Hardy Hibiscus in July

Now that it is July, each of the plants is doing its best to make a show, as the picture above makes clear.  There was one casualty last winter, the large viburnum bush that screens much of the labyrinth from the road and the neighbors nosey eyes, got confused and entered Winter in Spring mode.  Much of it was killed off. 

If you look at the right of the photo where you see our neighbor's bright white front steps, you will see a few of the viburnum's remaining branches.  It is supposed to hide those steps.  You can see on the right, the new suckers that are coming up from the roots.  Each is only about a foot tall, but these are the future trunks of the bush.  Once they get big enough, the old ones will get cut out.

But the topic for today is the hardy hibiscus, of which there are now three.  Each provides some bright color in pink, red or mauve.  If you go back to the top panorama, you can see all three.  In order, from the right and below those white steps is a bright pink one, just to the right of the center tree trunk is a dark red one, and below the left side of our neighbor's arch top trellis is a mauve one.  Each has a different history and style.

The pink one comes from the house my family owned in Pleasant Valley, New York.  My parents bought a large, old farmhouse, and in the first few years I discovered a hibiscus growing along the side of the pond.  When I showed Mom the flowers, she knew what it was, and had me dig it up to plant it up next to the bay window.  This was in the mid-60's, and it was probably originally planted by the previous owners who had landscaped the area near the pond.  I assume it is an early variety of Hibiscus moscheutos, but cannot find any source on the Internet to identify it.

The color is bright and simple, and the flower is not complicated. Each flower lasts about a day.  This particular plant was moved to the current location last fall, and has settled into its new home very quickly.  Since there are not as many buds on it, there will only be two weeks of flowers, but that period may lengthen as the plant gets bigger. 

The one in the middle, behind the tree is Hibiscus "Robert Fleming."  Its flowers are HUGE, at least 8 inches across, and open up very flat like a plate.  As you can see in the picture there are many buds to go on this stalk alone, and there are seven stalks.  These flowers stand out even when partially hidden by the foliage of other plants.  I first wrote about it last November, and I am still thrilled with this plant.  My only concern is that at the current rate of growth, which is near a young boxwood hedge, it will soon become much to large.  But I like it where it is.

The last hibiscus, which is a mauve/pink color is to the left.  I must apologize because i had planned to get a close-up of it, but never took that picture.  But then, I also wasn't able to find its name, and since I am trying to be sure to include accurate names whenever possible, I will need to catch up on that one later.  We bought it to grow on the porch last summer, and put it in the ground in the Fall.

I will close with a shot taken from the road to the right of the top picture.  You will see the church bird feeder I painted a couple years ago - this is the first it has been put out in the garden.  We plan a vine to grow up the post, but haven't picked one out yet. The post is there to prevent future vehicles, including snow plows, from driving through the garden and hedges.  If they try it again, at least their vehicle will get as messed up as the garden has been.  Anyway, here is the shot.

Catching up with May Flowers

With many activities happening on weekends during this time of year, there is little time to keep up with the garden, and less time to write about the whole thing.  So, in a attempt to catch up, here are some photos taken throughout the month.

 Here is the Gold Sovereign tree peony, which is growing in the North garden.  This was originally bought for our house in Washington, DC, and grew there for many years.  It was moved out to Maryland a few years before selling the DC house.  I have had trouble finding  place where it can be happy, particularly since it seem much more susceptible to blight in the humid air near the water.  But you would never know that in the Spring, when the leaves are fresh and green, and the pure yellow flowers open up to show the pin cushion of stamens on the inside.  In the fall I will move part of it over into the labyrinth, since I am hoping it would get more sun and be less affected by the blight.

Also in the North garden is this climbing rose.  The name is written down somewhere, but for the sake of getting pictures up, I have to leave it out.  This rose was spectacular this year, with dozens of flowers cascading from its stems.  The pictures that I took were never able to capture the glory of them, so I decided to show this close-up of an opening flower and nearby bud.  Since this rose bush can been seen from our bedroom window, it is quite the sight when getting up in the morning.

The North Garden our secret garden, since it is surrounded on two sides by the house, on the north side by a board fence, and the entrance has a magnolia on one side and Japanese Acuba on the other, leaving a four foot wide entrance.  It could also be called the Deer Candy Garden, since it is packed with hostas, daylillies, and of course the rose, all of which are favorites of those long-legged Rats.

Here is a view of my false indigo, Baptisia sphaerocarpa 'Screaming Yellow' which grows under the Katsura tree in the middle of the labyrinth.  In the four years in that location, it has become quite large, making a ball of foliage that is over three feet in diameter.  I have to trim off some of the side where it crowds the path of the labyrinth.  It blooms earlier than the other perennials, making a good transitional source of color after the bulbs have finished. 

