Tag Archives: roses

Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day – June 2013

fence bed, front bed

This year, June on the Lot has brought the passing of the last of the Spring bulbs and the transition of the season from Spring to Summer. The first half of the month found the Lot blooming with peonies, iris, false indigo, poppies, spirea, wysteria, bleeding heart, coral bell, and thrift. Unlike previous years, I’ve begun to cut little bouquets of flowers for the Other Half and I to enjoy in our home offices. I also am having a lot of fun bringing flowers from the Lot to friends and family.

Now it is the 15th of the month and it is once again Bloom Day! This year, that means roses for the Lot. Three of the four climbing roses on the Lot were already established when we moved here. This first rose was doing poorly and suffered from black spot because of a downspout at it’s base. After trying to dig it out of the ground several seasons ago, this is what it appears like now.

Red Roses

At the southwest corner of the house is our largest rose. This thing is a beast. It tries to entangle and devour trick-or-treaters, mailmen, and at times our guests. Since the Other Half is in charge of mowing, he has a deep dislike for this plant. As wild and crazy as it is, I think it is beautiful. Right now it crawls over the edge of the porch, but there are plans for a hanging trellis in it’s near future.

Climbing RoseClimbing Rose on Porch

Here is a rose we planted in the backyard along the fence. I adore this “little one” because it is an offspring of my friend Mrs. J’s grandfather’s rose. Like she says, it has a pleasant scent of “Grandma Soap.” The four-footed garden helpers think the blooms made excellent bobbles to bop.

Backyard Rose

Last season Ms. A and I extended a south-facing bed in front of the house. The unusually hot and dry summer foiled attempts at starting many new plants in said bed. One plant that survived a move from the backyard to the new bed was this coreopsis that is just starting to bloom. Above it is the fading blooms of our fourth rose, a deep red one that is always the first rose to bloom on the Lot.

Coreopsis South Bed

Last Fall I hit the garden centers and brought home a small flat of Jewel of the Desert Peridott Iceplant (Delosperma). It is pictured above to the left of the coreopsis. The little groundcover is supposed to be super drought resilient. It made it through the winter, is now blooming, and should continue until first frost. Here is a closer view.

Peridott Iceplant

And last but not least is a plant purchased this season during the 2013 Annual Spring Nursery Crawl. This plant is also in the new, south-facing bed in front of the house. Check out this lovely Cherry Brandy Rudbeckia.

Cherry Brandy Rudbeckia

Remember to visit May Dreams Gardens to see what else is blooming this month around the world!

Bites & Blemishes

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One thing I’ve found very annoying about gardening is the fact that plants get sick. I know, there is no such thing as easy, non-maintenance gardening. I am also willing to work for beautiful plants. But, it doesn’t change the fact I fret and even get grumpy about plants being chomped on or made ill.

Both the catnip and the foxglove are showing such signs. I snapped pictures so I can try to puzzle out what’s going on with them once I was back to the computer. With the catnip, I’m thinking a combo of the wet spring and dense foliage is causing a type of mildew/blemishes on the leaves. I don’t know yet what is stressing the foxglove. At first I thought it may be some frost damage from a cold snap we had after the plant had sent out it’s first new shoots. Now I think it’s some kind of insect. Will have to research it more.
Edelweiss are budding in the back bed and yellow day lilies are going to open any day in the sidewalk bed. The forget-me-not seedlings are well on their way in Loki’s bed and the moonflower seedlings and new black barlow columbine in the gate bed are growing well. The rose bush in the southwest bed bloomed! The flowers are a very pale pink that turn almost to white after opening.
Also, this week I brought home some different types of ground cover from a co-worker’s garden. Our lot now has some vinca, chameleon plant and bishop’s weed.

Fieldtrip : John Ball Park

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My Better Half and I took a stroll this evening through John Ball Park. I believe volunteers from MSU’s master gardener program care for the landscaped sections of the park. As a result, it’s always a lovely place to visit with it’s very own rose garden.

As mentioned before, I do not know much about the care of roses. That’ll have to change because boy, oh boy, are some of those plants pretty. I snapped photos of the different roses in the park so I can identify them at a later date. Maybe, once educated a bit more in their care, I will purchase some for our lot.
There are also some nice “berms,” simple, circular beds whose soil is slightly raised above ground level, at the park. In one of the free gardening seminars I attended, the presenter spoke of how to construct them. I may reserve the idea of a raised bed just for a little vegetable patch. To create changes in elevation on our lot (which is very much needed), I could give a few berms a try.
Other things blooming on the lot: peonies in the sidewalk bed (pink with frills), little red roses in the front bed, the coral bells in Loki’s bed,  nasturtium, Jupiter’s beard, foxglove and rose campion in the back bed, the nicotiana in the fence bed, and the spiderwort and bachelors button in the alleybed. The lavender and hollyhock both are budding.