Category Archives: Garden writers

A Green Industry Summit Council

January 16, 2012 By in Garden writers, Horticultural Association, John Bartram is at home., Landscape Design, Nursery, Sustainability Leave a comment

“Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap, but by the seeds that you plant.”
Robert Louis Stevenson

“A plague [on all] your houses!”    with apologies to Mercutio from Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet Act 3, scene 1

My amanuensis has sent field notes back to me of a meeting of leaders in this botanical industry.  The gathering of minds had an intent to define a way through the shoals of troubled water in which we swim.  There were sharp minds at council tables. 

Two statements of purpose were attached to the gathering of horticultural tribes:

1.  Provide a venue for leaders of the industry’s organizations and associations to share insights regarding the future of the industry and the opportunities and challenges that are likely to emerge as they work to support their members and constituents.

2.  Initiate the first phase of an ongoing dialogue among these leaders to support their efforts to address and capitalize on these opportunities as they explore [what?] they may mean for the future of their organizations.

National Green Center Summit for Industry Leadership

The foolscap newsprint was a image from my youth. These elephant folio sized sheets were the same that Ben Franklin would have used in his print shop.

This was a very heady agenda.  A lot of work was initiated by the brief confederation of horticultural colonies.  It was the first trumpet call to become a United Nation of Green. 

Unlike the First and Second Continental Congresses, there were women present at the heart of this discussion.  Wisdom AND beauty.  Age and the enthusiasm of youth.  Brilliance of mind and those still dazed by the glare from the noonday sun.  And there were writers of well-turned phrases.

National Green Center

Sarah Woody Bibens was in a leadership capacity as Executive Director of the Western Landscape and Nursery Association

The reporter on site took special note of the ease with which the discussions were facilitated.  I greatly respect the scientific method and the processes in place to develop a group dynamic.  Dr. David Renz was the professor in charge.  His degree is recognized and promoted by the Midwest Center for Nonprofit Leadership, The Henry W. Bloch School of Management, University of Missouri, Kansas City.

National Green Center Industry Leadership Summit

The good Doctor was praised for his professional and efficient staging of the Association Summit.

In the world of my youth, we could have used such well-studied and eminently qualified professionals.  In my youth, I only had the wits with which I was born.  Now we can rest more easily on the taller shoulders of those who write better sentences…or possess more credentials…or speak with louder voices.

As in my day of Quaker Meetings, this group’s consensus was reached after strenuous exercise and posturing.  There was no argument.  There also was no vote.  The congressional leaders concurred to leave the observations in an unedited form.

Notes were taken, collected, and preserved.  I am told that those in attendance wanted to, “build on this session’s info and take it forward.”

The delegates to this congress were urged:  “DON’T WASTE THIS INPUT.”  In future, it might be brought out and viewed through a darkened lens.  But if it is not to be used immediately, how shall it not be wasted?

What proof can be drawn that this meeting occurred?  What sound does a falling tree make if unheard by a passerby?  When does a natural confederation cease to be a group of individuals and become an individual group?

This congress produced a set of Articles of Confederation.  Analysed in their pieces, they have a disparate and almost desperate need to grasp the roots and promote a horticultural revolution.  Again, Ben Franklin was there before us, “for if we don’t hang together, we shall–most assuredly–all hang separately…” 

Truer words were never spoken.  Or written.  We shall see if they are a call to action.

I Allow Others To Publish

January 8, 2012 By in Garden writers, Gardening, Horticultural Association, New Plants, Nursery 5 Comments

“If you would not be forgotten as soon as you are dead and rotten, either write things worth reading or do things worth writing”  Benjamin Franklin

I choose not to be original this week.  My amanuensis is engaged in a conference at some distance from me.  I would rather that he speaks for himself.  So, I have allowed him to post the following: 

{Submitted by Kirk R. Brown for J.B. approval.  Kansas City, Kansas.  National Green Center.}

GWA Dr. Michael Dirr John Bartram Kirk R. Brown

Dr. Dirr stirred the audience when he appeared at the National Green Center Conference and Trade Show

 

John, you must put this venue on your schedule.  It is imperative that you get to network with the “YOU” of this age.  Michael Dirr represents everything that you would subscribe to in the present world of digital communication.

He met with us at the Garden Writers’ breakfast.  His words were confrontational.  He has seen, and tried, and written, and been, and experienced everything that this industry holds in esteem.  He would be pragmatic and tell us there is no chance for success if he weren’t so passionate about his topic.

There were many of us at breakfast.  We talked a blue streak and impressed everyone with our credentials.  It was a moment of solitary elegy.  As individuals, we can shine in the roomful of self-defined authors.  I love this group!