If you look closely, you can see a bee approaching one of the flowers.  I have had a lot of bee activity, so I hope I am doing my part to support healthy colonies in the area.  While many like to leave the seed heads on their false indigo, I trim them off of this plant.  It is right in the middle of the whole garden, and the black and dead seed heads make the whole area look like it is not being maintained.  I leave them on the plants growing down the side of the ravine, and I hope some of the seeds will find places to grow and add more color and soil stability there.

Here you can see one of the Irises that I brought back from my Mom's garden in Amelia, Ohio in 2009.  Cheryl and I had gone in the Spring to clean-up and replant sections of the flower beds.  In the process we found a number of Iris Mom had planted, which were being overwhelmed by a ground cover.  While we moved many up to the front of the house, there were lots of small pieces that I brought back and stuck into the flower beds in the labyrinth.  This is the first one to bloom, and you can see the false indigo behind it in the picture.  I love combinations of yellow with blue and purple!  I wish I could say I planned it, but I really had no idea what the variety is.

In researching Iris grower's websites, I believe this is a "Costa Rica" Iris.  It is quite beautiful, and reflects Mom's delight in dramatic, multi-hued flowers.

This is another Iris with family associations.  There are many clusters of these iris around the labyrinths, and I expect that many of our neighbors will have them starting in the fall.  These original clumps of these came from the pastures around my childhood home in Pleasant Valley, New York. When I was a young teenager, I would cut large clumps of stems and walk around the neighborhood selling them at 10 for 5 cents.  A bargain, since I made sure there were also more buds on each stem.  I once did some research into the various types of Japanese Iris, of which this is probably a species.  But I cannot find my notes, so I am unable to list that here. 

I love these, very simple and clean flowers that go back a long way in my life.

This is the Siberian Iris "Jeweled Crown" which was new last Spring, and has grown much larger just in the year.  It had a series of buds opening, so the length of bloom lasted almost two weeks, making quite the statement.  With the rate it is spreading, this will soon become scattered throughout the labyrinth, and a few years later, into our neighbor's gardens.  But, isn't that part of the fun of gardening - spreading the joy.

There are more pictures to be shown and stories to be told, but they will have to wait for another time.

Jack-in-the-Pulpit

Since I have been distracted in running another blog for the church this last month, I have some catching up to do.  I will begin with the still small collection of Jack-in-the-Pulpits that I have.  Only three varieties, though I could easily buy many more.

This is an Arisaema serratum, bought at a National Arboretum sale a few years ago.  It is the earliest of the varieties to bloom, and shoots up to three feet tall before that pitcher-shaped bloom appears.  This grows up so early, the toad lilies that will grow up later and hide its dying leaves have just stuck their first leaves out of the ground.  The serratum leaves are very narrow and spiky, creating a slightly creepy effect that looks like something out of a vampire movie.

Unfortunately, as you can tell from the background of vinyl siding at the top and cinder block foundation at the bottom, it's setting is not the most attractive.  But I can guarantee you that it is so exciting to see the growing spear point coming out of the ground announcing its arrival, that you don't really care.  You saw this in the previous blog entry for the End of March.  See, I did come through with the promised pictures.

The next ones to come up are some native Jack-in-the-Pulpits that I rescued several years ago from the side of the ravine.  The ravine, which fairly regularly has had times when the soil gets wet and the sides slide down to the bottom, had exposed a clump of the arisaema.  I did not want to wait to see if it would survive the location where it was newly exposed to full sunlight, so I dug out a small portion and moved it up alongside the house.  That was my first time to deal with the plants, and I was surprised to discover they have a small bulb in the ground.  This makes it fairly easy to move them around since there are not lots of long roots.

The native ones are plain in comparison with the more exotic varieties with a mostly green pitcher and short in stature.  But as the native, they have a claim to space before all the rest, and usually have the largest clumps of bright red berries in the Fall.

Finally, here is the Arisaema sikokianum, a Japanese variety that the Plant Delights Nursery describes as "circumcised!"  That is one sample of their humorous plant descriptions, which goes on to say about this variety "since Arisaema sikokianum doesn't offset or engage in sexual self-satisfaction, you'll need more than one to start a family."  At the current prices, this one will have to tough it out on its own, so it has not had a display of red berry babies in the Fall.  I don't know that I could handle the sight of a large clump of these.

