So many roses smell wonderful, but this climber tops them all in my estimation. I got a start of this plant at the Arboretum gift shop fifteen or so years ago and boy, did it ever grow! It has been blessing us with its floral show and fragrance every May/June and then a sporadic later show, as well.
The plant needs a hard chop in early spring to keep it in line. I neglected to do that this year. The flowers were amazing, but the canes are overtaking one of the dwarf cherries and heading over the roof!
I pruned the rose a bit today and will whack it back good next weekend to try to get it to resprout and rebloom later in the summer.
Purchased for the memory garden and planted out in 2018, these hardy geraniums, which I can’t tell apart, are a favorite. They both generously produce lavender-blue flowers with a white eye in May/June/July and probably will do so again in the fall if I cut them back at just the right time.
This year, I was worried that the plants weren’t going to do much. The cool, wet spring seemed to stall out their growth, but they are growing wonderfully now and blooming well.
My 2020 plans for these plants is to trim them down in late July to see if they will grow back and bloom again. I’ll feed them at that time, too. And work to get some better photos of them.
This tree was a seedling growing outside a fence in Broadview. Brother Tim and I discovered them on an adventure somewhere. It was only a few inches tall at that time, almost twenty years ago. I grew the plant in a pot for a few years and then decided it would be the perfect tree to plant near our koi pond in the woodland garden.
The tree grew quickly and gracefully and is beautiful next to the pond. I read somewhere, about ten years ago, that Styrax can be poisonous to fish! We’ve had no problems with the koi, but we cover the pond in the fall to keep leaves out and net all the flowers out that have dropped off the tree in June.
My 2020 plans for this plant are to keep it trimmed, if needed, and enjoy the dappled shade it provides to the koi pond.
I don’t remember where my first Queen’s Tears plant came from originally. I would guess I’ve had it for about seven or eight years. I’ve divided it into three pots and pretty much neglect them all and these sturdy plants don’t care. They keep growing and blooming every spring.
These plants aren’t particularly attractive and the flowers are more interesting than they are showy or beautiful, but their simplicity earns them a place in the greenhouse. The only other bromeliads I have are the air plants (mostly tillandsias) that grow on a branch in the greenhouse.
You can see my 2020 plans for these plants are a bit ruthless. I cut two of the pots almost completely down to the ground, as they looked pretty rough. My hope is that they’ll pop back up all fresh and green and I’ll do a better job of moving them out in the spring for their flower “show.”
I grew several of these semi-tropical shrubs from seed about ten years ago. I kept them in large pots, but they never bloomed. As a last resort, I planted the last survivor out in the open border along the driveway. The plant surprised me with its hardiness. It has died back to the roots every year, then resprouted and grown to five or six feet by late summer. But still, no flowers!
We had some significantly cold weather this past winter, but not enough to cut the Iochroma down. It stayed alive and fortunately I didn’t cut it back like I usually do! It leafed out all the way to the top and sprouted buds and now flowers!
The flowers are a bit bigger than I imagined and a lovely shade blue-lavender.
My 2020 plans for this plant will be to get a few cuttings in July to see if I can get a few for sales and maybe one for the memory garden. I’ll also make sure to get an organic fertilizer spike under it to help feed its additional growth this year.
This plant is known as the Cheddar pink, presumably because Cheddar, UK is part of its native haunts. I grew my lone plant from seed over ten years ago and it never fails to perform in June with good-sized, spicy-scented flowers. The plant was growing in a brick wall that surrounded the Douglas fir bed, but we removed the wall this year to do work on the native plant garden. The Cheddar pink appears nonplussed.
I don’t do anything to support this plant. In 2020, I will try to get some cuttings in July so I can plant one of these in the memory garden and give some away for sales or neighbors.
I have a bunch of these low-growing plants in the front row of the memory garden, all started from seed in 2018. They put on a remarkable flower show in June, but then the hundreds of flower stems with seeds turn brown and look pretty miserable unless I find time to clip them all off.
I’ll work to get some better photos of these intricate blooms and the plants, as well, in 2020. I fed them in early spring with an organic mix and I’m hoping I’ll find the time to snip all the dead stems off come July.
Seeds for these fun pinks were purchased and planted in 2018. I ended up with a few plants that I put in pots around the driveway that spring I was impressed with the uniformity of the plants and the large flowers. I was frustrated that the bloom season was relatively short, however. That could have been due to the hot, dry weather, or it could just be a trait of the plant.
About three of these plants remain three years later and are just starting to bloom now (June 10th).
In 2020, I’ll work to keep the remaining plants fed and watered and see if they will have a longer bloom season or rebloom when cut back.
Another Campanula that I’ve had in the garden from the beginning. Easily grown from seed, I’ve tried the standard blue, the Telham Beauty strain, and the beautify pure white variety. The plain blue Peach-Leaved Bellflower volunteers around the garden still.
This plant is graceful and generous with its blooms. It doesn’t ask for much, either, but is short-lived for me.
My 2020 plans for this plant are to grab some seed pods when they are ripe and shake them where I hope to get some new plants.
I’m spending a lot of time on the weekends working in the greenhouse and garden, so I don’t have as much time to write about the plants or work. There are photos, though, so I’ll drop some here and hopefully come back with captions one day soon.
