Top photo of poppies from the ever-reliable Jeffg166.
Commentor SpiderInk linked to her blog Native Flora for Fauna in last week’s comments, and I invited her to send pics:
Here are some native plant pix that you are welcome to put up on Balloon-juice. All of these bloom in the northeast in April/May.
The first is Amsonia Tabernaemontana (Bluestar)
The second is Aquilegia canadensis (native Columbine) among Heucheras
***********
Spent most of yesterday afternoon acquiring what will probably be the last of this year’s annuals for the front-yard containers, and plan to spend the week getting them, plus the remaining mail-order tomatoes, properly planted out and sited for best effect. (Given the haphazard state of our ‘landscaping’, this sometimes feels like putting lipstick on a pig, but at least it gets me exercise out in the fresh air.)
Spousal Unit took a bunch of phone pics of this year’s iris blooms… I cannot recommend Schreiners Irises highly enough; we are getting gorgeous blooms from plants that spent the winter ‘set aside’ in last year’s battered tomato rootpouches… so if I can ever get him to focus for an hour or two, I might someday even be able to share proof-of-garden-life pics with y’all!
What’s going on in your garden(s), this week?
satby
Schreiner’s is where almost all my bearded iris come from, and though spendy they have really good sales. Plus, iris spread so every year you get more. Which reminds me to go deadhead mine, since they have several varieties that rebloom.
I have 1/2 the backyard to mow before it rains, IF the rain shows up. Then the rest of the week promises to be cool and less humid, so migrations of roses and tomatoes to their final growing locations, plus planting cannas, is the plan for the rest of the week. Getting another bid on the roof this week too. Hopefully, this one’s the charm.
Jeffg166
I grew Aquilegia canadensis from seed. Had three plants last year. This year only one flowered. Will gather seeds and sow them to get more plants started this year.
They were sold as native wildflowers. I didn’t know it was Columbia they were native to.
Have many foxglove seedling appearing in large pots last years plants were next to. Need to pot them up separately to grow on to plant in autumn.
Now to find the energy to o do all this.
sab
Those are so pretty.
Hopefully we will be downsizing on house this year. My garden failures (some mine and some inherited with the house) will become my daughter in laws. I get to start over in a new yard, smaller.
Need to save for old age, but I cannot possibly afford a nursing home, so one level ranch house with small yard is what we are looking for.
My dad spent $7000 per month for seven years just for rent and basics in a nursing home. You can buy a lot of one story house for that. Parents wouldn’t accept the reality. But I cannot afford not to accept the reality.
sab
@Jeffg166: Is Columbia same as Colombia?
sab
We had to take out a tree a couple of years ago, so the front yard is too sunny, and the plants are shocked, and fried.
Back yard we lost a wild cherry (dappled shade) and encouraged a Norway Maple ( big mistake. Full shade for the whole back yard.) Daughter in law will have to decide which trees to murder.
eclare
I need to trim my azaleas this week, looks like the coolest day will be Wednesday. The high will only be 82. I hope I haven’t waited too long, they were really spectacular this year for some reason.
CCL
I have been buying iris from Schreiners for more years than I will confess to.
One year, I was traveling cross country multiple times for a project based in Portland. Since it was too much ( time, money, wear and tear on the body) to come home on weekends, our trips were typically 2 weeks, so we’d use the weekends to explore.
I made my poor team drive to Salem because I wanted to see the Schreiners fields. We arrived and it was the day of their Iris festival (I swore I didn’t know!). Bands, food, thousands of iris all in bloom. In the garden parts, they intermingled the iris with lupin.
I was in heaven. My team was, hummm, bemused.
satby
@Jeffg166: Love the poppies, I haven’t had luck with them. Probably not quite enough sun.
@SpiderInk Great pictures of the native flowering plants too.
