OAKENSTONE GARDENS

Most of the time I do not know what I will be writing about next for Horticulture, but a good number of stories are literally found in my own back yard, or at least very close by, like this one. A one-time neighbor and forty-year gardening friend of mine had been gushing about a spectacular hosta garden she had visited. She had urged me to see it on a couple of occasions. One day she called me from this garden when I happened to be just a couple of miles away. She said she would wait for me there, so that she could introduce me to a couple of hosta gardeners extraordinaire.

So on that warm, bright summer day I drove through a pleasant, well-kept residential neighborhood in East Greenwich, R.I. Before my GPS announced my arrival, I saw attractive stone walls and stone features that I knew had to mark my destination: Oakenstone Gardens.

My friend Linda introduced me to self-proclaimed “hostaholics” Bob and Diane Adams, who since 1973 have lived in their garden-surrounded home that backs up to a golf course. The two had always liked to grow things, but at first they found challenges