THE URBAN ROCK GARDENER T M A NEWSLETTER PUBLISHED BY THE M ANHATTAN CHAPTER OF THE NORTH AMERICAN ROCK GARDEN SOCIETY Volume 24, Issue 5 www.mcnargs.org November/December 2011 ~ MEETING ANNOUNCEMENT ~ M ONDAY, NOVEMBER 14, 2011 @ 6 PM THE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY OF NEW YORK JANE MCGARY will speak on B ULBS IN THEIR HABITATS Jane McGary works as an editor of scholarly books and also edited the Rock Garden Quarterly for ten years, as well as compiling and contributing to three volumes co-published by Timber Press and NARGS, including "Bulbs of North America." She has been growing hardy bulbs since the late 1980s and now cultivates about 1300 species and subspecies in her garden and bulb house near Portland, Oregon. She has traveled to many parts of the world to see and photograph wild plants and to learn more about their natural habitats. The talk will concentrate on hardy and near-hardy bulbs as they grow in the wild, presenting plants from different parts of the world, including western North America, southern South America, around the Mediterranean, and from a variety of habitats such as beaches, meadows, woodlands, and alpine zones. The special challenges of cultivating bulbs from each type of habitat are discussed. Arum creticum th Please join us for our November meeting at The Horticultural Society of New York, 148 West 37 Street, 13th Floor, between 7th Avenue and Broadway, near the 7th Avenue #1/2/3 lines and the 6th Avenue B/D/F subway lines. It is three blocks north of Macy’s and not far from Grand Central, Penn Station and the Port Authority Bus Terminal. ~ MEETING ANNOUNCEMENT~ MONDAY, DECEMBER 12 TH , 2011 @ 6 PM THE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY OF NEW YORK KEAN TECK ENG will speak on THE ALPINE GARDEN IN FORT TRYON PARK Kean Eng grew up in a family with a farming background in Malaysia. He was trained as an agronomist in the tropics and graduated with a Bachelors (Honors) Degree in Agricultural Science from Putra University in Malaysia. He worked in food crop production and in the floriculture industry focusing on post-harvest physiology to extend the shelf life of cut flowers for export. He also worked for Dupont on field trials of warm temperate crops and ornamental plants in high altitude cultivation. In New York, he was an intern at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden where he obtained his Certificate in Horticulture. He is currently working in the Alpine Garden in Fort Tryon Park with the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, where he has been since 2008. His topic, “Restoring the Alpine Garden at Fort Tryon Park” will address the history of the garden, originally designed by the Olmsted Brothers, changes effected since 1935, and challenges presented in the restoration work he’s spearheading. A view of the Alpine Garden at Fort Tryon Park 2 ~NOTICE OF ANNUAL MEETING~ The Annual Meeting of the Manhattan Chapter of the North American Rock Garden Society will take place at 6:00 pm on Monday, November 14th, 2011, during which time we will conduct a short business meeting, pursuant to our Bylaws, for the purpose of electing Directors for the following year. The slate nominated for election is as follows: Judith Dumont Lola Horwitz Zabel Meshejian Michael Riley Abbie Zabar Kean Teck Eng Brendan Kenny Gelene Scarborough Steven Whitesell Nominations will be open to the floor, but the candidate must have accepted his or her nomination prior to the meeting. Please advise Secretary Judith Dumont of any additional nominations in advance. [email protected] Michael Riley, Chairman ~ RILEY ON THE ROCKS ~ Seasonal tasks are usually the topic of the Editor’s that they are sustainable. Many among us are hardcore erudite column, WHY DON”T YOU? - which you will landscapers who need to plan for hurricanes and floods read elsewhere in this newsletter, but ... this has been and errant snowstorms and this season has made that one HECKOFASEASON, and the “tasks” have been point very clearly. Because of their diversity and monumental. I only had to worry about a few snowflakes ruggedness – perhaps rock gardens (and rock gardeners) on my orchids and tomatoes, when Steve has been are the answer for TUFF terrains in every season. Stick through a flood, a hurricane, an October snowstorm and around and we will see? I’m thinking that the title of his column this month might November is the month for our board to get organized be “Why Don’t You ...Just Throw In the Towel?” and look ahead to the next year. We will elect directors, Aside from all of this, he once again did a superb job some new and some old (long-standing) who have done with the Tri-State Meeting at Lyndhurst with Don a fine job for our chapter