But maybe I should end its celibate life and buy another? All of the baby plants could be sold at the church's May Fest.  These would always be blooming at the time of the sale, and they could be sold at really great prices, spreading across the county!   Every year I give the Episcopal Church Women some of my rapidly expanding clump of Acanthus plants, they sell out of them rapidly.

I suspect the native plant society is not happy with me.

End of March

As the end of March arrives, there are a few of the newly planted bulbs showing their flowers in the labyrinth, and many others with buds emerging from the ground.

There is a dramatic difference from last year, when the narrow flower beds between the grass paths were bare.  The idea is to fill them with bulbs, which provide growth and color when the perennials are just beginning to break through the mulch.  Then, after the bulbs die back, the sections will remain empty, contrasting to the rest packed with flowers.  The idea belongs to Harold Nicolson's Lime Walk at Sissinghurst, what he called "My Life's Work" which I hope to see in full bloom some day.  

You see the one of the first narcissus in the front, a variety called Marijke, with pale yellow back petals, and a deep orange, ruffled trumpet.  What the description in the catalog left out is the way the flower faces down to the ground, so the orange trumpet is not even visible.  All that can be seen while standing and walking are the yellow petals.  This shy flower requires getting down on the ground, and looking over/up into the flower to finally see the orange trumpet.  Since the stem is only about six inches tall, you really have to get down low.  I am disappointed with its garden appearance, but as they build up clumps, I imagine many of these will be cut and brought indoors, so that they can bring their fresh brightness up-close on the dining room table.  It also means that next year there will be something else planted alongside these to provide some other color.  Although when I look closely, I see that they are mixed in with something else further back from the entrance of the path.

Another place of excitement are the red leaves rising up from the Itoh hybrid peony called Kopper Kettle.  I found this at the National Arboretum sale last year, and it was a fully grown plant when I bought it, so I did not realize the initial color of the leaves would be this gorgeous.  This is a cross between a herbaceous and a tree peony, so the stems are heavier and stronger that the usual herbaceous, and the densely double flowers are described in one catalog as golden yellow, orange and red.  It is a rich and wonderful display, and I hope the plant will not need the wire supports that are required to keep the rest of the peonies from collapsing in a heap on the ground with the first heavy rain.  I hope this goes well with the peonies that were brought from the homestead in New York and a few other picked up along the way!  One catalog says that it might even re-bloom once it is established - I will be amazed if it will do that!

On the north side of the house, with some of the early Sunday morning snow beneath it, is the gallantly struggling tree peony, brought out from our property in the city. Here are the much smaller buds on the tips of the woody branches, beginning to unfurl.  This section of the yard is more protected, so the hellebores, bulbs and other peonies are actually ahead of the same varieties in the labyrinth area, even though they are not getting much sun at all.  Being on the north side of one section of the house, and the west side of another, they only get late afternoon sun in the middle of the summer, yet that is enough to keep them going.  Planted around the various stems of the tree peony are dog-tooth violets, or trout lilies - Erythronium pagoda.  I first grew these in my full-shade yard in the city, and fell in love with them.  The open-bell shaped flowers just make me smile.  I am pleased to see them multiplying and making bigger and bigger patches.  By the time the peony has fully leafed out, the Erythroniums are dying back and disappearing into the ground.  They are a perfect pairing!

Finally, I cannot resist a portrait of Four Paws, reluctant though she was to stay in place while I focused and clicked the shutter.  She is sitting next to the pointed stem of a Jack-in-the-Pulpit bought a few years ago from the National Arboretum.  This stem will reach two feet before the flower will grow on its top, far above any of the surrounding foliage.  In front of where the dog is sitting there is a clump of native Jack-in-the-Pulpit I moved up from the steep side of the ravine, where it was being threatened by erosion.  There is a third one, still underground, about where I am squatting to take the photo.  Pictures and names will be listed when they are blooming.  It is a fun, small collection, and I could easily become a fanatic since they are simple to grow and delightful in their variety.

Hopefully, today was the last snow of the year, and the weather will move out of the 40's next week.

Ten Tons of Work

So finally we did it.  After saying we needed to do it, David stopped by a rock yard and ordered ten tons of rip rap, supposedly in a 6-8 inch size.  David first thought about ordering seven tons, but decided just to be safe, he would go with ten.  He had planned to have them back it across the yard, closer to its destination, but the water company was concerned the truck would damage the water line running just a foot in from the edge of the road. Rather than wait until they could put in a steel plate, we just had them dump it at the edge of the road.

