Sometimes you just want to sit down and *admire* the hard work you’ve put in. A potpourri from commentor SkyBluePink, headed ‘Flower addiction in full bloom’…
Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Deck FlowersPost + Comments (36)
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Sometimes you just want to sit down and *admire* the hard work you’ve put in. A potpourri from commentor SkyBluePink, headed ‘Flower addiction in full bloom’…
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What’s going on in your garden(s), this week?
Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Deck FlowersPost + Comments (36)
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Thank you, ace photographer Ema:
Did you know that tulips come in a variety of shapes?
I didn’t, until a spring visit to the Brooklyn Botanical Garden. We were there to see the cherry trees and yellow magnolias when we came across rows and rows of lovely tulips.
Here is a sample. Which one is your favorite? (For me, it’s a tie between the Yellow Pomponette and the Blue Spectacle because they both look so unlike my idea of a “regular” tulip):
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Send me pictures, people! Surely there are some harvest photos now — from your local farmers market, if not your own gardens?
What’s going on in your gardens, this week?
Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Tulip TypingPost + Comments (28)
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From our own beloved master gardener Satby:
I went big on lilies and gladioli this year, so I have a couple of new pictures of the lilies. Glads aren’t open yet.
First, a few daylilies. They came in a mixed bag, so I don’t know the variety names.
Next, a couple of Asiatic lilies.
This maroon and orange one is called Forever Susan, and it goes well with my coneflowers.
My neighbor gifted me two calla lily bulbs, and wow, four colors from just two bulbs!
Finally cannas, so far I have an orange, a red, and a coral one flowering, but I have 7 more not ready to bloom yet.
Bonus cherry tomato next to the red canna.
The cannas and calla lilies are in pots or grow bags to make it easier to dig them out and store over winter.
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We’re having a *good* tomato year, here north of Boston. We’re now picking a steady supply of full-sized ripe tomatoes, and a handful or two of cherrys just about every day, from a total of ten rootpouches. There’s been the usual blights, both yellow & wilting — some of the plants look like lollipops where I’ve removed the infected lower leaves — but they’re still bravely flowering and fruiting.
The one new variety I tried this year, Black Bear, is very highly rated by my supertaster Spousal Unit for flavor on a burger (his favorite use) or a sandwich. The plant started setting fruit early — although they took their sweet time ripening! — and it’s been productive for us. I got our plant from Laurel’s Heirlooms, but this is a good description from Heritage Seed Market:
“Black Bear” is a large purple beefsteak from Russia with a rather convoluted history of how it may have originally come from a variety called Negrityonok, but underwent a name change due to a feeling that the translation was racially inappropriate. Black Bear is, however, a much larger tomato than the original Negrityonok, so it is also felt that these two varieties are not the same.
I have to agree with the reviews I found…this is one delicious purple tomato. There is thick smooth flesh and lots of juice. But it did not like the heat and humidity in my garden and had very low production of fruits…or so I thought the first time I grew it. This spring I was able to set it out earlier and the productivity was excellent.
What’s going on in your gardens, this week?
Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Summer FlarePost + Comments (33)
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Another fine set from commentor HinTN:
On our way to the Grand Canyon, Mrs H and I stopped for four nights in Moab. We had been there before but chose some new places to explore. First up was a jeep trip up to Hurrah Pass. There weren’t a lot of wildflowers that caught my eye, but the landscape itself was amazing.
We did see this interesting bit of color along the way. It’s the seed versus the flower but so it goes.
Along the way there was Gooney Bird rock.
The day after the excursion to Hurrah Pass we went rafting on the Colorado River. No photos from that wonderfully wet day. 😎 However, the third day we ventured south of Moab to a section of Canyonlands NP that we had only seen from the rim at Island in the Sky (and Dead Horse Point SP). We saw these red fleurs in the way down.
The Needles is accessed by driving through the Bears Ears National Monument. Immediately upon entering Bears Ears, the road descends into an oasis of green which lines a small creek. Just at the bottom is the Newspaper Rock State Historical Monument. These guys were growing right in front of the “newspaper”.
Here are close up shots of the fleurs at the newspaper, which was pretty interesting (I’ll reserve the full frontal for an On the Road post, if I can ever pull that together).
