I finally put down the watering hose long enough to pick up the camera and take a few photos of the garden this week. I have had to water so much lately that I feel like I am permanently attached to the hose! We have soaker and drip hoses in some of the beds, but when I have plants that are so dry they’re wilted, I prefer to turn the hose on them. (Plus, hand watering gives me a chance to really see everything.) We are SO dry and in desperate need of rain! It hasn’t rained here in about three weeks, and we are HOT, very hot. The temperature was 96 today and we are supposed to go over one hundred degrees for the next few days, with no rain in sight. I’m watering just to keep things alive now. How’s your weather? Is it hot and dry where you are too? Anyone else feeling permanently attached to their watering hoses? :) Here are lots of photos I took this week, sorry for the poor quality of some, they were taken in late evening, click to enlarge.
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Petunia ‘Supertunia Vista Bubblegum’ in hanging baskets, Purple Angelonia and Petunia ‘Prism Sunshine’ in container, grown from seed
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Dwarf Pink Bee Balm (‘Grand Parade’), pink Double Delight Coneflowers, purple-leaved Red Shiso (Perilla Frutescens), and pink Polka Dot plants in the long border near the creek.
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‘Black Dragon’ Coleus, various types of salvia, marigolds in rock wall flower bed
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Pink Balloon Flowers, with ‘Laura Bush’ petunias and variegated Caryopteris divaricata ‘Snow Fairy’ shrub in the background. By the way, all my caryopteris shrubs are already in bloom. Everything is about a month ahead this year!
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Veronica
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Coneflowers
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An exceptionally pretty daylily :)
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Monarda ‘Grand Parade’
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White Swan Coneflowers and Agastache ‘Heat Wave’
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Zinnias and ‘Black Pearl’ peppers (at far left) with Echinacea Powwow White and PowWow Wild Berry coneflowers, ‘White Swan’ coneflowers in bed above gazebo
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Magellan™ Cherry Zinnias grown from seed
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Long creekside border near patio
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Closer View
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Container flowers with petunias, spike, verbena, bacopa, red geraniums, and dahlias in the background
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Dragonwing Begonias and Persian Shield in pots on the rock patio
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It has been very hot here in Virginia too, 96 to 104 for the last week. And we have not had enough rain. Your flower gardens are always so beautiful, as are your color combinations. I really like the monarda “Grand Parade.”
Thank you, Lana. I like that dwarf monarda a lot.
(Still no rain here! hope you’ve had some!)
Hello Sherry, yes it has been really hot and dry up here as well.. They said on TV the other night that we have already had 4 times the number of over 90 degrees days then in an average **year**, and that was still in June…
We did get some rain yesterday but it’s so hot and dry the ground was dry and dusty 30 minutes later with no sign of it being wet from the rain… Suppose to be 96 today and 98 tomorrow here in Michigan with the heat index near 106, so I understand what your talking about..
Is it to early to say “think snow”..? LOL
Love the pictures as always Sherry, have a safe 4th…
thanks SPider. hope you had a nice holiday. :)
having trouble getting this blog and all wordpress blogs to scroll or even typing here)
edited to add: Sorry it took me so long to respond, Spider. Ever since wordpress gave us an “upgrade” called “infinite scrolling”, I’ve had trouble not only with my blog but with all wordpress blogs. I turned off the endless scrolling on my blog, but it’s still there… I can barely get the pages to scroll, and typing in these forms on the blog pages takes forever, there’s about a ten second lag after every. single. letter.
Gorgeous. Wow, your Vernoica gets big!
Christine, that clump of Veronica is several years old now, and it does get big! Some years it’s almost 4′ tall!
Your gardens are amazing – I have limited space (and a limited gardening budget) so I live vicariously through your blog :) Your hanging basket of petunias is lovely, would you be able to post a turorial on how to get such amazing results from seed? (such as when and how to start them, how many seeds to use, and where to keep them until they are ready for the garden) thanks!
Hi Jessica,
Thank you so much for your kind words, I appreciate it. I’m glad you enjoy the photos. My budget is not unlimited, I grow many things from seeds and I divide and move perennials around every year. Over the years, I’ve just ended up with a whole lot of garden… lol
The pink petunias? They are not seed-grown, they are Bubblegum Supertunias. I bought those as small plants in spring, and they are -the- best petunias I have ever grown. One plant will absolutely fill up a large container, and as long as you feed and water them regularly and cut them back hard in July, they will stay beautiful until frost. (The yellow petunias and angelonias below them in the photo are the ones grown from seed.)
I have some tall sterlite shelves in a spare room in my house, and each shelf has two four foot fluorescent fixtures hanging over them (hubby affixed them to the shelves for me, and I can move them up and down by adjusting the chains), and I also have two 2ft. grow light fixtures. I just use plain fluorescent lights on the shelves and regular grow light bulbs in the smaller fixtures. I can get about 10 flats of plants on those shelves. I grow mostly annuals there, usually start them around January or February. I use jiffy seed starting mix and regular nursery flats, and after they start growing, I fertilize them with a weak solution of miracle grow once a month until I’m ready to move them out. (The lights are on timers and stay on about 16 to 18 hours a day, depending on how fast they’re growing. I adjust it to 16 if they’re getting too big too fast.) I harden them off on a concrete covered patio area about two weeks before planting them out in my beds and containers. No secret to it, I just keep at it and have learned what I can grow from seed and what is better to buy as plants. I do love trying new things from seeds though. This year, I’m looking forward to trying the new Cheyenne Spirit coneflowers. If I have seeds that fail, I just try something else or start them again — I enjoy working with them in the house during the winter months.
Hope this helps, and good luck with your own garden :)