New property, new challenges, new unknown plants

The bamboo is spreading :(. I spent lots of time kicking sprouts over. I have no idea how I'm going to control it! I don't even know what kind of bamboo it is.

Found a purple flower growing around the garden pond. Also, those grass plants in the wooden overflow box have brown heads to them...any idea what it is? Then we have something I thought was a weed at first, but now think (based on I.D.guesses) that it's some sort of lily.

purple- I don't know but definitely there on purpose.
Grass-- ditto
Lily- yes for sure

Bamboo- good luck!

Purple plant is most likely Salvia. The grass I have no idea and the last one is definitely a lily.

I dont recognize it as a salvia, but cant remember the name of the purple stuff...salvias...

kittriana you have there a S. coccinea and and S. farinacea.
I think I now see some Salvia shaped flowers on the purple things in question, but not a species I have grown.

:) if I knew em all I would be lying. Red salvia, blue slvia a white I dont show- I'm happy- I know they are a large family- hers isnt one I know off the top of my head. I need to edit more of my fone pix i notice, sigh...

I found a whole book on Salvia at the library some years ago. WHo knew? not me.

Not grass, reeds. Water gardens forum will know that one.

The leaves of the purple flowered plant do smell like an herb.

I'll post the reeds in the id forum, as well as the purple plant.

I'm so excited about this garden...i wonder what other surprises it has in store for me!

Also, Kitt...I cant post the reeds in the water garden forum. It says only paid subscribers can post there.

MD -

Kittriana came over to the ponding forum and mentioned something that about needing help. I will try to help as best I can- because I am at work, I have only just been able to skim through what you have posted.

The box over the pond is definitely a biofilter. Hubs should be able to trace the wires at some point. Bioflters work well to keep the water in a pond clean and clear. Has he had a chance to trace the wires?

You are a full zone warmer than I am. It looks like you have some type of grasses growing in the biofilter, but they may also be the tall grasses that I get in my garden that seed themselves if I cannot stay on top of it.

The purple flowers are definitely salvias. They do have a nice herby fragrance and if you cut them back after flowering, you should be able to get another nice flush of flowers.

The stalk on your posting from 4/28 - all the way to the right looks like an oriental lily of some type.

I will check back when I have a chance to really look at things.

Questions for you - have you seen any life in the water in the pond? Fish? Frogs? Anything?

Oh - congrats on your new home. It is exciting to see what comes up and flowers, isn't it?

Carolyn

Carolyn...Thank you for taking the time to take a look!

Kittriana...Thank you for asking for help!!!!

To answer some of your questions, Carolyn...

Hubby tried tracing wires. What. A. Nightmare. He ended up just ripping them out of the ground. It was a tangled MESS. My stepdad set up some filter thing...don't know the specifics, but I'll try to explain what he did. He bought a filter from Lowe's. He ran pvc pipe underwater to the black hose that runs up to the first pool at the top of the "tier". He also ran pvc pipe to that top pool as well. He put a pvc elbow on the end of the pipe and ran another pvc pipe to what you called the biofilter. When you turn the knob the water flows into the biofilter and spills out over the lip. As for that first pool at the top of the tier, it flows down into a second pool, then down into the pond over some rocks we set up to make it look like a waterfall. I'll add pics when I'm done typing, and then the next couple of posts will be pics as well so maybe you can see what I mean.

As for life in the water...TONS. There are 36 goldfish (they look like the goldfish you would get at the fair, only bigger lol). There are frogs, waterbugs and beetles, waterskating bugs, spotted salamanders, newts, and tadpoles. We also had a chorus of toads in the water a couple of weeks ago for breeding. I'll post pics of that as well. I also was lucky enough (lol) to be the host of a leech. Oh yea and I found a couple of dragonfly larvae.

Thanks for the congrats...this new home has been full of wonderful surprises!

I don't see the next set of pics I posted, so I'll try again.

Here was toad mating night. We tried to count them, but it was too hard...I'd guess there were at least 100 in there that night!

Here's some pics of the fishies.

MD

Goldfish in a pond will grow quite a bit larger than what you see in an aquarium. I know when I had goldfish, if I held one in my hand, the body would fill my hand with the tail spilling over. They can get to be a good 10" or so in size.

It looks like the goldfish did well over the winter without any deicers in the pond. Can you take the water temps? I am thinking because your zone is warmer than mine that you should be more than ok to feed them.

