The Plants of My Neighborhood, Or, Good Grief, Is That Another Boxwood?

Nothing much has happened in my garden since you last heard from me.  It rained a little, and my polka dot plants are looking nice, and the Japanese Maple is merrily budding away, but any photos would look just like Monday's photos.

So instead, today I'm going to talk about the plants of my neighborhood - specifically, the plants in pots and containers outside of restaurants and stores and apartment buildings.  If you think of New York City as nothing but gray, then you might be surprised by all of these plants.  However, if you live in the suburbs, it might make you sad that all of our urban plants appear to be living in captivity.

What I've noticed walking around my neighborhood the last few weeks is a lot of repetition.  For instance, there's arborvitae.

Arborvitae is an evergreen, recognizable for its flat, feathery needles.  (Forgive me if this is all too basic - I don't yet know who my audience is, and I am pretty much a gardening novice myself!)

The arborvitae in the photo below is no more.  It has ceased to be.  It's expired and gone to meet its maker.  But for some reason, it's still sitting in a pot in front of a restaurant.

There's also the holly.

And the ivy.

And the holly and the ivy.

And the yew.  (Only yew and yew alone.)

The yew needles are soft and flat, and the red berries (if any; none in this photo) are poisonous.

But there are two plants that are just everywhere in my neighborhood.  First, the boxwood.

Now, I get it.  The boxwood is evergreen; it is hardy in this region; and apparently any fool can grow it.  It looks fine whether it's groomed into a topiary or just allowed to grow in a natural shape.  Maybe next year, I'll put some boxwood into my garden.  But I just couldn't get excited about it this year.

And then there's the Dwarf Alberta Spruce.  This one is also ubiquitous.

The needles are short and sharp.

It's like a little Christmas tree in a pot.  Again, I get why it's popular.  It's cute and friendly.  It doesn't need any pruning to give it that nice pyramid shape.  But I just can't get excited about it, and so there won't be any Dwarf Alberta Spruces in my garden this year.

So what will be in my garden this year?  I think I'm going to have to leave you in suspense for a while, or I'll run out of blog posts before the plants actually arrive in the mail.

A quick note: I will sometimes be mentioning brand names in my posts.   I have not received anything free from anyone; everything in my garden is purchased at retail.  If I mention store or brand names, it is only so others can find the same thing if they want to.