“Sal’s Bear,” as the bear cub is named, was sculpted by Nancy Schön and cast in bronze. He was in three pieces when we unloaded him from the back of a truck after his long ride from the Boston area, but he wasn’t broken. The two smaller bronzes that accompany the bear depict an overturned bucket of blueberries, pinecones and a chickadee – all symbols of Maine. The three-piece sculpture is now surrounded by low-bush blueberries and looks right at home.

The inspiration for the cub, who will have a permanent home in the Children’s Garden, is Robert McCloskey’s book, Blueberries for Sal. The universal response when we mention Sal seems to be, “I love that book!” Seeing the climbable, photogenic personification (bearification?) of the cub in the story will surely delight visitors, whether they’re children now, had the story read to them as children, or read it to their own children or grandchildren.

Nancy Schön will be at Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens on Thursday, June 24, to help celebrate the art exhibit on view in the Visitor Center through July 17 – “Robert McCloskey: From the Drawing Board to the Page.” Please stop by between 5 and 7 p.m. on the 24th to see this wonderful show of dozens of originals and reproductions of the artwork McCloskey produced for his beloved children’s books, and to enjoy hors d’oeuvers and wine. This is the first time these works from the May Massee Collection at Emporia State University in Kansas have been on display to the public. The collection’s curator, Heather Wade, will be another special guest at the reception.  The maquette that served as a model for “Sal’s Bear” is also on view in the Visitor Center.      ~ Barbara Freeman

Entry into the Children's Garden

If you stand at the top of the broad stone steps overlooking the new Bibby and Harold Alfond Children’s Garden and just squint your eyes a bit, the garden looks finished – and amazing! Open your eyes and take a closer look, and it still looks amazing, BUT you’ll see buckets and ladders and hoses and sawhorses and all the clear signs that Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens’ newest addition is still under construction.

This crooked little "house" is in the Bibby and Harold Alfond Children's Garden.

“Is it really going to be ready?” We hear that a lot from visitors when they learn that the Grand Opening celebration  will be on Thursday, July 8. The answer is a resounding “Yes!” We’re on schedule, and, Nature willing, the opening will be a grand celebration. Children’s activities on the Great Lawn begin at 9 a.m. The festivities proper start at 10:30 with welcoming remarks by special guests including U.S. Senator Susan Collins and Maine First Lady Karen Baldacci. Then the Boothbay Region Alumni Community Band will lead off a colorful parade with the “real” characters from classic children’s books featured in the Children’s Garden, including Miss Rumphius, who will be handing out packets of lupine seeds. Next comes the ribbon cutting, and we’ll all stream into the new garden to witness the chicken and frog releases and enjoy a garden of cupcakes and other refreshments. It will be a day to remember!

Opening weekend will be full of activities, and the fun and learning – and growing – will continue throughout the season. Please plan to visit often, and bring every youngster you know so you can see this wondrous garden through their wide-open eyes!

Here are a couple of photos from yesterday – exactly one month to the opening! ~ Barbara Freeman

Thanks to Dave Brodeur from Jorgensen I was able to get some bird’s eye photos yesterday.  Dave took me up on the 40 foot lift he was using to install the windmill in the Bibby and Harold Alfond Children’s Garden.  From this height it is clear just how complex and fascinating this new garden will be when complete.  The crews have been working steadily and thanks to this and some luck with the weather we are still a few weeks ahead of schedule.  The Windmill is the most dramatic addition this week, but the last week or two has seen the addition of the two swing arbors, the greenhouse and greenhouse arbor and the unveiling of the activity shelter (it had been wrapped in tarps to keep out the winter winds).  Jason and his stonemasons have nearly finished the stone wall and pillars at the group entrance below the pond and finished the matching wall and pillars at the main entrance, too. 

Dave on the lift.

The completed windmill from above. The windmill is 28 feet tall and will pump water into a cistern. It will also feature weather instruments so young visitors can learn some basic meteorology.

Lee Dunning works on the apron welcoming visitors to the Bibby and Harold Alfond Children's Garden.

The partially installed greenhouse frame and completed shade arbor in the background. The greenhouse will be used by our Growing Green students to start seedlings in spring and house warmth-loving vegetables in the summer.

A view inside the activity shelter showing how the ledge flows into the space. All that is left to do now is to plant the roof next month.

The flagged stakes visible in this image mark the locations of the posts that will support the treehouse. This is the last of the structures to be built and work will begin on it during the next few weeks. Click on the image to view a sketch of the design by Herb Schaal.

Aerial view of the cottage and pond. The stonemasons are just beginning to lay the brick pavers around the cottage while others complete the group entrance gate in the background.

An aerial view of the entrance.

An 18 inch diameter, 75 foot tall red spruce blew down outside my office in the wee hours Friday morning. The small Kawasaki cart parked nearby missed total annihilation by only a few feet.

One of the mature red spruces that lined the top of the Haney Hillside garden succumbed to the high winds Friday morning. As it fell it crushed some of the weeping Norway spruces that march up the hillside. Four will have to be replaced in spring

Justin cuts up the spruce, trying to avoid more plant damage.

Justin cuts up the large spruce into rounds that will become seats for kids in the Harold and Bibby Alfond Children's Garden

The New Toro Dingo

 We were very fortunate to have received a grant from the Stanley Smith Horticultural Trust to purchase a Toro Dingo walk behind skid steer machine.  Thankfully,  the Dingo arrived just days before the big storm and it has proven itself already as we load brush and debris onto the truck with the grapple attachment.  The grapple is but one of the many attachments that the machine can use.  We also have a bucket, pallet forks, and a path leveler that will  be indispensible in our work on the grounds.  The machine is very light compared to a typical skid steer machine and its small size allows us to use it in tight areas.  Other attachments we hope to acquire eventually include a backhoe and a stump grinder.  Our backs say “thank you Stanley Smith Horticultural Trust!”

