Hibiscus

This is a dinnerplate hibiscus (Hibiscus moscheutos) that we got years ago. It continues to come back and bloom faithfully every summer. It's a short plant, never more than 3' high, with enormous flowers. Usually it only blooms 3 weeks a year. However it's so showy in flower that it can be forgiven its relatively short bloom time.
 

 

We have wild H. moscheutos growing on our property by the creek. Three of them grow in a slough that was dammed by beavers and spend most of their time standing in water. These are big plants, about 5' high and at least 3' wide. Most of our H. moscheutos are white with a marroon eye and one is pink.

Neches River Rosemallow (Hibiscus dasycalyx), the endangered Texas hibiscus, has never exactly wowed me, but this year it bloomed after the Japanese beetles had come and gone and I like it much better this year.
 

 

A tall H. coccineus/ moscheutos hybrid that we rescued from my husband's grandmother's garden. The leaves are broader and the flowers are pinker than that of H. coccineus.
 

The very elegant Hibiscus coccineus. I grew a bunch of these from seed and put them in the ditch that runs by the old house site, where their roots are submerged for most of the year. They love those conditions and bloom very well even with only half a day of sun, typically from mid-July through October.
 

 

At the other end of the cultivation spectrum is Pineland Hibiscus (Hibiscus aculeatus). This hibicus is native to pine savannahs and likes acid sand with good drainage. Perhaps it can tolerate moist sand but it cannot tolerate moist heavy soil at all. The flowers are a beautiful pale lemony yellow, much like Abelmoschus manihot, but on a much shorter plant with better foliage. The foliage on the Pineland Hibiscus is elegant, highly divided and of a bristly texture; I haven't noticed much insect damage on the leaves. This hibiscus puts out blooms, usually 2 or 3 at a time, all summer.
 

Summer Blues (Mostly Blue-Violets)

I don't have many true blues in the garden, especially since most of what is touted as blue is actually violet or purple. The only true blues I have in the garden this year are Brazilian Blue Sage and Blue Goblet Flower. My favorite blue of all is Butterfly Pea (Clitoria ternatea), an annual vine with unusual true blue or white flowers. Unfortunately I don't have any growing this year, but the year before I grew it with my Climbing Old Blush and they got along together very well. The Butterfly Pea was a very light vine, not shading the Old Blush at all, and the flowers of the vine and the rose combined together beautifully.

Brazilian Blue Sage is a favorite of Ruby-Throated Hummingbirds. The other day I was watering in some new transplants and accidently spritzed a little female that was feeding on the sage. She took off, then circled back, intrigued by the water and the possibility of getting a bath. I told her that she was cute and that she could take a bath if she wanted, and the funniest thing happened; she zoomed right up to me and looked at me in the face as if she knew exactly what I was saying. She went back to invesigate the water again but decided that even the water pressure from the droplets was too strong for her. Often I see hummingbirds following the sprinkler back and forth, staying in the very lightest part of the spray.


Brazilian Blue Sage with Joe Pye Weed, Buddleia Potter's Purple, rugosa rose, and Formosa Lilies.
 

Brazilian Blue Sage with green calyx
 

 

Brazilian Blue Sage with black calyx
 

 

Verbena Blue Princess is a lovely verbena, a lavender blue that combines beautifully with Homestead Purple and just about everything else. So far Blue Princess does not appear to be as vigorous as Homestead Purple but is more of a mingler. Blue Princess has overwintered once in my garden and I hope it proves to be as hardy as HP, which I've had for more than 10 years.
 

I finally got a Vitex tree, after admiring them in other people's gardens for several years. I love the violet-blue color of the flowers and the fragrance of the foliage, which smells like sage, lavender, and mint. It seems that flying insects of every persuasion love Vitex too. This is Vitex agnus-castus "Shoal Creek". The flowers are not a true blue as they appear in the photos, but a violet-blue.
 

 

Blue Mist Shrub is similar to Vitex in the color of its flowers and the musky mint/ sage scent of its foliage. All this plant asks for is good drainage and full sun; in a rich soil it turns into an octopus.
 

With Blue Jimsonweed
 

With Swamp Aster
 

Catmint is another plant that likes sun and good drainage. It has quilted gray-green leaves and blue-lavender flowers that put on a big show every spring and continue through the growing season. Like Vitex and Caryopteris the foliage has a musky mink scent; the fragrance of these three is similar but not identical, with catmint being the sweetest and the muskiest.
 

The native Ruellia grows wild in our floodway fields and I have moved some of it into the garden as a ground cover. Until Ruellia brittoniana, which gets to 3-4' in height, Ruellia caroliniana is prostrate. Although some consider it a weed because of its propensity to seed in, it has beautiful bluish-purple flowers in abundance and performs equally well in sun or shade. It likes a lot of moisture.
 

