A hint of autumn
Prairie grasses along the fence are beginning to head out, which always feels like fall to me. We have Indian grass, Big Bluestem, Little Blue, Side Oats Gramma and Switchgrass. New last year is the beautiful Dallas Blues (left) that has a gorgeous purple-blue cast to it.
Butterflies and bumblebees and bugs, oh my!
The Blue Mist Spirea is the most amazing shade of blue now, and teeming with butterflies and bees. Dozens, if not hundreds. (Click to enlarge the photo and see for yourself!) You can hear the buzz from several feet away. Yet when I water and fill the birdbath, the bees pay no attention ... too busy sucking that sweet nectar apparently. 
Jury is still out on Gazanias
I have mixed emotions about the Gazania Spendens we planted in pots this year. When the sun is bright and they are open they are stunning, but with our deck on the west side of the house, we mostly enjoy time out there in the morning and evening when the Gazanias are sleeping. And sadly, the foliage of these daisy-like flowers looks a bit too much like dandelion leaves for my taste.
UPDATE:
Now that mornings and evenings are cooler and we're able to spend more time outside, I've decided I really like Gazanias! They're bright and cheery.
Liatris finally blooms, September 2009!
A friend gave us this Liatris plant from his pasture two or three years ago. It bloomed this month, early in September, for the very first time! Pretty purple flowers wave above feathery stems, demonstrating the plant's nickname, gayfeather. It looks perfect nestled among the False Sunflowers.
Blue Mist Spirea gives a show
August is winding down, but the garden is still wild with color. The Blue Mist Spirea is one of our favorites in the spot we call the Arbor Garden. This plant attracts butterflies and bees like crazy and the blue flowers add a new touch of color to our mostly-shades-of-red-and-yellow garden. In past years the blooms haven't come on until mid-September to early October, but we're not complaining about it being early!
A day for front-porch sittin'
It's rare that it rains in August, but when it's as gentle and pretty a rain as this one was, we have the perfect front-porch, front-row seats. And our holey-rock water feature is entertainment enough.
Help with the garden chores!
Our little grandsons were here for a few days and they were a BIG help in the garden. Well... maybe a few things got pruned that didn't really need pruning, and maybe a few Dahlberg daisies got squished with tiny toes, but this is who the garden was made for and we had a blast! It's awfully quiet out here now that they've gone home.
A pinch here, a pinch there
My mother-in-law had a pot of some gorgeous variety of sedum and I brought a couple snips home hoping to get them started in our rock garden. I tried to get them to root in water first, but finally gave up and just stuck the cuttings in the dirt in a bare spot on the hill. A few weeks later, late July, voila!
I couldn't believe how they had spread! The waxy bright green leaves and magenta blooms mix nicely with the Speedwell and the other sedum varieties growing on the hill. And I love the way it has spread onto the rock border. What I don't love is that moments after I took this photo (after a half-hour weeding session, no less!) I noticed that pesky jagged-edged weed (see inset) peeking out from under the sedum. This weed is our most hated among weeds: dock. I can't believe I'm even allowing it face time on this blog. Just know that it died a violent death by my own hand! ; )
The lay of the land
A few long range views of the back yard. It's not until we walk along the fence (in search of weeds) and look back at the house that I realize how big our yard is. We've had some wonderfully pleasant days recently, with highs only in the 80s and record cool nights in the upper 50s and 60s...very unusual for mid-July!
Dahlberg Daisies are back
One little pot of these plucky Dahlberg Daisies has kept us in flowers for at least three years now. They apparently seed themselves, and each spring since we bought our first pot full, they've popped up between the flagstone pavers. We don't like weeds growing between the stones, but these are too pretty to take out. Each clump grows from one root and now that we know how prolific they are, once they quit blooming they're "outta here"...well, at least until next year.
Cart full of Coleus
Did I mention how pleased I am with the way our pots of Coleus have turned out? (Okay, I know I did, but they just keep getting better!) I think this colorful mix looks especially beautiful spilling over the garden cart my dad built for us as a housewarming gift four years ago. The plants seem to be thriving here in front of the house with morning sun and late afternoon shade.
