So if you see this post and think it’s been a while you’re right. Two months of silence is an unprecedented void on this blog, and I’m a little annoyed with myself that this winter the blog review will go straight from early spring bulbs right into summer… but that’s something to worry about in January. Today we’re just past the summer solstice and it’s midday with the thermometer at 95F (35C) and apparently that’s just what it took to get me inside and in front of the computer again.
One of the opium poppies (Papaver somniferum), probably a ‘Laurens Grape’ seedling, is looking exceptional in spite of the heat. The opium poppies are safe, but the Shirley poppies (Papaver rhoeas) became rabbit food once the bunnies developed a taste. They were looking so promising…
So where was I? Here of course. Partially busy, partially lazy, going to work, and then off to Iowa for a week at the end of May (also for work). Things were transplanted, things were weeded, regular rains helped everything immeasurably, and then a load of mulch helped me immeasurably in keeping the weeds from returning… once it was spread of course. I think the garden looks nice, and if you can remember one of the reasons I wanted it to look visitor-nice was for a high school graduation party that would take place here. It did take place. Last weekend when the weather was cooler and excellent we had food and fun and about 70 people over to celebrate. Last minute projects went until the last minute of course, but overall the scars and construction of the last few years have been erased and the garden is finally back.
All the rain was a blessing for the lawn, with newly seeded areas sprouting well, and zero-topsoil areas growing as if their roots actually had something healthy to live on. This is the side of the house where two years of concrete trucks and work vehicles had been accessing the addition. I now call it the daylily walk.
To be honest the garden has been here throughout, but there was a lot more ‘interesting’ than anyone but myself would appreciate. Buggy borders filled with weeds and waste spaces overflowing with seediness are the first things I’d check each morning, but others would likely hold a different opinion. The fact that there were little to no complaints about the mess and in particular the lack of steps down from the deck for several years is quite amazing now that I think on it. I should really do some before and after posts.
Currently the beds on the side of the house are overfilled with the common oxeye daisy. It’s a weed but it’s a weed which I’d take over empty mulch beds any day, and until better things get planted… or the heat wipes them out… I’ll take it.
A before and after would be great for one of the big surprises this summer. Little seeds sprout and grow and suddenly one afternoon you’re amazed by a huge flower on your baby Southern Magnolia (M. grandiflora). Yes, trees have been growing from seeds for eons, but when it’s by your own hand that’s something else. I would have to check, but I suspect the tree is somewhere around ten years old.
The first of five flowers which this Magnolia grandiflora has set. This and one other seedling have flower buds, the third still has some growing to do.
Perhaps the mild winter helped the Magnolias along, since they’re borderline hardy in this zone, but I’ll take it regardless. Another thing I’ll take is the nearly 100% overwintering of all the purple Verbena bonariensis which has come up just in time for the party. There are seedlings (still too small to flower) as well, but for the party a few big patches of purple really make things look much better than they are!
The path sloping down to the backyard and potager.
In between small talk and second helpings a few people noticed the garden. “Wow, that’s a lot of plants”, “it looks nice”, and “that must be a lot of work” were some of the comments and they were all quite nice to hear but I kept shooting myself in the foot by pointing out how many of the plants were actual weeds. For the oxeye daisies I kept telling people to look alongside the highway later and notice the same exact flowers, and for the verbena I pointed out that they’re all self-sown seedlings, and for the milkweeds I just highlighted the ‘weed’ part of the name. I do like the milkweeds though. They are a weed, but an interesting one and not as unattractive as many of my other “interesting” plants.
Alongside the driveway the showy milkweed (Asclepias speciosa) is flowering for the first time. It struggled to get started but apparently all the growth was underground since it’s sprouting everywhere this year!
Right now it’s the showy and the common milkweed which are putting on the best show. They’re somewhat similar but the common is much taller, especially this year with all the rain. Once they finish blooming I’ll wack em back since a six foot tall clump of m’weed by the front door is not the curb appeal our mailperson needs to see every day.
Common milkweed (Asclepias syrica) pops up throughout the garden because its roots go everywhere. In okay spots it will be cut down to about three feet after bloom, in not-okay spots I pull them out, and usually they break off neatly at the root and I can ignore what must be a massive root system.
So as usual I started this post with high hopes, but now it’s six days later and still not done. Let me try and get moving. A short summary (which is what I should have started this all with) is party was good, garden was decent, massive projects were finished enough, and summer is off to an excellent (although slightly exhausting) start.
