Front Garden in April

 This is a view of the fern leafted peony, the corsican hellebore, the west coast planter and some of the other alpines that are thriving in this little rockery under a deciduous tree in clay soil with a covering of flat field rocks.

 The mountain avens are spreading quite nicely.  I need to keep them clipped into the space there is for them.

 This little rhododendron like shrub is doing very well and is surrounding the little sundial in the little circle.  The alpine daisies are doing well in this little circle, but I cannot seem to get thrifts to survive here.  One other plant would be good to have in the circle. 

 This sedum with the pinkish hue is spreading under the smoke bush that has plum colored leaves.  Its a good combination and allows a flat area.  There are self seeding alliums in front of it as well as a few other taller perennials.  The front part looks a bit messy and I should clean it up more.

 This bridal veil sprirea bush is good every year.  I clip it.  If I did not clip it the branches would be long and hang down like a veil, in white.  I prefer the  clipped look.  It looks good against the dark hedge.  The new line of blue muscari make a nice layer of detail to this area of the garden that is between the street and the hedge.  I need to get that little hedge trimmed up this year.  I cut it back quite a bit last year and it was looking quite scraggly.  It is filling out now and needs careful pruning back.  All part of the fun.

 This shows the sundial circle and the sedum just across the rock border of the sundial bed.

This is a shot of the canola along the Yangtze river.  You can see how industrial the area is from all the smog in the air.  

Our Perfect Sepetember weather

Last Thursday, we loaded the Model T Ford Speedster on Louis' trailer and headed up to Campbell River for the Can-Am Model T tour. We stopped at 'Bravo' in Duncan for lunch. I had the best Greek Salad and salmon and shrimp in Filo pastry. The tour was excellent. I especially liked the lunch stop at Elk Falls park. The drive to Sayward the next day was very good too. There were a record number of participants and so we were kinda squished into the Lions hall for our banquet. Too bad my stomach was giving me trouble, cause I apparently missed the best barbequed salmon ever on Friday night. On Sunday we took the scenic route home along the old highway with a stop at Qualicum Beach for lunch in a place overlooking the ocean. A fine week end!

Before we left on Thursday, Dan and Irene stopped in with their airstream motorhome on a run up to the top of the Island and to see us on tour. We had dinner at home that Wednesday. After we got back from the tour on Sunday we had the house to ourselves. But our Scottish guests got back on Monday and Dan and Irene were on their way home Monday, too. Tuesday, we walked to Todd Inlet and went out to dinner. Thanks Dan and Irene!

Yesterday, our guests were all gone by mid afternoon. Is it ever quiet!! I took my camera out for a few garden photos. Then, with my raggiest shorts and t shirt I was going to go into the pond and get the filter out. But, it was floating. I had forgotten what kind of filter was on the pump. It is a foam type filer and it just sticks on over the little plastic filter on the pump. I washed it, stuck it back on the pump, and put a plastic mesh bag around the filter and pump. I put it back into the pond and turned on the power. Its working great! While skimming off the pond I found that there are numerous little baby fish, this year! What a bonus!

Today, I managed to get the grass mowed, and topped up the front water feature. The fish in there is still alive! That fish is getting quite old.... it must be at least 5 years old now. There are also little wall lizards everywhere in the garden. I have seen garden snakes across the road, but have not seem any in my garden, yet. I pruned a bit on the back plum tree. Dan had parked his motor home along the front close to the purple plum tree and did a bit of creative pruning on it, which I cleaned up. No damage done.

We have 4 jars of purple plums frozen. When we got home from the tour, all these plums had fallen to the ground. I rescued all of them that I could manage to keep, pitted them and boiled them for a minute or two, then froze them.

My garden tour - Patio and Driveway areas

The spring bulbs along the driveway. At the top right corner you can just see a bit of the geraniums. The van is just to the left of this view. When the bulbs are finished there will be an oriental poppy, some creeping phlox, some arabis, but not much for the summer show. There are morning glories in the hedge that need to be constantly killed. I treat them to some round up painted on the leaves, but this never seems to be very effective. I will have to be more diligent, I suppose.
I have a tall cedar hedge that runs from almost the back fence line along between our driveways and up to where the front line of our house. This is excellent privacy. In front of the hedge are some perennial geraniums at the back garage end. These plants are carefree, evergreen ground cover. Tough and reliable. They are just now coming into bud. The van is in front of them so they are seldom seen. At the other end of the hedge there is an opening between the hedge and the moutain ash tree. This is a borrowed vista showing our neighbours' cherry tree in bloom.
This is a very nice statuesque grass like plant. It is going to show up better in the edge of this garden when I have taken out the artemesia. I might replace the artemesia with more of the sedum. Behind this plant and the sedum there are 3 Rose of Sharon shrubs. They look okay when in bloom but otherwise are not that great. They leaf out late, and the fall color is non existant. As you can see in the bottom of this photo, I need to clean up the daffodils that have finished blooming. You can see some of the arabis in this photo. The arabis is doing great in the bottom part of this 5 foot wide strip. I have added some aubretia to the mix and will be adding more this summer for a nice show next spring. Both the arabis and aubretia are evergreen with white blooms and purple blooms respectively. They make a nice ground cover over the dying bulbs. In this area I need to remove a torch lily that is old and ragged. I also need to weed out dandilions, other weeds, blackberries and be sure the rose we took out a year ago stops putting up shoots.
This is a very well behaved sedum. As you can see, it needs to be dead headed. I am about half way finished in cleaning up this part of the garden. I have added 3 bags of the compost to the tulips and other plants along in front of the cedar hedge.
At the street end of the driveway we have a Virginia creeper going up a utility pole. This plant makes a lovely dark green mass in summer and turns to glorious autumn colors. Right now, before it leafs out, you see its winter underwear. This is a silvery ivy growing up through the creeper and slowly spreading up the post for winter color. At the foot of the creeper post we have St.John's wort. This is another very invasive plant but if kept in check and planted in the right place it does real yeoman duty. Its good here contained within our driveways and the street. I have to clip it back every few years. I only got it partially done last fall. The St. John's wort is expanding towards the other plantings along this strip between our driveways. In the bottom left corner we can see the New Zealand flax plant which has not survived our cold winter or the snow it had dumped on it. I will also take out the artemesia that has been crushed by snow load.
These tulips sit below the bird feeder by the garage door and downspout from the eaves.
To continue the garden tour from the woodland area we come past the van and big green compost bin. This bin is emptied once a month and I receive a 20 litre bag of compost from the service I have hired noted in the side bar of my blog. This is the patio area between the house and the back garage. You see the grape vine just coming into leaf. The bird feeder is empty because the starlings have been at it. It took them no time at all to gobble it all up. You get a glimpse of the tulips beyond the garage. To the right in this photo you enter the back garden or go up the steps to the deck.