Lily ‘Forever Susan’
Well it’s already past the middle of the month and I will try to catch up with a brief post for Garden Blogger’s Bloom Day.
Life has been very busy with travel to Europe and strange weather in Maryland. As shown above the first lillies are beginning to appear.
Lilium ‘Purple Marble’ is in the Peony garden.
Lilium ‘Pink Perfection’ sits out by the blueberries.
One flower that is particularly striking is the bright red Bishop Dahlia.
Bishop of Llandaff Dahlia
This one comes back every year even though dahlia are nominally not hardy enough to over winter in our are. The bulk of our dahlias are dug and put in the basement to get through the cold part of the year. Perhaps I should try a couple of other varieties in the ground over the winter. Right beside this Dahlia we grow a palm and a banana so it may be an unusually warm spot.
Nearby is a particularly nice green leaved plant with bright yellow flowers.
Lysimachia paridiformis var. stenophylla
Of course it’s important to note that the Stewartia is covered with flowers in a 20 foot tall tree at this point.
Stewartia pseudocamellia
And I’ve been meaning to mention one of the loveliest ‘weeds’ you could possible plant.
Corydalis lutea
These guys are zero care, widely spreading, and easily pulled if you think they are taking up too much space. And they flower from now until winter.
In the newly rebuilt Alpine bed the first Lewisia flowers are delightfully showing themselves.
Lewisia ‘Little Snowberry’
Besides the Alpine bed we have reconstructed the vegetable garden including two raised beds which were added today thanks to visiting family from Massachusetts.
2 raised beds
This should provide some more good growing space for beans, lettuce, and garlic.
And in lieu of a more complete posting I should mention that we did spend two weeks in England at the end of May. Once again we were at the Chelsea Flower Show. This time with a tour group led by our good friend Marianne Wilburn. (Hortcultural Exceptional Garden Tours)
Just a few shots from Chelsea, with more images to follow.
Chelsea Chrysanthemum
Tacca Chantrieri
Inspirational Ferns
Fern heaven
South Africa at Chelsea
Once again Chelsea is just loaded with inspirations for the future. Ironically one of things I discovered was Cornus Venus, a delightully large flowered hybrid Cornus that I had planted this Spring with knowing that the flowers are gigantic compared to the normal Chinese Dogwoods.
Cornus ‘Venus’
The world is full of discoveries…