No one complimented the Japanese iris but I thought they were nice. Please note the brick piles which still remain. I can’t do everything!
So in the week since the party I’m less focused on plumbing and deck reconstruction and more focused on finishing up on the garden to-do list. I’ll hopefully get another post up one of these days because the daylilies have started, the tulips have been dug, the annuals planted, and things look even better, especially since the heat broke yesterday and we had a nice downpour to water things.
The weedy end of the potager. More milkweed and still a few beds of bulbs to dig, but a mown lawn goes a long way in making any corner of the yard tolerable.
The cooler weather has been a nice break from the smothering heat and humidity, and yesterday I was able to work outside without the waterfall of sweat and overall homeless in Florida look which has been the rule for the last two weeks.
Part of last year’s ‘waste area’ became a firepit. It looks so much more purposeful than a patch of weeds but with the hot nights there have been no demands to give it a try.
When I said the garden looked good enough I wasn’t kidding. We were focused on other things, and other things always end up taking longer than expected and you don’t always get around to yanking out the dried up tulip stems. Weeds can wait when it’s a couple hours before the party and you’re setting pavers at the base of the new deck stairs while someone else is asking if she could powerwash the stairs so that she could set up tables and chairs since she thought that would be an important thing to do as well. She was right. It all came together and no one openly questioned the plethora of exceptionally healthy no-doubts-they’re-real-weeds and the embarrassingly undug tulip beds.
Someone with more sense might have focused on this bed in the very center of the yard, but…
Let me reassure you that in the days after the party the tulips have been (mostly) all dug and some of the biggest weeds are gone. There’s hope, and in another week or so I won’t need the distractions of food, beer and lawn games to keep people from looking too closely since hopefully there will be far fewer ‘ouch’ parts of the garden!
This driveway loudly announces ‘projects not done’, and no one said a word about it. I guess we have some decent friends, or at least friends who know better than to get me started on some long sand moving explanation.
So summer 2024 is off to an excellent yet tiring start. There shall be droughts and bugs and deer attacks but with any amount of luck there will also be garden harvests, bird-filled mornings, flowers, fragrance, and fun… and daylilies. I’m still kind of into the daylily thing, and with them opening up new blooms every day I have to make a decision on the daylily farm plans. It started as a joke, people were enthusiastic, and now I fear they were just joking along with me! We will see.
Thanks for reading and it’s good to be back!
sorta like suburbia 
Good to see your post, Frank. Sounds like a madhouse there over the past month! Hope you can get on the plus side of your chore list… looks like there’s a cool spell ahead to make it more bearable.
Lately, I’ve been getting up very early to get stuff done before the heat gets too much. All my adult life I was unable to get out of bed early, suddenly as a ‘senior’ (what??), I don’t seem to need to sleep as much. I’m amazed.
Enjoy your daylilies (the deer don’t eat the buds? 🤔 I have to spray Repels All on mine, as well as phlox and hosta, little buggers). Take a few pics for a quick post to show them off. Stay cool and hydrated!
The chore list is starting to look better. It’s been a busy week since and most of the biggest spring jobs are done, we will see if I bother with the rest.
I too have been getting up way too early. The one morning it was before five and I forced myself to take an afternoon nap just to be on the safe side of well-rested 😉 . Fortunately the children are there to inspire me. A 1pm breakfast request makes me wonder just how late they stay on their phones at night…
No deer lately unless you count the buck I had to chase off two days last week. I don’t think he did any damage and if he did the rabbits have gotten the blame… and they’re so cute I really can’t get mad at them. I will have to keep Repels All in mind just in case my luck changes…
Well, you’ve been very busy! The garden looks fantastic, I love the bed by the side of the house. And let me be the first to compliment the Japanese iris 🙂
Thank you! The Japanese iris are so elegant and velvety, I don’t know how people kept from gushing over it! -and I also love the bed by the side of the house, I hope it still has something going for it once the daisies get pulled and the daylilies finish. I did plant some cannas though, hopefully enough!
It is nice to see you in the garden again. I can tell you have been busy. Those edges look quite nice. Green grass and plenty of blooms weeds or not.
Congratulations on the Magnolia blooms. You should be proud of your skills as a plantsman.
I hope you do get to sit around the fire ring with a cold one or two. Cheers!