Is the water starting to clear at all with what your stepfather in law has set up? The water filtering through the biofilter should help to clear the water.

It looks like the pools leading to the major pond should spill into your pond, is that correct? Also, you have a bog, is that correct as well?

I love the wildlife in your pond and the new things coming up in your yard.

Carolyn

Sure, I'll take water temps tomorrow.

The water is not starting to clear. We don't run the pump all the time (our electric bill was 350 bucks last month...our electric bill at the old house never went over 200). Also, dippy doo dah hubby decided to add water to the pond because the level got low (we didn't have rain for a while), and forgot about it. Drained our well. Overflowed the pond. Now the pond is the color of clay.

The pools do lead the water to spill into the pond. As for the bog, I have no idea what you're talking about LOL!

Ouch! I thought my electric bill was bad..... Do they let you shop for your electric suppliers? Recently they started to allow that and I have been able to bring my electric down. It tends to be higher in the winter and I am thinking it is because my thermostat has an electric start. I run 4 pumps in the summer in my pond and the electric is lower then.

I believe you referenced a possible bog or mini pond on Feb. 26th. Is it a bog? A bog will help to clean the pond.

Apparently you are on a well - not a bad thing as you will not have to watch the chloramines and chemicals in the water (unless you are close to the fracking as that could be an issue too - but don't get me started on that).

Right now, the thing is to get the water clear - the bio filter should be able to do this - if it is working properly. Are the plants in the bio filter starting to green up at all?

I understand that you don't want to jack up the electric or dry up the well.

C-

Nope, I have no choice in electric companies. The only one out here is Central Virginia Electric Cooperative, and their price per kw is 3 cents higher than our old company, Dominion Virginia Power. So we are stuck with what we got.

The possible mini bog you are talking about is in my actual vegetable garden. Quite a ways away from the garden pond. I wish there was a way to upload a video here...I could walk you through the pond and garden and you can see and better understand in detail. Maybe I'll upload a video to my photobucket and post a link here...am I allowed to do that on this forum?

The plants are greening up in the biofilter. That's how I was able to post pics of the grass/reeds growing in it...the heads just started to appear.

On a different subject...I tried posting this in beginner gardening questions, but haven't gotten a response.

I have a silver dollar eucalyptus tree that is growing right at the corner of our two story shed. We had heavy rain and horrible wind about a week ago, and it blew the tree over. Does anyone know what I can do to save it? Can it be replanted somewhere else with less wind exposure? I tried anchoring it back in place, but it still falls over. Here's a pic of what it did look like and what it looks like now.

Didn't know that was hardy around here, neat!
I think you can save it but I would move it away from the shed- you don't want to save the thing only to find out down the road that it's grwoing into the shed. The root ball must not be much if it still falls over. Was it recently planted?

MD, I found 3 different species called Silver Dollar Eucalyptus? Eucalyptus cinerea are not very cold tolerant (zones 8-11) http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/51537/

E polyanthemos http://www.backyardgardener.com/plantname/pda_16f7.html

E cordata http://myfolia.com/plants/34453-silverdollar-eucalyptus-eucalyptus-cordata

That being said, the tree in question is in the absolute wrong location. They get very tall and have a wide spread (up to 100 ft) but shallow (top 12 inches of soil) root system. seems that transplanting (if you can get all of the tap root that can be up to 6 ft deep) may be the only recourse. I searched a number of sites and found NO info on transplanting from ground to ground...only on planting from container to ground....it seems that Eucalypts do not like their roots disturbed and do not do well if the tap root is broken.

http://homeguides.sfgate.com/eucalyptus-shallow-root-danger-43715.html

Sally...I have no idea when it was planted. It was there when we moved in. Since the people who used to own our house haven't lived in it for over two years, that means it is at least two years old.

Moon...it has the plant tag with it..."Silver Dollar Eucalyptus chinerea" is what it says. I think there's no hope for it due to what you said about the tap root...the tap root was snapped in two. Actually, it had two main roots...but NONE of them went straight down...one spread one way and the other spread the other way then down. The only thing holding it in the ground were roots that weren't its own....one root from a maple tree growing almost under the shed (which looks like has been cut quite a few times), and one from a briar. I moved it and replanted it anyway. Maybe I'll get lucky...but I doubt it. Some of the branches have leaves already turning brown.

