Sunday, June 7, 2009

butterflies in the garden

No pics, but plenty of butterfly activity in the garden lately. They love the asclepias, stokesias, and echinaceas.

Today:

Brushfoots:
Red-spotted Purple
Viceroy

Milkweed butterflies:
Monarch

Swallowtails:
Tiger
Black
Spicebush
Giant Swallowtail

Blues:
Spring Azure

Friday, June 5, 2009

pink and purple

 
Ted Stevens, with Nurseries Caroliniana says this pink bloomer is one of his top ten favs. It blooms from March until October, with the best show beginning in late March and continuing until late April. Indigofera amblyantha would bloom more with more sun, but, when you live in the woods, sun is hard to find!



 
Terri gave me this amaryllis, and mama gave me the purple iris. They seem to like where they are planted, and perform together each spring!
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More spring bloomers

More of the white ox-eye daisies! They just glow, particularly about dusk.



















The mid-season azaleas make me smile, and now that the deer can't munch them to the ground, there is more to smile about. One day, this deer fence will come down, but not until the azales, hydrangeas and camelias get large enough to withstand some munching. Or, the idea of that fence coming down might just be wishful thinking. Either way, right now, it's keeping the deer and rabbits out.


Julie gave me some columbine seeds from her amazing crop in Maryland. I laughed as I transplanted the little seedlings I started, knowing how much the rabbits would enjoy these tender morsels! But, to my surprise, the rabbits don't want them, the drought didn't faze them, the heat and shade and humidity didn't dampen their spirits. So, there is now a growing bed of columbines. Behind the White Bench by the pond, in front of a bank of red azaleas (the ones in cages).
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March Garden

The Gardens

OK, time to get back on this blog! The first photo
is the Sir Thomas Lipton roses by the
back porch. Barbara gave the two of them to me about 5 years ago, and they are
glorious when they bloom! They smell so sweet, which makes them perfect for the back porch. They bloom just about the time the pollen has finished, and we've moved outside for the rest of the year. I wish you could see/smell them in person. Last fall, I cautiously pruned a couple of the biggest canes out of each one, trying to bring the blooms closer to the ground. Now I know what to do with them this fall: prune them with a little greater abandon!






This is the view facing north, at the north
side of the Lush Lawn. The veggie garden is
behind the fence, the distraction is the white
ox-eye daisies. I bought a $10 packet of NC
wildflower seeds the summer before we moved
into this house and sowed them over the septic
drain field. Who would have guessed that EVERY
seed would germinate?!? I've been giving away
ox-eye daisies ever since. They are truly
happy in mid April, and the house appears
to be floating on a white cloud each spring when
they are blooming. The white blooms overlap
the yellow blooms of the tickseed by two
weeks, and the tickseed continue to bloom
the rest of the summer. The white rose
climbing over the garden gate is a Sombrueil, an antique that is also sweet smelling.












Ah, this pretty purple beauty is blooming on the blue tuteur in the above picture. Mama gave me this clematis in 2006. It blooms earlier than some other clematis, and is very nice with the white daisies.
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