Re: [gardeners] spring back east
Jeanne L. (gardeners@globalgarden.com)
Fri, 12 Apr 2002 03:38:44 -0700
Ron, I've been rather dreading my upcoming trip back east, but reading your
comparison I'm looking forward to it eagerly. Spring finally got to
Pittsburgh. A few weeks ago when I was there it was cold and not too much
was blooming - only crocuses and violas, on my property. But now I should
have daffodils and tulips and hyacinths, the Korean Snowball tree might
have some blooms on it, maybe the golden chain tree... lilac should be on
its way too. I'll be there 3 weeks so I'll get to see some changes. If
only that's all I had to do there, hang out in the garden or on the porch...
Jeanne
At 07:45 AM 4/9/02, you wrote:
>Good morning, Penny,
>
>New York may not be able to grow cherimoyas or macadamia, but you are
>able to grow many wonderful things that are exotic to us in Southern
>California: lilacs that smell like lilacs; wide varieties of tulips
>without having to dig them up in the fall to refrigerate them; Norwegian
>maples (a perennial favorite as a shade tree); 90% of the bulbs in most
>catalogs (most require more chilling than we can muster, usually);
>apples that taste like apples; and the list could go on indefinitely.
>It's just a different gardening world, no better, no worse, and often
>even more challenging, given the heat of the inland valleys in which
>many of us live, or the cool dampness of the coastal regions in which
>others of us live.
>
>We also get into trouble by pushing the envelope as to what can really
>grow here, both in the direction of tropicals, and in the direction of
>those things that truly require more chilling in order to thrive.
>
>And New York is every bit as beautiful as California. A New York
>springtime is one of life's delights. The flowering cherries and other
>fruit trees; the azaleas and rhododendrons (yep, can't really grow
>rhodies, either); the forsythia. The blooms of spring in your neck of
>the woods, Connecticut and Long Island, last year, when we were back to
>L.I. for my reunion, were simply breathtaking.
>
>We may have the Sierra, but the Catskills and Adirondacks are just as
>beautiful, in their own right; we may have Lake Tahoe, but you have the
>wonderful Finger Lakes, Great Lakes, Champlain and George, among scads
>of other beautiful bodies of water. Again, California is in no way
>better, just different. Having lived in both states a fair number of
>years, I can appreciate both...but I fear my arthritis would no longer
>appreciate NY winters as I once did:(
>
>At any rate, it's time to get under way, to do some much-needed watering
>of the fruit trees, so that they do not drop overmuch fruit and to clean
>up fallen rose and iceland poppy petals.
>
>Enjoy spring!
>
>Ron