CCL
@eclare: Ours too. They didn’t bloom at all last year. We are thinking last year’s abundant rain and mild winter are the causes of our exceptional daffodil and azalea blooms.
satby
@eclare: mine never get big enough to trim 😢
eclare
@satby:
Wow. Every year for me. They aren’t my favorite color, but they came with the house and are well established.
eclare
@CCL:
Hmmm…we had a very wet but colder than normal winter.
JoyceH
My yard is a moonscape full of craters. I’m growing a puppy.
delphinium
Nice pics Jeffg166 and Spiderink!
Barely got the grass mowed before the rain moved in yesterday; today will be spent planting some annuals and weeding.
@satby: Good luck with the roof!
rikyrah
Good Morning, Everyone😊😊😊
Baud
@rikyrah:
Good morning.
eclare
@JoyceH:
How is Jazzy? Is she done with school? (I think your puppy is a she)
Van Buren
Here at the Van Buren house, we are running a weeks long experiment called, “Which expensive plant do baby bunnies like best?”
OzarkHillbilly
More thunder, more rain right now. Another tornado watch, another flash flood warning. Yesterday was perfect gardening weather but the 2 days of rain preceding it put the kibosh on that.
HOWEVER…
After today we have 4 days straight of sunny skies and temps in the 70s. I’m gonna have to make the most of them.
stinger
I’ve been using Schreiners for years, thanks to someone right here on this blog who recommended them. Wish I could remember who. Probably in a Sunday Morning Garden Chat post or comment. Thanks, person-I-can’t-remember!
ETA: Possibly Mike in Oly?
Jeffg166
@sab: Have you looked into any kind of disability insurance? I have no idea what your health is like or your age but it is worth investigating.
I bought a policy 14 years ago. I paid on it for than length. It runs $5k a year.
I just had bladder cancer surgery. The policy covers 2/3 of the 24 a day living nurse I had. What would have cost me $5k cost me $1900.
I can have a home health aid in for 7 hours a day and that is fully covered by the policy.
The policy runs for three years of coverage. The clock starts every time I have someone in my house.
Jeffg166
@satby: I sow my seeds in September in a pot then transplant through the autumn and now even into the winter. They do best if they winter over in the ground.
OzarkHillbilly
Yesterday, I glanced up at my rain gauge and noticed there was something strange inside it. My first thought was, “A leaf?” Looking a little closer I saw it was a fence post lizard. Poor little guy had slid down into it and got stuck at the bottom, head first. I figured him for dead but when I “poured” him into my hand I realized he was still breathing. All but catatonic, his toes were able to flex enough to grab a hold of my skin with a death grip. After 30 or 45 secs. I pried him out of my hand and set him on the garden bench. A minute or so later, he skittered off to freedom.
He didn’t even say, “Thanx.”
satby
@Jeffg166: I may try that! thanks.
@stinger: Could have been Mike, could have been me, I’ve mentioned that mine are from there and linked multiple times over the last 16 years I started growing them. Probably both of us.
Princess
Do any of you have suggestions for non-hideous annuals I could plant to fill in my dahlia bed? My problem with most annuals is that because many are tropical, I feel like they look out of place.
@Jeffg166: Where do you get Colombia from? They’re native to Canada and the northern states and their familiar name is columbine.
OzarkHillbilly
@Princess: I plant zinnias and cosmos for fillers. They are super easy to grow. Stick the seeds in at prescribed depth and forget about them. A month or 2 later and, “Voila!” Color.
Nukular Biskits
Asked this a couple (?) of weeks ago so I’ll ask again:
Anyone seeing any hummingbirds?
I have yet to see nary one at my feeders this year. 🥺
OzarkHillbilly
@Nukular Biskits: You know I am. Their numbers ebb and flow depending upon how attentive I am to filling the feeders, with highs between 30 and 40, maybe more, and lows around 10-15. They are pretty good about pestering me for refills when I am otherwise busy.
Barbara
@Princess: Marigolds, zinnias
Scout211
I’ve seen a few Anna’s hummingbirds (our regulars) but not at the feeders We still have plenty of blooming plants and shrubs that they are taking advantage of right now. Maybe your area has lots of blooming plants right now so they are ignoring your feeders.
