year. The technology has obviously changed and the productions are just incredible. Some of the artists I saw on exhibit are originally from the East coast but they are all worth a memory. I copied down the websites of three galleries and they deserve a visit. http://www.friesangallery.com; http://www.rileygalleries.com
and http://www.travergallery.com

Individual artisans that were impressive were Dan Dailey from New Hampshire, Karen Willenbrick-Johsen, and Preston Singletary. If you're not familiar with some of the recent glass work, this should start the journey. I have been told there is a glass museum in nearby Tacoma but that too is left for another trip.

So back here in Vermont there is still more of the heavy rain I saw on the trip back. From Washington to Philadelphia, it is a real mess. Vermont farmers that were in trouble before the spring rains have thought about closing down, vegetable gardeners have replanted two or three times, the strawberry crop has been very poor and August blueberries will be at premium because the bumble bees were too wet to pollinate their favorite fruit.

Our gardens here at Vermont Flower Farm look very good, save for some yellow leaves here and there where water settled for too long. The daylily 'Spider Miracle' flowered yesterday and it brought a new light to the garden in the middle of a thunderstorm. The early 'Lemon Lollypops', 'Stella d'Oro and 'Black Eyed Stella' are out in abundance. When I make my morning walk in a few minutes, I know there will be 12 or 15 new daylilies to look at and photograph.

The sun is bright this morning and the day has the makings of a hot one. It's already at 78.6 A big doe just when through the lower field so I better get going here. No doubt she's looking for some flowers in the lower garden and I'd prefer she went elsewhere. The native Lilium superbum have exceeded 8 feet tall and are setting bud. I have never figured out how deer do it but they eat the flower buds. Oh for a disciplined Border Collie!

From the mountain above Peacham Pond where the loons call at 3 AM

Garden wishes,

George Africa
http://vermontflowerfarm.com