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Old Fashioned Flower Surprises
We bought an old cottage with long-neglected flower beds and every spring there are new rewards from old bulbs and tubers. |
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Old Fashioned Flower Surprises
We bought an old cottage with long-neglected flower beds and every spring there are new rewards from old bulbs and tubers. |
The hummingbirds really go for this. We planted some by our front porch and we have little visitors every morning all summer.
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I like this one — it looks all scattered and disorganized, just like me.
You should see my little cubbyhole home office! The location of (almost) everything has been carefully memorized;-)
Good luck. Take good care too. Tell S I said hey too. I am really enjoying the pictures of everyone here. Thanks for sharing yours with us.
These had almost given up. I cleaned out the competing weeds and fed them. The next year, we had several happy blooms.
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These are actually small trees that bloom like this for several weeks. They take hardly any care at all. The disadvantage of these is, they spread like crazy and can become a nuisance.
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Hibiscus makes it through the winter? In Indiana?
There are many varieties that seem to do quite well around here despite the cold winters (although that may be changing).
This looks like one of the H. moscheutos we have in our garden as well… I just love these plants and would be delighted if they spread faster… but maybe if I quit collecting the seeds and giving them away they might? Looks like you have one of the “Disco Belle” varieties here, always lovely!
I’d say you folks got a great inheritance with your house! Glad you set about saving it for posterity … that’s what good gardeners do, eh?
There are some gorgeous miniature iris that almost look like orchids that bloomed this year for the first time. I’ve got to get some photos of them next summer.
This particular lily is a double bloom. Its also one of the favorites on the deer menu here. The first year they budded, I was dismayed one morning to find all the buds nipped off neatly just before they were to open.
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These come back every year and require almost no care at all. On the left is a sprig of catnip and the feathery looking thing in the background is fennel. It has a licorice odor.
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Pretty and tasty!
We plant these annuals every spring and they provide us with garden color and cut flowers for the house all summer long.
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Not to be too parochial, but, don’t you have some campaigning to do. 🙂
I hate it when I hit post before I’m ready to.
I didn’t mention that I’d enjoyed all of your diaries. In this one the bee balm is my favorite. It looks like a flower I found springing up in our woods at the end of the summer that I’d never noticed before (Thanks, Olivia.) called horse mint. I wonder if they are related.
Now back to your campaigning! 😉
I’m not familiar with horse mint, but bee balm (monarda didyma) is a mint, just one of the more flashy bloomers. If what you have in the woods is pink, I’d be willing to be it’s the wild variety of monarda. As ID said, it attracts hummingbirds by the droves, so if it’s monarda, let it have all the space it wants!
We have both a white and pink varieties. Here’s a shot of one.
It does look as if it could be related, doesn’t it? Sort of like a deranged clover blossom;-)
The flower is less full than the cultivated varieties, but no mistaking that one! If you check the stems, you’ll find they’re squarish, which is typical of all mints (including such ones you might not know such as Coleus).
I’d be curious to know what the foliage smells like when you rub it … the garden varieties have different scents … the red tends to smell citrusy, while the purple has a vague chocolaty scent. I suspect this one might not be as pleasant, but I haven’t seen enough of it up close in the wild to see for myself.
If you like it Jim, you can easily propagate tons of it by digging up small clumps in the spring and transplanting to where you’d like it to take over. Divide often and share is our philosophy on this stuff. Lovely, tough, and pretty low maintenance.
Thanks, Jim. Actually I’ve been dashing out between postings. Just returned a short while ago. One of these days, I’ll rest!