The green of life requires blue. . .*
At the front of our house, in two curvy planting beds, the Evolvulus ‘Blue Sapphire’ is thick and blooming heavily — in the morning.
By early afternoon, the flowers close up, and I’m left with just a small-leaved, grey-green ground cover — which is still pretty nice.
(Above: that’s a pink-blooming crape myrtle tree to the left, doing so-so — I’m going to give it a light pruning pretty soon and see if it will fill out a bit.)
I planted out little sprigs of the evolvulus last July. This open area used to be occupied by a large Norfolk pine. However, it was dying (see here; sixth photo) and had to be cut down.
I’m not very happy with the grass and stone arrangement on the left side of the center planting area (below). It looks rather ragged. One of these days, I plan to remove the turf grass (I really like to have a wee bit of Round-Up) and plant mondo grass between the stones — as well as take up a few stones and add a two or three mounding plants.
Below, the blooms of Evolvulus ‘Blue Sapphire’ are a true blue. It is a tropical plant, hardy to U.S. zones 8-11.
(Click on any of the photos to enlarge them or on ‘Continue reading’ below to scroll through all the bigger images.)
Below, I’ve also used it to edge the planting border along the upper lawn in front of the terrace. (A plan of our garden is here.)
Below is the same border from the other direction, standing at the center steps. (The red-flowering shrub/vine at the end is a Mussaenda erythrophylla.)
Below, the border continues on the left side of the steps. The tall yellow flowers are double Rudbeckia laciniata.
Below, the zinnias in our cutting garden (from last month’s GBBD) continue to be beautiful. The tall grass in the back is lemongrass.
To see what’s blooming in other garden bloggers’ gardens today, check out May Dreams Gardens.
Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day is the 15th of every month.
*by Robert L. Jones, from “Blue.”
enclos*ure 