Pics from June 9-10

Here are some from my place -- First up POPPIES!! My first year with them.

The is one from 'Falling in Love' a Coral picotee mix from Burpee.

Here's another, brighter one

And here they are in the garden

Here is Lilium Regale album -- Very fragrant.

This is the edge of the patio. Annual Iberis and Tidal Wave Silver Petunia. Both from seed. I htink the Iberis was wintersown

This is Lilium 'Manhatten' -- the ony upright Asiatic I really like.

Texas Bluebonnet -- wintersowed seed, but not very good germination. I only got 2 live plants out of the deal.

This is Eremurus. It is the Springfield Hybrids or Shelbourne Hybrids from Idaho -- something like that, from B&B. I like them because they are not 7 or 8 feet tall.

Caladium that I wintered over.

Front sidewalk..but this is the side entrance to the front sidewalk, not the main one. Petunia Dolchissima Flambe or one of those from Park's -- I like it, but not as much as I liked the picture in the catalog :) and Pansies that were wintered over form last fall.

Lovely!!!
:)

Susan

Wow! You are really getting the cottage look this year. The poppies are fantastic. I failed at them once more with only one I like blooming. I really like the annual Iberis. Let me know how long they bloom for you. Why don't you post the pick of Manhatten on the lily forum. Nice shot.

susan

I love those foxtail lilies. Do they need full sun? How tall do they get? BTW Great job over-wintering the caladiums, I need to try them but I don't want to throw them out at summer's end either.

Pretty plantings with the poppies Illoquin. Is that swiss chard I see in the 3rd photo? I really like the eremurus, how tall does it get?

PGZ5 - When I said overwintered, I just meant I dug them up after the frost, removed the foliage and stuck them in a paper sack in the basement. Then when the sun gets higher in the sky, about Apr 1, I put them in a flat and water once only until they come up. They alternate a garden space with pansies which have the exact opposite schedule. The variety I am growing is very common, but if you do just a little research on Caladiums, you can find which ones take a good long while to come up and which ones come up almost as soon as you put them inthe flat. I like the second kind because there are fewer things that can go haywire. :) (The ones that take a good long while are still just rolled up arrows, not expanded leaves)

Susan, I didn't realize what a mess that photo was. I was actuallyin the midle of the garden shooting across it. If ou view if from the front (or back) it looks a little more organized. poppies go dormant and I'm hoping the maigolds yo seed behind will fill in the spaces.

SemperV - Yes, It's Swiss Chard. Why? Now that's a good question you ask! I had grand visions of a totally RED BED full of annuals. I diligently sowed a million red annuals, but I fell quite short beause there is more square footage there than I realized. I augmented with ones from the garden center, but by the time I finished planting mine out, the pickin's were slim. I got the requisite red petunias and red salvia, but then I saw the stems on the Swiss Chard, and thought, "Close enuf!" Now we are in a drought and the seedlings that were direct sown are severely stressed, so I'm not real sure what it will end up looking like.

Probably more than all of you wanted to hear,
Suzy

Illoquin,
Nice idea of a red bed, too bad about the drought. When you plant a single color bed are you strictly limiting it to the one color or do you add a secondary or complimentary color? I asked about the chard because I like to inter plant flowers with vegetables and herbs. The chard, particularly "Bright Lights", is frequently mentioned in articles as being very showy. I bought 2 plants to try but they seem overwhelmed by the self seeded hardneck garlic and red Russian kale. I thinned the kale yesterday and stuck it in a pitcher of water to cook later and realized the leaves look very decorative in a vase.

The idea was all red and only red...but it could be anything from maroon to scarlet. I saw a photo of this done mostly with perennials and it was stunning. Unfortunately, I forgot to sow some of the seeds that need hot weather, and one of those was Castor Bean which takes up a lot of room.

The reality is this: I bought seeds of a named variety of Alonsoa meridionalis (The Rebel) which was supposed to be all red, but half of them are sort of peach. I bought a red Mimulus from Annies Annuals and it was peach. I sowed red Nasturtiums (commercial seed) and they are orange. I also bought seeds of a Dahlia called Bishops Children, which is 90% red, and the first one blooming is pink/magenta. The biggest problem was I forgot it was going to be my red bed and sowed seeds of a coral poppy -- they came up everywhere! Then, because of not getting those large Castor Beans and some large Red Benary's Zinnias sown in time, I didn't have enough plants and just gave up at one end and stuck all my odds and ends there. The result is awful. LOL. Maybe when the poppies finish and I pull them out it will look better, but I doubt it. I'll take a photo later today so you can see.

I think the red bed idea with perennials might be easier to accomplish than it was with annuals, but I can't have perennials growing in this bed because of the daffodils which have to have full sun and be dug & divided on a 3 year rotation.

Suzy

Oh suzy, I love hearing about the thought process behind the results, so don't stop telling it. I think sometimes that helps us get the results we wanted, if you know what led you there in the first place, if that makes sense? I think sempervirens is onto something. I really like chartreuse foliage plants beside red blooms. And burgundy plants with yellows. It is probably easier to do a garden with more than one color at any rate, so props to you for even trying! You could try red, white and blue, or red and yellow. A friend of mine is doing red and white, it looks pretty cool. She has petunias, million bells, and pentas I think.

