As we gear up for a busy spring in the gardens, I hear lots of people wondering about Lyme Disease protection, and how to best repel ticks, naturally or otherwise. Ticks are out and biting now. This handsome fella had two ticks just on his head a couple days ago. In the duration of time [...]
I've been asked to give a presentation on butterfly habitat gardening tonight at the 2013 Albany Capital District Garden and Flower Show, and I'll be here at the Jessecology booth all weekend, promoting ecological landscape design.
This week I completed installation of a habitat garden in Clifton Park using native plants. Like many gardens in the capital region, adding native plants gives an immediate and noticeable influx of wildlife motion. This property has a forest edge and natural wetland habitat within a half a mile. Butterflies and songbirds are nearby and [...]
This spring I began native plant garden designs and installation at a property in Burnt Hills that quickly gained the nickname, "the bluebird house," for all of its bluebird visitors. This is an endangered species of Coneflower called Echinacea tenesesis. It's endangered because it's rare, not because it's hard to grow. There is a lot [...]
This work week continued in a Clifton Park property that's added extensive habitat garden space over the summer. Many native plants for butterflies have been introduced, especially in this featured photo, which will one day be referred to by neighborhood children as, "Butterfly Land." Here we see the quintessential Monarch habitat plant: Swamp Milkweed or [...]
It was delightful to visit a home in Clifton Park this week where I'd designed and planted a habitat garden two months ago. The above photo shows Filipendula rubra in bloom, and the photo below shows the same plant at installation time. The home owners have done a stellar job of keeping their new habitat [...]
This week I installed a habitat garden design in Queensbury, NY. The project was especially exciting because of the property's proximity to wetland habitat. In every direction around the home in fact, there are wetlands, and 3/4 of the photos used for our wetland habitat post were from within one mile of our ecological garden [...]
The Glens Falls Business Journal printed a story about Jessecology in their current issue! It's their special environmental edition, they did a swell job of explaining the ecological advantages of native plant gardening and design. Thanks so much everyone!
This week I got to work on my favorite type of project of all time: developing a habitat garden for butterflies and birds in Clifton Park NY, using native plants. This home is located near a tremendous amount of wetland habitat already, and creating an ecological garden in this proximity just makes it sparkle all [...]
People suggest I show "before" and "after" pictures of gardens I'm designing; it's much easier to think of photographing in the aftermath of lots of change. At the outset of any project, there's usually too much concentration and set-up to remember a "before" photo. Today in Clifton Park, NY I was sculpting an edible garden [...]
This past week I finally had a chance to do something I've meant to for weeks: visit the Saratoga DEC Tree Nursery. I drive by it on Route 50 all the time on my way to garden design projects in the Saratoga and capital district. I've been more than curious: I've read about some of [...]
In my home container garden, I had planted some potatoes that grew as sprouts in my cupboard. After planting the white, etiolated potato sprouts a couple weeks ago, I mentioned them in a blogpost. As you can see in the photos, a couple weeks of sunshine makes a world of difference. Now I have enough [...]