Garden Bloggers Bloomday June 2023

Great Spangled Fritillary on orange butterfly weed (Asclepias tuberosa).

The 15th of the month is Garden Blogger's Bloom Day, hosted by Carol Michel's May Dreams Garden Blog.

The severe drought continues here in my corner of northwestern Virginia (Zone 6B)--we've had only a half inch of rain since the beginning of the month, on top of the driest April and May since I've lived here. I don't know if the drought is contributing to it, but we also seem to be having the worst tick season yet--I've been bitten twice in as many months while working in the confines of my garden! That last one was a lone star tick, a recent introduction brought by deer.

Speaking of which, the local deer have been incredibly voracious: I've hardly seen a flower from any of my daylilies. The buds get eaten before they have a chance to open! They've decimated my Coneflowers and phlox too. But there are still a few blooms from plants that don't appeal as much to these beasts. The orange butterfly weed is out in force, though even the 'Hello Yellow' variety got munched back.

The chiggers, that scourge of the rural south, are also out in force and viscious--I have to douse myself in insect repellent just to go out into my garden, and even then it's likely I'll get at least a few bites!

 

Asian lilies and red-hot pokers.

Red and orange Asian lilies.

 

The Asian lilies bloomed, but this year, their glory was brief. These photos were taken four days ago, this morning the flowers were all gone, devoured by the deer. That's so unusual--I was under the impression that Asian lilies were toxic to most animals, including deer, and these flowers had never been touched before. What could be going on? Have deer suddenly developed an immunity to the toxins, or have they become suicidal?

The Red-hot pokers are still holding on, only a few spikes have been chewed off. The Diervilla 'Kodiak Black' is blooming. So are the foxglove pentstemons and blue Centaurea in the Herb bed.

 

Diervilla 'Kodiak Black'

Centaurea 'Emperor William'

Foxglove penstemon.

 

'Incrediball' and my new Oak leaf hydrangea 'Ruby Slippers' are blooming, and it looks as if 'Little Quick Fire' will bloom later on, but I doubt that my other two hydrangeas will present much bloom this year--the old wood died back to the ground during our dry spring.

 

Oakleaf hydrangea 'Ruby Slippers' and 'Incrediball' in background.

Oakleaf hydrangea and tradescantia.

My front yard offers welcome shade at this time of the year, and a variety of blooms: Gaillardia "Arizona Sun', a pink bee balm in the shade, and two varieties of lavender. The daffodil foliage is dying back, but the annuals that were intended to hide the dying foliage are being munched by the deer!

 

My front yard on June Bloom Day--Gaillardias in front.

Pink Monardas under the cherry tree.

Lavender under yellow magnolia tree.

Lavender and yarrow by the driveway.

The bed by the front driveway sports an 'Admiration' barberry with lavender (Lavandula 'Grosso') and red yarrow.

 

Clary sage in bud.

Although not in bloom yet, the buds of the clary sage (Salvia sclarea) I grew from seed last year are developing. This is a biennial native to the Mediterranean region which I've never grown before--I can't wait to see what the flowers will look like! The leaves are somewhat fuzzy and tough, the plant is usually cultivated for its medicinal oils.

 

Ceanothus 'Gloire de Versailles'

This New Jersey tea plant 'Gloire de Versailles' is a hybrid between a native eastern variety and a California one. Supposed to be deer-resistant, I've had to put a tomato cage around mine to keep if from being devoured by deer, like many other plants in my garden--it's finally making some progress.

More red-hot pokers (Kniphofia) on the west side.

Hanging basket with Calibrachoas on the back deck.

I have a number of hanging baskets with plants on the porch and the back deck, but these haven't grown enough to make much of a show, except for these Calibrachoas. As the summer progresses, I hope they'll make a better showing.

Dog Days Coming Around Again

Great Blue Lobelia (Lobelia syphillitica)

Great Blue Lobelias

The dog days of August are coming around again, as they do every summer. After July's record high temperatures, they don't seem so awful, thus far.  My Great Blue Lobelias have put forth more flower spikes than ever this year, and they are gorgeous. The crabgrass and weeds are lush, too--I went out yesterday morning to weed around my veggie bed and try to tackle the worst of it in the back yard beds. Two hours later I was drenched in sweat, had one large plastic bag full of weeds, and feeling that I'd barely made a dent. It will take many more sessions to get the weeds under control, in as much as that is at all possible.

Black or Levant cotton (Gossypium herbaceum ' Nigrum')

My three black cotton plants grown from Lili's seeds are producing lots of flowers and bolls. The seeds were collected from the U.S. Botanic Gardens a number of years ago (I've seen this exotic annual selling for amazingly high prices in catalogs), and thanks to my daughter-in-law's green thumb, we've managed to keep this line going.

Black cotton flower bud.

The following spring the collected seeds went in my garden beds, and I shared some with my daughter-in-law. But with soil as poor as mine, only a few blooms and bolls with seeds developed.  Lili had better luck in her garden, and managed to get enough seeds to return the favor last year. The flowers are so lovely! Their beauty is hard to appreciate fully because they tend to hide under the foliage.

Black cotton flower

I've done paintings of both the Great Blue Lobelia and the black cotton--my Great Blue Lobelia painting sold last year, but I still have the watercolor of black cotton that I painted as Artist in Residence at the U.S. Botanic Garden in 2018. The specimen I worked from didn't have any flowers present so I introduced some from my photos taken of the ones I'd grown. Unfortunately, my photos didn't show the exact way the flower stem grows out from the middle of the leaf petiole, so I didn't get this detail quite right. I'm tempted to try another painting to correct my previous misunderstanding.

The back yard from the Badlands.

I took this photo of the back yard from the rearmost bed, the one we call "The Badlands" because the soil there was the worst imaginable. I remember well how little grew here and all along the perimeter of our lot at the edge of the woods. My idea for landscaping this area was to create a transition zone for the huge trees at the edge of the woods with a series of smaller understory trees. These three trees were the first I planted in the back yard: a dogwood, which revealed itself to be a C. kousa (Asian) type only this spring, when it finally produced its first blooms, a redbud (Cercis canadense), and behind that, a Seven Son Flower tree (Heptacodium miconoides) which is a native of China.

Seven Son Flower tree (Heptacodium miconoides)

Flowering clusters of the Seven Son Flower tree

The common name for this small tree comes from the observation that the number of flowers in each cluster is usually seven. I bought this Heptacodium as a sapling on sale for the amazing price of $6--the selling point for me wasn't just the price, but that the tree blossoms in August, at a time when little else in the garden is in bloom, the blossoms are fragrant, and it grows fast.  After planting it I've had time to appreciate its other attractive features--in autumn, after the flowers fade, the sepals turn pink, giving the appearance of a second flowering, and the bark peels in layers of different colors that make a wonderful display in winter.

Basket of begonia.

I didn't find any fuschias for the hanging baskets on the porch this year, so I bought this beautiful red Begonia instead. Calibrachoas in several colors went in the two other baskets, with the addition of some creeping Jenny (Lysimachia nummularia 'Aurea') hanging over the edges. 

Hanging baskets of Calibrachoas on the porch.

The recent rains have brought out some new flowers: Crocosmia 'Lucifer's red flowers make a nice contrast against the fluffy blue Ageratum, with orange marigolds. The yellow Chrysanthemums are already starting to bloom, despite earlier de-budding. I'm curious to see how the 'Autumn Joy' sedum will look in the fall when the pink Muhly grass puts out some of its plumes--the deer have really chewed up the sedums!

Herb's bed.