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Live Long and Prosper

March 14th, 2012

Spring insinuates itself little by little into the winter and into our awareness, almost like a dye put drop by drop into a glass of water, hardly coloring it at all first, but eventually, by steady additions, changing its appearance and even its very nature.

Joe Eck & Wayne Winterrowd in Living Seasonally: The Kitchen Garden and the Table at North Hill

Mr Chiots and moved into this house 10 years ago, in February of 2002. That first spring I purchased four primroses at the grocery store checkout that were marked 50% off. They were the first things planted by me in the gardens of Chiot’s Run. I wasn’t a gardner then and can’t remember why I chose to plant them where I did. The next spring two of them came back and bloomed, then the third year I was down to one.

Amazingly, this little primrose is still thriving in the garden. I can always count on it to be one of the first signs of spring in the garden and one of the last flowers to bloom in the fall. If we pack up and move, this little primrose will definitely come with along to our new home. I don’t know if it will survive, but I’m sure going to try.

What’s the longest living plant in your garden?

11 Comments to “Live Long and Prosper”
  1. Kathi Cook on March 14, 2012 at 5:41 am

    We bought our house 13 years ago after my mother passed away. We divided up a peoney she had into 3 pieces. I planted it that summer with some of her ashes. It has been blooming beautifully every May without fail. I am definitelyy taking it with me if I move too.

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  2. Victoria on March 14, 2012 at 5:59 am

    Beautiful!

    Love primroses. Each year they return, they bring back a flood of memories…and a few extra blooms. Its a good reminder of how I arrived at this point, and the excitement for what’s to come.

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  3. Dr. Dad on March 14, 2012 at 6:15 am

    Maybe you picked them up that day because you remember your dad always planting primroses as a favorite flower?

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  4. Donna B. on March 14, 2012 at 8:37 am

    I’ve only lived in my home for four years, so the oldest thing that I have planted is actually a transplant from my mother’s more established garden. The first summer that I lived there she brought over six sticks planted in soda bottles – they were all offspring from a Butterfly Bush she grew as a border shrub in her DE garden. In the first year alone, the ones planted along my front porch grew to eight feet high! It’s my favorite summer blooming item in my garden, and it’s COVERED in Black/Yellow Swallowtails all summer long…

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  5. Vonnie on March 14, 2012 at 9:20 am

    Love your little primrose. My longest living plant in my current garden is actually a mango tree planted by my grandfather in the early 1920s. Not sure if that counts as I didn’t plant it myself : )

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  6. Brittany P. on March 14, 2012 at 10:29 am

    The first thing I planted when we moved here 16 years ago was a blue hydrangea bush. The oldest living things here would be 100+ year old pine trees and oaks.

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  7. Mich on March 14, 2012 at 11:20 am

    When I first moved to the farm, I was a non garderner my Granny gave me a varigated Holly tree…which I planted in the wrong place and 28 years later it is still there! lol. She also gave me a Queen Elizabeth rose which still flowers its socks off every year. Lived in the house nearly 8yrs before the gardening gene finally kicked in!

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  8. Maybelline on March 14, 2012 at 12:49 pm

    A lilac cutting that came from a friend whose relative brought it to California via a covered wagon in the late 1800s. It’s blooming now even though my pup munched it pretty good.

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  9. KimH on March 14, 2012 at 6:33 pm

    The oldest plant that has survived in my yard is a clump of common orange daylillies that I have divided a zillion times. M’honey & I were out on a bike ride & we stopped at a natural spring for a sip of water & the sides of the road were covered in them. I took one root.. its multiplied a thousand times since.. I divide & give away and divide & give more away every year.

    I think the oldest plant itself is (besides our giant Elm tree) is some iris that I got from my moms land where my grandmother lived when she was a little girl around 1909ish.. The houses on that land are long gone, but the flowers remain & flourish.. There is a huge swath of all different colored iris on one hillside, & up on top of the hill where another house was, is covered in Jonquils (Daffodils). Its just beautiful..

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  10. Lisa on March 15, 2012 at 11:42 am

    Bringing the primerose with you into your new home is a good idea. The photos look great. I just remembered how I miss spring so much. It will always symbolize a new beginning.

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  11. itchbay on March 15, 2012 at 8:38 pm

    The primroses are here every year, as are the nasturtiums and forget-me-nots. But I only planted all three of those over the last three years we’ve been in this house. The house sat empty and the yard was un-attended for about a year before we moved in. The only plants that survived from the previous owners are the trees and one small star jasmine, that was very nearly dead when I got here. It’s happy now. :)

    Reply to itchbay's comment

About

This is a daily journal of my efforts to cultivate a more simple life, through local eating, gardening and so many other things. We used to live in a small suburban neighborhood Ohio but moved to 153 acres in Liberty, Maine in 2012.

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