Last blooms

Physostegia virginica (false dragonhead), beloved by bees

 

Perovskia (Russian sage)

 

A few zinnias that survived the drought

 

Volunteer morning glory

 

Pansies

 

Woodland aster under the maple tree

 

My new favorite sedum, also beloved by bees

 

Who knows what will be left when we return in a week?

Book report

Geoffrey B. Charlesworth came recommended in another gardening book, I forget which one. Although he is (or was?) a rock gardener living in the Berkshires, and therefore much of his advice has to be tempered for drought-ridden Zone 7, his book of essays is a delight. I particularly enjoyed the last three pieces, describing a perfect (gardening) day, a less than ideal day and a third kind of day. His advice to be patient, and his description of the excitement of planning a new bed apply to all gardeners. And his ditty about why your plants have died is a classic:
You walked too close. You trod on it.
You dropped a piece of sod on it.
You hoed it down. You weeded it.
You planted it the wrong way up.
You grew it in a yoghurt cup
But you forgot to make a hole;
The soggy compost took its toll...

Fall Beauties

A few delights from the fall garden this year.

The autumn crocus (colchicum) is bright and cheerful, though I think it does better tucked into corners than right in front of a hydrangea where I put this one.

 

This is my new favorite, Sedum Sieboldii. Its grayish leaves and sprawling habit make it work well against the stone wall. It gets morning sun, midday shade and then a blast of afternoon sun and seems to be doing fine without full sun.

 

And this is the dahlia that just goes on and on! The plant itself looks like hell, but it keeps throwing these gorgeous blooms. As God is my witness, I will treat it better next year by putting it in full sun and staking it.

 

This aster just appeared in the front garden, and it actually works. One way you know it's a native is that it is absolutely covered with butterflies:

 

And this ghostly creature is colchicum autumnale 'Alboplenum.' It's supposed to be elegant and beautiful, but I think it looks dwarfish and creepy.

 

The Moon of the Bulbs

October is, if you're provident, a good time to plant bulbs, although you should really wait till November to plant tulips here. This year I was on the early side with my orders, and have planted the following to date:
96 chionodoxa (deep blue) in the corner garden among the oakleaf hydrangeas. No, it won't look quite like this picture, but my hope is that the corner will eventually be a sea of blue in early spring
6 fringed yellow tulips under the aucuba (golden echoes)
8 dozen more Tommy crocuses under the maple tree
2 dozen more English bluebells (hyancinthoides non-scripta) under the oak tree
4 dozen Scilla Siberica in the walkway garden

Still to be planted are General de Wet tulips (fragrant, orange, probably under the butterfly bush), and a mixture for the front door pot that I lifted from one of Emma T's columns (it's the In the Still of the Night collection). It is supposed to be a mysterious, elegant mix of black, cream and mauve tulips and hyacinths. We'll see.

Also planted are two flats of pansies and a flat of spinach in the raised bed.

Because of the impending Paris trip, I called Brent and Becky and asked them to ship the order right away. With any luck, I'll be able to get them all in the ground next weekend.

Satisfaction

A most satisfactory gardening morning today. Yesterday at Colesville I picked up three variegated liriope - mundane, I know, but finding things that will live under the dry shade of the maple tree is not easy. Plus, they are reliable and attractive. Got them planted, also a Begonia grandis 'Heron's Pirouette' that I couldn't resist. Plant Delights Nursery says, "While the triangular green foliage on the 15" clump is similar to the species, it is the huge and excessively large flower clusters of deep pink that set this selection apart." That went in by the fence along the terrace garden.


Five woodland asters are in search of a home, I'm sorry to say. They do well in dry shade, but they grow about two feet tall, higher than I was envisioning them. So instead of edging the white garden, they may end up under the oak tree...or among the oakleaf hydrangeas and hostas in the corner garden...or spilling over the wall along the walkway garden.

