Gotta love those Lisianthus. They are perennials and love heat and drought. I've had these guys for going on 3 years now - Leave them in the pot and don't even bring it in for winter. These are Sapphire Pink Rim - I bought the seeds from Parks.
This message was edited Jun 4, 2011 9:05 AM
Oxalis Triangularis. I used to bring it in for winter, but it does fine outdoors all year in a protected spot. Background is hardy begonia - not blooming yet.
Entlie
I have one like that but mine has the triangular leaves.
I did not know Lisianthus did so well in our heat. good to know!
Gotta love purple shamrock. i have some in a pot and love how easy care it is.
Barb
Carraway Lace Cap Hydrangea.
I am doing my best to keep this from direct sunlight - so far so good with the help of a beach umbrella from time to time.
It wilts terribly in hot afternoon sun, even if it's only for a short time on the back side of the deck.
Entlie
That is so pretty! I don't think I've ever seen a hydrangea like that .. Hydrangeas are amazing in that the flower heads last so long! The bed only gets about 1 hour of sun a day and I've noticed those in the back which get less bloomed first than the ones in the front which get a little more .. in fact the one that gets the most sun has buds but no flowers yet. This is my 2nd year with hydrangea - last year the plants were really small and didn't do all that much .. this year they are in full swing .. anyone know how tall these guys are going to get?
Looks lovely!
X: Still love those beautiful brick on your house. About the hydrangea--if they are Endless Summer variety, they want get much higher than your window. You can control them by just pruning.
Thanks .. the bricks are called Salisbury and they are about 15% bigger than regular bricks. They don't make them anymore either unfortunately. I haven't a clue as to what kind of hydrangeas these are - they were acquired though a trade.
Macrophyllas can get pretty huge. I do prune mine back severly each year but they are still about 5' x 5'. Endless Summer does seem to stay smaller but the flower heads are smaller too. They look happy there, you might eventually want to expand the bed to make it wider and let the hydrangeas grow "one sided" into the larger space. Mine were here when I bought the house and they are too close to our AC area so they grow out to one side and have been happy that way for many, many years.
This is an old photo but they still look the same.
Wow! I guess there is going to be a lot of pruning going on .. I really don't want these guys to get much bigger or I'll need to find a new home for the Caladiums.
Beautiful! Do you add anything to the soil to make them blue?
Entlie
loving the Hydrangea pictures from all you ladies! soo reminds me of my Great Gram's home :)
It's been so dry here I found a new use for the rain gauge since the glads are flopping over.
My soil is so acidic that all my hydrangeas are blue. These are merritt - supposed to be red but even adding lime they stay a bluish purple.
Here are more of my hydrangeas. Except for one lacecap that is white all the others are shades of blue. Not complaining I like blue but pink and red would be nice.
Lavender has limped along for years (I only have one clump). This year it's much happier - probably because I was home this spring and fertilized earlier.
Wow, Cornish! What area of Charleston do you live where you have acidic soil? All the literature I've read over the years describes Charleston area soils as "acidic", but not my plot! I have some spots that Clemson has measured at 9.0, with 8.0-8.5 being average! And of course, all my favorite plants like acidic soil... So every year I put tons (literally) of sulphur out, and gain maybe 1/10th of a click down the scale. Most other gardeners I've talked to around here (Limehouse Bridge area) have the same problem. You're lucky!
Wow indeed Cornish! I love the intensity of the blues you have! I may steal a bucket of your soil when I head down that way and grow a cutting of my pinks in it just to see what happens! - Mine are growing in that lousy Evergreen Top Soil you get at Lowes. If I remember correctly you said you bought some .. why don't you incorporate some of it around one the the bushes just to see what happens.
I think it must be all the leaves I use as mulch. When I first built these beds I put down beautiful , expensive mulch. By fall it was covered in leaves- I have to many trees. This past spring the leaf mulch was almost a foot deep so raked off most of it. Bad mistake with this drought.
Anne,have 1 bag of Lowes topsoil left- can't hurt to try it.
