Tour Long Island's private gardens on 'Open Days'

BY PAM ROBINSON | Special to Newsday

May 1, 2008

Carol Large in her Locust Valley garden. (Newsday / Bill Davis / April 30, 2008)

Some gardeners look out over their creations and see not only trees, mountain laurel and azaleas but also the past and the future.

Roberta Lee of Cutchogue got an early start on gardening, helping her mother when she was just 4. "And I wasn't playing," she says. Now gardening discussions form a bond with her daughter, Jessica, who lives near Los Angeles.

Carol Large of Locust Valley also has memories of a childhood spent in gardens. She laughs when she recalls providing free "labor for my parents when I was 2 years old. My parents and grandparents were gardeners. My grandfather propagated camellias, and my parents taught me to call plants by their botanical names."

Both women are among the many Long Islanders whose creativity and passion for nature will be on display through the national Open Days Program of the Garden Conservancy, a series of public tours of private gardens that begins Saturday and continues through mid-July.

The Open Days Program has been held nationally since 1995 and is designed to encourage understanding and appreciation of horticulture and nature's beauty.

The program begins with tours of gardens in Amagansett, Cutchogue, East Hampton, Montauk and Wainscott, moves on to Nassau County May 24 in Locust Valley, Mill Neck and Old Westbury, returns to Suffolk June 21 to a garden in East Hampton and wraps up July 13 with tours in Cutchogue, East Marion, New Suffolk and Southold.

Suffolk County gardeners have been participating since 1996, and those in Nassau since 2004.

Lee and her husband, Manfred, have 2.6 acres open for two tours, one Saturday and the other July 12. As the seasons change, the tours will offer different features.

Among other standouts for the first tour, Lee says, is a redbud tree that blooms the first week in May. "The redbud's flowers bloom from the bark," she says. "You can't see the branches; it's just brilliant, a violet color looking like fireflies. It's a marvel of nature, a privilege to observe."

Elaine Peterson, whose garden also is open Saturday, promises that the trip to Montauk will be worth it.

"During the first week in May every year, the local shade trees, Amelanchier canadensis, are in full bloom," she says. "There is really nothing like this anywhere else on Long Island, and I've been told that our version of these native trees - very sinewy due to the winds - is seen nowhere else but in coastal Oregon."

WHEN TO VISIT GORGEOUS GARDENS . . .

May 3

Manfred and Roberta Lee, Cutchogue, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.: Deep perennial gardens surround the property, with azaleas, rhododendrons, roses, hydrangeas and lilacs spread throughout the garden.

Abby Jane Brody, East Hampton, 10 a.m.-4 p.m.: This half-acre, primarily woodland garden features rare or unusual flowering trees and shrubs as well as herbaceous plants.

Margaret Kerr, East Hampton, 10 a.m.-2 p.m.: Plants grown in the Middle Ages surround a courtyard around a fountain and lily pool highlighted with espaliered pear trees.

Richard Kahn and Elaine Peterson, Montauk, 10 a.m.-

2 p.m.: The property is protected by the original nonnative plantings of oak, silver maple and privet, with design and materials determined by the challenges of wind and salt spray.

Biercuk/Luckey, Wainscott, 10 a.m.-4 p.m.: The four-season woodland garden under a high oak canopy shelters a collection of rhododendrons, azaleas, mountain laurel, pieris, understory trees, perennials, bulbs and tropicals in season.

Cobb Garden, Amagansett, noon-4 p.m.: Flower beds are filled with tulips, which give way to perennials, with an assortment of annuals as well as countless varieties of daffodils.

May 24

Carol and Jim Large, Locust Valley, 10 a.m.-4 p.m.: Ten acres of mature woodlands, streams, ponds and fields are placed in a framework of rhododendron, mountain laurel and azalea.

Howard Phipps Jr. estate, Old Westbury, 10 a.m.-4 p.m.: Rhododendrons have been bred and raised here since the beginning, and their hybridization continues today, along with a Japanese garden and the site of new rhododendron seedlings.

June 21

Arlene Bujese, East Hampton, 10 a.m.-2 p.m.: Flowering trees include cherry, pear, maple and red leaf plum.

Margaret Kerr, East Hampton, 10 a.m.-2 p.m.: See May 3.

Carol Mercer, East Hampton, 10 a.m.-4 p.m.: Mercer and partner Lisa Verderosa have a garden-design business called the Secret Garden Ltd. Previous years' recognition includes the Gate House Gardens at the 2003 Villa Maria Designer Showhouse in Water Mill and gold medal awards at several of the New York City flower shows.

Alexandra Munroe and Robert Rosenkranz, East Hampton, 11 a.m.-4 p.m.: This young garden around a 1928 beachfront house combines formal and naturalistic landscaping.

July 12

Conni Cross, Cutchogue:

10 a.m.-2 p.m.: This is a 23-year-old garden on approximately five acres, with a shade garden in light, sandy soil and a tufa rock garden featuring dwarf and miniature conifers and alpines.

Manfred and Roberta Lee, Cutchogue, 10 a.m.-4 p.m.: See May 3.

Alice and Charles Leviens, Cutchogue, 10 a.m.-4 p.m.: A two-acre mixed border and woodland garden have been planted to provide year-round privacy, continuous blooms in season and many-faceted views.

Steve and Barbara Friedman, Mattituck, 10 a.m.-4 p.m.: This waterside garden includes a pool garden, a wisteria-draped pergola and a variety of perennials.

Maurice Isaac and Ellen Coster Isaac, Mattituck, 10 a.m.- 4 p.m.: This early 1900s country farmhouse has been designed with two major borders incorporating plantings of unusual combinations of bulbs, perennials, trees, shrubs and annuals.

July 13

Alan Santos, Cutchogue,

10 a.m.-4 p.m.: This garden and pool surround a house that originally was a barn. The pool has brick patios, a pergola and a seating pavilion adjacent to Wickams Farm.

David and Mary Jane Cassaro, East Marion, 10 a.m.-4 p.m.: The gardens include native plantings, mixed borders, a pool, a pergola and a sunken patio, all in a seaside setting.

Koehler's Keep, New Suffolk, 10 a.m.-4 p.m.: Six areas have been developed - a rock garden, a perennial bed, a front house entrance, a driveway island, a bayside bed with grasses and roses and a large bed with shrubs along the driveway.

Lyn and Mark Rickabaugh, New Suffolk, 10 a.m.-4 p.m.: This 1800s house with wraparound porch boasts a swimming pool, pergola, outdoor shower, extensive gardens and stonework designed by Conni Cross.

Mayfield, Southold, 10 a.m.-

4 p.m.: A berry garden is just one of the views available from this property adjacent to fields and a vineyard.

Source: The Garden Conservancy