Garden Bloggers Bloom Day for July

Lady Bird always loved the wild flowers

She wanted us to love them, too.

Here in the city where her wildflowers grew,

We bid our Lady Bird adieu.

The flag flies at half-mast for Lady Bird Johnson in a new garden fitted within the footprint where the Arizona Ash used to stand. I planted wildflowers like Eupatorium greggii - Gregg's Mistflower, Anisicanthus wrightii, also called Hummingbird Bush, and a plain old calico-colored Lantana, adding Salvias guaranitica and 'Black & Blue', a 'Bengal Tiger' canna and Verbena bonariensis. They're growing near the birdbath in a mixture of clay, compost and the ground-up stump of the large Ash tree. These plants are just beginning to flower, bringing an occasional butterfly, bee, or hummingbird to see if it's worth stopping here.


Malvaviscus is another flower planted to please the hummingbirds. It grows in light shade near one of the two remaining Arizona Ash trees and is sometimes called wax mallow or Turk's cap.


More wildflowers - a pink selection of Gaura lindheimerii and Echinacea purpurea 'Purple Stars'.

These Balloonflowers - probably Platycodon grandiflora - were brought along as seedlings from Illinois; planted in fall of 2004, they're now looking settled in their second Texas home.

Buds and flowers keep appearing on this 'Champagne' mini-rose, which was a mid-winter gift from my mother and sisters.

The first Amarcrinum flowers of 2007 opened yesterday. The variety is possibly 'Fred Howard'. If you're interested in amarcrinum, you can read more about it in this older post. Crinum-type lilies are not always fragrant, but this one is!

The White crepe myrtles, Lagerstroemia 'Acoma', are having a fine summer. They were twisted and curled by too many years in deck containers before we moved here and it's taken several more years to train them into tree-form again - this year they've finally grown taller than the privacy fence.

Near the corner of the veranda you can see a Pink crepe myrtle, the boxwood hedge, and hanging baskets with impatiens, ornamental sweet potato vines, oxalis and Evolvulus 'Blue Daze'. I've used only impatiens and torenia in other years, but with the Ash gone, the sun is stronger on this end of the veranda so I'm experimenting with the 'Blue Daze'.

Our 'Julia Child' rose, bought in early spring, is having a third bloom cycle! She's backed by a white coneflower and Mexican Oregano.

The Buddleja 'Black Prince' above right has been in bloom for months; the yellow lantana seems happier now that the weather has turned hot.

Perovskia - called 'Russian sage' with a true sage in the background, Salvia guaranitica.


Three cupheas are in bloom now. This orange cuphea is probably Cuphea ignea, also called cigar plant. It dies back in the cold, then grows into a shrub by the end of the summer. It's planted near another chunk of 'Bengal Tiger' canna and one of the the 'Acoma' crepes.

Above is a close-up of the orange cuphea. You can decide for yourself if it looks like a cigar!

The red and purple flowers of Cuphea llavea, nicknamed Batfaced cuphea, aren't very big, but hummingbirds always find them.

This pink cuphea also has that 'Bat-faced' look, but its growth pattern is more like the orange one - each winter it dies back to a few inches tall. It sits like an undecided lump for a few months, but with sun, warmth and water, decides that Austin is not so bad after all, and by August it's turned into a three-foot tall shrub again, covered in bees and trying to smother its neighbors.

Here's a list of some other plants showing floral action. The sunflower is just starting, plants like the coreopsis are full of buds and blossoms while others like the larkspur are almost done. Dependable workhorse plants like Abelia, Salvias and the honeysuckle have produced flowers month after month.

Abelia

Salvia 'Coral Nymph'

Liriope

Tomatoes

Peppers

Cannas

Coreopsis 'Creme Brulee'

Chrysanthemums

Petunias

Dianthus

Salvia greggii in several colors.

Pavonia lasiopetala, a native Rock Rose

Blue plumbago

Fennel

A few apricot daylilies

Larkspur

Purple leaved oxalis

'Blue River II' hardy Hibiscus

Sunflower

Vitex agnus castus

Coral honeysuckle

'Little Gem' Magnolia

Scuttelaria - skullcap

Zinnia linnearis

Happy Garden Bloggers Bloom Day, organized by Carol of May Dreams Garden.

I hope you're all having a blooming July in your own garden. We're spending time at other gardens this weekend on the annual Austin Pond Society Tour.

Meme-me, Meme-me, Meme

Memes float around the internet ocean, sometimes traveling in on the same wave, and three have recently washed ashore here. I've participated in several memes already, so that when MaryC tagged me for Eight Random Things a few days ago, my reply was that I didn't have eight interesting things to tell. Dawn then tagged me for Seven Random Things. I decided to give it a try, but if this post bores you - blame Mary and Dawn!

A different kind of meme surfed in when Beth tagged me as a Rockin' Girl Blogger - not strictly true, but just having my name in the same sentence with 'girl' was a kick.

