June Beauty 2022

Despite the fairly dry Spring and tornadic weather with the occasional deluge the daylily season started in early June as normal.

The daylily above is a hybrid from Bob Elliott with cotton spurge in the background.

Fairy Tale Pink never lets me down. Each June morning is a pleasure as I deadhead the previous day's blooms while admiring the fresh beauty of the new.

Fairy Tale pink in profile

The weather extremes have delayed the blossoms of two new varieties, Mystical Rainbow, and Hail Mary (a freebie) that I received from Oakes Daylilies. The torrential rain events removed the top soil from the plants and it was awhile before I realized it. They are looking healthy again, but probably won't bloom until next year. I highly recommend ordering from this company. The plants I received were huge!

A neighborhood favorite, the brocaded yellow daylily. Unfortunately, I don't know the name, but Oakes Daylilies has one that is very similar, Brocaded Gown. The more I look at it, it might be the very same variety. This daylily performs well in part sun as well as full sun in my garden.

And because you know I love pink.......Barbara Mitchell.

Moving on to topics other than daylilies, the Black n Blue sage is performing beautifully. This is a good thing as the red bee balm and another variety, Raspberry Wine, are practically non-existent this year. I'm afraid they experienced an existential crisis with the dry Spring. The hummingbirds are feeding on the sage which is good. Last year they seemed to prefer the red bee balm over the sage. I didn't see them use the Raspberry Wine bee balm though. That's a garden for you, ever changing. Expect that change to increase with the increasing weather extremes.

Funshine abelia (bottom left) has really impressed me. These are by far the most floriferous abelias we have. They open as a pale lavender and fade to a white. I'm comparing these to Kaleidoscope, Rose Creek and Miss Lemon. I'm tempted to replace these with Funshine. I won't do it though. That just cruel, falling for a "pretty face". The other plants are healthy enough with excellent foliage color. All of the aforementioned varieties cope very well with heat, dryness and part sun.

The Chinese asters (white daisy shaped flowers) and the Unplugged So Blue, Mealy cup sage are also great performing plants. I plan to add more of the So Blue sage to the garden this autumn if I can find it. The two peonies that I planted in this area are healthy, but no blooms. Did we plant them too deep? I don't think so, but a neighbor has advised me to just be patient. Maybe, next year they will bloom.

Sometimes you have to accept that a sculpture will work better than a plant. We have a new piece of garden art from Etsy to draw the eye to the far back garden near the spiral. This sits between two pines which offer too much competition for most plants. The original color was turquoise and rust which turned out to be a receding color combination in the shade of the pines. A coat of Sherwin Williams "Dewy" made it glow.

Another perspective of the sculpture. Ian is growing Muscadine grape starts in the black pots. That's a temporary location behind "Pan" to give them a little more sun.

I think I have succeeded in finding plants that can take the heat of the front porch. I'm never that great with pot plantings, but this year I think I have a winning combination. I was aiming for a country garden feel with lots of yellow and white to go with the front door. Well, I should have closed the front door for this photo.

Yellow petunias and white pentas are the main attraction. The pot in the middle has an underplanting of lemon thyme and a dark foliage accent for interest using sedum, Peach Pearls. I wasn't expecting it to bloom so early. That was a very nice surprise.