Garden Day Bloom Bellyaching

Another bloom day arrives at Aurora with nothing much to add to the sum of gardening splendor. The Iceberg roses in front are blooming but the petals are wrenched from their stems about an hour after opening by this crazy wind and then strewn about the yard like styrofoam peanuts.


The white plumbago is pretty; but the four plants all take turns flowering, so there is never a mass display which is what I was striving for. Striving plays a big part in my garden vocab. Despite my careful study I am unable to discern the bud/flower/seed pattern in the plumbago so I am never certain when to shear off. I cannot tell what is past flower and what is new flower bud.



The Pink Knockouts are doing better now that the heat is over. Although their color still seems washed out. I would like to say that this photo doesn’t do them justice, but in fact, the color is accurate. I’ve been feeding the living daylights out of them, so I don’t know what more I can do.




Ah, the Port St. John Creeper, the English sheepdog of vines. A shaggy slobbering happy pink blob that is always happy to see you. And it has a two-fer aroma package: the desert willow scent of its flowers and the pinto bean pungency of its crushed stems and leaves.



Here’s poor ’ol Charles Grimaldi, who’ll probably be goners by the morning if the predicted freeze happens. He’s loaded down with buds and not one has yet struggled into bloom. Charles has been thoroughly watered and tonight he'll don his newly-purchased little jacket (a length of foam pipe wrap) so maybe he’ll live to see some bloom. But I think there’s another Arctic front coming mid-week so his future is doubtful.



In preparation for colder temps, I ventured in to the small shed built into the garage, where I keep large pots and cuttings over the winter. I haven’t been in there since last spring. To my horror I saw that I had overlooked a baby yucca. It has been in there unwatered all through this past dire summer. I felt like Hitler.



It looks pretty damn good, all things considered. No amount of striving needed for this hardy survivor.

Tropicana Dreams

This morning before dashing off to work I took this happy little snap of one of the rosebushes I bought in Luling that were supposedly Knockouts. Neither the leaf nor the bloom color look like the standard KR. The KR website lists a variety called Rainbow Knock Out Rose that “covers itself with coral pink blooms painted with rich yellow at the base.” Maybe that’s what these are. They’re throwing off buds and blooms like crazy and seem to be immune to the blackspot that’s rampant with this on/off hot humid weather.

I’m in the process of digging up my side yard for a new bed that sits along my patio. A coral-based showcase might be interesting: The Rainbow Knockouts, flame acanthus, a hot pink and orange canna or two, some tangerine impatiens along the border, old reliable pavonia, that orangey zinnia. Oh, and some four-o’clocks, the mutant ones that have yellow streaked with cerise.Some giant purple/green leafy things mixed in, banana, ginger or something.

Gardening: A Contact Sport?

Nine days ago I was dragging a wire trellis to the garden shed when I tripped on it and fell splat forward. The trellis banged off the top of my ankle instantly raising a golfball-sized swelling. This was two hours before I was to get on a plane to Chicago, so I rushed inside to elevate and ice. It seemed to be doing okay until Monday when the bump turned a suspicious Knockout Rose-red. A trip to the doctor and one lancing later, I am still alive and at this moment, MRSA-free.

I’ll spare us all the posting of the gory photos. But it got me thinking about the health hazards involved in gardening: poison ivy, wasps, toxic thorns, cactus spines, sun exposure, lower back pain, and of course, the classic Green Thumb. My mother spent several years struggling with this fungal infection; it was a painful and stubbornly persistent.

Perhaps the most potentially lethal of all is the ladder-related mishap. I cite the hilarious passage from Jonathan Franzen’s The Corrections, wherein the narrator, after putting away several scotches, is out on his deck barbecuing and is suddenly seized with the notion that the Hedges Must Be Trimmed, never mind the fact that it is night. He gets out the ladder and begins shearing the bushes. Being drunk, he decides that rather than climb up and down to move the ladder along the hedgerow, he’ll grab hold of the ladder and “jump” it sideways. A trip to the emergency room ensues.

So no drinking and trimming, unless it’s eggnog and a Christmas tree.

Gathering of the greens

The Thanksgiving trip reaped its own bounty of garden treasures. While taking in the plantings around our condo, I noticed that the striped yucca was sending out pups into the lawn which were being routinely mowed down. So I dug up and brought back 6 of the chopped off plants, another variety for my front bed.
This one is giant starburst shape. In a few years, my front bed will be a health hazard of spikes, if not a burglar deterrent.


Then in Luling, we stopped at Castros, one of two fabulously funky and idiosyncratic fruit & vegetable stands that do business directly across the street from each other, selling produce, plants, and pots. This summer I bought a Knockout Rose for $15 in Luling, cheaper than I have seen them in Austin. This weekend they were $7, so I bought two more. I don't know where I'm going to put them.

Daylight Annoying Time

In preparation for the new front bed, I bought 3 Iceberg roses today. I decided to bail on putting in Knockout roses, despite their wonderful qualities, I just don't want that screaming magenta going on out front.
The Iceberg seems to be universally considered the best, most disease-resistant white shrub rose. It looks gorgeous that's for sure and also smells great, which Knockout doesn't. Here are my pots sitting in the back awaiting their debut. I've placed them along side their soon-to-be BFFs, the blue-gray spineless prickly pear.