Monthly Archives: July 2018

GardenWalk Cleveland 2018: A Recap

PERTINENT, POPULAR INTEREST, PRACTICE

by Elsa Johnson

It has long been said that Cleveland is a city of neighborhoods. There is the Eastside / Westside dichotomy that splits Cleveland into slightly dysfunctional fraternal twins, each with its own perhaps not-so-accurate image, and then there are the pockets within – little villages, so to speak, that once were based on a specific ethnicity (like Little Italy) and have their own unique flavors.  Showcasing this is one of the things that Garden Walk Cleveland does so well.

Last year Gardenopolis Cleveland visited North Collinwood, and discovered that the up-close ambience of these eastside neighborhoods close to the lake is a Year-Round-Summer-Cottage flavor. The year before that we visited West Park, the neighborhoods on the eastern perimeter of the Rocky River Gorge. This year the decision to split the Walk into two days with the gardens split one-day-only among them allowed us to take in more. On the first day we visited the Detroit Shoreway / Gordon Square Neighborhood, and on the second we visited little Italy, new to this do-it-yourself-tour this year. We hoped to visit Slavic Village also, but alas, dear readers, we are not as sprightly as we used to be, and after Little Italy we went home and took a nap.

In the Detroit Shoreway neighborhood the character of the streets can change block by block. Here is a street with modest single family homes on modest lots, but two blocks away, west of 65th street, the houses are more substantial and were intended to be more impressive. All of this is clustered around the Gordon Square Arts District, which has long been anchored by Cleveland Public Theater. The highlights here included a backyard bar designed for serious partying, a miniature backyard railroad set (that did not photograph well), a picturesque garage that once housed the vehicles of the on-site mortuary, now decorated with murals, a professionally designed backyard with a little hill for grandchildren to roll down, chickens and chicken coops, the occasional charming picket fence, various yard art, arbors inviting one to sit down under dappled light and shade, and a community orchard. We like the idea of a community orchard. Despite its proximity to the Gordon Square entertainment and commercial hub, this neighborhood feels suburban (city style, not country style).

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This was in high contrast to Little Italy, which definitely possesses a more urban vibe and density – and long has, tho even more so with the University Circle development engine only a railroad track away. There is new residential and commercial construction taking place in Little Italy, too, in several locations, and property values, we were told, are skyrocketing. This provides interesting contrasts. One finds serious vegetable gardens (and fig trees) in long deep lots contrasting with lots so small and tight that anything that grows must be grown in a pot (or many, many, many pots). One can find a front yard patio graced by tables topped by bright red umbrellas, in front of a house on which the vertical pillars have daringly been painted to match: eye-catching and fun. Among all this one finds a few seriously contemporary minimalist buildings with seriously contemporary minimalist landscaping. One ingenious example of thoughtful sharing of space that stood out was a new structure side by side with an older structure, with the outdoor space designed with a shared garden and the sitting area for the older structure incorporated into the new architecture at the ground level, with a porch for the  contemporary structure above. Sounds confusing but it was brilliant (as long as everyone gets along).

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Most gardens on Garden Walk are not professionally designed — and that is one of the pleasures; to see at an intimate scale the quirky personality and flavor of individual gardeners. As always, we enjoyed the opportunity to see the life of these communities at a personal, individual scale.

More pictures! From Lois Rose

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Food Forest Surprises—Mainly Good

PERTINENT, POLLINATION, POPULAR INTEREST, PRACTICE

by Tom Gibson

This strange spring–just above freezing for much of April and early May and then, wham!, summer—has my back yard food forest proliferating in unexpected ways.

The big burst has been berries. Service berries, spice berries, currants, black raspberries, elderberries are almost doubling their output. I speculate that the cool-but-above-freezing weather kept early flowers at their pollen producing peak far longer than usual. The most delicate are definitely the very early spice berry blooms, which typically get frozen dead almost immediately upon opening by the next day’s cold snap.

These green berries will turn red in the fall and are great and-all-spicey cooked with apples.

Another surprise has been my pawpaws. As longtime readers of Gardenopolis Cleveland may remember, I have had to hand-pollinate the flowers to get fruit production. The pawpaw co-evolved, not with the non-native honey bee or even the native bumblebee, but with blow flies and other insects who are attracted to blooms offering the gentle smell of poop. Thus the need to get out my little water color brush and agitate pawpaw blossoms like a nectar-hungry blow fly.