Alice my billbergia has settled in nicely to it's new home .. putting out new shoots! Can't wait for it to decide to bloom again.
Good job! it looks very happy. Mine seem to bloom at the oddest times, you never know when it will push out a flowers spike.
This is my favorite of the new echinaceas, "Hot Papaya."
I love echinaceas and have had zero luck with them. Tried in Kentucky when I lived there, and no luck here in New Bern either. Do you grow them in part shade? My stepmom had lucious ones in Colorado that were almost to the point of being invasive. I even brought some of those home but they didn't survive. Yours are beautiful!
Entlie
Pretty! I like the mix of colors and leaf types.
I grow echinaceas in full blazing sun, under no irrigation. Occasionally I drag the sprinkler out because we've had no rain to speak of. Ardesia said that Allan Armitage (UGA Professor & well known garden speaker) indicated that he wouldn't buy any of the new echinacea cultivars unless they were in a gallon pot so you'd know they had some hardiness to them. I, too, have found them to be kind of delicate. Tony Avent of Plant Delights also said they are susceptible to poor winter drainage.
Wildflower.org (great website for native plants) gives us a clue to why we have problems. Many of these plants are cultivars of Echinacea purpurea which is native to "Extreme northeast Texas. Well-drained limestone, sand, clay, loam. Rocky, open woods; thickets; prairies." Our soil is wrong in most of the south (too acid) and we get too much rain. So, while some of these plants have adapted o.k. to our area, the reason they're not doing well is probably not you.
If you've ever bred for anything (plants, dogs, etc.) you know that you can only breed for so many things as a top priority. Right now for echinaceas it's color and flower, not hardiness.
Interesting points!
Entile,
Good to know about the new echinacea cultivars. Makes sense.
I just bought 'Pow Wow Berry' (in a gallon container). Ehinaceas get rust here; hope that's the only problem have with it.
barb
I hope so too. I'm pretty gun-shy about echinaceas, but may give it a go with all these new ones.
Entlie
I have grown chrysanthemum for years, so I can not believe what is happening this year! My mums are in full bloom right now.
I talked to people at Wingard's yesterday (btw: hope you toured the Secluded Gardens this weekend--gorgeous!) and was told that this is not unusual, in fact, is expected from wintered over mums.
I never remember it happening before. Even the ones I have cut back to induce branching are little mounds of color.
In my senior years my memory is playing tricks on me but really...............
Mums are my favorite fall flower, I just find it impossible to muster enthusiasm for them this time of year.
Was asked: do the colors clash with your spring colors? Folks, in my garden 'clash' does not occur--if it grows-I consider it beautiful.
My mind just doesn't want to accept these as early summer bloomers. Odd?
Wow .. I always thought mums were fall flowering too! My Hibiscus sabdariffa which is suppose to start blooming in late Summer thu Fall was putting out blooms a month ago .. I attributed it to the sudden cool down with the nights into the 50's for about a week after having a couple of weeks in the low 90's. I cut off all the growing seed pods 2 weeks ago.
My mums, that have been wintered over, bloom in mid summer every year. Just cut them back and enjoy that you got two bloom periods out of them.
ardesia, so they will come back when deadheaded this go round? I am worried that I won't get fall bloom. You give me hope. Do they need any special treatment after the first bloom other than cutting back?
X, I like that color. Wonder if it would survive for me? None of the others (than reds) seem to.
Gessieviolet, These guys are really pretty .. green leaves with red stems and seed pods .. Flowers start out as pale yellow and slowly go to dark pink. I have a plant available if you're interested. Grown from seed and not a rooted cutting. It's a little over a foot tall I think. They are suppose to be perennial but I treat them as an annual.
You won't have any problem with those mums. If they were not cut back now they would have become too leggy. Now you will likely have many more blooms in the fall. A win win.
Yay! They made it through the winter.
I've been waiting all spring to see these.
Mind did too! I was amazed. Those are pretty with the red center!
