Day Lily

It was a hot, humid day today. When I went out this morning, I pulled out my camera to take a few pictures of this day lily. When I did, the lens fogged up immediately. I cleaned it off and waited a bit, but the pictures from the morning aren’t all that good. In the evening it was still pretty steamy but my camera had a chance to warm up before I got home and I was able to get a few pictures that I was happy with. It rained today, so the flowers were decorated with drops of water, too, which is always nice.

Datura stramonium (Jimson Weed)

One of the most common of the “large weeds” we have in our yard is Jimson weed (Datura stramonium). It is pretty easy to spot, because if grows into a fairly large bush, surprisingly large for an annual. It has pretty, little, white flowers but it’s a mean plant in most other respects. First, it is covered with spines and you don’t want to be pulling it up without wearing substantial gloves. It’s also quite poisonous, containing dangerous levels of alkaloids. Because they have psychoactive effects and because they are also fatally toxic in only slightly higher amounts, Jimson weed is responsible for hospitalizations and deaths each year. Just pull it up and get rid of it, folks.

Monarda (Bergamot)

In the back yard we have Asclepias tuberosa (butterfly weed) and Monarda (bergamot) in bloom. The former is bright orange. This is the later, with it’s crown of fancifully shaped, tubular flowers. I love the look of these. They are so different from other flowers and really stand out as a bright spot in the garden. They are growing in the back, along the fence, and make quite a statement.

Rosa arkansana (Prairie Rose)

I thought I’d post a second picture from Saturday, because, well, just because. A while back I planted a bunch of species roses up at our place in Pennsylvania. A few of them are living and one or two doing very well. This is the healthiest of them and is a prairie rose, Rosa arkansana. It’s absolutely covered with flowers right now and is pretty impressive. It is a native of the central portion of the continent, from the central Canadian provinces south as far as Texas and New Mexico.

Yellow Day Lily

The day lilies are blooming. This is one of the small, yellow varieties that seem to be all the rage these days. I think they bloom over a longer period than the standard, orange kind, which is probably enough to recommend them, although I do think I like the color of the orange better. Any color this time of year is welcome, though.

Marigold

Ten days ago (Saturday, June 14, 2014) I posted a picture of marigolds. A week later (Saturday, June 21, 2014) I posted a picture of a hydrangea that we bought that day at the garden center. We also came home with a pretty good collection of annuals and among them was this marigold, which I think may be the same as those in that earlier picture. They sure are pretty little things and very eye catching. This is among the flowers that greet us as we come up to our house each evening. Nice.

Dorothy with Rainbow Eye Patch

My mom has a few class prisms in her front window and in the afternoon, they cast various rainbows around the room. It’s especially nice when they happen to fall on someone, as here. Dorothy was sitting on the sofa with a rainbow on her face and let me take a dozen or so pictures, with various strengths of fill flash. This is the best of the bunch, balancing the lighting of her face with the brightness of the rainbow eye patch.

Oenothera speciosa (Pink Evening Primrose)

It seems that as soon as I get caught up, or nearly caught up, something distracts me and I fall behind in posting again. So far I haven’t missed a day of taking a picture since I started, but that’s bound to happen at some point. Today (which was a week ago, relative to when I’m posting this), I took some close-up pictures of the evening primroses growing in front of our house. They are scattered around there and in the back border and are pretty little things, opening up as it gets cool in the evening and closing up in the heat of the next day.

Hydrangea ‘Big Smile’

Last weekend we were at a garden center and I posted a picture from our trip that was of a sea of Marigold blossoms. We bought two hydrangeas that day and this is one of them. It is called ‘Big Smile’ and we really like the color of the flowers, with the deep blue of the central fertile flowers and the pink of the larger petals of the outer, sterile flowers. This picture hardly does them justice and I think they are even better from a little distance. It’s still sitting in its pot on our back patio, but it is intended for a partly shaded spot in the back border.

Blackberry Lily Leaves

I’ve posted pictures of the flowers of the blackberry lily (it used to be called Belamcanda chinensis but in 2005 was renamed Iris domestica). This picture is of the leaves, which are very much like the leaves of the more familiar bearded iris. They are, if anything, even more compressed into a tight fan. I love the pattern of alternating leaves. We have a few of these now, in various places in the yard. We started with just one that we brought from our old house in a pot. Each year we scatter the seeds quite freely and a few have come up.

I recommend this plant if you want something a little different and that blooms a little later (early to mid July) than the other irises. The flowers are not large, only about and inch and a half or two inches across, but they are bright orange, speckled with red and are borne in happy profusion. The fruit are also attractive. The seeds are single seeded but they form in clusters, looking like huge blackberries, which is where the common name comes from.