Sorry MD. It may have succumbed to the cold as it got larger...try pruning the brown stuff off and weight the root ball in place with bricks to help keep it upright...also, try staking it with 3 fairly tall stakes set in a triangle. Tie the stakes together for support rather than tying them to the tree. If it survives, that will allow a bit of movement to help it anchor itself. Good Luck.

I didn't weigh the roots down with rocks (I had already moved it before you posted), but I did anchor it with 4 stakes. It's not going anywhere. I'll prune it tomorrow.

I thought I had your Salvia named. The Alds store had something that looked just like it, But the tag was just "SALVIA" . Big help that is!

They are all really bad about that not bothering with decent info- chuckl- mY save em from indignant customers who wanted ALL the nitty gritty specifics.

While weeding the garden yesterday, I found a new surprise! Mint! Dunno what kind, but it's mint! There's something else growing in the same bed but I don't know what it is...could be just a weed, who knows...it's the last picture.

Could be chickweed. Weed

Blacberries and blueberries dont like the same ph where i live. I dont think your blackberries are wild stock tho. They should be in different parts of the garden growing tho, azaleas and blueberries and dogwoods can be fertilized with same fertilzer. Mint have a spearmint flavor? Or Mojito flavor? Chuckl

LOL I didn't taste the mint. I don't want it...we had wild mint growing where I grew up, and mom made mint tea with it. Not my favorite. So I have someone coming today who wants it, she's an herbalist, and I'm sure she can tell me what kind it is. She's also going to forage through the beds that aren't weeded yet and tell me if there's anything else growing that I don't recognize.

I don't know how the blueberries, blackberries, and raspberries are growing in the same areas. I can't tell the difference between raspberries and blackberries until the berries arrive, so they could all be blackberries or all raspberries, I don't know. I found three empty deteriorating raspberry pots in the garden, and that's why I guessed some are raspberries. Time will tell! I also found a tag laying on the ground...not in the garden, I found it while moving the eucalyptus yesterday...it says "Brown Turkey Fig". So I wonder if there's a fig tree growing somewhere on my property. Have no idea what it looks like though. I googled images, but I saw more than one type of leaf, so I don't know how to find it.

I'm going to take a video today of my property and show how everything is spread all over the place. I'll either upload it to my photobucket or to youtube and post the link...if I'm allowed to on this site!

A link is fine.
The fig should have some leaves by now. I have a Brown Turkey. Fat stems, not very twiggy, large leaves.

Ok, so...ever since I learned what this tree was, I planned on cutting it down because it is invasive. Then some of the flowers bloomed. Now I'm torn. I have never smelled a flower that smelled so good in my life. I'm talkin' bout the Royal Empress tree.
My favorite scent ever is honeysuckle. I have candles that are honeysuckle scented. I have honeysuckle perfume. When the honeysuckle blooms, I cut pieces off that are full of flowers and put them in vases around my house. I never thought there was anything that smelled better than honeysuckle...until now.
How do I fight myself? LOL...I know I should cut it down. It's invasive! But how can I make myself cut something down that smells like HEAVEN???

Cut it down and then we'll find you things that smell just as good. You have plenty of room to grow Datura, the beautiful double flowered yellow ones smell wonderful!!
THere's a scented Gladiolus, or Nicotiana...really, we'll find you alternatives.
You can let it finish blooming though.

Yeah I had read the best time to cut it was after it bloomed and the blooms have died and fallen off. Sigh. Maybe I'll find some wisteria or lilac. Those aren't invasive, are they? They smell good. But honestly, I don't think there's anything out there that smells as good as the empress blooms. I wonder if there's a way to capture the scent of the flowers...like scented oil or something...potpourri...anyone know how to extract the "smell" from a flower???

I imagine that it can be boiled down, but trapping the scent and keeping it at the right smell is way over my head. Try You tube, chuckl. I get caught with mulberry spice more than honeysuckle...

You could suffuse baby oil with a bunch of gently crushed petals in a sealed container and allow it to absorb the scent I suppose.

supposed to be a vanilla scent.
Lilac should work pretty well in your zone 6--my zone 7 is not working for whatever white heirloom lilac I have been nurturing. Some have chill hour requirement.

I'm using coconut oil...and letting the petals soak for 24 hours, remove petals, add more and let soak for 24 hours. Hopefully that will work.

Sally...could the plant you said was a weed (possibly chickweed) be an herb? The small leaves smell like an herb but I can't pinpoint which one. I did find a few plant tags in that bed...dill, basil, oregano, and something else I can't identify.