Each Little World

IVOM

Sometimes one flower is enough. Though I usually steer clear of big fancy daylilies, I couldn't resist 'NIght Embers.'

GBBD: 7.15.2023

The mini Hostas are starting to bloom. You can see from the hose that I watered at the beginning of the week, not believing we'd get any of the rain that was predicted.

I was wrong. From lunchtime Wednesday until early this morning we got almost two inches. Heavenly. 

Allium 'Summer Drummer' is the latest to bloom. Its papery covering started peeling off July 5th, but these lovely buds still have not yet opened as much as I expected. 

Hemerocallis 'Petite Sioux' is a small-flowered daylily from my first garden. I got it at a Wisconsin Daylily Society sale in the early 1990s and have never seen it to buy again. One of my absolute favorites for color, bloom size and bud count. The flowers are not quite fully opened in this image.

H. 'Lady Inora' is another small flowered variety but larger than 'Petite Sioux.' Great bud count on this one as well. The buds on this one all opened in time to get beaten up by the rain. 

H. 'Little Rainbow'

I love the Ligularia varieties with tall flower spikes like 'The Rocket'. I added another similar-flowered one this year named 'Eva Heimann.' 

Though I am less fond of the flowers of Ligularia 'Chinese Dragon,' the buds are wonderfully curious and the foliage is among the largest and most dramatic in my garden.

Asclepias incarnata 'Ice Ballet' has fragrant white flowers that are a nice change from the more typical pinks and oranges of most milkweed flowers. Then again, given the number of orange/peach/reddish Asiatic lilies and daylilies I have in the garden, perhaps adding an Asclepius tuberose might make sense. 

Since I haven't posted anything since last Monday, I am rushing Bloom Day a bit and posting today. 

Ferns

I love ferns. Large or small, native or not, I can't get enough of them.

This is Cheilanthes lanosa 'Mighty Tidy' aka Hairy Lip fern. Eventually it's supposed to spread into a foot-wide clump. But that is going to take so long that I am not worried that these two are planted too close together. They're in my so-called rock garden which gets sun and great drainage as these ferns require. Almost every plant in this bed is a quirky dwarf and I need the tags to id them.

I have had terrific success with our native maidenhair ferns as well as the Himalayan variety. So I decided to try Adiantum aleuticum imbricaturm, the dwarf western maidenhair fern, which is also found in Wisconsin. The fern in the center left is a no id variety. What I really love is this mix of ferns with Carex morrow var. temnolepsis 'Silk Tassel.' This Carex is at the top of my "must get more" list.

The autumn fern, Dryopteris erythrosora 'Brilliance,' emerges latest of all the ferns I grow. I always leave last year's fronds in place so I know something is actually planted in that bare spot. 

When they are most autumnal looking I can see them in this view from inside the house. The yellow flag marks a newly planted shrub that needs watering. 

I just realized that the spores on the back of the fronds of the nearby Christmas ferns (Polystichum acrostichoides) are the same warm cinnamon color as the autumn ferns. A happy accident rather than planned planting. 

Now I'm thinking perhaps I should add a couple of these Digitalisferruginea into the mix.

Or perhaps the Digitalis should go by the Tea House where they'd nicely echo the 'Mrs. R.O. Backhouse' martagon lilies. 

Bulb surprise

For years, I've had great luck with bulb orders; I've usually received exactly what I ordered. So it is very frustrating when you discover six months later that what you ordered is not what's currently blooming in your garden. This saga all began with Lilium asiaticum 'Forever Susan.' I planted 'Susan' after admiring her in a friend's garden.

When I discovered how overpowering she was visually, I planted some Lilium asiaticum 'Landini' (below) across the path to calm that intense color down. 'Susan' is so prolific I've given bulbs away. I've bought 'Landini' bulbs four times from three different sources. It just doesn't seem to like my garden as it only lasts a season or two. 

My latest attempt to add more 'Landini' resulted in this lily. 

No idea of its name and it's much larger than 'Forever Susan' and looks out of place compared to my other lilies. Maybe if the 'Fusion' lilies return (below), I should forget the dark color and stick with orange on both sides of the path.

Or maybe I should complement 'Susan' with a different flower altogether; something like Digitalis ferruginea, the rusty foxglove.

Then again, the surprise lily looks rather nice in a bathroom bouquet with my new shower curtain. You have to look closely to see the dark red Astilbe blooms; they almost fade into the fabric design.

