The Garden in June

 In an attempt to keep my promise to blog more often than once a month, here's my second post for June!! 

Back in the 80's, I used to love making macrame plant hangers. A few years ago, I made some for our patio when we first moved in, but I have hunted high and low and been unable to find them, so I made a few more. Happily I discovered Hobby Lobby have a decent selection of cords, metal rings and beads!

We have three Crepe Myrtles in the garden, but this is the best of them.  Last year a hummingbird could be seen daily perched in the branches, keeping an eye on the feeders.

I know I planted several of this Liatris, but this is the only one that came up (or possibly the others got "weeded" before I realized what they were. It's surrounded by Salvia Greggi and Pineapple Sage.

Here's the Turk's Cap I showed in my last post, happily settling in to its new home. I noticed some volunteer Turk's Cap seedlings under the Southern Wax Myrtle that will need to come out.

Another plant that I think suffered from my early spring "weeding" was Zinnia.  Last year the flower beds were overrun with zinnia, but my vigorous hoeing this spring meant that I ended up having to buy more!

Some of the daylilies are still hanging on and shrugging off the heat now summer is here.

Lots of little joys in this island bed this year.  First, the Hamelia Patens that I thought had died actually came back and is flowering.  Plus the Cosmos and Cleome that I started from seed are doing well (no photos).  Finally, the native milkweed I planted earlier in the year are coming along nicely.  No blooms yet, and they are still small, but I hope the Monarch butterflies will be able to enjoy them for a long time to come.

Here's a long shot of the island bed -- earlier in the week I planted some Dallas Red and Pot of Gold Lantana across the front side.  They will spread and fill in the bare patches as summer draws on and the butterflies will love them in July and August.

I'm so happy I managed to bring the Rose of Sharon (via cuttings) from my previous house.  I just love it's happy blooms, and the bees and hummingbirds love it too :-)

 This next photo is rather deceptive.  Unfortunately our Sam Houston peach tree just isn't living up to its name.  First of all, the tree never properly rooted -- if it weren't for be staked up, it would fall over.  All it's roots are in the top couple of inches and none have ventured down far enough to anchor it.  Too much clay down there I guess, even though we dug a pretty big hole when we planted it.

While this looks like a nice big healthy juicy peach, it's rather small and there's a bruise/hole on the other side.  Update:  I decided to go and check on it today and there was another one near it that wasn't too beaten up so I picked it and ate it.  It was the most delicious peach I have ever eaten!  Sweet, juicy, warm from the sun.  We have to try and save this tree!

That's it for today's post - I hope my dad enjoys it after his comment on my last post!

Today I'm linking up with  the following memes:

Friday Flower Photos hosted by Nick V.
Flower Friday hosted by Aquariann
Today's Flowers hosted by Denise at An English Girl Rambles

Words and photographs by Jayne Wilson, Green and Serene, Jayne's Country Garden.

The Garden in June

We've seen some extremes of weather so far this June.  We've had plenty of blisteringly hot and humid days -- those days I neglect my garden chores and take refuge in the air conditioned comfort of my office/studio -- and we've seen plenty of torrential rain. 

Take yesterday, for example.  The sprinklers had run in the morning as they always do, so naturally we had a downpour in the afternoon.  Not a long downpour, but heavy enough that water couldn't get down the downspout fast enough and was overflowing the gutters.

 But it didn't last long and before we knew it, it was hot and steamy outside again.

I'm not saying I haven't done any work in the garden recently.  I have, but I've had to be choosy about when I do it. Evenings would seem to be ideal, as the garden cools off as the sun goes down.  But for some reason, (could be all that aforementioned rain) the mosquitoes have been BRUTAL this year.  I made the mistake of staying out last week and was covered in itchy mosquito bites.

So I've been getting up early on the weekends to get my gardening in.

One of my recent tasks was to replant a volunteer Rose of Sharon. The original shrub was one that I brought cuttings of from my previous house. It's doing great here up against the wall, but the Southern Wax Myrtle is crowding it out a bit.

Just in front of it (see the black arrow in the center of the photo) is a seedling about a foot tall.  I realized it couldn't stay there so I looked around to find somewhere for it to go.

Further along the garden wall is the perfect spot.  It will have room to grow and as an added bonus, it will hide the ugly cinder block wall (see below)

I also planted some summer color in the new island bed, in the form of pink Pentas, white vinca and purple Angelonia augustifolia "Serena" series. The bed still looks bare, compared to the happy chaos of blooms in the other one, but I hope it does well this summer. 

