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Craig Levy

I started in 1977 growing plants at wholesale nurseries and a wholesale seed company in California. In 1992 I started volunteering (in the nursery, of course!) at Strybing Arboretum in San Francisco where I met my wife. My wife is originally from upstate and we moved here in 2002. It took at least two years of living here for me to fully understand our property and to take advantage and work with our microclimate. Although growing zone maps show us to be in 5, we are realistically a 4b. I am inordinately proud, in a smarmy kind of way, of how many of the plants we brought with us have thrived. Coming from a zone 9 has been quite an adjustment for all of us. But we are thriving and enjoy the beauty and what the land gives us everyday. USDA Hardiness Zone: 4b/5a Location: rural; Central Leatherstocking near Cooperstown, New York Geographic type: riverine valley Soil type: Chenango alluvial - shallow clay and highly stony Experience level: 28 years professionally wholesale and retail, no longer in the business Particular interests: native plants and ecosystems, flowering and berry producing shrubs, home-grown foods, maples, birches, willows, ornamental grasses, filipendulas, iris, ligularias, persicarias, asclepias, artemisia, asters, arisaemas, hardy geraniums, euphorbias, eupatoriums, origanums, lysimachias, eryngiums, lilies, and visiting nurseries

Lucky 7

July 8, 2007

Instead of a single day of good fortune like yesterday’s auspicious 07/07/07, this has been a week of luck for one reason: rain. Although it can’t be discerned from the surrounding woods with their uncommon fullness bordering on rainforest-like lushness, this summer has been uncommonly dry. Late spring and summer started out so well it [...]

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Green-eyed but not envious

April 29, 2007

Not much is going on that isn’t the same for all gardeners: snow gone, ground drying up, warmer temps, shoveling the ground for the first time this season, planting, weeding, mulching. I’m doing it and don’t want to read about it, so how about some pictures and a bit of relevant text instead?

Here was my [...]

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Servicing my watering needs

April 23, 2007

I had a conversation with a gardening friend about watering the other day. We each have strong personalities and the talk was lively and interesting, filled with opinions and advice. When the time came for “I’ll show you mine if you show me yours” I did and I’ll share them with you too.
I have spent [...]

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Classic Garden Structures: Book Review

April 14, 2007

When I’m thinking of building a garden project, the first book I turn to for ideas and inspiration is Classic Garden Structures by Jan and Michael Gertley. I’ve read and leafed through many books on making and building objects for the garden but this one remains my favorite. Beyond their inherent usefulness, all of the [...]

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Magnolias

April 3, 2007

A strong argument for calling Magnolias Tulip Trees
I grew up with a large Southern Magnolia in a small backyard. Its great size dominated the space, smothering the ground below and adjacent plants with massive quantities of leathery leaves and sucking up all available moisture with large surface roots. I was unknowing of its survival tactics [...]

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Green Frogs

March 31, 2007

Hmm, what’s your name? If you were thinking Kermit you wouldn’t be far wrong.
Winter seems to still be with me. The nights are consistently in the low 20s and snow remnants remain on the ground. Mostly on the north sides of hills and buildings, and hiding behind large trees and objects, the white has not [...]

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Kaleidoscope Skies

February 18, 2007

Picture yourself in a boat on a river,
With tangerine trees and marmalade skies
I grew up during the Beatles era and “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” has always been a fave in my top five. From the start, there was speculation that psychedelic drugs influenced John Lennon when he wrote the dreamy, trippy imagery into [...]

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Snow Days of Winter

February 17, 2007

Not the Valentines Day love-in I was expecting, this was a storm for the record books. Under a state of emergency all day and through the night, my county was closed down and everyone was told to stay off the roads. When it was over the snow totals came in. My little, almost unknown, town [...]

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Seed info

January 9, 2007

Spring-like warmth and an absence of snow have conspired to create irresistible conditions for working outside in the garden. But not much beyond a little cleaning, mulching, and pruning can be done, as the soil is soaked and soggy and, as tempting as it is, it’s much too early to sow seeds outside. I’m channeling [...]

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Pop Quiz

November 3, 2006

I like quizzes, games, and puzzles and hope you do too. Here’s one I made up. What do the following plants have in common: hosta, allium, phlox, crocus, magnolia, geranium, fuchsia, astilbe, clematis, anemone, gladiolus, hibiscus, iris, impatiens, begonia, canna, dahlia, forsythia, zinnia, petunia, cosmos, wisteria, hydrangea, delphinium, rhododendron? Click on “more” for the answer.

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Fall Perennials

October 24, 2006

Tick-tock, winter is coming. I was greeted at dawn with a few hours of light snow this morning. It melted as it landed, not like the snows that have recently visited Watertown and plagued Buffalo. It is a warning that fall is at a close and winter is coming. I spent this past weekend digging [...]

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Last Call for Annuals

October 6, 2006

We’re in the midst of the last warm days of fall giving way to cool and colder weather. Light and medium frosts have been visiting with hard frosts soon to follow. It’s interesting to see how the plants in the garden respond to the weather. Placement and severity of frost have brought an interesting – [...]

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The Wedding Gift

September 9, 2006

Some plants are bold. They would like nothing better than to be planted in the middle of the garden, flailing their leaves, emitting impossibly sweet fragrances. Others are more secretive, more sinister, skulking in dark places and hidden ways, hoping to be overlooked by humans while they continue with their mystifying activities. And then there [...]

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