Color Echoes V-Autumn Sing now of lusty fruits and flowers!

Yes, Perennial Planters, it's that time of the year of fiery foliage and lusty fruits and joyful flowers, so says Robert Blake in his poem...

http://quotations.about.com/od/poemlyrics/a/blakepoem20.htm

so we should be able to identify some interesting 'colorations' to 'trill our hearts and brighten our cheeks' and put down in our notebooks for next year's September garden scheme.

Right now, I'm especially interested in perennials planted with fruits and vegetables that carry through a color theme. Of course, I don't have any in my own garden, but only dream of it...anyone else, though? Here's the French Gardener's link to edible flowers which fascinated me

http://www.frenchgardening.com/aupotager.tmpl?SKU=3109799473273765

and then her Potager essay that has lots of color schemed pics that sent my imagination into action. http://www.frenchgardening.com/aupotager.tmpl

I'm not sure I'm so joyful about Autumn being just around the corner, but we are in for some fabulous color echoes in the next few weeks, and I do look forward to those pics posted on this thread...in the meantime I'm going out to get some purpley kales for a start into the new season! So everyone's welcome to post away--and we look forward to lots of new ideas!

(I you like, check out our first four threads for some interesting 'Color Echo' ideas (a la the author Pam Harper) for next year's summer garden planning http://davesgarden.com/forums/t/536597/ Lots of good ideas here, I think!)

A container from Inniswood Metro Gardens, August 20.

Yes! Another whole page of idea-sharing to come. Must get out the camera....

No fruits or veggies yet, but this is blooming today:

Phlox 'Kirmeslander' with an unknown magenta Phlox

Gorgeous! What's the colorful doohickie by the marker in the pot? I know I should know the name, but I don't.

Beautiful phlox!

was picking seeds for my fall vegetable garden and noticed some echoes.

Now there is a lovely, earthy palette.

I second that!

Good eye!

I love these threads, such inspiration. I like that phlox combination!

Moby, are you talking about the Petra (croton)?

Rachel

Yes!! Thank you!

These are hardly lusty yet, but I'm really looking forward to seeing this combo next year. I just started getting my co-op heucheras and tiarellas in the ground, now that I think I know which ones are going to make it. The Japanese Painted Fern and Heuchera 'Geisha's Fan' are quite echo-ey, I think. These threads inspired me to just walk around with the pots to see what combo I liked most. Such a big change from my usual degree of prior planning. Thanks, everybody who's contributed so much here.

those are great mickgene. I wish heucheras, et al loved houston, they don't

What a shame, vossner. Not even in pots? I had one in a half-barrel planter last summer that propelled me to get more. There are so many new lovely colors varieties, I'm just getting into them. I've had only Palace Purple until this year.

yep. they're probably OK up to z8. Our nurseries do sell them, fresh from somewhere up north and people buy them like crazy, but it's not long before they peter out. Palace Purple which I think is one the the hardiest is what is sold here, and even that one, just got smaller and smaller on me.

thanks goodness for internet pic, at least I can still enjoy them that way! LOL

For you, vossner!

How's this for lusty fruit! LOL

and some joyful flowers

Autumn coloured Heuchera "Marmalade"

Sanannie..what a beautiful collection of Heuchera you have.

thank you, thank you, thank you

Delish!

i think those are THE lusty fruit. garden of eden special, anyone?

What a beautiful phlox picture, Sanannie! And I love the seeds pic, Naien. Looks like a poster.

naien, they do look THAT tempting, don't they! My mouth waters when I look at that pic!

What kind of luscious apples are those, starzz? They are sooo beautiful...can't resist....must have them....aaaaaahhhh!

Those are Ida Red apples..they won't be ready for a couple of weeks yet.
The apple trees are loaded..and they are organic..I don't spray or prune except when the limbs are in the way...the
trees are the "bones" of my Secret Garden..an old stand of about 50 trees..half of them spys for cooking and the other half Ida Reds for eating. This is a bumper crop this year and I don't know why. Lst year there were very few. I just let friends and family come over to pick what they want.

This is a photo of when the trees were in bloom.

Glad you all enjoyed my "Lusty apples"

What a beautiful orchard. Oh to be sitting in it!!!!! Are there mosquitos there this time of year? This time of evening they are to be bad to be out.

Thank you. I love to wander there in the mornings and sometimes I get a bite then....but really the mosquitos aren't too bad here. I think because there is a commercial apple orchard across the road from me and they spray their apples frequently.

Oh Starzz, that setting is so magical looking! Like a fairy realm; I love it. It brings back memories of when I was a child. I loved to play under the apple trees when they bloomed. With every breeze pink and white confetti of petals were everywhere. Thanks for sharing, Neal.

Starzz, what a lovely place to be able to wander in!

Thank you both for your lovely comments.
It is my special place that I have been working on for 7 years now.

Here is another view including part of the "daylily walk"

Oh, I love Ida Reds! They are my favorite along with Cortlands. Not too sweet, not too tart. Tangy. I get them every year at the orchard up on the hill about 20 miles from where we live.

Starzz- you make me want to plant apples! It really is a beautiful orchard. Do you have any secrets for growing beautiful hole free apples? My MIL has an apple tree that drops rotten fruit all summer long.

Starzz, it is absolutely beautiful! What a lucky gardener you are!

Sanannie, mickgene and starzz - all fabulous work. The one picture still on my mind is that orchard in springtime. I'd never get any work done - just sit and enjoy the view. The phlox photo is stunning. Great work.

We have had a bumper crop of apples this year -- these are very old trees and unmaintained so the apples aren't the greatest (good for a couple of pies!) but the view in the spring is fabulous -- this is a picture I took this spring ...

That IS a lovely view.

Thanks Pirl..wish you were all close enough to come and enjoy it with me.

Ivy1..no secret I just let them grow..and they sure surpried me this year. Last year they were terrible..who knows how Mother nature works.
Pixydish..thanks..I do feel lucky.


Crokny..very pretty! Isn't it unusual this year to have such a crop.
This year they are good apples.Mine are unmaintained too. The trees sure get huge when you don't prune them.

Cheers,
Carol

You should see the pear tree! Very large tree, very small pears (but tasty) ...

Starzz--you are too funny with your 'lusty' fruit and 'joyful' flowers, but your fruit and flower bouquet pics are exactly what Blake was talking about in his poem, I think! Beautiful secret garden and daylily walk...a garden to dream on!

So I definitely need some 'so round and full' apples or pears from beautiful trees like yours and crockny's to add some character to my garden. I've been watching an espaliered pear at the nursery near us--waiting for a the fall sale...it's getting pretty late, though, and I'm giving up hope on getting it for half off...want to plant it on a mottled brick wall behind some Oakleaf hydrangeas, heucheras and verbascum...mmm...for a little late summer color echo-ing, you know...better get to it, if I want to make it happen!

crockny--your new york apple orchard garden pic is splendid! I visit my sis in Cooperstown several times a year, and your pic is so representative of the beautiful gardens and views in that area...where is Kerhonkson? Catskills, maybe? The name sound a little rumplestiltskin-ish...

Sanannie--love your collage of the coral bells...really a good reference for the learner like me who can't tell them apart! No wonder you are so good at color echoing if you keep photo references like that!

Voss--I can bear to part with one of my purple palaces, if you want it in thanks for the daylily you sent me...

Happy gardening this weekend, everybody...t.