4th of July blooms
Tomorrow is the 4th of July and the garden is wild! We are finally seeing the Coneflowers appear, but they are mostly hiding behind False Sunflower (Heliopsis helianthoides) and masses of Wild Bergamot (some people call it bee balm). We've spent the last three mornings weeding! The mornings have been so pleasant we really haven't minded being outside, but the weeds do seem more prolific than usual this year. Of course my farmer dad thinks a lot of the plants and flowers in our garden are weeds!
Kansas sunsets
Kansas has some of the most beautiful sunrises and sunsets I've ever seen, but they are so difficult to capture on film that we are rarely able to share them via photos. These pictures come as close as any I've ever shot to capturing the breathtaking colors and the sense of calm a Kansas sunset inspires.
[As always, click on any photo for a larger image.]
Butterfly Milkweed is blooming
The Butterfly Milkweed has popped open, leaving bright orange spots in three places along the fence. It looks especially nice nestled between the False Sunflower and white Yarrow.
Smoky Hills Success
This is the Smoky Hills plant we moved from Rock Garden Hill. It seems to love its new home in the entry garden where it receives nice morning sun, but shade in the late afternoon.
Garden failures
For a couple of beginners, we've been fortunate that our plants have done so well, but we'd be less than honest not to tell you about some of our failures:
Smoky Hills. This pretty purple-bloomed plant (along the base of Rock Hill Garden) captured our hearts when we saw it at the arboretum plant sale. Ken grew up in the Smoky Hills of Kansas, so of course we had to have some! But something about this spot didn't agree with our Smoky Hills (too much afternoon sun?) and it died. Fortunately, we were able to transplant one plant to the flowerbed at the entryway, and it is thriving.
Moonlight Broom. For reasons unknown, this beautiful, unique plant only lasted three years in our garden before giving up the ghost this spring. We held out hope, until early June when we finally dug out the shriveled root. 
Blue Dune Lyme Grass. Its blue hue contrasted beautifully with the lawn. The first year it was mild mannered, but after that, it tried to take over our world (the label warned us, but we turned a blind eye.) Finally this year we got aggressive and fought back with Roundup. It would be a great plant to fill in a large, contained area, but not here, where we prefer to see Catmint and Rose of Sharon thrive.
We've had some other wildflowers that bloomed beautifully one year and didn't come back (Cornflower, Coneflower and Coreopsis...hmmm...all the "C" plants?) and others that we planted that never showed up (New England Aster, Lupine and Stiff Goldenrod). But Cupflower, Butterfly Milkweed, Wooly Verbena, Yarrow, Columbine, Spiked Gayfeather (Liatris) and a host of others return faithfully each year.
Coleus: a good decision
We're so happy with the way the coleus pots are turning out! Every bit as colorful as any flowers we could have planted, and always in bloom, much easier to care for and we can bring some of them inside this fall for cheery color throughout most of the winter. And to fill all these pots, we spent under $14! To see these pots when we first planted them, click here.
June garden
Early June and the garden is on the verge of peaking. The flower pots are filling out, the Carefree Delight roses are a riot of pink against the back of the garage, and the wildflowers along the fence are beginning to bloom. It's a joy to spend mornings and evenings out here, but the hot afternoon sun makes the backyard off limits to everyone but the cats.
Harvesting roses
I forgot what a treat it is to have roses to cut and arrange on a whim. They make the house so cheery!
Celebrating a new tree
A new tree is always cause for celebration here, even though our reason this time is bittersweet. An ash tree that was here when we moved in succumbed to ash borers. It's always sad to lose a tree, but we chose a beautiful lacebark elm (Siberian Elm) to replace it. Because the trunk has a crook in it, and some damage from deer, we got a great deal, but the tree farm planted the tree for us and assured us the elm would survive both flaws. We think it has great character because of those flaws. Here's a before-during-after shot. (As always, click on the photo to enlarge.)
Moments after I first posted, I looked out to see that a fat robin had adopted our tree. Doesn't he look pretty perched there?
Subscribe to:
Posts
(
Atom
)
