Water Garden Audio Highlights

The Shelby White and Leon Levy Water Garden opened in 2016 with a lush design inspired by the wetlands of New York. Gardener Margarita Diaz Poulson thinks of this space as an all-season garden, with something magical to notice any time of year.

Listen along as Margarita shares her favorite highlights from all four seasons.

• Introduction to the Water Garden

  Learn about riparian plants and water conservation in the Water Garden.

  Read transcript

  The Shelby White and Leon Levy Water Garden opened in 2016 with a design inspired by the wetlands of New York State. With over 9,000 individual plants, the Water Garden conserves water and provides a habitat for local wildlife. Its lush plantings and secret nooks are a haven of tranquility in our concrete jungle.

  I’m Margarita Diaz Poulson, the gardener of this space, and I’m excited to share my favorite highlights.

  When visitors ask me about the Water Garden, they often expect to find floating plants or large fountains. But it is a wetland habitat, and many of the plants featured here are riparian plants, from rushes, sedges, and willows to black tupelo trees.

  Riparian plants don’t float on the surface of the water. Instead, their strong fibrous roots are anchored along the shore. They are magnificent plants. They are continuously working to prevent soil erosion, while removing contaminants and improving water quality.

  The two bodies of open water in this space, along with a hidden piping infrastructure, help the Garden capture, filter, and recirculate rainwater, easing pressure on city storm drains and reducing water consumption.

  I like to tell visitors that the Water Garden is truly an all-season garden. Whether you're here in the quiet winter months or the spectacular summer, this space has something magical to offer each visitor.

• Spring

  Spring highlights to look for in the Water Garden.

  Read transcript

  In early spring, look for the dainty yellow blooms of the cornelian-cherries planted at the south end of the Water Garden, near the Children's Garden house.

  While you're here, see if you can find the native sassafras tree and its greenish-yellow flowers. These flowers emerge right before its leaves. One leaf is shaped like a mitten, one like a football, and one like a ghost!

  Along the water’s edge, you’ll find native marsh marigolds with yellow blooms that resemble buttercups. You'll also find a diverse collection of sedges and rushes sending up new shoots. Blue herons and egrets start to visit the pond at this time of year in search of their daily snacks.

  In mid-spring, don't miss the blooms of Davidia involucrata, an iconic tree located between the Children’s Garden house and the larger pond.

  Its large white bracts––or modified leaves that surround the flowers––wave majestically in the wind, resembling handkerchiefs. Known as the dove tree or handkerchief tree, I think of it as the matriarch of the Water Garden.

• Summer

  Summer highlights to look for in the Water Garden.

  Read transcript

  In the summer, the Water Garden is lush and vibrant.

  At the north end of the Water Garden, across from the large lawn, is a tall meadow planted with ironweed, helianthus, echinacea, and rudbeckia. It creates a lovely barrier from the road. Weaving into the meadow is a path with a bench, where you can catch birds taking a bath in Belle's Brook.

  Head south on the road and you’ll find elecampane, meadowsweet, lobelia and other plants with histories of medicinal use. Also prominent here in summer are plants in the Malvaceae, or mallow, family. You’ll see the large bright blooms of hardy hibiscus and rose-of-Sharon planted around the large pond near the weir path that bisects the two ponds.

  If you're looking for another spot to rest, sit under the shade of the northern catalpa tree, which shows off its string bean-like seedpods from mid-summer through fall.

  One of the best things about the Water Garden is the wildlife. From bees to dragonflies to frogs, this garden is full of life in summer. The stars of the show for me are the birds that spend time here, filling the garden with their sounds and entertaining visitors.

  One of my favorites is the northern mockingbird. When I'm weeding, there’s bound to be one watching me nearby, waiting for any insects exposed in the soil.

• Fall

  Autumn highlights to look for in the Water Garden.

  Read transcript

  As the season shifts to autumn, the bright purples and yellows of asters and goldenrod make a spectacular show around the perimeter of both ponds. This perennial pairing is not only attractive to us, but also to bees and other insects.

  Near the road close to the Discovery Garden, you’ll also find beautyberry shrubs. They produce clusters of tiny purple, pink, or white berries that sustain many birds through the cold months, while rabbits in the garden enjoy snacking on their foliage.

  In the fall and winter, I leave many of our flowering shrubs and perennials standing, rather than cutting them back to the ground. I do this for two reasons: they are a source of food and shelter for pollinators, birds, and other wildlife, and I like to showcase their interesting seedheads and seedpods.

  It makes for a much more interesting garden space than bare ground, and when rain, snow or ice falls on those stems and seedheads, I think it adds an additional touch of magic.

• Winter

  Winter highlights to look for in the Water Garden.

  Read transcript

  In the winter, on the south end of the Water Garden, the bare stems of red, orange, and yellow twig dogwoods, as well as the orange stems of flame willows, light up the area with all their colors.

  Also on the south end, take in the coppery-colored leaves of Epimedium, or bishop’s hat, before it gets cut back to the ground in anticipation of its early spring flowers.

  As we move into January and February, I can't wait to see the fuzzy nubs emerge on the branches of pussy willows as a signal that spring is near. You can find them adjacent to the tall meadow along Belle’s Brook. Some are gray, and some are pink. These nubs are the bud of a flower, called a catkin, that blooms in early spring in a rainbow of colors.

  In late winter, we start to cut back many of the deciduous woody shrubs to rejuvenate them before spring arrives. On warm winter days, take a seat on one of the boulders around the ponds, and watch the ducks drift by.