by Connie Oswald Stofko Plant exchanges can be a good way for beginners to get started in gardening. For experienced gardeners, plant exchanges provide a way to find good homes for their excess plants, and perhaps even find something new and unusual for their own gardens. “You tend to see a lot of the same plants, such as daylillies and black-eyed Susans,” said Peter Arnold, branch manager at the Eggertsville-Snyder Branch Library, who has organized the spring and fall plant…...
by Connie Oswald Stofko Native plants and flowers are strongly recommended for your rain garden because these plants have the greatest chance of growth and survival in Western New York. Using native plants also means low maintenance– you won’t need to water. Last week, we discussed building a rain garden and how rain gardens help keep our water clean. We showed you the rain garden at the Crane Branch Library in Buffalo, and we promised more information on plants for…...
A sale of native plants and mums is being held to benefit the Western New York Land Conservancy. You must order by Sept. 4. Pickup is from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 11 at Orchard Glen Retirement Community, 6055 Armor Duells Rd., Orchard Park. Native plants are vigorous and hardy and, once established, require no irrigation or fertilization. They provide a habitat for butterflies, insects, hummingbirds and other small birds and animals we know and need. These native…...
Rosa Dream Come True Adventures in Organic Gardening By Laura Sileo-Lepkyj I generally practice a survival-of-the-fittest approach to gardening, but I admit to pampering my roses a bit. I figure they deserve it for the joy they bring me. Few other flowers make me literally tear up from their beauty. I planted my roses last spring. I have mostly English roses because I love the heavy fragrance and voluptuously full blossoms. The exceptions are my Grandiflora “Dream Come True” and…...
by Connie Oswald Stofko The gardens of Lois Weinstein, master gardener, were among those displayed Saturday, July 17, in the first Amherst Garden Walk. Weinstein initiated the walk because while Eggertsville, Snyder and Williamsville are represented on garden walks, the rest of the Town of Amherst had no garden walk. Her husband, Barry, who is town supervisor, encouraged the idea–as long as it didn’t cost the town any money. (It didn’t.) There were 32 houses on the garden walk. Lois’s…...
by Connie Oswald Stofko Suzanne and Bob Wiepert built their “backyard oasis” by doing a little bit each year, starting in 2006. This year their gardens at 9525 Melinda won first place in Clarence Hollow in Bloom, a garden walk held Saturday, July 17 by the Clarence Garden Club. The Wieperts bought the house for its large backyard, just under an acre, which had big trees and boulders. From there, they built separate gardens and gave them names. At right…...
by Connie Oswald Stofko Hire professionals for the overall design of your garden, then have fun adding to it. That’s the advice of Chuck and Nancy LaChiusa, whose gardens at 140 Fernwood in Grand Island were on the Grand Island Garden Tour July 17. They gave us a preview the day before the walk. The LaChiusas started off about six years ago with an annual garden, but turned to perennials to decrease the amount of maintenance. Sculptures also play a…...
by Connie Oswald Stofko This Snyder house was once so overgrown that ivy had infiltrated through a window and was growing into the gold shag carpeting inside the house. But now the home boasts a tidy formal garden in front and lush English cottage gardens in back. The home of Craig Coyne and Gary DiNezza at 31 Darwin Dr. was part of the Snyder-CleveHill Garden View in Amherst on Sunday, July 11. Though the property had been sorely neglected (there…...
by Connie Oswald Stofko The garden of Geri and Dominic Mitro of 701 Orchard Parkway, featured on the third annual Orchard Parkway Garden Walk in Niagara Falls, expresses their gratitude to God. “After praying for three years to find our new home in 2004, we felt so blessed we wanted to glorify the Lord with our landscape,” they wrote in the garden walk brochure. LED lights are strung around the cross in the garden surrounding their front porch, which you…...
by Connie Oswald Stofko You can visit all of Cherie St. Pierre’s gardens in Eggertsville as part of the Open Gardens program of the National Garden Festival, but one is so different than the others that we had to give it an article of its own. While St. Pierre’s home and an adjoining property have traditional yards, her rental property across the street at 3887 Bailey has no grass in its front or backyard! She loves gardening, but the retired…...
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