We spent a lovely afternoon walking around the Hunt's place admiring all of the work that they have done over the years. A nice lunch was served from the goodies that were brought to share. Thanks to Mick and Edie for haiving us.  

See below from Mick

GARDEN DESCRIPTION: I have a lot of interesting plants and plantings on the five acres. This spring I added four new native golden azaleas, three lilac shrubs, an American hornbeam, and two American beeches, all of which are fairly small, but I've been planting here for nearly 20 years so a lot of what we have is more mature. I dug up the two new beeches on our property and moved them to the house, and they seem to be okay, so far. Of necessity I subscribe to what I call the Rough School of Landscape Design and Maintenance which means none of this is refined and highly groomed, as a Japanese garden might be. However, I usually plant symmetrically and
on “lines of force.” Our land was a badly neglected horse pasture overrun with noxious and often invasive plants when we bought it and it’s still a constant battle to keep those things in check. Much of the property is open grass, and I usually only plant around the borders and the house. We also have a vegetable garden in which I specialize in sweet corn and Edie in greens, but this summer we are putting much of it into cover—oats and hairy vetch.
 

I tend to install mass plantings of a variety of material, do little pruning, and I mulch heavily to reduce weed growth. As time allows I collect native plants from the wild. One bed contains hydrangeas of different kinds, witchhazels, Ensata (Japanese water) irises and dwarf crested iris, a row of dwarf rhododendrons, and a rare species of goldenrod. I even planted some native ramps in there. Oh, and the several Calycanthus and twin pendulous spruces. Then ferns, and the volunteer golden ragworts that threaten to take over on the ground level. The border for the bed is of golden quartzite rocks and boulders we gathered from the property. They make a nice water feature when it rains as I have no roof gutter there and the rain drips on the rocks.
 

Some other plants: actual hazel nut trees. A west coast person will likely know them as filberts. I have a couple dozen of those. Also we have trout lilies, 10 western hemlocks-rare in the eastern US, and they are always beautiful. Recently I put in a Chinese hemlock. I’ve got about a dozen very large forsythias-like 10 or more feet tall, and even wider-some of them. There’s pear trees, a hybrid volunteer chestnut, blueberries, paw-paws, ginseng, a huge mulberry tree, and so on. I’m hoping something will be in bloom when you come! -Mick

Click on the first photo to enjoy the slide show of full-sized photos!