Saugus Gardens in the Fall: Here’s what’s blooming in town this week to make your walks more enjoyable

By Laura Eisener

Veterans Day is tomorrow, and Riverside Cemetery and other locations around town have been getting spruced up for commemorative events. Gordon Shepard was giving the lawn a final mowing for the fall when I passed by last week. The wet spring and summer helped make grass thick and green this year, requiring far less watering than in the dry summer of 2022.

Black walnuts (Juglans nigra) near the center of town have produced a good crop of nuts. A pair of trees in the Saugus Iron Works parking lot and a third one near the maintenance building, as well as several others in backyards on Central Street, have produced a lot of food for wildlife. The falling nuts have been abundant in the community garden behind St. John’s rectory, but chemicals in the roots of these trees can be inhospitable to many plants, including tomatoes, eggplants and potatoes, so these species have to be planted beyond the trees’ root zone. Members of the heath family (Rhododendrons, azaleas, blueberries, for example) are also adversely affected by walnut roots and to a lesser extent the related hickory (Carya spp.).

Japanese anemones (Anemone hybrida, sometimes called Eriocapitella hybrida) bloomed for a long season this year on the town’s middle/high school campus, starting in July and continuing into November with a spectacular display near the high school entrance. The planting there includes white flowering ‘Honorine Jobert’ and pinkish purple ones that are probably ‘September Charm.’ In front of the bright red SHS sign, the white blossoms of ‘Honorine Jobert’ combine to form the Saugus school colors: red and white. These are among the easiest to grow summer to fall perennials, thriving in sun to part shade, very resistant to deer and rabbits. Because of the bloom time, they provide a nice “welcome back” to students at the end of summer that continues beyond the first term.

Sandy Mears has been enjoying abundant blossoms on her foxgloves (Digitalis ‘Pink Panther’) this summer and fall and says, “I can’t believe they are looking so good in November!” She bought this plant this spring and has had almost continual bloom since then. The rainy weather may be part of the answer, as foxgloves do like soil that is consistently moist, but most descriptions of this variety say it blooms in June, July and August, and don’t mention September, October and November! Also, this may be a non-seed-forming variety, which in many biennials will result in a long bloom season. Since purple foxglove (Digitalis purpurea) are biennials, the original plant often dies after producing seeds. If the flowers are removed before they go to seed, the original plant may return the following year and bloom again. On the other hand, if allowed to go to seed, new plants may pop up that bloom two years later, and if this process continues for several years, you may get a lot of new plants. Foxgloves are old-fashioned cottage flowers that have been popular for centuries. However, if you do bring the foxglove flowers indoors for a vase, make sure you don’t let small animals or children nibble on them because they are dangerous to consume. Reportedly the taste is terrible, so most wildlife will not be harmed by trying to eat them, but the danger is significant for livestock, pets and people.

In the trees, the color display continues, though many of the brightest colors have faded. Flowering dogwoods (Benthamidia florida or Cornus florida) are among the most popular spring flowering trees, adaptable to sunny and partly shady locations. They often have another show in the fall, as the leaves turn red and yellowish, and the trees produce small oval fruits which become a feast for migrating birds. While admiring those fall features, a close look at the branches will likely show small round buds with pointed tops (like an onion shape) at the ends of branches – these are the buds of next year’s flowers. The buds for 2024 are already formed and waiting for spring. If you don’t see many of those, you might want to give the tree a fertilizer high in phosphorous to encourage bud production for bloom in spring 2025!

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  Editor’s Note: Laura Eisener is a landscape design consultant who helps homeowners with landscape design, plant selection and placement of trees and shrubs, as well as perennials. She is a member of the Saugus Garden Club and offered to write a series of articles about “what’s blooming in town” shortly after the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. She was inspired after seeing so many people taking up walking.