September GBFD: beauty in the details

Sep25

It sounds a bit noble and refined to study the intricate details but in reality the big picture is just a little too ugly to show. Autumn rains have yet to pan out and the bulk of the garden has that end of summer- waiting to die- air to it, so with a garden full of drought stricken, end-of-their-rope plants, close-ups are clearly the way to go.

A wider view of the watered deck plantings. With only a few weeks left before frost I’m happy to see my newest banana nearly doubling in size since its August planting. I love watching those new leaves unfurl!

The closeups will hopefully be a celebration of the late summer contributions foliage makes to the garden. Yes, I know we’re into autumn now but Christina over at Creating my own garden of the Hesperides celebrates foliage day on the 22nd of each month, and since that date is still a summer number I’m going to use that excuse to hold onto summer for just a few days past the autumn equinox…. well maybe just until next week when the temperatures look as if they’ll drop.

Caladium ‘pink splash’ enjoying the unusually warm September weather. Just foliage color here and although my choice might be suspect it really is an easy plant. Best of all no dropped blossoms on the porch to clean up.

Most of the focus right now is on the tropical plants and annuals which are blissfully putting out new leaves regardless of the impending frost-doom. Let me give them their five minutes of fame before they get thrown in the dark garage for the winter again. I think I’ve shown the scented geranium ‘Lady Plymouth’ before, but with a pleasant scent and fine variegation it really doesn’t hurt to show it again. Plus, I am one of THOSE people who think variegation makes everything better, so here she is again 🙂

‘Lady Plymouth’ perlargonium brightening up the front entry with its finely cut, outlined foliage.

Matt over at Railway Parade House and Garden might give a little chuckle to see such a small specimen of eucalyptus, but here in Pennsylvania I’ve struggled to get it this far. Last year it was a small floppy mess, this year it’s a bigger floppy mess. Assuming I can bring it through another winter, my hope is it will show a little backbone and put on some height. The reddish highlights on the silvery coin shaped leaves are completely unique here and I love it for that… even if the color disappears against the gray decking and white railing.

Eucalyptus cinerea, the silver dollar gum. It has a nice eucalyptus scent when you get close enough.

Something else which is starting to grow on me are the cane begonias. They always look good, the foliage is cool, and for me they are completely foolproof to overwinter (in an above freezing spot with no water). All the leaves fall off and they look terrible but come springtime and April showers they leaf out as if only a week has passed. When I was younger and growing up on Long Island I couldn’t understand why the Coe’s of Planting Fields (now an arboretum) would devote an entire greenhouse to these boring plants. Twenty five years later I’ve finally figured it out.

‘Limon blush’ coleus with a silver splattered cane begonia. The silvering may be faded due to too much sun and the lateness of the season, but the flowers still keep coming on this tall (4+ feet) specimen.

I’ll finish up with a few more begonias. September is a few days away from becoming the area’s hottest September on record and practically rainless at just over 1/4 inch for the month, so again the potted plants are helping me keep my sanity.

Someday I hope to rediscover the tags which came with this plant, but for now the finely silvered foliage and discrete blooms earn it a home -even if I don’t have a name.

If I had more shade around here I would surely put these begonias to more use, but siting them is always an issue. This pink speckled one never even made it out of the pot ghetto this year. Every week it was another round of where-to-put-it and now I’ll just have to enjoy it as it is.

Another unfussy cane begonia. Most of it’s winter was spent bare root on a saucer in the back of the garage… which is not exactly what you’ll read in Fine Gardening but I like to test limits 🙂

Well that’s my take on September’s GBFD. It may not be the perfect illustration of the contributions of foliage in the garden but it does show the contributions foliage has made to my sanity lately. Give Christina’s blog a visit and see what others are doing in their own gardens with foliage this month. It’s always a good show!

Wow, winter was quick!

Nov14

I got to sleep in an extra hour this morning, so the sun was already coming up as I left for work. Strange things happen when your routine gets a little off. Apparently while I slept, winter came and went and now we’re looking at the first snowdrop of the year! Surely this picture must be right out of late march?

