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Here and There…Now and Then |
Securigera varia (Crown Vetch)
I was waiting to be picked up from work today and went out into the drizzle to take a few pictures. There is crown vetch growing here and there in the wild places near my office building and I took this of the leaves with water beaded up on it. It’s name comes from the flower clusters which (when not weighted down with rain) are neat, little crowns. The fact that it’s so common has a lot to do with it being planted for erosion control along highways.
Sisyrinchium angustifolium (Blue-eyed Grass)
I went out into the back yard after work today and took some pictures of the tiny blue-eyed grass flowers. They are in abundance right now but the individual flowers don’t stay open for long, opening and closing each morning and evening. I got this one before it shut for the night. We only planted a few of these but they have come up in other places around the yard. I wouldn’t describe them as aggressive but we will need to start pulling them up before too long so we aren’t overrun. If any of our friends would like one, let us know and we might dig one up for you.
Kousa Dogwood
The Cornus kousa (Japanese dogwood) is in bloom and I love these trees. Personally I think they are nicer in almost every way to the native C. florida (the flowering dogwood). There aren’t as many good pink varieties, of course, but it’s a handsomer tree with interesting bark and less bothered by anthracnose. The fruit is interesting, as well, although I guess if it were dropping on my patio I would prefer the smaller fruit of the native. Kousa also blooms much later, obviously, which I suppose is a downside, since there is so much else blooming right now. This is one of a bunch growing around my office building.
For a long time we’ve gone to Thanksgiving Farms on Mother’s Day so that Cathy could buy plants for the yard and for containers on the patio. We didn’t go last year, although I don’t remember why. Dorothy was away for the weekend and we didn’t have any plans so we decided to make the trek. It’s about 40 miles but it’s such a nice place and they have things we don’t see anywhere else. I brought my camera and took quite a few pictures but I especially noticed these three flowers, since they are all geum. They are so different from each other but each is pretty in its own way.
Pink Multiflora Rose
Last year in my Project 365 I posted a picture of this rose on Day 142, May 22, 2011. I know that you have to be a bit daft to actually plant a multiflora rose, particularly in a small garden. The great English rosarian, Graham Stuart Thomas, says in The Graham Stuart Thomas Rose Book (Sagapress, 1994):
It can best be described as an arching shrub, although its shoots will ramble into trees as high as 20 feet. Normally it makes a dense thicket of interlacing lax shoots, much like a blackberry. So dense is it, indeed, that when planted closely as a hedge it is rabbit-proof, and so thickly do its stems grow that it is becoming increasingly popular in the United States and also in Britain as a roadside plant, for its resilient thicket can hold a car which runs off the road. What a use for a rose! On the other hand, how lucky we are to be able to provide so pretty and sweet a shrub for such a use. It is claimed in America that it is “horse high, bull strong and goat tight.
Pink Multiflora Rose
Thomas, of course, was a rose person. How bad can any rose be? On the other hand, Michael A. Dirr is a more general horticulturalist. He has a little different opinion of R. multiflora in his well respected, 1,187 page Manual of Woody Landscape Plants (Fifth Edition, Stipes Publishing, 1998).
Under the heading “Habit” he says, “A fountain with long, slender, recurving branches; eventually forming an impenetrable tangle of brush suitable only for burning.” About its growth rate he says, “fast; too fast for most farmers who have this species in their fields.” His description for “Culture” is, “Same as described under R. rugosa although this species is more invasive; tolerates dry heavy soils very well.”
Pink Multiflora Rose
He goes on with an entry for “Landscape Value” of “None in the residential landscape; has received a lot of attention for conservation purposes; makes a good place for all the ‘critters’ to hide, yet can be a real nuisance for the birds deposit the seeds in fence rows and open areas, and soon one has a jungle; use this species with the knowledge that none of your gardening friends in the immediate vicinity will ever speak to you again.” Finally, he gives the following “Additional Notes.” “Utilized as an understock for budding the highly domesticated selections. Another species that appears resistant to black-spot and the typical rose diseases. I cannot overemphasize the invasive and greedy nature of this species. Have observed entire pastures/fields invaded and captured by the plant.”