Here’s one more that we saw in the Bears Ears area before heading out into the expanse beyond the wetland/drainage.
You drive through quite a bit of striking country that is a mix of untended land and irrigated farmland before you arrive at the Needles section of Canyonlands NP. Both sides of the road were meadows of what turned out to be smallish sunflowers.
The ranger staffing the entrance booth said this was the first bloom of such size in his memory. He attributed to the excess of snow the preceding winter.
After we spent time wandering around in the Needles section (possible OTR post), we headed further south to visit the Edge of the Cedars State Park Museum in Blanding. On the way we stopped for a wonderful lunch at the High Desert Cafe in Monticello.
The Cedars is on the site of a partially excavated, archeologically speaking, village. They allowed unescorted access to the kiva, which was a wonderful experience. There is a garden off to the side of the entrance with this bit of whimsy.
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What’s going on in your garden(s), this week?
Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Moab Area WildflowersPost + Comments (24)
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I have become interested in native plants and I’m trying to add only natives from now on, preferably Oklahoma natives. I’ve mostly done that so far by buying native perennial seeds whenever I see them in the local stores, but that strategy has run its course because there aren’t that many widely available. This fall I will be planting seeds I ordered online.
All the flowers in these pictures are native except for the cypress vine, which is from Mexico and S. America. (It can also be invasive, BTW.)
The red sunflower in the top pic is Velvet Queen. I don’t know what the yellow one is but I thought it looked interesting.
Black-eyed Susan (rudbeckia hirta). The rudbeckia was a little surprise that I had forgotten I planted this spring, but it doesn’t match the variety on the seed packet, so I’m not sure what it is.
The red Cypress Vine is just starting to bloom. It’s a morning glory relative that reseeds itself every year.
Mealycup sage (salvia farinacea). The salvias have been growing in my garden for years and they are extremely attractive to all sorts of bees.
I think the bumblebees love hibiscus because they get to sit down to eat. They also sleep inside the flowers when they close in the afternoons.
This is a new tomato for me called Burgundy Traveler — it has been extremely productive so far.
I wish my neighbor who loved cucumbers hadn’t moved away this year.
I tried to grow catnip from seed sown outdoors last year, but the cats found them and destroyed them at the seedling stage. So when I saw this sickly looking rootbound plant on the clearance table, I decided to try one more time. This time I was able to nurse the plant back to health before the cats found it, although you wouldn’t know that by looking at it now.
This cat is Pierre. The insanely overgrown rootball turned out to be protective, because I’m sure without that they would have pulled it out of the pot.
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I know it’s a busy season for us gardeners, but — Send me more photos, people!
We finally got our first ripe full-sized tomatoes this week! A full-sized Momotaro Gold (highly recommended for flavor), and a couple of Cherokee Purples (predictably among the first and last producers every year). Lots of green globes swelling nicely…
What’s going on in your garden(s), this week?
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Amazing travel pics from commentor HinTN:
Mrs H and I spent four nights in late June at the South Rim of the Grand Canyon and saw some wonderful wildflowers to go with the vistas of the canyon. Any commenters that can identify them please chime in.
These next two had the same color but were in very different places.
Here are two lovely but very different red flowers.
Here’s a yellow beauty. And then…
…A sorta matching golden light from the setting sun outlining this tree clinging to the edge of the canyon.
Finally, we walked the Trail of Time, which is 1.4 miles along the Canyon Rim that is marked off in geologic time, displaying the rocks and layers from bottom to top with samples strategically placed along the trail. If you begin at the “beginning” it ends at the geology museum. We were there for the full moon.
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What’s going on in your garden(s), this week?
Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Grand Canyon WildflowersPost + Comments (35)
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Thanks, once again, to commentor Glidwrith for these photos from their lunchtime rambles:
Top photo: These are pretty ubiquitous, sort of a California daisy.
Also fairly common, still don’t know its name.
Someone planted multi colored kale. I was surprised that they sprouted bright yellow flowers.
Last one, the ever present bird of paradise.
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Some of these are distinctly Dr. Seussian!
What’s going on in your gardens, this week?
Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Further SerendipityPost + Comments (38)