About four years ago, we felt we needed to find a sport which we could do relatively easily now as well as forty years from now. After much searching we settled on purchasing flat water kayaks, since we have a lot of lakes, streams and rivers where we live here in Northeast Pa.

Today, was the first opportunity this year, we had to get our boats wet in a local reservoir. Recently the Corp of Engineers have decided to raise the water level in the lake by about 50' which would allow releases during the summer for whitewater enthusiasts down stream, while still maintaining a large reservoir which could manage flood flows.

We had never paddled the lake when it was at this level. Two pristine world class trout streams/rivers feed this lake. Paddling up one of the rivers we soon realized that raising the water level added about 3 miles, one way, to our paddle. We have always paddled up the streams until we hit whitewater and then turned around and paddled back to the put in.

Well, today as we paddled away from the shore, I asked Cheryl, "What do you think we are going to see today?" Every time we paddle, we have the ability to interact with nature on a up close and personal scale. However, today was special. We could tell we were coming up to the end of the river where we would be able to paddle, when we saw signs on the trees along the river cautioning to stay in the river and do not disturb the wildlife area.

And then it hit us, this is where the Bald Eagles are nesting on this river and sure enough there was a large male perched on the tree about 200' in front of us. We pulled over to the side of the river and sat and exchanged glances with the Bald Eagle. He dipped into the river and sat in the reeds, I can only guess while he enjoyed his fresh catch. We saw him majestically take off and circle up to the tree tops and disappear.

As we paddled and sliced our way up the river on the far side of the sand bar.......there it was about ten feet below the top of the 70' White Pine. A nest the size of a Volkswagen and a couple of Bald Eagles sitting in the nest. We thought we had seen eaglets flying overhead and I guess they use the nest as a base of operations.

Still glancing back at the nest I was now hugging the side of the river as it narrowed to a stream and right there, ten feet in front of me on the marshy edge of the stream was a gorgeous heron. I backpaddled to the other side of the stream and watched as the heron meticulously crept up the side of the stream looking for his lunch.

As we paddled upstream as far as we could go, our last interaction of the day was with a mother Cormorant and about 6 little, well I don't know what you call them but duckling size Cormorants...We took a break on a large boulder in the middle of the stream with our kayaks safely tucked on shore. The water cool and gin clear felt good, as we dangled our legs in the water.

As we slipped into our kayaks for the 1.5 hour paddle back to our car, we floated by the still stalking heron and nest of eagles which had a truly birds-eye-view in an environment free from any sounds other than the water flowing over the rocks and through the reeds, the sound of water dripping from the end of our paddles with each stroke and the warm sunny on our bodies.

Now, you may say, Hey! What does this have to do with gardening? For me, it is when we truly engage and experience nature in it's most natural setting that I get inspired to create gardens, ponds and waterfalls for our clients. Although these ornamental gardens may not be inhabited by Bald Eagles and Herons and we cannot kayak the water features, they will support Hummingbirds, Koi, frog, salamanders, tadpoles and Downy Woodpeckers.....close enough for me when I can't go out paddling!

This photograph was taken in a 4200 sq. ft. perennial garden on one of the estates, for which we provide landscape management.

After my meeting with Hoichi, I have begun to look at our gardens in a different light. He is right, we Americans are more involved with now, bigger, better and faster and infrequently wonder how the gardens we love, developed. Our clients want to see the gardens now when we install them, when in fact, true American style gardens take 30-50 years to begin to show their true colors.

This particular section of the gardens we work in was begun in 193o and was originally a vegetable garden. The owners of the estate at the time, brought in teams of horses and handlers to remove the rocky soil to a depth of 2' in this part of the three acre property and replace it with loose, rich friable soil. There are no pictures of the garden at that time, however, local history tells us that the area was heavily logged at that point in time.

Now in 2007, the garden is surrounded by 70 foot tall, towering Norway Spruces which must have been planted about the time the garden was started. These towering Spruces offer protection from both the drying summer winds and the intense winter winds, while providing shade for the garden about 30% of the time during the day as the sun traverses the sky. Ideal growing conditions for the resident perennials such as Butterfly Weed(Asclepias), several varieties of Poppy(Papaver)Knockout Roses, Butterfly Bushes(Buddelia), towering Dephiniums, Sedum, Sea Holly(Eryngium), Mountian Bluet, pictured here(Centaurea), Black-eyed Susan(Rudbeckia), Iris, Anemone, Yarrow(Achillea), Stella D'oro Daylily(Hemerocallis), Climbing Hydrangea(Hydrangea petiolaris), Clematis, Baby's Breath(Gypsophila), tree and shrub form Peonies, Mt. Pinks(Phlox subulata) and wild Foxglove(Digitalis)

I love to work in this perennial garden as the color, fragrances and textures change each and every week. In fact, when my sister passed away two years ago, upon my return from Denver, I worked in this garden for about a week straight. The owner does not visit much in the fall and with the sound of the adjacent dam and creek filling the air with the soothing sound of rushing water, I had time to reflect on both my sister's life and mine.

Gardens truly have the power to heal both the body and the soul.

I can't believe it has been since February when I last posted. We have been extremely busy with garden construction this spring and 12" of snow in late April did not help our already packed schedule.

Our podcasts have been doing very well in itunes(TM) and that has kept us busy producing these biweekly episodes. We are in the progress of upgrading to a Macbook Pro so we can produce both audio and video podcasts....with maybe a little background music and the ease of transferring our digital interviews to our podcasts. If you do not have itunes you can download directlty through this link.

This past weekend we were able to tour the outstanding Anderson's Japanese Gardens in Rockford, Illinois and have a couple of great conversations with Hoichi Kurisu who designed and built the gardens for Mr and Mrs. Anderson.

This garden has evolved from 1978 to it's current 12 acre site with the completion of an outstanding visitors center which includes a corporate meeting facility, year 'round restaurant, extensive gift shop, volunteers break and education room all of which is enveloped in this beautiful work of Japanese architecture.

Our upcoming podcasts will include our extensive conversations with Hoichi Kurisu who designed and built the garden and Tim Gruner who has been the Horticultural Manager for 18 years.

Cheryl and I left the garden both inspired and humbled by the mastery of Hoichi and his crew in the development of this garden.

Well, we have decided to take our blogging journal one step further. In the winter, is when I usually upgrade our software so I have the time to learn any new add-ons to the software. Last fall we finally purchased ipods(TM) so we would have exactly the right music we needed when we were on the elliptical.

This lead to our discovery of itunes(TM) and ultimately podcasts and podcasting and the unlimited potential of how this could be applied in gardening. So, after a lot of research and a learning curve, we started to podcast and now you can access our podcasts in two different ways.

You can access our podcasts on itunes(TM) at http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?id=215207014
or at http://www.gardenhaus.libsyn.com/rss our goal is to provide horticultural news, education and entertainment through stories and humor.......

We are excited where these podcasts will lead and the many applications they have for the gardening industry.......so subscribe to our podcast and every two weeks we can take a stroll down the garden path.