The West Chicago Garden Club

By Christina Covarrubias

A February garden in West Chicago should be difficult to discuss. However when you find a weekend with 50-60 degree temperatures it’s easy to survey the garden and take time to admire the winter landscape. Sadly, no early spring bulbs or ephemerals were popping up despite the unseasonable weather.

The Kruse garden, at 527 Main Street, belongs to the original house built in 1917 and presumably the garden dates back closely to that time. Past Kruse garden volunteers describe uncovering stone paths buried in layers of soil, digging a hole to find the hole belonging to the goldfish pond (though we don’t keep goldfish)and explained the north hillside was originally a rock garden. This long established garden offers visual interest in hardscaping, mature trees and perennials left standing from the past season.

As always you are welcome to walk around the garden any day of the week; parking behind the garage. You are also welcome help garden with our wonderful Kruse crew starting in April on Wednesdays from 9-11:30am or the Second Saturday of every month from 9-11:30am. Commitment to come every time is NOT required to join the fun.

By Kerry Perry

The garden was put to bed in late fall. Not much was cut back as we wanted to protect the habitat for overwintering bees and other insects. There was a beautiful blanket of snow a few weeks ago and I only wish it had stayed longer. The recent warm weather brought immediate melting and now the yard is brown and somewhat dull. But, ahhh…the anticipation of spring! We’ll be ready and waiting for new growth.

“The tiny seed knew that in order to grow, it needed to be dropped in dirt, covered in darkness, and struggle to reach the light.” – Sandra Kring

Several Snowdrops Galanthus woronowii bulbs were planted in the far NE sec�on of the garden. They will be among the first flowers peeking their heads out of the snow in early spring.

One of my favorite photos is of the bench by the garden shed and the old maple in the background. It looks so peaceful, tranquil and pure.

Join the Kruse Crew Wednesday mornings, generally April through October. It’s a fun learning experience and you have the opportunity to get your hands dirty.

By Christina Covarrubias (Photos by Kerry Perry)

The Kruse garden is still looking glorious in its autumnal hues! The monkshood wins the award for latest perennial to flower here this year and our small clump of trout lily is growing and flowered in its very orchid-like way. 

A special thank you to our Wednesday Kruse Crew- Kerry Perry, Barbara Darrah, Chris Gicela, Dee Soustek, Marilyn Santos-McNabb, Jean Ann Saarnio, Mary Anderson, Judy Knaak, and Karen King- for your gift of time, plant knowledge, talent and muscles over the past 6 months. Your fellow Kruse gardeners bundled up for our last day in the garden, October 29th.  We celebrated the end of another beautiful garden season and walked around with pencil, paper and camera in hand for over an hour planning for next year. We will need about 3 times as many hours and gardeners next year if we want to check everything off our plans! Anyone else a little delusional with their garden plans or is it just me?!?

Last month we shared our Wasco trip selecting a new tree. As we were looking around for another tree, the Wasco tree expert kept suggesting tree varieties and we had to reply “we already have one of those” to so many of the trees he suggested. It’s the sign of a great garden legacy to have such diversity of established trees in our almost one acre garden. With this tree diversity comes multi-seasonal interest and an extended autumn season. 

Enjoy the fall foliage photos!