Pink Multiflora Rose
Having said all that, I’m a fan of places for all the critters to hide. Also, this pink sport or more likely a natural hybrid, was growing at the edge of the woods near my office. I dug up a small piece and within a month all that was growing there had been sprayed and killed. Some would argue that I should have let it all be killed but this pink version, which is very similar in almost every way to the species, seemed worth keeping. The difference it in the flowers — they are larger than the species, as well as being a beautiful, dainty pink. There are somewhat fewer of them, but still enough. The leaves seem entirely free of rust, mildew, and black-spot.
Actually, my ultimate goal is to try to produce a tetraploid version of this diploid rose. That would be valuable for hybridizing, because some many important roses are tetraploid. Whether I can actually do that remains to be seen. In the meantime, I’ll continue to prune this hard, trying to keep it contained, and I’ll do it with the knowledge that none of my gardening friends in the immediate vicinity will ever speak to me again.
Dutch Iris ‘Eye of the Tiger’
A few years ago I planted a few of these Dutch irises called ‘Eye Of The Tiger’ in the front of our house, along the sidewalk. Dutch irises are actually hybrids of the Spanish iris (Iris xiphium) and the Morocco iris (Iris tingitana) but are often called Iris x hollandica. I think they’re awesome.
Champneys’ Pink Cluster
Roses are about to appear in force. The rugosa in the back yard is blooming but I haven’t gotten a good picture of it yet. This is ‘Champneys’ Pink Cluster’, a Noisette bred by Champneys (U.S.A.) in 1811. It is growing on the south end of our house and is a very upright plant. I have it tied to the trellis that Keven helped me put up two years ago. It’s the smaller of the two roses there. The other completely covers the 10 by 12 foot trellis and hangs off of both sides. That’s starting to bloom, as well and I’ll try to get a good picture of that soon.
Zéphirine Drouhin and Clematis
It’s a bit early for roses to be blooming but it’s been that sort of a spring. I have a couple roses that have flowers up against the house. One rose, ‘Roseraie De l’Hay’ is about to start blooming. Ralph, on the other hand has quite a few already out in his back yard.
Back about ten years ago (I don’t remember precisely) he asked me what roses he should plant and I gave him a list of six or seven to choose from. Instead of choosing, though, he planted them all. They are mostly doing very well and a couple are quite huge. This one is ‘Zéphirine Drouhin’ and it’s a very nice Bourbon rose bred by Bizot in France in 1868. If you are looking for a good, reliable rose with an amazing, damask fragrance, this may be the rose for you. It does suffer pretty badly from blackspot and will be mostly leafless by the end of the summer but it grows so vigorously that it doesn’t seem to do any lasting harm.
The roses are the cerise-pink flowers whilte the white flowers are clematis, which is a very good companion to roses.
I went for a short walk in the neighborhood when I got home today. I walked around two blocks and stopped to take pictures a few times, mostly of flowers and in all cases of colors. Here’s a selection. The irises were all in Mark and Kathy’s yard. Mark invited me to the back when I told him what I was looking for. The clematis were growing on mail box and lamp post, respectively. I also took some of rhododendron flowers but I wasn’t happy with them so I left them out, although that would have added a bright red to the collection.
Aquilegia ‘Biedermeier’
As you can see from the flower in the background, this particular flower has faded a bit from the bright blue-purple it was. I still think it’s a wonderful shape and pattern, though.
Clematis ‘Mrs. George Jackman’
Whether you call them KLE-mə-təs prefer kli-MA-təs, they have beautiful flowers. This is Clematis ‘Mrs. George Jackman’ and we planted it last week so it can grow up into a large rose on the back fence. It’s only a foot and a half tall and is covered with big white flowers. I’m looking forward to a few years from now, when it’s really established. Should be nice, especially with the million little pink rose flowers that should come out before the clematis is done.
Dandelion Seeds
Like most people trying to grow a lawn, I’m not crazy about dandelions. They are pretty tough to get rid of completely and they will grow in almost any soil conditions. As much as I hate them in my lawn, I am actually kind of fond of the seed heads, at least from a photographic angle.
I was sitting on the lawn at church with Gwendolyn watching the other kids playing soccer with a big rubber ball and I took this picture of a dandelion seed head that was growing where we happened to sit.
Chives
I don’t have a lot to say about this picture. It’s chive flowers opening up. They are growing in a crack in our patio and self seeded from chives I grown in a container and use for cooking. My favorite thing to do with chives is to tear up the flowers and sprinkle them on soup or steak or whatever. Purple food!
