Background Switcher (Hidden)

The Ongoing Garden Tour

Tuesday, September 6, 2011

 I can already feel summer slipping away, see it in the yellowing leaves and hear it in the tree crickets and the mournful kowp of the cuckoo. So I've saved it here, and I'm enjoying going through blossoms present and past and sharing them with you. Here's Rose of Sharon "Satin Blue," much the finest Rose of Sharon I've seen. Great big glorious blue flowers, shiny big dark green leaves. Its breeder seems to have conquered the spindliness that makes so many older Rose of Sharons look ungainly and out of place.


I miss the snow peas already. I got a bad batch of seed, labeled "Sugar Snap" and actually about 95% snow peas. They were delicious anyway, but I'm not going to buy them at Apex next year. Somebody was asleep at the wheel in the bulk seed section.
  

My friend Nancy gave me a spectacular calla lily called Flame. 
Never having grown one, I was enchanted by its single long lasting flame-orange flower, and its speckled tropical leaves.
 

 It comes from a big bulb that I'll dig and save over inside. It's too precious to leave it to the elements.


In the same shaded garden, Fuchsia magellanica is blooming like mad. Native to Chile, it's hardy over the winter, a most disarming thing: a hardy fuchsia that comes bravely up in spring and blooms hard until frost. Hummingbirds love it, of course. I like to wonder if it's the progenitor of many cultivars.



Speaking of hardy plants, here's an iceplant Delosperma cooperi. Apparently it's native to South Africa. I'd always hoped it was native to California, since I saw it growing amongst the rocks in Monterey. Hmm. Clarification needed. It persists through the winter and blooms all summer long. Very nice solution for the stone steps on the side of our house.
Of course I'll have my fancy little annual portulacas, too. I love those plants. My dad always grew them and called them "moss roses." For some unfathomable reason the rabbits left them alone this year. Usually they're wabbit candy. Yay!

 The lavender hedge was spectacular this year. It was buzzing with bees and ever so fragrant when brushed against. Of course I let it sprawl all across the sidewalk just so we can brush it with our legs. Phoebe deliberately careens into it while riding her razor scooter so she can smell of lavender, if not of old lace.

8 comments:

I'm not capable of passing a lavender plant without stroking it. And I never look first. So far the bees have been too startled by my audacity to complain with their little complaining ends.

They are moss roses to me too. Mine were in a pot on top of an old wooden chair. They made it until last week. Bunny got them. Nothing left but dirt.

Ice plants are a non-native invasive in CA...

Beautiful,thanks for sharing these. Yes, Lavender is intoxicating and I "brush" mine every chance I get, Bergamot, too. My alleged snow peas were also mostly sugar snaps this year. Wussup??I have calla envy!

Portulacas to me, a favorite aunt always had a huge bed of them by the driveway. They always remind me of a circus parade.
I have some volunteering in the pot with my red mandevilla, who knows how they got up there.

Love all the flower photos.
Well, "moss roses" are portulaca here--and thanks for explaining why mine are always eaten. I love them, but they are always sheared off. HA--the rabbits did it.

I am loving your tall skinny compositions - especially the one with your house!

Thanks, Julie for the moss rose photo. mama grew theminthe bowl of an old cream separator,sitting on the table by our well on the farm in central Texas. A lovely memory,thanks again. Linda

Posted by Anonymous June 17, 2012 at 5:14 PM
[Back to Top]