Late May 2012

Following up on Allium Forelock, here are two flowers a month later.  While they are still much the same size, they are slowly transforming in seed heads.  I'll have to decide whether to harvest the seeds, and see if they will grow.  I don't want them to scatter about, because if they are viable that would be dozens of new plants, most likely growing in the grass.

I promised to have more to say about the orange foxglove.  That will have to wait until I can confirm the proper name.  I thought I knew it, but a closer examination makes me suspicious. The problem of knowing the proper name soon will be solved by the list of plants I am compiling in digital form, from 12 years of journal entries and a bag full of plant labels.

One of the nice May combinations can be seen on the right.  The lavender blue flower is a native Penstemon smalli bought from the now closed Lower Marlboro Nursery.  The yellow flower is Coreopsis 'Jethro Tull' with a ground cover of Moneywort (Lysimachia nummularia) - which has not been added to the list, so I cannot specify the variety.  Unfortunately, the Feather Reed Grass on the right is also still unlisted.  Give me a break, I just started to work on the list this week and am up to 2004.

Here is a close-up of the Penstemon flowers.

The Penstemon blooms for 3-4 weeks, with the Coreopsis starting in the second week and continuing on for about six weeks.  With regular deadheading, the Coreopsis puts up new flowers, though they get smaller and more sparse, until it is done by the end of June. 

Another plant that came from the closed nursery is the Purple Milkweed, Asclepias Purpurascens.  The original three plants, that were little more than seedlings, have taken three seasons to get established and grow large enough to bloom.  This year they came into full glory, with large clusters of flowers.  They sit among a group of other tall perennials including a hardy hibiscus, visible on the left, Russian Sage, appearing behind and on the right. 

Soon they will fade into the background when the hibiscus starts opening its huge, dark red flowers. But for about three weeks they offer a warm color and disguise the still stretching stalks of the hibiscus.

Milkweeds provide food to a variety of insects, and are famous as a food source for caterpillars of Monarch butterflies as well as other insects.  Until doing research for this entry, I didn't realize that the caterpillars ingest and store the bitter and toxic chemicals in the milkweed leaves they feed upon, which protects them from being eaten by birds. 

Speaking of insects, here is a visiting butterfly enjoying the nectar of the milkweed!  Now if it will also lay some eggs, maybe you will see a complete life-cycle?  Stay tuned.

Finally, here is a super-sized Verbena bonariensis on the edge of the sidewalk.  These tender perennials are usually killed in the winter time, but this one survived the mild weather.  Of course, it blocks half of the sidewalk, which David thinks is just wonderful.  It will need to be pruned back heavily to encourage re-blooming, but recovery is quick.  A hat tip to Christopher Lloyd of Great Dixter, England, where I first fell in love with these.

Looking back to Early May

In the spirit of remembering what bloomed last month, here are pictures from Early May. 

I will start with the Secret Garden.  I call it that because I hope the deer will never find it. That failed last summer when 20 feet of day lily blossoms were eaten early one morning.  This is a narrow strip between the house and a board fence we put up with our neighbor's permission to get more privacy for all of us.  If you look closely highlights from left to right include: many white peonies with one pink one; above the highest peony is the seed head from one Jack-in-the-pulpit; fading hellebore flowers, yellow tree peony blossoms; white bell-shaped flowers on the Japanese Snowbell tree; and the masses of yellow roses on the fence.

Turning to the labyrinth, most of the planting areas have filled up, looking more mature and established.  I am pleased with the variety in colors, foliage shapes and textures, plant shapes from round to tall and spiky, and fine or coarse textures.  As plants have grown enough to be divided, and then moved into different places, the repetition of things create a sense of unity.  There is still more to be done, and this fall it will require some significant dividing and moving of more large plants.

One of the fun, new plants is Allium Forelock, with very tall stems reaching four feet.  They look a bit alien, growing up so much higher than anything around.  I was worried that strong wind or rain showers might knock the sideways, but that has not been a problem.

I had banned any allium until we had gotten control over the wild onions that heavily infested the whole yard.  I wanted as clean a slate as possible, so when there are new onion seedlings, I might be able to distinguish the bad from the good.  So, this is now the third allium we planted in the last year.  I am hopeful the alliums will work over time, because they are totally varmint proof.  Nothing will touch them, a strong criteria for living next to a nature preserve, with its overflow of deer, gophers, rabbits, foxes, and who knows what else. 

Here is a close-up of the Allium Forelock flower-head newly emerged from its sheath.  It is only 2 inches in diameter, with the sides and bottom becoming more rounded over time.  The top looks like someone with a bad hair day.  I will try to get another shot, soon, to compare.

