Oh No

The very high temperatures of the past few days (humid and in the 90s) have broken, but it's still muggy.

I did a terrible thing to the brand new groundcover pussywillows (Salix yezoalpina):

 

They were so lovely back on May 27 when first planted:

What did I do?  I sprayed with horticultural oil because when they were still in pots, ready to be planted, they were infested pretty severely with aphids.  I sprayed extensively.  It was not heavy dormant oil that should only be used on stems before leafing out --- it was superior oil which can be sprayed on foliage.

But.  When temperatures are very high --- and we did approach almost 100 degrees a couple days back --- the foliage will burn.  The two plants I sprayed are brown and crispy.  A third one, added later, is not affected.

All three plants got a little stressed from the heat and from being transplanted.  It has been so dry until the last days, and although I watered, they were stressed. They are on the east side and get good afternoon shade, but the sun hits pretty hard up until 1 pm.

Hort Oil: use with care.  I also burned the nasturtium leaves pretty badly.  Even with the lighter oil, leaves become damaged when high temperatures hit.

The nasturtiums are putting out new leaves and will be fine.  I am hoping the same for the two dwarf pussywillows I damaged so badly.

Rain, and Lots of It

Yesterday storms rolled through and brought lots of much needed rain.

It's been too dry: a third of an inch 8 days ago, and a third of an inch three days before that.  The confusing thing is the amount for this storm.

It was lots and lots of rain, but Bradley Airport at Windsor Locks reports only a quarter inch total!  Weather Underground, with a station on Duncaster, reports .88 inches.

My own weather station, newly re-installed, shows 1.56 inches!  A quarter inch or an inch and a half?  Which is it?  I'll split the difference and say we got a full inch of rain and it was needed and it was appreciated.

While the plants benefited from all the water, they did get beaten down in the wind and downpour, and all look saggy and bedraggled.  And there was no bluebird sunny day to follow the front moving through; today is still overcast with a white sky and yellow light.  Sheeesh.  Can't get a good picture.

Got A New Camera

Small and tidy in the hand.  Lots of features and a lot more zoom than my old one (10x, versus 3x).

I'm still struggling with white light and yellow cast to all the wide landscapes, but that is the nature of the light this spring.  No clear blue days!  I do a lot of color editing in iPhoto.  There must be a better way to compensate for the white light (I'm using the "cloudy" and the white balance settings.)

Close up macro shots are good.

A Visit to Jane's

Hot and humid now.

Jane reciprocated and Jim and I had a tour of her garden yesterday.  Wild, messy, tumbling down slopes, very exuberant, and filled with surprises (benches, pots, sculptures, tag sale finds) in every corner.

I like her pea gravel area and want to do something similar in the Secret Garden space we have.  I particularly like the larger rocks that make the edges irregular.

And I love the long stone wall above the pea gravel area.

She has so much shade, and lots of hostas and other shade loving plants.  She has a steep slope that is overtaken with weeds and wisteria roots that needs to be hacked back, Round Up controlled, and then planted.

She also has a pond, which is lovely, but seems like a lot of work (the pump is broken, the yellow flag is overtaking it and can't be ripped out easily, etc.)

A very different garden than mine!

Secret Garden ideas

I do want to take up the turf in the wavy area between the west walk and the new border --- the area we are calling the Secret Garden.  I want to put pea gravel down, and let the plants spill into it, blurring the edges.  I want to get rid of the sharply defined grass / border edge.  Something like this from Three Dogs in a Garden:

Dissatisfaction

I seem so unhappy with the garden this year.  Spring was late, and cold, and although there have been nice days, most of my pictures this year seem so inferior to last year's, and the plants almost seem stunted.

Is it the camera?  I'm getting a new one, the old Sony cybershot is 8 years old and acting up.  Or is it the light?  White sky, flat light, everything looks so yellow and I do a lot of editing to correct the color --- this spring has been late, cloudy, dry and cold, with very few truly sunny nice days and not enough consistent rain when it was warm enough to plump things up.

Is it the voles?  I lost so much.  In addition to the whole front walk, a lot in the Birch Garden is missing.  The allium moly, which is supposed to spread, shows only a clump on the left.  The perennial snapdragon is gone.  The Schubert onions bloomed so late they disappeared into other foliage.  The evening primrose, that I had to try to control, is mostly gone, just weeds in its place, and the same for the wild coreopsis on that side of the Birch Garden.

Was it last year's heat and drought?  Some plants don't look happy.  The 'Northblue' blueberries look ok and leafed out and bloomed, but there is no fruit.  It all shriveled and dried and nothing formed.

The knockout roses are really bothering me.  Lush and prolific, the color is annoying.

