Here are some photos from Monday (the 9th), partway through the heat wave -
Part of the front border:
The yellow trumpet in the center of the shot is the first salpiglossis (aka painted tongue) to bloom this year. A second one is opening in this shot (on a different plant). Last year the salpiglossis seedlings I bought were heavy on the red trumpets with yellow markings. This year so far (as of today too) all the ones to bloom have been yellow. In this shot there are also blooms of pansies, violas, sweet alyssum, stock, blue-on-blue felicia/kingfisher daisy (Felicia heterophylla), marigolds (both French [large red/orange blooms] and signet [smaller orange blooms on ferny foliage]), Marguerite daisies, and California poppies.
Here’s the same area from a slightly different angle:
The tall deep green stalk rising behind the salpiglossis bloom is one of the parsleys. It started to bolt several days ago (before the heat wave even started) but has yet to actually bloom. The other one, planted in a different, less windy area of the garden, is still producing leaves. My initial conclusion from my parsley experiment is that windy weather tends to make parsley bolt faster.
California poppy and dianthus blooms:
I believe the dianthus/pink that’s currently blooming is ‘Inchmery’ (I planted it last year, but it didn’t bloom, like so many other things in their first year in the windy, hot front garden). I planted two of them last year and they are prolifically blooming right now. ‘Inchmery’ is an antique pink, but like with so many antique pinks, the breeding stock has been diluted to the point where it’s honestly difficult to tell for sure if what you’re being sold and/or are growing in your garden is actually the original stock from the olden days of gardening or is a plant of a similar description. I don’t believe it’s usually intentional on the part of sellers; I think it’s honestly just really hard to be sure, since there were no photos then, not very many color drawings have survived, and written descriptions from the time period oftentimes fit most or all of the plants now being sold as the cultivar. Regardless, whether it’s ‘Inchmery’ or not, it’s a beautiful pink, very floriferous, whitish-pink, and carrying a lovely fragrance. I got my stock of it from Select Seeds.
The Small’s penstemon (Penstemon smallii) is blooming in the middle of the left of the shot (a pale purplish color on the outside of the tubular blooms). There’s an orange gazania just below it, and pansies and violas below that. On the lower right are a felicia and a signet marigold. Behind the poppy and the dianthus blooms are a blooming lavender (Lavandula angustifolia cultivar ‘Lady’, one of the ones I got at the first farmers’ market), a euphorbia (chartreuse bracts), and salvia (Salvia coccinea) ‘Brenthurst’ (coral blooms partially visible behind the euphorbia).
Another shot of the front border:
I thought this one might give a good sense of how tall the sundial lupine’s blooms are, as well as iris ‘Mme. Chereau’. (’Mme. Chereau’ and fellow iris ‘Quaker Lady’ [the latter not pictured here] have faded fast in the heat wave; most blooms lasted less than a day, and there are no current open blooms.) You can also see the full plant of the bolting parsley in this shot. The tall silver plant is the rose campion, still budded.
Plants still waiting to be planted in the front garden:
Amongst them are two six-packs from last week’s farmers’ market (the rudbeckia ‘Toto Mix’ and the lisianthus), the baptisia/false indigo from last week’s market, sweet marjoram, winter savory, sage, a Salvia greggii that blooms in a creamy yellowish color, curly chives/German garlic/ornamental onion (Allium spirale AKA Allium senescens), lavender cotton, French tarragon, and a second rosemary, ‘Tuscan Blue’, which is a richer green color of leaf and more upright-growing than the one I already planted, ‘Arp’, and than many other rosemaries. It’s been ages since I grew curly chives, and I was psyched to see that the nursery had added it to their herb section. What can I say, I just love growing alliums of all kinds.
The heat wave finally broke today. It was our longest heat wave since 2002, when it was very hot and very humid for eight days straight. It is still fairly hot, and mostly sunny, but it is no longer humid; now the air temperature accurately reflects what the air feels like, instead of having to factor in high humidity to create a heat index. I took many more photos this morning and hope to make a post with some of them later.
Leave a Reply