Author: Trish Murphy

Artist: botanical, still life, and natural history illustration.
Garden designer: native plants and naturalistic gardens

New Availability List & Pausing Deliveries

Tall Sunflower at Beaux Arbres

I have a new Availability List to download. The demand for native plants has been so great this spring, that many, many species are temporarily out of stock. For many species, plants seeded this year will soon start to be available. However, some of the slower growing woodland plants are not available until next year.… Continue reading New Availability List & Pausing Deliveries

May 8th – Trailer is Full

Although I had said that the cut-off for putting in orders for Saturday, May 8th, would noon on Friday, the response has been so great (Thank You, Customers!) that our trailer has no more space. We we be bringing plants into Ottawa again, for Saturday May 22 and possibly before.

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Categorized as Nursery

May I Introduce: Water Plantain

It is extra-ordinarily difficult to capture in a photo the charm of Water Plantain (Alisma trivale). The small, white, three-petalled flowers are widely spaced on a tall but insubstantial inflorescence, which, in a photo, is mostly just not there. In life, however, the transparent scrim of little stalks and buds and flowers, held high above… Continue reading May I Introduce: Water Plantain

May I Introduce: Sticky False Asphodel

Sticky False Asphode.

This charming little wildflower deserves to be much better known and more often cultivated. Grassy foliage, glossy and attractive, grows about 20 cm tall and spreads by rhizomes to fill in an area. In mid summer, the flower stalks rise above the foliage. The initially pink buds open to white flowers. After flowering, the vivid… Continue reading May I Introduce: Sticky False Asphodel

May I Introduce: Fringed Sage

Fringed Sage

Soft, silvery, foliage is a desirable decorative feature in gardens. To augment the bright silver of native Pearly Everlasting and subtle silvery-grey of Parlin’s (Plantain-leaved) Pussytoes, I now offer the silky silver of Fringed Sage. It is much more hardy than the popular but notoriously finicky and short-lived Silver Mound, the standard garden centre offering.… Continue reading May I Introduce: Fringed Sage

May I Introduce: Ditch Stonecrop

Seed capsules of Ditch Stonecrop

This is an oddity for sure. A lanky plant, 30 to 60 cm tall, with undistinguished leaves and small cream or pale green flowers, it is an unlikely candidate for inclusion in our gardens. Ditch Stonecrop’s only ornamental asset is its colourful seedpods. In late summer, the capsules turn pink — grown in sufficient sun,… Continue reading May I Introduce: Ditch Stonecrop

Blooms for Early Spring

Hooked-spur or Early Violet (Viola adunca) in the Rock Garden at Beaux Arbres.

The very first flower at Beaux Arbres is almost always a little non-native rock garden Iris, Iris reticulata. Although I discourage the use of many of the little bulbs from the garden centre, because they readily leap from garden to woodlands, I have never seen nor read of any problem with the little Irises. At… Continue reading Blooms for Early Spring

New for 2021: Goldthread

Goldthread

The very glossy, evergreen leaves of low-growing Goldthread (Coptis trifolia) are most attractive, but before you start thinking this may be the ideal shade-loving ground cover for your shady garden, be aware that this little cutie demands a cool, acidic organic soil, and is not suited for warm urban conditions. It grows in damp moss… Continue reading New for 2021: Goldthread

New for 2021: Starflower

KONICA MINOLTA DIGITAL CAMERA

The tiny white seeds of Starflower (Trientalis borealis) are easy enough to collect but I did not have great success germinating them. So I have only a handful of plant available for Spring 2021. I have no idea how popular this quiet but charming little woodlander will be. I can imagine folks who love the… Continue reading New for 2021: Starflower