13,520 Garden Web Discussions | Perennials
Yonderbound - would you have a photo of your bridal veils that you could share here? I'd love too see them "puffed" because I want too see what I'm missing. I'm in 6B Canada zone and my astilbes only get morning sun. I can post pic of mine tomorrow.
Thanks,
Mira
Yonderbound - would you have a photo of your bridal veils that you could share here? I'd love too see them "puffed" because I want too see what I'm missing. I'm in 6B Canada zone and my astilbes only get morning sun. I can post pic of mine tomorrow.
Thanks,
Mira
I love, love, love my Chicago Apache daylilies - and I don't even like red, lol!
:)
Dee
P.S. I hesitated to put this particular link in, since when I called it up the first review was not favorable. But this is the best photo in terms of color, IMO. Just the like color in real life in my garden.
Here is a link that might be useful: Chicago Apache
camp, I planted some leymus candescens rye grass (I think thats what it is) in the corner, the dirt keeps running downhill covering my gravel which makes me crazy. I found this grass growing in shade at a construction site and dug some up while the men were gabbing, me and my little handy shovel. The area was marked for destruction. It will take shade and forms thick tussocks that are actually attractive when separated from weeds etc. This is very dry shade but as it comes out further plants become more visible. Hakone Grass! Not in this dreadful spot. Its beautiful but I need function and something tough, preferably native since its such a challenging area. I was really falling for the Sesleria autumnalis for the yellow green I even tried the silver leymus 'Canyon Prince' one year, its looked like big dead spiders. I donated it to the neighbors yard and its forming a nice area of blue in their backyard in no mans land (needs weeding but I resist interfering). Probably come fall, I'll place an order with SRG. I promise not to come over there with my shovel and grocery sacks and I'll look up those other suggestions, light colored would definitely be welcome.
Here in the central US there are numerous ghosts towns or nearly ghost towns and empty roads you rarely see another car on, miles of grasses, abandoned fields, abandoned farms, old bridges, roads leading nowhere etc. You can make an entire activity visiting the abandoned past and not see a soul for miles all day long. People would think you were crazy if they saw you digging grasses, but I am sometimes crazy that way. I don't know what its like in Great Britain but here a person really can find treasures in the wild without feeling like an environmental abuser, in fact its easy to get lost in the overwhelming miles and miles of nothingness out in the middle of nowhere. I think sometimes we have a tendency to picture something altogether distorted when discussing subjects like plants in the wild. I've dug bluestem plants from the wild along with several other starts of plants. I never thought of it as a bad thing in certain situations and still don't, if you saw what I am talking about you'd laugh at the idea of causing harm. If you hired every person in the midwest and handed them a shovel to dig with, you'd hardly make a dent in a year's worth of digging, the very idea is ludicrous. Its other factors that are problems, like invasive plants for instance just to name one of many. I hardly think any harm is done moving a few small blue stem seedlings from a place out in "The Sticks" like Pond Creek or Lamont, Oklahoma where they are thick to another part of Oklahoma where they aren't currently growing constitutes wildlife or plant endangerment. Once upon a time they would have covered what is now my urban property and now they are growing and multiplying again, instead of a bermuda grass lawn which is hardly good for the environment.
I find I cannot hardly get a visual of England in my head, I imagine lots of green and places I see on PBS like "Upstairs Downstairs' or something like that, old cities, great buildings & abandoned monasteries from the reformation period. I am sure its a distortion of reality.
This post was edited by TexasRanger10 on Mon, Jul 14, 14 at 19:06
Texas blue grass is getting some air time down here. It does take some shade and it is beautiful when it blooms , The first picture does not do it justice. I think it will do its thing in clay als. I am thinking of getting several plants. I saw some 4" pots at the nursery here in Austin. I also have Mexican wire grass choosing to come up in all day dappled shade
Here is a link that might be useful: Texas Blue grass
Christin, good to know I can move the Cimicifuga if I need to! I just nibble on a lovage leaf if I'm working nearby!
I'm definitely moving some Sweet Cicely next Spring!
Posting pics online is on my to do list--unfortunately I need hands on learning--so it may take a while!
Unbidden, those meadow rues are gorgeous!
Echo, I have lots of wet soil most of the year but am working on lightening it up, so maybe an Agastache is in my future! Thanks for all the specs!
Rouge, thanks for sharing that!
Plantingman, DH won't let me plant Buddleias--they seeded all over the place--especially in our gravel driveway...I'll check out the Russian Sage.
I'm pretty sure I've lost a lot of plants to poor drainage.
Thanks for weighing in everyone!
Hi,
Iris is pretty tough. I have quite a few that even do well in a bed of dry soil. They root pretty close to the surface and so when they start multiplying they should be divided. With a big clump of iris, you'll often see these rhizomes right at the ground level. With any luck, you'll have flowers by next spring!
Keith
Very interesting that 'Blue Cloud' seems to be more aggressive with the self seeding. I'm glad that a least a few members haven't had any problems with the white calamint and will hold out hope that I'll have the same experience.
Yeah, botanists are a funny group... sometimes they get so hung up on details, they miss the forest for the trees!
I have both 'Paris' and 'Rave On', in one flower bed. It was going to be concentric gradations of color, ending in Obsidian in the center. Hah! Insert reality check here, mumble mumble.
Each spring some weaker member is gone into the Great Beyond and there is a mad scramble to fill in the hole. Now it's more freeform
"Man proposes...
