Garden volunteers visiting from JC Raulston Arboretum

It's always great to have gardeners visiting the Garden, and this was a special group.

I hosted a group of volunteers from the JC Raulston Arboretum at NC State in Raleigh this morning, showing them as many highlights as I could fit in -- in a couple of hours --a challenge more than ever. 

The Upstate visit, orchestrated by Marian St. Clair (Garden columnist at the Greenville News and SC Master Gardener) and Beth Jimenez (of the JC Raulston volunteers) included visits to private gardens in Greenville, nursery visits in Greenville and Seneca, the visit to SCBG, and a special tour of Chuck and Betty Cruickshank's personal garden in Clemson  (Chuck shared the story of the SCBG Hosta Garden with us on site).

The Garden is alive with colors of green in spring - this has been a wonderful spring for natives and ornamentals alike. 

More trilliums than I've ever seen before were in flower, and later today, SCBG Director Patrick McMillan showed me a Silene polypetala in full flower that's just appeared in the Woodland Wildflower Garden. 

Silene polypetala flower (P. McMillan)

None of us has ever seen this plant in flower there before -- nor do we know its origin -- but some combination of good conditions has supported the flowering of this rare Georgia native in our Garden!

Monarchs & John and Carolyn Turner

Many folks don't subscribe to newspapers any more, but I've continued our subscription to the Greenville News just to have a feel for what's going on in the Upstate.

Marian St. Clair, a SC Master Gardener and SC Master Naturalist, in her regular weekly gardening column last Saturday for the Greenville News, mentioned monarchs coming through (there have been lots in the last few weeks).

But more fun, she featured our butterfly gardening friends, John and Carolyn Turner, in her piece.

For now, this is the link to the on-line version.

Planting day in the new SCBG Butterfly Garden

Who-hoo! How fabulous to have a new site, many great new plants, and more to come, with such a nice group of folks to help plant and learn about butterfly gardening.

Rosie, Linda, Jackie, and Jeff planting

Here are more images from this morning.

Gathering together

Getting ready (the Turners and Kathy Bridges, an SCBG horticulturist)

Planting with Carolyn Turner, Donna Crader, Linda Alston-Binic, and Rosie Bayer

Our butterfly gardening friends, John and Carolyn Turner, and I are SO excited with the new site for the Butterfly Garden. John Bodiford and Kathy Bridges (our horticultural staff colleagues) along with James Arnold (on grader duty for this project - thanks, James!) were totally supportive, and I know I'm just grateful and pleased.

Our Lake and Hills Garden Club friends, who underwrote our initial butterfly garden planting (thanks so very much), turned out too, represented by club president Rosie Bayer and butterfly-garden liaison Linda Alston-Binic.

We had a monarch-tagging as a dedication. Photos to come.