Fall blooming snowdrop

Wishful thinking aside, it’s not March and this isn’t the last snowfall. It’s the first in fact and the snowdrop is my little fall blooming galanthus elwesii (monosticus?) which I thought had died of spite over the summer. This is the fall blooming variant of the regular spring blooming giant snowdrop (giant being a relative term with drops) and I just love it. When I saw it sprouting earlier in the week I did a little skip around the yard and then ran to tell my housemate…. She was much less impressed. Maybe the kids will appreciate it, I’ll just have to remind them it shouldn’t be picked 🙂

In a Vase on Monday-Mumday

Nov11

Congratulations are in order for Cathy at Rambling in the Garden for reaching the one year milestone of her weekly “In a Vase on Monday” meme. Each week for the last 52 she’s been encouraging people to fill a vase with whatever strikes their fancy in the garden or in the local meadows and woods. I’m always amazed by the creativity and depth of the creations, and although my own contributions never manage to get outside the ‘pluck and plunk’ category they’re always well received and the whole process is fun. This week I’m joining in again and just in time too. The last of the autumn flowers are limping into winter, and the weather forecast doesn’t look good for them this weekend.

The last of the chrysanthemums.

Three of the latest chrysanthemums are still hanging on; an unknown white which has been blushed pink by the cold nights, the spooned frosty violet flowers of “Carousel”, and the neat pink pom-poms of a self seeded volunteer. It’s nice to still having some flowers out there even after the trees have lost their leaves and most other perennials have died back.

Chrysanthemum “Carousel”

There’s nothing fancy about the vase, again it’s just my favorite flowers in a simple clear glass.

Score another victory for laziness. A couple years ago I missed weeding out some self seeded chrysanthemums. This small pink was my reward.

This might be the last flower filled vase of my gardening year, but it’s the first for Cathy’s 2014/15 season. Congratulations!

Winter might be on its way

Nov9

I have to think of what to do with my lovely lotus. The sun came up this morning and its small container-pond had a skim of ice on it from last night’s cold snap, the low having been about 27F (-3C). I think I’ll leave just enough water in the container to cover the roots and place the whole thing in the coldest (yet unfrozen) corner of the garage. If I can find a few loose tubers I might put them in a Ziploc baggie with some wet sphagnum moss and leave it in the vegetable drawer of the spare fridge as a backup plan.

There’s no illusion of an Indian Summer once ice starts forming on open water.

Even in death the dried leaves still repel beads of water, and when frozen they look even cooler (pun intended). I really hope this plant can tolerate my poorly planned and half thought out overwintering plans!

A cold, calm night, and everything just froze as is. Winter is a’comin!

I’m glad I got these pictures this morning since I haven’t had a chance to be out in the garden much lately. The time change has me leaving in the dark and coming home in the dark, and eight cuttings growing under a shop light doesn’t quite satisfy my gardening appetite. Hopefully tomorrow I’ll have some time, since today was a bust with birthday parties, to-do lists, and grocery runs….. I just have to be careful online tonight, I’m obsessing over my yard’s lack of conifers 🙂 Wish me luck!

What is this!?

Nov1

This could be a problem. I’m obsessing about my little cuttings rooting under the shoplight in the garage. They’re the goodies I snipped from Michael Bowell’s garden in early October, and as the outside garden dies back and bores me the indoor garden takes over. This is supposed to be my “winter garden”, not my “overwintering cuttings garden”.

I fired up the indoor garden early this year to give the cuttings a good chance at surviving. Don’t they look promising?

Maybe Santa will bring me another shoplight.

The cuttings went into a tiny bit of rooting powder, a loose sandy potting soil, and then sat on the cozy warm heating mat which I got last winter. They seem to like it, I just have to figure out when I can remove the mat. The spotted begonia leaf and the yellow elephant ear are favorites. The elephant ear was just a tiny root nub which had a little bud on it, I hope by next year it’s a couple feet tall!

