Visitors 2021

Welcome to our gardens! This year we have experienced such an influx of beautiful visitors to our flowers. We enjoy them everyday and we love to share them with as many people as possible. These are some of the beautiful creatures finding oasis in our organic gardens this year:


Hemaris is a genus of sphinx moths in the subfamily Macroglossinae, which is native to the Holarctic. Our first hummingbird moth of the season!

  

Everywhere we look, butterflies and bees! 

The bees almost disappear in the pollen of the pumpkin flowers! We will continue to upload our favorites as time goes on! :) 

WELCOME TO OUR GARDENS!

 

VISITORS, POLLINATORS and the OTHERS!

Our gardens are 'abuzz' every morning in the Spring,

 Summer, and early Fall.

You can hear the many visitors at work and we love to get them in photos. Here are some of our visitors. The videos of the hummingbirds are few because well... their wings move 10 to 15 times a SECOND and they are FAST!!! We usually get them at the feeder where they are 'at rest' getting a sip! In the early Spring, they chase each other out of the feeders often. Wait for it... hehe!

                        Pro tip: You may have to double click the videos! :) 

                                 

                  'The Bee Assist' Do bees help flowers open?                                                    They do! (Apparently!) 

 The bees are so interesting. They are incredibly talented and to say we are bragging about our bees would be true! We are bragging! We love the visitors and we have many! Bees, butterflies, beneficial wasps, birds, and the 'others' are one of the vital reasons we grow. We are so happy to be able to share our joy with you. 

Not as clear as we would like but we love this photo because of the light from the throat of the Morning Glory shining off his fur. Like he is at the theater enjoying the show! The best seat in the house! 

This guy!!! Woodpeckers get thirsty too! 

There is a joke in here about a bee seeing his shadow and running scared into the hole but we haven't found it yet. Haha! To err on the side of caution we are just calling it, 6 more weeks of Spring! 

He comes out of the aging flower and grabs the bottom of the petal with his leg to change direction! Watch the video!

This little peeper had an injury. He was there for the mosquitoes. 

Our pal, 'Anthony Hopkins',  did a good job and fared well all season! :) 

So many beauties! 

A butterfly on a Butterfly Bush! What are the chances??? This beauty is a Monarch! 

We will post more throughout the growing Seasons of New York in 2021! 

We hope you find many visitors in your gardens this year! 

(Just going to leave this right here:
 We love when people share our photos but please know they are protected. Unfortunately, people are using them to sell fake seeds. :'( If you do this, we will be coming to call. Please do not do that. Use them to bring other people joy! Its the best use of any photo!)

 

Our Silly Terminology

We will add and alphabetize these as our blog grows. Terminology in our gardens takes on a life of its own. We hope you enjoy this as much as we do. 

• Franken Flower: Any flower that did not grow as expected for many reasons. Specifically, in our blog, it refers to openly pollinated morning glories that grew different than the parent plant in a beautiful way. 
• Gray Tray: The Gray Tray is an invisible place in the unknown universe where we 'toss' 'unspeakables' in our garden. These are questions that can be answered a multitude of ways and justified by the answering body.  Example: "Bob grew a seed and sold it to Mary. The seed grew as a different plant than Bob grew. Mary claimed the seed she purchased from Bob as her own because grew in her garden. Did Bob also name this plant something? Should Bob be the governing body of this namesake? Should Mary? I don't know, toss it in the Gray Tray!"
• Seed to Seed: This blog will show growth of our plants that start as a seed and end as a seed. 
• Visitors: Bees, butterflies, wasps, hummingbirds, beetles, moths, lady bugs, spider mites, garden spiders, caterpillars, and any other creatures who find a home in our gardens for the growing season. 
• 
  

The Joys Of Open Pollination

CAN WE SPEAK ABOUT THE JOYS OF OPEN POLLINATION?

There are these people who hide their beautiful Morning Glory plants indoors and pollinate them by hand to obtain the most pure specimen of seed. Yet, even when this is done, and it's not done often, there is no guarantee that this plant is going to be true to seed for the next generation. 

In fact, Morning Glory, especially the most beautiful, Ipomoea Nil, mix freely among themselves in many ways including; wind, birds, bees, butterflies, wasps, and all kinds of ways we never thought of. Surely, you can hide your beautiful glories indoors and try to grow them without mixing but the MOMENT someone grows them outdoors, there is a valid chance they will share genetics with other glories. 

Some people take steps to avoid crossing by planting a half mile apart but it only takes one bee with a mission or a neighbor planting too close or a wild glory popping up and tada, mission not accomplished. 

In fact, most growers, both professionals and private, grow outdoors and the mixing of genetics has become the standard, not the exception. 

What does this mean? It means that you can purchase a seed today from a photo of a Morning Glory, grown by the most careful of growers and you may still get a 'Franken Flower', as we love to call them. The good news is, 'Franken Flowers', at least in the Morning Glory selection, are some of the most beautiful flowers in the world!!

The flower above is from our gardens in 2020. We purchased it as a completely different Morning Glory seed from a grower who also openly pollinates. THIS is one example of how tremendously beautiful Morning Glories mix. You never know what you will get. Maybe it will be like the parent plant and maybe not but the chances of it sharing the same DNA structure is almost impossible, in most cases. 

To love Morning Glory is to embrace the beauty and power of the openly pollinated world. We are showing you the parent seed. To expect an exact replica from our plant would be an expectation that is unrealistic. 

Our 'Seed-To-Seed' platform has many purposes. It is to share our growing joy, show the condition of our parent plants for prospective buyers, and teach about the joys of open pollination. 

We hope you will enjoy this wonderful adventure with us. Open pollination of Morning Glory is the standard across the board in growing them. When we say we have never met an Ipomoea we do not love, we mean it! Ipomoea NEVER disappoints! 

 

And So It Begins...

                      AND SO IT BEGINS!

 

    The first post! How exciting! This dish is of joy is filled 152 Varieties of hard to find and rare varieties of Ipomoea Nil, new variations and colors of poppy, some well-loved natives, different variations of Columbine and a few other biennials. This day marks the beginning of our adventure and we hope you will reach into this bowl of joy and find a seed that you are excited to grow. 

    As we begin our germination process this week, each seed will be given its own page that will share its journey from seed to seed.  We hope that you will join in our greatest adventure and give us feedback. We only seek to do better. All feedback is greatly appreciated! In the spirit of another super season, so begins our journey of openly pollinated seeds of joy, that always have a surprise inside.