But this spring’s long cool and sudden warm caught me too busy to respond. I was able to give my water color brush only a few outings.  I was resigned to a lackluster harvest.  And I was especially resigned to getting no harvest from branches any higher than 8 feet.  I just could not bring myself to haul out a ladder—even with the above-average number of purple blooms—and go into the treetops agitating pistils and stamens with my brush.

Then the surprise: fruit that formed where it has never formed before, high up in the trees.

I can only speculate that the number of blooms reached a critical mass producing enough scent to attract blow flies.

But that leaves a question:  How will I harvest them? Pawpaw harvest is almost as labor-intensive as pollination and why pawpaw production is best suited to the obsessive home gardener. Typically, I squeeze each fruit to see whether it is soft enough to ripen on its own inside on a window sill (thus avoiding competition from possums and other critters).  Now I’ll have to wait until they fall.

This spring also brought an ugly surprise: the predations of the four-lined plant bug (Poecilocapus lineatus). They usually spend a short time in my garden, sucking chlorophyll, and leaving brown spots.  But then they disappear.  I typically ignore them and the plants resume their green growth.

Not this year.  They’re all over, as evidence by brown spots wherever I look, and seem to be staying longer than ever.

I’m regretting not trying to remove them early on with organic soap.

I’m tempted to trim off the brown-speckled leaves, but am resisting that impulse for fruit-bearing plants. As shriveled and ugly as the leaves appear, they still seem to be doing their main job of producing sugars that give the plant enough strength to produce fruit.  See this goji berry flower and its ragged leaves.

If I cut the leaves, I’ll eliminate the fruit!

Any similar garden experiences you have had, dear readers, with our unusual spring?

This weekend! GardenWalk Cleveland 2018

PASSION, PERTINENT, POPULAR INTEREST, PRACTICE

by Ann McCulloh

A FREE self-guided tour of Gardens in Cleveland, Ohio, July 7-8, 2018. Some new features (see below) and some favorites, too. Check it out at gardenwalkcleveland.org.

GardenWalk Cleveland has been a (nearly) annual tradition in Cleveland since 2010, when the founders of this free, self-guided celebration of this city’s neighborhoods and gardens were inspired by their experiences of the GardenWalk in Buffalo New York. After seeing the way GardenWalk Buffalo revitalized perceptions of that city from cold, drab and depressed, to vibrant and blooming, Jan Kious and Bobbi Reichtel initiated an all-volunteer effort to bring that same vitality and spirit of neighborliness to Cleveland.

GardenWalk Cleveland is an invitation to walk the city’s neighborhoods and glimpse literally hundreds of unique hidden worlds. Every gardener has a vision of their ideal place, created in partnership with art and nature. Most people love to share their proud successes, but also welcome the chance to discuss their hopes and letdowns with sympathetic fellow gardeners.

All of us co-editors at Gardenopolis.com are eager to fan out and swarm the extraordinary and quirky gardens of five neighborhoods this year. My tour last year included stunning water gardens and daylilies in West Park, and intimate, mysterious lakeside hideaways in North Collinwood.  I’m looking forward to touring (and photographing) in Slavic Village, Detroit Shoreway and Little Italy this year.

This year’s Garden Walk Cleveland continues the tradition of a free, self-guided tour of selected, and possibly unfamiliar neighborhoods around the city. There are also a couple of changes, just to keep things interesting!

  1. LITTLE ITALY is the new neighborhood on the tour. Cleveland’s distinct and varied neighborhoods are some of it’s proudest features. Little Italy has a European character, with many restaurant patios and pocket gardens on display.
  2. SPLIT SCHEDULE! Gardens in West Park and Detroit Shoreway will be open for touring on Saturday July 7 from 10-5pm ONE DAY ONLY.The gardens of Little Italy, North Collinwood and Broadway Slavic Village will be open on Sunday July 8 from 10-5pm FOR ONE DAY only.
  3. REFRESHMENT STATIONS for picking up map guides, raffle tickets, etc. will be at selected gardens (three in each neighborhood), where you can also get snacks and beverages. Refreshment stations are indicated in the guide with red dots, and by a colorful banner in front of the garden.
  4. The raffle prize is a collection of garden items and gift certificates worth over $600. Tickets are one for $5, five for $20, and available at refreshment stations.

You can find the interactive garden guide and lots more information online at gardenwalkcleveland.org (click on the “Guide” button at the top of the page) or pick up your free map of the garden locations at Dave’s Supermarkets around Cleveland.

Take advantage of this open invitation to explore Cleveland’s colorful gardens and unique places – you’ll be amazed and inspired by the creativity and originality of your neighbors and fellow gardeners.