My wife loved cats.

   My dear wife, gone now three years (cancer), "planted" numerous cats (and other creatures) around my gardens to "help" me.  And, honestly, she often did as these photos of a cat or two will show.  The photos were taken between 2015 and 2020, though the spot is about 10-12 years old.  It all started with a thick piece of a log left over from another project in another part of the gardens.  Most of the moss appeared on its own.  I think it did a great job.  There are about five species of moss in the garden.  The small fern is Cystopteris fragilis (Fragile fern or Brittle bladderfern), a world-wide fern which spreads readily by spores and rhizomes.  The sixth photo shows a closeup of the dominant moss, Thuidium delicatulum and Thalictrum dioicum (Early meadow rue), a small native perennial that appears often in my gardens

   The first two photos were taken a few weeks ago, and it shows the approach to the "cat garden" that is positioned on the south border of the property, backed up by a stockade fence (replaced in May).

More of the back yard

   One of the most influential gardens I ever visited was Bellingrath Gardens, just south of Mobile, Alabama.  It has a large oval "great lawn" surrounded by shrubbery, backed up by large trees.  Both my front and back lawns reflect that design.  Quite unnatural--but striking and impactful.

   The first two photos, taken from the same location, show the before and after views of my remaking of the backyard last summer, and continuing this summer.  I reduced the size of the lawn by a third and added perennial beds around the smaller lawn.  In the second photo the Vinca minor has yet to fill in the foreground area.  The triangular bed on the left foreground was built last week, and it contains all tiny hostas.  

   The next two photos are views of the patio looking towards the house.  I only use begonias for annuals, and only one color, rose, plus white.  I gave up mixing colors and species many years ago.  I found it too busy and messy looking--like trying to look good wearing plaid pants and striped shirts.

   I designed the hanging light fixture way back in 1980, and I have three new fixtures in my gardens now.

   The next two photos show my favorite moss garden, built in 2016.  The wooden structure was designed by Leonardo da Vinci about 500 years ago.  I saw a larger version of it in a da Vinci museum in Venice, Italy.  I'll bet he never built one!  Very difficult to make, even with modern tools.

   The last photo is of one of the first moss gardens I built, around 2008.  Moss Acres, a commercial seller of moss in Pennsylvania, uses this photo in their magazine ads and on their Facebook page.

The Williamsburg Garden

   This garden is adjacent to the patio, to its north.  Its name, and the garden itself, was inspired by my trip to Williamsburg, where I was impressed by the formal gardens there, often including antique paving bricks.  I began the garden in the late 1970s, and it has changed considerably over the years.  In 1999 I leveled it by digging down a foot on the north end.  About 15 years ago I added brick walls on the west and north sides.  This year I am rebuilding them, and I will add a cedar top to the walls, the four "pedestals," and the center cylinder which was built to cover the well casing.  I will also remove the boxwoods on the north side, replacing them with a low perennial that will not block the view of the bricks (what was I thinking when I planted boxwoods there, anyway?).

   Because it was getting increasingly difficult to grow grass in the shade there, I replaced the grass in 2017 with moss.  The species is Climacium americanum, a moderately common moss found in eastern North America.  It is especially beautiful when the new growth (yellow green color), in a hydrated state, is backlighted by a low-angle sun--shown in the last two photos.
   The Japanese garden is visible to the north of the garden.
   The flowers are wax begonias.