June 2006
Summer at last!

It's June 21st! Summer's here and with that come the lilies in our garden, as well as the ever expanding blooms on annuals, such as Petunias, Verbena, Snapdragons, Fuchsias etc.

The last weekend in June, and virtually ALL of the barriers we had in place to keep canines out of the beds, have been removed. That's not very easy to spot in this picture, but, it sure has opened up the garden for us.

One of last year's Hosta acquisitions has been given roomier accomodations -a #3 pot- as well as a much sunnier location. This spot sees around 8 hours or more of direct sunshine this time of year and if you compare it to last year's results you will notice a dramatic difference.

Another of last year's additions, 'Platinum Tiara', looks much more golden the more direct sun it receives. After sitting on the ledge of the Hosta nursery for the better part of a year, it has been given a new location in one of our new ceramic pots we bought 10 days ago.

As said, mid month we purchased 4 different ceramic pots, those large ones you see all over the place, made mostly in Vietnam, China or India, and we did a bit of head scratching over what to fill them with sort of half way through the growing season. Didn't want to get a set-back with transplanting lilies for instance, so we thought we try an arrangement for 2 of them where we'd simply take some perennials in #1 and #2 pots, arrange them in their pots in the ceramic one, fill the voids with a good potting mix and use that mix to plant some Lobelia and Bacopa.

This is what the largest looked like with Hosta 'Gold Standard' -which did suffer some sunburn later in the season-, Heuchera 'Peach Melba' and 'Velvet Night', as well as some Thyme. It made a striking arrangement, but I think next year we'll replace this Hosta with one that's a little more sun-tolerant, like perhaps 'So Sweet' or 'Guacamole'. Then again, perhaps a third Heuchera, like maybe 'Key Lime Pie', we'll cross that bridge when we get there.