Wildflower Wednesday

Happy Wildflower Wednesday, er Friday! Late as usual. Better late than never though, right? I have been so busy working in the garden that I've been too tired to blog at night!

Gail's right, Phlox pilosa is practically perfect. This is Ozark Phlox, P. pilosa var. ozarkana. Sweet candy pink flowers with a sweet fragrance. For something with "prairie" in the name it can handle quite a lot of moisture, and needs some moisture to thrive. Not a dry prairie kind of phlox.

 

 

Goldflame Honeysuckle, so colorful, so polite, and sweet if
you catch the perfume in the morning before it has burned off.
 

I don't know the name of this Lousiana Iris but I love its rich royal purple color. I don't think it's 'Black Gamecock'. I think that's a deeper blue purple than this one.

 

 

I wish I'd gotten a picture of Lyreleaf sage while it was in bloom, but here it
is looking striking even while going to seed. I dug some starts of this from the
floodway fields. Give it some room and it's actually quite showy, with its bunch
of light lavender blue flowers. The wild ones here have burgundy veining but
it's not overdone, as with a couple of cultivars I've seen in nurseries.
 

I love spiderwort this time of year. Mine don't run around, just seed around a little, and in a wet year they will bloom from April until a freeze cuts them down. In a dry year they just fade into the background or literally go underground to wait the drought out.

 

 

Clockwise from top left: Pink Primrose, Amsonia (Willowleaf/ Hubricht's hybrid), spiderwort, and more spiderwort with Verbena 'Homestead Purple'

 

I used to read about Amsonia in garden catalogs and wonder what the fuss what about. I thought the pale blue flowers looked rather anemic and just didn't get it. Then one day I was walking along a path at the JC Raulston Arboretum and saw a big billowy Hubricht's Amsonia, no flowers, just summer foliage. It looked soft, it even felt soft, and had the same sort of movement as grass but with more substance. What a nice foliage plant, I thought. So I got a couple from Niche Gardens. They didn't get very big until I put them in a low spot in front of the big perennial bed. Even so, they took a few years to size up, and in spring when they bloomed, looking like flowers stuck atop a bristly cock's comb, I waited impatiently for the flowers to be over and the plant to fill out for the summer. Now that they are a mature size and covered with flowers in spring I love them then too. The flowers are fragrant, with strong vanilla notes. I finally discovered this a few years ago, when I could smell the white iris even though I thought I was too far away even for those to waft. The Amsonia and white iris have a very similar delightful scent. Hubricht's even colors in fall, although that too, took time. They didn't do that when they were young. A plant that ime requires patience, like baptisia, but very much worth the wait.

Hubricht's Amsonia with Baptisia alba and australis

 

And my very favorite May natives of all, Baptisias!

Baptisia alba
 

Baptisia australis
 

Most of my Blue Baptisias are lavender and purple, like the homegrown seedling below,

 

but a few are actually almost blue, ranging from royal to periwinkle blue.

 

'Carolina Moonlight' and 'Twilite Prairieblues' are the only two baptisias I've ever spent over 20 bucks on, that came in 5 gallon pots, and I should have bought more like that, because these have been miles ahead of my seedlings.

 

'Twilite Prairieblues' has been more pretty and less strange this year. The flower color is highly changeable, responding both to light and flower age. This year I noticed the flowers at twilight actually being ageratum blue. I've wondered about the popularity of this plant. It is both very fertile and very robust, but also just kind of weird. I've always liked it as a specimen plant. I wouldn't want a whole garden full of them.

 

 

'Carolina Moonligh't and 'Twilite Prairieblues'
 

I would like a whole garden full of 'Purple Smoke'.

 

 

 

 

Thank you Gail for hosting Wildflower Wednesday and highlighting our wonderful natives.

Celebrating the color green

As the spring flower season is cranking up, I wanted to take a contemplative moment to celebrate the color green.

Red Maple

 

 

Serviceberry
 

Oak-leaved Hydrangea

 

 

 

Wildflower Wednesday

This is the time of the year that the natives start spreading their wings. And the time for some long-awaited friends to make a reappearance.

Toothwort used to bloom with joyful abandon at the old house site, but since then, it has been much more shy to bloom. Still, this has been a good year for it, and this spring I have been finding the delicate white blooms in all sorts of out-of-the-way shady places, where I had tucked spare rhizomes years ago.

 

Of the four Florida azaleas that used to be at the front of the house, three survived. The one below has scarcely missed a beat, blooming every year since. It's a nice size ~ about 4 high and 3 feet wide ~ and covered in flowers.

 

 

The other two I have waited SIX long years to see a bloom again. They've been residing on the east side of the house for the past two or three years now, after it became clear they wouldn't make it if they stayed where they were. I was so happy to see flowers on them again!

 

Ironically the Florida Azalea that's doing the best is one that I put at the edge of the woods opposite the paddock behind the house. It's taller than me and gorgeous. The deer haven't touched it. I have heard my others and in my own experience deer really like the evergreen azaleas and I am keeping my fingers crossed that this remains so. The deer will chomp my Encores and especially the shell pink double that came from DH's grandparent's garden if I don't remember to spray them with peppermint. I forgot this year and so the shell pink looks like a bundle of dead twigs with a hint of green leaves at the ends and some pink flowers down in the interior of the bush that the deer missed.

I love Florida Azaleas with Woodland Phlox.

 

I thought the only Woodland Phlox I had left was the medium blue ('Clouds of Perfume'), but there's some dark blue 'Louisiana' left after all. The very light blue/ white 'May Breeze' is gorgeous but isn't as tough as the others. Excepting last year, which had some very hot weather but was not dry, we've had a lot of dry, dry summers and Woodland Phlox doesn't appreciate that. I'm going to keep mulching my little shade garden next to the house, though, as I don't have that much shade anymore where I'm willing to micromanage things.

 

 

 

 

 

Every year when the Piedmont azaleas bloom I wish all of my garden was like this.
The bright rose/purple azalea on the right is an Encore 'Autumn Amethyst'.

 

 

 

 

 

As the flowers start to fade they look like they are shedding "teardrops".

 

The native crabapples were magnificent this year, as usual. We have three: one at the edge of a field, and one next to a path that leads to the creek, and one next to the creek. This is the first year I've seen many flowers on the pathside tree, and it was beautiful.

The tree at the edge of the field:

 

 

 

 

 

 

This one next to the creek was also covered in flowers, almost surprisingly so considering how many other trees are growing around it.

 

 

The flowers are not strongly fragrant but have the same sweet scent as apple blossoms.

 

Thank you Gail for hosting Wildflower Wednesday!