(I dragged a green stool into the bathroom to be able to take this picture).

A Week of Flowers: Day 5

Oops! I am so used to posting on M-W-F that I completely forgot I was going to share my flowers every day for a week. Here are a few early summer drama queens to help me get back on track. Lilium 'Forever Susan.'

L. canadense

L. martagon 'Claude Shride"

To see what other garden bloggers are sharing during this "Week of Flowers," visit the blog of our host Cathy at Words and Herbs. 

GBBD: 7.15.2022

My Ligularia and tall Thalictrums were all in bloom at this point in the summer for the last two years. Another sign of how the weather has everything on a different schedule this year. At the moment it's lightly raining but it looks like we're soon going to pass through the big hole in the center of this storm. Aargh, my garden is dry as a bone. But there are some lovely bright floral spots:

Lilium canadense are still performing.

But July in the Midwest is daylily season, Hemerocallis 'Petite Sioux'

H. 'Lady Inora' with Astilbe taquerii 'Superba'

H. 'Little Rainbow'

Euphorbia 'Ascot Rainbow' is Zone 6 but my last plant returned for a few years. So I'm giving it another try. 

I'm still in thrall to my new Hydrangea serrata  'Mountain Mania'

Hakonechloa grass with Sedum 'Matrona'. I like it best at this stage before the flowers have really opened. 

Hostas are beginning to bloom, along with Alliums and a few sporadic Geraniums here and there. In my garden, mid-July is more of a foliage than a flower moment.

Opposite effects

Two orange lilies just opened across the path from each other. They could not be more different or create more opposite moods.This is an Asiatic lily, 'Forever Susan.' I personally call her 'Suddenly Susan.' When she opens, the garden is suddenly transformed. The word 'forever' makes me think of something old and delicate which 'Susan' definitely is not.

Across the path is Lilium canadense, a very delicate beauty. This one is in its first season and is not very tall. I have a small group of this lily in red, yellow and orange. Once you discover these lilies you will be hooked. 

IVOM

A week ago I grabbed the last of the candelabra primroses and the first Martagon lily to make a quick arrangement for the living room. Stems of Heuchera flowers and an Allium complete the group.

Allium atropurpureum is new for me this year. The flower head is not fully round but more of a bowl shape with a narrow base. The color is dark and intense. Its companion Allium still hasn't opened. 

I love matching and contrasting flower color with the little strokes of color on this vase from Madison's Studio Paran.

The 90°F. temperatures at the beginning of this last week popped all the Martagon lilies, so I had no qualms about cutting them or the Alliums from my traffic island bed. I used them to make a deck vase for the 2022 Garden Bloggers Fling visit to our garden on Saturday. It's still looking good. 

I made a quick run out to K&A Nursery to pick up a special order Hydrangea that had come in. When I went inside to pay for it, I fell prey to temptation and snagged this Begonia. 

The flowers and foliage caught my eye but the stems are the real stars of this show. Alas, no id tag. I used it to block a clump of dead tree trunks as you enter the back garden for the tour. Yes, I know. Totally obsessive behavior. 

Back soon

I've been frantically trying to cope with the weather to keep my plants alive and the garden weeded and prepped for the Garden Bloggers Fling group coming to my garden this weekend. Two days in the 90°s last week and more of the same Monday and Tuesday. I was out just after 5 am yesterday morning to weed and water while the temps were bearable. I went in by 8:30. 

Leaves on many plants are turning brown and crisp from the heat. Other plants are bursting in and out of bloom in a matter of days. Hoping my Martagon lilies last until the weekend but I have my doubts.  

I'll be back next week when the temps should be lower and I can relax and play in the garden.

IOVM: Pruning pleasures

My spring-blooming witch hazel, Hamamelis vernalis, sent up a bunch of suckering stems that I finally got around to cutting out. Imagine my surprise when I discovered the foliage was lovelier than it ever is on the shrub when it emerges in the spring or colors up in the autumn. I immediately decided those stems were worthy of spending some time being admire in a vase indoors. 

Once that little project was done, I walked across the driveway to cut down some of the seedpods of my red Martagons, Lilium martagon 'Claude Shride'. Unlike my peachy flowered variety, these seed pods were as unexpectedly beautiful as the Hamamelis foliage. 

The pods provided the perfect companion for the suckering stems. 

One quick and easy bouquet and one that I am enjoying as much as any I've put together all summer.