David traveled from Kansas City, Kansas in his all electric car; Nissan's 2011 Leaf. The car's range is approximately 60 miles, which means a recharge for every 60 miles traveled. I will leave it up to you, if you wish to calculate the number of recharges needed between Kansas City and Madison, Wisconsin. It's more than I would be willing to do.
David is a consummate planner. Prior to his trip, David had everything laid out in a spreadsheet. To maximize mileage between charges, David often traveled at lower speeds, sometimes as low as 25 miles an hour, but he can go faster and does. Traveling at low speeds saves energy but requires using less traveled back roads. Generally, David stays off expressways. He left for the return trip this morning at about 1 AM. David devoted yesterday afternoon to planning his trip back home with bedtime at about 5:30 PM.I will miss this adventurous and patient friend. An early morning email from David informed us that he arrived in Janesville at about 3:30 AM, traveling the back roads at about 25 miles an hour. Police officers stopped him twice to check if he was all right.
So how is David's visit related to the Prospect Gardens? The process for developing the gardens was not as intentional as David's trip planning. We started with a basic plan but without a detailed route to what now has emerged. Ours was a more organic and emergent process, as opposed to a detailed set of steps. Here are seven pictures of those results as of today and as we move from late summer into fall.
The above picture and to the right is of Sneeze Weed (Helenium Autumnale). Beautiful yellow flowers and which of course blooms in late summer. I have no idea why the common name is Sneeze Weed. I transplanted this one from my backyard garden.
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This one (to the left) is in the cone flower family. I don't know its specific name. Maybe I should look it up? Its "parents" came from Janice's rain garden. Janice is one of our neighbors.We have several rain gardens along our street, all contributing to reducing rain water runoff while adding beauty to our surroundings.
Bottle Gentian (Gentianna Andrewsii), the plant to the left, as you can see, has a soothing purple flower. I love the bloom's shape and color. This one started as seeds nearly six years ago when we first developed the garden.
Ever since that first year and at this time of the year, I look forward to seeing this beautiful graceful plant. May it continue to thrive.
These are Tall Coreopsis hanging over the shabby chic picket fence. The picket fence serves as the northern border of the gardens. These flowers were planted about five years ago. Percy donated them.
While they add late summer color, these plants can be quite aggressive. Every spring we pull many seedlings. Also to prevent them from getting too tall and toppling over more than what they already do, I gave them a haircut in June.
The Japanese Sumac, like all sumac, has already developed stags of brownish seeds. Shortly the green leaves will turn into a golden hue, adding color to gardens until late fall.
This Jack-in-the-Pulpit is having a healthy and productive summer. The waxy seed pods of compact shiny red beads will eventually break apart dropping hundreds of seeds. When the seeds are ready to break apart, I offer Mother Nature a hand by scattering the ruby red seeds. I will do this again this year and the result will be more Jack-in-the Pulpits next season.
I am now wondering how David is doing on his adventure while enjoying the quiet of this last summer holiday. Perhaps there will be another email form him this evening. Sure hope so.
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