Sensory Garden

There are 18 different "Gardens" within the Chicago Botanic Gardens.  This is the Aquatic

Garden, which will have many water lilies and lotuses later on.  Right now it has spring

flowers.  This gorgeous bed has five types of tulips plus white pansies.

A double pink tulip, which looks like a peony, and Frilled Pink Tulips.

A Frilled Pink Tulip.

Double Pink Peony Tulip and White Pansies.

A pot and dripping fountain with yellow and brown pansies.

A hanging basket with yellow pansies.  The Gardens have many hanging baskets with

a variety of flowers, showing what can be done.

Double White Tulips

A pair of "Quebec  Greggii" pink and yellow tulips.

The Circle Garden has a fountain in the center and is surrounded by purple tulips

edged in white.  A variety of flowering crabapples are in back.

The center of the Circle Garden.  The colorful tulips in back are a "Netherlands Mix."

Purple tulips edged in white.

"Deep Love" pink tulips.  They are very large.  Blue pansies in two shades.

"Queen of the Night" black tulips and beds of purple tulips.

"Netherlands Mix" of tulips were in four large beds.

To the side of the Circle Garden are two smaller "Secret Gardens."  This spring, they

were more beautiful and lush than ever.  They, of course, change with the seasons, but

right now they are filled with Yellow Snapdragons, White Tulips, Blue Poppy Anemones,

Yellow Pansies and Primroses, Pale Blue Daze, and other spring flowers.

White Tulips, Blue Poppy Anemones, and Yellow Snapdragons.

Small Batalin Yellow Tulips and Deep Purple Pansies.

The Secret Garden

White Lupine

"Deep Love" pink tulips in another bed.

"Avalanche White" tulips and  Pink Pansies along the path leading to the Enabling Garden.

The "Enabling Garden" shows how to garden even if you can't bend over or kneel down

on the ground.  All of the beds are raised so you can work them standing up.

Various pansies, Purple Ranunculus, red tulips, orange African daisies, a kale plant,

and others are in this bed.

Blue pansies, white alyssum, orange Moroccan Toadflax, and Orchid Harmony

Poppy Anemones are in this planter.

Tall Pink Stock, "Black Penny" Blue Daze, pansies, ranunculus, and kale.

Little blue Forget-Me-Nots, blue and white pansies, purple ranunculus.
Even in a small area, you can have lots of flowers and color in a raised bed.

Raised beds and large pots make it possible for everyone to grow flowers at home

if they wish.

A corner of a raised bed.

 Pots filled with flowers; they would look nice on a deck or terrace.

Next we head out to the Woodland Path and Sensory Garden.  This bed at the base of

a tree has Blue and Yellow Pansies, Double Orange Tulips, Yellow Daffodils,  Red

Moroccan Toadflax, and Purple Tulips.

Beds line all four side of this courtyard and they have various mixtures of the flowers.

The beginning of the Woodland Path.

Mixed bed of spring flowers.

Double Orange Tulip, Purple Snapdragon, Blue Grape Hyacinth.

Double Orange Tulips, Tall Purple Tulips, Yellow Jonquils, Blue Grape Hyacinths,
Red and Yellow Moroccan Toadflax, and Blue and Yellow Pansies.

Blue Grape Hyacinths, Double Orange Tulips, and Red Moroccan Toadflax.

"Indigo Blue" Forget-Me-Nots in a bed.

A mixture of tulips, anemones, Stock flowers, and vegetables in a bed.

"Orchid Harmony" Poppy Anemones

"Sorbet" White Violas

A visitor in the "Secret Garden."

Two visitors in the Enabling Garden.

Spring Flowers in Chicago 2018

The Sensory Garden is laid out on raised beds along a path which encircled a hill.

This was filled with massive collections of brilliantly colored tulips right now;

in the fall it will be filled with chrysanthemums.

Blue pansies, red and white tulips and purple stock.

Orange and white tulips.

Blue Pansies, purple stock, red tulips, and white tulips.

A variety of tulips.

Blue poppy anemones, purple, yellow, red, and orange tulips.

Left deep purple primrose, right blue poppy anemones, Helmar Triumph Tulips.

Helmar Triumph Tulips

Orange primroses and wallflowers; red, yellow, and purple tulips.

"Mona Lisa" Poppy Anemones, wine color.

"Masquerade "Deep Purple Double Tulips, "Clara" purple and white tulips,

"Fringed Fancy" Pink Tulips.

"Fringed Fancy" Tulips

"Clara" Tulips and Purple Stock

Purple Stock and "Fringed Fancy" Tulips

Tulips and Stock

"Helmar Triumph Tulips" and more.

Orange Pot Marigolds, Blue Pansies, red, white, and orange Triumph tulips.

A planter with purple ranunculus and "Spring Delight" tulips.

Purple and blue lupine near the lake

The English Walled Garden with flowering crabapple.

Blue and White Oesteospermum and Orange Bidens.

View of part of the English Walled Garden

Yellow Lupine

"Red Popsicle" Lupine

"Golden Yellow Ranunculus" in a planter.

Icelandic Poppies.

"The Hillside" this spring was covered with 2500 Icelandic poppies, whose bulbs

were planted last fall by volunteers.  We had never seen them so numerous and colorful,

and every one was at peak bloom.

Hillside of Icelandic Poppies

Icelandic Poppies - stand on high stems as thin as a wire.

Orange Icelandic Poppies

Red-Orange Icelandic Poppies

Flowering crabapples line the shore all around the lake.

On one side, near the Icelandic Poppies, two rows are planted to create a tunnel of

white blossoms.

The path under the white flowering crabapple trees.

Blue Delphinium

Harmony Blue Poppy Anemones

Five types of white flowers fill the beds around the "Pavilion," where wedding

receptions take place.  Double White Tulips, White Taper Tulips, Frilled White Tulips,

Mount Tacoma Single White Tulips, and White Pansies.

"Sorbet" Violas.  This is a new variety, which will not go on sale until next year, when

they will have enough seeds available.

"Indigo Blue Forget-Me-Nots."

A border bed by the Rose Garden of "Dream Touch" Double Tulips.

"Dream Touch Double Tulips" in red, orange, and purple, with pale blue pansies.

"Dream Touch Double Purple Tulips."

A visitor along the Woodland Path.
That's a yellow magnolia in back; they are rare.


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