Oh the optimism of a new season 🙂

Will work for mulch

Oct31

Back in the day when I was younger and fresher I used to do yard cleanups and odd jobs on the side for a little extra spending money. It doesn’t make much sense, but I still hold on to a job or two, ask myself why, and then drag myself out on a damp morning for a day of hard labor. Long hours working in someone else’s garden gives you plenty of time to think, and the conclusion I’ve come to is that I do it for the mulch. I don’t get nearly enough chopped leaves around here and my thin topsoil greedily eats up every leaf I dump on or turn into it.

Colchicum and vegetable beds tucked in nicely under a layer of whatever the mower sucked up off the lawn. Pity the poor seed grown chrysanthemum which spent all summer waiting to be transplanted out of its tiny pot. Amazing it lived, let alone bloomed.

I do the cleanup and take home a couple bags of weeds for compost and chopped leaves for mulch. It’s not easy coming to terms with the idea I’m a mulch whore but when I’m home and showered and looking at my haul I feel a little less cheap.

A bonanza of chopped leaves for the garden. If I had more I’d start a leaf mould pile, instead I use them all up as garden mulch.

I snuck into my brother in law’s yard last weekend and mowed up his back yard. It was only fair since most of his leaves are off the trees which suck the life out of the North side of my yard. I don’t think he even noticed, and the daffodil beds thank him. My fingers are also crossed for the neighbor across the street and the chance that he dumps his mower bags out in the woods rather than into unmarked trash bags. That would be quite the haul 🙂

The last of the dahlias still dodging winter. The plants look more than ready to give up but the blooms are still coming.

We have a freeze coming this weekend which should finish off the last of the tender plants. Normally October 10th is what I think of as our first frost date, so sneaking through into the first of November is a treat, even though most of the annuals seem more than ready to give up.

The formerly lush red leaved castor bean is all ripening seedheads now. Take a little care when handling these, they’re the source of the poison ricin.

I’m ready to do the final cleanup. After a freeze the dahlias and cannas will be dug and the roots thrown into the garage. Then with the exception of late bulb sales I’ll be taking a bit of a rest for the holidays. Time for bird feeding and snow watching 🙂

One of my last bloomers of the season, this selfsown chrysanthemum looks nice paired with the red of yet another dogwood seedling and the yellow of fall hosta leaves.

So I think this season is just about a wrap! Bulb planting counts as work for next season -which makes cutting back and removing the frozen annuals the last chore of the 2014 season. Most people look forward to a winter rest, but not me. I’m already antsy for late winter’s cyclamen and snowdrops!!

GB Foliage Day- October Highlights

Oct25

Ok I know I’m a few days late, but I still wanted to get in on Christina’s GBFD post. It is her 500th post after all!

For us the foliage season is going downhill fast. Here in NE Pennsylvania the foliage color has peaked and most has dropped, and it’s just some of the slowpokes and lingerers which are still giving a show. The gray days of winter are approaching fast….

Color along the front porch. In a few more days the hostas will turn bright yellow, but for now the dogwood seedling (now a sapling?) steals the show.

We’ve had a good amount of rain lately and I’m digging and planting and cleaning away. I love a nice green lawn in the fall, and spent yesterday mowing up the fallen leaves and leaving behind a neat lush carpet. What I should have done is transplant the flowering dogwood seedling which is way too close to the porch and house…. but I guess I’ll just have to live to regret that one’s placement. Maybe it will somehow work out 🙂

burning bush fall color in a mixed border

Burning bush (euonymus alata) living up to its name with a few final zinnias and giant reed grass (arundo).

The red of the burning bush foliage is a fantastic color at this time of year, but I think this will be its last fall. It’s an invasive plant around here and although several neighbors also grow it I don’t want to contribute to the problem. There were enough seedlings coming up last spring to tell me it needs to go, and maybe a native blueberry will be a better choice for the spot (tastier too).

yucca color guard with ceratostigma (leadwort)

Yucca ‘color guard’ with the burgundy foliage of ceratostigma (leadwort).

Last winter was rough on the yucca, killing off most of its leaves. I’m glad to see it has recovered since I love the foliage so much. Right now the leadwort has a nice reddish tint which sets off the yucca well, and even without the bright blue late summer flowers it’s still a great plant. Too bad I never planted the colchicums out here. That would have been a nice look!