GWA Breakfast National Green Center Kirk R. Brown

These writers gathered to be acknowledged for the wisdom they bring to the horticultural table. We had a wonderful breakfast.

 

Dr. Dirr has a horticultural glass which may be half empty, but it still brims with the sparkle of choice flowers.  His is a new world of COLOR.  It is loud and clear in his message.  He wants this world to be full of COLOR.

National Green Center Kansas City Kirk R. Brownj

Botticelli was passionate about color and light. This was every bit of his Venus and the Birth of Spring. But she said she didn't come with shells.

 

Dr. Dirr doesn’t believe that we can correct our mistakes or overcome our history of failed attempts.  He does not easily sign on to passing trends and fancies.  It was a day of revelation. 

This is the New Testament Gospel.  We need to recreate who we are.  We need to rewind the image of who we become when we dream.  And we need to change the direction of where we want to go.  He is tired of doing the same thing the same way.  His challenge is to live up to our colorful promise.

It will shortly be spring.  We need to see the light of this spring and take steps to make it different from those other springs of our youth.  The light is still there.  We just need to see it through different glasses.

In the Bleak Midwinter…

January 6, 2012 By in Garden writers, Gardening, John Bartram is at home., Landscape Design, Sustainability 2 Comments
In the Bleak Midwinter…

“In the bleak midwinter, frosty winds made moan

Earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone.”   

Christina Rossetti  1872

I welcome yet another new year.  It feels good to shed the old skin and attempt to dress with relish in the tighter-fitting garments that holiday feasting have created.  I look about my world and think of the major events that shape it.  Now is a time that reflection should transition to action.

I will tell you that a Moon Garden is one planted with specimens that bloom only in white or have foliage in grey or mottled with creamy variegation.  It is a garden to be enjoyed in the moonlight.  It is the first of my many garden rooms that I see when approaching my house in the evening.  On All Hallow’s Eve this past year, the Moon Garden, the place of my dreamy reverie, was covered with eight inches of heavy wet snow.  Everything was stressed not the least of which was the owner.  These are my children and they were suffering!

The White Garden Orefield PA 18069

The Moon Garden in a better season. The photograph was taken by a grand and glorious photographer, Karen Bussolini. She is a special friend and fellow communicator of sustainability.

Since the disappearance of that early snow and the steady decline of temperatures into our normal winter cycle, I have been impressed to see how quickly my garden has acclimated itself.  It will be restored to full vigor when it surges back into bloom next spring.  Still, because my thoughts are caught on the bare branches of deciduous trees, I wonder why nature would react so positively to such early abuse.  Why does she continue to rebound for us?
 
In this season, I am actively seeking causes of why our own non-responsive nature doesn’t rebound when confronted with the abuse we heap on the natural world surrounding us.  Do we ever notice when the world cries out for cures to many of its uncurable illnesses?  Our sicknesses range from the common cold to the end of the polar ice caps.  And I think back to those delegates in Philadelphia in the days of my youth when another cantankerous, garrulous independent named John Adams could not hold back his wrath saying, “Piddle, twiddle and resolve.  When will it be done?”

I have been too long away from Philadelphia and its more genteel society to wish any one of them ill, but this should be the season to contemplate change.  Just as John Adams was pushing for the start of a revolution, I am also inclined to encourage revolutionary action.

It is a season to review lists, pay debts, collect outstanding balances that are due, and make resolutions.  These should include attempts to redress oversights and slights, receive inconvenienced or unreconciled relatives, improve one’s personal appearance, manners, station in life, or monetary situation and above all make more time for the things that are most fulfilling.  In short, it should be a time where dreams become reality.

Many of my dreams have come to fruition.  Most often that ripeness and maturity has been at a greater cost than I ever anticipated.  The cost has been in money, lost time, friendships, and pieces of my soul.  As yet another winter is passing, I take stock of my soul and find that it has a strength which for much I my life I thought it lacked.

So it is time to move forward with renewed strength and vigor into the wilds of nature and challenge the prevailing authority with news of change.  Nature will throw off whatever blanket it finds intolerable.  When nature becomes too hot, it will rid itself of even the most clinging garments.

I am on a path of collision with those who would not seek to preserve and protect the environment.  The colors and shades of belief are fast disappearing.  The issues become black and white.  They should be as white and clear as my Moon Garden! 

White Garden John Bartram Kirk R. Brown

Narcissus bloom again in spring in the Moon Garden

Either we choose to welcome a vibrant budding spring or we shall certainly lie exposed in a permanent bleak mid winter.  My choice is to go out and see how my garden is growing!  Blessings on your house and health and prosperity to your person.