Here’s a migration map from Hummingbird Central for 2024 to check your area.
Barbara
@Jeffg166: It’s hard to get that kind of insurance once you reach the age of 60. Even before, the market has been volatile.
stinger
@satby: Then thanks!
satby
@Princess: Petunias? the newer “wave” petunias are thicker and spread to fill gaps pretty well. There’s slight differences between the wave varieties (how much they spread or mound) but colors galore.
Nukular Biskits
@OzarkHillbilly:
The little traitors. THAT’S why they’re not here … they’re all at YOUR house!
Nukular Biskits
@Scout211:
Even the neighbors in have been asking.
Last year I had quite the unruly mob in the backyard. This year, nothing. One neighbor has seen one but it didn’t stick around.
I’ve gotta wonder if the migration path has shifted slightly. I was concerned that avian flu may have taken out a lot of them.
Princess
@OzarkHillbilly: I adore cosmos. Good idea. Thanks to all for other thoughts.
Eyeroller
@Jeffg166: Not sure what you mean; that columbine species is native to eastern North America. However, it hybridizes, so commercial cultivars may not be of all native ancestry.
Aquilegia coerulea is native to the Rocky Mountains and is the state flower of Colorado.
OzarkHillbilly
@Princess: I used to like the bright oranges, reds, and yellows but these days I lean more towards the pastels. (not that I don’t find places for the o’s, r’s, and y’s, just not quite so prominent)
Eyeroller
@Nukular Biskits: I have seen one male at my feeder and the nectar isn’t going down much at all, but this has been typical for many years now. They aren’t interested while the (invasive) honeysuckle is in full bloom, and there’s a lot of it around my subdivision. I hope avian flu hasn’t harmed the population.
Scout211
Not a garden bright spot, but a bright spot in the sky.
Saw The Eclipse And Aurora? Now Comes A Third Once-In-A-Lifetime Event
I remember the buildup and then the disappointment with Halley’s Comet, so YMMV, but possibly the comet of the century. That would be fun.
Geminid
@OzarkHillbilly: Speaking of bright oranges, do you see any flame azaleas in your area? I’ve seen them along the Blue Ridge Parkway, done in North Carolina.
eclare
@OzarkHillbilly:
To me, red and yellow flowers are “hot” flowers, the colors make it seem hotter outside, which I don’t need. Pastels are more “cool” colors.
BenInNM
Finally planted my tomatoes, eggplant, and a cucumber plant yesterday. I always struggle with them here between watering and the soil. It seems no matter how much I amend it the plants seem to struggle. But every year I get sucked back in to try again.
I am trying a new watering technique, however. I read about burying a terra cotta pot, filling it with water, and then covering it. Supposedly the water will slowly leach through the pot and you only need to fill it about once a week. I’m a little dubious but I thought I’d try it.
Gvg
@Princess: They are native all the way down to Florida. I think they were discovered first in Canada, but are actually more common further down. Pretty much the whole eastern half of the country. There is a similar looking one native to the west coast. It’s worth trying to get seeds from your local population because of climate differences. Pretty sure the ones from Florida wouldn’t do well in Canada and vice versa.
eclare
@BenInNM:
That sounds like a lower tech version of the soaker hose that I have, the water slowly drips out.
OzarkHillbilly
@Geminid:The azaleas are best to the south of me in Madison, Iron and St Francois counties. I did not make it down there this spring but my son did and he said they were spectacular this year.
@eclare:
Agreed.
Nukular Biskits
Last year, I complained about the beautiful roses I had planted out front turning sickly and dying (leaves turning yellow, dropping and then eventually the plant would just die). About 1/3 of the plants did not make it. Didn’t help last year was hellishly hot down here.
