ELK RIDGE GARDEN

A woodland style botanical garden at Grand Lake O’ the Cherokees.

About Elk Ridge Garden

Elk Ridge Garden is a woodland style botanical garden at Grand Lake O’ the Cherokees in Grove, Oklahoma. The Garden was designed and built by Dr. Leonard Miller of Grove, OK. Dr. Miller is a Past President of the American Rhododendron Society. Dr. Miller also developed Lendonwood Gardens in Grove.

Elk Ridge Garden has one half mile of gravel walkways lined with native stone. Along the paths are collections of perennials which number in the thousands. Shade loving plants grow in gravel soil under mature oak trees. The garden is bordered by the Elk River arm of Grand Lake which provides beautiful views from the house, tea house and lake landing. Description of the garden.

What’s In Bloom

Spring brings wild flowers that disappear in the warm summers. Impatiens flower all summer and into the fall. They were planted some years ago and now they are so prolific that they have become weedy reseeding themselves each year. There are three hundred and eighty varieties of herbaceous perennials. A large collection of carex, pulmonaria, heuchera, and heucherella are planted along the paths.

The garden has three hundred rhododendrons, a plant some what foreign to Oklahoma, and numerous azaleas. There are over 675 woody plants, including rhododendrons, conifers, acers and a variety of shrubs and trees. This group comprises some of the rarest plants that will grow in our zone six. Acer pilosum variety stenolubum is described by ‘Maples for the Garden’ book as one of the rarest maples in cultivation. Elk Ridge has a small collection (one hundred trees) of palmatum, japonicum and species acers.