So, here you can see where it was dumped. Below that juniper hedge, at the edge of the ravine is where it is going, about fifty feet away, and over the edge.  Possibly you can see the bright red trunks of the red twig dogwoods that a nursery and I had planted along the sides, hoping they would sucker out and hold the soil.  Little did I know, the nursery did not plant the suckering type, and in matching their variety, nothing was holding anything much in place.  The heavy steel pipe was put in by the previous owner, and water running out had created a gully.  We had a nursery put in the black plastic pipe and run that down to the bottom.  It worked most of the time, but often the plastic disconnected.  Last fall, when eight inches of rain fell in three days, it had come off, and washed out another foot of soil.  The end of the steel pipe was at my shoulder when I stood in the gully below.

We carried rock and dropped it in place Saturday morning (after finally signing papers to refinance the mortgage - a process started last October!) then Saturday afternoon, then Sunday afternoon.  We took it slowly and carefully, watching how we moved and several times I used some yoga stretches when my muscles started cramping up. 

So on Sunday evening, at 5:30, we got it done.  To give you some sense of how much rock is in the ravine, the metal pipe sits just above the rock where it comes out from the ground, and the plastic pipe is now a couple of feet above the rock at the pipe.  It is a lot of rock!  I tried to protect the dogwoods from damage, but one was smashed to pieces by where I had to drop the rocks over the edge.  Others had various degrees of damage, but nothing deadly.  I will go in and prune them back, so they will sucker up with new growth above the rock.  So, just one final picture from the bottom so you can see how those ten tons look when filling in an erosion gully.

Hellebores in March

The extended cold throughout February has delayed the hellebores until this month.  But, as always, the wait is worth it.

With nothing else braving the still harsh weather, the newly emerging leaves and flowers of the hellebores seem to be too tender for what is going on around them.  But, as this one shows, they are up with new leaves and flowers, ready to start a new garden year.  Sure, the crocus are already blooming in the grass, which I reported earlier, and the witch hazels are putting out color and fragrance in abundance.  But it really is the first herbaceous perennial that signifies the beginning of a new year.  With the old name of Lenten Rose, these hellebores have come up slightly before Ash Wednesday this year.  But since this year has Lent starting about as late as it can, if this were any other year, they would have begun blooming a few weeks into that church season.  This one does have that soft, rose color, which I like.  It even has the tapered shape of a rose bud before the petals fully open up.  

I have a number of white varieties, and just bought a new one that has a bright, clean yellow flowers, "Winter's Bliss" which has been showing off on the dining table in the condominium in DC.  But the ones that most thrill me are the dark, deep purple or maroon reds, which seem much harder to find.  This is one of a group of unnamed seedlings I bought from a hellebore specialist a few years ago.  I took the chance on finding some particularly interesting colors and styles, and this one has certainly met that hope. This along with most of my hellebores are in the North flower bed, a small space with the house on two sides, a fence on the third, and our parking pad on the fourth.  I have begun moving some hellebores into sections of the labyrinth beds, as shaded areas grow slowly under various trees and shrubs.  They fit in well in the back of sections that are visible when all else has died down. If I get some other interesting blooms, you will be the first to see the pictures!

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Cutting the Ornamental Grass

A large sweep of tall grass starts behind labyrinth and covers the top of the steep slope down the ravine.  The grass, Miscanthus sinensis 'Gracillimus,' was on site 2000 when we bought the house.  It is on the left side of this photo, behind the low juniper edging.  Screening our neighbor's house from view when it is fully grown, it provides privacy for people who walk the labyrinth.  Its dramatic 30 foot wide drift rolls in waves in the wind, just as the water in the Chesapeake.

Here is a similar photo to the one above, showing the difference with the grass cut down.  Each spring the ornamental grass must get cut before the new green stalks begin growing.  February is the preferred month, with the temperature in the upper 40's or low 50's.  Using the electric hedge shears, this section took six hours to cut the grass, collect the straw and haul it down the hill into the brush heap.


If you look to the left of the tall pencil hollies, beside the edge of the junipers, you can see the brown, rounded stumps of grass.  Our neighbor uses the grass along the edge of her lawn.  I cut off some of that also, which can be seen behind the juniper.

Looking directly at the location from within the labyrinth, you can see the dramatic difference without the soft wall provided by the six to eight foot tall grass.  The Bay is even visible through the leafless trees, though that view will be gone once the leaves open up.  In the next two months, the grass will have grown high enough to provide a sense of enclosure and protection.  It also helps anchor the evergreens so that they don't seem to float so close to the edge.  There is an open view of the Bay, through the gap in the trees made by the ravine, just six feet or so to the left of the picture.  So, as a person is walking along the path away from the road, there is a shift from an intimate, private space to a long view to the horizon.