The soil in the flower beds is largely made up of the red clay they use for house foundations and, short of digging all that out, about the best I could do was add additional amendments like compost. I also added iron as iron deficiency can cause the symptoms I was seeing. When the cooler weather came, the surviving roses seemed to perk up but then came winter.
This year, I ordered a pH test kit (uses test color-coded test strips) as, given the high clay content, I was suspicious the pH was very high. Turns out the pH was not that high, but definitely on the alkaline side whereas most roses like a pH between 6 to 7 (slightly acidic).
So … I removed all the mulch, very sparingly spread some garden sulfur, top dressed that with about an inch of peat moss, then replaced the mulch. So far, things are looking good in that bed, with only one bush showing signs of stress similar to last year.
Interestingly, the three drift roses that came with the house apparently don’t like the new conditions as much.
I also planted 4 dogwoods between our fence and the sidewalk. They were looking good but then their leaves started wilting. Research informed me that dogwoods thrive in acidic soil (and the top 12 inches or so of the soil there is construction clay) so I did the same with them. That may have been a mistake as they look worse now.
O. Felix Culpa
@Nukular Biskits: Yup, I’ve had hummers at my feeders for several weeks now–in Albuquerque.
Lovely pics, Jeff166 and SpiderInk!
As for my garden, the tomatoes are all in their pots outside, and most outdoor seeds planted. We’ve already harvested a radish, with many more to come! (French breakfast, my favorite kind.) Various beans and squash, flowers and herbs are emerging. My overwintered Swiss chard is reaching an end, so I have to decide what to plant in its stead.
I’ve been working on establishing a pollinator garden with native plants since we moved into this house last year. It’s been doing much better than expected, with early blooms from snow in summer, now the paprika yarrow and red birds in a tree are flowering, and others like goldenrod, milkweed, desert mule’s ear, and various penstemons to come. It helps that we do not have the bunnies, packrats, and other critters that liked to feast on our plantings in the windswept high desert of rural Santa Fe County.
Geminid
@Princess: Calendula is a nice and reliable annual. They grow 18 to 24 inches high, and the yellow to orange flowers are good for cutting. The seeds look like small caterpillers.
eclare
@Nukular Biskits:
Good luck, dogwoods are so pretty.
OzarkHillbilly
@Scout211: I well remember coming out of an Arkansas cave and looking up at a star filled sky to see Hale-Bopp and it’s prominent tail streaked across the sky. I will take that memory to the grave with me.
TBone
My roses have decided to riot this year! Uproariously. So many blooms I don’t think even one more could fit on the bushes. The scent is amazing 🤩
Nukular Biskits
@O. Felix Culpa:
They must be taking that right turn there …
TBone
@OzarkHillbilly: that’s a great visual I just got of you looking up in wonder and amazement
O. Felix Culpa
@Nukular Biskits: Hehe, that must be it.
Nukular Biskits
@OzarkHillbilly:
Years ago, back in the early to mid 90s, we had a comet that was very visible to the naked eye. I can’t remember the name but it had been in the news for months.
Anyhoo, I happened to be in Jacksonville, FL, and went for a visit with a cousin who lived there. We went to another cousin’s house for dinner, watched a football game, and came back to the first cousin’s house.
As we got out of his jacked-up 4×4, he looked up into the night sky, saw the comet, and said, “WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?!?!??!”
I would not be surprised at all today to find out he’s a Trump supporter.
Eyeroller
@Scout211: Phooey, I’ve seen two naked-eye comets. One was in 1997, comet Hale-Bopp (the one with the accompanying alien spacecraft <my nym>). I didn’t get extremely good views of it but the tail was pretty clear. The most spectacular one was, I believe, Hyakutake (1996). It had a very long tail. The skies were much darker at the house then, before some development, so it was easy to see. That one was truly once in a lifetime.
The biggest disappointment was indeed Halley’s, which I saw through binoculars at its last visit in 1986. Comets are unpredictable because the nongravitational forces that cause the tail slightly perturb their orbits. But the relative orientation of the comet, the Sun, and the Earth makes a big difference in the comet’s visibility. In 1986 Halley’s was on the opposite side of the Sun from the Earth during its perihelion, so the worst possible condition for visibility.