in the past. Our former Dembowski, Don Ohl and many other volunteers – Program Chairs – Lola Horwitz and Mary Buchen are THANK YOU ALL. It was a terrific meeting and just retiring from that position and we thank them prolifically when I thought my roof wouldn’t hold one more pebble for their fine job in planning. Programming is a complex – I came home with four new troughs, several hunks of job for any one or two people, so we are going to morph tufa and a few more plants (actually Francisco bought it into a committee including Abbie and Brendan and a those darned plants). It was an exciting meeting with few other people. It is complicated because of the many Malcolm and Monica McGregor, lots of good plants and elements involved in planning, extending invitations, friends, and ... our Manhattan Chapter members made up arranging hardware/software compatibility, hosting, a HUGE percentage of the audience, it made me very honoraria, participating with other chapters, etc. If any of proud that many of you made this very worthwhile you have an interest in helping with this task, you would effort. be most welcome to join the committee – there is plenty to do. Zabel would welcome help in arranging tours, Now, about those seasonal tasks, which this year, for our Gelene would like help in collecting dues (like ... pay friends and members in the Parks Department and Public now?). None of these positions, or offices, or Gardens, represent a year or so of work in repairing and committees are singular in their planning or execution so removing damaged trees and other “bones” in the garden please step up and offer your services to help your – you have our heartfelt commiseration and gratitude for fellow chapter members. the work you do. Perhaps the most seasonal task that we I am really looking forward to hearing our former Editor, face is in planning and planting sustainable landscapes Jane McGary in November, and then in December, our and sustainable gardens. I loved the description Malcolm own Kean Teck Eng. I’m sure that his Alpine Garden in McGregor gave of his “prairie garden in northern Fort Tryon Park has a few seasonal tales to tell. See you England” which resulted from his trip to the NARGS there Annual Meeting in Colorado 2010, because I too came home and planted a “prairie trough in Manhattan” as a result of the same inspiration. We do (or try to do) such frivolous things because we can; but not with the idea 3 ~A NEW METHOD OF CREATING RAISED BEDS~ Stepped planting arrangement, Gilboa, New York Tony Robbin and Rena Kosersky have created an interesting and original hillside garden feature adjacent to their farmhouse on the northern edge of the Catskills in Gilboa, NY. The cascading, cubic forms are executed in locally quarried bluestone slabs each approximately 18” x 18”, a manageable size for most people to handle. The forms relate to the explorations of four-dimensional space seen in Tony’s paintings and sculpture currently on view at the Orlando (FL) Museum of Art http://tonyrobbin.net The space was formerly the site of an aging wood deck that was removed. The sawn edges of each slab, with a natural cleft face on both sides, are bonded together with a two-part epoxy adhesive product called Akepox, manufactured in Germany by Akemi. The slabs were epoxy bonded and held in place with clamps for a day, then placed in their final positions. The slabs are arranged in near-cubic units that step down the hillside, with a change in grade from the kitchen doorsill to the toe of the slope of approximately three to four feet. Each cubic bottomless unit is placed against the next to form a monolithic open grid, with about 6-8” of vertical slab face showing. The garden was inaugurated with a ‘cube party’ and cube-shaped food was served – cheese cubes, bread cubes, cubic baklava. Each unit is planted to a single species, often with colored foliage and special attention is paid to foliar texture, Bronze-leaved Ajuga reptans, silver reindeer moss, an unnamed hybrid Heuchera with amber foliage, Carex oshimensis ‘Evergold’, and soft gray Antennaria dioica are among the plants selected for display. Non-living materials also occupy some of the units and the grid alternates living and non-living materials in checkerboard formation. Non-living materials include black river stones, crushed brick, charcoal gray gravel, and black shot sand. A row of slab-covered units act as a staircase to the herbaceous borders, turf paths, pergola-shaded dining terrace, and a large pond stocked with bass that lie below. 4 A trough created and planted by Malcolm McGregor mimicking the Czech crevice rock arrangement method ~ SEEDS ARE COMING!!! ~ The NARGS seed exchange donations are due to arrive at the end of November.