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Echinacea and liatris are two of my late-summer favourites for a sunny, prairie-style garden. These plants are growing in my Adventure Garden and that's bearded iris in the bottom left corner, but they'd also look great teamed up with ornamental grasses.
Liatris also comes in white and echinacea comes in all kinds of red, orange, pink, purple varieties to suit your garden - as long as you have a sunny spot!
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I recently decided that the epimedium rubrum I had, while pretty in spring, was just not showy enough to be front stage beside the steps to my front door, so I started re-arranging the front Shade Garden. I moved the epimedium elsewhere and switched in 3 Brunnera 'Jack Frost' (also from elsewhere in my garden) which is one of my favourite shade plants. Their silvery leaves with intricate green veins look great all season, not to mention they have pretty forget-me-not-blue flowers in late spring. I'm much happier with this garden now!
Here's another view from a little further back. Don't those silvery leaves look pretty? That's a new Persicaria 'Red Dragon' with the variegated leaves in the front left, which I've seen mixed information about, so I hope it will be hardy here. I'm going to mulch it for the winter to be safe. Does anyone have any experience with this plant?
And here's the garden as seen when coming around the side of the house towards the front door. The epimedium rubrum has been moved to the spot on the bottom right of this photo, where it will do just fine in the dry shade close to a spruce tree.
The path needs work, I know. It's on my list.
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Have you been to the perennial gardens at the zoo? They are a great place to get both design and plant ideas as they are well landscaped, have a wide selection of hardy perennial plants, and almost all plants are labelled. I was there in July and found myself paying close attention to the orange and blue-flowering plants as I am still looking for a few more plants to fill up my new front entry garden with a blue-green-orange-red colour scheme. Here are my notes:
Above: When you're looking for orange, even these common orange daylilies suddenly look very attractive, especially when planted in gigantic drifts like this! Paula, if you're reading this, your orange daylilies are doing just fine, although not quite this impressive since they were just transplanted this spring!
Above: Golden-orange helenium 'Mardi Gras' is the Calgary Horticultural Society's "Perennial of the Year" - so of course, I must get some and try it in my garden!
Above: Anchusa azurea (alkanet) 'Feltham Pride Strain' is in the borage family so of course, boasts true blue flowers and bees love it. It is not the most elegant-looking plant but true blue flowers are hard to find so I think I might give this plant a shot. I'll be looking for seeds next spring.
Above: Gentiana septemfida (summer gentian) is another plant with true blue flowers. I actually have this plant already in my garden, but it was a gift and I wasn't sure what kind of gentian it was. Thanks to the plant labels at the zoo, now I know!
Above: This groundcover mix of Anagallis monelli (pimpernel) 'Angie Blue' and 'Angie Orange' also caught my eye but they are annuals and too short to work in my garden. But maybe I'll try them in pots - their colours are fantastic!
Above: And finally, this meadow-like planting of thyme punctuated with spikes of bearded iris was so gorgeous that I didn't care that it wasn't blue & orange. If I had just one more area in my yard where I could make more garden space I'd be tempted to try this!!
Alas, I do not have the space. Do you?
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I was out of town and offline for a few weeks on vacation and it was truly restful to have the space away from garden and work. In the garden, I think I burned myself out with 2 major projects in spring: installing hoops in the veggie garden raised beds, and prepping and planting the new front entry garden (including removing countless wheelbarrow loads of red shale mulch! It just about killed me...), and I hadn't been feeling very motivated to do much else.... until now.
After the first week of holidays I was ready to think about gardening again! There is much I want to accomplish but I don't have a lot of time this fall, so it was time to make lists and prioritize. What would make the most sense to get done first, and what can be accomplished in my limited spare time? Some areas need thinning, and others need re-working (for example because I have a new colour scheme in the front garden), and other areas are still in early development.
Above: this area of the Adventure Garden has barely been touched since planted in 2008, and needs some thinning. That poor, crowded blue oat grass cannot be seen in its full, symmetrical, blue glory!
Primarily, I will be moving some plants around to get ready for some more major projects next year. Fall is a great time to move plants because the weather is getting cooler so it's less stressful on the plants, and there's still plenty of time for them to get their roots established before winter. Not only that, but it's much easier to place plants in fall when they are big, rather than trying to remember in spring how much space that tiny, newly growing plant is going to need! So get out there and make some changes this fall!
Here's my list, and I've already started:
England (the main edible garden area)
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I'm just back from holidays - I've been out of town and offline for several weeks - and am excited to see corn doing so well in my garden!
I planted it this spring on a whim - I usually like to try growing at least one new and different thing each year, and I've never grown corn before. It was more for the novelty and for the kids - I planted an ornamental variety and a baby corn variety - and didn't really expect to get anything as corn needs such a long, hot growing season and doesn't typically do well in Calgary unless you have a hot micro-climate. But with the hot summer we've had mine is doing quite well and I might even get a small harvest! That's what I love about vegetable gardening - it pays to diversify and every year there are surprises.
So if you've sent me a message in the last few weeks, my apologies for not responding yet and I'll get caught up in the next couple of days. I don't put a vacation message on my email as it just doesn't seem like a good idea what with pictures of my house on the website, etc.
How is your garden doing?
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