Thanks Lisa, this is an excellent time of year andI’m thrilled to say we just got another downpour, so that says tomorrow will be a well-watered morning and everything just sighs in relief when it gets a real rain. I hope you’ve been keeping up with the rain this year, spring seemed so optimistic compared to your years of drought.
Yes, maybe towards the end of the week there can be an evening by the fire!
Things are looking pretty nice! Better dig those tulips, all that rain can’t be good for them. ; )
I have most of the tulips out of the ground and drying now, and will have to show off the drying racks I made last year. They’re quite excellent for managing large quantities of dug tulips and daffodils, but not rainlilies of course… which still shows no signs of flowering.
Good to have you back Frank! I did notice your absence, but also remembered the party you mentioned in your last post. So, glad it all went well, and you can spend a bit more time on the garden now. Congratulations on your first Magnolia! Your garden beds are looking so lovely, and I love the irises! I think the firepit was great idea and I am sure it will become a hit in cooler weather. I shall look forward to seeing some daylily photos soon…. Have a great week!
Thanks Cathy, I’ve been busy since the party and for the amount of sweat and dirt and bug bites I’ve endured I’m not sure if spending a bit more time in the garden is all it’s cracked up to be! But it’s rewarding of course, and I think after another week of hard labor things might be closer to where I want them.
I’m going to try and get some daylily photos tomorrow. There will likely be way too many and people will grow to fear daylily season as much as snowdrop 😉
I think I can take any number of day lily photos Frank… more so than snowdrops! 😆
Oh dear! lol
I always feel uncomfortable when people “compliment” the garden by saying it looks like a lot of work. Well, yes, it does involve physical exertion but it’s where I want to be and what I want to do, so how can it be work? Or maybe what they mean is, “It looks like a lot of work that you’re not keeping up on”? Either they don’t get it or it’s a backhanded insult. If I see someone knitting a sweater, I don’t say “Wow, that looks like a lot of work.” I might be thinking, “That’s so tedious it would drive me bonkers, and I bet after all that it will itch.” No, I will find something to admire or admit that I’m no good at knitting but you seem to enjoy it.
Congratulations on the magnolia flowering. It’s not enough to get a seed to germinate–you had to keep it (all three!) from dying for ten years. Bravo!
The knitting analogy is perfect, I need to remember that the next time someone brings up work in the garden.
Also in my opinion the type of garden work does matter. Some people hate weeding, I don’t mind… some people hate mulching, I enjoy it… some people enjoy harvesting and preparing their produce, I find it tedious…
But on the other hand on those days when I’m dirty and disgusting with open wounds and a sore back, don’t even try and go on about how wonderful gardening is!
Thanks and welcome back!
thanks for the comment!
Well, it all looks good to me. Glad to hear the party went well. I am impressed by your seed grown Magnolia grandiflora, I thought it took much longer than that to get blooms. Looking forward to seeing your Day lily nursery.
I think some plants are much easier around here, with our hot summers and lovely humidity. Many just melt, but magnolias seem to tap into their Jurassic swamp days and relish the weather.
Well, that and your green fingers. Or thumbs as you Americans say.
It’s lovely to have you back. Congrats to the graduate and on the party. Loved people’s comments on the garden. Non-gardeners simply do not know what to say because they don’t get it at all. We’re gardeners. We garden. Even when it’s work we are good with that because we’re working toward more flowers, new design whatever. Spent 4 hours yesterday starting to dig out a huge long swath of Epimediums that are at least 25 years old. They are moving into the gravel path and interrupting the flow of rainwater from the gutter. Plus they are boring and hiding the beautiful rocks. If you’ve never dug them out they have a strange root system that is like horizontal interlocked branches. Hard but satisfying work. Can’t wait to see your daylilies.
Oh! I transplanted my first Epimedium last summer and that wiry mess of a root system was way beyond my patience level. Into a new spot it went whole, and it’s been fine, but I can’t imagine dealing with a huge swath. I have been adding new ones here and there and I hope that’s not a problem 😉 but there are a few which I’m not sure I’ll keep. They’re all very interesting in their own way, but some might not be worth the space in this smaller garden (and even smaller shade garden!)
I really like the creating part and adding part of gardening, but I find many of the repetitive tasks to be painful. A border which is repeatedly invaded by grass or a plant which seeds too much is a buzz kill for me… as is watering. I really find watering to be tedious.