But most satisfactory of all was digging out the erstwhile cutting garden by the raised bed. This has been overgrown with gooseneck loosestrife and a creamy white perennial pea from Mom. Both are attractive for just a few weeks a year - not enough to justify them, sadly. So I uprooted the loosestrife (fully aware that the fleshy roots are still interspersed throughout the bed, but they're not hard to pull out), and cut the pea back so that it didn't look quite so tattered. Then expanded the bed just a bit to make a curve in front. The depth is about three feet along the straight edges, maybe up to five feet along the curve.
So, what to plant?

I'm mindful of the fact that my neighbors see this garden daily as they get in and out of their cars, so it's time to pull it together a bit more. I'd like to put in at least one shrub, maybe an evergreen (cherry laurel?) that won't get too big. Then perhaps a clematis for the trellis where the pea currently rules. Park the echinacea and Stokes asters there, too, until the sun bed starts to take shape.

I'm trying to plan in an orderly way. I've cut out graph paper in the shape of the bed and look forward to cutting out various plants and seeing how they look on the plan. Such an SJ I've become!

The groundhog did it!

I'd planted four little red Russian kales, very pretty and promising to provide good fall color in the raised bed (which mostly looks like hell right now), plus providing delicious home-grown kale (for heaven's sake). I have been watering them faithfully every day during the drought, and after a week in my care they were thriving.

Yesterday afternoon I spotted a groundhog in the back yard. I opened the back door to look more closely, and he lumbered quickly away (interesting how they do indeed lumber but move so fast). Guilty conscience??

An hour or so later, I wandered over to the raised bed to congratulate myself on the kale, only to shake my head in disbelief. Where did it go? It has been nibbled down to the ground, and I can only conclude that the mysterious ravager of my vegetable garden has been the groundhog all along. Wikipedia quotes the Cornell University Press as saying, "Mostly herbivorous, groundhogs primarily eat wild grasses and other vegetation, and berries and agricultural crops when available." Seems to fit the bill. Do not be fooled by the charm of the groundhog in the photo, they are clearly evil.

I remember that Mom, that pacifist, thought that shooting groundhogs was perfectly appropriate, although I think they hired trappers to take them away. As for my garden, it's time for some fencing!

Book report

The Collector's Garden: Designing with Extraordinary Plants by Ken Druse.

A look at the various kinds of plant collectors: aesthetes, specialists, missionaries and hunters, as he styles them. An overview of the gardens and gardeners is accompanied by gorgeous photos, including many close-ups of plants as well as the sweeps and drifts. The gardens are as extraordinary as the obsessed gardeners. I was particularly struck by three of them.

Lauren Springer (later Ogden) designed a garden in Denver that takes into account the severe weather and lack of rain. (Don't fight the site.) The resulting prairie/mountain garden has lots of plants that would work well in drought-ridden Virginia, I think. I loved the way she filled up every inch of her front yard with mostly low-growing plants.

Nancy Goodwin moved to Hillsborough, North Carolina, carefully selected as a good gardening location despite the heat and drought of the area. The photos here show a lush yet dry blue garden, and sweeps of orange, yellow and chartreuse set off by black sweet potato vine used as a groundcover. I love her saying that she'll kill a plant three times before giving up on it - moving it until it finds the right spot or she just moves on.

Wave Hill in the Bronx is one of the great North American gardens (not that I've seen it - yet). The emphasis, at least in this book, is on the late summer-early autumn garden, where leaf shape is just as important as color. This appeals to me because summer can be so hellacious here that you don't want to set foot in the garden. The onset of cooler weather, as we're having today, makes hope spring up again. And, of course, the autumnal plants like asters, grasses, salvias, sedums are beautiful in themselves.

So, taking an idea from Wave Hill, I'm now thinking of designing the new sun bed for September to November interest as well as spring. The plan is slowly emerging...

The book was published in 1996, and after only fourteen years many of the gardens and gardeners have changed or moved on (Heronswood being the prime example), reminding me how transient gardening really is. But there is still a lot here to discover and explore. Cyclamens, anyone??