How are visitors supposed to know that photography is not permitted if signs are not clearly posted. I checked your website and could not find any rules prohibiting photography.

if you consider this a problem then perhaps you need to post proper signage. At least in the US museums that do not want photographers clearly state that in their rules and posted signs. If no signs are present then the photographer can make a reasonable assumption that he can take pictures. I guess we need to be mind-readers as well!

And why would anyone consider it "rude". When I visit tourist sites I take pictures of everything I see – in fact I consider banning photography of such beauty to be "rude".

Generally, you don’t need the permission of the owner to take pictures of private property from a public spot, like a sidewalk or a street. Once you are on their property, however, they can decide whether or not to allow photography.

Sometimes the photography rules are printed on the ticket stub, or posted at the entryway where you buy tickets. Since most fee-based attractions allow casual snapshots, the few who do not allow this usually work very hard to explain how their rules are different. Many allow snapshots, but require permissions (and additional fees) if the images are being taken for commercial use, like on a commercial blog or other commercial website.

magnificat41 therefore my intellectual property.

Well, no. The photographs are the intellectual property of the photographer. It is a reasonable assumption on the photographer’s part that snapshots shared within a personal photostream would be allowed. It is like taking out your vacation snapshots and showing them to your friends. If you don’t want people to do this, you really need to be much more explicit about how your commercial enterprise is different from other tourist spots.

I am sending her a Flickrmail to discuss the issues raised in her comment, but I am asking other Flickr users whether anyone has had similar reactions. It seem to me that all I am doing is sharing with others my discovery and appreciation of her beautiful garden, which she opens to the public for a fee. I did not notice any signs posted at the garden requiring permission to take photographs.

Am I out of line here?

All s/he had to do was ask. I am finding that this is an on-going problem, at least s/he has acknowledged the name of the garden.

I suspect most people would find this rather rude?

Wendy Dare, owner and creator of Mill Dene Garden

Thank you for sharing with Clan flickr

Thanks for sharing

this great garden shot
in GARDEN FAVORITES!