I like boxwood, and this variegated one surprised me by making it through last winter without a single scorched leaf. The odd little drumsticks to the right are seedheads from an anemone who’s name escapes me at the moment.

The big foliage stars around here are the hardwoods, and if you move around to the back deck, the red maples are still hanging on to a few leaves. Without any wild storms or hard freezes the color has lasted quite a while this year.

It’s been a nice long fall this year, and I’ve had plenty of time to work through the summer containers figuring out who comes inside and who doesn’t 😦

Off to the other side of the deck the not-quite-tropical border has faded to dead stalks, and I’ll probably leave it like that all winter. Fortunately the grasses are at their peak, and with a little late afternoon sun everything has a nice glow to it.

Panicum ‘cloud nine’ is a big fluffy grass which really comes in to its own this time of year.

I’m not much for fall cleanup, I tend to leave everything standing throughout the winter and then mow it all down in March. I do get a little greedy with the leaves though. I’ll mow up as many as I can and use the mulched leaves to blanket vegetable beds and bulb plantings. They’re perfect for keeping out winter weeds and feeding the earthworms.

The heucheras are showing new colors and patterns now that the weather has cooled. It will be interesting to see how these settle in and perform next year… I bet these would love a nice chopped leaf mulch.

More evergreens would go far in setting off some of the fall foliage, I just don’t have much in that department. Overgrown yews are about all I have, and they’re a little close to the house to let them develop into the small trees they could be.

Bright reds and oranges of fothergilla. It’s a great native shrub for late season color, just keep the rabbits away from it in winter.

… and of course cyclamen. How can you talk fall foliage without mentioning cyclamen?

The last flowers on cyclamen hederifolium. As long as snow doesn’t cover them I’ll be able to enjoy these leaves all winter.

I’m much later in posting my foliage than I should be, but on the 22nd of each month Christina at Creating My Own Garden of the Hesperides hosts the Garden Bloggers Foliage Day, and gardeners from all over the world show off what leaves are doing for their gardens. Take a look and see what they’re up to…. I’m going to try to, but I have so many bulbs to plant and leaves to mulch it’s going to be a busy weekend!

In a vase on Monday: End of the road

Oct21

This is actually an ‘In the Vase on Sunday’. With a freeze forecast for Sunday night I wanted to get out there and save the last bits of summer for just a few more days (a vase full of frost blackened flowers wouldn’t be as welcome on the dinner table). Zinnias, dahlias, and chrysanthemums fill (some would say overfill) this week’s vase.

The late afternoon light and cool nighttime temperatures of fall really bring a glow to the zinnias and dahlias.

The dahlias are still the backbone of this arrangement. It’s been flowering for months, and even with a healthy wash of mildew over its leaves the flowers just keep on coming. Red zinnias and dark pink daisy chrysanthemums fill in between, and a few seed heads of panicum and tufts of papyrus reed lighten up the mix. I thought I’d add some “bright lights” swiss chard for the lusty leaves, but it’s the colored stalks which really stand out. Maybe I’ll just include them for the stems alone next time!

This arrangement is fresh and bright enough to carry an August picnic table, if it weren’t for the chrysanthemums you wouldn’t even know it was fall.

I spent the rest of the afternoon lugging pots into the garage and taking coleus cuttings. Although a few of the hardier pots stayed out overnight (geraniums, oleander, dracaena), the rest have begun their six month imprisonment in the dungeon. I won’t water them, they’ll look terrible, but hopefully they’ll go somewhat dormant rather than keep trying to grow and as a result die.

Inside the house the colors go well with the Halloween and harvest decorations. A few little pumpkins would look great alongside the vase but the kids insist they stay on the porch 🙂

Our freeze didn’t amount to any more than a frozen windshield and a few singed coleus, but it’s good to have much of the sheltering of plants done. Now all I have to do is reorganize them enough to fit a car in there too!

