The Best of the Rest, 2011

January is a good month for clearing out duplicate or subpar photos from my computer. It's a big job, as I can stroll through the garden and come back with several hundred photos! I eliminate a lot of them from my digital camera before transferring them to a computer, but I still end up with scads of photos just taking up hard drive space. However, there's always some photos I want to hang on to, even though they never made it to the blog.

Here are a few of the 'best of the rest'. For each month of 2011, I picked one previously unpublished photo taken that month. I chose them for different reasons, and the selection was harder than I thought!

January:Naked trees are beautiful! January may be a dreary month, but even as a few dead leaves still cling to tree and shrub branches, I appreciate the sculptural quality of the landscape. It's a good month to see the 'bones' of the garden.

February:Snowfalls are few and brief here in Helena, Alabama. I enjoyed pretending this is the normal winter appearance of my yard! The blue bench in the Front Garden is beautiful whatever the season.

March:Only six weeks after the previous photo, dogwoods and some azaleas and other flowering shrubs are blooming. The Japanese maples also put on a show this time of year.

April:I have had this concrete squirrel ornament for many years. He moves around the patio and surrounding area according to whim. 

May:The swing in the Lady Garden is a favorite spot to watch and listen to wildlife. Hawks, owls, bluebirds, robins, cardinals, and many other species of birds frequent the area. Not to mention squirrels, chipmunks, and bunny rabbits. Occasionally there are raccoons and foxes, opossums, and snakes. And lots of insects!

June:This year I added several hydrangeas to the ones already growing along the little path that connects the Lady Garden to the Front Garden. I now have a hydrangea walk! 

July:This 'Butterfly' Japanese maple was planted earlier this year. It grows near the hydrangea walk. I love its variegated leaves. I once had another one of these, unfortunately planted in poor soil in way too much sun. It was a deadly location. I hope this one will like its shady site with soil enriched with lots of organic matter. It's looking good in July, and so far, so good.

August:Many plants and people suffer through the summer doldrums in August, wilting in the heat. The bright foliage of weeping Deodar Cedar 'Feelin' Blue' is a refreshing, deceptively cool note in the Woodland Garden.

September:Look very closely amidst the garlic chives. Can you find two hairstreak butterflies?

October:This October photo looks over the herb bed. One can see down the slope to the arbor in the Lady Garden. This area becomes wild if I don't trim and weed it regularly through the summer, which I never do because it's craziness to do that kind of work in July and August! I clean things up once the weather starts to cool. The herb bed is on my list for a major renovation. It's not at the top of the list, but it's on there.

November:The ivy that grows in the woods beside our drive may be beautiful, but it is terribly invasive. Lou cuts the ivy from around the base of as many trees as possible each year, but it is a losing battle. The lady who built my house sixty years ago loved ivy and planted a few sprigs here and there. I wonder what she would think if she could see it now. I have to work to keep it out of the main part of the Woodland Garden.

December:I love these variegated poinsettias. Each year many of my Christmas decorations are plants, and that is no surprise to anybody!

I hope you enjoyed seeing some of my leftover photos. May you have happy gardening and make many good memories in 2012!

If that's not enough, also see 2010 Leftovers

Time to Get Moving!

The air feels fresh. Fresh, not stale, moldy, not hot or stifling. It is a gift sent by tropical storm Lee, still a few hundred miles away but headed our direction. Gentle soaking rains, so badly needed after a dry August, have fallen all day, and we should get heavier rain and even cooler temperatures over the next several days.

September has arrived, and some of the plants have golden tints which glow in the afternoon light. A few days ago I took the following photos of the front garden. The second one is a good overview, showing how the front garden wraps around the lawn. I probably feature this view too often on this blog, but I never tire of the changing moods as foliage and and flowers transform through the seasons.

More moderate temperatures means it is time to get back into the garden. Every year I take a critical look to decide what plants need to be moved. Some of my plants have been moved multiple times before finding the right spot. I once dug up a seven foot tall crepe myrtle and transplanted it, for the third time. 

Fall is the best season to plant new perennials, shrubs and trees and to transplant existing ones in my garden. Our ground doesn't freeze in the winter, so plants have months to establish their root systems before the growth spurt of spring and the heat of next summer puts stress on them. This year the list of transplants is long, and I am looking forward to starting. In fact, I started this weekend by dividing and moving some purple salvia plants in the front garden. It's a little early, but I figured the rain would help it settle in nicely. 

I was inspired to move the salvia because I had to make room for a new bench in front of the parking court. It's a small bench made of twisted iron and a slab of flagstone, just large enough to hold a heavy, frost proof pot. After a difficult summer, this area was looking stressed, so I wanted to do something to enliven the spot. I planted a 'Blue Boulevard' Chamaecyperis in the pot and surrounded it with creeping jenny, stonecrop, and some sheet moss. The Blue Boulevard is a small tree, and I am planning to root prune it every spring to make it into a sort of bonsai. A stone rabbit completes the composition. The rabbit is also a new purchase. The Kingdom of the Three Rabbits now has four!

A small assortment of flowers are blooming in my garden at the beginning of September, but as temperatures cool, roses and other flowers should find new life and put on a show until frost arrives. Meanwhile, a few decorative elements add some color to the garden.

A metal hummingbird flies amidst annual purple fountain grass:

Another metal stake, this one with a ladybug, is surrounded by garlic chives. Below the top picture are a few shots of some other spots of color in the garden:Clockwise from middle left: Garlic chives; The Zephirine Drouhin rose beside the front arch almost disappeared during the summer but is now making a comeback; Japanese maple seed pod; The berries of dogwood 'Cherokee Chief' are beginning to turn red.

A birdhouse stands out against a background of cosmos, zinnias, and other naturalized flowers in an area I am calling the wild garden:Above left: A bee doesn't mind the tattered state of a cosmos flower. Right: Cigar plant, Cuphea ignea, is an annual with interesting orange flowers.

I know that we are not finished with hot, humid weather, but these few days are a nice respite and a promise that fall is coming. Time to get moving!