For next year, I'm planning to divide the daylilies I have in the other island bed and move them to this one, so I'll have a happy chaos of blooms in both of them next year :-)

I've never planted sunflower seeds - not because I don't like them, but because it appears I don't have to!  I feed the birds by putting seed along the supporting rail at the top of the fence.  That allows more birds access, and also keeps the seed out of the range of the sprinklers (I noticed when I moved in that hanging feeders always seemed to get soaked by the sprinklers). 

 One unexpected bonus is that I get volunteer sunflowers where I don't expect them.  Isn't this a beauty?

That's all from me today, but keep a lookout for an update later in the week.  I'm on a nest watch at the moment. It appears we have a pair of Carolina wrens building a nest in a decorative watering can on the shelf on the patio.  I'll try and get some photos to share in my next blog post




Words and photographs by Jayne Wilson, Green and Serene, Jayne's Country Garden.

All is Not Dead - In Fact, Quite the Opposite

With the severe drought we're having, I really didn't think I'd have anything to share.  But I saw a couple of unexpected surprises in the garden this evening and headed out with the camera.  As I snapped shots, I was quite astounded at how well things are doing, considering hot and dry it has been.
 Our area is on voluntary water restrictions so I've moderated the sprinkler schedule and it seems to be working.  Basically I run the sprinklers in the middle of the night twice a week, and I run them for an abbreviated amount of time, and then repeat.  So it's not using any more water than before, but more of the water is soaking in and not running down the street to the storm drain and it's not evaporating as soon as it hits the ground. 

I love it and the garden seems to like it as well. As usual, the photos will enlarge when you tap them.

In the repurposed grill-turned-planter, the vinca that I planted has put out a zillion seedlings. Not sure what I'll do with them, but I should be able to get at least a couple of plants going from this lot.

I forget what this is, and apparently didn't make a note in my garden journal (tsk. tsk)  It was looking pretty ragged a few days ago, but I trimmed off the dead bits, gave it a drink and it rewarded me with some new flowers.

I suppose I'm going to have to trim the "Scentless Star Jasmine" as we call it.  It's growing so rampantly there's almost as much on the other side of the fence as there is on ours.  Or perhaps future neighbors won't mind a vine taking over the fence?

Amazingly, in spite of being subject to benign neglect and drying out completely more than once, this petunia is still putting out blooms.  I've been deadheading and trying to keep it evenly moist this week and it seems to be thanking me.  As I was putting birdseed out early this morning, there was a hummingbird moth nectaring on it  which was neat, but I didn't get photos.

Underneath it, I almost missed this bloom on the Tropi-Canna.  It looks like there are some more blooms on the way too.

Underneath the Southern Wax Myrtle, this Dutchman's Pipe Vine languished for a long time.  Now suddenly it's growing and even flowering (see pic below).

 In front of the lattice hiding the phone and cable utility boxes, the bulbine is blooming.  I nearly lost this early in the year, so I'm thrilled to see the little blooms on it.

That's all I got photos of today in the back garden.  This doesn't include the Rose of Sharon, the Vitex and the Texas Star Hibiscus, which are all still blooming, but I thought it was time to show you the front.

Beside the driveway, this little bed bids you Welcome, and offers a view of the new house being built on the lot.

More rampant plants - this time sweet potato vines.  Does anything kill this plant? 

And when I looked closer, I spotted this daylily getting ready to rebloom (it even looks like I missed one bloom today)

 Elsewhere in the front, lots of Lantana "New Gold" (as well as "White Gold" not shown)  Can't kill this stuff either - I love it!

 Underneath the seedling Live Oak, a Guallardia "Fanfare" has been blooming for months.  I'm resisting the temptation to deadhead it and letting it reseed if it wants to.

Speaking of reseeding - last year's tropical milkweed reseeded everywhere. They seem to be doing well this year and you know what I noticed?

NO UGLY ORANGE APHIDS THIS YEAR!  Last year they were COVERED with those nasty things.  This year, not a one (YET)

And finally, one more reblooming daylily about to bloom. Please just ignore the raggedy-looking verbena. It needs trimming back, but I've been on the injured list this week and haven't done any weeding at all --- that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it!


Words and photographs by Jayne Wilson, Green and Serene, Jayne's Country Garden.