We’ve had rain off and on for the last couple of days which is bringing the leaves down. Dark, dreary days but no frost yet. Many leaves are brown and crisp but there are spots of color among the fallen. I think the show will be brief, but I am enjoying every saturated hue.
Here are my Six on Saturday.
- The crepe myrtles are beginning to turn.
2. The red twig dogwood “Arctic Fire” has finally combusted. Once the leaves fall the red stems will provide winter color until they are cut back in the spring.
3. Amsonia hubrecti (fernleaf) “Arkansas Bluestar” has turned yellow. I had another variety which stayed green and kept its leaves through the winter. It was quite invasive so I dug them out. This clump has grown from a single plant given to me five years ago. I am saving seeds this year and will try to propogate more. I’ve seen it in other gardens where there are large swaths and it’s spectacular.
The small waterfall maple (Acer palmatum, commonly called Japanese Maple), to the right of the amsonia was bought as a rooted twig at the Philadelphia Flower Show at least twenty years ago. I brought it with us when we moved to this house twelve years ago. This photo reminds me I’ve got to get out and put the hose away before we get a hard freeze.
5. In the spring I planted cornflower (Centaurea scabiosa) seeds – “Perennial Butterfly.” The plants came up but the foliage didn’t stand upright, it just flopped in the raised bed. I almost pulled them out. No flowers until now — and just one! I’ll be interested to see what happens next summer. There are lots of plants with healthy looking leaves. I’ll divide them and put them in different areas to see how they do. If they flop again and don’t flower they’ll go into the compost bin.
6. I’ve brought my tender plants inside to a corner of the living room for winter color. The red geranium in the big pot was given to me ten years ago by a friend as a hostess gift. That friend has since moved away, but Betsy’s geranium is a long living reminder of our friendship. It goes out to the deck in the summer but really is happier inside. The big pots are on dollys and the other plants are on a repurposed kitchen island also on wheels.
There is an orchid on the top shelf that is alive and sending up a blooming stalk. It’s a miracle! I have killed every other orchid I’ve ever brought into the house. The clivia didn’t bloom last winter but I had repotted it so am hopeful for blooms this year.
That’s my six for this week, a meme started by The Propogator, a UK gardener. I learn something every week from the participating gardeners. This is the link to the rules if you’d like to join in.
Nice Autumn leaf colour. My dogwood shed almost all it’s leaves in one night of wind so didn’t get to enjoy leaves changing.
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We’re having a lot of wind this morning and I can’t see the dogwood from my office window. I wonder if I will have leaves by day’s end.
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I hope your clivia will bloom this winter. It isn’t easy and they have to settle before. Lovely Amsonia hubrecti, otherwise. I didn’t know it and the yellow color is gorgeous.
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I also may have put too many in the pot, but I’m hoping they rather like being root bound.
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Lovely colours. It’s nice how a plant can serve as a reminder of a friend or family member. My mum has a cotoneaster that her mum grew from seed and trained as a standard. Nan died over 20 years ago now but it’s still growing away.
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I have lots of plant memories and they all give me joy.
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I love clivia so fingers crossed for next year! The amsonia is a wonderful colour, don’t know that plant at all, does it have blue flowers or am I getting it confused with something else. Lovely autumn colour all round, it came in the end!
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The amsonia has blue flowers in the spring, but it is the fall color I am after. I saved seeds and will try and start some to plant next to the fence.
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Hello Mala. Interesting that you have the amsonia hubrichtii. I didnt know anything about this plant until i saw a huge swathe of them at a garden recently. It looked fantastic. I bought one! I shall be taking cuttings in there spring and I gather out comes true from seed too.
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You just need to make sure you have the fern leaf kind. The other one stays green and is invasive. On line I think they were both called hubrichtii.
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I bought the good kind from the garden shop where at i saw home it en masse. It was already in its autumn colours.
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Those geraniums do look great. I wish I’d brought mine in. Surprisingly, we’ve already had two straight days of snow.
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My son and d-i-l in Montana have had their first snow. We haven’t had a hard freeze yet.
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How excellent for the geranium. I got my oldest geranium in about 1980. I found it in a trash pile in my Pa’s neighborhood, and took two cuttings back with me on the train. I felt so sneaky about it. It is a common weedy variety, and is probably a straight species. I have taken pieces with me everywhere I lived since then, all through college and so on. I got my second orangish red geranium while growing citrus in the early 1990s. I found it growing wild in a nearby creek. It too goes everywhere with me, and is also likely a straight species.
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That crepe myrtle is spectacular! I don’t know of any foliage over here that has that purple tint. I had a dogwood years ago and had to dig it up because it started to take over the flowerbed! Lovely cornflower, too.
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Well, I’m hoping the cornflower will get up to speed next summer. I think my camera does something to the reds but I have to admit that was a spectacular photo of the crepe myrtle foliage. I hope the red twig dogwood keeps spreading. That bed stays full of water and then turns to concrete in the summer and the dogwood doesn’t die. I don’t need any fiddly plants in that area.
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That crepe myrtle really does have some exciting colours in it. The bloom is nice, too, isn’t it? I think I remember yours from spring. An all year round kinda guy.
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