Random Thing One
The post title reveals that I cannot resist a pun, no matter how bad.

Random Thing Two
When other teenage girls were reading fashion magazines, I was curled up with westerns by Zane Grey or Ernest Haycox and loved historical fiction set in places like Ye Olde London. This could explain why much of my wardrobe is denim and suitable for working outside and the rest of it once provoked my youngest sister to declare, "you have a closet full of costumes, not clothes!"

Random Thing Three
I own a couple of Feng Shui books and like them - some of it seems goofy but a lot of it makes sense to me.

Random Thing Four

As mentioned in a previous meme, I think genealogy is fun. My sisters and cousins and I scan any family photos we can get, then pass the photo files around. I printed small versions of them and Philo helped me make this family history photo wall. To keep it from becoming static, some of the frames have blank spaces for future additions. One frame contains more than a century's worth of weddings-in-miniature. This grouping may not have the impact of a large piece of art, but is meaningful to us.

Random Thing Five
Recent stuff rewatched on DVD included The 40-Year Old Virgin [2005], Moonstruck [1987], and The Quiet Man [1952]. How wonderful it is to be able to see movies from every era! And I love the commentary tracks.

Random Thing Six
What's essential in my kitchen: Red Peppers, olive oil, heads of garlic, onions, tomatoes, broccoli, Marjoram, basil, Romano cheese, pasta, Ajvar spread on Wasa Rye, Philo's homemade salsa, pimiento cheese, green pepper tabasco sauce, thin corn tortillas, Kashi cereal, blueberries, dark chocolate and lots of French Roast coffee.

Random Thing Seven

I can keep a home-improvement or garden project in the planning stage for ages... refusing to start implementing it until I've worried the concept to pieces. At this pace our house will never appear in Cottage Living.

Random Thing Eight for Mary C, a new friend who is a birder.

I dearly love blogs that feature both plants and birds, and envy those of you who can photograph the feathered ones in mid-air. Many of us get lucky once in awhile, but Dawn catches them repeatedly . While Mary in NC is taking a break, wander through her archives and be amazed - she's put herself in jeopardy to get the perfect shot. James at Coyote Mercury records the birds well here in Austin. On behalf of near-sighted bird lovers everywhere, thank you all very much!

The rules state that I should now tag 7 [or 8] other people with this meme - if you're interested, please consider yourself tagged... memes can be a pleasant way to get to know each other.

As to tagging Rockin' Girl Bloggers - many of you fit the description, but I'm nominating just one. She has no regular internet access at the moment and may not know about this tag for weeks.

Did any of you see the start of the Blue Planet run around the world? You can read about it here at the Blue Planet Website. I don't know whether the run will change the lives of those who need safe drinking water, but I admire people who try to make a difference - and this team is extraordinary.

One of the team members is Mary Chervenak, a wonderful young woman who is giving up her summer for this cause. I held Mary in my arms when she was a baby - and am now thrilled to see what a strong, beautiful, articulate woman she has become. Mary occasionally has the chance to post to her blog page on the Blue Planet Website, and she gets my rockin' girl blogger nomination.

Go Mary!

Sparkler

The red rose, white Pentas, white salvia and Salvia 'Black& Blue' barely constitute a floral sparkler let alone the explosion of color I was hoping to gather for a photo. Real fireworks, legal or otherwise, can be heard around Austin on every Fourth of July. I like fireworks, but have always felt tense as bottle rockets flew over dried-out roofs in our usual hot, dry summers. They'll be very hard to light this year!

It's still pouring in Texas, and I wonder whether this photo of a puddle in the secret garden might be considered garden porn by those of you who need rain so badly. [Lilac and peony photos fit this category for me!] If you're in a drought area, may gentle, slow soaking rains fall on your gardens soon, allowing the waterlogged places [like Oklahoma City, which had 20 straight days of rain] to dry out a little.

MSS of Zanthan Gardens has concentrated on tomatoes lately and Pam/Digging has been away from her blog for a while. Well, while Pam is busy and you're missing her fabulous photos, my photos might look better ! Here are a few from my garden this week - some have rain and mist, others were taken in sun. When the rain stopped and the sun came out, I covered myself in mosquito spray and went out to weed and prune.

This unnamed oriental lily bloomed in a deck container for a few years, was planted in the ground in 2005, and is somehow living and blooming in our heavy clay soil. There have been a few flowers each year, but there were 10 buds this June - and they're huge, measuring 8-inches across when fully open.

In closeup this lily has little 'bumps' but no spots like the Stargazers. One flower in a vase puts out so much fragrance it can be overpowering inside the house.

The 'City of Portland' canna loves the moisture and keeps blooming. There's a little coral color blended into the brick of our house. This color sets off a war when something in the magenta/pink range is planted near the brick, but growing the cannas near the wall looks okay to me - what do you think?