If it's voles, they are eating away at the roots, and the plant will slowly and inexplicably die. If you tug at the stalks of the plants the roots will feels "loose", and the soil may seem disturbed or fluffy around the root ball.
Several years back I had a terrible problem with voles in the 2 garden beds in front, and they ate all my Kobold. Now I sprinkle a castor oil solution I read about on the Hosta forum on those beds when necessary. This works unbelievably well and it lasts for months! Do a search on this forum for "voles castor oil" or such and some threads will no doubt come up.
Thank you all. I'm sure glad I asked!
Will call my SIL today. Not sure how long she has had hers, she didn't seem to have too much....yet!
Camp, thanks for the suggestions. I really like c latiloba.
This post was edited by lilsprout on Mon, Jul 14, 14 at 6:59
(if you can't grow Monarda, I would give up on gardening!)
I am feeling a bit embarrassed as I love seeing a wonderful stand of BB in other people's gardens but I can never get similarly for myself!
I have had clump of some dwarf variety for a few years and I find the blooms are weak and do not last nearly as long as they should.
I am tempted to dig it out but I do like that aroma of bergamot.
Maybe I will give it one more year.
I am adding more plants that are favored by bees in effort to help them survive. I have many plants that the bees love but nothing holds a candle to Bee Balm. It is buzzing with bees from morning until night, they can't get enough. Talk about easy to grow!
Hi Karen and Cheryl,
I believe you are absolutely correct! I checked out the link and the weyeriana buds match what I have. I must have never come across this type of bush. While I'm sure it will be nice, I am disappointed that it was sold to me as Black Knight (even had a tag on it by that name). I do intend to contact my nursery and inquire about it. I really like the long flowers that most bushes produce. The tag on mine even indicated it as a dark purplish color. I can't believe that the nursery goofed on this. I just hope that this weyeriana grows tall and is hardy. Thanks SO much for the information. I suppose I can get used to the pom-pom flowers! At least it is alive and growing and doing well! But the nursery needs to know that they sold me something different than what I was told.
Best,
Keith
Keith, I agree that you should tell the nursery they sold you the wrong buddleia. Perhaps they will give you Black Knight since b. weyeriana isn't what you wanted. But I hope you keep b.w. and post back on how it grows for you. I have b. davidii royal red which has a different charm, so I understand why you want black knight. My b.w. is honeycomb which has custard yellow flowers.
I saw it locally on a garden tour and instantly knew I wanted it. Here in NM it grows to about 6' high, around 4' across. Unlike b. davidii it is more upright and statuesque. It makes a BIG statement! The garden where I saw it had a semi-circular bed of them, about 6, all in bloom. It took my breath away.
I spoke to the owners about hardiness. They said they had had them for about 8 years. We're supposed to be Z7, but we've had subzero winters twice in the past 4 years. The b.w. had a lot of dieback, but they pruned it and it grew back strongly.
Good luck,
Cheryl
The good and the bad are combined with my clematis plants. Good bloom and growth on some that were lagging behind last year. Meanwhile less bloom or no bloom on some that have bloomed well other years. Thought I lost Gravety Beauty until it appeared from the crown recently.
As Kevin indicated earlier, delphiniums are outstanding. Annabelle hydrangea in full bloom having escaped critter damage this year. Shasta daisies looking great. Veronicas, yarrow, monarda, echinacea and lilies in full bloom. Daylilies have just started.
Hostas have loved all the rain we've had but my perennial gypsophila has died.
Self seeded annual poppies, lychnis, and annul rudbeckia are blooming.
Perennial salvias in second flush.
Some critter damage but minor, ate one group of liatris and some of the lily stems, some phlox trimmed earlier, and some asters. A couple of asters eaten to the ground.
Tomatoes and beans are doing well. Peppers are flowering though need more sun. Will be moving my vegetable beds this fall as trees have grown and casting too much shade in that area now.
I lost very little to the harsh winter. Probably because we had deep continuos snow cover.
All in all the gardens are looking very lush and full of bloom. This may be the peak of the season.
I have very few new plants this year. Due to some very unexpected financial constraints, just about the only things I've bought are herbs and fruit (tomatoes, peppers, strawberries, blueberries).
I changed the location for growing tomatoes and they're doing so much better this year. They're on the front porch in pots and in the front bed. I'm not crazy about the scent of tomato plants, but if it yields yummy tomatoey goodness, I'll survive.
The mystic spires salvia has taken over. Way bigger than last year (first year in the ground) and it looks as though it's trying to eat the hydrangea. I was expecting the hydrangea to be the bigger of the two, so things look a tad lopsided. The echinaceas have been blooming for nearly two months now, the asclepias incarnata is growing well (no flowers yet...) and the gardenias put on a grand show.
The halesia (Carolina silverbell) survived and put out new leaves. I was most astonished as I wasn't sure it would. I planted it in autum 2012 as a 1' sapling via mailorder, and it leafed out last spring, but then languished and eventually dropped the 7 leaves it'd produced. I wasn't sure it'd survive winter, but it did. It's obviously lost its old form, and hasn't done too much, but it's a little bigger than last year and I'm holding onto hope for it.
So I suppose the flourishing tomatoes are the good, the flowerbed eating salvias are the bad, and my poor little halesia is the ugly.
Yeah, I'm not a great cell phone photographer. I think creeping phlox is right. Thanks for all of your input.
Here in the foreground is some of my purple in bloom. I also have some pink but the purple spreads much larger for me.