With my back still bothering me, I stayed home today. I did put in a little time at work, mostly a long phone call to discuss a proposal that is being written for a project that includes a web site. When Cathy got home from work I asked if I could take her picture for my photo of the day. She agreed and I took almost two dozen shots of het with her flowers. Most obvious are the Rudbekia (the Black-eyed Susans). There is also orange and yellow butterfly weed Asclepius tuberosa) on the right. In front of that is the pale pink spider flower (Cleome). There are other annuals in pots and there is the red teapot lower down.
Tagged With: Patio
Cathy In The Back Garden
Back Patio
These are the containers in the south corner of our back patio, outside our kitchen door. They’re doing pretty well right now and really brighten up the back yard. There’s a lot of green in the yard, which isn’t all that unusual. Having some intense colors is really nice and annuals are so easy. There are some day lilies in the foreground on the left, which are in a container that fell over a few years ago and has been lying on its site for a few years. They don’t seem to mind in the least. There is also a hanging basket with Lantana in the upper left corner. Technically it is a broadleaf evergreen shrub but it isn’t hardy here and is generally grown as an annual.
Cathy’s Patio Garden
It’s summer here in Maryland and with it come the summer colors. Cathy often plants containers with a mixture of annual and perennials plants for the patio but this year I think she’s outdone herself. The patio is surrounded by black-eyed Susans (Rudbeckia) and that adds quite a nice backdrop to all the containers. To Cathy’s left, above the red tea pot, are cana lilies and a beautiful, bright red Pelargonium (a.k.a. geranium). The yellow and orange in the lower middle are purslane and there’s more of that in the bottom right, hear the elephant’s trunk. The hanging basket in the upper left is Lantana camara. As you can see, there’s a fair amount going on in the large, central bed. The garden against the fence has been dug out and almost completely restarted. It should be nice in a year or two, though.
Rainy Day
The forecast has been for rain for a few days and as usual, the forecasts were not very good. Today we had rain, however, and it rained pretty hard for a while. This is one of two bird baths on our back patio, surrounded by black-eyed Susans and with sedum growing on the surface of the patio in front of it. The pink elephant watering can adds a nice bit of color. I didn’t really go out into the rain today, standing on the kitchen steps and just under the eaves to get this and a few other photos.
Our Back Garden
This is a good time of year for our back garden. If you don’t like orange or yellow, you might not like it as much, though. We have a few black-eyed Susans. The tiger lilies are doing well. This is a self-seeded plant that seems to be happy where it landed. You can just make out the half-barrel with some pink buds on it. That’s a rose called ‘Gabriel Oak’ and there is another rose in front of it, called ‘Rose de Rescht’ that I almost killed but which is doing pretty well again, planted in this heavy, concrete pot. The bright read below the tiger lily is a Mandevilla. Other plants include butterfly weed, geranium (Pelargonium, actually), various Sedums, and an ornamental grass, among other things.