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.

Peony 'Blaze'

Hot and humid and breezy, in the 80s.  Very summery.

The peonies!  So hard to photograph, so stunning in real life.

 And look how the red pops from afar:











As you can see, the purple 'May Night' salvias are in bloom and the deep rich purple is great with the red peony.  The doublefile viburnum is still blooming strong.  The camassias are gone by, and the cute geums are also gone.

All the little woodland hyacinths at the front of the Birch garden are just going by now.  The Zebrina mallow is opening.

The newest persicaria 'Dimity' have shot up fuzzy pink spikes, but the older plants haven't bloomed yet. Amsonias are blooming, but the pale soft blue is so hard to photograph.

Allium moly and the soft pink rosy garlic are flowering.

New Dogwood and Viburnum

Yesterday was the first really nice day this whole spring.  70s, sunny and pleasant all day, not just for a part of it.  But the power washers were here, kind of trapping us indoors all day as they worked on ladders around the whole house.

After they were gone, in the evening after dinner, it was cool and nice and I planted the 15 gal. Dawn viburnum.  Thought it would be so hard, but it wasn't.  A little awkward, but manageable all on my own.   It's way too close to the house, but does stay very vertical and narrow I have read.

Then today was back to dreary and overcast.  It got really humid and up in the 80s. 

I decided not to replace the little beheaded cornus mas by the driveway. 

It has leafed out, it is shorter, but it's full and not terribly deformed looking after all, and I don't want to move it.  It will grow. 

So I put the expensive big new one out at the far corner of the yard by the birches, where Jim has wanted an anchor plant to "finish" the view.

Visit at the Asylum

Humid today, still wet and deary since we got back, but by late afternoon it cleared and was lovely.

I went over to Cyndy Cromwell's today (Gardening Asylum) and toured her garden in Glastonbury.  She has just under an acre of very shady, very dense and lush woodland gardens.  It was wonderful talking plants with her and seeing everything she has.

She dug up things as we went along, and I now have purple irises spilling over the bare edges of the dry creek bed, as well as more Carex 'Ice Dance'.  And she gave me a clump of chocolate Joe Pye weed, Eupatorium rugosum 'Chocolate'.  It has lovely dark foliage and is supposed to be compact and upright.  I put it in the Meadow's Edge garden on the left side.

Eupatorium rugosum 'Chocolate'

She also gave me some autumn crocus (it has huge strappy foliage that will disappear later... I thought autumn crocus was a small leaved little thing?)

And Queen of the Meadow -- Filipendula rubra.  Not sure about the pinkish fuzzy blooms.  I put it next to the doublefile viburnum, squashed in with clumps of daylilies.  It will get tall, but stays sturdy and upright.  It wants a lot of moisture.  If the foliage declines, cut it back.

Filipendula rubra

She cut two viburnum branches, one with roots (viburnum tomentosum 'Mariesii' which is similar to my 'Shasta').  The other is Viburnum x carlcephaleum I think, fragrant snowball.  Hers was in full bloom and delicately beautiful.  She cut a branch and we'll see if it roots in soil, but it's iffy.

After my visit with Cyndy, I went to Woodland Gardens and got the Cornus mas they ordered for me (very large!) to replaced the little beheaded one, and the Dawn viburnum, a tall 15 gallon plant!

Back Home

Returned from Missouri on Saturday.  In our absence, over 5 days we had 3.1 inches of much needed rain.  It's still cool (60s) and overcast.

The doublefile viburnum blossomed while we were gone:

The camassias are in full bloom, awfully pale, but massing nicely:

 

I love the new smokebush.  The leaves really are a deep color but translucent:

 

I am not at all sure about the 'My Monet' weigela.  The flowers are sparse, the colors are odd:

Lupines on the back hill have spread: