Still a lot of winter green, though a little beaten up, probably due to the late season. Purple Penstemon Richardsonii and bleeding heart still in bloom, the last of the Gaillardia is fading. No frosts yet. The Brodiaea are very late everywhere, they usually start to pop up about the end of November! Some Shooting star and Camassia cusickii starting to come up. Continue reading “Wintergreen December 2011”
The late spring means the fall is late, too. Lots of leaves still on the trees and shrubs, so the yard is still private at the end of October. Still working on building up the evergreen screen. Made three Ceonothus Velutinus / Snowbrush simple layerings a few weeks ago. The last set of C.V. air layerings made some inadequate roots. These are hard to find in nurseries, so I’ve had to make my own from the original ones.
Planted out the pots with several types of shooting star and delphinium seedlings from last year in the as yet mole-free meadow which was cleared last year. This gets lots of sun. They were left over summer when the seedllings die back, but the summer was so wet and cold that moss grew over much of the pots. In planting these out it looks like a few seedlings are present at the periphery of each pot, but the moss probably killed many of them off – they should be planted out in the spring. More problematic are the bulbs such as Fawn lily seedlings…they are supposed to be kept over an extra winter in the pots. Lots of bulb seedlings, but maybe I should put them in the ground when moss starts to form. When I plant the ’09 bulb seedling I’ll have a better idea how these are affected.
I’m going to plant seeds in pots that I haven’t before, less common plants like Munro’s Globemallow (cool orange flowers), Blue Columbine and Yellow Columbine, Hooker’s Onion (small plants, pink flowers) and Harsh Paintbrush. The usual seeds – all the camas (small, light blue, white and large purple), Chocolate lily, Leopard lily, etc will be planted around outside. Sometimes the planting in pots is just interfering with their best chance, just ending up in the right spot in the ground, but sometimes its worth it, plants occasionally do better in the pots. This is true of Wild Blue Flax and camas.
Below is Harsh Paintbrush, a bright orange red. The bright orange parts are actually leaves, not petals:
Mock Orange in bloom, and the Swallowtail butterflies have come back to the neighborhood.
Lupines in bloom. They are a bigger more vigorous plant than before, since they don’t have any more competition from the Mahonia, which had started to overrun the place. Time to start checking for aphids….I use a spray with oil, water and a few drops of detergent to kill the bastards (the aphids, hopefully, not the lupine!).
Continue reading “Almost summer? Hard to tell with this cool rainy weather…..”
Weather still cool, with too much clouds and rain , especially when i’m off. Occasional sun breaks to give us rays of hope. There were several sailing regattas out on Puget Sound, it was a nice day today for it.
Continue reading “Can’t tell if Spring is here!?”
Tons of Camas, Brodiaea, Chocolate lily, and 2-3 yr leopard lily. White fawn lily seedlings thriving, as are the Dodacatheon/ Shooting stars, Delphiniums, and Wild blue flax. Maybe Rainier or Lopez “penstemon “. Rainier “tufted hairy” seeds germinating, which is probably an Anenome.
Mr Squirrel is busy foraging, and screaming at us when we get too near. We’ve moved the logs hiding his cache of nuts and pinecones more than once this year – next year should be more stable for him/ her.
Chocolate Lily popping up in several places, Lopez seeds planted about three years ago (photo of mature plant above). Most of them have survived mole ravages, landscaping traffic and other insults. They take about 3 years to start blooming.
Continue reading “Interim notes – March 10-17 2011”
Unless otherwise indicated, all plants mentioned are northwest natives.
Dodecatheons of several types just starting to sprout.
Above is some blooming, although even the mature plants won’t do that for a while.
Delphinium seeds in planters popping up, Nuttalii (above)and Menzensii. Also new White Camas seeds. Mature Camassia Quamash starting to sprout up in the yard.
Above, Tiger Lily
Planted seeds in potting soil, seed soil and sand, then covered in sand and gravel. Seeds from northwest native plant sale and from our yard:
ellensgarden.us 