Bloom Day August 15 2009

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.)