Tag Archives: Bloom Day

Sun lovers and finches find the chocolate centered sunbursts irresistible. A stiff, upright annual or short-lived perennial native to the eastern United States, but has become endemic throughout North America. The Black-Eyed Susan is probably the most common of all American wildflowers.

Bloom Day
Bloom Day
Bloom Day
The biggest and most successful of Bloom Days is well past. Our Gardens are in the various stages of fruiting and reproduction. We bring fat, full baskets of beans, squashes and cucumbers, tomatoes, onions and herbs in every day. There are even more loads of corn and peaches from the farmers markets.

So the success of our gardens is more this month than blooms – it’s the fruit. Next month it will be the groaning pantry shelves filled with these fruits of our labor and the drying seeds.

These floppy hydrangeas are beautiful and long blooming I suspect if it were moved to a sunnier area they would not be so droopy. Because they are so big, they can fill a large vase, making for a very dramatic table centerpiece.

Buttered Popcornn, one of the earliest bloomers this year, is still producing these big brilliant blooms.

Old faithfuls, these marigolds were off to a slow start but are thriving now in the hot August sun.Marigolds are planted along the flower border and in the vegetable gardens.

These rare heirloom vining petunias are doing well in the shade of the cucumbers and squash. They have added a delicate blooms to the trellis all summer.

Tomato production has been limited by the early blight. This is the second summer with limited tomato harvest. Though there are still blooms making more tomatoes, so we will see whether they have time to make before the first frost.

Left to do:
Plant another crop of green beans, some turnips, dig the potatoes.

I am going to break up the bales that I used in my garden experiment. growing on bales is a good sound idea and I will try again next spring. A number of unfortunate circumstances have limited the bale garden success this year. More on that later. (the tomato above is growing in a bale.)

Dolly’s Garden

About 5 hours away from my garden, I decided to share Dolly’s Garden with you. I’m in Branson and I drive past Dolly Parton’s Dixie Stampede most every day. There is a giant butterfly made of flowers in the lawn.

Long story short. So, I drive up to the Dixie Stampede, loaded with two cameras. I can not wait to see what flowers they have used in this gorgeous floral landscape.

Maybe some dwarf gerbera daisies, little golden sunflowers, red cocks comb?

I had to laugh. The flowers are not real. And it makes sense to me. I think when you are driving by on highway 76, the important thing is big bold color and simple clear design. From the highway, the butterfly is gorgeous.

Up close, as you walk up to the box office, the flowers are real.Stella De Oro are hardy, permanent and easy to grow in most any soil, and they do standout like little golden trumpets. The green mound shaped plant is about 24 inches tall and wide, making it a compact landscaping plant that will look good all summer.

There are a lot of these sunny plants used in the landscapes throughout Branson. Stella De Oro offers a profusion of bright yellow blooms in early summer, then flowers repeatedly throughout the season. The golden blooms are are trumpet shaped and flowers reach about 2½ inches across.

All the window boxes are filled with beautiful artificial flowers. As I was snapping photos of the these fake flowers near the horse stalls, there was a grey horse that looked bored and sleepy, but the minute I started taking pictures, that grey mare perked right up. A show horse to be sure.

The grey mare became lively and alert when the cameras started clicking. She did not know I was only taking photos of the colorful but fake flowers.

Ahh, yes, Bloom Day. I’ve been so preoccupied with my gardens that I’ve started talking to myself. “WOW! When they said ‘May be invasive,’ they really meant it!” and “Why did I plant That?”

Genista lydia Bangle is a nearly leafless plant with bright green stems when it is not blooming tiny snapdragon-like bright yellow flowers.

Rosa Crown Princess Margareta
I love these little wild looking roses. They put on a big bloom of enthusiasm, then continue occasionally to bloom all summer. When it gets cool in the fall, they start to get excited and bloom heavily again. Even a light frost will not deter them. I’ve had blooms on the Thanksgiving table from these little roses.

The chive flowers are still hanging on. That short-lived cilantro that reseeded itself, is about to bolt. I’ll plant some more so I will always have it for Mexican dishes. (Ha! As if I had a kitchen to cook in.) The chives are supervising those insecure and clingy spring peas that may or may not reach maturity. A mild spring can turn into a ferocious summer in a day here in Missouri. I love the sage flowers, the bees love it too.

Sage, cilantro, geraniums replacing the lavender chives near the spring peas.

In my garden, sage is grown both a culinary herb and a perennial flower. Sage blooms in the most delicate lavender shade. It’s a must-have herb in the garden with long lasting spiky blooms and an essential ingredient in corn bread dressing or grilled pork chops.

Peonies are blooming. They always remind me of my grandmother and Decoration Day, as she called Memorial day. I would cut a trunk full of peonies, and bring them down to her house Memorial Day weekend. We put the flowers if fruit jars and decorated of family grave sites with the peonies. Some were here when I moved in. Badly overgrown and neglected. Little by little they are looking better. A hardy serving of compost, some bone meal and plenty of mulch has improved their bloom number only slightly. “But they just LOOK better, I keep telling myself.” The bright pink color is an older variety – who knows the variety? The only acceptable solution is to love ‘em and leave ‘em where they are, or replace them with larger and newer varieties, which will take a couple of years to get healthy, well rooted plants to make them selves at home. Peonies always look better when they are weeded and cared for. I imagine, if they are left to grow, they may outlive me.

This tiny yellow flower is arugula that has gone to seed.

Weigela – VariegatedWeigela florida ‘Variegata’ I grow it for the foliage, the flowers are a bonus.

The last of the iris are still beautiful.

An old fashioned Aquilegia (Columbine).

Marigolds

Three things:

1. Buy a Gardener’s Journal – A Ten Year Chronicle of Your Garden, like Lee Valley Tools http://ow.ly/71Bh It’s so big and heavy, I can’t loose it. Now, when I buy a plant, I write down the name, in this book. NOW PLEASE!

2. If anyone at the nursery ever hands you a cute little green plant in a 2 ½ in pot and the label reads “may be invasive.” Smile. Return the plant. Take a step back, turn, and run for your life. Lock your car doors, and check to make sure no one has ‘gifted’ you that cute green plant in a 2 ½ in pot.

3. When you are leaving comments on other garden bloggers bloom day blogs, NEVER, NEVER mention their big bloomers.

And finally, something to share from a southern Missouri gardener: