August Bloom Day Delights

Hello out there in the blogdom. We want to welcome one and all to walk the paths in the Faire Garden to see what’s blooming on this August Bloom Day, sponsored by Carol at
May Dreams Gardens . Although there are many blooms to photograph this month, the garden as a whole is not as fetching as one would like. We are sort of between times of bursting blooms, the daylilies are done and the mums and muhly grass have at least another month to go before wowing us with a riot of pinky hues. But we still have a good variety, some new, some old. Shown above, being visited by a lovely Painted Lady butterfly is a new plant, we bought several of these actually from the big box, Heliopsis ‘Bressingham Doubloon’. We needed some larger yellow flowering plants and this is said to grow four to five feet tall. In the ground here for about a month so far they are doing well, even with drought conditions.
Purchased in Pennsylvania with a label showing a double pink flowered coneflower in the photo, this is definitely an echinacea, but the flower form is like nothing we have seen anywhere. There are many buds and the plant is healthy and robust. How or why it came to have that tag, who knows, but we are hanging on to this treasure and hoping the seed comes true.
A native wildflower here that came with the property is this Datura metel. It is an annual here and self sows freely. We let a few of these flower and seed to keep it in the garden. They grow large, about five feet and the flowers open in the evening and on cloudy days with a heady fragrance.
Another wildling, the passionflower, Passiflora incarnata, also known as Maypop, seeds about and also spreads by underground roots. Most of these have to be pulled or we would have nothing else growing in the beds, but a couple are allowed to flower. They are the host plant for the larva of the Gulf Frittilary butterfly, hence the holes in the flowers and leaves. That is okay, it is why we grow them.
A seed grown dahlia, D. ‘Bishop’s Children’ has a bleached out orangey red bloom. Some of these winter over and return to bloom another year or two, but are short lived and need to be started nearly every year to ensure their existence here. They germinate easily in the greenhouse/sunroom and flower the first year, nearly instant gratification.
The oldest water lily in our pond is finally blooming. The shade is encroaching on the pond and it is feared the waterlilies cannot bloom with so little sun. The few flowers we get are treasured.

The Salvia greggiis line the long wall at the back of the main house and the second terrace up the hill. They were given a harsh haircut after the spring flush of blooms and are just now producing buds again. Also known as Autumn Sage, they will offer bright color as the days grow shorter.

Okay, this is a bad thing. It is a virus ridden echinacea, with traits that the breeders are selecting and calling fancy names, like Green Envy and the double flowered monstrosities. I had a large stand of the old purple and white coneflowers that became infected with this blight and had to pull the whole lot of them out. That was several years ago and I see some of these returning in a bed up at the top of the property behind the knot garden. Those echinaceas were seedlings from the first batch and seemed to be normal until this year. Luckily they are far from the beds with the newer named cultivars from the Sky series, but insects visit all the plants here and can spread bad things as well as do good deeds such as pollinate. These will have to be destroyed soon. I just wanted to show you all.

Here are some more plants in the same bed as above. You have been warned.

Whew, that was scary. So let’s get back to happier thoughts with this little fellow on our cutleaf sunflower, Rudbeckia lanciniata. Many thanks
Christopher C. of Outside Clyde for identifying this plant. We call these the tall sunflowers, for they sprout up to ten feet tall from the evergreen rosettes by August each year.

Red turtlehead, Chelone obliqua is just beginning to open. Purchased at a plant sale in Knoxville last year, we were not sure enough moisture could be provided for this shade lover to prosper. Even though we are not giving extra water, the plant appears vibrant, that is a relief.

A self sown petunia in the path, it looks like one of the original wave petunias. I haven’t grow these since the first year of gardening here, 2000. Who knows how it got here, maybe a seed was in the pine straw?

We have the worst experience with the agastaches. We have bought plenty of them, large full plants that dwindle as the season progresses into wisps of their former selves. This A. ‘Coronado’ was barely alive this year after being planted as a huge specimen last fall so it was moved to a spot with better soil, more sun and within the vision line of the woman with the hose. Maybe we can get it back to robust with some TLC. I do love the color.

One flower on the several osteospurmums that were planted in the containers for season long color. They bloomed early and then stopped. It is hoped they like the cooler temps of fall and will give us color again, until it is time to rip them out and plant the pansies and violas that take us through winter and spring. That happens in October.

Growing on the old branches left of the rose
Killer , R. ‘Alberic Barbier’ is the crossvine Bignonia ‘Tangerine Beauty’. There is an old rusted metal clothesline pole behind the cut tree trunk standing next to the new arbor. The crossvine has instructions to grow across the top of the sixteen foot wide arbor to provide shade and beauty of blossoms. It is doing its duty so far.

We rarely show flowers from the front part of the property for they are few, but this Coreopsis ‘Zagreb’ has earned a spot on the bloom day post with its floriferousness. Pieces have been spread along the curving walkway to the front steps and it is hoped that edging will fill in some day for summer long yellow cheerfulness to greet visitors.

A southern summer cannot be complete without the papery blooms of crepe myrtles. This dark watermelon colored one is Victor, behind out of focus are the blooms of Hosta ‘Royal Standard’, their fragrance is intoxicating.

A freebie from the Arbor Society for joining in 2000, this is one of a group of crepe myrtles that have grown to tree proportions. This light pink one is in the middle section along the curbing and was dug out to be moved after
the giant pampas grass fiasco. The moved tree died, but whatever was left in the ground from the original planting regrew and is now a many trunked shrub. Some of those stems need to be cut to the ground to give it better form. But the flowers are welcome.