Sure would be nice if your gardens would learn to turn out as we imagine them. I planted a number of hot pink Sonata cosmos this year that turned out to bright orange and gold shortr cosmos. Will have some interesting coor combos this year.

LOL ==> Sempevirens.... well, if we can use cabbage and kale in our flower beds, I guess there's nothing wrong with them being in vases, as well!

Lincoolnitess, That's too bad, but it's sort of funny, too. I have a couple of pale pink roses I forgot about and put oranges and browns next to them. 2 are your chrysanthemums which have to be pinched back again! Speaking of chrysanthemums, I thought of you yesterday and went ahead and spent $10.00 on a semi double daisy potted mum with a yellow button, and bicolored petals (white center and pinky-purple outer petals). I stripped it down to nothing and have a lot of cuttings going which I hope to share along about July 25th.

Semper & PC --> Broccoli has a nice bloom, seriously, but the stalk is VERY thick (as thick as a stem of broccoli!) . LOL!

Suzy

I was amazed at the bloom on okra - I never realized it was the same family as Hibiscus, lol... sorry, not the best bloom to show off, but that gives you an idea...

Squash has pretty blossoms too. :-)

That okra blossom is pretty -- and the leaves have a little splash of red where the petiole meets the leaf? Nice!

Suzy

Oh, and cotton has the same.... lol.

I'm just catching up with this thread... wonderful blooms!

I've used 'Bright Lights' chard and even burgundy lettuce as border plantings in a landscape bed... worked out pretty well, and the bunnies tended to stick to the edges of the bed and not go rampaging through the other flowers, LOL.

Suzy, I love the caladium in your photo... I'm wondering if you know what kind it is? I got chatting with Bill (Caladiums4less) in the chat room last night and discovered that, contrary to what I thought, there do exist sun loving caladiums... woohoooo!... I'm particularly looking at 'Galaxy'... check out this photo on his website... I thought it looked quite similar to the caladium in your June 10 photo.

Edited to remove the nonworking link... I can't get the link to go through either, but here's the link to Bill's site, http://www.caladiumbulbs4less.com Look under "rare" to find 'Galaxy'.

In any case, I'm glad to know what yours is also, as I agree about the usefulness of varieties that spring right up!

This message was edited Jun 20, 2007 1:02 PM

I can't get your link to work right this second, but I think mine is Florida Fantasy. For sure it's not Galaxy.

Suzy, I edited my post above... check out 'Galaxy'... sure does look a lot like 'Florida Fantasy' to me, but then I'm new to caladiums, so it's probably like folks who think all pink-blooming african violets look alike, LOL.

Beautiful blooms, Illoquin! Those Texas bluebonnets are VERY picky; you have to have had just the right amount of rain the spring before for them to bloom, and they do NOT like wet feet. At all. They've already come and gone down here. (sigh.)

I've never seen an okra bloom before. It's very pretty as are the squash flowers. Last year I had cantaloupe vines growing in the flower garden from the compost I used.
This year I have a lot of garlic that self seeded.

I have a pumpkin that volunteered. It came up from where the compost pile had been, and is already ready to be baked and frozen and ready for Thanksgiving. Can't believe I did an autumn harvest in June!

I just put in some okra to grow over a cattle panel arch; I'll post pics if it works.

I'll give you a hint about the vegetable (actually, you bein' a Suthren' gal, you probably know) they are *so* much better eaten directly off of the plant, no bigger than your thumb.

Sorry, back to your regularly scheduled thread!

Hope your blooms don't get as bruised up as mine were! Brigid, do you have a type that vines? Mine were bushy, about 3' tall.

Pagancat, I honestly don't know! I just got 3 pots of it from W/M and stuck it in the ground. I'd like it to climb the arch, but I'll fry it up either way. yum.

Ah, see - you *are* from the south! Everything is better when fried.

I can attest to that, and I'm not *from* the south! Hehe. But I have been there, does that count?

I figure, brigidlily's okra will climb up over the arch, cause everything's bigger in Texas! *wink* ;0)

Darn tootin'!

There ya have it!

The rose colored yarrow has kindly decided to volunteer next to the penstemons lovely maroon seed heads. Too bad the balloon flowers are only in bud.

Illoquin, please don't give up on the bluebonnets. A few seeds will come up in one year, but normally, they take two. So you should see better results next year. And I hope you do! They are soooooooo lovely.

Semper -- IO didn't know Penstemon had seed heads! Thise are great looking!

Tx Lady, No, of course I won't give up on them! I have 2 more blooming, so hopefully will have more seeds. You know how it goes in those trades/swaps....you get the number of seeds you get, and sometimes it's a handful and sometimes it's just a few. They look happy as clams, and I know they are in a place with good drainage, although I'm not sure they get enoough sun. I was so excited to find out from the DG Plant files that they are hardy to -30 !!! I assumed they were perennials, and then I re read the information and saw the entry that they were ANNUALS! LOL!

I'm going to leave the seeds in place and see if they will naturalize for me.

Suzy