Bloom Day – Page 3

Bloom Day in November: dill(flowers) and sunflowers

November 15, 2013April 13, 2016 Cindy at enclos*ure10 Comments

The quiet flowerworks in the mind of God . . .

— Howard Nemerov, from “A Sprig of Dill“

A dillburst in the flower borders.

During the summer, I transplanted a lot of small dill plants from the vegetable garden to the yellow areas of the flower borders. Unfortunately, dill really doesn’t like to be moved, and it really doesn’t like it during the dry season. So all the little plants just remained little.

But lately, after six weeks of rain, they are growing and a few have begun to bloom.

I’ve always thought that dill is a nice ornamental plant.

Eventually, that variegated ginger — of which you can just see a bit above and below — will be huge and dominate this area (and there is another very small one hidden to the left of the dill bloom below).

In the meantime, I’m hoping that the dill and Missouri primrose will self seed here as long as there is space. (I will help it along, and I’ve also been sprinkling about Verbena bonariensis seed.)

I was pleased to get the picture above. The yellow of the primroses is usually too intense for my camera to capture any details.

Above, the dill blooms/seadheads are beautiful even as they fade to tan.

In our vegetable garden, the dillworks continue. . . .

In the background are blue-green Russian kale. Some of the next batch that I grow will also go into the flower beds — like these at the Smithsonian’s Butterfly Habitat Garden.

This Bloom Day, I also got interested in the after- blooms of our sunflowers.

Below is what one of them looked like at the end of summer.

Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day is the 15th day of every month. To see what’s blooming in other garden bloggers’ gardens, please visit Carol at May Dreams Gardens.

Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day in February

February 15, 2012April 13, 2016 Cindy at enclos*ure11 Comments

This quilt recently arrived at our house as part of our Art in Embassies exhibition of contemporary fine American crafts. It has been generously loaned by fiber artist Terry Kramzar of Kennett Square, Pennsylvania, and the title is “Tiger Lilies.”

I had the idea that I would feature daylilies for this month’s Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day when we unpacked the quilt. Today, I went out into the garden, which normally has a lot of blooming daylilies around the drive, and found only two.

I have no idea which cultivars of Hemerocallis these are. You can see some of the new ones for 2012 at allanbecker.gardenguru.

The tiger lilies in the quilt are Hemorocallis fulva. They are native to the Himalayas, China, Japan, Korea, and southeastern Russia and were brought to America from England in the early 17th century.

Here’s a little of what else is blooming in the garden today.

A small pink (a bit coral) shrub rose of unknown variety. This is really nice. We need to try to root some cuttings.

We also have this yellow crown of thorns or Euphorbia Milii, native to Madagascar. I like this plant, and there are two of them in the garden. One, with red blooms, is right next to some steps, and this one is in a rather ugly container next to the parking area. It’s not going to be fun to move them.

Here’s why.

Our lobster claw or false bird of paradise, Heliconia (I think I have Heliconia rostrata), has put forth a lot of huge blooms, but its foliage is a little tatty. Heliconias are native to the tropical Americas and the Pacific Ocean, west to Indonesia.

Thanks to Carol of May Dreams Gardens for hosting Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day (the 15th day of every month).

Bloom Day in January

January 15, 2012April 13, 2016 Cindy at enclos*ure8 Comments

I was surprised this week by this pretty cream and pink canna, blooming among some shrubs near the garage. It’s a short variety, and I need to move it to a place where it will get a little more attention.

This is another small canna currently blooming near the patio.

They are all I’ve found in our flower beds, which is a little strange since cannas are such a common plant here.

This is my favorite local variety. It’s medium tall and the blooms are clear orange.

Cannas, neighbors — These are my neighbors’ cannas, planted outside their garden walls.

Cannas are so common in Africa that you might think of them as native plants, but all cannas are native to the Americas. In the U.S., they range from southern South Carolina, west to southern Texas.

Cannas like full sun and consistently moist soil. They have a high tolerance for contaminants and can be used to extract pollutants from wetlands.

The blooms and foliage of cannas have such a strong presence that I think they need to be placed in gardens that are rather dramatic in return and maybe somewhat tropical.

Cannas at American History — Beautiful use of burgundy-leaved cannas in front of the Smithsonian’s Museum of American History, Summer 2011.

Here is a nice old-fashioned garden bed with canna from the South African blog Sequoia Gardens.

Of course, they’re great in showy pots.

SomeLikeitHot.JPG.w300h400 — Cannas and coleus at The Morton Arboretum, via This Garden Cooks.

I found an interesting online newsletter, Old House Gardens, which offers a lot of history and advice on the use of cannas. It reports that Georgia gardener Ryan Gainey uses Canna indica (commonly called Indian Shot) in a big clump with chartreuse ‘Limelight’ hydrangeas and yellow ‘Hyperion’ daylilies.

Russell Page included them in his imaginary personal garden in groups of pots, along with “yuccas, hedychium, Francoa ramose, tigridias, yellow and white lantanas clipped into balls, and the dwarf pomegranate.”

Henry Mitchell lamented in The Essential Earthman that cannas had been swept out of favor, along with geraniums, elephant’s ear, and crotons, “because people remembered well how ridiculous they had looked in the wormy little dribbles of Victorian gardens.”

He recommended the large, red-flowered, green-leaved variety, ‘The President’, with “clumps of ligularias and rhubarbs and so on.”

For cannas with reddish-purple or bronze leaves, Mitchell recommended pairing them with plants of gray and bronze foliage, as well as straw-yellow, buffy, or sharp lemon flowers like daylilies — or with figs, pomegranates, or “chest-high mounds of gray wormwood and black-green yews.” It is perfectly OK to cut off the canna flowers if they are “too flashy” for you.

Thanks to May Dreams Gardens for hosting Garden Blogger’s Bloom Day.

Bloom Day in December

December 15, 2011April 13, 2016 Cindy at enclos*ure5 Comments

Today, I took a closer look at my Abutilon or Chinese Lantern bushes.

yellow closeup — Closeup of yellow Abutilon.

Compared to many of the other tropical or semitropical plants in the garden, the Abutilon are rather quiet. The flowers are neat and smallish and hang down like bells.

good bush — Abutilon are also sometimes called Flowering Maples because of their leaves.

abutilon closeup — This variety has white blooms with pink veins.

orange bush — A showier bush with reddish-orange blooms.

orange closeup copy — A reddish-orange bloom.

white abutilon closeup — A white flowered Abutilon.

This bush has variegated leaves and is rather overshadowed by a pink Brugmansia or Angel’s Trumpet.

datura and varigated abutilon — An Abutilon with variegated leaves beside a Brugmansia.

coral abutilon varigated — A coral bloom. Another name for the bush is Chinese Bell Flower.

coral closeup — Closeup of a coral flower.

I think my bushes are Abutilon x hybridum, descended from South American varieties and brought here by expats. Rwanda has one native variety, Abutilon bidentatum Hochst. ex A. Rich., which is not very showy.

Another species, Abutilon longicuspe, with purple flowers, is also native to east and central Africa.

Please visit May Dreams Gardens for more Bloom Day postings (the 15th of every month).

Abutilon longicuspe flower — Abutilon longicuspe. Photo via http://database.prota.org.

Bloom Day addendum

August 15, 2011January 16, 2014 Cindy at enclos*ure1 Comment

These giant pink and red flowers (entitled 58th Street) have recently been planted/installed at The Phillips Collection at 21st. and Q Streets, N.W. Earlier this year, they were displayed — along with 8 sculptures like them — on New York City’s Park Avenue. The artist is Will Ryman.