My daughter warned me in a phone call while we were on our recent trip that she hadn't done a very good job of keeping my plants watered. Her focus had been on caring for our animals and the poor plants were pretty much left to shift for themselves. A week of mid-90s temperatures and no rain was more than some of them could stand. I started emergency watering as soon as I got home, but I'm afraid it was too late for a few plants.
Sigh.
Oh well, on the bright side, it's an opportunity to buy more plants and maybe add something wonderful to the garden.
It's not an unmitigated disaster. Most of my plants came through with flying colors. Color being the operative word - the garden is full of it these days.
While we were on the road, I kept seeing crinums in bloom everywhere we went, which made me wonder if my crinums back home had started to bloom.
Sure enough - some of them were in bloom. Out by the pond, the old white crinums sometimes called swamp lilies or spider lilies were blooming.
In another part of the garden, pretty 'Ellen Bosanquet' is in full bloom.
The summer phlox is at its peak of bloom now.
4 o'clocks at various sites around the garden scent the late afternoon air with the delicate perfume of their blossoms.
The crocosmias that were just beginning to open their blooms when I left town are now in full bloom.
The vitex 'Montrose Purple' is also full of blossoms.
Wine-colored flowers of the evergreen wisteria decorate the fence where the plant lives.
Along the north side of the house, the 'Cashmere Bouquet'
Clerodendrum bungei is providing additional color.
And nearby, the
Clerodendrum thomsoniae, 'Bleeding Heart' adds a bright white and red note.
And another day, another sunflower. This one is at least twelve feet tall and full of these sunny blossoms.
So, no, all was not lost in my week on the road, and I know my daughter did the best that she could between her more than full-time job and taking care of her own house and two cats, as well as my house, yard, and animals. I'm grateful for what remains and now, if we could just get a
little rain, maybe all that brown grass would green up again.
So many colorful blooms just waiting for you! I love the bleeding heart clerodendrum, but I think my very favorite are your sunflowers. Where do you have them growing in your garden? I would bet your birds love them!
ReplyDeleteThey grow in the veggie garden. I planted a bed of them there last year and this year they reseeded themselves, so the current crop is all "volunteers."
DeleteA 12' sunflower is my kind of plant. I love your Clerodendums also.
ReplyDeleteThose sunflower plants really are impressive and they help shade the plants around them which those plants greatly appreciate on these hot, dry days.
DeleteI know what you mean. I once had a collection of delicate little Corydalis, but had to go help out when 2 of my grandkids were being born, and my husband didn't take care to look for delicate little plants to water so I lost all of them, and I gave up and never grew them again. Plus all the weed grasses went to seed and I've had 7 years of bad weed luck.
ReplyDeleteBut I'm sure those grandkids were worth the lost Corydalis!
DeleteI tend to be philosophical about lost plants in general, although there are some that I am specially attached to. But plants die - that's a fact - and their deaths allow us to bring on new and maybe better plants. At least that's what I keep telling myself...