Post photo of your favorite perennial combinations, Part 2

Post photo of your favorite perennial combinations, Part 2

We came from here:

http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/1118192/

Cool. :)

Thanks. This is such a great topic, and it's my favorite thread. But it was getting way too long.

I like the contrast of the baptisia next to this barberry in my yard. Pic taken this morning.

Beautiful!

Great Picture!

Oh wow, when I enlarged it, the barberry looks like a mountain in the distance, away from the baptisia.. What a fabulous illusion!

My "plan" is to plant Baptisia australias with the perennial yellow snapdragon (A. braun-blanquitii) I am growing from seed this year. They both like full sun. I don't know if they will bloom together or not, as the yellow snapdragon will be new in my garden. I have the Baptisia on a berm, so I think the perennial snapdragon will do well.

I also started from seed Digitalis grandiflora that is a perennial yellow foxglove. I don't think it could handle that much sun.

Thanks, Donna, for starting a new "page". I guess I did just panic!

WarriorWisdomKathy: wanted to know what Penstemon grandiflorus was. Here's a picture:

http://www.morningskygreenery.com/product_info.php?products_id=630
Click on it to enlarge.

Great minds! I have both baptisia australis and digitalis grandiflora. I had several enormous baps at my old house. Now there is a plant you really have to leave behind. I was going to purchase them, but happily, a really great trader on DG had some, and received Heuchera Firefly from me (I grew what I intended to be three and got seven. And they divide easily. And rebloom. And come back year after year. I left them in their pots over the winter and they came out of dormancy like champs. They are already over a foot tall. I received a gift of digitalis grandiflora from a sweet person in exchange for allium christophii bulbs that had reseeded

Some of my very nicest plants have come from my fellow gardeners at Dave's.

Heuchera Firefly is a very pretty Heuchera. I bought Heuchera on the clearance rack at Lowe's last fall. They grew very well. Then, in the winter, the deer ate them down to the ground all you could see was a flat circle where the stem had been. I worried they would not return, but they all returned but one, and they are doing nicely. I would like to divide one of the other two so I could cover up that bare spot the Heuchera are edging. I thought I should wait until fall??

Birder -

I would do the divisions now so they have the season to grow before Fall and Winter, providing they have enough leaves on them. I think they will have a better chance that way.

Here is one of my favorite combos - Monarda Jacob Cline and Astrantia Major.

Penstemon 'Sweet Joanne', Baptisia 'Solar Flare', yellow Gaillardia, and Amsonia tabernaemontana.

This message was edited May 20, 2012 7:53 PM

birder17, That Penstemon grandiflorus was a real stunner. Thanks for posting a link.

Great pictures Carolyn and Clint.

Carolyn---is your monarda already blooming or is this from last summer? Gorgeous. My monarda is a late July/August bloomer.

Clint---purple and yellow is my favorite color combo in the garden.

The Penstemon grandiflorus looks great. I'm going to have to add some of that next year.

Pic 1) Pairing of two lupines
Pic 2) thyme mixed with kinnikinnick

Pics both taken this afternoon.

The monarda/astrantia combo is last Summer.

I always have had problems getting penstemon to grow - any secrets, Clint?

Kosk, Beautiful pictures! How do you get Lupines or kinikinnik to grow in zone 8?
I got a Monarda Grand Parade and it started blooming in April, might be an early bloomer don't know for sure.

Carolyn, thanks for sharing that red one. Monarda Jacob Cline is a real beauty! I will add one next year along with some of that Penstemon, hopefully Clint will give us some pointers. :)

This is a bloom on the 'Grand Parade'

Grand parade is great---I think it is also a shorter monarda? I put in 3 shorter monardas this year for fronts of beds.....I think they might be Grand Parade, but I'll have to check my records.

My zone 8 is deceptive. Zones are based on average low temps, but really Oregon is a Northern climate. The valley that stretches between the Coast range and the Cascade mountains (from Seattle down to Northern CA) is a maritime climate. This means for us that it rarely gets below 32 degrees in the winter (giving us that zone 8 status) but also summer times are relatively cool due to our summer night time temps. (Even when we have a stretch of 80-90 degree days, our nights are still very cool and the temps always drop to 50 by morning, even in August). If you get up early, open all of your windows, and then shut them by 10 am, it is possible to never need air conditioning. Our peak temperatures come at 4 pm. So to sum it up, we can pretty much grow anything here. Semi-tropicals all the way through Northern things. I feel like it is the perfect place to garden. A few aphids in the summer and a little powdery mildew/black spot are the only things I battle pest/disease-wise. The only negative is that the cool summer night temps mean our tomatoes don't taste as sweet.

We have typical Northern springs---I had a light frost 2 days ago, and today's temp is only going to reach 60, I believe. So that's why the lupines like it here. But very few things get killed in winter due to mild temps. For example, ceanothus does really well here.