The amsonias were such a pale whitish blue, very blah.  Same for the camassias, so light blue they diappeared.

The lack of shade on the patio is bothering me.  I actually want to move the sourwood (!)  It's too skimpy to offer any real shade.  Will I kill it if I move it?  I want to put in big fast growing river birches, a little mini grove, along the walk and patio wall, offering a real screen.  Several of them, to draw you in as you round the bend in the walk, and to really shade the area.

What to do with my beloved sourwood?  Can I plant the river birches around it?  I really really want to get a grove of shady trees around the patio on the west side.

I despair this year.  Nothing looks lush, nothing is shady enough, stuff is missing, and blooms are washed out.

Jane Visits

Lovely day today, in the 80s, sunny and breey.

Jane came today for a visit to tour the garden.  She had some great suggestions, and admired everything.  It was about 4 pm and very bright and sunny -- not the best conditions. 

After, we sat on the patio, but there is simply no afternoon shade.  We moved the rockers and huddled in the one small spot of shade from the umbrella.

The awning above the deck provides no shade at all at that time of day.  It's nice at noontime and I enjoy my lunches under the awning, sitting on the deck, but late afternoon is impossible out there.

It's one of the big disappointments about enjoying my garden --  at the end of the day you can't sit anywhere and enjoy it.

Tornadoes

Yesterday Springfield and Sturbridge Mass. were hit with two tornadoes and four people were killed.  It was a definite black funnel cloud and caused a lot of damage and injuries.

Incredible that it happened just 20 miles away.

We saw troubled skies to the north and it was quite stormy, but we got barely any rain, and just gusty winds.  No real lightning or thunder.

Later, after the worst of the storms passed, we got a short rainstorm that brought about a third of an inch.

Today is beautiful and sunny and breezy, very cool, only in the 60s!  The front, violent and devastating, passed through and brought this cooler weather.

Today I pruned the hollies on the berm (and got covered in ticks for my efforts.  When I came in and undressed I found about five inside my shirt, on my shoulders... hope I got all of them.  I deadheaded the hyacinths and pruned other things than needed tidying.

I think the spruce by the front door has white pine weevil again.  Not good.

Jim put up the weather station today.  It had been down since the post fell over last winter.  He dug a new hole and put in a new post clad in cedar at ground level.  Unfortunately one of the two cups broke off the anemometer.  It still spins, and it is recording wind speed, but I don't know if it is accurate or not.

The knockout roses are blooming.

Last Day of May: beautiful

Yesterday was sunny, barely any breeze, in the low 80s but less humid than earlier in the week.  A beautiful day to end May.  I sat on the deck under the awning, with my laptop on the patio table.  Nice.

I bought a purple leaf sand cherry  at Bosco's, not sure where to put it.

I had stayed away from them after the disaster with the ones the builder put in.  I moved them (they were in front of the house where the weeping Japanese maple was.  They looked terrible and died after the move).

I plunked the pot into the back garden in front of the hemlock, where the St. Johnswort was that I had liked so much (damn voles).  Voila!  A pop of intense red color nestled in the greenery.

These shrubs are leggy and can be awkward as stand alone plants, but are perfect tucked in among other things, peeking out.  I like their pretty white flowers in spring.

Eventually the hemlock will gain more height and serve as more of a background.

I also bought a 'Forest Pansy' redbud, very open , very pretty. Also a real pop of deep color, and I put it at the left edge of the new garden that fronts Meadow's Edge.  I have wanted for a while to bring that space "forward" toward the patio, and create a shaded path between it and the front of Meadow's Edge as it disappears to the back of the lot.  I think this really does it.

It's June now, and time to stop planting, designing, moving and installing.  Time to relax for the summer months, keeping up only with the basic maintenance chores like watering and weeding.

gratuitous shot of johnny jump ups

Memorial Day Thunder

Thunderstorms rolled through just after dawn this morning and we got about a third of an inch of rain.  After it cleared at noon, it was hot, sunny and humid.

I did almost nothing in the yard, and died of sweat doing it.  I just walked around with the torch weeder, zapping wet weeds.  I trimmed up the blackhaw viburnum in front of Meadow's Edge, and gave the Sheffield Pink mums their pinchings (sheared them with the shears).  Phew!

The amsonias are blooming, but the hubrichtii in front is white, not even close to being blue.  The flowers are fuzzy, kind of bottlebrush-like, not the starry spikes I had expected. 

Amsonia 'Blue Ice' are low growing and vivid blue.

 

I finally pruned the 'Okame' cherry that had such a lopsided form.  It is now limbed up and skinny but should fill out more evenly.