Our Joe Pye Weed, Eupatorium purpureum ‘Gateway’ is having an excellent year. We dug out the privet around Ferngully where the soil is wonderful loam and split and spread the Joe Pye around the trunk of the dead tree. It nearly covers the trunk and the butterflies love the flowers. So do we.

An unknown yarrow from a mixed planter bought on sale at the end of the season last year has given us good color in the black garden. Ajuga reptans is one of the groundcovers in the black garden and is a nice foil to the red.

The Sedum spectabile ‘Autumn Joy’ is turning from broccoli to fruity purple, or at least this one plant in the front of the house is.

The row of Autumn Joy around the daylily hill still looks like this. Who knows why, they are both in some shade, neither gets extra water and all came from the same mother plant. Soon these will color up and draw the butterflies and bees en masse.

Sedum spectabile ‘Matrona’ has purple stockings and darker flower heads. The Japanese Blood Grass, Imperata cylindrica looks especially nice with Matrona. In fact, there is little the blood grass doesn’t look good with, if anything. A little gaillardia is blooming red orange in amongst the sedum.

Looking at the heath/heather bed, one can see the flower buds on the green Erica ‘Mediterranean Pink’ behind Calluna vulgaris ‘Firefly’s yellow summer needle like foliage. Firefly will turn bright red with the cold temps of winter. The pink flowers are nondescript but cute. The Erica blooms in January and continues through spring, good winter interest there.

This combination turned out surprisingly well. The Sambucus ‘Black Lace’ was a replacement for a Japanese maple that was killed by the late frost of 2007. Hosta ‘Guacamole’ has light lavender blooms that make this scene pleasing. Blue Star junipers give evergreen interest during winter when the decidous Elder and hostas are leafless.

Still blooming is Paphiopedilum ‘Honey’, that is the shortened version of the long name, on the right. Just beginning to open is P. (Starr Warr x Maudiae) ‘Pisgah’ x P. Dark Spell ‘Wolf Lake’, AM/AOS. This is why we call the green leaf orchid Honey. Because this is the first time the spotted leaf one is blooming on a bloom day, it gets the full name published. From now on it will be P. Star Wars. Honey has three flowers open and more buds still holding promise. It was purchased online from Carter and Holmes Orchids and was shipped as a tiny thing. Star Wars was purchased at an orchid show in Knoxville at the mall two years ago by offspring Semi as a birthday present. It has a second bud sticking up also. Thanks Semi, dear, good choice.

This is Caryopteris ‘Worcester Gold’. Even though the photo is less perfect than desired, I wanted to show you the gold leaves and blue flowers of this fragrant shrub. Short lived but easily rooted wherever a stem touches ground, this plant forms the border between the yellow/white garden and the black garden. maybe clicking on the image will give a better look at this nice specimen.

We started wtih the close up macro shots and have worked our way to the long views. Standing under the deck, the closest plants are the blood grass mentioned previously with creeping lemon thyme to the left. The tall plant behind and to the left is White Snakeroot. Ageratina altissima also known as White Sanicle or Tall Boneset, is a poisonous perennial herb in the family Asteraceae, native to eastern North America. An older binomial name for this species was Eupatorium rugosum, but the genus Eupatorium has undergone taxonomic revision by botanists and a number of the species once included there have been moved to other genera. The formal language is from wikipedia, for I thought this was a Eupatorium still, silly me. To the right on the slope is rosemary, with some garlic chives beginning to bloom white in front. The dried flower heads of Calamagrostis x acutiflora ‘Karl Foerster’ show up in the rear. Old Karl is hard to beat in the tall grass category.

A shot looking up towards the knot garden and the shed shows the finished blooms of the eryngiums and belamcandas lined by the small Korean boxwood ‘Wintergreen’. Dianthus grows between the concrete step stones, the wheelbarrow to the left is home to the small sedum collection and some volunteer Salvia coccineas. To the right is Cotinus coggygria, Purple smoke bush with Salvia greggii at its feet. Tall hot pink crepe myrtles give color in front of the hemlock row that hides the chain link fence. On the far left side is the beginning of the row of orange berried pyracanthas. You may be able to discern the blood grass in the window box planter on the shed. Also growing in there is Japanese painted fern. I wanted to show the garden as a whole, or as much as can can be seen in one shot, to reveal the true appearance of the garden right now. It has leaf form interest, some color from foliage, flower and berries, really a lot going on, but it is not a sea of flowers as the macro shots might suggest. I wish you all could see it in person, for it has lots of texture and wildlife, the things that make a garden feel alive and vibrant.

This final photo of the plantings along the wall at the back of the house looks pretty enough, but do notice the contents of the rain gauge. There is none. The blue Salvia farinacea, yellow marigold and yet more blood grass, (yes, it has been spread far and wide here) are hanging on, but the hose watering is getting tiring and is no replacement for water falling from the sky.

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This wraps up another installment in the Bloom Day series. It is great fun to put together the posts of what is blooming during each month of the year. It is more what took a decent photograph than what is blooming to be honest. There are always pretty things that I would like to show you that just don’t cooperate each month. But enough felt like posing for the camera this time around to have a good amount, maybe too much for those with slow download speeds from their internet providers. It will be interesting to look back in future years at these records to be reminded of plants possibly gone by then and remember the good old days when there was abundance all around.

Frances

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