Thursday, August 20, 2020

Some of the plants in the boulevard, the driveway and the inner front garden rooms, in June

The crocosmia buds on June 19th.  These are some rather aggressive bulbs.  They are attractive to humming birds and easy maintenance so I have clumps of them everywhere in my garden
This little geranium or it might be called an erodium grows next to the stone path with the golden oregano on the other side.  In fact it is being overgrown by the oregano.
I have campanulas of various kinds around the garden.  This one grows in a fairly shaded area in the magnolia tree bed, next to the cedar hedge.
I have a few of these Sedum, autumn joy, around the garden, also.  This one grows in the same area as the above campanula.  They both like more sun than they are getting, but they survive.  They bloom at different times and so provide some color in this garden room for a longer period of time.
This is the cleaned up clump of black bamboo.  When I took out the dried canes it makes the black canes more visible.  I like the look of the clump thinned out.  I will be doing more of this when I get the time.  The black canes look good with the build up of the leaves that turn white.
This is the rectangle bed on the west side of the boulevard garden room.  The lovely big white veronica grows too close to the cedar hedge, with the little erodium beneath its feet.  It is being crowed by the crosmias on the other side of it.  So, I need to get in there and dig out some of the crocosmias.
This is the, approximately 6 feet by 25 foot strip that runs across the front of the boulevard garden.  The French lavender is the star of the show for 2 or 3 months.  I have cut it back now and hope it produces more bloom in the next little while.  There are various other perennials in this area: lupines, foxgloves, achillea, irises, the blue grasses, pinks, all underplanted with thyme.The daisies keep coming back and so I have daisy boquets in May or June, until I get them all pulled out.  There is another strip in front of this one that is about 10 feet deep by the length of the boulevard from our driveway across to the neighbors driveway.  It is about 35 feet long, making the bottom 'green frame' around my front garden.
The blue grass, the pinks and the tall bearded irises.  To the right side of the photo there is a tall bridal veil spirea shrub that I keep pruned to a globe shape.
To the right of the Spirea shrub is another rectangular bed.  The front strip is quite nice with the lychnis, some more pinks, the self seeding verbena bodinaires, and the plum tree to the right (out of the picture).  Behind these plants the little rectangle became over grown with blue bells.  I put leaves on them in the autumn to try and control them.  I have transplanted some orange daylillies  in there.  They are in quite a lot of shade.  The orange colors brighten up the corner.  I need to clean cut back a tree that has been there since the beginning of the time the house was built.  It has got away from me over the last couple of years and needs to be taken down to ground level again.  
The virginia creeper goes up the telephone pole in the 5 foot deep strip between the neighbors driveway and our driveway.  It turns marvelous colors in the autumn.  It has st. john's worte planted beneath it.  I have some fairly aggresive plants growing in the driveway strip. 
The torch lily:  Gardeners should be diligent with watering during hot and dry spells. Provide a 2- to 3-inch (5-7.6 cm.) layer of mulch to help with water retention and for protection during cold winters. Cut foliage off at the base of the plant in late fall and remove spent flower spike to encourage more blooms

Kniphofia, also called tritoma, red hot poker, torch lily, knofflers or poker plant. 

The striking red hot poker plant (Kniphofia uvaria) is in the Liliaceae family and is also known as poker plant and torch lily. This plant thrives in USDA zones 5 through 9 and is an upright evergreen perennial with a clumping habit. Over 70 known species exist of this South African native plant.

As you can see I am not taking very good care of this plant.  I did not realize that it should be cut back to ground level in the Fall.  Nevertheless, this torch lily is a fairly tough plant.  It grows in front of the mountain ash tree, with a tall rose, volunteer oregon grape, nasty black berries and bind weed for competition.  

a close up of the torch lily blossoms.
 This is the Yucca, next to the Virginia creeper, with the st. John's warte and an Autumn Joy sedum.  The sedum and the Yucca are forming buds.

Yucca is a genus of perennial shrubs and trees in the family Asparagaceae, subfamily Agavoideae. Its 40–50 species are notable for their rosettes of evergreen, tough, sword-shaped leaves and large terminal panicles of white or whitish flowers. 

Yucca glauca is native to central North America: occurring from the Canadian Prairies of Alberta and Saskatchewan in Canada; south through the Great Plains to Texas and New Mexico in the United States.

This finishes the posting for my garden in June.  I have been away for 3 weeks, so I do not know if there will be a July in the garden posted, as I have a lot of catching up to do in the garden.

Blogger has been making some changes.  I guess any further photos will need to be much smaller to fit in the space provided.  It always annoys me why they have to fix things that aren't broken.  😞