Rhododendrons Run Riot at New Jersey Botanical Gardens

I love rhododendrons. They remind me of the North Carolina highlands, where I was born, lived on occasion, and love. A few times in my life I've seen them blooming at Craggy Gardens, near Asheville, and on Roan Mountain, further to the north.

When I was in my teens my father tried to grow rhododendrons at our house near Nashville, but there was so much sun and so much heat they didn't make it, except for one, which grew, thin and scraggly, in the two feet of dense shade between our house and the little concrete block house that housed our well.

I planted a half dozen rhododendrons in my shady lot in Pine Lake. Several are gone, and several are still hanging on. I love it when they bloom.

Here are some photographs of rhododendrons in bloom. I took them yesterday at the New Jersey State Botanical Gardens. The morning sun highlighted the delicate blooms to perfection.

Had I been a week earlier, I could have caught the hundreds of crabapples along this concourse in full glory...

... but they're now past their prime.

I hope to drop by again tomorrow. Maybe the red rhodos will be open by then.