They are not beautiful, but fit the "what in the world is that" quirky category of flowers - so David thinks they are wonderful!  I find them humorous, and anything that makes him smile is alright by me.  We all need to smile more often.

What I want to watch is what kind of seed-head there is.  I don't know whether to leave them on, or maybe cut them off and discard them so they don't self-seed?  Any suggestions?

I promised last time to show the full flower stage on the Continus 'Young Lady.'  It as a fine, slightly pink haze behind the Penstemon digitalis, 'Husker Red."  Since this picture was taken, the flowers heads totally hide the foliage underneath, making a truly smokey looking bush.  Actually, if you look at the labyrinth shot above, you can see the bush near the left edge.  It creates a very useful contrast.

We originally bought at least two different 'Husker Red' plants.  Multiple divisions later, you can see that this one has more green in its leaves, what the descendants from other plant have a red/purple leaf color. When I dig these greener ones up, I will give them away to neighbors who appreciate the free plants, and keep the others for my own use.  Oops, I wasn't going to tell them that.  Heck, they don't read this blog anyway, so they will never know it!

So, here is one final view across the labyrinth.  I will say more about those orange foxglove type flowers next time.

Catching up on April

I confess, I have been delinquent in putting up new photos for the last, oops, two months.  I have been taking the pictures, but I was gone for almost three weeks in April on a trip to Italy, and then I worked on narrowing down the more than 900 pictures do a manageable 375 and post them on Shutterfly. So, looking back at April, here is what I can show you.

This photo actually dates to before April, when the leaves on the Katsura Heronswood Globe were just emerging.  I wanted to document the progression in color and overall appearance of the leaves on this tree over the first few weeks in Spring. I know there is international interest in the Heronswood Globe because one of the most frequently viewed picture on this blog is one I took of that tree. 

When the leaves are first emerging, there is this interesting blend of light yellow green and burgundy red, making a short term display. 

As the foliage matures over the next 3-4 weeks, the green color deepens into the tone on the right.  However, the leaves on the tips still retain that burgundy color as a light coating on portions of the leaves.  Many websites talk about the foliage color in the fall, but fail to mention this transition in spring. Some places describe the foliage as a blue-green, which doesn't fit what I have seen.  This specimen is in a full-sun situation, and combined with our high temperatures and high humidity in July and August, that may shift the color away from any really blue cast? 

This is an early shot of Cotinus coggygria, the variety Young Lady, which is very slow growing.  There are already pictures, which I will post later, that show it in full bloom, and it is spectacular this year.  It had been in another, prime location in the front of the labyrinth for many years, but never performed well enough to earn its visibility.  So, we moved it a year ago, and put the standard dwarf cedar in its place.  Maybe it is shy and needed a more modest spot, because this year it looks the best it has ever looked. 

You will see water on the next few shots, because I was out early in the morning after a light rain. Those drops of water always sparkle on the flowers and foliage.  On the smoke bush, they bead up dramatically.

The next shot of a rosebud growing in front of the fence in the Secret Garden flouts its water drops in a spectacular way. It just looks so fresh and inviting.  This bush out-performed what it had done any previous years, with dozens of flowers over some weeks of time.  The problem with traveling in April is not being able to enjoy them every day.  After the first flush of warm weather, things cooled back down enough that many flowers lasted far longer than usual.

Moving onto the peonies.  This one, a Kopper Kettle, bloomed for the first time in the three years it has been in the garden!  It had about a dozen flowers.  Curiously, some formed on woody stems above ground, and some on new foliage that emerged from the ground.  As an inter-species variety, with both tree and herbaceous peony parentage, I think each side was showing off!  I took several pictures of this plant, and this one is the most representative of them all.  But I have to say, there were surprising variations - one had bright streaks of magenta on its petals.

This white peony is what I call a "classic" because it traces its heritage to plants growing on the farm my parents bought in 1964 in Pleasant Valley, New York.  I have kept bringing new divisions of it to each garden I have made over the years, and I hope to have one growing nearby into my old age.  These flowers have a strong, spicy fragrance, and a bouquet of 6-8 will fill a room with their heady power.  I have no idea what variety this might be, or where to find that information.  It is tough, lives where ever it is put, and makes me very happy when it is blooming.

I will close with this picture of a soggy common sage plant growing near the front steps.  I am glad we have it there, so I really do notice it blooming.  I would not normally recommend sage for its flowers, but these are worth a front row spot.  This is an area where the previous owner of the house put in a deep layer of gravel, with little soil, and it gets baked in the hot sun during the summer.  If we can get herbs established here, they usually adore the conditions, and we get rich flavors for cooking.

I have lots of pictures from May  that I am working on, and will put them up soon.