Last Hurrah

I was out in my woods yesterday doing some cleaning up, coiling up hoses, doing a post-mortem on the past gardening season. It was refreshing to see a couple stalwarts still kicking out blooms.
#1 is a Japanese woodland perennial called rabdosia. Starts blooming late fall.
Not super spectacular from a distance, but when nothing else is blooming, it's nice.
#2 is aconitum, a reliably showy late fall bloom.
#3 is another odd Japanese woodlander, leucosceptrum stellipilum.
A more common related species is leucosceptrum japonicum, but I find it too rambunctious.
L. stellipilum is more well-behaved.
#4 is yet another Japanese woodland plant called collinsonia (formerly keiskeia).
Easy late blooming woodland perennial. Won't knock your socks off, but anything is nice this time of year.

Aw, weerobin I know it is a sad time of year when we have to put the garden to bed for the winter. I miss mine everyday. I love being in the yard as much as I can. But I love the pics of yours. I love the last too. I like the white blooms on plants anyway. Especially real tall one like goats beards and black cohash. Neat pics. The blue is so pretty I will have to look that one up. Ronna

weerobin - tell me more about your Aconitum. I lost A. napellus 'Royal Blue' after last year - I think the heat and drought finally did it in after years in my garden. Mine didn't get supplemental watering.

Weii I did not realize they were monks hoods. I've always wanted those. ! You say they are rambuncious?? Very pretty. Does your get any sun?? My side yard is the shadiest spot in my yard. But it is a bright shade. Still shady.

My yard is so heavily wooded, there aren't many areas with significant sun exposure.
My aconitum is in at least moderate shade - just some early morning sun, then under shady canopy the rest of the day. It has reseeded into a couple other places in the yard, nothing alarming. Mine seem to tolerate the miserable heat & humidity fine, but I do have supplemental irrigation. And the shade may help as well, of course. Last year, I bought some different-colored cultivars, but I think there was some sort of curse, as the strangest unrelated catastrophes doomed each of them. I guess I'll try next spring.

Weerobin, I'm very interested in that Rabdosia longituba. That is gorgeous. I think it would set off our white anemone very nicely. I'll have to add that to the list of plants to buy for spring :)

Eventually our yard will be fairly wooded too but not for 10-15 years. Shortly after moving in, we only had 1 tree in the yard so I planted another 11 to compliment it :) We live on a 1/4 acre...

I got to thinking Weerobin do you have any hardiness issues with that plant? You and I are in the same zone and it says this plant can do zone 6 minimum.

This message was edited Nov 15, 2013 3:31 PM