October color

The roses are still in bloom.  I have a couple of rose bowels in the house containing the most fragrant Gertrude Jekyl which is a David Austin English rose.

The plants on the deck are about finished blooming.  I have not replaced them with Chrysanthemums or pansies.  I probably won't do this either.  As soon as it rains these plants that look great coming out of the greenhouse turn to brown mush. 

This is the Tibouchina 'Royal Dreams' shrub on the deck.  It has one leaf that has changed color.  This is a very showy plant, but tender.  It has to come into the house over winter.  I shall put it into the library, so that none of the other plants get any outside bugs it may have on it.  It can be pruned back quite a bit, so it bushes out more with more of the Royal Purple blooms on it.  When I bought this one it was a tiny plant in a tiny pot.  It is now about 4.5 feet tall and looking very healthy. 

The michaelmas daisies are in few well behaved clumps all over the garden.  Aside from the tree leaf colors they are the best Autumn plants.  I have seeds saved from some of the plants and hope to put them into pots to grow.  I have some seed from the wild sweet peas that I hope to get growing in the woodland area.  There is poppy seed, delphinium, hollyhock and lily of the Nile.  I have 4 bags of topsoil to put into the pots where I hope to grow these seeds.

This is the firethorn, covered with berries, this year.  The germander is finished blooming and will be cut back in the early Spring.  I like to leave the perennials foliage on over winter.  The robins are going to happy with this feast of berries later on when they ripen. Early Monday morning I was sitting at my front window watching all the birds.  We have the Colquitz river across the street from us.  It is rather wild area that is not made into a 'park'.  Its wonderful habitat for the the wild life. I saw deer in the deer pasture.  There were Canada geese, 2 big blue herons, a whole bunch of robins, tit mouse clumps, and numerous other birds.  In the back the humming birds are constantly at the feeder.  I wonder if they fatten up to over winter here.
I have transplanted my recent purchases of perennials and bulbs.  There are a few good 'butterfly and humming bird' plants.  This woodland area is covered with good mulch.  When I emptied the last bag of this mulch, I found that I have more of it under the bag of fine cedar bark mulch.  So, if I should need some good compost there is a bit there.  There is also the old compost bin to empty, also.  We are to have about a week of perfect gardening weather, so I must get out.

Early Autumn in the garden

This is another view of the renovated path in the back garden. 

The vegetable garden has been weeded and the compost added.  It needs one more bag of compost added.  The Community compost people emptied the bin today and left the needed bag.  I have used up all of the compost so far this year.
The weeding in the woodland garden is finished.  I will need to be very diligent about removing the blue bells when they come up in the Spring.  I have added the butterfly bush next to the black tub.  I have added the woodland compost to the area and have used up all of that compost that was available.  I have put in some daffodil bulbs, a few crocus, hyacinths and dutch iris along the middle ground of this 5 - 6 foot strip of woodland.  The area I am working on stretches from one side of the old garage along behind the garage to about half way past the garage.  I have not measured it, but it must be at least 25 feet.  I have purchased 11 perennials from Cannor, and I hope to put about half of them into this area.  There is a monarda, a veronica, a lychnis (Maltese Cross), Liatrus (gay feather), anise hyssop and a primula that I will add between the bulbs.  These perennials should cover the fading foliage of the bulbs from the spring.  Across the old sidewalk from this area is the lovely lace cap hydrangea under planted with some ... I think its called sweet woodruff and muscari, with some stray daylilies, the lily of the valley shrub, and ferns that hide the old black compost bin.  The compost bin needs to be emptied.  I am adding kitchen compost to it, so it should be good additive to the gardens when I get it dug out. 
Along the front I added 40 more muscari to the crocus field and I should now have a border of blue around the crocuses when they all come up in the spring. I expect to add a lavender, a black eyed susan, and a dwarf coreopsis to the strip next to the crocus field.  I need to keep the daisies under control in this strip and not let them crowd out everything else.  I could use one more pussy toes in the front of this border. 

The apples are not great this year.  I think they are ready to be used now.  I still have apple sauce in the freezer from other years. 
The next area on my to do list is the pond and Japanese garden area.  I need to weed all of the violets and stuff out of the moss garden, dig out some ferns that are taking over, and then think about what I am going to do about the area under the deck.  I want to make a sitting area, so there might have to be some digging and moving of dirt to make the level area. 
The trees are starting to turn colors and the rains have started.  There was over half an inch of rain in the rain gauge.  I saw a weather forecast saying that our winter is going to be colder than usual.  I guess those hornets were right! 

October harvest

An attempt at a still life.  The bottom photo has been enhanced with the Virtual photographer filter called 'spice'.  I do think it adds a bit of spice to the original. This is the harvest from my garden on Oct. 1.

more of the harvest still on the trees.  The fig is having its best year.  There are lots of grapes this year.  I am waiting for colder weather to make them sweeter.

 This is the verbena bonariensis.  It is said to be on the Washington State invasive plant watch list.  I can hardly believe it.  I want more of this easy care plant to grow in my front garden.  It is said to self seed easily.  I only have a one or two plants from an old old plant I once purchased.  I shall save the seed and plant it where I want the plants to grow.  I think it needs more moisture than it gets in my carefree front garden strip. This area has a ground cover of thyme, a season of tall daisies and achillea, then the michaelmas daisies bloom... now.  On the other end of this strip across the front I have lynchnis, under planted with pussy toes, with some dutch iris in the Spring.  This year I have added a yellow spot of black eyed susans and coreopsis.  There is the plum tree, a red currant shrub and a lavender.  The black eyed susan has a very long blooming period.  I need to establish more of them!

I renovated this path in the back garden by taking out the flat field stones and adding the stepping stones.  I added pea gravel to fill in and hope to get the Sicilian mint to grow and weed out everything else in the path.  This is the view of the path from the old sidewalk along beside the old garage, and looking towards the entry to the Japanese garden.  I have weeded this path up to the entry to the Japanese area where it also branches off to one of the entries to the vegetable garden.

I have weeded along the back behind the garage from the irises and germander to the end of the old sidewalk where it becomes the bark woodland path.  I have dug out the big leafed plant that was in the front and crowding out the Trilliums.  I have left this plant to grow at the back of the border beside a torch lily clump.  I have the new buddleia/butterfly bush planted in front of this clump.  I hope the thin leaves of the torch lily and the fat leaves of the other plant make a nice backdrop for the butterfly bush.  There are Saskatoon berry trees behind the tub garden, and then the irises, and germander.  There are a few cedars and a yew behind these two plants.  After I had the weeds taken out I put down about 6 bags of the good woodland compost I had liberated from the clean up of the Virginia creeper and St. John's worte in the spring.  The dry twig from this same operation in the Spring is making a very nice springy covering on the wood land path.  It should keep the path from being muddy in winter. 
It is dark by 7:00 now.  We had about an inch of rain last week, some high winds and cooler temperatures.  It is good gardening weather. I have quite a few jars of soup made and frozen.  This should free up some of my time to get outside. 
Of course there is always computer and camera stuff to play with, too. 
Last nite I was watching some depressing videos about the deepening of the depression.  The people living in the tent cities are really very sad and in dire circumstances, now.  There was talk of revising the whole global monetary system going back to a base of gold for all currency.  It was estimated that the US dollar would hold less than half of its present value.  The Chinese and the Oil barons are not much interested in financing the US wars any longer.  Of course, our dollar seems to be tied to the US buck and will probably slide down the slippery slope as well.  Although, our debt is no where near the proportions of the US.  Its all pretty scary.  Makes me want to buy a piece of land where I could raise some livestock and poultry... that will never happen, though.