Bluebird Aster.
 

Zwanenberg Blue Spiderwort
 

 

Coneflowers

Coneflowers, like Summer Phlox, are a mainstay in the summer garden. As common as it may be I love Rudbeckia fulgida "Goldsturm," one of the few plants that thrived in our barely admended clay subsoil after we moved into our house. I planted it beside the driveway and it has put on a beautiful show year after year. It's especially striking in dappled shade; the flower color takes on a beautiful glow. It's survived flooding from Floyd and Alberto with no problem, as it's a coneflower that likes a lot of moisture.
 

The Echinceas that I like best are the white and purple forms of Echinacea purpurea. E. purpurea is beautiful, reliable, and combines very well with ornamental grasses.

With Blue Love Grass
 

When we were able to bring our horse home (we had to clear and seed pastures and build fences and shelters first), I was finally able to really amend on a large scale and the difference in what I have been able to grow in the garden has been like night and day. In the background is the son of my Thoroughbred mare and a Half Arabian pony.
 

Coneflowers and Mexican Feather Grass
 

Although the white Purple Coneflowers never last long for me, they look so striking with the wild type that they're worth the small effort it takes to grow them from seed.
White Swan Echinacea
 

Rudbeckia triloba has the same gorgeous golden yellow color as Rudbeckia fulgida on a taller plant. Although R. triloba is a biennial or short-lived perennial it acts as a perennial in the garden since it seeds in readily; there is always some around from year to year.
 

With Monarda Raspberry Wine and Panicum virgatum
 

Garden Scenes from June/ July

We moved our house out of the floodplain in the spring of 2007, so the beds around the house are fairly new.

The beds that are between the house and the driveway (with neighbor's pasture in background) are starting to shape up. These pictures were taken in late June. The beds look a bit different now; I'm done constructing them and finished planting except for some daylilies that are due to be shipped in Sept.
 

 

 

 

 

East side of the house, looking down toward our pastures. The big perennial
bed is to the left of the driveway, and the bed bordering the neighbor's
pasture is on the right.
 

This is the bed next to the neighbor's pasture. The redbud is one that we got from the National Arbor Day Foundation as a seedling. It's really taken off and was beautiful in bloom this spring. I have several other redbud seedlings that are doing well, some from the NSDF, some that I grew some seed, but none of the others have grown as quickly as this one. We've only had it 3 years and already it's 8' tall.
 

This shot shows a view of the bed next to neighbor's pasture taken from the big perennial bed. A lot of the bed next to the neighbor's pasture is Bur Marigold (Bidens polylepis or aristosa), the native sunflower that coats all of the ditches and moist fields with yellow in Sept. En masse it even has a very nice fragrance. One of my very favorite wildflowers. The daylily in this picture is Commuter Daylily, Hemerocallis citrina.
 

 

This is the bed by the gate, the bed closest to the horse pastures, taken standing next to R. palustris scandens and looking back up toward the house. Pictured are Panicum virgatum, Muhlenbergia capillaris, Monarda Claire Grace, Smooth Beardtongue going to seed, and Verbena bonariensis. There's Seashore Mallow and Joe Pye Weed in this bed too, just not tall enough yet to be visible in the picture. I have had a hard time keeping this bed maintained; the slope of it and the fact that the bed is essentially a ditch, with hard-flowing water in it after storms, makes it difficult to amend.
 

From the middle of the big perennial bed, Buddleia Potter's Purple, Blue Jimsonweed, Phlox paniculata David and Robert Poore, and seed pods of Carolina Bush Pea.
 

Obedient Plant, Carolina Bog Mint and Garden Friends

These are a few of the things in bloom in the August garden.

We got a start of Obedient Plant from my husband's grandmother's garden,
and let it wander in places that are not easy to cultivate.
 

Carolina Bog Mint is endangered in the wild due to loss of habitat but thankfully
is now available from nurseries. Even as it grows wild at Howell Woods in Johnson
County, NC it is threatened by wild pigs, who dig up everything in their search
for food. Thanks to last year's drought I have only one patch blooming this summer,
in a ditch near the hay shelter, where it's been able to glean enough moisture to
survive. Carolina Bog Mint is a low-growing plant, stoloniferous, and long-blooming
~ as well as gorgeous and unique. A very fancy ground cover if you have the damp
soil for it.
 

 

I got this hosta from my paternal grandmother 30 years ago,and she had it
for at least 20 years before that. It's either Hosta plantinagea or H. Royal
Standard; the white flowers are large for a hosta and smell like honeysuckle.
 

Ah Youth is making another appearance,
 

as is Buttered Popcorn.
 

Indigofera amblyantha has bloomed constantly the entire summer.