Pic:
Centranthus ruber (yeah, kind of self sows like crazy, but I love it), some free irises that seeded themselves 20 feet from their parent plants (cool), and alchemilla. Pic taken yesterday.

kosk, Sounds like a great place to live! I am a little jealous. I found some new Lupines called Regalis Morello Cherry, First heard of them in a email from Annies Annuals. Could not afford to buy even two because they wanted 29.95 for shipping. Plan two, I ordered some seeds from Summer Hill. I am really hoping for the best. :)
I will give up if this don't work but either way I love the Baptisia, might use that instead. Love the kind you have do you know what it is?

Oh thanks. But I forgot to mention our many months of rain (Nov. thru April/May--this drives many people away from the Pacific NW bc they crave sunshine) plus the two months where we don't get a speck of rain (July/Aug)---requiring irrigation. So it's not perfect here. But as a gardener, I welcome the rain. We are coming off of 2 weeks of glorious sunshine (had to start irrigating, believe it or not), and we are getting a nice soaking rain today thank goodness. The plants are happy.

My baptisia is the 'Purple Smoke' variety. I bought 3 of those as 1 gallon plants last year locally. (they were really healthy plants from a really good garden store), and I am amazed at how large they are this year already.

You will have good success starting the lupines from seed. In my opinion, they are by far the easiest perennials to start from seed. Big seeds, fast growth. All of the lupines in my yard I started from seed. (Lupinus polyphyllus, Russell's Hybrids). I also started some Texas bluebonnets (lupinus texenis) and Lupinus elegans 'Dwarf Pink Fairy' this year. Easy from seed. Texas bluebonnets should do well in VA, right?

Pic: the power of purple. more lupine with Spanish lavender in the background. Pic from last week.

I've heard about the Pacific North Wet, "Enjoy Washington weather -- ten million slugs can't be wrong!" We were talking about it on another forum, the thread was about slugs but it really was not a real thread just a garden tip about how to get rid of them.

I hope the Lupines do good, there is one that is native. How can it be native if you never ever see any? The nights are not cool here, also it's very humid and I hear they really don't like that. I see plenty of days when I go to bed, it's still 85 and when I wake up it's only 75, oh gosh if it's that hot at 5 in the morning you know it will be a scorcher.

Love the Purple Smoke and I must check-out the 'Dwarf Pink Fairy' sounds beautiful. :)

LOL! I totally forgot about the slugs! Yes those are a big pest, too. I fed a huge monster (?like four inches long) to my chickens yesterday that I found in my greenhouse. The chickens fought over it.

WOW!! That is HUGE! LOL! That bad-boy could probably eat a Hosta in one night, you wake up and the thing is just gone, chewed to the soil. LOL!

Echinacea 'Merlot' with Agastache, Coreopsis, and Russian Sage. Echinacea ' Tomato Soup' is in the background too but it's so small!

Man, you leave this thread for several hours and boom--it's a lot longer--but I do enjoy reading and looking at all the pictures. Keep them coming!

virginia: Yes, I think the Pestemon grandaflorus is pretty. I have about a dozen that I have started from seed. I also have Penstemon cobaea blooming in my garden that I started from seed last year. I am surely enjoying it.

echinaceam: Ah, some of my favorite flowers. Pretty.

Here's my Penstemon cobaea with poppy and larkspur.

I like that and the popies do brighten things up! Do they bloom all summer?

Clint, maybe you should plant Echinacea 'Merlot' by it self, it really steals the show! Other plants? What other plants? :)

I know. When I divided that from the mother plant, I didn't think it would grow. It just looks so happy. LOL. The black stems are beautiful. I'd love to have a white Coneflower with black stems too.

Yes! Very cool and very different. Sigh :)

Allium schubertii and an artemesia

Jmorth, very cool! I love those "starburst" alliums. Like alien things that have descended to earth.

I love the starburst alliums too. They remind me of the fireworks on the 4th of July.

I love the combination both in color and in form of Clematis Durandii and Maltese Cross.

A crazy bundle of allium christophii, campanula Bernice, and lilium Rosepoint Lace.

These two plants were meant for each other. Echinacea 'Pow Wow Wild Berry' and Agastache 'Golden Jubilee.'

Purple Bee Balm, yellow Coreoptis, purple Salvia and white yarrow. The coreoptis spread out on it's own to frame the bee balm. I love the effect it gives!!

Like that one!

Those are just beautiful. :)

Beautiful Pepper and Echinaceamaniac! Pepper---do you know what variety of bee balm that is? I like the height, color, etc

The monarda is Prairie Gypsy. I had to dig around to find the tag. Got buzzed for it but luckily not stung. lol

Thank you! Very sweet of you to check for me. Prairie gypsy is a beauty!

These are two of my favorites. Queen of the Prairie and Monarda Blue Stocking and Joe Pye and Valerian.

Nice photos everyone; wellcome back spring.