Looking at the long range forecast there’s a strong possibility next Monday will also host a vase full of flowers (chrysanthemums I hope!), so it will be nice to join in on the Monday vase meme a few more times before snow flies. If you’d like to join in or take a peek at what others are up to, drop by Cathy at Rambling in the Garden and take a look. Each Monday I’m surprised at what people put together!

Glass Gem Corn

Oct16

The title explains it all. After nearly giving up on the watering a few times, and feeling guilty for the curled up/droughty leaves nearly all of the time, the Glass Gem corn has finally limped on in to the finish line. It’s not a huge harvest but I love it all the same.

Just in time for all the harvest displays, ‘Glass Gem’ corn looks just as you would imagine…. glassy.

“Glass Gem” is a popcorn type who’s origins trace back to the corns grown by the Native Americans. This of course doesn’t seem a far stretch since all corn originates out of the fields of the earliest American farmers, but “Glass Gem” is a strain reselected by an Oklahoman farmer out of several of the oldest of corn strains available. That’s the short version of the story. There’s much more to it and if you’re interested check it out by clicking here.

I hope I don’t do the history of this corn a disservice by just hanging it around the house for decoration, but I think it’s just too cool to pop or grind (plus I only have a few kernels!) I’ll have to grow it again next year and see if I can improve the harvest. Having a couple real ears and not the tiny little deformed things I picked should really up the wow factor!

It sounded like rain…..

Oct12

There were a few raindrops on the roof last night, I’m sure of it. In fact there was light rain lingering in the morning, enough so that I put off going next door to help dig holes for a fence moving project (I really didn’t need much of an excuse to put that off….). By the time late-afternoon rolled around and bowling and hole digging was done for the day, the garden looked as dry as ever. The only plants still looking somewhat fresh are the chrysanthemums.

On an 85F degree day a few weeks ago I dug up and threw this plant into a pot by the front door. It barely wilted, the buds are opening, and I’m quite pleased with the show. This is chrysanthemum ‘pink cadillac’.

I might have to spread the good cheer of chrysanthemums around the garden a little more next spring. It’s hard to think fall flowers in May but they really do stand up to a lot of abuse, and by abuse I mean bone dry soil and little attention from me for pretty much the entire growing season.

I’ve had this one for a few years and oddly enough last week found its original nursery tag mixed in with a batch of compost. Of all the mums I’ve killed it must have been destiny to recover the ID of chrysanthemum ‘vicki’.

Potted mums are always a nice autumn treat, but my success in overwintering them has been hit or miss. This spring I dabbled in the world of hardier chrysanthemums by ordering a few rooted cuttings from Faribault Growers in Minnesota. They offer “Mums from Minnesota” which are mums developed and grown locally for the harsher winters of the upper Midwest. I’m afraid I might have to order a few more this spring, I really like how they worked out… even though I don’t think I have room for any more!

A late, taller mum, “Carousel” should make a nice cut flower. To bad the leaves are starting to yellow from lack of water….

This spring I opted for mostly ‘novelty’ types with quilled and spooned petals. I like them well enough but I think what I really want are a few fat, football types. I’m not saying I’ll fertilize, stake and disbud to get the largest of show blooms, but I did try out a single football type this summer and loved it most of all (please don’t tell the others). I think I need more 😉

An interesting bloom, ‘dolliette’ is a little clumpy for me, I like looser sprays of flowers and these seem a little crowded.

Hopefully no one has been offended by my use of the name ‘chrysanthemum’ for these flowers. The new genus name is ‘dendranthema’ of course and I’m not thrilled with learning a new trick. Will they also no longer be mums? I guess we can call them mas, but that doesn’t seem as catchy even though it does still gives mom her due.

Lettuce transplants in the garden. My half-hearted attempt at a fall garden.

The only other thing I’ve been enjoying in the garden lately is the one lonely patch of garden which has been receiving regular water. I planted it up with lettuce transplants found at my favorite local nursery and according to my calculations I’ll need to pick approximately 8 salads from this patch in order to make it a worthwhile investment.

But like they say: price of transplants- $5, having a tiny fall garden patch- priceless….. unless you still add in the time, compost, watering 🙂

sorta like suburbia

more than you ever wanted to know about my garden

Category Archives: fall