BruceFromOhio
Weeding, and then some more weeding. Later, there was … even more weeding.
The lilacs and iris came and went in a day (or so it seemed, it was really more like a week) and the hastas appear to be sneaking performance enhancements when no one is looking.
Spanky
@Nukular Biskits: Too late for this year, but keep in mind that roses put a lot of energy into flowering. If you have the time (big caveat), try pruning off most or all of the buds next year and see if that helps.
You may find that one year without flowers pays big dividends down the road.
Barbara
My hydrangeas are about to go in full bloom, for the first time in three years. Astilbe are starting to come out. My baptisia have already flowered, but the penstemon remain strong. Other assorted flowers are also out, like salvia, and the first round of roses. Our goal is to have something in bloom all season long.
We no longer use bird feeders because we were told that they can be a vector for the transmission for certain avian diseases. Not the H1N1 avian flu, but something that arose before then. We do have some out of control honeysuckle in the side of our yard, but I haven’t seen any hummingbirds thus far.
Princess
@Geminid: Calendula is another flower I love.
Barbara
@Spanky: I didn’t prune my roses this year because, hip replacement, and it makes such a difference in the overall look of the plant. Once the first bloom goes, I am going to get someone in my family to do a pretty hard prune. They really aren’t that finicky if you stick to some older varieties, but like tulips and some other really showy flowers, complex hybrids just aren’t as vigorous.
Nukular Biskits
@Spanky:
Oh, I did forget to mention that. I pruned them all early this year.
Spanky
@Eyeroller: I suspect Hyakutake is the one nukularbiscuits saw.
The biggest bust in my lifetime is unquestionably Kohoutek (1974). The press hyped that one to the max, and it was a total bust. The nadir of that episode was one Saturday morning right after perihelion, when it was supposed to reveal itself in all its glory in the early morning sky. We had publicized a viewing session on the science building roof starting at 5 AM. As president of the university’s astronomy club, I was in charge, and when I woke up at 4:30 to a steady downpour I almost rolled over and went back to sleep. But nope, I trudged down to the center of campus, just in case.
The elevator doors opened on the rooftop level and the place was PACKED. And when I announced that we weren’t going to see the comet (because it’s fucking RAINING, you idiots) people were PISSED.
I think that episode gave me PTSD.
Spanky
@Barbara: Ain’t that the truth. I hate a hard prune, because I always think I’ve killed them, but they always prove me wrong in fabulous ways.
JAM
@Nukular Biskits: I have been seeing them since mid-April in central OK.
Nukular Biskits
@Spanky:
Hyakutake sounds correct. I’d have to look it up but I’m too lazy.
I’m also old enough to remember the hype about Comet Kohoutek. I was (and still am) a space geek and was really excited about the opportunity to see a real comet. Even to this day, I remember the bitter disappointment.
MomSense
I discovered peonies in front of the porch and a large raspberry patch. Planting gifted apple and peach trees today in between truck loads. Thinking of raspberry peach pie.
Jeffg166
@Barbara: I was 62 when I signed up. If I had signed up when I was younger it would have cost less.
The companies sort of hope people drop it after pay in for years. I almost did and now I am very happy I didn’t drop it.
Jeffg166
@sab: My mistake. Dyslexic strikes again.
Jeffg166
@Eyeroller: Yes, I see I misread the post. There were sold as a native wild flower.
MagdaInBlack
@OzarkHillbilly: Had to look up “fence post lizard.” They’re pretty cute. I’m glad you saved him.
StringOnAStick
@O. Felix Culpa: I love Redbirds in a Tree, and so do the hummingbirds. I mix mine with agastaches so it’s a war zone as far as their antics go.
Yesterday one of the neighbour’s hives swarmed; it was so loud we could hear it inside the house!