Convallaria majalis (Lily-of-the-Valley)
Convallaria majalis, lily-of-the-valley, is a remarkable plant. When we lived in our old house there were a few houses near by that were to be torn down to widen a road. We did what we called “plant rescue,” digging plants out of the garden (with permission) and replanting them in ours and giving them to friends. There was a lot of lily-of-the-valley there, growing alongside the driveway. Actually, it was coming up through the driveway in places. You have to admire a plant that can break up a pavement.
It’s fairly expensive at the garden center so we dug up a lot of it, putting it in every spare container we had. When we moved here in 2006 we brought three or four containers of it with us. Actually, we still have a container full. It blooms every year but if anyone would like some, we’d be happy to share. As it turns out, there already was some in one part of the garden here, and that’s where this photograph was taken.
Lily-of-the-valley has sweet little flowers that are hard to resist. They aren’t as easy to photograph as you might think, though. I’m still not sure I’ve captured them properly. Still, I’ll keep trying.
Prunus virginiana (Chokecherry)
Prunus virginiana, commonly called chokecherry, is a pretty common tree around here. They bloom quite a bit after the fancier ornamental cherries. Their flowers are smaller and simpler but still quite lovely, I think. There are lots of flowers in these little racemes, which is nice, also. These are on a tree along the edge of the woods behind my office building but they’re starting to bloom all over.
Anemone sylvestris
This little snowdrop anemone (Anemone sylvestris) needs to be planted but for now, it’s quite happy in a pot on our driveway.
Spanish Bluebells
(Hyacinthoides hispanica)
The Spanish bluebells are in bloom now and are quite lovely. For some reason, although I don’t care much for proper hyacinths, I like these close cousins.
Pink Flowering Dogwood
I once had a dream where I was at the intersection of Beach Drive and Kensington Parkway and I came across a very unusual flowering dogwood (Cornus florida) that had the most beautiful flowers. They were just the right shade of sky blue, sort of powdery and delicate. I thought, “now there is a tree that would sell like nobody’s business — everyone would want one for their garden.” Unfortunately, it was only a dream but I think of it every spring when the dogwood starts to bloom. Well, the regular white and pink flowered sorts are very nice, as well, if you can keep the anthracnose under control. The Asian species (Cornus kousa) is quite nice, as well, and I like the Cornel cherry (Cornus mas) although the flowers are quite different to the former. This one is in our front yard, right up against the house. It really isn’t a good place for a tree but particularly this time of year I can’t bring myself to take it out. I think it probably was a seedling that just grew there and the previous owner let it alone.
Epimedium x rubrum
While I’m on the subject of cross-shaped flowers, I really like epimedium. There are a lot of them and more being introduced. It makes a nice ground cover, although it’s a bit of work to fill a large area with it. It is semi-evergreen, replacing last year’s dried out leaves with new leaves each spring. Some have blooms that face upwards and are held above the foliage, which is obviously a plus. Others have less conspicuous flowers that are more work to see. Flowers range from purple/red to yellow to white and are little delicate crosses, as seen here on this Epimedium x rubrum. We first saw them at the U.S. National Arboretum. A few years ago I happened to meet Marc Cathey (he was the director of the Arboretum from 1981 to 1991) and I mentioned that we fell in love with epimediums there. We agreed they were worth having and should be planted much more often.
Japanese Honeysuckle (Lonicera japonica)
A lot of people are pretty unhappy with Japanese honeysuckle, particularly in the mid-Atlantic states where it is a real nuisance. The flowers are sweet smelling, though, and kind of pretty.
Camellia japonica
My dad really loved camellias and planted quite a few in his not-too-large yard. It’s not hard to see what he liked about them — evergreen and covered with bright flowers during the winter and spring. This one is growing beside the chimney but I don’t know what variety it is. If we can find it in his notes I’ll update the caption. There used to be a tall camellia there called ‘Mrs. Lyman Clarke’ but this isn’t that. That one died in an especially cold winter many years ago. That same year the ‘Lady Clare’ died to the ground but it came up again and is a huge bush again, flowering happily every winter. I planted three seedlings of ‘Lady Clare’ in the yard of our old house. I happened to drive by yesterday (dad’s birthday, incidentally, so I was already thinking of him) and they are blooming, as well. One of them has flowers that are almost identical to ‘Lady Clare’ except they are pure white. I miss having that and was sorry to leave it behind. At least it’s still there and hopefully being appreciated. Camellias and dad — I can’t think of one without thinking of the other.
