Wild Ones Capital Region NY offers tours of two gardens on Thursday, August 6, 2026. Learn more about Kim Dean’s “7 Acres to Play” in Ravena below and Genoveffa’s Selkirk garden here.
Register here to attend.
Kim writes:
My mother was an avid gardener, and while I don’t have fond memories of helping my mother in the garden, much to her chagrin I’m sure, the fact that we had lots of flowers growing up definitely influenced me in some indirect way. Ever since I’ve had space of my own, I have spent time adding gardens. First focusing on vegetable gardens and growing plants that reminded me of my mother’s garden from my childhood; purple coneflower, black eyed susan, and daffodils.
I grew up in western NY and one of my earliest jobs was as a naturalist at Allegany State Park. It was here where I started learning wildflowers and native plants so that I could lead native and edible wildflower walks, which slowly escalated to learning native plants wherever I found myself. I’ve lived in a few different places over the last decade… Ohio, South Carolina… and dove in head first to the native plants of those regions when re-imagining the landscaping at those homes. The problem is I always installed gardens, only to move after 2-3 years, never really seeing the end product.
When I moved back to NY in December 2024, I was determined to find my forever home and finally install gardens that I could see develop and evolve over many years. In June 2025, I purchased a house on 7 acres in rural southern Albany County. It has a mix of everything; mature trees around the house, meadow, a small pond, and some great rock outcroppings. The property had been neglected for the last few years though, and invasive species have taken over several acres of meadow.
I spent the first several months reclaiming space around the house that had been taken over by trumpet vine, bittersweet, poison ivy and ailanthus. In October 2025, I was one of the many federal employees that were furloughed and spent most of that time preparing areas for new garden beds in my front yard that were previously nothing but lawn. I had a clear plan for a ‘bird garden’, but wasn’t able to find many of the straight species I had wanted, so I opted to plant mostly native cultivars because that is what I could find at the time, focusing on shrubs that provided benefits to bird (pussy willow, ninebark, winterberry holly).
The gardens you’ll see in the front yard are in various stages of development, including some areas that are still empty while I wait for cardboard and mulch to kill some parts of the main border garden I am expanding, but all were nothing but lawn and weeds less than a year ago. My ultimate goal is to have a few large native cottage gardens to provide some privacy from the road, and to bring back the flower gardens I’m told used to impress the neighbors when the original owner of the house kept the area maintained. I’ve been trying to do this on the cheap, filling beds with plants I grew myself from winter sown seeds, transplants I found elsewhere on the property, and smaller bare root shrubs and plugs I purchased from local vendors. I’m not a total native purist, as I still have some annuals and bulbs I like to grow each year for cut flowers – and right now they are helping to fill out dead space in my gardens as I source more native plants. I started small with these gardens just to get something started, and plan to expand over the years.
I’m also working on reclaiming several acres of meadow that have been overrun with spotted knapweed, canada thistle, and multi-flora rose. For now, I’ve been mowing and removing plants by hand, and have been enjoying finding natives that have been able to come back with less competition, like the patches of native bee balm (Monarda fistulosa – I think) that I’ve been tediously mowing around. A portion of wet meadow is relatively invasive free, filled with goldenrod, milkweed, sedge and rushes. I plan to add more species to this over time to increase the biodiversity, and keep expanding the meadow outward as I deal with the invasives.
Overall, my gardening style is pretty laid back and while I usually start with a plan, what actually gets planted where is wholly dependent on what plants I have at the time and how impatient I am to get things in the ground. I don’t pay as much attention to soil health as I should, or spacing, and fully expect I’ll have to move plants around as I see what establishes and what isn’t a great fit for the space. I’ve definitely made some mistakes this past year, but it’s all part of the learning process and I’m hoping to share those lessons learned with folks.
These gardens are just barely getting started, and I’m hoping those new to native gardening can see it’s better to just go for it, and that even a year one garden can fill out nicely in one growing season!
