Thursday, April 8, 2010

Spring is Sprung


When it comes to gardening in Central Jersey, conventional wisdom states that there are certain plants that, given half a chance, will take over your yard, your neighbors' yards, and any nearby land.

Some of them can sometimes be controlled a little with constant pruning and applications of agent-orange-like chemicals.

Some of these plants are "invasives", plants not normally native to this area that, once introduced, may overwhelm many of the native plants. There are also native plants that are practically immortal; they can be found inexpensively in all the local nurseries or divided off from friends' plants.

Local gardeners know these plants include English ivy, forsythia, azaleas, rhododendrons, dogwoods, oaks, maples, apples, bamboo, and multiflora rose. They are guaranteed successes, no matter how brown the gardener's thumb. Sometimes they are successful even when you don't want them to be.

And then there are the common trees that always just seem to be there, populating the local woods - oaks and maples, for example.

In the decades that I have been working in my current yard I have managed to kill English ivy, forsythia, azaleas, rhododendrons, dogwoods, oaks, maples, apples, bamboo, and multiflora rose. And some really big oaks and maples.

Years ago one of my aunts kindly divided her irises when they were taking over her flowerbeds and gave me several bags full. I guess you could argue that I didn't kill them because they never even made it above ground.

But, it's April. I have just transplanted four forsythia plants from a friend's yard. Again. Hope springs eternal...
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Notice the small flower arrangement at the start of this post. The daffodils are from my yard, but I had to get the forsythia from a friend.

It just struck me that I could have put some dandelions in my arrangement.

Friday, April 2, 2010

Somerset County Summer Concerts 2010

The schedule for the upcoming Somerset County Park Commission's 2010 Summer Concert Series has been released and it looks like another winning season for fans of all types of music.

Enjoy these photographs of past concerts:

Mark your calendar. I'll post more information as the concerts, held at Duke Island Park, get closer.

Thursday, April 1, 2010

A Tale of Two Developments

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness....we had everything before us, we had nothing before us..." - Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities

This is the condensed tale of two age-restricted developments - Hearthstone at Hillsborough and Gateway at Sunnymeade, both located in Hillsborough not far from each other.

Both developments were conceived in the early part of this past decade and, as proposed, consisted of various types of dwellings: single-family, duplexes, townhouses, and condos.

Here are current pictures of Hearthstone...


..and here are current pictures of Gateway...

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This is an April Fool's Day post, but not an April Fool's Day joke.
Unfortunately.