Tulips Past
Many people treat tulips as annuals in our area, planting them in beds in the fall for spring bloom and then pulling them out to be replaced by other annuals for the late spring and summer. I planted some in the falls of 2009 and 2010 and they all came up again this year but only one bloomed. That one (featured in a post a little over a week ago) is starting to fade but still provides a splash of red against the pachysandra. We went to Cathy’s mom’s last night for dinner and she has a pot with tulips in it in her living room. They are a beautiful metalic orange, as you can see, but they, too, are a little past their prime. Still striking, though.
Cherry Blossoms
We have two cherry trees in our yard. I’ve posted pictures of blossoms on the first of them already. They bloom out of sync with each other, which is actually nice because it lengthens the bloom time. The first has small, simple flowers. The second, which is blooming now, has very large, double flowers that are quite beautiful against the blue sky. It’s also gotten cool again so this tree’s flowers should stay with us a little longer than the first’s did.
Dogwood Flowers (Cornus florida)
Who doesn’t like dogwood flowers? One of my favorite sights is seeing dogwood blooming throughout the woods as a reliable, understory tree. It’s that time again.
I’ve always liked apple blossoms and I think I prefer them over cherry blossoms. I’m not sure why I like one over the other since they are both simple, five-petaled, white flowers on medium sized trees. I think I prefer apple trees to cherry trees, and maybe it has something to do with that. At Glen Orchard (a cousin’s orchard that’s been in the family for over a hundred years) they grow both apples and cherries but it’s the apple trees that surround the cabin and perhaps that’s the real source of my preference. The view from the cabin when the apples are in bloom is right up there in terms of beauty. When I see apple trees in bloom, particularly simple, white apple blossoms, I think of Glen Orchard and in turn of my grandparents.
Whatever it is, I love apple blossoms and they are out here now. The flowers pictured here are on a few feral trees growing in the empty lot next to my office building, down by the stream. They are very happy there and I’ll be sad when the time comes for that property to be built upon.
Green and Yellow
Not surprisingly, with all the flowers blooming, there are lots of bees about, from the humble but industrious bumble and carpenter bees to the flashy, green cuckoo wasp, they are all over both tree and weed. Mostly doing yeoman’s work pollinating flowers in their effort to collect their daily bread (so to speak), they add motion and even color to a static, if already colorful, scene.
I love bees.
[Update: this has been identified by the good people of BugGuide as genus Augochlorella. The yellow flowers are Barbarea vulgaris, which goes by various common names including yellow rocket and bittercress.]
Daffodil 'Actaea'
Myosotis (Forget-Me-Not)
Here are two flower pictures to welcome April, 2012. First, a really nice poeticus daffodil called ‘Actaea’ that are growing alongside our front walk. They are later than the big yellow ‘Marieke’ daffodils which is nice because we have blooms for a longer period that way. I really like the big, white petals on this one. There’s another variety with even better color on the edge of the cup but this one is pretty good.
Then, I have a picture of forget-me-not, one of the Myosotis species, but I’m not sure which. We have a large patch of these in the back yard and Cathy has just moved a few of them to the front under the cherry tree. Hopefully they will do as well there. The flowers are quite happy. I’ve only just realized this year how much blue we have in our garden.
Anemone blanda
Lots of things in bloom right now and I’ll put up a few more tomorrow but for now, here’s a little flower that I like. It is Anemone blanda ‘Pink Star’ and there are a few of them trying to compete with the gooseneck loosestrife, which will ultimately win unless something is done to protect the little ones.
Flowering Almond
We have this little flowering almond in our front garden. It never seems to get bigger than about four feet and it died to the ground a few years ago. This winter was milder than average so it’s doing quite well. Maybe it will do better this year. Anyway, it has very double flowers about half an inch across which are quite lovely. Imagine a tree full of these.
Wilted Tulip
The forecast was for a frost overnight and our thermometer read 27°F this morning. The ground is warm and I don’t expect any significant damage to plants and flowers in the yard. This tulip, the only one of ours that is actually blooming so far, didn’t appreciate the cold, though.
Redbud Slippers
I’ve always thought that Redbud (Eastern Redbud, in this case, Cercis canadensis) is misnamed. On the other hand, neither Purplebud nor Pinkbud sound quite right. I never noticed before how much these little flowers look like pink slippers, though. Pretty neat.