Dick Zieg loads the truck with downed branches from the storm. The grapple attachment on the Dingo is perfect for this sort of work.

More Witchazels Come Into Bloom

The relatively mild weather in February has brought more witchhazels into full flower throughout the gardens.  The Hamamelis vernalis ‘Amethyst’ that I profiled back in January is still in flower in the Lerner Garden of the Five Senses.  It has been joined by several Hamamelis x intermedia cultivars that perfume the air on mild, sunny days.  As the garden slowly wakes, snowdrops and crocuses are unfurling as well. 

Hamamelis vernalis 'Amethyst' in late February

Hamamelis x intermedia 'Jelena' is one of the best of the spring witchhazels. Hamamelis x intermedia is a hybrid between the Chinese H. mollis and the Japanese H. japonica. It has great hybrid vigor and selections are available in colors ranging from yellow to orange, maroon, near red and cream.

Hamamelis x intermedia 'Pallida' along the entry walk with the Visitor's Center in the background.

With all the snow falling to our south, February has been mostly clear and seasonably cold so far here in mid-coast Maine.  The lack of snow has allowed work in the Harold and Bibby Alfond Children’s Garden to proceed apace.  Jason and his crew from Jorgensen Landscapes have finished the greenhouse wall, Lee has laid most of the pavers, and Mark Becker and company are making great progress on the Activity Shelter.  With every week that goes by, the garden looks more and more amazing.  The stone wall in the greenhouse is just beautiful and the interior of the activity shelter, with its tongue and grove cedar roof and columns that appear to rise out of ledge that spills into the center of the structure is simply stunning.  Now that Greg Lowenberg has joined the staff as Education Director, interpretation and educational programming is really beginning to take shape.  We had a very good meeting with former Penobscot chief Barry Dana regarding the construction of the Wabenaki encampment in the backwoods area.  Barry is a skilled artisan who makes everything from small baskets to wigwams and canoes out of birch bark, cedar and saplings.  We are hoping that he will help us plan and construct the encampment later this spring.  Plans are also well underway for superlative opening day and opening weekend festivities on July 8-11^th.  More details to come soon on that. Bill Cullina

We’ll select our 12 favorite images and post them in an image gallery here at MaineGardens.org, and maybe you’ll even see your photo in an upcoming issue of The Botanical Thymes.

To participate you must become a fan of the Gardens on Facebook. Once you become a fan, you’ll need to post your favorite images before February 15. We’ll notify our 12 favorites and deal with all the techie stuff one-on-one (file size, resolution, etc.)

The fan submitting our favorite photo will receive a one-year Family Membership to the Gardens (a $75 value). Second prize is a $25 Gift Card to use for admission, gift shop or cafe purchases, Third prize is a guest pass ($10 value) to keep or give away. The deadline is February 15, so don’t delay! – Margaret Hoffman

Gardens Volunteer Coordinator Amanda Russell and Emily Ellingson, Environmental Educator,  prepared instructions, as well as all the materials, including fresh flowers, vases, ribbons for bows, and the makings for attractive hand-made cards.  Special thanks to volunteer Carolynn Dolbear, who helped make this day special by baking lemon pound cake for our snack. Participants were Mary Chase, Joan Vargas, Mary Neal and Rochelle Runge. – Margaret Hoffman

Unlike the flowers of the common witchhazel, which are nearly always yellow in color, Ozark witchhazel blossoms range from maroon and orange to gold and pale yellow.  I was skeptical when I read of a plant called ‘Amethyst,’ however, as this is a real color departure for the species.  Now that it is bloom, I have to say that it lives up to its name.  The color is a beautiful amethyst purple with no hint of the red or orange found in other “purple” witchhazel cultivars.  There is a cultivar called ‘Washington Park’ that is pinkish purple, but that is as close as I have found.  ‘Amethyst’ is quite remarkable, really.  In doing some background research for this post I found out that the plant was raised from seed around 1980 by Tim Brotsman (Brotsman’s Nursery) of Ohio and named in 2003 by Don Shadow of Shadow’s Nursery in Tennessee.  Don has been responsible for recognizing a number of superior native woody plants and helping to get them in to the nursery trade.  Brotsman believes that ‘Amethyst’ is actually a H. vernalis hybrid (most likely with one of the Asian species or their hybrid).  I have suspected this to be the case with another well-known H vernalis cultivar called ‘Sandra’ which has larger flowers and richer orange fall color than a typical H vernalis.  The fall color of ‘Amethyst’ is very similar and equally striking, and the flowers are slightly larger than a typical H vernalis (but at 1 cm still within the range for the species).  Whether ‘Amethyst’ is a hybrid or just a particularly fine form of the species, it has quickly become my favorite Ozark witchhazel and certainly an excellent antidote to the winter blues.  We purchased our plants from Broken Arrow Nursery, though a few other mailorder nurseries sell it, too.  It is rather scarce in the trade, so I plan on rooting some cuttings so we can make it available here in the future.  I will also collect seeds to see if I can raise a seedling that is even closer to true blue.  The fact that that this cultivar has very little red pigment masking the blue leads me to think it is possible if I can procure some viable seed.  Ozark witchhazel is an easy plant in the garden.  Grow it in full sun to light shade and moist soils and it should be winter-hardy to zone 4.   – Bill Cullina