Sunday, May 15, 2016

Bloom Day May

Hello all! For most of what I have flowering right now, please refer to my Mother's Day post. Very little has changed in the following week, except that it would really be cheating now to say a daffodil is still blooming (the remaining poeticus flower is kinda hanging on in a droopy sad state).

Here in Maryland we have had almost three solid weeks of some-rain-each-day (it didn't add up to a large amount altogether, but we set a record for consecutive days of measurable rain, at 15, and then it kept raining after the day that broke the record). It's stayed pretty chilly, too. I have not put the tomatoes in yet. On the whole the flowers are good, though, and I think at seasonal average.

Additions to the previous post:

Chives

One of what I think of as "Barbara's poppies" (they were overrunning her vegetable garden, so I rescued some)

Cranberrybush viburnum now open

Alliums also opened up

Amsonia starting to bloom. I have more of these to go in that I grew from seed.

Penstemon

And one lone rosebud!
I've been thinking about bulbs to put in come fall (yeah, I know, but what else can I do when it rains all the time?). Now that I've cleared out the beds along the driveway (former privet hedge now turned over to blueberries, and the vinca pulled out of the larger bed), I'm going to try tulips again, hoping that the deer stick to their plan of avoiding that side of the house. And I'd like to put in a bunch of fragrant daffodils near the deck. And more alliums out front. Maybe hyacinths when I've got the vinca and ivy out.

Meanwhile things progress very slowly in the Food Forest Thing out back, but in the drier periods we've done a little. Today I need to get mulch on the black raspberries. No time like the present... before it decides to rain again.

Sunday, May 8, 2016

Flowers for Mother's Day

Things that are blooming right now:

Mock orange

Golden alexanders

Columbine

Last of the daffodils - a poeticus
Pansies (with lettuce in planter)

Honesty (lunaria)

Bleeding hearts still going strong
Cranberrybush viburnum just about to bloom

Geranium
Scattered petals of:

glorious red buckeye
The thing that is no longer Allium bulgaricum
This is an Allium - about to burst forth
Dianthus that came back from last year despite being an annual

Clematis that likes to crawl on the ground near the mailbox

Sweet woodruff and celandine poppy

Lily of the valley
Bridal wreath spirea with nandina
Recording these in case they're gone by the fifteenth! Sunny today after a week and a half of rain - I wish I could have done more outside but my shoulder is very painful (hope this will pass). Got a few more plants in the ground though. Things are coming along...