Another Canna goes by several names, including 'Praetoria' and 'Bengal Tiger', and has striped foliage and orange flowers. I planted it in three places in my garden, liking how it looks near this 'Acoma' crepe myrtle and a self-seeded tropical milkweed, Asclepias curassavica, with Perovskia/Russian sage at the base .

The Zephranthes 'Labuffarosea' rainlilies opened a few flowers, but their numbers are down from last year. I don't think they like being waterlogged - some of the bulbs may have rotted underground.

Last year two Snail Vines, Phaseolous caracalla, ran rampant in my garden. One took over the garden arch and smothered the Coral Honeysuckle, leading me to evict it. The other one covered the metal obelisk so densely that the structure was invisible, but I liked the flowers, so let it finish the season.

Once free of the annual snail vine, the Coral honeysuckle did well, and has taken over the arch. It's been showing off those flowers nonstop since March, framing the garden and attracting hummingbirds.

I planted seeds for Moonvine, Ipomoea alba, and Blue Pea Vine, Clitoria ternatea, at the base of the obelisk a couple of months ago - actually planting them twice, since the first seeds never sprouted. The second set of seeds sprouted and are twining up the metal bars, but are not yet blooming. I like the way the obelisk looks this year, and am not in a big hurry for the flowers. The birds seem delighted with the exposed framework - a hummingbird likes to perch on the crossbar in between sips at the Buddleja, honeysuckle and Salvias and it's also a favorite hangout for the wrens.

I hope you're all having a safe and happy holiday, with some sparkle in your evening.

Ponds and Poetry

Uncontrolled water in the home garden can be a disaster - water confined and channeled through a water feature can be wonderful. If you're in the mood to see wonderful water features, you're in luck - it's almost time for the annual Austin Pond Society Tour, that special weekend when some of the members invite you into their gardens, demonstrating how Nature and Technology can work together to bring water, sound, plant life and animal life into your own back yard. That's our birdbath full of bluejays in the photo - if just a simple birdbath can get this much action, imagine what a pond could do!

For 2007, the event spans two days and features 30 locations - including a couple that will be open on Saturday night. Mark your calendars for Saturday and Sunday, July 14th and 15th, 2007. Wristbands are available at the Wildflower Center, Emerald Gardens and Hill Country Water Gardens, and can also be purchased online. You can also get them the day of the tour, but buying ahead can save you a couple of bucks.

Pond Tour Information on the APS website

The Pond Society kindly linked to my posts about last year's tour. We made it to almost all of the Saturday locations - mainly in-town ponds, loaded with ideas for urban and suburban gardeners - but I didn't have the camera with me that day. On Sunday I took photos at some unusual ponds in more rural settings out to the NW of Austin. If you're interested, here are links:

Liberty Hill 2006 One , Liberty Hill 2006 Two, Liberty Hill 2006 Three,

Leander 2006 and the Night Tour

The Pond Society site also has links to photo galleries from several previous tours.

Carolyn at Sweet Home and Garden Chicago is trying to get a garden muse day going on the first of each month, much as Carol of May Dreams has encouraged us to post flower photos for Garden Blogger Bloom Day on the 15th.

There's also a 'Green Thumb Sunday', a monthly 'Festival of the Trees', and even a 'Wordless Wednesday' going around. My first reaction was that things are getting awfully organized and scheduled in the garden blogging world. I'm starting to feel like an Austin Slacker version of Huckleberry Finn, suspicious that the Widow Douglas is trying to 'sivilize' me and think I'll slope off for the river.

But the idea kind of grew on me, so what the heck - here's a poem for Garden Muse Day. When one of the Muses whispers in my ear, it's seldom Calliope guiding me to epic poetry, or Melpomene leading me to write tragedy. No - the Muse that usually shows up is Thalia, inspiring comedy. Maybe she also inspired me to plant 'Thalia' narcissus, seen in this March photo.

The following rhyme is a few years old. A lot of my garden verse has been set to music with more than a dozen of the songs comprising an in-progress musical comedy copyrighted as Roots in Austin. I've made some of the songs into videos for YouTube - they're linked at left in the sidebar. More videos are in the works, but this little snippet of doggerel doesn't seem to have a musical future - it's slight, and cute, and nerdy in a horticultural way:

CALLA
A long time ago from a silvered movie screen
Came words made immortal by a cinematic queen:
“The calla lilies are in bloom,” said Hepburn in a trance;
At seventeen I knew that I must own these lovely plants.

In Northern lands I nurtured them, rejoicing at one flower.
My rhizomes cellar-dwellers were through winter’s chilling hours.
To Texans they’re less precious - here they’ll live with no protection,
Yet still are waxy, delicate, a chlorophyll confection.

The spathe emerges from the soil; the spadix is concealed.
Soon luminous white, or pearly pink, or yellow is revealed.
Some ask for Zantedeschia, preferring Latin words,

Too many calla flowers? Never! The concept is absurd.

Written by Annie at the Transplantable Rose

Garden Muse Day